"Kacchan!" - Speech

'Izuku!' - Thoughts

"I AM HERE!" - All Might Speech

"Detroit Smash!" - Special Technique Usage

Beta'd By BigCC

Chapter 4: Robo Rumble at UA

Several Months Later

Observation Room, U.A. High School

Yaoyorozu Momo was feeling rather pleased with herself. Just a few days earlier she'd completed U.A.'s rigorous Recommendation Entrance Exams (after earning an Academic Recommendation from her previous Middle School) and had earned one of the four available seats in the vaunted U.A. Heroics Course. In addition, she had been invited, along with her parents, to observe the Practical Portion of the General Entrance Exams. As far as she knew, the other three people who'd earned the Recommendation Seats (Todoroki Shōto, Tokage Setsuna and Honenuki Jūzō) would be attending as well.

She'd just entered the observation room, a rather large conference room adjacent to the one that U.A.'s staff would be using to judge the exams, when her father stopped abruptly.

"Midoriya-san? Is that you?" he called out, a grin spreading on his face.

Curious, Momo peeked around him to see just who he was talking to.

"Yaoyorozu-san?" the man her father was addressing turned around, apparently recognizing her father's voice. He was a fairly tall man with long, straight black hair pulled back and flowing down his back. He had red eyes, a stern-looking face and was dressed in a well-fitted (and fairly expensive from her own experience) suit.

"It is you!" her father said in delight as he stepped forward to speak with the man. "It certainly has been a while hasn't it. I haven't seen you since that charity dinner in Hokkaido."

"That it has. I was glad we managed to earn as much as we did, it was for a good cause." Midoriya agreed with a nod. "Ah, I see Eikō-san is with you, and this must be the daughter you keep mentioning."

"Indeed, our little Momo is actually the reason we're here today." her mother stated with a proud smile. "She managed to earn an Academic Recommendation to U.A., you see, and even passed the Recommendation Exams."

"Ah, my son mentioned those before, they're supposed to be even more difficult to pass than the regular Entrance Exams." the dark-haired man agreed before turning his attention to her and offering her a polite bow. "My apologies for not introducing myself earlier, young lady. I am Midoriya Hisashi, and I work for Fabulous Fundament's Fabrics and have collaborated with your parents and their company in the past."

"Yaoyorozu Momo. A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Midoriya-san." Momo returned with a slight bow of her own; her manners as impeccable as always.

"I must say, I didn't know that F.F.F. had managed to gain enough influence to earn a seat observing the U.A. General Exams." Mother asked with a slightly puzzled expression.

"We just recently struck a deal with Principal Nezu himself in order to start supplying U.A.'s Support Course with hero-grade fabrics. They've apparently been having issues with the quality of products coming from their previous distributor and the good principal had finally enough." the businessman explained proudly. "Since we're now a contracted contributor for the school, we automatically received a single seat to watch the Entrance Exams. My superiors were kind enough to allow me to be our representative this year. It's not every day that your son takes these exams."

"Oh! That's quite the lucky break for you!" Father offered with a smile. "Is he on any of the screens at the moment?"

Midoriya-san returned his attention to the collection of screens taking up the entirety of the front of the room before pointing to one labelled 'Testing Ground Gamma: Entrance.' "There he is. The boy with curly green hair."

Momo inspected the screen in question and quickly spotted the boy her father's friend was describing. He looked to be about the same height as her, perhaps an inch or two shorter, with a lean and firmly muscled physique that was easily noticeable through the tight green and silver unitard he was wearing. She quickly noticed that his eyes were a particularly bright green and that his hair was indeed green and extremely curly. It was almost…fluffy-looking in her opinion.

"I take it he gets his hair from his mother?" she asked curiously.

"The colour yes, but he actually inherited the curls from me." Hisashi offered with a chuckle. "My own hair was nearly as bad as Izuku's when I was younger and I absolutely hated it. Felt like I had a bird's nest on my head if ever let it grow out and I had to spend nearly a half-hour each morning just trying to straighten it out. While I was working in America a few years ago, I came across a salon with a hair-dresser that had a Quirk he called [Hair Shift] that let him permanently alter how someone's hair grew. I took the opportunity to get my hair type changed to straight. Granted, my wife, Inko, scolded me something fierce when I got transferred back to Japan for doing something like that without telling her."

"Well, it looks like things will be starting soon. Shall we all sit together." Father offered.

"Certainly, having some company to enjoy the show with will be nice." the other man gladly accepted the invitation. The four or them quickly found a place to sit and the conversation between the three adults flowed easily.

"Might I ask what your son's Quirk is?" Father asked, causing Momo to perk up slightly as well.

"Hmm. Well, I have [Flame Breath] and my wife has a Levitation Quirk that lets her float and draw in small objects." Hisashi offered teasingly. "Logically, that should mean that my son would have some form of pyrokinetic Quirk. Except…well, you do know that there are five main ways Quirks are passed from parent to child, right?"

"Quirkless, direct inheritance, combined inheritance, mutation, and strengthened inheritance." Momo quickly offered.

