Death

by tmb1112

Death is a Quirk that can only kill. A perfect Quirk for a villain, but what if the boy who manifested that power just wanted to be a hero? Enrolling in U.A. might not be enough when all your Quirk can do is kill people. Follow Zach Sazaki from his first day in Class A on a story that spans years, as he learns to be a hero, finds out more about his Quirk, and too much to summarize!

58. Chapter 58

A/N Hey everyone! Just wanted to say thanks for reading this story so far, and I hope you enjoy the longest chapter ever in it as we continue the Sports Festival! Back in America after 6 months of studying abroad, should be able to keep up my schedule and posting these as often as I can!

Disclaimer: Still don't own Boku no Hero Academia

Chapter 58:

At the top of the mountain in the middle of the U.A. Sports Festival stadium, Momo Yaoyorozu stared over at Zach Sazaki's back. Her eyes widened at the sight of the side of his face while he looked out off the edge, his eyes focused on something even though there was nothing out where he was looking, his smile wide and reassuring despite his scars. Zach, she thought, not even feeling that disappointed as she stared his way. What are you looking at?

"Fifth place! Team Monoma and Shiozaki!"

"Haa ahh, haa ahh, I thought Class A, was supposed to be better?" Monoma started calling out from in between Midoriya and Zach. They looked in towards the blond boy whose hair turned back to normal right after he dropped down on the ledge of the mountain, his green-haired partner by his side. Ibara Shiozaki looked a little hesitant as she lifted a hand for Monoma's back like she wanted to tell him something was wrong with what he just said, but she just lowered that hand and shook her head sadly.

"Is there actually, something wrong with him?" Kirishima wondered between panting breaths. He turned to Bakugo, but his partner was still glaring across the mountain towards Zach who finally laughed and said something to Monoma about how Class A had the top four teams. "So we didn't get first in the first round," Kirishima said, and he patted Bakugo on the back. "Let's crush 'em in the second," Kirishima said, clenching his other fist in front of him. Bakugo darted a glare at Kirishima as he wanted an undisputed first place, but he hummed afterwards and thought back on what Aizawa mentioned earlier. Aizawa sensei said about how last year there were two solo events, like there wouldn't be this year. Second round's going to be more like Cavalry Battle again, but different, harder…

"Yow! And they keep on coming in!" Present Mic shouted as teams started rising over the edge in rapid succession. "One after the other we've got Team Iida and Shishida in sixth! Team Mineta and Asui in seventh! Then Tetstutetsu and Honenuki!"

"He didn't say our place number," Honenuki said in a disappointed way to his gray-haired partner.

"Rrrg," Tetsutetsuo shook his fists in aggravation as they were one place too late. He turned around, then to his partner and said, "Think you should let them out now?"

Honenuki glanced back and off the side of the mountain, then he shrugged and stopped using his Quirk that he had used to get past two other teams on the final stretch right at the end. Those two teams came out of the ground they had sank into while already exhausted, and the four of them turned towards each other before starting a mad scramble for the top of the mountain.

"Only two minutes left!" Present Mic shouted, and the two teams running for the top of the mountain, struggling to make it up the steep slant, started rushing even faster. They were both struggling, and they both wanted to use the handholds Tetsutetsu left for them by slamming steel hands into the sharp slant earlier.

"Wait! Let's just go one by one. We can all make it."

"True, not a lot of teams there yet…"

The two teams about to start fighting came to an understanding, and still with a minute and a half left they started climbing up intermittently. One of them from one team went first, then one from the other team to ensure they didn't try betraying each other which they agreed to without ever saying it aloud.

"Team Sero and Ashido!" Present Mic called out, making other teams around the mountain rush more as places seemed to be filling up.

Ashido fell down to her knees with her legs pointed out in either direction after making it there. Sero put his hands down on his knees while panting on Kirishima's left a few feet away, and Kirishima turned and said he was glad the two of them made it. Sero groaned and then muttered, "No thanks to you- well, okay a little in part thanks to you." He leaned straight up and stretched back, letting out a long sigh before swinging around his left arm that had some pain in it.

"Could have not made such a huge blast after we beat the Ants though," Ashido said, her voice annoyed as they and the other groups who had helped Bakugo's team wound up getting left behind.

