I'm so sorry to get your hopes up everyone!

After a much needed break from writing, I came back to reread chapter 10 and... Good Lord, that was a bit too many words for my liking. So, I decided to cut it in half before I finished the next chapter, in order to make that last chapter a bit more manageable to read.

This chapter, for those who already read chapter 10, is the second half of chapter 10. Sorry for the inconvenience everybody!

If you haven't read the original Chapter 10, then... I hope you enjoy!

Before we start, here's a key going forward:

Underlined words will signify words spoken in another language. The most common ones will be English (for Pony, All Might, and Present Mic), and Mandarin (for Rin). If someone is speaking a language, and they are not one of these four, I'll be sure to include the language they are speaking.

As a fair warning, this is a 1B heavy chapter. I do not own My Hero Academia.


Before the previous match had even ended, Reiko and Kojiro had decided to use the very same room the former villains had fortified. Despite all the damage the room had taken from Ibara's assault, the most important fortification had remained generally untouched, and the two new villains planned to put it to good use as they made their stand against the new heroes.

With Reiko's quirk, it was quite literally a simple matter of thought to move the bomb from inside the closet to inside the protective shell decoy the previous team had spent most of their preparation time creating. The shell itself, while being tall and bulky and made of file cabinets, desks, mushrooms and other bits of rubbish like broken Sheetrock, had been welded together into a ring-like shape; it had an open aired top, which allowed Reiko to simply lift the twelve-kilogram bomb and carefully maneuver it inside the makeshift barrier.

Once the bomb was inside the shell, Kojiro filled the empty spaces between the two objects with a thick layer of slow-drying adhesive, the kind that stuck to everything and had incredible viscosity. And then Reiko finished their preparations by telekinetically placing the tarp on top once again, where it immediately stuck to the glue.

If the heroes wanted to capture the bomb, they were going to have to get through a shell of debris and the glue trap within- assuming they had successfully dealt with the villains first, of course.

The villains were done with all of their battle arrangements before their first minute of prep time was even over.

So, for the rest of their prep time … they simply elected to stand there in silence.

Honestly, Reiko preferred it this way. The quiet let her mind relax as her thoughts sharpened, and idly, her deep, royal blue eyes glanced over every detail of the purposely left messy room. Noting that basically everything in the room was well within her range, she took the time to memorize the location of every object that was within her safe weight limit to use, which was currently almost eighty percent of the room. If she wanted to get serious, then everything in this room was fair game.

Everything.

But then again… that was if she wanted to get serious. A simple training exercise just wasn't worth the agonizing migraine and multiple body aches that were sure to follow if she made that choice.

As she speculated which combinations of junk would garner worthwhile results, she noticed her partner starting to fidget out of the corner of her eye. Turning her gaze slightly towards him, she absently wondered what was making the gentle giant so uneasy.

At the same time, she also took a moment to fully take in his costume; in her honest opinion, it made him look like a baggy bottle of glue, complete with… accessories, around his neck, ankles, waist, and wrists. Now that she thought about it, they all kind of looked like the bottom portion of glue caps. How fitting.

"Is everything alright, Bondo-kun?"

The gentle giant jumped in surprise and backed away slightly, waving his huge hands in front of him as he did. "I-I'm sorry, Yanagi-san! I-I didn't m-mean to disturb you!"

"I wasn't bothered. Is something troubling you?"

Kojiro fiddled with his hands, not knowing what to do with them exactly, and also not looking at her as he spoke with his shoulders hunched over. "I-I'm just worried… w-we're going to be fighting Shishia-san and Tsunotori-san, and, uh, they're both r-really strong… I j-just don't wanna… let you down… and c-cause us to l-lose…"

Reiko shrugged easily in response, to show that she wasn't one who was bothered by something as trivial as an outcome to a simulation. They were here to train, after all.

"I appreciate the sentiment, Bondo-kun, but you needn't worry. I'm not someone who is easily influenced by competition."

"O-oh, I see…"

Their silence got a little strained after that, and Reiko could tell that her partner was still uneasy despite the fact that she spoke the truth about not being competitive.

She truly appreciated his silent soul, and how he kept to himself and didn't bother her unnecessarily. Generally speaking, she typically enjoyed company like him, Yui-chan, Kinoko-chan, Kuroiro-kun… and maybe Midoriya-kun, and she always felt that people like them were kindred souls. As such, she always made a conscious effort to be a little kinder to people like her- people who thought so much so loudly, as they quietly kept everything to themselves, never being able to speak up for reasons only known to them.

So, in a rare show of empathy, she decided to gift him with logic, which she had come to know was the best defense against nuisances like anxiety and doubt.

"Your quirk is well suited for restraining, Bondo-kun. As long as you get the chance to quickly activate and solidify your quirk, we will have little to worry about. My quirk, on the other hand, has a lot of utility use, and we are in a room full of ammunition. I'll make sure you have all the chances you need to restrain our opponents. The chances of our success are quite high, so please… be at ease, Bondo-kun."

"B-but… w-what if they're b-both faster than I can manage to restrain them? W-What if they they're both s-strong enough to escape? What if- "

As the adhesive hero-hopeful continued to speak, his voice continued to get higher and his words started to come out faster. His fidgety hands grew even more restless, and Reiko felt her eyes widen in understanding as she processed both his actions and his words.

As gently as she could, she cut him off before his anxiety could grow even more.

Ah, so that's the issue… "Bondo-kun. Life isn't always so black and white. It's ok if they escape or dodge your quirk, or if you miss and make mistakes- we're only in high school, after all. We are here to learn and grow, so please… don't worry about such insignificant probabilities that are outside of your sphere of control. Just do your best, and know that whatever happens, tomorrow will be a new day for you to try again."

Kojiro turned to her fully for the first time to appreciate the wisdom of her strangely reassuring, yet detached words.

As he looked at the girl dressed in a white, knee-length kimono with black knee-length boots, sashes, and a black mask that covered her face from the nose down, he found himself eternally grateful that she wasn't anywhere near as scary as he originally thought her to be. Even though her blue eyes were devoid of emotion, he was nonetheless thankful for the peace of mind they brought him as her logic offered a sanctuary against his unease.

Her kind gesture was enough to make his eyes water slightly… except in his case, his unfallen tears were less like water and more like epoxy. As discreetly as he could, he turned away from her and dabbed at the corner of his multiple eyes, rubbing his face in a way so that the chemical he secreted wouldn't smear his cheeks too much. It was a pain to remove the remaining residue afterwards, especially when his allergies got bad in the summer.

Reiko pretended not to notice this so that he could have the privacy he wanted and needed. But, when she next took a glance towards his direction, she saw him making weird movements with his fingers. The action was reminiscent of a kid picking his nose and flicking away the booger. Except in this instance, he was flicking away little balls of the adhesive he secreted.

Her eyes widened in epiphany, and a moment later, she spoke of an idea that would help to make things a lot easier for the both of them.

-(TTAE)-

On the outside of the building, as Pony studied the blueprints before her, her partner stood next to her taking deep breaths of air and sniffing through his nostrils.

"Yanagi-sama and Bondo-sama are in the same room that Awase-sama and Rin-sama had previously occupied."

Surprised, Pony looked up and said "Really?"

"Yes. It appears they plan to take full advantage of Yanagi-sama's quirk… and with Bondo-sama's quirk to help restrain our movements… we are at quite the disadvantage. What a simple, yet wonderful strategy." Jurota couldn't help but smile widely at the prospect of facing foes who knew their strengths and how to cater to them.