"Exactly. Now, I've already ruled out him being Quirkless and Direct Inheritance Quirks, as in getting a Quirk that is the mirror image of one of your parent's Quirks, is getting rarer and rarer these days, so that takes two options out." Hisashi offered with a proud smile. "My son's Quirk is actually a mix of all three of the remaining categories. It certainly makes mine look like little more than a party trick. It mixes aspects of both mine and his mother's Quirks, strengthening them both, and with a few additional properties that seemingly emerged from nowhere. It really is a fascinating Quirk, even the esteemed Doctor Matsushita himself was interested enough to invite Izuku to his offices once a year for an examination."

Momo's eyebrows immediately shot up at that admission. Doctor Matsushita was widely recognized as one of the best Quirkologists and Quirk Researchers in the world. For him to express enough interest in a specific boy to invite him to his office year after year for an exam spoke volumes about the strength and uniqueness of that person's Quirk.

"You always do love going the roundabout way when explaining something." Mother stated with a roll of her eyes. "Will you at least tell us its name?"

"[Silver Tyrant's Flame]. It was actually my son's best friend who came up with that one." Hisashi smiled again. "A bit ostentatious I know, but it's certainly a very fitting name, as you'll see soon enough."

Momo, for her part, turned her attention back to the screens, now officially intrigued by Midoriya Izuku's Quirk.

Two Hours Previously

Entrance to U.A. High

"We're really here...!" Izuku murmured in disbelief. After ten months of hard training (including three months of 'Ohmygod, kill me now' training under Burnin'), he was finally here, at the goal he'd been working towards for over a decade!

"Hell yeah!" Katsuki punched his shoulder excitedly. "This has been a long fucking time coming, but we're finally here! Let's go kick ass and take names!"

With that bold declaration the blonde-haired bomber strutted past his friend and into the campus like he'd already won first place in the exams. Izuku could only shake his head slightly at his friends' antics.

There were times that he truly envied Katsuki's seemingly endless confidence.

"Right, time to get moving." Izuku stated, steeling himself and taking that first step forward to follow Katsuki…only to seemingly trip on nothing.

'Oi...what the hell, me?' he deadpanned as the ground grew closer. 'Welp, looks like I'm going to get to meet Recovery Girl sooner than I thought...'

However, rather than the sharp pain of impact, he was suddenly engulfed in a sense of weightlessness as he stopped mid-fall and started floating in mid-air. Blinking in shock, Izuku turned his head slightly to catch sight of a cute brown-haired girl in a thick brown jacket standing just to one side of him, one hand retracting back from where she'd obviously just reached out and touched him.

"Hi!" the girl greeted him cheerily. "Sorry about just using my Quirk on you like that without even asking permission, but I thought that falling like that before an exam would have been pretty bad luck." she offered, smiling brightly as she reached out and gently adjusted him so that his feet were back under him. She then brought the tips of her fingers on both hands together. "Kaijo!"

Gravity suddenly returned and Izuku landed on his feet with only a slight wobble. He turned to face the girl with a shy smile on his face. "Um…thanks for that. I don't think I would've enjoyed having to visit the nurse's office before I even made it to the exams."

"No problem." the girl replied, still smiling. "The name's Uraraka Ochako by the way."

"Midoriya Izuku." he returned. "You here for the Hero Course exams too?"

"Yup. Best of luck to both of us then." Uraraka replied before checking her watch. "Shoot, it's almost time for the exams to start! We'd better get moving!"

"Really?! Crud!" Izuku yelped. He and his new acquaintance started running towards the exam area. At the back of his mind, Izuku was pretty thrilled about meeting such a nice girl right off the bat. Maybe this wouldn't be such a stressful day after all?

One Round of Extensive Exams Later

Auditorium

"You know, I've never really liked tests all that much but that one was just plain murder." Izuku muttered tiredly to Katsuki, both boys having already taken their assigned seats.

"Blame fucking Aldera. Place was such a low-level bitch-fest that the jump in difficulty took us both off guard." The [Explosion] Quirk-holder offered with an annoyed growl. He'd known that that shithole of a school had been nothing but a millstone around his neck, and that test had just fucking proved it. "We still managed to ace it, no doubts there, but if the classes at U.A. are anything like that exam, we're definitely gonna have to knuckled down and pick up the slack from Aldera's fucking Easy Mode."

"Can't argue with that." the verdette nodded in agreement. After years of dealing with the painfully easy exams at Aldera, it had been a particularly nasty shock to face the level of U.A.'s Entrance Exams. Once he'd gotten over it and gotten started answering the questions, he was fairly confident in most of his answers, but the sheer shock of the sudden shift and the fact that he'd actually had to exert himself academically to finish on time after so long had been exhausting.

"Can I hear you say, 'YEAH!'?" a voice at the front shouted. The Voice Hero: President Mic stood there, his trademark sunglasses shining in the spotlights. When no one answered him, he sighed and continued on. "Welcome to the U.A. Practical Exam Briefing, listeners! Right here and now, I'm gonna give y'all the down-low on how to rock these exams! Ready? Here we go!"

The screen behind him blinked into life, displaying a mock cityscape, along with the shadows of four objects surrounding it.