"Team Shoji and Sato take tenth place! Then Team Aoyama and Tokoyami right behind them! Under a minute left- YOW! That last Ant just won't give up. Everybody try your best! OH! YOW! And Team Ojiro and Hagakure sneak up to victory, and Team Kendo and Awase behind them!" Present Mic's commentary was getting louder and quicker together as the timer ran below half a minute, down to twenty seconds. "Another team from Class B with Kamakiri and Tsuburaba! Fifteenth place we've got Team Kazumi and Sahara, and with ten seconds left three teams are rushing the final dash to the finish. Everyone else still on the metal section, RUN! SEVEN SIX- There it is! Team Jirou and Koda make it with four to spare! Three! TWO! ONE!"

A loud buzzer went off, then Present Mic screamed, "AND ONE FINAL ENTRY!" Everyone gathered on the summit panting or talking to others who just arrived looked towards the eastern side where another couple of hands grabbed onto the ledge like the first place team had done when they arrived before. Zach and Kaminari smiled wide as they looked over towards two of those hands, and they jogged over to them as they were pulling up.

"Nice, you made it," Kaminari said as Kuroiro lifted his head just over the top of the ledge.

"Team Kuroiro and Shinso reached just inside the time limit!" Present Mic shouted. Zach's eyes widened a bit and he darted his gaze to those other hands as Present Mic continued. "Which brings our total teams to seventeen, and total number of passing students to thirty-four! Guess we'll go with that number for the next round! Ya-HOO!"

Wonder how many they would have let in? Midoriya thought. He was looking off the side of the mountain with some pity at a couple of Class B students who were only fifteen meters below the summit and collapsed with disappointed and heartbroken groans. The boy with dark, curly green hair turned and looked around the summit at the thirty-four of them who did make it up there. Everyone from Class A made it this time, Aoyama too! Midoriya smiled as he looked over towards the boy with the navel laser who was grabbing at his stomach at the moment, but had a smile on his face just like his dark partner next to him. Tokoyami said something to Aoyama, and the blond boy held a thumbs up before trying to straighten his body out.

Kaminari helped Kuroiro up to the summit, and Zach stepped next to them and reached down his left hand despite the soreness he felt in his arm that got a lot worse with the final pull to the top. The boy with spiky indigo hair having a harder time pulling himself up after climbing the steep cliff already, lifted his gaze and looked into Zach's eyes. Shinso's eyes widened, and Zach just looked back into them before lowering his left hand more for Shinso's right.

Same hand he knocked me out with last year, Shinso thought, then he lifted his right and clasped it with Zach's fast as he could not hold on for long with only one. Zach pulled him up hard and Shinso was only a little surprised by the fact he did not have to drop to his knees first to get up. "Thanks," he said after a second, then he let out a deep breath and lowered his dirty and ragged hands to his knees like Kuroiro was doing next to him.

"Hard time getting here?" Kaminari asked, feeling a little smug at the question himself.

Kuroiro rolled his eyes while keeping them thin and narrowed, then he lifted his gaze up to Kaminari and said, "Todoroki made it harder to climb at the start. Didn't get up there in time to 'jump.' Didn't even make it before there were Ants moving around again."

"You guys still made it though?" Zach asked in surprise, as it sounded like there were multiple of those robots between them and the other teams who had made it through during the gap.

Kuroiro nodded his head to the right at Shinso who straightened up again. "Got enough others to distract the Ants to let us get through," Kuroiro said.

"Oh yeah," Shinso said, muttering it in a tired voice as he was exhausted from the sprints and climbs. He cancelled his Quirk, though the people he had used it on still down below were distracting non-moving robots that had all froze as soon as the timer ran out. Four Class B girls and a couple of support department students near them blinked in confusion, then they realized what they had done and dropped their jaws while spinning to the summit. Thinking about who they had responded to in panic, what that boy's Quirk was that they remembered from the past year, and the fact that they could see his back up at the edge of the summit closest to them confirmed what they already knew to be the hard truth.

"Damn it," Komori muttered, bowing her head more so her already long bangs were sure to cover her eyes.

Yui Kodai put a hand up through her black hair and let out a long exhausted sigh, then she shook her head around and turned to look at the leaderboard behind her and a little lower in elevation at the top of the bleachers. "Who from Class B did… alright," she muttered. She hummed to herself and scratched the side of her head, "Guess that's okay. Less people total made it to the second round this year too."

"Though if we had made it…" Reiko Yanagi began softly. "Never mind," she finished as her friends looked in towards her.

"Hey, half the class ain't bad," Tokage said, shrugging her shoulders. The girl with long curly hair then turned her head and called over, "You guys are from a support class right? Nice job making it this far up."

The disappointed girl and guy from the support department actually smiled at that. Everyone knew the gap between the hero classes and the others was big, but it was only going to be larger after a year of intense training in the hero course. "You guys are probably the farthest ones up from your department," Kodai agreed as she looked over towards them.