This match was going to be thrilling.

"Ummm… I-I'm sorry… but… you cheating?"

"Hm?"

Jurota turned to regard her for a moment with a curious expression on his face. As he took in his partner's nervous expression and stance, he also took the time to study her costume purposely for the first time. He was honestly impressed with her overall matching theme, as everything about her costume seemed to relate to horses.

The outfit itself looked like a typical jockey uniform, predominantly orange with cream colored trousers and patterns around her chest, stomach, and fingerless gloves. Her uniform even came with a halter and a couple belts around her body, as well as some stirrups near her feet. He was mildly concerned about some of the tactical uses of the belts (specifically, the horse halter around her head), but perhaps she had some uses that he couldn't think of at the moment.

"Ah! I-I'm sorry… I just want know… is that… cheating technically? Ok, us do that?"

Jurota crossed his arms and leaned against the railing she was perched on as he seriously regarded her question. "That... depends on your outlook, Tsunotori-sama. Here in school? Possibly. And if it is, I humble apologize for jeopardizing our simulation. Out in the real world however, I would merely call this intelligence gathering, and there are many heroes who specialize in this kind of work. Besides, we're hardly the only ones that are cheating... if one was to say we are cheating. Compared to what Tokage-sama's been doing for what I assume has been the entire class period- "

"Wait wait wait! Ah! I'm s-so sorry!" Jurota turned to look at his partner at her sudden startled outburst in another language, and saw that she was looking extremely apologetic as she placed her hands together in front of her in a pleading motion. "I'm so sorry! My Japanese not yet good! Slow down please?"

Jurota immediately leapt up from the rail and gave a deep bow as an apology, cooperating with her wish as he did. "Please, forgive me, Tsunoroti-sama. I truly forgot that you are still fairly new to this country. I will do my best to accommodate."

As Pony frantically waved away his concern, she took the time to look at his costume… or… lack thereof.

All he wore was a pair of black baggy pants. And black combat boots. And some neat goggles.

That was it.

That was his entire costume.

"Please! It's ok! No sweat, no sweat!"

With the awkward situation behind them, Jurota straightened his back, gave her a nod, and proceeded to turn and gaze in the direction of where he knew the bomb was located. Pony followed his eyes before she spoke a couple questions in an effort to help create a plan.

"So, Juro- Oh! Sorry! Uh, Shishida-san! Um… what think to do? And um… how did you know where at?"

The hairy boy answered her second question first, since it was easier to explain and since he actually had an answer for it.

"I can smell them from here." For emphasis, he tapped his nose as he sent her a sideways smile.

"Wow! Really? But they are away far! And many people already, ummm… walking here?" Pony turned her eyes upward in thought as she spoke English under her breath for a second. Then her eyes lit up when she found the correct phrasing. "Yeah! Many people already been through here!"

"While that is true, Tsunotori-sama, each of our classmates has a particular scent that I've already memorized. It is very easy for me to differentiate… ah, distinguish, between different scents when multiple are present. And, please don't repeat this without me around to accurately explain, but whenever Bondo-sama uses his quirk, he gives off a strong odor similar to rubber cement. That scent is… hmm… thick and heavy in the same area that I can smell an abundance of the aloe-like scent that Shiozaki-sama's vines secrete. Thus, I believe, at the very least, that we should start our search in the same room from the previous match."

"But as for what to do… I am not sure. While I do believe that Yanagi-sama is the bigger threat… our defeat will come just as easily if we don't deal with Bondo-sama properly. Do you have any ideas? Oh, my apologies: is my speech a little easier for you to understand now, Tsunotori-sama?"

"Yup! Thank you very much!" Pony flashed him an appreciative grin as she held two thumbs up. "But, I have question?"

"Yes?"

"Can you use the… umm…" Goshdarn it, I have no idea how to say this without being super offensive or insensitive… Praying that her partner wouldn't get mad at her, Pony opted to mime her words to the best of her ability. She puffed out her cheeks, hunched her shoulders and back, and did several clawing motions in the air as she made a grrrr sound with her throat.

Thankfully, Jurota understood with an empathetic nod.

"I… could… But, there are two problems if we chose to go that route. First," he held up his index finger, "I am restricted by a time limit. If our fight lasts longer than eight minutes- which, given who we are fighting, that possibility is quite high- then the moment my powered form drops, I would become crippled with exhaustion, and you will have a dead weight on your hands. The second problem," he lifted a second finger, "is not so much tactical, but more… ah… personal. See, while in that form, I become rather rambunctious-"

"What? Ah, sorry… become what?"

"Oh, my apologies… uhhh… rowdy? Unruly?"

"Oh ok! But why problem?"

Jurota looked away in embarrassment as he scratched his cheek absently. "I'd… rather not offend people whom I respect. And, it often makes me unbearable to many."

"Do… do you think we can win if use it? Because like you say before, we are, um… in high school, and in real world, could be edge we need! Besides, you really nice! Mean words can forgiven!"

Jurota took a moment to look at her in surprise before he acknowledged her viewpoint with a nod of respect and a small smile. "I… will concede to your argument. How silly of me to be hindered by something so insignificant… Thank you, for your perspective, Tsunotori-sama!" He offered her another deep bow before coming out of it with a wild grin spreading on his face.

"Very well! From here on out, I will put my pride aside when it becomes tactically important to do so!"

As Pony innocently cheered on his proclamation in English (Alright! Now I'm hella stoked for our fight!), his wild expression slowly turned thoughtful as another problem became apparent. "But, even if we are to use my ability to the utmost… how do we incorporate you into our plans?"

Pony paused for just a moment before an idea came to mind, one that she was hesitant to share because it put a lot of the burden on Jurota.

But as it turned out, the more he listened, the more he was willing to put her plan into action.

Right as the two of them had finished making their plans, the booming sound of their teacher telling them to start reverberated through the speakers, initiating the start of their simulation.

In one fluid motion, nearly every aspect of Jurota had tripled in size, from the length of his hair, to the length of his canines, to the bulk of his body.

Just as quickly as he transformed, he knelt down to allow his partner to climb on top of him with an air of impatience and gusto. "LET'S GOOOO, PONY! LET'S WIN THIS SHIT!"

"Y-yeah!"

As the girl clumsily clambered up onto his back and gripped his back hairs as well as she could (Ew Ew Ewwww OhmyGodthisissoweird!), she nudged him in his sides with her hooves as she would if she were riding a horse back at her granddaddy's ranch.

But instead of speeding up slightly like a horse would, Jurota bolted ahead at breakneck speeds, zipping along the perimeter of the structure until they were suddenly on the same side of the building that their opponents were probably in.

With three stories separating them from their destination, and about 50 meters away from the building, Jurota wasted no time and sped forward about half the way in a mad dash before he did a singular powerful jump to get to their goal.

He was honestly lucky the room was on the third floor- it was right at the edge of his physical capabilities in his powered-up form; any higher, and he would have had to climb the building instead.

Right as he crashed into the building through the outside windows and the mushrooms that still remained from the first match, Pony leapt off of him. She used one of her horns to keep herself afloat from right under the windows for a while and prepared the other one, just as they planned.

-(TTAE)-

Reiko and Kojiro were in for one hell of a surprise when a giant ball of fur crashed its way through the windows.

The fact that they had neglected to move the bomb away from the windows meant that Jurota had almost barreled right into it.