"On the back of the seat in front of ya, you'll find instructions tellin' ya where to go between Testing Grounds Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Epsilon! Once you've finished here and changed into the sports clothes ya brought along with you, you'll all be taken via bus to your respective testing grounds, each a large city, chock full of Villain Bots!" the Pro Hero explained. "Each of these robotic ne'er-do-wells are worth a certain number of points! Destroy a One-Pointer, you get one point! Destroy a Two-Pointer, you get two! Destroy a Three-Pointer, you get three, and that's the highest ranked bot that there is! The goal here is to rack up as many points as possible inside of ten minutes. The only rule is no attacking other examinees, listeners; U.A will not abide any wannabe anti-heroes! Anyone who tries is automatically disqualified, ya dig?"

"Looks like we're in different testing grounds." Izuku noted as he examined his and Katsuki's instructions. "I'm Ground Gamma, you're Ground Epsilon."

"Tch." the blonde boy clicked his tongue in irritation. "Makes sense. They probably don't want friends and classmates to form teams and work together."

The green-haired fire-user looked on with bemusement as a blue-haired boy wearing glasses stood up and asked President Mic about why there were four robots on screen and in the pamphlet, yet he had only mentioned three of them.

'Maybe because this a test for a Heroics Course and they want to see how the applicants deal with an unknown variable?' Izuku thought with an eye-roll. Seriously, this guy needed a chill-pill even more than Burnin' did.

(Elsewhere, Kamiji Moe restrained a sneeze before glaring around suspiciously.)

A moment later, the super-stiff boy suddenly whipped around and called him and Kacchan out about 'chit-chatting and not taking these hallowed exams seriously.' Izuku was then forced to keep his best friend from reducing said boy into a fine red slurry.

Once President Mic calmed things down and explained about the Zero Pointer, they were all dismissed with a cheery, "Enjoy your suffering!"

Making a quick trip to the assigned changing rooms, Izuku quickly changed into the unitard that his Dad had managed to have made for him by calling in a few favours at work. It was relatively simple-looking, emerald green with silver trimming and a number of lines running across it, but, far more importantly, it was made out of one of the most fire-resistant fabrics available to modern society, made by a licensed Quirk Producer. A secondary material had also been mixed in to help disperse the heat more efficiently as well.

Almost as an afterthought he slipped on a pair of standard fire-resistant running shoes that could be bought from any Quirk-specialized shoe store. They weren't anywhere near as effective as the unitard and would likely be reduced to charred threads if he was forced to really go all-out with his Quirk, but they were better than nothing.

"Kick ass, nerd!" Katsuki offered with a fist-bump as they parted ways to get on their respective buses.

"Take no prisoners, Kacchan!" Izuku returned.

"How many times am I gonna have to tell you to stop calling me that stupid fucking nickname before you actually listen?" the blond boy rolled his eyes in annoyance.

"About as long it is going to take you to learn to stop swearing every sentence." Izuku returned with a grin.

"So, fucking never, then." The bomber rolled his eyes again.

Izuku spent the bus ride over to the assigned Testing Ground mentally going through his plan. It was just the bare-bones of a plan for now, based on the few facts that he was able to discern from the silhouettes of the three 'Villain Bots' he'd seen on the screen. He was still going over it when they finally arrived at the testing site.

'The One-Pointers didn't look like they had much armour, but they seemed to have ranged weapons of some kind set into their arms. Ranged fighters or skirmishers then, hit them hard and fast before they can escape. The Two-Pointers were noticeably larger and they looked like they had both melee and ranged weapons built into them, so they'll probably be a lot more aggressive. The Three-Pointers looked like they were literally built like a tank, and the white sections on their back probably denoted some kind of ranged weapon. Those will likely be the hardest ones to take down. I also need to remember to keep my flames throttled, with how many people there will be running around I don't want to risk getting hitting any of the other examinees in the crossfire...'

"Excuse me!" a hand suddenly clapped down on his shoulder, breaking Izuku out of what he quickly recognized as one of his 'mutter storms.' He thought he'd finally grown out of that bad habit. Turning, he caught sight of the overly-serious blue-haired guy with the glasses. He was dressed in a tight-fitting blue and white bodysuit now. "Your muttering is disturbing the concentration of your fellow examinees! Kindly cease and desist at once!"

"Alright, first? There's nothing in the rules that Present Mic gave about muttering to myself, even if it is a 'disturbance.'" Izuku pointed out, now more than a little irked by the boy's over-officiousness. "Second, if another person talking is enough to distract someone then they clearly need to try for another school, because I doubt anyone so easily distracted is suited for U.A. High's Hero Course. Third, it's an unconscious bad habit that I've had since I was a kid, I can't control it. And fourth, I'd say you were the one disrupting people by trying to act like some kind of disciplinarian when you don't have any authority over anyone here."

The other boy recoiled slightly at the mini-rant, allowing Izuku to quickly shrug off his hand before walking away. He quickly caught sight of Uraraka, who'd changed into a simple black and white tracksuit. She looked vaguely nervous, so he decided to go over and try and help her calm down.

"Uraraka-san, you're looking a bit tense." he offered as he stepped up next to her.

"Huh! Oh, Midoriya…yeah, a bit." the brunette offered with a sigh. "This is just on a whole other scale than anything that I'd expected."

"Well, if you ask me then I'd say you're a shoe-in. You certainly showed how heroic you were when you helped me at the gate." Izuku offered with a kind smile. "Just keep calm, keep an eye on your enemy to find a weakness, and take them out."

"Thanks, Midoriya-kun." Uraraka offered with a smile. "Wow, all my tension's gone!"