The girl who smiled their way shook her head after that, losing her smile a bit while turning to the leaderboard again. "Looks like Sahara made it," she said. The girls from Class B looked at the screen too and down to the fifteenth place team of Sahara and Kazumi. "She's in Class H with us."

"And she teamed up with Kazumi after all," the boy from Class 2-H added to his classmate. "Those two's Quirks really do work well together."

At the top of the mountain, Shinso turned after straightening out, looking for someone whose name he heard called before. He spotted the taller guy with broad shoulders and a brown goatee who he started walking towards, and Hiro Kazumi turned to the spikier-haired teen coming his way. "Damn, you made it again Shinso," Kazumi said in a disappointed way, tssking before he said it.

The two of them were not in the same class, and Kazumi said to the boy he barely knew, "I'm going to be the star of the general studies' department this year."

"Are you now?" Shinso asked.

"That's right," Kazumi replied.

"In that case, it looks like we're going to wind up fighting each other," Shinso said. And after this casual conversation, you will not feel it strange to speak when I mention how we are fighting for the top of the general department. You didn't even hesitate to answer my question. Shinso had to stop himself from grinning before he turned away from the other student standing next to a girl he had not seen before.

The girl much shorter than the bearded teen with her leaned up next to her boyfriend and whispered something with her hands cupped to her mouth. Her partner opened his eyes wide and darted them back to Shinso's back as he headed away, and Zach lifted the left corner of his mouth in a smirk as he spotted it. That girl's from the support department? He wondered as he looked at the girl with dark red hair pulled back into a ponytail. His eyes darkened as he knew there was a reason he had been staring over there, and the focus of his gaze on her hair made it clear to him. Geez, smile and focus. Sports Festival. People's eyes are on me right now.

"The rest of you, might want to get off the mountain… Or, well there are elevators under the ground." Present Mic's voice confused most people at the stadium and watching on tv, but it straight up scared the people all over the mountain who were tired after their twenty minute climb. Loud clanking sounds started filling up the stadium, and everyone standing on top of the mountain stumbled around and had to steady themselves, right before the summit started descending.

The entire mountain started sinking back into the ground, and a few panicking students from general studies who never made it very high tried jumping for the edges of the base that they had been running down towards. Only a cluster made it there and those were the ones already heading down disappointedly before Present Mic said anything. They sat there at the round edge around the mountain and got smirks on their faces as they watched the other scared and panicking students sinking down beneath the surface.

"Keep your heads on straight," Mother Russia called out, flying down on the mountain and yelling at the students who never made it to the top. "There are underground exits and elevators. You're on television…"

Little did Mother Russia know at that moment, all the televisions had gone to commercial break. Present Mic continued calling out as the mountain kept sinking, "We're taking a quick break to set up the arena for the next event! But there's not going to be a siesta between the first and second rounds to prepare if you were looking for some time to relax, winners!" Present Mic yelled. The group of thirty-four at the summit turned their heads and looked towards the commentators' booth they had almost lowered down to the equal level of. "Hope you aren't too tired from climbing the mountain, because round two is coming right up!"

As people started murmuring to each other both on the summit and in the stands wondering what the teachers meant and how much time they would have, someone called up to the summit towards the back of a tall boy in Class A. "Hey Sero! Little help!"

Hanta Sero turned and walked to the ledge behind him only a few feet away. A couple of guys from Class B looked up at him and then glanced down again at the dark pit they were descending into. It was going to be a long trek for them down the mountain once the floor closed back in, and Sero hummed as he thought about helping them out. Mic did just mention that there was not going to be a big break between rounds though, and he was trying to relax during the break.

"If you're above the ANT section of the mountain, don't move down. The floor will close in right above it," Mother Russia called out as she flew up the slope of the mountain again. A group of students who had almost made it and were trying to get to the summit instead of going down relaxed themselves at the sound of that. A few teams who were on the steel section started jogging up instead so they would be above the surface when the floor closed instead of stuck walking down the whole mountain.

Sero grinned a smile that covered the bottom half of his face with his big teeth and shrugged down at the Class B guys who just sat down where they were and started waiting. Then the dark haired boy in Class A turned as he heard a funny call to his left, "Hey! Could I get my shoe?"

Mother Russia looked down towards Denki Kaminari who was missing his right shoe and had a really dirty sock on his foot. Ashido looked towards him and her eyes widened before she called out, "You got here first without one of your shoes?"

"It's Mineta's fault," Kaminari said, looking over towards the short boy who smiled smugly after hearing that.

