Alright guys I'm back for another chapter. Thanks to all of you who continuously give me feedback and pitch suggestions, it really does help out tremendously. Many of you guys seemed to like the original draft of this story as well so I'll be continuing that too. If you haven't read it go ahead and do so, it's similar though the difference is he's an anti hero rather than a hero. Anyways enough of that, let's get on with the chapter.
The next day our blond semi-pro found himself back in class 1-A. He arrived a little early so he found he and his teacher were the only ones in class so far.
"I spoke with Best Jeanist yesterday." Aizawa commented as he got into his sleeping bag while still sitting in his chair. Naruto knew exactly what they must have spoken about so he just sat back and stared back at him. Taking that as 'I'm listening' Aizawa continued.
"Jeanist told me you saved the hostages, demonstrated great strategy, showed you could work with other heroes, and managed to cause no collateral damage." He looked to Naruto to see what his reaction was. He wasn't surprised to see him still just staring. It reminded him of, well, him. "Not bad." He compliments before tossing an envelope at his apprentice before completely entering his sleeping bag.
Naruto caught it with no effort and opens it. Reaching in he pulls out about thirty-two thousand yen. That got a reaction, his eyebrows raised up quite a bit. He looked over to his teacher waiting for an explanation.
"That's how much the job was worth. Jeanist had to take credit for the whole thing since you left immediately after. He said the money was yours since it was you who did all of the work."
He placed the money back in the envelope and folded it to fit in his pockets. "I'll have to remember to deposit this later" He thinks to himself. "If you see Jeanist before I do thank him for getting this to me. Also, when is the festival supposed to take place." he asked.
"It begins in two days, the first event will be an obstacle course race between everyone." He informs him. "You, Present Mic, and I will be up in the commentators box. Don't worry though, you won't be commentating, it's just Mic and I. You'll just be spectating from there." he told him.
"I can already feel the headache coming from having to be so close to Mic while he screams." Naruto comments while rubbing his temples "He's funny to listen to when you're not next to him." Aizawa nodded in agreement. Mic was a good friend and Hero but he was too loud.
"Tell me about it. Anyway, after the tournament officially ends Midnight will make the annoucement for the final battle between you, the winner and the runner up."
"Won't it be a bit unfair that they'll be tired and I'll still be fresh?" Naruto asked.
"Normally yes, but that's why the fight is going to be a two on one. That's where you'll prove yourself to all of the heroes. Some are doubtful about you since you're young."
"That's fine. handicap or not it won't take me too long to deal with them." Naruto comments.
"I won't expect it too." Aizawa stops and hears voices from outside. "Sounds like everyone's arriving. Do whatever you want until classes end then show up at the front of the school an hour after all the students have gone home." He instructed. They couldn't speak anymore as the students entered the room.
Seeing as they seemingly had a lot to do today he wouldn't be able to talk to Jirou. He pulled some earphones out and played some music. That's how the rest of his day would be spent.
Once class was out he decided that he had an hour he might as well go get some food. He stopped by this Ramen place he'd seen near the school. It wasn't half bad. Once he stepped out of the food joint he noticed Jirou walking in his direction.
"Hey, what are you doing?" She asked.
"Just getting a bite to eat, what about you? I figured you'd want to be home after all the work you had to do in class today." he responded.
"Normally yeah I'd go straight home but I figured I'd go to Tower Records and pick up a new CD." She told him. "I'm kind of nervous about the festival and music always helps me relax. You wanna come with? If you don't have anything going on that is." She added hastily at the end.
He pulled his phone out slightly from his pocket to check the time and still had around forty five minutes before he had to be back at the school. "Sure let's go." He said.
They arrived at Tower Records and both immediately headed towards the metal/hard rock section. While he had no plans to buy anything originally he did end up leaving with a vinyl. They were there for only a few minutes, just to get what they were going for and left. As they were heading back Naruto remembered the envelope.
"Hey hold up I need to stop by the bank really quick." He told her. Luckily there was one around the corner. They stopped by and Jirou watched as he pulled out a wad of bills and had them put into his account.
"You always carry that much on you?" She asked kind of surprised. While it was normal for people to carry cash all the time usually it was always only a two or three thousand yen. Not thirty.
"Nah not always, I got paid for a job I did recently with Best Jeanist." He said quietly so others wouldn't hear them.
"You're so lucky." She said "You're our age and you're already out there on the field while I still have a few years of courses to go through." She added. "Are you going to be at the festival?" She followed up.
"Yeah I'm gonna be up in the commentators box with Aizawa-sensei and Present Mic. He saw her perk up at that information.