"Sometimes all you need is something to take your mind off what you're worried about so you can stop being nervous. It works for me all the time." Izuku said with a smile in return.

"AND GO!" President Mic, the gate beneath him suddenly swinging open as the applicants stared up at him in shock. "What? You don't get a countdown in real life, Listeners!"

With a roar of determination, all of the examinees charged in...except Izuku. With a single solid stomp to the ground, a bubble of silver flames erupted up from beneath him, carrying him slightly into the air. In seconds, it took the shape of a silver horse, with Izuku perched on its back, a saddle and stirrups forming under him, with a spear in one hand, and reins in the other.

"Yah!" he said, kicking the horse into a gallop. OK, it was a bit of theatrics, as he was controlling it with his mind, but looking good was a part of modern-day heroics!

Charging into the cityscape, Izuku quickly found one of the One-Pointers that President Mic had displayed. It also made him wonder who had designed it; and more to the point, who had thought that a motorized unicycle design was the best fit for this kind of thing?

"Target Acquired! Die Hero Scum!" the machine squawked at him before bringing an arm up, the gatling gun on it starting to cycle.

"Silver Assault Blades!" Izuku roared back, flames erupting from his shoulders and swiftly forming into a dozen swords of solidified flames. Before the gatling gun's barrel could pull off more than single full rotation, the machine was suddenly riddled with silver blades.

Letting out an electronic shriek, the machine collapsed and exploded pathetically, the silver flames muffling and absorbing the flames of the blast to almost nothing.

"That's one!" the green-haired boy said grimly. "Let's get hunting!"

Guest Observation Room

Momo could only stare wide-eyed as she finally saw '[Silver Tyrant's Flame]' in action. The flames themselves were simply beautiful in her opinion, but the display of control and power their owner was showing was equally impressive.

"Attaboy Izuku!" Hisashi was grinning in delight, every inch the proud father. "Keep it up!"

"Oh my, that really is an impressive looking Quirk." Momo offered in interest. "And he must have trained extensively to get that kind of control."

"Most weeks he spends at least three days at the Volatile Quirk Training Centre, three others are for physical training and the seventh is a rest day. That's been my boy's schedule for the past ten-odd years." the businessman offered proudly. "And my wife and I have to keep an eye on him to ensure he takes a proper break every now and then."

"I know the feeling." Mother offered sagely, looking pointedly at her. "If this one wasn't working with her trainer, then she had her nose buried in some form of science book so she could better utilize her own Quirk."

"My Quirk is called [Creation]." Momo answered the obvious question that Hisashi was sending her via a raised eyebrow. "It allows me to use my stored lipids to create any non-living object, but in order to do so, I need to fully understand the molecular structure of the object I wish to create."

"That's...wow. I must say, that has to be the single most useful Quirk I've heard of in quite some time. I know my Izuku would love to talk your ears off about it; he's an utter Quirk Nerd and loves breaking down and analysing any Quirks he comes across. He picked it up as a hobby from spending so much time at Doctor Matsushita's offices and the good doctor has said that Izuku has quite the talent for it." Hisashi offered proudly, keeping one eye on the monitors as he watched his son run rampant across the cityscape, destroying any robot that crossed his path and rescuing any examinee that he saw being overwhelmed. "He broke that new hero...what's her name...? Ah, the Mineyama Hero: Mt. Lady. He broke down her Quirk in about ten minutes flat after her debut. I'd love to see what he could do with yours."

"Now that sounds like a splendid idea." Father offered, causing Momo to turn to him with wide eyes, quickly realizing what he was planning. "How about we invite you and your family over for dinner at some point?"

"It would have to be next month. I'm afraid that after the exams are over, I'm scheduled to attend a large conference in China." Hisashi sighed irritably. "I'll talk to Inko and see if she has a free day next month as well. I'll call you when I find out."

"Sounds like a plan." her father replied with a nod.

Momo knew exactly what was going through her father's mind at that moment; he was essentially arranging a play-date for her...when she was turning sixteen in September. She silently resolved to give him The Look later tonight to make sure he knew that she was aware of just what he was plotting.

Being the only daughter, and thus the sole Heiress, of the Yaoyorozu Family, the Yaoyorozu Hero Support Company and the remnants of the Yaoyorozu Zaibatsu that her family had managed to keep clawed together after World War II, all meant that Momo was well used to being sought after for what she was and what connections she could provide others rather than who she was. She was far too used to people wanting to use her for her Quirk and, more irritatingly, she was used to people, both male and female, wanting to get close to her because she was very physically attractive and puberty had hit her like a truck.

All of that meant she was somewhat lonely and isolated, both in general and at school. So her father, trying in his own fumbling way to help his beloved child, often introduced her to the children of his colleagues. More often or not, they ended up being false-friends, but she did have a couple of pen-friends who she cherished deeply.

'I'll just have to roll the dice and see what Midoriya Izuku-kun is like.' she thought, a bit of hope in her musings. 'We may be classmates after all, so getting to know each other now wouldn't be a bad idea. It would certainly be nice to have a friend in class for once...'

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Endeavour glowering at the screens which showed the green-haired boy. His son was also watching the fire-user on the screens through narrowed eyes as well. She wondered what was annoying them so much?

