The bus ride to the site of their Provisional License Exam was met with constant anticipation and excitement from the entire class as the buildings flew by. Not a single person wasn't looking forward to proving their mettle and moving onto the next stage of their time at Yuuei. Obviously there was a sense of nervousness – at least for some of them – that made those worry about possible "what if's" about today's trials, but that was quickly squashed as the massive building came into view and everyone piled out of the vehicle once they came to a stop.
The site of a large boy from Shiketsu slamming his head hard enough into the ground to draw blood didn't stop Kaori from feeling a little worried at just how…enthusiastic…some people could get in situations like these. It made her wonder just what kinds of Quirks they would go up against as well as just how much more practice other students taking the test would have given many would be in their second and third years of Hero training.
After a very tired-sounding description of how the first stage of the exam was going to start, Kaori was moving along with most of her classmates as the timer counted down for the start of the test. She was a little miffed that Kirishima hadn't stuck with the group, but she couldn't blame him for running off after Bakugo when the hot-tempered boy ditched their larger group in favour of his own hunting. Kaminari following after them as well as Todoroki heading off on his own (not really too surprising there on the flip side) left a sizeable portion of her classmates still grouped together to watch each other's backs once things began.
What Kaori hadn't expected was a VERY large group of students immediately targeting them once the battle began. In hindsight, she would realize it made sense given how publicized Yuuei had been in recent months between the Sports Festival and other events like the attack on the USJ. But in that moment all that mattered was survival as they were bombarded from all sides.
For a moment, things seemed risky as one of the other students used his Quirk along with another's to launch a barrage of hardened projectiles underground. Thankfully Jiro was able to reveal their path by obliterating the ground they were travelling through using her new costume. That didn't stop the balls that were coming at them however, and the path they were taking was less than usual with the curve they were flying at. But that didn't matter as them being visible was all Kaori needed to throw up a projection and grab all of the balls out of the air at once.
"Aw, come on, Kaori!" Mina shouted from her side with her arms slightly raised. "I was JUST about to use one of my new super moves!"
Kaori was about to respond as she glanced over towards her friend when her eyes widened at something beyond the pink-haired girl's view. "You might just get your chance, Mina, behind you!"
"What do you m-" Mina turned in the direction Kaori was looking before her own eyes widened and she flung her arms in an arch releasing acid from her hands. "Max-Acidity, Max-Adhesion!" She then turned back to Kaori briefly with a grateful look. "Thanks for the heads-up!"
Kaori looked back towards the large group of students around them, quickly appraising the situation and trying to figure out some way that she could help the scenario using her Quirk even with her ability to react to every angle being limited. It was as she did this that she noticed some of the students were a little more tightly packed then the others.
"They're too bunched up, but I think I can make an opening! Once I use my Quirk, everyone follow me and we'll break through!" Without waiting for a response, she forced her Quirk to activate fast and strong, something that months earlier would have left her with a small headache afterwards but this time was only met with the tiniest of twinges in the front of her mind before it passed. "Meteor Impact!" As she shouted it, a massive fist formed a bit above the more tightly packed students and started to descend towards them Kaori swung her arm down. Had it not been for the fact that these students had already seen their Quirk's in action, many wouldn't have thought to look above and dodge out of the way, but Kaori's intent hadn't been to squish them – just to make them create an open space for her and her class to rush out of. "Now! There's a gap in their circle!" But before they could start moving too much, one of the other students out called from a different direction.
"Out of the way, guys! They've got too strong a defense for us to break through! Our only chance is to separate them!" The boy's hands were then planted firmly on the ground before he shouted loudly, "Max Power! Underground Shockwave!"
Had Kaori had a few more seconds to react he might have been able to get away from the attack, but she was already in motion along with some of her class that had overheard her shout and was unable to properly respond to the sudden tremor and blast that sent them all flying. The only person she was able to latch onto was Mina as the two of them had been standing close together when it had all happened.
As the dust settled and Kaori coughed out some dirt from her mouth that she'd accidentally inhaled, she looked around to see if she or Mina were in any immediate danger. Seeing that they were safe for the time being, she glanced over and gave her friend nudge on the arm with her foot.