"Serves you right," Mineta said, while trying to pull the Pop Off balls from Tsuyu's back. They had been sticking there for a while already so their adhesiveness had gone down, but they were the first ones he pulled off all day and he was struggling to get any of the four off. "Leaving us behind, like that, after we teamed up," Mineta said while struggling harder to pull the balls off. Tsuyu got him up there so he didn't want to leave her with them stuck on if the next event was starting right away. Tsuyu was actually looking over her shoulder in some surprise as Mineta struggled to pull the Pop Offs away, something she never actually asked him to do.

"Hey, we all made it, right?" Zach said as he heard Mineta's complaint and walked over. "Oh, that doesn't look..." Zach noticed what Mineta was trying to do, and he had an idea after trailing off. "Tsuyu, you mind if your clothes get a couple holes in them?" He pulled off his grappling gun and pointed at the sharp prongs sticking out of the barrel.

Mineta's eyes opened wide and he stopped pulling away, nodding towards Zach and sticking a thumbs up at him. Kaminari looked over wide-eyed too at Zach's bold suggestion, then Tsuyu hopped towards him and nodded her head. "Don't want Mineta doing it," she said, and finally Zach's eyes widened a bit too as she was telling him to cut them off.

Man I wish it was Mineta though. If I touch the Pop Offs on accident I'll get my hand stuck. "Okay," Zach said, "don't move though, okay?"

"Don't be afraid to cut a little extra off- ow!" Mineta got smacked in the side of the head by Tsuyu's tongue, and Kaminari and Sero started laughing at him.

Then Kaminari looked back up towards Mother Russia who never responded to his question from before. "So about my shoe..."

The mountain stopped lowering after the steel section lowered completely below the normal elevation of the arena. The walls on the outside started closing back in to their normal positions, but the students who were over there did not need to worry about falling into the hole, as the edge of that outer circle started closing back in on the summit still protruding from the ground. Only the steepest section just off the summit and the flat peak itself were still above the surface level, and some of the students started looking around to try and figure out what the next event was going to be with this strange setup.

A few teams jogging up the metal part of the slope slowed down and collapsed as the floor closed in above them. Lights turned on beneath the thick closing floor above the mountain's slopes though, illuminating the lower section and pointing arrows towards the elevators they could use to return to the aboveground part of the stadium. As soon as the floor clanked to a shut around the top edge of the steel section, a big timer of ten minutes appeared on all four big screens at the top of the bleachers in each cardinal direction. The contestants still panting and catching their breath at the top of the mountain stared at that ten minute countdown with wide eyes. Mother Russia called down to Kaminari while the blond was gawking at the timer too, "You can get a new shoe."

A medical station stuck out of the wall on the south side of the arena. It was a long white counter with some bandages on it and not much else. After Mother Russia told Kaminari he could get a shoe, she called out, "The second round is starting now!"

"There's really no break?" All Might whispered, a nervous look on his face as he looked down towards Midoriya who was struggling to stand on one of his injured legs.

"You ever get a break out there?" Snipe wondered to the man next to him who sighed but then shook his head. "Though I'll say it," Snipe added while looking around the group on the summit. "They could sure use one after that."

"What's the second round?" Kirishima called up to the woman in a tight red costume who seemed to be taking a dramatic pause for some reason.

"Split yourselves into teams of two to four," Mother Russia called out. "The second event, is King of the Hill!" The summit beneath the contestants' feet flashed blue light with a ripple that started in the center of the peak and expanded out to its edges. Those standing at the edge and looking off saw that the blue light did not continue down the slopes around them. "The match will take place over five minutes. At each ten second interval the summit will flash blue. You and all your team members must have both feet on top of this surface in order to receive the five points for that interval."

All of the students started doing math in their heads, but Mother Russia continued before most of them could get it, "There are a hundred and fifty possible points you can receive. Only the top four teams will move on to the next round. You have just over nine minutes to prepare," she said in a thick Russian accent, her voice getting more serious at the end. "Use your time wisely." She turned and started flying up.

"H-Hey," Kaminari called up before she could get too far. "I thought you said I could get another shoe?" Mother Russia kept flying up, and she did not say anything else while crossing her arms high above the summit.

"That's it?" Sero muttered, scratching the side of his head and then rolling his shoulders around. Good thing I'm not too tired from the first round. Not like those guys who were fighting from start to finish, Sero glanced towards Kirishima and Bakugo who still looked worse for the wear.