"Really? Are you gonna be commentating?" She asked excitedly. Naruto chuckled and shook his head.
"No, only Present Mic and Aizawa-sensei are gonna comment. I just have to be there." He told her. Pulling out his phone again he realized it was almost time, he'd have to start heading out.
"Well, I'd love to stay and hang out a little longer but I gotta meet sensei back at school. I'll see you in class tomorrow." He said. After saying their goodbyes they headed in separate directions. As he turned the corner he stopped as to not bump into a scarred man. He was scarred from under his eyes and seemingly everything under half of his mouth.
"Excuse me." The guy said as he stepped around him. Naruto looked at him for a second before shrugging and going on his way, not knowing he'd be fighting that same man in the foreseeable future.
When he arrived at the school he saw his teacher waiting for him at the entrance. "Good. You're on time." was all he said before he began walking. Naruto noticed they were heading back to the training ground where they had sparred the first time. He was right, the man stopped in the same spot as last time.
"As of now the only way we can improve on the field is by doing actual jobs. So until that time comes we'll have to wait for experience in our coordinated attacks. Of course we'll make strategies that fill the gaps in our defense but whether or not they'll be useful will remain to be seen.
For now we'll continue your physical training." The man walked over and stopped in front of a metal square shaped box with two handles at the top.
"You'll be doing a workout before we spar once more. Put your hands through here until your forearms are the only thing touching the metal handles." He instructed. Doing as he was told he crouched down and put his hands in.
"This is what I did to build my strength when I trained myself. Go ahead lift it up." Taking a deep breath the blond tries to stand and quickly realized it was really heavy. "If you're wondering, it's a hundred fifty pounds. Now, you're going to do two laps on the track while carrying the weight. Get to it."
Taking a deep breath he stands up and begins. He wasn't going fast, this would be a lot different if he could carry them with his actual hands. He managed to do the first lap with some trouble but by the second he was feeling the strain.
"HAAA!" He yelled as he forced the weights up and took two steps forward before coming back down. "Damn. No wonder Aizawa is as strong as he is." Naruto thought as he lifter the weights once more.
Across the track his teacher was watching, though his eyes looked half closed he was by no means bored. In fact, he was watching approvingly as his student kept going despite being tired. He heard the sounds of footsteps nearing and glanced over without turning his head. It was the symbol of peace.
"All Might. What can I do for you?" He asked now with a bored tone. The man smiled.
"I just came to see how young Naruto was doing under your guidance." He said loudly and with a smile. Though they didn't see eye to eye they still had a great respect for each other as heroes.
"He's doing well. He hasn't quit nor complained about anything." He replied.
"Hmm. I see you're making him do your same training regime." All Might said.
"Yeah. It'll help him increase his physical strength and speed to the necessary level for us to be able to be able to perfectly coordinate. Looks like he's almost done." Aizawa said as Naruto got closer.
"Then I'll leave you to it. I have to go check up on someone myself." The man said before taking off. Naruto watched the number one hero leave, and while he was slightly curious as to what they may have been talking about he was more focused on finishing.
"Done!" He said as he let the weights drop in front of the man. He held his knees for a second to collect his breath.
"Good work." Aizawa said. "give yourself a minute to cool down. After that we're gonna spar again." He told him.
Once he felt he had enough time to recover Naruto stood across from him and entered his second form once more. His hands up fully extended at face level, body turned slightly.
Neither moved for a few seconds before Aizawa dashed at him. Naruto immediately noticed the man was moving much faster than the first time they clashed. He was still able to block his punches but only barely. He blocked a left before taking a straight right to the chin. Quickly he jumped back to create some space.
"Alright, I'll have to step it up a bit too." Naruto thought. He ran forward and went on the offensive. The two mirrored each others attacks and continued to try and find an opening in one anothers defense. Naruto saw a right hook coming and brought his hand up to block it but faster than he expected Aizawa switched it up and spun delivering a kick to his face.
He force behind the attack managed to drop him but he stood up the moment he hit the ground. "Damn, his attacks are heavy." He thought, he felt a pain on his left eye and rubbed it quickly before preparing again.
He tried fakes, elbows, kicks, rapid jabs but nothing was going through. He felt himself get punched in the gut.
"This is bad. If I used time skip I could've stopped these attacks by now." He thought as he continued. He felt a kick hit him and send him skidding back a little. "I got it"
He steps up his speed and manages to graze the man before seeing him retaliate with a left hook. Bringing his hand up to block he watches almost in slow motion as it nears. "Now" He thinks as he changes hands and brings up his other hand to stop the kick that suddenly took the punches place.
