Okay, starting on the 28th of September this time. Lets hope I don't take like 4 months to do this one. This might be shorter than the previous one? By that I mean that I somehow managed to write 6k with the previous one being like 5k… I feel like these are slowly getting longer, but last time took too long. Anyways, this is my first fic, so I'd like to get some feedback on this.
Especially with how I'm making several… lets just say, pretty significant changes.
Chapter 5: Entrance Exam; Start!
Hitoshi raced forward as soon as he saw the gate open. Perhaps he was too tunnel-visioned, and he probably just ignored whatever countdown the site's proctor was yelling. Oh well, Instead, he focused on finding some sort of weapon.
If he were to be completely honest, he wasn't expecting too much out of the exam. Being kidnapped threw a wrench in what preparations he had, and his quirk was all but useless here. His best hope was to find something he could use. If only he were strong enough, then he could take a door from one of the site's buildings and use that as a shield, though he doubted he could actually pry one off of its hinges that easily.
Luckily, he knew that pipes on some buildings would come off if one were to ram into them with enough force, so his only hope at passing the practical was to get that as a weapon, and beat his way through as many robots as he could.
Unfortunately though, what met him when he ran into one of the alleyways an angry 1-pointer, which lunged right at him. Sliding under the metal fist, he dashed further into the alleyway, past the robot.
It probably wasn't a wise idea to corner himself, but it didn't matter. He needed a weapon, and wasn't above putting himself in a little danger. Hell, despite all common sense, he had dived in to shield some green broccoli from a falling building. Thankfully the door he was carrying took most of the damage, even if it resulted in a few cracked ribs.
He briefly scanned the alleyway for the pipe he would use, and then rammed himself into it. The pipe dislodged as easily as he thought it would, and he grinned as it fell into his hands. Armed with the improvised bat, Hitoshi looked back at the 1-pointer as it approached slowly. The robot was way larger than Hitoshi, even when it was apparently the weakest of the robots. It lunged at him again, its weight and momentum nearly sending it crashing into the empty dumpster behind him.
It was slow to turn, so despite all his nerves, and the sound of his own heartbeat ringing in his ears, he brought the shoddy weapon down on the one pointer. Once, twice, three times, before it swung its fist around at him.
The fist soared over HItoshi's head and into the wall beside them, the crashing sound of bricks crumbling reminding him of the collapsing building. Shaking the thought out of his head, and shaking the feeling back into his arms, he thrust his bat forward at the robot's head, and into its eye piece.
Hissing and whining, the robot shuddered before slumping forward and over him. The thing had stopped it seemed. Did this mean he beat it? His first few attacks didn't seem to damage it much, only mildly denting its chassis, but piercing its eyelense seemed to down it instantly.
'Maybe…' he thought, 'Maybe I have a chance after all.'
He grinned as he crawled out from under the robot.
His odds were slim, and he didn't know if stabbing them in the eye would work for the rest of the villain point. It would be a gamble if he were to try, but it was bet he was willing to take.
Yui dashed through the exam field, trying to get past her competition and gain an advantage. Before the gates had opened, she was pocketing the pieces of gravel and other odd bits of material on her way to the site. Her idea was to use these pieces as ammunition, by throwing them and making them grow the moment they left her hands.
A while ago she had managed to figure out that when something grew, its weight changed proportionately, and with its weight, it's momentum also changed. One snowball fight followed by an emergency hot bath during her childhood taught that her gigantified items could do a lot of damage.
Ignoring the brawling students and running deeper into the cityscape, Yui encountered her first villain-bot, some odd mix of a scorpion and a mouthless piranha plant. Taking a small handful of gravel from her pocket, she swung her enclosed hand at the enemy. The moment the pieces left her hand, they exploded in size, crashing into and through the robot and sending its pieces flying back.
'Two points…' she counted in her head.
Running forward, she searched the fake city for more points. Most of the robots she encountered were downed with one volley, though the occasional three-pointer took more stones to destroy. She was also starting to notice the gimmicks of each of the robots too. The 1-pointer was fast, but slow to turn, while the 2-pointer was almost the opposite. Compared to the first two, the three pointer was more of a tank, in both a literal and metaphoric sense, given that it attacked by pelting beanbags at people.