Midoriya lifted a hand up to his mouth and started muttering into it fast. "With this competition it seems like having more people on your team would be better, but if all four members need both feet on the ground at each interval... and it's not just about how long you stay on, since teams could get up there only for the ten second mark and get their points just to hide back off the summit. It also takes into account the actions of the previous round, similar to the first one last year except it's not based on points just how tired each member is..."

"Deku," Uraraka said, straightening up and smacking her cheeks a couple of times to ready herself. The girl with a cut on the left side of her face continued, "I'm going to go to the medical station over there. It doesn't look like we're getting any help."

"That's right," Midoriya whispered in agreement, darting his gaze up to the commentators' booth that was oddly quiet at the moment for Present Mic being in there. They gave us that station but didn't say anything. Some of us are bleeding and they didn't mention what to do about that.

"Hey Bakugo, you going to be alright?" Kirishima asked as he saw Bakugo's hands shaking at his sides. "You used a bunch of big blasts, right?"

"Shut up," Bakugo said, and Kirishima nodded as that was as much of a 'I'll be fine' as Bakugo would give him. "Come help stop the bleeding," Bakugo added while turning and jogging off towards the medical station. Kirishima looked at him in surprise for that, but Bakugo technically didn't ask for help so it didn't seem that strange to him.

Bakugo lifted an arm and wiped some blood from his face that was getting in his eye. He noticed Kirishima jogging after him, then he lifted his head up as Present Mic started calling out, "Uh uh uh! No repeats of partners there Team Ashi-ro!"

Sero and Ashido snapped their heads up to the commentators' booth after they had just nodded at each other in agreement to stay on the same team. Zach's eyes widened and he spun to Kaminari, then he shrugged after his blond friend looked at him in surprise too. "Good luck," Zach said, then he turned and started jogging off. They were pressed for time and there was not much else for him to say.

"Huh? Huh?!" Kaminari watched Zach go, then he snapped his head back and forth as different partners were splitting up all over the place. His eyes widened even more, then he spun and ran to the side of the summit and called out, "Hey! Class B guys!" The two who were walking down the slope and almost at the bottom at the flat level of the arena looked up towards Kaminari. "Either of you size eleven shoe?!"

"Damn Bakugo, guess we're fighting this next round," Kirishima said, though he just jogged faster and up to Bakugo's side. "So let's get your head wrapped faster so we can go make teams."

"I don't need your help," Bakugo said, and Kirishima glanced at him in surprise. Bakugo grumbled since he had just told Kirishima to assist him a few seconds ago, and he just muttered, "We're not on a team anymore."

"Well, I think I might've gotten nicked by one of those robots too," Kirishima said, and he just picked up the pace towards the station right in front of them. "So let's do this fast." Bakugo grumbled some more but decided not to waste time arguing when he really could use the help.

Zach started looking around at the top of the summit for a new partner. There were less than eight minutes left and he still did not know who he wanted on his side. Aizawa started speaking while everyone was looking around for new partners, "The most important aspect of the last event was how quickly a team realized the need for cooperation with other groups. The teams who managed this the best were Sazaki and Kaminari's, and Todoroki and Yaoyorozu's." Zach glanced up for a second towards their homeroom teacher's booth, but he shook his head around and got back to looking for a partner fast. "With a lower number of students making it than the maximum we would have allowed, the order of arrival didn't matter at all. So despite their placings at second and third, those two teams that fought the Ants for the longest are the worst off."

Bakugo grit his teeth in more annoyance, then snapped at Kirishima who finished tying off the bandage to go get a team of his own. Bakugo ran back towards the summit himself, and he saw a group of others looking towards him and calling him over to make teams with each of them. Despite looking pretty beat-up and with a bandage wrapped around his forehead, not many of the others considered it a huge disadvantage as long as it was still Bakugo.

On the other hand there was Midoriya, who was trying not to let his limp show as he looked around at the other competitors. He was grinding his teeth hard behind his lips, such a frustrated look on his face as he thought about what Aizawa just called out. I missed the point of the event completely. I was too focused on getting first, making myself stand out, and I got Uraraka hurt too during it. I thought with my speed and strength I could get through the robots even seeing how strong they were... he looked around and he was starting to get more panicked as he saw Sato and Shoji look his way, then turn the other direction and run towards a returning Bakugo to try and join his team.

Everyone knows I injure myself too often. They don't want to risk it! Who can-

"Hey Midoriya, want to team up?" Midoriya spun with his eyes opening huge, his worries starting to vanish. He froze though as he realized who the voice belonged to at the same moment as he turned. He stared behind him at a boy two inches shorter than him, with black hair, and a scar under his right eye going across his face.