He felt the kick hit his arm and quickly spun and delivered his own kick to his teachers chest. Not giving the man any opportunity he struck. He threw a straight right that got blocked and managed to stop the next fake which came in form a punch. He parried the blow and landed three solid punches to the mans body.
This continued for another twenty minutes or so before Aizawa stopped. "That's enough." he said as he dusted himself off. He was pleased to see the man wince slightly when he tapped his abdomen, though he was in no better shape.
"You finally got it. The point of this spar was to see how long it would take you to adapt to my change in fighting style." He explained. "I moved faster than before, disguised my attacks much cleaner than last time, and let a little more force behind my attacks." He added.
"You and I seem to be the only ones who understand that without a quirk many heroes are useless. If for some reason your quirk didn't work, or if I was a villain and used my erase quirk against you, I'd have killed you.
Every time we spar I'll take it a little more seriously to force you to adapt to new fighting styles. The goal is to have you be at a level where you can hold your own against some of the big name heroes. If you can do that you shouldn't have much problems with most villains." he told him.
"Like that guy from USJ." Naruto told him. "Sure I used my Time Skip but he couldn't do anything when I got close to him, he just tried to grab me and use his quirk."
"That's right. He relies completely on it as opposed to training his body as well. Anyways, that's enough for today. Good work." The man said.
Naruto bowed "Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow." He said as he began walking home. Along the way he rubbed his eye again. "Damn that hurt." He thought.
The next day Naruto was a bit late to the class, though he wasn't a student so it didn't matter much. He walked inside and everyone turned to him, more specifically his eye. Around the bottom of his eye lid was a light purple bruising.
He sat down and waited for sensei to finish talking.
"Looks like I put a little more force into the kick than I expected." Aizawa commented looking at his eye. "Do you want to have recovery girl fix it?" He asked.
"Nah it'll go away quickly it's no big deal." He responded. The man nodded.
"Alright. Also tomorrow is the festival, all heroes have to go in their hero costumes." He informed him.
"Have you forgotten?" Naruto asked rhetorically. "I don't have one." He explained.
He watched the man stand up and head to a panel on the other side of the room and pull it out. He reached in and pulled out a black box and handed it to him. The others in class had stopped what they were doing to see what his costume looked like.
Opening it up he was pleased to see the costume looked exactly like he had designed it. The coat was made of good material and the body armor was super hard.
"You'll have to meet with the staff tomorrow morning for the briefing of the festival." Aizawa told him as he went to get his sleeping bag.
"I don't understand, if I'm fighting until the very end why do I have to be there for the whole thing?" He asked quietly, not wanting the students to hear that he was taking part.
"In all honesty you're there as motivation for the students. The festival is mainly for established heroes to scout for potential apprentices and to see where the current generation stands power wise. You're going to be there as an example of how strong someone can become with hard work." He explained.
"So I'm just a symbol is what you're saying." Naruto asked deadpan.
"Pretty much." Aizawa answered.
"Oh well what can you do?" He said to himself. "So this is a hero responsibility, to act as an example for others." He thought to himself. "God how I wish a villain would attack right now." He added as an after thought.
He took a seat and took a closer look at his costume and tried on the armor, it was well made. He put it away after making sure it was to his liking and went on the internet on his phone. As he was about to watch a video he had an idea. He quickly went to the government website and began his search.
To his delight he found exactly what he was looking for. There was a list of the most wanted quirk users. He noticed that he recognized a few of them. One though caught his attention.
"Muscular. Real name unknown. Wanted for multiple counts of premeditated murder and assault." He read in his mind. The guy was number nine on a list of ten.
"Someone tell me this doesn't look like a grown up Bakugo" He said to himself glancing at the angry boy. "I'll have to ask Aizawa how this works, can I hunt him down or is there a procedure to this?" He added. Closing the web page he began doing research on Muscular, anything that could tell him more about him. The more you know about your enemy the easier they are to dispose of.
"So I get to show the heroes I'm the real deal and hopefully get to hunt this guy down. These next few days will be alright." He thought as he continued his research.
Alright guys so next chapter the festival begins. Do you want me to go through the matches and just give Naruto's thoughts on them or should I just skip to the end since we know how this plays out. As most of you guys already expect Bakugo is going to get humbled a bit as well as Todoroki.
Also if any of you are into one piece I do have a new story I just put up if any of you wanna check that out.
Anyways you guys let me know what you want to see. Anyways if there's anything you guys would like to suggest leave it in a review or PM me. Later.