At first she thought the beanbags were a non-lethal and ignorable option, seeing how she found tonnes of them scattered about the ground. They weren't to be taken lightly though, as the impacts felt like baseballs launched out from the old pitching machine in her school, except worse. The growing number of welts on her body were a testament to their unexpected strength.
Running up to the most recently downed robot's remains, Yui shrunk pieces of its plating and stuffed them into her pockets. She was running low on ammunition, as each handful contained several rocks. Hopefully with the shrapnel as ammunition, she wouldn't waste as much on each robot. With a handful of shrunken steel, she dashed further into the field.
Breathe in…
Breathe out…
Izuku kept repeating this in the moments before the gate opened. Sweating buckets and fidgeting with his hands, he stared up at the massive door. Almost everyone else looked ready for the exams, from the guy with six arms, to the blond doing weird poses at one of the cameras. Some quirks were easier to identify than others, or he could at least guess what some of them were. The person who had the six arms was clearly a mutation type and was most likely stronger. There were even a few people with what looked like equipment to go with their quirks, if the belt that the blond had was any indication.
Apparently he was muttering outloud, as he felt a heavy hand clasp onto his shoulder.
He didn't want to admit it, but he nearly jumped out of his skin at that.
"What are you doing here? Are you taking the entrance exam to interfere with everyone else?"
"N-no! Ofcourse not! I-I'm just wondering why nobody else here looks that nervous!" he almost winced at his own volume as he turned to face the stranger.
He stepped back as he met the examinee's gaze head on, catching a glimpse of a blue and black jumpsuit. The pants stopped under his knees, and he thought he saw pipes sticking out of them. "I-it's just, this is kinda a big deal. A really big deal. UA is a national school after all, and it has really low pass rates."
Perhaps he started to trail off topic as he went deep into how big of an occasion the entrance exam was, as he was shocked into silence by what sounded like a faraway call. Though it wasn't as far away as he thought, as everyone else had also heard it and looked to one of the buildings. He could hear Present Mic's voice coming from the top of it.
He heard the gates opening as the yelling continued, so his attention was split. On one hand, he wanted to listen to Present Mic, but on the other hand, if the gate was open, then he might as well run for it. Izuku had thought of the hero's "Okay! Start!" as permission to go, after all.
Seeing a few other examinees looking nervously at the gate, Izuku threw caution to the wind, as he ducked through the crowd, and once he reached the thickest part of the crowd, he leaped over everyone. Being able to jump over a person's head was an unexpected but welcome boon.
Leaping over the competitors got him to the front of the crowd, infront of an open gate. Grinning, he dashed forward, the force of his step cracked the pavement as he flew through the gates. While he felt bad for pushing his way through the crowd, he knew better than to hesitate from the escape plan.
Everyone seemed to spring into action to chase after him. Frantic cries and shouts echoed from behind Izuku as he sprinted into the exam-ground. It seems he wasn't the only one who was fast however, as rather quickly, the examinee who tried chastising him earlier could be heard running up behind him.
Ignoring the thought, as Izuku turned on one of the roads, he was instantly beset by the faux villain robots. A pair of 1-pointers, evident by the large, spray-painted number 1 on them stood in the middle of the street.
Just as he'd practiced for hours on end with Gran Torino and All Might, Izuku called the increasingly familiar heat of One for All and coaxed it into his arm. Like a bullet rocketing out of its chamber, Izuku's fist slammed into the 1-pointer, followed with a strong burst of air, which sent its remains crashing into and through the second.
The piles of wreckage scaped on the pavement as the robot's remains were dragged through the street.
He did it.
His first real punch, outside of Gran Torino's mindnumbing training. His eyes drifted to his extended hand and glanced at knuckles. His arm was only slightly warm, and the stinging in his knuckles was quickly fading.
A smile grew on his face as he dashed forward. Maybe all of this wasn't a fluke after all. He still didn't know if he could succeed, but Izuku would give it his all.