In fact, had it not been for his current reflexes, Jurota would have knocked over the bomb and the heroes would have immediately lost.

Instead, he avoided the protective shell entirely as an enlarged clawed hand struck and dug into the floor tiles at an angle with enough force to adjust his trajectory. He used the remaining power of his jump to land himself on the other corner of the room, far away from the bomb.

The villains recovered from their shock right as the beast rolled up into an aggressive stance after his collision with the wall, not even fazed by the impact in the slightest.

And then, the two sides moved to attack the other.

Jurota was the first to react, sprinting quickly at Reiko and aiming to swipe low at her legs with a snarl.

He got extremely close too, had Kojiro not sent a whole wave of his quirk at the furry boy at the last second, prompting him to dodge away from her and towards him halfway through his attack.

In retaliation, she used her quirk to send a pipe on the wall careening straight for his head, but the other boy was too quick, jerking his head to the side as he moved to attack Kojiro with a low swipe.

Instead of hitting the glue creator, a desk was suddenly shifted to the side from right in front of Kojiro.

As half of the desk basically imploded from the force of his blow, Kojiro sent a stream of adhesive forward, and Jurota was forced to quickly leap back to avoid getting caught.

But before he even landed, the other half of the desk was suddenly launched towards him at incredible speed.

It would have hit him too, had Jurota not shown a startling display of flexibility and agility, curling into a small ball right at the last second while in midair; the half-desk simply sailed right under his form, just barely missing the beast and crashing into the wall behind him as he landed on all fours with a growl.

-(TTAE)-

Their intense game of cat and mouse continued on for roughly a minute, and neither side was able to land a blow on the other.

Jurota was constantly putting pressure on the two villains, giving them little time to plan and coordinate their attacks as they barely dodged his chaotic, wild swipes.

But the villains were able to put just as much, if not more pressure on him; Reiko's activation of her quirk was matching his ferocious speed and brute strength with ease, and the random spurts of glue would force the beast to completely abandon his assault for a few seconds just to avoid getting hit with the adhesive.

The fight had the three of them so preoccupied that none of them had noticed the buzzing sound coming from the other side of the bomb's protective shell.

Then, about a minute and twenty seconds in, Jurota finally landed a solid blow on Kojiro and sent him crashing through the wall and into the hallway. As the other boy groaned out in pain sprawled out on the floor, Jurota closed in on him to deal the final blow to knock him out.

Suddenly, the broken tiles under Kojiro's body came alive and slid him out of harm's way, allowing the boy to scramble up and regroup his partner, clutching his ribs and narrowly dodging the swipes to his head as he did.

As he clumsily leapt through the hole in the wall, Reiko calmly prepared their trump card while looking suspiciously behind her. She had finally noticed the unusual sound coming from the other side of shell, and now that one of them was injured, it was time to bring this fight to an end.

"Bondo-kun, are you alright?" she asked, as she mentally retrieved twenty of their trump cards from a hidden pocket of one of her sashes. They responded to her will and began to swiftly orbit around her head.

"-cough- Y-Yes!" His voice was higher than usual as he jumped out of the way of a swipe aimed at his knees.

"Ok. Let's- "she narrowly sidestepped out of the way as a huge claw almost made contact with her entire body from Jurota's attempt to pounce on her. She held her hand against the sting of the graze as a few of the items dropped from orbit around her head. "Let's catch him with the little ones!"

"R-Right! -cough-"

Jurota had once again overshot his target by more than a few meters, and was desperately trying to claw his way around to continue taking them both head on. Whatever they were planning to do, they wouldn't be able to do it so long as he kept pressing his advance.

At least, that's what he thought.

He turned around to face the first person that was closest to him and was moderately surprised to see Reiko standing calmly before him at the ready.

Excellent.

She was well within his reach for multiple swipes; all he needed was to get one strong hit on her to ruin her concentration, and victory was theirs.

Jurota charged forward without hesitation and swiped low at her legs once more. He wasn't surprised by the outcome- in fact, he had been counting on it.

He had been expecting her to dodge his first attack, and he wasn't disappointed when she did; for someone with a mental quirk, she had remarkable reflexes.

However, she was now in his territory and well within range of multiple melee attacks. The advantage was his, and he would be sure to press it for all its worth.

But as his claw came to swipe down on her and land on the floor, he didn't feel the multiple tiny one-centimeter globs of glue make soft contact with his palm as she evaded his first attack.

Sure, he may have smelled the glue, but he had been smelling the adhesive scent everywhere for a while now, and he was currently focused on other tasks.

His sharpened vision may have also seen the globs, but since they were so light, Reiko was able to move them at incredible speed.

So, as he tried to follow up with his next claw attack… he suddenly found his momentum stalled.

Looking down, he saw that his claw had, somehow, become stuck to the floor…

And unfortunately for him, his first reaction was to try to pry himself free from his restraint.

As he quickly moved his other hand to assist in his freedom, he failed to notice that more of the little globs of adhesive had sped towards his other palm, and had successfully landed there.

And right at the moment his free hand latched onto his stuck one to try to release it… his free hand became glued to his stuck wrist.

Stunned and confused by what just happened, Jurota was completely caught off guard to the point where Kojiro was able to slam into him with something heavy and slimy.

Wildly looking around, Jurota saw that the gentle giant was pressing a large slab of drywall with a coat of his quirk into his side… and he was using the damn thing to wrestle him to the ground!

Realizing what was happening, Jurota tried to wrestle back as best he could with no hands and glue everywhere on his left side…

But it ultimately failed as a file cabinet came crashing into the same side that Kojiro was on, to assist him with restraining the aggressor. Kojiro dribbled out a thin sheet of glue under the beast as he was pushed onto the floor, in the hopes of attaching him there for the rest of this fight.

Eventually, the two villains somehow managed to get him flat on his stomach. Without wasting another second, Reiko began to unfurl the capture tape in midair with her powers when something streaked by and ripped the tape to pieces.

As the two villains whipped their heads around to follow the flying object streak back behind the shell of the bomb, Jurota acted while he had the chance to do so.

After all... he needed to buy his partner as much time as possible while she was worked on freeing the bomb.

In one quick and powerful motion, he got his feet back under him, put all his strength into his lower body, and heaved himself upward with a bellow.

The villains turned their attention back to their supposedly restrained captive just in time to hear the sound of floor tiles cracking and hair being ripped out. But before they could see anything, Reiko was suddenly kicked in her chest and sent rolling a few meters back.

As Kojiro rushed forward to help his partner up, the two villains continued to hear the sound of ripping fur and cracking floor tiles before a challenge was roared their direction.

"DON'T YOU KNOW, VILLAINS?! CORNERED AND WOUNDED BEASTS ARE MORE FORMIDABLE IN A FIGHT!"

As the two villains looked at the hero with his vicious, feral grin, they found themselves simply dumbfounded at their opponent's sheer tenacity. Multiple bits of hair were missing from his body, and there were various items still glued onto him, like the bits of drywall stuck to his side and the piece of tile stuck to his large palm.

He truly did look like a wounded beast… and that made his grin all the more terrifying.

Kojiro, who was running on adrenaline coming from a mix of fear and injury at this point of time, simply waited with shaking knees to see what his partner would do so that he could back her up.

Reiko merely looked on in annoyance, and huffed out her irritation under her breath. "Goodness. All this exuberance is just overkill."

She then sent the file cabinet from before straight for the back of his knees, and wasn't at all surprised that he jumped over it. As Kojiro took that as a signal to charge their enemy, she shook her head and begrudgingly rejoined him in the fray.

