As Izuku got back to the seats, he was given a lot of encouragement by his fellow students. Pats on the back, congratulations.

He supposed he should feel happy about beating Todoroki, but the fact was that he just didn't.

Beating someone who was holding back just didn't feel right with him.

As he sat down in the seat that had recently been occupied by Mina(Who had headed down to prep for the next bout, which would be her against the girl from 1-B) Uraraka was strangely absent.

When he asked about that, the rest of the class just shrugged, saying she had left with Mina.

Nobody seemed to know more than that, so As Mei and Ibara stepped into the ring, he sat alone, and in silence to watch her and her ever cheery grin. Venom was still pissed at him and keeping his silence, so he wasn't even getting g comments from. Him. It was strange to watch one of the bouts with nobody at his side to talk to. Not Uraraka, not Mina, not Venom, and not Tenya.

So as he sat there, he instead took in the sight of the girl whose powers let her summon forth a torrentine of powerful green plant vines and the girl with the robot arms.

Now, she was still wearing the steampunk looking gloves, but she was now gripping the strange tube she had holstered to her belt, in her right hand, and brandishing it like it was actually a sword.

Said tube had a cable going straight down into the harness around her waist, so whatever it was, it was clearly powered by the same battery the arms were.

"AND NOW, WE HAVE THE BATTLE OF THE LADY OCTOPUS OF THE SUPPORT DEPARTMENT, WITH HER SINISTER ARMS AND LIGHTNING GAUNTLETS, AGAINST HER STANDS THE THORNY SAINT OF 1-B, HERE TO SEE GOD'S WILL DONE! WHO SHALL BE VICTORIOUS? LET US SEE… READY… SET… GO!"

Izuku was watching Mei closely as the battle began, and with his improved sight, he could see her push a button on her belt as a storm of vines shot forward against her.

Then, from the tip of the tube, green, burning light exploded, extending into a long, narrow blade of pulsing energy, nearly 2 meters long.

He blinked in shock, as Mei brought the fucking lightsaber in a sideways sweep, cleaving through the vines with such heat that not only did they instantly sever where they hit, but they ignited the vines themselves in green flames.

As Ibara recoiled from having her hair being set on fire, Mei quickly pushed herself back with her mechanical arms, easily avoiding the cut-off, burning parts of the vines, which hit the floor before burning themselves out to ash.

As Ibara was busy smothering the flames by slamming them down into the ground, Mei began on her sales pitch for this round.

"SUCH STRONG, POWERFUL VINES IBARA! BUT ALAS, PLANTS BURN! AND FEW THINGS BURN AS BRIGHT AS A SWORD MADE OF SEETHING, SUPERHEATED, OTHERWORLDLY ENERGY! BEHOLD THE POWER OF GEORGE LUCAS OLD SCIFI WEAPON BROUGHT TO LIFE INTO A REAL, PRACTICAL WEAPON IN THE FORM OF LUKE 23.4!"

Then, from below vines shot up from all around her! In front, behind, and to the sides, preparing to encase her in a cocoon, far more thorough than the way she had roped up Kaminari.

Then, the blade exploded far, far further in length, goes straight down sideways into the ground, turning the cement to molten glass the moment it touched it.

Mei then swiped the blade from one side of the arena to the other. The Vines still shot up, but were now obviously powerless, falling on top of Mei with no energy behind them, as Mei had severed them from their master down under the ground.

Mei quickly disentangled herself from the wines with her arms and went on selling her new sword.

"AND UNLIKE THE FICTIONAL PRODUCT THIS WEAPON TAKES INSPIRATION FROM, THIS WEAPON DOES NOT JUST COME IN ONE SIZE! INSTEAD, IT CAN BE MODIFIED TO BE ANYWHERE FROM 30 CENTIMETERS TO 10 METERS LONG! FAR, FAR MORE PRACTICAL TO USE, BOTH AS A WEAPON AND AS A TOOL."

As she talked, she did something at her belt, making the energy blade shrink down into a much more practical length.

This time the reaction was stunned silence from the entire arena, as everyone stared at the green blade, which was now about as long as the old Sci-fi weapon had been in the return of the Jedi.