Nezu sat in a dark room full of screens with a delightfully scalding cup of earl grey by his side. He had to admit, he was pleased with this year's turnout. First there was the fact that he had some students running as soon as the doors opened, (this little fact pleased him immensely. It was so rare for him to find people with common sense nowadays), then there were the few students he could see becoming top heroes through skills and tenacity. There were a lot who were rough around the edges, like the explosive blond in ground A, or the boy who could copy quirks in ground C, and he could point out a few more troublesome personalities among them, though this year's candidates seemed infinitely better, especially considering the previous year's disappointment. Despite the outroar from the parents of the students, the principal couldn't fault Shota for expelling his class. At least Kan's class had decided to get their act together after that unfortunate loss.
Meanwhile, most of this years batch looked like they knew what they were doing. Some were gathering information to strategise, while others were relying solely on their bodies and quirks to get by. There was one interesting student who had thought of using a drainage pipe for an improvised weapon, even if he could tell there was no technique behind what he saw. A swift glance at Shota showed that he too was watching, within the confines of his familiar yellow sleepingbag. Perhaps, even if the student didn't make it, they'll be transferred in at the sports festival.
Taking a sip of his steaming hot tea, he looks back to the screens. It was amusing to see little interactions pan out, like how the boy with the hardening quirk kept defending people from the shrapnel made by the explosive blond, or how Toshinori's successor kept swooping in to save people from their own mistakes.
One of the students was disabling robots cornering others with the wave of a hand, and even stopping them before other examinees could. He'll have to adjust the points later to account for her telekinetic quirk.
"Hows that silver haired little listener doing that?" Ah. It seemed that Yamada had come back inside.
His question had the rest of the marking staff muttering amongst their own little groups for a moment, as they tried to piece it together.
"It seems that young miss Yanagi is using her quirk to dislodge the robot's circuitry" beside him, Yagi chimed in, placing his tablet back on his lap. Nezu saw the examinee's student profile, and caught a glimpse of her quirk. Poltergheist, a telekinesis-like emitter quirk. The amount of fine control she displayed was exceptional among telekinesis quirks, though it looked like she needed to work on her weight limit.
His faculty had fell into silence, only to be broken awkwardly by Power Loader. "That would explain the internal errors that are appearing." a lit-up tablet hung by his side.
Yamada hums before nodding, and sitting down near Aizawa's sleepingbag.
Finishing off his current cup, the dog/rat/bear pours another, and turns back to the screen. The time limit was almost up with only a fifth of the exam left. It was time to unveil his last surprise, he decided, and after prompting everyone, Nezu opened the hatch on the desk infront of him, holding a red button.
The Yaruki switch. It was the same gimmick each year. While some of the teachers had explained the Zero Pointers, he knew for a fact that none of them had explained their purposes, or had intentionally misled them in Yamada's case. When Nezu had first brought up the Yaruki switch, his goal was to push the applicants to their very limits. Despite all the mixed feelings, the board had approved his request in the end, on the condition that they be used sparingly. That had been decades ago at this point though, and now, the High-Specs had more than enough power to do whatever he wished with the gargantuan machines.
"Everyone, be ready! The true test is about to begin!" he called in a voice, way too jovial for what was about to happen, as a furred paw pressed into the big red button.
The ground trembled in the Site A with a large number of its examinees. Hitoshi had no clue what could have been making all the noise. That is until he started hearing people screaming.
It wasn't until he looked to the main road when Hitoshi understood. The examinees were completely dwarfed by the sheer scale of the robot in the middle of the street. Hell, he didn't even know where that thing could have hid, as it towered over all the nearby buildings. He couldn't see how any student, let alone himself, was supposed to contend with that.
His feet slowed to a stop as he stared at the goliath, the long since dented and half bent pole nearly slipping from his fingertips. Compared to the rest of the examinees, Hitoshi only felt increasingly helpless as the exam went on. He could hear what some were shouting while beating up robots, and much to his shame, his score wasn't nearly as high. How was a guy like him, with no physical quirk to speak of, supposed to fight these robots? How was anyone supposed to fight that metal behemoth?
"Hey man! You gotta move your feet! We needa get away from that thing!" a voice yelled, snapping Hitoshi back to reality. It was the boy he'd seen chasing around the blond and blocking or deflecting debris. His clothes were burnt and torn, revealing hardened muscles underneath. The edges of his skin looked as jagged as his teeth. "Hello?"