-(TTAE)-

The villain's attempt to restrain Jurota took much too long for either of their liking. And it had become an increasingly frustrating process (for Reiko, anyway).

After trading a few blows, the ashen haired girl would find a way to get the tiny globs of glue somewhere on his body in an effort to bind him in place.

Then Kojiro would, once again, bind the beast anywhere he could with his strength and his glue; he used everything he could, from floors, walls, furniture, and whatever else was available at that point of time.

But like a wild animal, Jurota would twist and turn to escape, ripping off chunks of his fur as he did, as well as the pieces of furniture he was stuck to.

And then the entire process would start all over, again.

Literally, anytime the two villains would take the opportunity for a breather… anytime they stalled, got distracted, or tried to split up so that they could deal with the other problem behind the shell… Jurota would capitalize on that moment with an instant of incredible power, and they were forced to bring their attention back onto him.

While they knew that Pony was probably the one creating all that noise from behind the shell, they simply could not deal with it, seeing as the raging beast in front of them wouldn't allow them to, and he simply would not quit.

But then… Jurota hit his time limit.

Instantly, while he was stuck in their seventeenth trap, he shrunk back down into his normal form, overcome and shaking with exhaustion and with huge patches of fur missing all over his body.

Both of the villains had been especially grateful that they had the foresight to create an insane amount of the tiny globs of glue, seeing as they were on their last reserves of it and Kojiro was almost dry from overusing his quirk.

As he desperately and wearily tried to wiggle out of their trap, Reiko finally got a couple wraps of her ruined tape around him as best she could.

And All Might's announcement was sweet, sweet music to her ears.

"SHISHIDA IS OUT!"

Without taking a much-needed break, the two villains hurried over to the other side of the bomb's shell as fast they could, where they were met with… an unusual scene.

Pony was crouched behind the shell, with her face locked in total concentration as her arms shakily held themselves in front of her.

Oh, and her horns were everywhere.

To be exact, fragments of her horns were everywhere.

From being stuck in the slow-drying glue of the shell, to the odd fragment sticking out from the furniture that was used to create the shell, to on the floor around her feet, her horns were everywhere. The scene was reminiscent of a woodworker covering an area in sawdust as they went about cutting and shaping wood to their heart's desire.

Especially when Pony had both of her horns in front of her, rotating at high speeds like hands on a clock. Effectively, she was cutting into the shell almost as if she were using a miter saw.

Almost as soon as they saw the scene, the two villains realized that the high-pitched whirling sound was the American's horns cutting into the various protective junk around the bomb. From the looks of things, she had a hard time bypassing some of the material (as evident by her horn fragments). But given the amount of time she had to herself, her results were nothing but spectacular.

In the time it took the villains to restrain the beast, Pony had been able to cut away a respectable two-meter by two-meter hole, which was almost big enough to get the entire bomb out with the correct movements.

Thank goodness Kojiro had placed a slow drying adhesive layer between the bomb and the shell; that layer appeared to be the only thing slowing her down.

The villain's split-second hesitation as they took in the scene was enough for Pony to notice them out of the corner of her eye, and she reacted accordingly.

The first thing she did was dive for the closest cover available as she sent both of her spinning horns after the villains.

Reiko was able to deflect the horn directed at her by batting it away with a table leg as she physically dodged to the left.

Kojiro wasn't as lucky. As he tried to dive under a nearby desk, his horn caught the edge of his baggy costume and dragged him all the way to the opposite wall, impaling him there.

Unfortunately for Pony, she had landed in a rather unfavorable spot. As soon as she popped back up to send her wayward horn back at Reiko, the telepathic girl sent the four-legged guest chair that was right next to her straight into her gut.

Reiko then proceeded to push the chair, and consequently her, all the way to the nearest wall. The legs of the chair were pushed into the wall all the way until the seat was flat against the other girl's chest, squeezing most of wind out of her body.

And right as Reiko unfurled Kojiro's capture tape and began to haphazardly wrap it around the horned girl, something blunt collided into the back of her head with a solid WHAM, sending her stunned and spinning all the way to the floor.

"THE VILLAIN TEAM WINS WITH A FINAL TIME OF 9 MINUTES AND 9 SECONDS! WELL DONE, BOYS AND GIRLS! THIS WAS AN EXCELLENT MATCH TO WATCH! WHAT AN OUTSTANDING SHOWING OF SOME PLUS ULTRA SPIRIT! PLEASE COME ON DOWN TO THE BASEMENT FOR YOUR REVIEWS! TEAMS B AND E, PLEASE GO OUT AND GET READY FOR YOUR TURN! AND GOOD LUCK!"

Collectively, all four teens let out a groan of exhaustion as they sunk to the ground.

Or… they would have, if they could.

Pony was still pinned to the wall by the chair, so she simply just sagged a little into its support. Jurota stifled a tired groan as he tried to flop himself over to his other side to no avail. Reiko sat up rubbing her head and blinking the stars out of her eyes as she tried to get her bearings. And Kojiro was the only one who was fully capable of moving, seeing as he was able to yank Pony's horn out of the wall with a little bit of effort.

As the glue creator clumsily got up from the ground, he began to approach Jurota to help him out of the glue trap as gently as he could.

When Kojiro was close enough, Jurota turned his head awkwardly to smile widely at the kind boy as he slowly undid the adhesiveness of his quirk.

"You were absolutely marvelous, Bondo-sama! I had no idea your heart was so noble!"

The gentle giant flinched slightly at the praise, glad that he had something else to focus on other than the complements sent his way. "Ah, n-no, I-I only helped Yanagi-san… I-I didn't do much, really…"

"What?! Why on Earth would you say that?!"

"I-I-I um, got in the way to often…" The adhesive around Jurota's legs were now completely undone, which allowed the furry boy to shift a little towards his classmate with a look of bewilderment on his face. "A-And Um, y-yeah… you definitely got me g-good a couple times… I-I think you might have broken a few ribs from that one swipe…"

The adhesive was now undone on the other boy's midsection, and as he sat up to absently rub his partially bare stomach, he looked the other boy straight in the face with an honest smile. "And yet, despite your injuries, Bondo-sama, you still faced me head on, like a true hero would! And I highly doubt that anyone would call what you did during our match today as 'getting in the way.' That implies you were dead weight, and I can personally guarantee you, you are not." For emphasis, Jurota gestured to the bits of glue still stuck to his fur and the patches that were missing from his body.

After the furry boy leapt up from his spot on the ground and shook the remaining adhesive out of his fur (like a dog would with water), he placed a hand on the taller boy's shoulder and spoke clearly so that there would be no confusion whatsoever. "Bondo-sama. You were truly, and incredibly, spectacular today! Please do not think otherwise, as I assure you, your actions as well as Yanagi-sama's were what ultimately led to your victory. Be proud of yourself, Bondo-sama!"

As Kojiro stumbled through his response at the other boy's declaration, Reiko had recovered enough to approach the foreign exchange student. But when she began to try to gently remove the chair with her quirk, her head, and the chair, began to wobble something fierce.

Looks like Tsunotori-chan hit me harder than I expected… Hesitantly, she grabbed the back of the chair and tried to pull it out of the wall with her own strength as Pony did her best to help.

They weren't getting anywhere, seeing as the chair was impaled deep into the wall, and this task require people with actual muscular strength to perform.

As she pulled, she called out to the males on the other side of the room, and they responded as immediately as they could.