Izuku was not a star wars fan, nor was he particularly familiar with any of the many, many different incarnations of Star Wars, but even he felt a certain level of awe watching the fluid way Mei turned the ground to glass and the vines to burning cinders.

"WITH THIS, I HAVE NOW BROUGHT THE LIGHTSABER FIRST BROUGHT TO REAL LIFE BY HACKSMITH INDUSTRIES IN THE 21TH CENTURY TO PERFECTION!"

And with that, she launched herself forward using the awesome power of her arms.

He wasn't sure what Mei had assumed Ibara would do, but the vine girl did not back away, nor shrink in fear. Instead, she did the exact same thing, launching herself forward using her vines, though hers was much more controlled than Mei's jump.

Then they smashed together into a flurry of green and Grey tendrils, that made it really hard to see what was going on.

Izuku instantly understood what Ibara had done. She had forced this into a close-quarters fight, where Mei could not use the sword to just cleave away at her plants, and sure enough, the blade when out, Mei apparently having retracted it.

Of course, getting into fisticuffs with Mei also meant exposing yourself to those gauntlets of hers.

Sure enough, with another blinding flash and a "CRACK" of thunder, the mass exploded into bright red light.

Ibara however, did not immediately go down, having seemingly used the same kind of grounding shield as she had used against Kaminari in their previous bout.

3 more blasts followed in the tangled mess, as metal and plants fought for dominance until finally, a metal tendril closed around Ibara's arm.

Then, To Izuku's complete shock, Mei brought up her gauntleted hand to said arm.

Ibara screamed as red light coursed through the arm in a shower of sparks, then through her body!

Then, she fell still, the mess of greenery immediately stopping to move.

"Winner Hatsune Mei!" Midnight announced as she walked over to where Mei was currently disentangling herself from Ibara's vines.

As Midnight called for some help from the robots to cut Ibara's vines away enough to easily move, Mei began walking away from the arena, one of her arms had completely blown it's fuses, and being carried by two of the others.

Like before, the end of the bout produced a hell of a lot of noise from people, as everyone began chatting about what had just happened, and how nifty her invention had been.

Izuku however, instead looked at her in silence, a level of fear pulsing through his body. He was going to have to face everything Mei had in her next round. And as he watched, he noticed that to her harness, she still had that metal ball attached. The final of the inventions that she had refused to leave behind during their talk.

If the tube was Luke, the gauntlets Mikasa, then that would probably be… He thought back… Eren.

How had she described it? It would just kill everything around it? Great. That probably meant she had yet to use her absolute best trump card.

I


Mina had gone to the preparation room expecting that the fight between Ibara and Mei to be over quickly.

Instead, she sat there for a good twenty minutes just waiting, before she was finally called out to her fight with Tokage from 1-B.

As she stepped out into the sunlight, she glanced over up at the stadium, to the place where the students sat.

She saw that neither Tenya nor Todoroki had come back from the infirmary, nor had Uraraka come back after going to visit Shoto after he lost.

The rest of her friends were all there though, including Izuku at the very end of the stands. She gave a big grin and a wave.

She was about to look for her mom, but she didn't find her in the stands before she was up on the arena, and face to face with Tokage.

Her opponent was also grinning, but unlike Mina, she had a mouth of sharp teeth, just like Kirishima. For some reason she had her jacket fully open, revealing just a sports bra underneath. Like Izuku, she had discarded her shoes for some reason, though in her case, she wasn't even wearing socks.

"So you're Black Cat's daughter eh?"

"Yep."

"Well then little kitty cat, I'm afraid you're gonna have a very bad time. You might just say… You've got some terribly bad luck."

At that she raised her hand up in a fist, which she unclenched as it turned green, and scaly, her fingertips becoming sharp claws.

"Wait… Was that supposed to be a cat pun? That… That was really stretching it."

"Really? I thought it was Purrfect."

Mina was about to reply but was cut off by Present Mic.

"AND IN THE PENULTIMATE BOUT OF THE SECOND ROUNDS OF THIS TOURNAMENT, WE HAVE ASHIDO MINA IN ON CORNER! THE DAUGHTER OF THE LEGENDARY BLACK CAT, THIS PINK LITTLE JAGUAR SHALL NOW HAVE TO FACE THE MIGHT, OF THE TOKAGE SETSUNA, THE FLYING, GREEN LIZARD OF 1-B! WHO SHALL PREVAIL IN THIS BOUT OF THE JUNGLE? LET'S FIND OUT… RIGHT NOW! START!"