"Y-yeah! Im with you" he tightened his hold on the pipe, his knuckles almost white with how hard he was gripping it. Clearly nobody here was fighting it, even the loudmouth with the explosive quirk was running away from-
'Nope, never mind, he's ignoring it completely and rushing after more points' he thought with a scowl. He had half a mind to copy the blond and try to take out any robots he could find, first he needed to get the hell away from that titan.
Hitoshi only hoped that he would find any robots he could beat as he ran.
'There was a giant. UA had a giant.' Suspended in disbelief, and running like her life depended on it, Yui sprinted while she tried her hardest to figure out just what the hell was going on.
One moment she had been fighting robots, then the next the floor was opening up beneath her, and the intersection she and a few other examinees were standing in was suddenly replaced by the colossal 0-pointer.
'What the hell was UA thinking putting something like this on the entrance exam?!' she fumed as she ran.
Even while running, she could hear and see the giant's chaos as it wrecked havoc around the city. It was all she could do to keep running away from it. For something so big made of metal, the 0-pointer was fast.
The few examinees running beside her suddenly ducked into an alleyway. She'd heard something about trying to move to where it couldn't get to them instead of trying to outrun it.
It sounded like the best idea she'd heard all day, and apparently everyone in the quartet agreed.
She ran into the alleyway with them as the ground shook. The 0-pointer had been slowly gaining on them as they ran, but now that they were in a smaller space, she hoped that it was too big to get to them, even if it meant she couldn't use that.
Though something troubled her as they ran into the alleyway. The rumbling was still getting closer, as if the Zero Pointer was after them specifically. Maybe it was for all she knew. The fact of the matter was that it was still getting closer. She could see the shadow of it as it stopped at the entrance of the alleyway. They were cornered.
The Zero Pointer loomed over the alleyway, looking down at them. Its hands pressed against the rooves of the adjacent houses, which cracked and crumbled under the strain.
Chunks of debris fell down towards the group as the titanic robot clawed its way towards the group. The ginger-haired girl behind her blocked some of the chunks of rubble with enlarged hands, though that probably wouldn't work well against the Zero Pointer itself.
Some of the rubble seemed to knock other pieces out of the way while on the way down, and with a glance back, she saw that their silver-haired companion waving her arms around as if she were pushing them herself. Despite the telekinetic's efforts though, they still couldn't do anything about the zero pointer.
Watching the Zero Pointer claw its way closer, Yui let out a breath. The drawbacks were going to suck, but that was Future Yui's problem to deal with. Shaking her head, cerulean eyes took in everything in the alleyway, from her companions beside her to the Zero Pointer at the entrance to the alley.
Steeling her will and reaching out, she tapped the both of them on their shoulders, grabbing their attention. "...I'm going to do something… But I need a lot of room… Please stand back."
As the two slowly backed off, still covering themselves and each other where possible, she made a mad dash forward at the titanic robot, careful to avoid the falling debris as each stride brought her closer.
'Imagine the lever, imagine the lever, imagine the lever-' the chant reverberated within her head as she ran, trying to picture the lever in question, and trying her hardest to push it, praying that her gamble would pay off.
In the midst of her efforts, she started to feel a nauseating, sickening heat, followed by a rush of vertigo and a blast of chilly winter air. With each step she took, the feeling repeated itself, again and again.
Until she ran into the monster
And metal crashed.
In the span of a few short seconds, the Zero Pointer was toppled over by the new giantess. Its plating was crushed under several hundred tonnes of teenager as its internal components imploded on themselves.
While extremely effective, the backlash felt like hell to her as her giant form sat on top of the crushed robot, trying to gather her thoughts enough to turn her quirk off. Shrinking back to her normal size, she gasped for air and tried her best to not collapse from hellish nausea.
It took her a few moments to process all of what just happened, on account of the rather debilitating combination of feverishly hot and dizzy. All she could feel was a weird lack of pressure as if she came out of a pool after spending too long in it.
She'd just beaten a Zero-Pointer. A robot which everyone was trying to run away from. Giant form was powerful, even if its drawbacks were horrid.
She felt faint.
Maybe that was another effect of using the giant form.
She couldn't feel much either. Perhaps that was why it took her nearly a minute to realise someone was rubbing circles into her back as she tried to not pass out.