After a couple more ineffective tugs, Pony hesitantly spoke up in a timid voice. "I sorry if I-I hit head yours too hard…"

Pausing slightly, Reiko looked at her with a royal blue eye. "It's fine. Injuries heal, and we were on opposing sides. It was bound to happen." After a couple more unsuccessful pulls, she looked at the foreign girl once more, and even though her mouth was covered by her mask, her gentle smile shone through her eyes. "I appreciate it though. Truly. And I am also sorry if this," she tapped the chair with slender fingers, "ends up bruising your body. But what about you? You looked like you were about to pass out any second…"

"Oh. Um… spinning horns really fast, really hard… And needed many horns to use…"

Reiko nodded absently as she still tried to yank the chair out of the wall. With her quirk out of commission at the moment, she wasn't really getting anywhere with it. Still, the action allowed her to pleasantly think to herself I may have found another kindred soul to look after…

Finally, both of the boys came over, and together the two of them helped remove the chair from the wall as Reiko moved to catch the girl, who was still standing on shaking legs.

"Easy there, Tsunotori-chan. I will support you- "

"Tsunotori-sama, you were incredible! You must have held out for so long, and I humbly apologize that you had to do so because of my failures."

Reiko turned to narrow her gaze at the not-as-furry boy as her head throbbed at his unwanted volume; excessive liveliness was the last thing that the four of them needed from him at this point of time. "Shishida-kun, please, have some restraint- "

"And Yanagi-sama! You used your quirk with such grace and poise that I thought you were already a sidekick for a moment- oh, my deepest apologies, did you say something?"

"Yes I did, Shishida-kun. I thank you for your compliments, but please show a little restraint. Right now, the both of you need to recover, and your excessive volume isn't exactly helping in that matter."

"Ah! Ha-ah ha! My deepest apologies Yanagi-sama-"

"- Please don't use -sama-"

"-but I'm just merely ecstatic from the fight we just finished! We all just fought so magnificently, and I just can't help but express my gratitude and respect for everyone's performance!"

Reiko, who had begun to head towards the basement and was still carrying Pony from under her arm, paused to send an irritated glare back at the lively young man as her head continued to throb. How he still had so much energy despite what he went through was just simply beyond her. And speaking of 'performances'…

"Shishida-kun."

"-and I just can't- oh, yes Yanagi-sama?"

"… Why were you the sole decoy? You and Pony could have worked together to take the both of us out instead of taking on the responsibility yourself, and the both of you would have been more successful in your attempts."

"My idea. Thought easy to cut through shell. It was not," groaned the blonde on her arm.

"We also thought that you would neutralize Tsunotori-sama's quirk with yours, Yanagi-sama. And with myself in Beast Form, we believed we had a better chance of success if we followed through with the plan we used." Jurota took on a serious and thoughtful tone as he trailed behind the two young women and Kojiro quietly trailed behind him.

"Tsunotori-chan, Shishida-kun… this strategy of yours was incredibly reckless." Reiko cut across his thoughts with a shake of her head as she resumed leading the way back. "What if we had been real villains, and there were more than two of us? Or, even worse, what if we had guns? With the two of you divided, you both could have been easily killed…"

There was a heavy silence that rang out as everybody fully processed her words.

Jurota was the first to break the silence with his sincerity. "I appreciate your wisdom, Yanagi-sama. It did not occur to me to think of a situation outside the parameters of our simulation. You have my thanks, and my respect, for pointing out our flaws."

Out of the corner of her eye, Reiko saw the boy bend down into a low bow as a show of thanks for receiving her input.

With a roll of her eyes, she simply just shook her head as she quietly dealt with the slowly dulling throbs in her mind. As she still continued to carry the tired horned girl down to the basement, Jurota and Kojiro moved to help her, the former going under her other arm and the later replacing Reiko to relieve her of the extra weight.

"Thank you, Bondo-kun. And there's no need for thanks, Shishida-kun. Just please be sure to keep in mind that there could always be something worse than whatever you believe the worst-case scenario is to be."

"And… I will admit… even if your plan was reckless, it was very well executed. Had you, Shishida-kun, been able to hold out for probably a minute or so longer, I have no doubt in my mind that we would have lost."

From under the weight of his teammate, Jurota flashed Reiko a toothy smile. "You have my thanks, Yanagi-sama. Your evaluations and insight are not only astute, but perceptive."

Reiko nodded her thanks from ahead of the trio as she turned to look at them as they continued on their journey downward. As her gaze shifted towards her partner, the same gentle smile she had before slowly grew from behind her mask.

"And Bondo-kun," Kojiro flinched at the sudden mention of his name, but he turned towards her direction regardless. "Good job today. You did well. Try not to think so negatively about yourself in the future, ok?"

"T-Thanks, Yanagi-san!"


"Alright Kodai-san, how fast do you want to win this?"

At the suddenly spoken words, Yui turned to look at her partner, her eyebrow raised partially in confusion and partially in curiosity.

Currently, she and her partner were simply waiting for their round to start. They had found a good place to temporarily hide the bomb, and they hadn't conversed much in their allotted preparation time except to explain their quirks.

Well… Juzo had talked. Yui more or less nodded along with his explanation, seemingly taking everything in stride, while giving practical demonstrations of her own quirk with the stuff in her side pouches and answering her partner's questions with more nods and shakes of her head.

Instead of talking strategy or making light conversation, the both of them simply just went straight to work finding a place to hide the bomb the moment they could. It wasn't an awkward silence in the least bit, but a focused one where both parties nonverbally agreed that there were other things to prioritize at the moment.

And up until Juzo had broken the silence with his question, that was the most either of them had communicated at that point of time.

The inquisitive stare that Yui sent his way made Juzo repeat his question, just in case she hadn't heard him properly.

But it wasn't the question itself that was confusing her, it was the way he said it. As if their win was already set in stone, and the only variable left to determine was how fast victory would come.

She blinked a few times as he patiently waited for a response, until she finally shrugged and looked away from him to continue examining the bomb.

Juzo let out a quiet breath of disappointment; he had been hoping that he could've had some info to work with besides the simple nods and shakes of her head. But this was fine. If she wasn't worried about how long it took them to-

"Fast."

Juzo looked up at his partner with light surprise at the sound of her soft response, which had been almost imperceptible (So she can speak…).

As he took a second to watch her observe the bomb and to confirm that he hadn't been hearing things, he absently noted the design of her costume.

Simply put, it was a red bodysuit paired with a white skirt and white vambraces. On the front of her chest, there was a simple white v design, and she wore a… unique hat, on her head. The hat in question resembled the front half of a baseball cap with a metal fin that went from the front of her hat to the back of her head. Accenting her uniform, she wore a simple white belt around her waist and white straps around her shoulders, and each were adorned with an oval shaped gemstone and multiple small pouches, which Juzo knew housed a bunch of tiny objects like screws, bolts, nuts, and washers.

Finally having a little bit of information to work with, Juzo decided to see what else he could get out of her before their round started.

"Ok! How fast would you like to win? Three minutes? Four?"

Yui had leisurely walked around the bomb halfway before she glanced back at him and held up five fingers.

"Alrighty! I promise you, we'll be sure to win this round in about five minutes."

"And twenty-three seconds."

Juzo blinked in surprise and was able to just barely perceive the ghost of a smile disappearing from her face. With another blink, she was back to using the neutral expression that he and the class were used to seeing. Wait, was she making a joke? Or… being sarcastic? Either way, it's nice to know she has a sense of humor.