Mina moved the moment the T sound reached her ears.

In one second she had closed the gap between the two of them and hit Tsukage with a strong hook to the side. Not nearly as hard as she could hit, but more than enough to-

Her entire side exploded into red as Mina's punch ripped out her entire side, bones, and blood and muscle flying everywhere.

Mina froze in complete shock, her hand covered in blood, absolutely horrified at what she had just made happened

That turned out to be a mistake, however, as a green fist slammed into the side of her head, sending her flying.

She almost went out of bounds, but instinct drilled into her made her slam her hand down into the ground, acid letting her bore her fingers for a grip hold.

She as quickly got to her feet, still shaken, she could hear horrified gasps and other such sounds from all around the arena.

Tokage was standing where she had been standing when Mina hit her, making a comical face of horror and despair.

"Oh noooo…. You have killed meee…. I'm going to dieee…."

Her lung was completely gone, lying in a hundred pieces on the floor, making for a macabre sight, but her comically over the top acting made it pretty clear she wasn't exactly in pain.

That and the stinging in her cheek from where she'd been hit replaced Mina's horror, with annoyance and anger.

"You got a healing factor don't you?"

"Awww… I was hoping you'd play along a bit longer pussy cat."

Her lung began growing back, sinew, bone, and muscle growing back in a few seconds, though her jacket and pants were now absolutely covered in blood. Tokage didn't seem to mind.

"Gotta say though pussy cat, that was some really fast movement there. Almost too fast to be legal. You might just say, that you're… A cheetah."

Mina's next attack was a sweep kick, sweeping Tokage's legs out from under her. Literally, as they exploded into a red mess of blood and bone, the moment she hit them.

Mina had planned to follow that up by grabbing her upper body and flinging it out of the arena. In fact, she had her hands around Tokage's jacket before gravity had even set in.

Only instead of being flung, her upper body remained firmly in place as the jacket ripped apart instead.

This time, Mina avoided the follow-up punch and was halfway across the arena in the blink of an eye.

Tokage remained standing exactly where she was, her legs having turned to a complete, non-existent mess, whole her disembodied torso remained floating in the air.

Right… She had done something similar before, hadn't she? She had disconnected her hand and kept it floating to help Bakugou in the cavalry battle right?

As she was standing there, Tokage began regrowing her legs, in a similar fashion to how she'd regrow her lung.

Regeneration.

What had her mom said about those? That you beat them by either exhausting their stamina, capturing them in a closed space, or freezing them whole.

The second and third weren't gonna happen.

And that left…

"I don't suppose you have a limit on that regeneration."

"Sure do pussy cat. 10-20 minutes of non-stop regeneration will slow it down drastically, and eventually, I'll be immobilized unless I get something to eat."

"... You're… You're just telling me this? Just like that?"

"Sure. After all…" Her body began to transform. "I'm ending this in the next two."

Her skin turned green, scales reknitting over skin, the backside of her pants ripped as a long, powerful tail sprouted from her waist. Her face twisted, a snout forming, her sharp teeth rearranging themselves into a maw like that of a dragon.

Her eyes changed, the white going out of them, replaced by blood red, her pupils shifting and turning until they were nothing more than slits. When she was finished, she had gained about 40 centimeters in height and had become way bulkier.

When she spoke again, her voice had gone down several levels, though Mina could still tell that it was Tokage.

"Now, my unfortunate friend… Let's go."

Then she burst forward. Mina ducked as Tokage launched a sideways kick right at her, then grabbed her tail as she followed the kick up with using her tail as a whip.

Then she grabbed the tail and yanked, expecting it to either come loose or give her a good way to throw Tokage's body.

Instead, a detached hand once more hit her, this time in the back of the head.

Mina saw stars and she slammed into the ground, and she felt a crushing grip above her.

"End of the line kitty ca-"

Mina surrounded her arm in acid, and swiped around In a circle, searing Tokage in half, the lower body, and arms dropping like a sack of potatoes.