"It's all clear for now, we should get moving."
"Got it, but what about the others?" Mina replied as she got to her feet.
"57 students have now passed, please hurry and finish this test already!"
Kaori winced at the proclamation. "We don't have the time to check on the others, they'll be fine. We need to worry about ourselves and get some targets already before all the spots are taken."
"But how are we supposed to do that? We're outnumbered and these are people that have had more time to come up with combos with their Quirks and planning their moves compared to us."
Kaori thought to herself before a light-bulb went off as she remembered a scenario she had been in not long ago. A small smirk found it's way onto her face within the next few moments. "Not as much planning as you'd think. Sure they've had more time to organize their Quirks, but there's only so much they can prearrange for a scenario they don't have total control over. They may have the element of surprise, but all we have to do is outmaneuver them and find a way to exploit any opening we can get."
"I've seen that look on people before." Mina commented with a knowing grin. "What do you have in mind?"
"We're going to set up a little ambush on the fly. We just need to get somewhere that has a lot of corners and cover."
It took the two of them a minute or so to silently make their way to a less chaotic section of earth and rubble, but the two quickly stopped as they noticed a group of students arguing amongst themselves as they clambered over rubble in the distance, unaware of their presence.
"You know what you did! That was going to be my third target and you just had to make sure you were one step closer to finishing before I could, huh?!" A boy slightly their senior snapped.
"It's not my fault your aim sucks! Or that you're lousy at dodging a ball! It's your own fault you've only got one target that hasn't been hit, I've only lost one of mine so far after that earthquake scattered everyone!" A young girl snapped back at the yelling boy.
"Would the two of you SHUT IT?! There's still a bunch of those Yuuei newbies scrambling around out there and I would like it if we could finish this part of the test and move on! I've only got one target left on me as well as two hits to get on other students still! You can sort out your sexual tension another time!" A third student, another girl snapped at the two of them as she massaged her temples.
"THERE IS NO SEXUAL TENSION!" Both of them shouted at once.
"Are they supposed to be friends or something?" Mina whispered from next to Kaori as they knelt just behind some debris, barely out of view. "Or did we just find some extended family of Bakugo's?"
Kaori had to fight – hard – to keep from snorting loudly and giving away their position as she flailed her arm in Mina's direction with a tight-lipped smile. After pausing for a few moments to calm herself and catch her breath she took another quick peak to see if they had moved yet. Seeing that they were now being a bit quieter and trying to form a plan themselves, Kaori turned to Mina.
"Alright, we know that they're starting to get desperate. And that they've already lost a few targets to other fights. We can use that to our advantage to make it easier to take them out. I'm going to step out and lure them over here, and while I'm doing that you make the ground around here extra slippery so that they lose their balance when I lure them over."
"Why not just grab them with your Quirk and pin them? Wouldn't that be way easier?" Mina whispered back with a confused look.
"I can't risk my hands getting injured from some surprise Quirk I don't know about. Besides, there's a good chance I'd cover at a few of their targets depending on where they placed them. So once we've got them off-balance and stunned, ideally, you'll use something similar to your Max-Adhesion to bind them and make it easier to tap their targets."
"Sounds good, then we'll both get two targets and only need to worry about one more each to finish."
"Nope, I'll grab one and then you grab the other three to finish up. My Quirk gives me a bigger advantage than yours would on its own, and this way at least one of us makes it through for sure."
"Not happening. I'm not letting you go solo when I can provide backup against people we know nothing about. Being an idiot is Kaminari's job when he's used his Quirk too much."
Kaori stared at Mina's hardened expression for a moment before her shoulders sagged with a sigh. "Fine, but don't blame me if time runs out before we can find more targets."
Mina gave her a thumbs-up as she winked playfully. "You got it, partner!"
Kaori could only shake her head with an amused expression as she stood up and stepped out from behind their cover. "You guys done bickering over there? Or should I give you a few more minutes to work things out?"