"Zach," Midoriya began, and he stared with wide eyes at the other boy for a few seconds. Then his fists clenched at his sides and even his hurt right leg straightened. I can't. I need to stand out. I need, even if I know it's going to be hard just to make it in the next round alone, I need to get first! And not just first, but a first where it's my name people see. If the first place from the last round gets it again but with another partner, or if it's Zach at all... "Sorry," Midoroya said, and Zach's eyes widened at the response. "I can't do it," Midoriya said.

"Okay then," Zach spun and jogged off. He was surprised, but he quickly reminded himself that more important than asking 'why' was finding someone who would be on his team. He darted his gaze around and then smiled wide as he saw who he was looking for, leaving behind Midoriya whose mouth was left open as he had prepared an explanation for Zach. Midoriya shook his head around to stop thinking about that, and he nodded in agreement with how quickly Zach moved on, looking around himself for a new partner.

"Yo Jirou..."

"What are your Quirks?" Bakugo snapped at the three Class B students also trying to team up with him like his own classmates.

"Hey Bakugo!" Bakugo turned his head, and a smirk spread over his face at the sight of the short person running back to the summit.

"What do we do Kazumi?" Sahara asked her tall boyfriend next to her. "Without our love combos, will we really be able to make it to the next round?"

"The top four teams make it in," Kazumi whispered down into her ear. The short girl with a red ponytail opened her eyes wide, then she nodded at the boy from general studies who she met exactly a year before at the last Sports Festival. "Tell your teammates too," he whispered to her, then they nodded and ran off from each other in different directions.

Under five minutes, this is bad, Zach darted his gaze around, skimming right over Yaoyorozu's team of four he was disappointed to find her already in. She had been apologetic towards him and he could see she even considered breaking off to join up with him, but he didn't want her to do that considering how good her team actually looked. Kirishima, Tsuyu, and Tokoyami. Dang, and Kaminari teamed up with Jirou so I can't join up with her now. Running out of good teams... and no way Bakugo lets me join up with him, probably for the same reason as Midoriya.

Zach looked towards Todoroki, then he grimaced as he took a step only for Todoroki to shake his head at him. Holy crap, Zach thought as he looked to ether side of Todoroki at his two teammates. A group of others who just left Bakugo disappointedly all spun towards Todoroki too as they saw the only two members at his sides. As they started running over though, Todoroki shook his head and said they weren't taking anyone else.

Guess it was a good move not to join with me, Zach thought as he saw Midoroya standing with Iida and Todoroki. The guys who beat Stain together. Even with a hurt leg, I know Midoriya well enough to know he'll still make it, and I guess those two do too. Bakugo sent everyone else away with only Uraraka on his team... Him! Zach started running towards the big group who were arguing with each other.

Shoji broke away from Sato who he could not team with, and who he didn't want to keep struggling against about joining the others' teams. Mineta convinced Shiozaki and Kendo to let him join their team, saying he could stick people's feet on top of his Pop Offs and they technically wouldn't be touching the ground at the intervals. Monoma and Tetsutetsu joined up, and Tsuburaba grouped up together with Kuroiro. Shishida growled at the spiky-indigo-haired boy next to him but then nodded his head reluctantly at the guy who brainwashed him the year before to join a team. The fact that Shinso asked instead of just forcing him into a team made Shishida realize they all wanted to win, and he forced himself to look at the positive aspects of joining with Shinso.

Zach jogged past Sato and the short girl from the support course who he purposely kept his gaze away from, and he jogged to the tallest boy in his class who turned seeing him come over. "Shoji?" Zach asked, a hopeful look on his face.

Mezo Shoji glanced up at the tv screens that had the time limits on them down to four minutes. He looked back down at Zach who he had heard already was not going to use his Quirk during the tournament. But he won the last round anyway... "Do you have a plan?" Shoji asked.

"You're like a tank," Zach said. Running out of time. Really need this to work out! "So I think it'll be tough for people to force you off your feet if you plant down hard enough. And I'm going to be trying to knock other people off the ground at the intervals."

"You want me to be defense?" Shoji asked in surprise and some confusion. "Why don't we both stay near an edge and try keeping-"

"I'm betting the first thing Todoroki does is put up a wall around the outside of the summit," Zach said, darting his gaze over towards the person most people in their class considered as the strongest. Shoji looked over too and he focused on the three who were huddled and planning something. "And if we're not farther in when that happens we'll be pretty screwed. Even if we don't get caught in the ice, just being stuck outside it is bad enough-"

"I'll join your team," Shoji said, interrupting Zach as the timer lowered down close to three minutes. A relieved look spread on Zach's face, then he listened seriously and nodded his head at what Shoji continued with. "I'll work on knocking people up too though. I have to keep moving anyway or Todoroki will freeze my legs and force them off the floor." Both of them knew without saying anything that knocking people off the ground was as important as them staying on themselves. Neither of them had the best mobility, so running around for five minutes straight did not seem like it would work, especially on the square summit that was not all that wide for thirty-four people being on it.