With Izuku

"And that makes thirty-nine!" the fire user shouted gleefully as another Three-Pointer was consumed in flames.

Things were going so well! All of his training and efforts were paying off in spades! And he was having the time of his life!

Izuku had never had the opportunity to test his Quirk against so many mobile targets before, the Volatile Quirk Training Center's targets being entirely immobile and incredibly fragile compared to the Villain Bots he was facing now. Aside from his spars with Katsuki, this was the first time he'd been able to let his Quirk run this wild before, and he was starting to see why so many people enjoyed training with other people if it was this exciting!

Of course, just because he was having fun on his own didn't mean that he hadn't stayed responsible and lent a hand to anyone he'd found in over their heads. There had been one boy, who looked like he hadn't slept in a week, who had been completely overwhelmed by a One-Pointer. At a guess, his Quirk was a mental- or biological-affecting one, which would be utterly useless against robots. He'd caught the One-Pointer in a snare of flames and then used another burst to hastily reforge a nearby piece of debris into a crude spear before tossing it to the boy, who hadn't hesitated to ram it through the captured machine's chest.

Quite why the purple-haired boy hadn't thought to bring in a weapon of his own was something that boggled Izuku's mind. There were forms that could be downloaded and printed off from the U.A. website that would allows someone a piece of 'support gear' if they could prove that being denied it would be a detriment to their ability to take the test. Having a Quirk that was entirely ineffective against artificial targets would surely be a good enough reason to allow the boy a weapon of some sort. And it was obvious that the Entrance Exams would involve fighting robots, there was even a picture on the Entrance Exams section of the website featuring previous examinees fighting them.

Granted, the robots on the picture (which looked like it was from when they'd first been used nearly fifty years ago) were far smaller and more humanoid than the ones they were facing now, but the point still stood.

"THREE MINUTES LEFT!" President Mic announced.

"Damnit, it's been seven minutes already?" Izuku blinked in shock. "This has gone by way too quickly!"

Taking a quick look around, he quickly caught sight of a lone One-Pointer within easy range of his flames. Grinning, Izuku raised a hand and quickly formed a beach-ball-sized fireball before firing it at the machine. The fireball slammed into the Villain Bot, detonating and quickly consuming it in a small flare of silver flames as it self-destructed and brought Izuku's points total to an even forty.

Then the ground beneath him started to violently rumble. Moments later a massive metallic arm seemed to burst from the ground, smashing through a building just a few dozen yards away from his location. Using the destroyed building as a handhold, the rest of the robot soon emerged. Fully revealed, it towered over even the tallest of the surrounding buildings, with eight glowing red eyes mounted on its rectangular head and its elongated body painted a camo green as it stood on a pair of massive mechanical tracks.

"Th-That's a Zero-Pointer?" Izuku yelped in shock, quickly recognizing the fourth silhouette from the display. "Isn't that a bit much!?"

His reaction was actually fairly mild. Most of the surrounding applicants were already turning tail and running for their lives from the towering behemoth, many screaming for their mothers at the same time.

Izuku was about to make a more careful retreat; there was nothing to gain from even trying to fight the thing and he could just as easily manoeuvre around it and hunt down some more last-minute points-

"HELP!"

The sound of a familiar voice suddenly stopped him cold. Turning toward the direction of the scream, he quickly noticed that it was coming where the rubble of that first destroyed building had fallen. Focusing on the debris, he quickly caught sight of Uraraka Ochako trapped under a large slab of concrete. And the newly emerged Zero-Pointer was already trudging directly toward her, either unknowing or uncaring of her position, and was about to run her over!

Any thoughts of retreating were instantly immolated from his mind. Instead, his steed was already racing toward the debris field while his mind flew through the mental repertoire of items he'd mastered forming and solidifying his flames into. With less than a second's thought Izuku had selected the item he needed and raised a single arm into the air. This scale of creation required a bit of memetic gesturing, even from him.

Silver flames erupted from his extended arm, bursting upward like a geyser and quickly reshaping themselves into a sphere, which quickly began to grow larger and larger as more flames were added. Soon the rush of flames stopped and the sphere began to shift, elongating and stretching into an oblong shape as long as an eighteen-wheeler. The flames then began to condense, details forming as the flames reshaped itself into a solid form. Within a few seconds the flames had formed into a massive, ornately decorated spear that hovered in mid-air, awaiting its master's command.

"Silver Spear of Rampart Smashing!" Izuku roared out and thrust his arm towards the Zero Pointer.

The massive construct rocketed forwards with the full force of Izuku's will behind it, crossing the distance between its creator and the robot in the blink of an eye, smashing headlong into the massive machine's chest and actually managing to push it back several meters. Sadly, the armour protecting it was amazingly thick, thick enough that the large spear hadn't been able to do more than cut a hole in the outermost layer.

Izuku was frowning as his silver charger rapidly closed the distance to the debris pile where Ochako was pinned. That had been far less effective than he'd hoped, and the Silver Spear was his largest controllable attack. Years of training had let him develop a certain pattern. Once he'd mastered controlling a certain amount of flames at once, he'd either start building up to a new larger amount or start working to increase the precision of his control on his previous gains. Goemon-sensei had always encouraged him to never stop trying to push his limits since Emitter-types like them could only increase the power of their Quirks by constantly pushing their limits.