Then, now on her back, she headbutted the woman right in her snout.

She felt a sickening "crunch" as bones and nose broke beneath her forehead.

Then staggered to her feet, and once more put distance between her and Tokage.

It was only then that she realized her entire body was coated in blood.

Holy shit this had gotten really fucking disturbing, really disturbingly fast.

"Not so easy is it kitty cat?" The lizard woman said in a cheerful tone.

"I've seen that reaction before. Everyone thinks, I'll just stall while doing as much damage as I can, but in almost every case I've ever seen, they always get that same reaction once the blood really gets going."

As she talked, the disembodied upper body regrew it's lost parts, a new couple of arms sprouting into being in a bloody, gory mess, while a new set of legs sprouted from a regrown, now naked lower body.

As if to emphasize the point, Tokage slammed her newly regrown foot down on her former lower half, and it exploded into a mess of blood, bones, and broken sinew.

Mina wanted to throw up.

She almost did in fact, but she barely managed to keep it down.

I


Holy shit, this had taken a sudden turn to the macabre.

Izuku watched in complete shock as below, one of his closest friends fought against the seemingly invincible Lizard woman.

In terms of speed and offensive power, Mina was clearly superior. Tokage was strong enough to crack the concrete, but Mina's acid, her own strength, and a much higher speed than the lizard meant she was making literal mincemeat out of the woman with every bout, not having to hold back at all, making an enormous difference.

Unfortunately for her, brute force wasn't going to win this fight. Tokage just completely regrew any damage Mina dealt her, almost immediately.

That, along with her ability to just split herself apart and control her body mid-air, also made a massive difference, as once in a while, she managed to get in a lucky blow.

A scratch, a punch, a kick.

It was obvious that her plan was just to wear Mina out. And that plan was working.

However, Izuku could see that it wasn't her physical damage that was taking the biggest toll. No, that would be to her mind, as Mina was clearly not taking being dumped in blood, and having to fight over literal guts on the ground.

She was going into shock, he could see that clear enough. Her entire body was shaking in a way that didn't really line up with the damage she had taken so far. Her face was a mask of someone who was trying desperately to hold it together. But it was the eyes that really sold the story.

Mina's black and golden eyes, usually calm and sly, were now frantic, wild, desperate. Accentuating that, she was panting, hard and repeatedly in quick bursts.

As he stood by the rails, looking down, hands clenched around the caved in rail just as he had with Uraraka, Izuku somehow managed to work through all the horrified comments and whispers around the stadium to focus exclusively upon the arena, where Tokage once more managed to get in a hit, this time, closing around Mina's left anr with a bite.

I


Mina did not scream. Instead, she punched Tokage in the face so hard, that her jaw was ripped clean off.

The pain in her arm was striking, then went dull.

As she once more put distance between the two of them, she almost slipped at a set of intestines but caught herself.

She got back into stance, that boxing stance her mom had drilled into her so diligently that it had become part of her blood. Arms up, to guard, ready to punch, or launch a surprise kick.

The smell was all-consuming. It was like the blood was seeping directly into her mind. It was everywhere, filthy, rotten, all-consuming.

Her eyes darted down on herself, where she was absolutely drenched in the foul, thick red liquid. Then she caught herself, and her eyes went up again, to look at her foe.

In comparison to her shaking, panting state, Tokage was relaxed, calm, completely in control. In spite of the fact that all the blood that was covering her, was her own blood, not Mina's.

"You've never seen a dead body at all, have you Kitty cat?"

Mina just shook her head. She didn't want to talk. She didn't want to give the blood more chances to seep into her mouth.

"I'll admit that's kinda surprising. Considering who your mom is, I kinda expected her to really go to town with her training. But I guess Japan isn't filled with dead corpses anyone can stumble unto."

Mina didn't answer, just holding her stance. It wasn't that she was physically tired, quite, on the contrary, the beating she had taken now was nothing compared to the harder training sessions she'd had with her mom. It was just that she felt… Numb. All over. It wasn't just her mental state either, her entire body was beginning to feel numb.

The lizard grinned.

"That numbness, by the way, isn't just shock. My bite is poisonous you see."

Mina startled.