Running around the test site was easy. It was finding robots which proved to be hard. Izuku knew the exam lasted for 15 minutes, but for the past two, it became increasingly apparent that the testing site had a limited amount of robots, and he had no idea if fourty-nine points was enough to make it. It was taking longer and longer to find each villain robot, the more that he ran.
He'd been keeping count of how many he'd defeated, and while he thought that he'd gotten a decent amount of points, he wasn't sure if they counted as his. A third of them were from half-beaten robots that he'd save other examinees from.
The clock was running out too, so he had to find more robots to destroy. That idea was thrown out the window however when he started running past people who were screaming.
The further he ran, the more the ground began to shake until he saw it. The zero pointer, wrecking buildings and chasing away examinees.
As a dust cloud flooded over him, he couldn't help but think, 'Isn't this a little extreme?!' Apparently Izuku had said it outloud too, as the speedster that had confronted him earlier shot him a look before running past him.
Turning to join the rest of the fleeing examinees, he made to escape the Zero pointer, only to freeze on the spot when he heard a cry of pain.
He turned around to face the robot,
And his body moved on its own.
The next few moments were too quick for most to follow. A flurry of footsteps followed by a sudden gale, blowing away the dust cloud.
Izuku lept, shattering the pavement below him, as one of his feet crashed into the metal of the Zero pointer's hand, crumpling upon the impact.
A second burst of wind buffeted the examinees as he kicked off of the hand with a second, explosive leap.
He knew that taking down the Zero Pointer wouldn't give him anything.
He knew that to take it out he would make a mess of his arm from going over his limits.
But he couldn't just stand idly by as that thing destroyed the centre, people would only get hurt if he did. The girl who cried out would get crushed if he did.
Toshinori grinned beside the school's principal. He'd been very impressed with his successor's showing so far, but to think that he'd take on the Zero Pointer too?
"There aren't any combat points for taking down the Zero pointers…" he spoke slowly, thinking out each word as his eyes were locked to the screens. "But there is opportunity. A chance to show your potential"
His smile widened, and he let the embers of One for all flow through him as wisps of steam drifted off his expanding form. 'So clench your buttcheeks kid-'
'And yell this from the depths of your heart!'
One for all flowed through his fist, as strong as he dared to let it.
"SMAAAAAASSSHHHHHH!"
At the force of his punch, the Zero Pointer's head jerked backwards, its faceplate caved in as shockwaves rocketed down its body, further decimating it, as it crashed backwards into the cityscape.
He only realised he was falling when the sharp pain in his arm shocked him back to attention. His arm was bruised and bleeding, his legs were on fire, and he was quickly falling towards the shattered concrete.
'Maybe 7% was a bit overboard' he thought as he fell.
Perhaps it would have been smart to think about a landing strategy before he launched himself at the giant robot, but oh well. At this point, Izuku could only roll with it, and roll with it he did.
His right arm hurt like mad, and his skin felt ragged, especially near his knuckles, but he still had one arm left, and from what All Might and Gran Torino told him, he could use the recoil from a 5% Smash to land safely. He just needed to time it right.
One for All charged into his left arm, fist raised to launch a Smash towards the ground.
His fist flew downward, One for All igniting in his arm and-
…
All his momentum stopped mid-air.
He didn't hit the ground, and he had yet to fire off a Smash.
He righted himself as he touched his cheek with apprehension. He felt what could only be described as a stinging handprint on his face.
Looking to the left upon hearing splashing, he saw a trail of rainbow-looking vomit as the alarms rang.
Sighing in relief, he fell to his knees, sitting on the crumbled concrete and wincing as a shot of pain streaked up from his arm.
"Alright, good work, good work!" he heard after a moment, looking to the source of the voice, someone wearing a pink and white nurse outfit
Several people were approaching the elderly woman's voice.
"Here. Have a gummy."
Izuku turned around further, cautious of his injured arm, in an attempt to see what the commotion was about.
Recovery girl was at the facility, walking through the crowd, handing gummy bears to examinees if they came close enough to her or until she approached them, and she was making her way towards Him.
Izuku looked wide-eyed at her. Despite being brought in the other day by All Might, he hadn't run into her. "Y-You're the Youthful Heroin! Recovery Girl!"
"Yes, and it seems you've done quite a number on yourself, young man." she raised her cane, gesturing for him to try to lift his arm. He tried, but couldn't help but wince.