Once you'd mastered a certain of strength, always push for more. That was the mantra that had allowed Thunder Hero: Issen to rise to the Top 10.

'There wasn't enough weight behind it to pierce though that armour.' the green-haired pyromancer realized. Normally, fire lacked any form of physical mass, but due to its unique nature, the silver flames of his Quirk were closer to a liquid in nature, and that included having a physical mass that could be weighed like any other liquid. Interestingly enough, one litre of his sliver flames weighed exactly the same as a litre of water, one kilogram. Right now, his maximum capacity was just under 7000 US Gallons, or 26 metric tons, of silver fire for any single attack.

That the machine could withstand the full force of that much concentrated silver fire, propelled by the full force of his pyrokinetic ability, spoke volumes of the machine's durability. It would take a measure of strength approaching All Might's in order to fell that behemoth with a single strike.

But that didn't mean he was done just yet.

With a thought and a wave of his extended arm, the spear seemed to dissolve into a large pillar of silver fire which quickly began to entwine itself around the Zero-Pointer, binding its arms and particularly the tank treads it used to propel itself with thick tendrils of condensed silver flame. The machine audibly struggled against the silver bindings, the metallic whining of strained machinery audible even from a distance, but for now they managed to hold.

Meanwhile Izuku had finally reached his destination, pulling his fiery steed to a halt in front of the stunned form of Uraraka Ochako and leaping off.

"Uraraka-san, are you okay?" he called as he came to kneel next to her.

"Y-Yeah, just a bit...trapped." the brunette answered with a strained grin. One of her arms was stuck under a separate piece of rubble than the one pinning her legs, rendering her quite helpless to escape.

"Stay still, I'll get you out of there." With most of his concentration focused on keeping the Zero-Pointer restrained, Izuku was forced to rely on memetic aides to help create and control his constructs. With a thought his right arm was engulfed in a large plume of silver flame that quickly solidified into a massive copy of his own arm. With great care, he manipulated his newly enlarged limb and used it to gently remove the rubble that was pinning her arm to the ground.

Ochako hissed as she tried to move it. It was sore as hell, but she honestly couldn't tell if it was a bruised bone, strained muscles or something worse.

"That's one. I'll have your legs free in a second." Izuku reassured her before enlarging his silver arm and repeating the process with the larger one, sighing in relief as he managed to get her leg free without any complications.

The brunette used her good arm to force herself to a sitting position, wincing as she felt her right ankle. It was definitely sprained at the very least, if not broken.

"Can you stand?" the green-haired boy asked as he dismissed the extended arm.

"No, I think it's sprained or twisted. Maybe broken." Ochako hissed out haltingly.

"I'll have to carry you then; I can't hold that behemoth back much longer." Izuku stated, silently grateful that whoever had designed that damned monstrosity hadn't decided to give it any apparent projectile weapons in addition to having fists the size of an SUV. He quickly and gently scooped up the slightly shorter girl into a bridal carry before bringing his horse around. Another mental command formed a small, simple staircase of solidified flames to help him get her mounted before he swung himself back astride his steed as well. A thought dismissed the stairs and got the horse galloping again, putting as much distance between them and the Zero-Pointer, which was already beginning to break free of its binding, as they could get.

"W-Wow…this is some kind of Quirk you've got here." Uraraka breathed in awe as Izuku focused on guiding the galloping construct between through the fields of debris. "What even is this stuff?"

"Fire." the verdette answered, smirking slightly when she looked up at him in shock.

"Fire?!" the brunette blurted out in shock. "B-but, it's not even hot." she muttered, absently poking the horse's silvery mane with a disbelieving finger.

"My fire only burns what I want it to, Uraraka-san." Izuku answered with not a little pride. "So long as you're with me, you won't even feel slightly warm, let alone be burnt."

A sudden crash caused bother teens to turn around, finding the Zero-Pointer had finally broken free of its restraints and was now pursuing them. Whether it was the machine's limited programming responding to Izuku's attempt to attack it or just bad luck, the massive machine had apparently locked onto the duo and was now in hot pursuit. Its massive treads allowing it to easily ignore the scattered debris and slowly gain ground on the fleeing teens.

"Oh crud." Izuku murmured. "Well that's a thing…any ideas on how to deal with big, metallic and angry back there? All my biggest attack did was put a gash in its armour." he asked his companion.

"Can you make anything with this fire of yours?" Uraraka asked nervously.

"Anything I can form a strong mental image of." the green-haired boy answered with a nod.

"ONE MINUTE LEFT!" Present Mic called even as the Zero-Pointer continued to gain on them. It didn't look like it would be able to reach them before the exam ended, but neither teen really wanted to risk that calling time would actually stop the behemoth.

"Then what about a really big drill head!?" the girl offered in a rush.

"That…that could work. I've already managed to make a hole in its armour to get it started." Izuku agreed, slowly their mount slightly so that he could freely raise both his arm over his head without risking falling off. Both arms quickly erupted into geysers of silvery flames, once more forming into a massive orb that quickly reshaped and solidified itself into a massive spiral drill. It wasn't the most realistic creation he'd ever made, looking far more like something out of an anime, but needs must when one was being pursued by an angry giant robot.

With another thought, his brow furrowing in concentration, Izuku set the massive construct spinning on its horizontal axis.