"It's not fatal by any means, but you're soon gonna be feeling Really bad. You might say you'll be feeling… Catatonic."

Normally, Mina would probably have groaned or rolled her eyes at that pun, a good-hearted smile on her face, or she might have made it herself. She liked puns. Usually.

Right now though, all she could focus on was that feeling of dread, of fear bubbling in her stomach. The fear of understanding she was about to lose.

that was bad. Really, really bad.

She had had the lesson that you could never, ever give in to fear. You had to face fear head-on. Because the moment you gave in to that fear, that was the end.

How the hell was she gonna get out of this?

What… What was the conditions of victory again?

It was getting hard to think. To focus.

And all the while, that smell still permeated through her nose, digging into her mind.

What the hell did she do now?

"No response? Don't tell me poison is working THAT fast? Well, don't worry, you'll get to deal with it in the sick room soon enough. I just gotta throw you out of the ring first.

Right, throw her out of the ring.

That was the only way to win.

How the hell could she do that, when her enemy could literarily keep her body parts frozen in midair?

Once more Tokage sprung forward, this time aiming at her with an overhead slam of her tail that cracked the ground beneath where Mina had just been and sent blood covered stone flying.

A claw shot out, and once more, Mina burned it straight off. And just as several times before, another green fist slammed into her from behind, knocking the wind out of her and sending her flying.

This time she only barely managed to avoid going out of bounds.

She forced herself to her feet, once more turning to face the green lizard woman, who nonchalantly regrew her severed arm.

Mina glanced down at the now lifeless Han. Then she froze.

A solution shot into her head. An obvious solution. Having now seen the way forward, she acted immediately, grabbing on to the chance to end this, with all she had.

Mina shot forward, with a speed that would have made even her mother at her peak proud.

Tokage, nonchalantly, brought forward a hook, which hit an arm covered in acid, turning it to a bloody paste.

But the actual attack was another hit in the back, making Mina scream, as sharp claws dug into her.

She didn't stop though. Instead, she grit her teeth, and brought her acid covered hand forward in another swipe, once more cleaving Tokage in half.

The reptile sighed.

Then, before she could regenerate her lower half to replace the now lifeless lower half, Mina grabbed that lower half, and with a throw, she sent the lower body flying out of the arena.

Silence followed.

Then "Tokage Setsuna is out of bounds. The winner is Ashido Mina."

Tokage just stood there dumbfounded, as Mina stood there, panting, still absolutely covered and caked in blood.

"...Shit. Holy shit, I should have seen that. Huh. Oh well. Congrats on the win Ashido." She gave a wave, and a reptile grin, then simply turned and walked out of the ring towards the exit.

I


Mina made it 9 steps inside the corridor, before she fell to her knees, and began throwing up. Hard.

She kept puking up her guts for about half a minute. Then, a short break, before she kept puking.

As she tried to recover, just breathing, she felt a hand in her shoulder. Weakly looking up, she saw a kind, womanly face, long white locks going down around it.

Her mom didn't say anything, just offering her a hand to help her get up.

She took it and didn't argue when the much taller woman put an arm under hers to help her walk.

"Let's go get you cleaned up, then straight on to recovery girl."

"Y-yeah…"

As they walked through the corridors, her mom continued.

"You did really well out there. Most people would not have managed to hold it in before they got out of the arena."

Mina was about to reply, when Izuku came around the corner with some speed, clearly having run down here.

He had an absolutely worried look on his face, and Mina felt blood rush to her cheeks, despite it all.

Great. Just what she needed. To be seen by Izuku, covered in blood, weak, and carried by her mom.

Izuku absolutely froze as he saw her, then 3 seconds later he blinked, only then realizing that Mina wasn't alone.

Before he could say anything though, her mom cut him off.

"I'll handle her kid, she needs a shower, and that's not something you can help with. You can talk to her after your next match, speaking off, you should probably go prep for that. I don't think the next fight will last that long."

Izuku's mouth was open for a moment like he really wanted to object. But he thankfully didn't, and just replied with a nod, then, stuttering telling Mina she did a great job, before finally moving on.

She could feel his eyes on her back all the way until they passed the corner though.

"... Thanks."

She simply grunted and remained silent until they reached the room for the showers.