"Hmm, lacerations and heavy bruising… possibly a hairline fracture along the bones if you're unlucky, but at least nothing is broken. Should only be a moment, dearie. Please keep your arm up."
She kept staring at the arm for a moment before her lips seemingly stretched to it. Her quirk started running as a nearly ethereal green glow shrouded his arm. The bruises mended themselves and the lacerations stitched themselves back together almost instantly.
"Run along now dearie, I have another patient to get to here and more to rescue from the other exam sites." She turned towards the centre of the facility with an unreadable look on her face. "Why is it that everyone feels the need to go so far I wonder…"
When Izuku looked back up at her, she was already walking deeper into the testing grounds.
The test had ended, and it was now only a matter of time until the results came back. He stretched his arm as he made his way out of ground beta. There wasn't any lingering soreness remaining after being healed. He made his way to the locker rooms provided for examinees, unaware of the glances people sent him. He wasn't too used to changing around others, but if he was going to get into UA, he supposed he was going to have to get used to it.
He was about to change into the spare set of clothes he'd packed in his bag when he spotted the red cap on top of them. He'd forgotten to give it back this morning. Shaking his head, he placed it on top of his bag as he changed.
Picking up the cap and checking his phone on the way, Izuku walked out of the locker room donning another of his previously oversized, now tightly fitting All-Might hoodies.
He wasn't expecting a message from Kodai, but she probably remembered that he still had her hat. He wasn't paying close attention to his surroundings though, nearly tripping on the steps as he jogged.
After less than a minute, he was near the gate of UA, standing in the middle of the courtyard. He looked around and found her pretty quickly, wandering near the trees that circled the courtyard. Izuku approached his slightly pale friend. He was holding the hat in his hand this time he wouldn't forget.
"... Hi" Upon getting a closer look, she really didn't look well. She was leaning on the tree, and he could see the half-full water bottle and what looked like a medicine bottle leaning on her bag.
"Are you ok? You look a little pale…" He offered the hat as he got closer.
She reached out and grabbed it, then just looked at it for a moment before putting it on.
"... My quirk… it evolved recently… I went way over my limits…"
It took Izuku a moment to think about what her limits would be. He didn't know what kind of quirk exhaustion would occur, but if it was anything like what Gran Torino made him go through, he could at least empathize with her pain. "I guess we have that in common"
"Your quirk evolved too?"
"No!" he almost winced at how loud his voice was. Some of the contestants leaving the courtyard looked over in their direction when he yelled. "I m-meant I went over my limits too not that my quirk evolved…"
'Not that I can really say it evolved anyways…'
He thought of One for All, and how he'd only gotten it this week. Honestly, it probably counted as a quirk evolution to anyone who didn't know about it, but according to both Dad and All Might, the fewer people who knew about his quirk, the better.
"... Anyways, Sorry for keeping your hat for so long… I'm going to go. Um… Have a nice day." He waved goodbye as he walked away. It wasn't the smoothest way to end a conversation, but then again, Izuku wasn't good at talking to people. Not that he had anyone he could talk to as a friend. As much as he wished his relationship with Kaachan could improve, he wasn't going to get his hopes up.
He really did have to go too, at least if he didn't want to deal with public transport. Despite the effects of the kidnapping dosing him in some sort of enhancement serum, using One for All, and furthermore, getting healed by Recovery Girl, exhausted him.
It only took him a moment to find his dad's car, and minutes later they were driving back home, with UA's walls receding behind them. Hisashi seemed content to hum softly to the radio as they drove, the quiet jazz was nice and relaxing, especially after the exam.
There would be about a week until the results came back, so all that was left to do until then was wait.
Around two months this time. I think I'm getting a little better at this. What do you think about what I did with Yui's quirk?
I've been sitting on that idea for a while now, and I have some pretty fun things I want to do with it. It's probably obvious at this point, but Yui, and a few more of 1-B's caste are going to be very reoccurring.
Next chapter should Hopefully be the start of UA, and maybe some Midoriya family time. I know that I've been giving Inko a criminally low screen time.
Lets hope that I don't take too long on the next chapter now, i wanna squeeze the next one in before New Year's, but I wouldn't hold my breath.
Oh well, have a good one~