Juzo felt himself chuckle a little at her response before he nodded along and gave her a thumbs up and a smile. "You got it. Five minutes and twenty-three seconds, on the dot."

Whether she laughed or smiled, he wasn't sure since her back was once again to him. But he didn't ponder too much on the thought; instead he asked his next question in the spirit of keeping the ball rolling. "Would you rather go on the offensive, or play a little bit of defense? I'm fine either way… but I'm not sure what you'd be up for."

Yui turned to look at her partner once more, this time with a contemplative expression.

Honestly, she was fine with either decision, but she had assumed that they were going to go with the defensive route. After all, that was what everyone else on the other villain teams did, and since they were supposed to be guarding a bomb, it only seemed like the natural choice.

But…

She idly fingered her pouches, thinking about the contents she had inside.

She was by no means arrogant, but she was proud of her quirk and its great utilitarian power, as well as the amount of control she had over it. She knew what she was capable of, and how to dance along the lines of her limitations like a ballerina…

... But she was honestly wondering what her partner was capable of.

Yui had seen the exquisite control he had of his quirk, but to say that he could go on the offensive with it?...

She had to admit, she was curious about the abilities of their class's recommendation students… especially since the both of them didn't even take the assessment tests seriously.

So, for Yui, the answer to Juzo's question was obvious.

"Let's attack."

As she looked him in the eye to verify her choice, Yui took the time to take in his costume.

He was dressed in a black full body suit and clad in a thick, orange, three-piece chest plate armor. Like her, he also wore vambraces, but his were of the same thickness and sturdiness as the rest of his armor and of the same color. He wore them not only on his forearms, but on his upper arms, thighs, and calves as well. His feet were also clad in a similar fashion but styled as boots, and he wore thick white gloves on his hands as well as white knee pads.

Juzo also had a helmet that was black with orange stripes trimmed around the chin, and housed rather thin eye slots. In all honesty, if he wore the helmet (since he wasn't at the moment), he would have looked more like a vigilante rather than an actual hero.

But the most peculiar thing she found about his costume was that he wore a big jewel encased in a bronze plate that sat over his heart. It was pretty and red, but when compared to the rest of his costume, it seemed… out of place.

As she wondered why the jewel was a part of his costume, Juzo scratched his chin and nodded along absently. Then, he asked her one last question.

"So, what do you want to do for our attack? I have a plan, but if you have one of your own, I'd be cool to do that too. Or, better yet, we could combine our ideas."

He watched her carefully as her deceptively vacant eyes made contact with his and she politely gestured to him with a simple wave of her hand. Getting the gist of what she was saying, he nodded along, hopped up from his seat on the table, and placed his helmet on his head. "Very well. Let's go on a walk then, shall we? Oh, and before we go anywhere, let's take care of our bomb…"

-(TTAE)-

Outside of the building, the two heroes were having a very animated discussion.

But in this instance of 'animated discussion', one hero was waving his arms and chattering about excitedly as the other looked like he was on the verge of a migraine.

"-Man, that last fight was wild! Shishida was all like 'rawr!' and then Bondo was all 'squelch squelch!' all while Tsunotori was like 'whirlwhirlwhirlwhirlwhirl!-"

"Yup. Sure was."

"- and Yanagi was like… uuuuhhhhh… actually, I dunno what kinda sounds she would make…"

"That's probably for the best, dude. You wanna help me come up with a plan or what?"

"Oh yeah, oh yeah! We're fightin' Kodai and Honenuki, right? Man, I wonder how our fight's gonna go! -"

"Not too terribly well if you don't help me plan this thing. I can promise you that."

"Right! Right right right! My bad maaan, when I get excited my heart and brain just likes to go 'neerrooooom!' But like I was sayin', man-"

Sen felt himself die a little on the inside as he forcibly closed his eyes.

Well… at least he has a versatile quirk that he knows how to use well. I just need to get through the next fifteen minutes or less, and this'll be alllll over with…

As he opened his eyes, he skeptically glanced at his comrade next to him, who was excitedly going over the blueprints with his vivid imagination. His costume was… thematic, to say the least.

His chest was surrounded by white armor that looked to be reminiscent of an ink bottle, but as it tapered down his torso, it exposed a black under-piece. His arms and legs looked to be covered in the same material as the black under-piece, but they were of varying lighter tones of colors instead. His hands were stuffed into thick elbow-length gloves while his feet went into boots that also looked like ink bottles, and supporting his trousers was an… odd shaped belt.

But the weirdest thing about his costume was his mask.

Simply put, his mask was similar in shape to a page of manga… and for the life of him, Sen just couldn't figure out how it was attached to his face in the first place.

Or how his mask managed to even stay on his face, since it was constantly changing shape.

Or how he could even see through the mask.

Or how he could even see, period.

Or why he even needed a mask in the first place, since his head was already incredibly recognizable.

He was brought out of his idle observations by a couple vigorous shakes of his shoulders. He looked over to see Manga pointing excitedly to an area on the map; the speech bubble (currently in the form of a couple exclamation points) had obviously said something, but Sen hadn't quite been able to hear it.

"Hm? What's up?"

"Yooooo! Why don't we try the roooof!"

"… wait, what!?"

"The roof! I bet they're be expecting us to go stomping on in from the ground floor, like 'tromptromptromp,' but not from the roof! And! We could probably find them faster too!"

"… Yeah, that's great and all, but how the hell are we going to get onto the roof in the first place?! And furthermore, how do we follow up our actions after we do that?!"

As Manga began to quickly explain his ideas, Sen found himself impressed by his comrade's cleverness. Soon, the two of them began to form a plan from those simple ideas, and Sen found himself begrudgingly approving of his comrade's wit even more.

But somehow, Manga found an issue with his own plan, as evident by his face shifting into an old school emoji frowny face.

"Ah, darrrrnnn… I completely forgot about the 'fighting' part…"

"You just leave that to me."

Manga looked up in surprise to see Sen looking back at him with a confident expression; his arm was raised in front of him and a slight zzzzttt zzzzzttt sound came from the sleeve of his costume.

It was then that Manga realized that he had been so absorbed with all the excitement of today that he hadn't properly noticed his partner's modest uniform.

Well, it certainly looked modest, but it was actually pretty sleek in design. The main outfit looked to be a high-tech windbreaker with multiple brass rings around his neck and arms. He wore a tan trench coat that he left open down the middle, and black combat boots that also sported the same multiple brass ring pattern of his neck and arms.

But on his hands were the coolest set of gloves that Manga had ever scene: pitch black, fitted, and with a thin brass blade spiraling around each fingertip and around the palm, they looked like something that a comic book villain would wear when they first debuted in a series.

Or, if you were boring, they made his fingers look like drill bits.

In the end, Manga couldn't help but nod along eagerly with Sen's confidence.

At long last, and just in time, the two of them were finally on the same page, and ready to kick some ass.

-(TTAE)-

"INDOOR ANTIPERSONNEL TRAINING, ROUND FOUR: START!"

Sen turned to his partner with another confident smirk on his face. "Alright Fukidashi, let's do this!"

"Awwww yeah, Kaibara! zzzzzZIIIIIIIIP!"

As soon as the word rang from his mouth, it came to life with a sound similar to an engaging zipline, and the words formed a straight line all the way from Manga's mouth to the roof of the building. When he felt his quirk anchor into the cement, he grabbed his partner and together they ziplined all five stories up.