"Silver Drill Giga Breaker!" he called out as he sent the drill flying straight at the same point he'd struck with his Silver Spear, right at the centre of its chest. It was actually a lot harder to keep it on course thanks to the drill's rapid spinning, but he managed it.

The massive drill slammed into the Zero Pointer like the fist of an angry god, striking exactly where Izuku had aimed. The (comparatively) small tear provide just enough leverage for the massive drill to do its work and the massive machine's armour was quickly torn to shreds before the drill got to work on the far more fragile internal components.

"Whoa…!" Ochako whispered in awe as the massive drill tore straight through to the opposite side of the Zero-Pointer's chest, small explosion from delicate machinery being completely annihilated echoing around it. "You think it's gonna blow like the smaller ones?" she asked nervously.

"I'd like to think U.A. wouldn't be that dramatic, but just in case…" Izuku mutter as he extended an arm toward the drill, slowly opening and spreading his hand as wide as possible. While he normally disdained from using memetic gestures to help in controlling his flames, it was a necessary evil when he was working with such large amounts of his silver fire.

Instantly the drill, which had lodged itself partly poking out of the Zero-Pointers back, dissolved back into a mass of silver flame that quickly spread itself outward, engulfing the entirety of the massive machine in a shroud of silver.

And just in time too. A few seconds later a muffled 'KABOOM' erupted from beneath the flaming shroud as the Zero-Pointer self-destructed. The addition of the blanket of silver fire robbed the explosion of most of its fury, with just the shockwave of displaced air sending some examinees stumbling to the ground, with a few smaller bursts of flame managing to break free through holes in the blanket created by the pressure wave.

Izuku quickly wrapped up all of the loose flames with his silver fire, completely smothering them, before allowing it to dissipate safely. He allowed himself a small sigh of relief when he saw the pile of scorched scrap that had once been the Zero-Pointer. "Whew, well I'm glad that's over with."

"TIME'S UP!" President Mic shouted.

"Haah…I hope I managed to get enough points." Uraraka sighed out. "I think I managed about thirty before that thing nearly buried me alive."

"I got forty. Though from what I heard the others shouting about as they went, a lot of the other applicants didn't manage to get out of their teens or low-twenties, so I think you're still ahead of the pack, Uraraka-san." Izuku offered before he quickly caught sight of a very easily recognizable old woman walking through the site with a syringe-shaped cane. "Ah, there's the Youthful Heroine: Recovery Girl. She'll have you fixed up in no time."

"These dratted exams are getting worse with every year. I'm gonna have to put my foot down with that varmint of a principal before one of you lot manage to get yourselves killed." Recovery Girl groused as she watched Izuku carefully lower Ochako to the ground from his horse, which dissolved into a small pyre of silver flames before dispersing a moment later. "OK dearies, what seems to be the damage?"

"Uraraka-san here has a possible fracture in her left arm, and a twisted, maybe broken, ankle on her right leg." the verdette pyromancer reported respectfully as he stepped back to let the healer do her work. "I'm completely unharmed, maybe a bit tired after using so much of my Quirk in such a short timeframe."

"That blasted Zero-Pointer did a number on you, hm? I swear that thing does more damage to the applicants than the rest of those bots put together." the healer tsked and kissed Ochako's forehead. Instantly, a glow appeared around her injured arm and leg, and the brunette felt the pain in them fade to nothing.

"Hey, all the pain's gone...oh wow, I'm tired..." Ochako said before covering her mouth as a yawn overcame her.

"That's the downside to my Quirk, I'm afraid." Recovery Girl offered, smiling at the tired girl. "It takes your stamina in order to speed up the natural healing process. Have some gummies, both of you. They'll pep you up a bit."

Passing the pair some of the treats, the healing hero walked off in search of more patients.

"I'm gonna go back to my hotel and sleep the rest of the day..." Ochako groaned, before blushing as her stomach rumbled. "...after I have something to eat first."

"Hotel?" Izuku repeated.

"Ah! I'm from Mie, so I arrived here for the exams yesterday, and I'm staying in a hotel overnight before heading home tomorrow." the brunette explained. "Thing is, there's no meals at my hotel, and I don't know any of the places around here. Midoriya-kun, are you local? Do you know somewhere inexpensive I could go to?"

Izuku internally frowned. Most of the hotels in Musutafu provided breakfast, lunch and dinner to their guests as a basic service; the only ones that didn't were the local motels, and those tended to cater to a fairly rough crowd. While he was sure Uraraka could take care of herself if she managed to score thirty Villain Points, he wasn't sure if he liked the idea of her going back to somewhere like that.

Forcing his thoughts back under control, Izuku nodded. "Depends where your hotel is. Where are you staying at?"

The name she gave him confirmed that it was a motel, but it was, very fortunately, one of the better ones, which made up for its lack of meals with secure rooms and a fairly upstanding reputation. His father had stayed in that one when he was working to secure his company's new contract with U.A. (Izuku had naturally badgered his father about any details when he found out) and had stated that he wished all the motels he stayed at were that secure

"Well, there's a couple of places you could go to..." he said as he walked with her out of the Training Ground and back to the bus. The two parted at the gates of U.A., but not before exchanging numbers with each other.