"What the?" The girl who had been trying to act as the mediator startled as she turned towards Kaori's voice. "Seriously?! You're going to take on three students that are your seniors when you don't have the advantage of knowing what our Quirks are while we know all about yours since you're from Yuuei? What kind of idiot are you?!"
"Oh, no one special. But clearly I'm better at keeping myself in check if all it takes to set you three off is a bit of a spin on a massive game of dodgeball."
"You realize that there's no way in hell you'll be able to stop all three of us, right?"
"Oh, I don't know about that~" Kaori replied with a singsong voice. "After all, I only need three targets and I overheard how between the three of you that there's still four available. Meanwhile I've only got three and four is how many you all need to pass. How easily do you think the three of you can beat me when you're climbing over each other to try and catch me?"
"Catch you? Why would we-" The boy had a confused look on his face.
"Bye!" Kaori didn't let him finish as she sprinted back behind the rubble, narrowly avoiding the trail of slime Mina had formed by crafting a quick platform network using her Quirk like she had gotten so used to doing. One of the many perks of their extra training and time to hone their Quirks over the past few days. Not a moment later she could hear the three of them bickering as they chased after her with reckless abandon. As the three of them turned the corner, the girl that still had two targets left was in the lead and was the first unfortunate victim as she sailed along Mina's path and slammed face first into a vertical slab of rubble that Mina had coated with more of her Quirk, though this mixture was far more sticky and durable as the girl struggled to move slightly before realizing she was stuck fast. Unfortunately, the shriek she had released upon hitting the patch of slime caused her teammates to hold fast on their approach, leaving two quite capable opponents for Kaori and Mina to deal with.
"Thought you'd pull one over on us by luring us all into a trap, huh?" The "leader" of the group stated with a smirk. "It's clever, I'll give you that. But it's not gonna cut it unfortunately. Not with the match-up you just put yourselves into."
"It's two-on-two; I don't see what the big issue here is." Mina replied confidently.
"Oh? How can you be so sure?" The boy replied before his body started to vibrate rapidly and duplicates of himself shunted out of either side of him. "It seemed to me like we're still at a bit of an advantage. I will say though, you are quite lucky with who you managed to get trapped already. Akane would've had a huge advantage if she were able to fight. Too bad she's such an idiot and got too far ahead for her own good."
"Shut it, Arata!"
"Ignoring her, why don't you do the honors, Ahmya?"
"Don't get all arrogant and think you're the boss now. But fine, I'll follow your instructions this time around since there's no real point in not doing it anyways."
The second girl, Ahmya, then took a deep breath with her entire torso tilting back somewhat as she held it for a few moments before she tipped forwards and let it out, spewing a dark cloud of black smoke into the air, obscuring the her and the boy(s?) Arata from view. The smoke then continued to flow as it covered Mina and Kaori as well, cutting off most of their vision as well as any idea of what direction their opponents would come from.
"Mina!" Kaori shouted to her side where she knew her friend still was. "Run back out of the smoke and find a way to stop that girl from spewing more of it! I'll deal with clone-boy!"
"You sure?" Mina's voice came from her side, though it already seemed to be moving away from her.
"I'll manage! Just go get rid of this smoke so we have more visibility!"
"Don't be so sure about that!" The boy's voice came from her front-left side as a hand clenching a rubber ball appeared from the darkness and headed towards her abdomen where one of her targets lay. Kaori narrowly avoided the impact with a quick sidestep to the right, only for another ball to slap down onto her right shoulder and another of her targets, leaving her with only two chances left to survive the test. "I've definitely had more practice in near-darkness then you have. There's no way you'll make it out of this one!"
Kaori smirked in general, being that she had no idea precisely which direction her opponent was at the moment. "We'll see about that. I've had some pretty strong mentors teaching me a few things over the last few months."
Finally, we are amidst the Provisional License Exam. This is easily one of the parts I was looking forward to doing the most as it's just a crazy ride of Quirks and tactics that we get to see going off. Next chapter I will *try* to get out a little sooner, but I won't blame anyone for not holding their breath based on my recent track record.