It would have looked really cool… if they had actually stuck the landing.

While on the side of the building, Sen rotated his upper body and his arms to begin immediately climbing onto the ledge; as soon as he was up, he turned around to help his partner.

With both of them no longer hanging from the side of the building, they made their way to the roof access door… which was locked.

"CRACK!"

The word came from Manga's mouth like a lightning bolt, and it began to dance along the knob until a decent-sized crack splintered it into almost four pieces. Sen then activated his quirk on both of his index fingers, pressing them through the cracks in the door knob with ease. In no time at all, the door knob had been successfully removed, and the two boys clumsily opened up the door to sneak their way inside.

And then, Manga activated their stealth mode.

"hhhhuuuuuuuuuuuuUUUUUSSSSSSsssssssshhhhhhhhh…"

The words came out in a cloud-like state as it enveloped the two boys completely. As they moved, neither their boots nor their breath made the sounds they were supposed to as it became suppressed and replaced by the sound of Manga's quirk. They then began to run together through the hallways and search for the villains, the noise they created from crashing through the doors masked by the muffled silence of Manga's quirk.

They quickly and efficiently searched through every room of the fifth floor before Manga couldn't keep their stealth up any longer. As they paused in the stairwell on the opposite side of where they had come in from, Manga took a few seconds to recover as Sen kept an eye out for them.

Moments later, Manga tapped him on the shoulder and enveloped them in their cloud of stealth as they descended down to the fourth floor.

As Sen was just entering the fourth floor, he suddenly leapt back. After an eager grin, he gave Manga a nod and pointed down the hallway he had just looked with his thumb, while holding up two fingers in his other hand.

As Manga nodded in understanding and deactivated their cloud of hush around them, he prepared his throat and waited for Sen's signal to move, ready to assist the other boy in any way he could.

When Sen finished counting to three, they both leapt out of the stairwell and into the hallway. Sen began to rotate his forearms and fingers at high speeds as he ran towards the villains with Manga right behind him screeching "vvvvVVVVRRRROOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!". The words formed themselves into a sleek pattern of runner's blocks that formed under Sen's feet, and propelled the spinning teen forward at an incredible pace.

As they rounded the corner, the villains- who had been heading away from their stairwell- turned around at the sound of their quirks in action.

Juzo then promptly grabbed Yui's arm and ran away from them.

But not before Yui subtly dropped a nut into a soft patch of cement right at their feet, where it sank about three centimeters under the surface without a sound before the cement solidified once more.

Sen was about halfway towards them before they started running away. He couldn't help the grin on his face as he sped to within two or three meters away from them…

… and then he ran full-speed right into a solid, stainless steel wall, one that that filled the entire hallway and had erupted in front of him out of nowhere.

As Sen shook off his daze and spun back up from the ground, Manga had caught up to him.

"Dude, are you ok?! You just- "

"Shut up and help me break this thing!" Sen waved him off as he began to drill through the nut at rapid speeds. Manga began to chant, "crumbleCRUMBLECRUMBLEcrumble!" as Sen's arms drilled their way through the obstacle. After a handful of seconds, they had broken their way through, and they made a mad dash after the villains who had just turned the corner into the stairwell on the opposite end of the floor they had just entered.

"Kaibara! Why are we chasing them?! Shouldn't we try to find the bomb!?"

"They probably have it on them! Kodai can shrink stuff, remember!"

"Oh yeah, good ca-AAAHHH!"

"AHHHH!"

As they had begun to run down the stairs (an enlarged bolt that fit perfectly into the upward staircase had prevented them from going up), they suddenly fell right through them, landing on their backs on the stairway directly below.

"Owww… ooohhh… what the heck just happened!?"

"Ooooo… Dammit!... That asshole effected the damn stairs! Look!"

Manga looked up to where Sen had shakily pointed, and sure enough, he was looking at two teen sized holes in the stairway directly above them. "He can do that?!"

"Apparently! Come on man, they're getting away!"

As they got up and to continue their pursuit, they rounded the corner of the stairwell and saw the two villains jogging away from them down the main hallway.

Manga wasted no time, and as soon as he saw them, he cried out, "ZAP! ZAP!"

The two words took on the shape of lightning bolts as they sped towards the duo, and right as they were about get hit, Juzo had once again grabbed Yui and ushered her into an adjacent wall. The wall rippled a little until it became solid once more, and both the words harmlessly struck the area they had just been in a fraction of a second later.

Meanwhile, the two heroes quickly closed the distance towards the room with Sen in the lead.

But as the heroes entered the room, they saw the two villains slip into another wall and leave, heading towards the staircase the heroes just exited.

"CRACK!"

"Hup! Haw!"

Before the wall could completely solidify, the word had leeched into the cracks of the wall and had imploded a good portion of it before Sen drilled through, his two forearms rotating at high speed.

But almost as soon as the wall came down, Sen was being yanked out of the way by Manga screaming "YOINK!"

Sen had narrowly avoided a piece of rubble the size of a car slamming into the new hole, effectively sealing it shut once again.

"Nice save bro!"

"Thanks! Come on, they went this way!"

No sooner had Manga ran through the door and had taken a few steps back into the hall did he run straight into another enlarged nut that had also erupted from the ground out of nowhere.

As Manga fell down clutching his head, Sen began to realize Oh SHIT, they booby trapped the area! And they're trying to keep us at a distance!

Frustrated, he decided he wasn't about to play their game anymore.

Once he helped his partner back onto his feet, he led them towards the other staircase in an attempt to try to head them off before they could get out of their reach.

Now the only question was: do they go up, or go down?

He got his answer as he entered the stairwell and came to a halt; yet another expanded bolt obstructed the stairway that led downward… so that meant the villains had went back upstairs, right?

Or, were they being led into another trap?

Either way, they were going to avoid climbing up the actual stairs.

Sen suddenly grabbed a hold of Manga and made a running leap at the wall of the staircase going up. He rotated the bottom half of his body at high speeds as both of his feet connected with the wall, and he angled himself so that they effectively skidded upward onto the next level as they traveled along the walls that went up.

The effect was similar to someone not applying enough downward force when they operate a power drill, and the bit ends up 'walking' all over the place because of it. His feet even left score marks like a drill bit does on the wall face as he got to the next level.

And after they successfully landed onto the top portion of the fourth floor of the staircase, they burst into the hallway without wasting another second…

…Only for the both of them to sink up to their neck into the floor, before the floor around them immediately began to harden up once more.

"GODDAMMIT!"

"OH, COME ON!"

"Sorry guys. Don't take this personally."

Both of the heroes looked up to see both of the villains mere meters away from them, calm but ready to react if anything went wrong.

Sen merely laughed as he forced his whole body besides his neck and head into his second highest speed rotation, forcing everything to spin one way and then the other in rapid succession. They were not about to lose sight of their opponents now that they had them within melee range.

"What, do you think this is gonna stop us? This is only annoying!"

"crumbleCRUMBLECRUMBLEcrumble- yeah, what he said! -crumbleCRUMBLECRUMBLEcrumble-"

In less than three seconds, both of the boy's combined efforts to escape from their cement restraints proved to be fruitful as they were able break somewhat free, and they quickly began to clamber on out.

In that time, neither hero had really noticed that both of the villains simply chose to just wait there patiently, instead of taking the time to flee.

Neither of them had really noticed that Yui was holding what looked to be a thread in her hand as it stuck out randomly from the wall next to her.

And neither of them knew just how capable Juzo was of delicate control when it came to his quirk.