"We can rely on Bakugo blowing apart any large sheets of ice Todoroki tries covering the surface with, and Todoroki has to make sure he doesn't freeze the ground below Midoriya and Iida too. He has to be precise," Zach theorized. "He's on a team with people with a lot of mobility, so they are probably going to use that…"

Other teams were planning around the summit as the timer lowered down to two minutes. Mother Russia was not saying anything else about starting points, and Present Mic just started calling out teams based on where the contestants were atop the mountain. "And the last two teams, Team Ojiro and Kazumi, and Team Hagakure and Koda are formed! With just over a minute left, what kind of strategies are these students going to make?! All of Class A, half of Class B, a couple from general studies and one from the support course!"

"Breaking up the platform when it's this small already is only going to hurt us," Jirou retorted to her partner. "We've just gotta keep people away from us. Hold this area."

"Alright!" Kaminari agreed as that idea sounded solid to him.

"And if you zap me..." Jirou started threatening, making Kaminari take a big step away from her back with a small laugh.

Zach looked across the stage for the second event at his last round's partner. Kaminari used his electricity twice, the second time in a big attack stretching a wide area. He didn't go as strong as he could though knowing there were people around the area who might not have jumped, as well as preparing for the charge to still be there when they landed. Mineta convinced those Class B girls to let him join easily, but neither of them saw how many of his Pop Offs he was throwing at the Ants towards the end. Before I shot away with the grappling gun I definitely saw him slowing down, and he looks tired still even though he wasn't climbing at all. Still need to be careful of the Pop Offs, wish I had a glove over my left too... Zach glanced at his right hand and the double black gloves over it. He had his usual one beneath as well as one the school made him use whenever training with others, just a little thicker so he still barely noticed its presence.

"You focused?" Shoji asked as he saw where Zach was looking. The timer hit thirty seconds and the larger boy noticed other teams around the area looking around at their opponents now instead of each other.

Zach clenched his right hand into a fist and nodded his head once, smiling and looking at Shoji to show he was in it. People are watching. The whole Sports Festival, they're going to be watching me. Keep it together. Keep up appearances. Make everyone here know, I'm here. Make Shigaraki feel like a fool for failing to catch me. Make my mark, to make a difference, to make what I say matter. Zach bent his legs and his right hand lowered to his side and hovered over his grappling gun. So I can make a change in this world, for the better.

"Ten seconds left people! YOW! Look at them. Ready for battle! Ready for war!" The crowd started cheering louder and louder as Present Mic hyped them up.

Mother Russia lowered down and she called down to the students, "I will be referee. Do not go too far or I will remove you. Win."

"THREE! TWO! ONE!" Present Mic finished the countdown and everyone in the stands kept cheering. He did not call out 'Start' or anything, the timer just vanished and a new one with 5 minutes on it started counting down on each of the screens.

No one moved. 4:59, 4:58, 4:57... The top of the summit was silent with all the contestants darting their gazes around at the people around them, each of them daring someone else to make a move. 4:55, 4:54... the audience started quieting down, people getting confused as each of the students in blue uniforms stood there waiting for something. Some of them started to think that nothing was going to happen at all, and they would all try getting close to the 150 points before maybe fighting each other at the end.

Tsuyu croaked softly, "Gero." She held the shield out in front of her as did Yaoyorozu at her back. Kirishima crossed his arms and used Unbreakable, and Tokoyami covered his body in Black Ankh to give himself a strong defense as well. Then all four of them started sinking into the ground at 4:52. Their heads all started spinning the same way to see Juzo Honenuki smirking towards them from seven meters in front of Tsuyu's shield. Ashido grinned behind him, then she yelled out and stumbled to the side as an ice wall rose up next to her. One of her stumbling feet got caught in the ice and lifted off the ground at 4:51, the same second Bakugo blasted himself forward with his feet skidding across the floor. He shot towards a couple of Class B teams not far from each other, and he waved his right arm in front of his body with explosions blasting towards their feet, making some of them step or jump backwards.