As he waved Ochako goodbye, Izuku felt lighter than he had in years. First, he had, no questions asked, kicked ass at the exams. Second, he had made a friend, which was so very rare. Thanks to the brown-nosing tendencies that Aldera seemed to encourage, he and Katsuki had basically been each other's only real friends for years now. Not that being friends with Katsuki was bad, but Izuku was a friendly boy who liked the idea of having friends, so having to ignore overtures because they were made under false pretences had been a very unpleasant experience.

"Hey, son!" a familiar voice called, breaking him out of his thoughts and forcing him to look around.

"DAD?!" he yelped at the sight of Midoriya Hisashi, standing in front of U.A.'s gates looking highly amused. "What're you doing here?!"

"Thanks to my company's new agreement with U.A. we got a seat in the Guest Observation Room." his father replied with a grin. "I pretty much demanded that my bosses let me take it or they'd need to replace me, just so I could at least see my son and nephew-in-all-but-blood kick ass and take names. And son, did you not fail to disappoint. Most girls talk about having a prince on a white horse sweep them off their feet, but that young lady got a prince on a silver horse, didn't she?"

"Daaad!" Izuku groaned. "It's not like that! I don't think the Zero Pointer could see her, so Uraraka-san might have been squashed!"

"Son, don't you think the teachers would have swooped in to save her? They are Pro Heroes, after all." Hisashi pointed out, still very amused. "But you proved that you were a hero there, no mistake. If you don't get in, I will be very surprised."

"Uncle Hisashi? What the hell are you doing here?" Katsuki asked as he walked up to his friend and pseudo-uncle.

"Taking you boys home so you two can get changed. Then we can go out and celebrate you two smoking the competition while I regale the rest of the family with tales of your derring-do." the man answered, clapping a hand on Katsuki's shoulder. "I saw you do very well out there, Katsu. Your parents are going to be very proud when I tell them about it."

Although he still looked grumpy, a rare honest smile crossed the face of the [Explosion] Quirk user at that.

"Now, let's get going, my car's just a short walk over here." the man led the two off, chatting happily, and unaware of the glowering he was getting from the Todoroki duo standing unnoticed nearby in the shadow of the school itself.

Later

Endeavour's Office, Endeavour Agency

Japan's Number Two Ranked Hero, The Flaming Hero: Endeavour, sat alone in his office, leaning back slightly in his chair with a familiar scowl across his face. This was by no means an uncommon occurrence, but the source of his ire was a fresh one. Normally, his ire was directed toward the smiling glory hound known as All Might, or one of his new interns proving to be a waste of time, or his masterpiece Shōto's continued rebellion. But this time, it was an entirely new emotion that was causing Todoroki Enji discontent, one that he'd never felt before in his entire life.

Envy. Sheer unadulterated envy.

'Such a powerful Quirk...such dedication...such control...such talent...such ability!' the fire-user thought, his gut churning. 'On his own, Midoriya Izuku has managed to forge himself into the perfect materiel to test and hone my masterpiece against...if it wasn't for his Quirk's greatest weakness being Shōto's preferred element!'

He had listened to the rave review that Burnin' had given him on her temporary pupil after she returned several months ago with a heavy degree of scepticism. Surely no child born with such a powerful Flame Quirk could have the talent or work ethic to develop it to such a fine level of control on their own with only the limited guidance of a former hero who lacked even an appropriately similar Quirk. The sheer level of ability that his Head Sidekick had described had seemed the stuff of pure fantasy and he'd said as much.

Yet today, he had been proven grossly in error. The fact that he now owed Burnin' a month free of paperwork duties only added to his annoyance.

Not only did the boy possesses a Quirk that could rival Shōto's in terms of raw power, but he had one that seemed to have been forged specifically to counter other Fire Quirks. To add to that, the boy seemed to be able to create his unique flames in not only immense quantities but also shape and solidify them at will without the need of memetic gestures, for the most part.

While Endeavour could control his flames to an extent, it was not easy and took focused willpower to do so. [Hellflame] was not an easy Quirk to control and Enji had spent literal decades training and forging his mind, body and Quirk into a single weapon wielded by his will.

And now, as if to mock him, along comes Midoriya Izuku, able to do almost everything he could do but better, and seemingly without any effort. He knew full well from Burnin's reports that that was not the case, that the boy had apparently dedicated himself to a degree that would make even Enji himself proud in his goal of mastering his Quirk, and the effort and focus in the boy's eyes while he fought against the Zero-Pointer was just as obvious.

But still, to see one so young with such power and control…it rankled him more than he'd like to admit.

He had also seen the way Shōto had glared at the boy. A fire user who seemed to have no problems throwing his fire around was akin to the proverbial red flag for his youngest son, so Midoriya had just risen to the number two position on Shōto's 'people I need to overcome' list, if Enji wasn't mistaken.

'You wish to only use your mother's ice? Fine. Defeat Midoriya during the Sports Festival and feel cocky, Shōto.' Endeavour snorted. 'The real world will show you that your determination is only going to hurt you.'

Looking at the time, the Flame Hero picked up a pen and started filling out forms. Paperwork never ended when you were in charge of an agency, especially forms for destroyed equipment from burning in an agency filled with fire Quirk users, and he wanted to get home on time for once.

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Next Chapter Deliberations, Meetings and Letters

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