From where the villains stood, Juzo gave a subtle nod to his partner as he simultaneously softened the pit the two heroes had created into a subtle, quicksand like consistency from his boots contacting the ground. It made their clambering all the harder as the outside edges released the other end of the item Yui held.

Then, from the pit, he made a path for the thread-like item to follow. He only softened the four-centimeter-wide trail from the pit, to the wall, halfway up it, and then over to where Yui stood next to it.

No sooner had Juzo given the signal, Yui began to reel in the thread in her hand as it was plucked out of the wall, down through the floor, and around the two heroes.

With the heroes still desperately trying to get out, she activated her quirk on the object, and the thread expanded back into several wraps of capture tape.

And as both of the heroes recoiled in shock and surprise, both of the villains yanked hard on the capture tape to seal their victory.

"THE VILLAIN TEAM WINS WITH A FINAL TIME OF FIVE MINUTES AND TWENTY-SEVEN SECONDS! WELL DONE, VILLAINS! AND WELL DONE, HEROES, YOU BOY'S PUT ON A VALIANT EFFORT! PLEASE COME ON DOWN FOR YOUR REVIEWS! TEAMS F AND I, YOU GUYS ARE THE LAST ONE'S UP FOR TODAY! LET'S HAVE OURSELVES A PLUS ULTRA FINAL BATTLE!"

As Yui breathed out a sigh of relief from knowing they had won, Juzo removed his helmet to wipe the sweat off his brow. Turning to his partner, he spoke low so only she could here, an honest apologetic tone laced into his voice. "Hey, Kodai-san, you were amazing today. I'm sorry I couldn't get you the time you wanted. Regardless, thanks for working with me, and I hope we get the chance to work together in the future."

Yui merely nodded absently as she headed to help the downtrodden boys out of their pit before the words finally clicked in.

She paused for a moment as she whipped her head back towards her partner, her eyes wide.

She had been kidding when she had given the random time of five minutes and twenty-three seconds… completely and honestly joking around… and yet…

Her partner's plan of guerilla warfare had worked almost flawlessly, to the point that he had almost gotten the time she had flippantly set…

She could only blink rapidly with her mouth slightly agape as she tried to process the fact that his title of recommendation student was absolutely nothing to sneeze at.

But when her mind did finally process the astonishing information, she found that there was only one response that she could immediately make to everything he had said and done in the last few minutes.

"Huh?!"

Juzo had knelt down to the boys in the pit and offered a helping hand to the both of them, which they glumly accepted. As they grabbed a hold of him, he slowly solidified the floor around them to assist as he pulled them out. "You guys did pretty good. I almost thought we were going to get caught a few times."

"Yeah… right…"

"Seriously! It was like the two of you were a couple steps ahead of us the entire time, man!"

Juzo gave a modest shrug as the two heroes, finally out of the newly solidified pit, dusted themselves off. "Not really. We knew that you, Kaibara-kun, were going to be trouble in close combat, and we knew that your quirk, Fukidashi-kun, originates from your mouth. We just made our strategy based off that."

"Mhhmm!"

Juzo turned to look at Yui, who had just joined them after her sudden realization. As she turned to him to give him a nod of respect, he returned the gesture. Turning back towards the two heroes, Juzo once again consoled them to the best of his ability.

"Honestly, if I had been paired up with anyone else other than Kodai-san," he gestured to the stoic young woman next to him, "I doubt this plan would have worked so well in the first place. Her quirk was what won the day here, and without it I truly believe that I would have had a much more difficult time in this fight. Besides, guys, don't sell yourselves short! Neither of us were expecting Fukidashi-kun to use that zap thing, and your starting combo nearly had us. You guys did good!"

"… appreciate it, man."

"Maaaan, you guys are pretty awesome, ya know? My heart is still rushing around in my chest, like 'budump BUDUMP budump,' ya know?"

Juzo gave a quiet laugh as Yui nodded her thanks, and the four of them began to make the trek downstairs.

But before they could get too far…

"Oh hey, Kodai, do you have the bomb on you by any chance? Whoever the villains are, they're gonna need it for the last simulation."

Yui tapped Juzo's shoulder, and he nodded in response, taking the lead as the three of them followed behind. As they left the current stairwell they were on and exited through into the third-floor hallway, they paused long enough for Yui to shrink the nut obstructing their path and put it back in one of her pouches. Then, they continued to make their way towards the other stairwell at the other end of the hall, the one that the two heroes had fallen through.

As they reached that stairwell, Juzo stuck his hand in the portion of the wall right next to the doorframe that led into it, and pulled out the tiny one-centimeter sized paper mache bomb, setting it on the floor as the two heroes simultaneously lost their minds.

"Are you SHITTING me!?"

"What the actual hell man! We NEVER would have been able to find it!"

Juzo gave a hearty chuckle at their antics as Yui expanded the object back to its full size. "See? I told you that without Kodai-san, I would not have been able to pull off any of these tricks. MVP for this simulation definitely goes to her this time around."

"Yeah… no kidding…"

The four of them began to relax into a comfortable silence as they continued on towards the basement.

But as they descended down the next flight of stairs, Manga suddenly broke the silence with an excited little whisper, just loud enough for the other three to hear.

"Ya know… As awesome as our simulation was… I can't wait to see the guys that are going next! That showdown is gonna be wild!"

"Yeah… that's one way to put it…" Sen said in a carefully neutral tone.

"Mmmmhmmmm…" Yui nodded along in agreement, her eyes slightly furrowed.

Juzo chose to not say anything to Manga's comment, as Manga excitedly began to predict what he thought would be the outcome to his quiet audience.

Although he did agree that the next fight was going to be something spectacular to watch… he couldn't help but hope that the fight never happens in the first place.

He wasn't quite sure if the building- or more importantly, the students- could survive the aftermath if it did.


AUTHOR'S NOoOoOTE!

So, first thing's first, the news.

Because of Corona, work is going to become hectic for the next few months. (Thanks, Corona...) This means that, for a while, I'll be working some long hours, which means less time will be spent on this story I have come to love. Also, for the other piece of news, I am 100% out of rough draft material for this story. That means that, from here on out, my progress is going to be slow, at least until I can get ample rough draft material stockpiled to the point where I can continue my usual pace of writing.

But just because life has given us a double whammy, doesn't mean that I'm not gonna be stopping my writing anytime soon :)

But now that the news is outta the way... how'd you guys like the chapter? Which was your favorite fight? Which character did you enjoy reading about? I'm dying to know, because, unfortunately... I am a perfectionist at heart. Info like this helps me get better, so please, don't be shy!

Here's a little fun fact for you guys: other than one pair who I chose specifically from the get-go... everything you read was the work of a bunch of dice rolls! (d20s for partners, d10s for matches, d6s for match order, then odds/evens for villains/heroes) A little weird, I know... but I think I like the outcome!

And again... I am profusely sorry about the original chapter. It was a bit much on the word length...

Also, if you're wondering why some costumes are a little different, keep in mind that 1) the student's continually upgrade their costumes, and 2) the student's have winter forms for their costumes (as displayed by Yui's lack of leggings and Reiko's lack of a fur lined kimono)

I wonder if any of you could catch the Black Clover reference...

Guys, again, thank you so much for all the love, and the support, and the patience, and just... everything! I promise, I will continue doing my best to get the chapters out at a reasonable pace, and I hope each and every one of you can stay safe and healthy until I do. Take care, and I'll see you guys next chapter!