A ding went off at 4:50, and a blue ripple went off across the surface of the summit. As the ripple went under Bakugo and Uraraka's feet, a green circle flashed under their bodies. Red circles dinged out beneath people on the rock surface even if they had both feet down like Honenuki, if one of their members did not have both feet down as Ashido did not. Green circles appeared beneath Iida, Midoriya, and Todoroki's feet inside the ice fortress suddenly cordoning off a section of the peak.

Zach and Shoji got green circles beneath them, as did Jirou and Kaminari not far away from them. Unfortunately, a group of teams with Class B students started rushing their way after missing the first five point distribution. Those groups were mixed with two others who had gotten points at the ten second mark, and all four teams were heading for the pairs of Class A students. Do we try teaming with Kaminari and Jirou? No, they're going to be good enough without us at keeping people off them. We need to move. "Let's run," Zach said, and he darted off to the right, while keeping an eye on Bakugo behind those teams he was not chasing after. Bakugo had ten seconds, and he was using all of them to blast through the ice fortress that was looking to give the team inside a sure shot at getting into the final round.

Ashido swung Acid down at her feet quick enough to melt ice and get out of the way of a charging Bakugo, then she had to dive out of the way of her flying partner who was slammed back by an extended black arm coming off Tokoyami's body. Dark Shadow swept a hand at her too, but Ashido flipped backwards and then cartwheeled away to avoid the creature of darkness coming out of Tokoyami. When Honenuki was thrown back, the team he sucked into the floor with seconds until the first interval emerged back out of it, and they were all frowning as they had seen the red circles appear around their knee levels a few seconds ago. "Let's move away from him," Yaoyorozu said as she saw Honenuki getting back on his feet not far away from them.

Yaoyorozu lifted up a Russian doll and she tossed it in the air towards Honenuki who looked about to try and sink them into the floor again. Ashido looked up after landing a flip, then she spun to her partner and yelled, "Close your eyes!"

Honenuki did not realize what was happening, and he did not have good enough chemistry with the pink girl from Class A that he would have an immediate reaction. His eyes did clench shut though, but only after the flash grenade popping out of the splitting doll went off.

Zach and Shoji had their heads pulled down and eyes clenched shut, and they opened them back up hearing the Class B students behind them yelling out. Behind those students they looked back at they could see one of the big screens showing two seconds until 4:40. Zach fired his grappling gun that he replaced the hook of before the round, and he yanked up after wrapping a blunt hook around Monoma's right leg. Monoma started falling, swinging his right leg back down hard, but the ding went off first and he grimaced as his leg was still up unlike the first ten second interval. His body turned to steel right before he would have hit the ground on his back, and he quickly got back to his feet while Zach pulled back his hook and turned to keep running with Shoji.

"Don't want to fight them," Zach said as he saw Shoji looking hesitant like he thought they could take the two pairs of Class B teams chasing them. Mineta and the Class B girls he was with had gone after Kaminari and Jirou, as did Shinso and Shishida. Kuroiro and Tsuburaba were right behind Monoma and Tetsutetsu, but the two of them just got their first five points to put them at the same level as their classmates. The four of them ran after Zach and Shoji who just reached ten, keeping them tied for first with a half dozen other teams.

Zach did not want to check the scoreboard this quickly, but his eyes darted up and then immediately shot across the summit towards the collapsing ice castle. Bakugo accepted not getting points as long as it meant they didn't either. Neither of them have ten.

A tongue wrapped around Zach's left foot and yanked him off the ground. He swung up in the air, and he called out, "Shoji don't!" His teammate about to rush Yaoyorozu's team to try and free Zach paused, and Zach pointed his grappling gun straight down so the hook was right on the tongue around his foot. Tsuyu's eyes opened wide as did Tokoyami's next to her. When Zach pulled the gun, as they both thought he might, they predicted he would aim down at her and fire to which Tokoyami would block. Pointing it point-blank against Tsuyu's tongue with how fast they knew it could shoot was crazy, and Tsuyu unwrapped her tongue even though she realized as soon as she let go how fast she was swinging a defenseless Zach through the air. Four seconds! Zach aimed the gun away from the tongue he bluffed at shooting with a completely serious look on his face, and he fired down towards Shoji who rose his left arms up seeing where Zach was aiming.

Shoji let the hook wrap around his left arms, then he pulled back himself and jolted Zach back through the air towards him. Zach shook his head at Shoji, but the taller boy caught him instead of letting Zach try to land himself, and the time hit another ten second interval while Shoji was trying to quickly lower Zach to the floor. "Close," Shoji said with a disappointed tone.

"Thanks," Zach said, surprising Shoji who thought he might complain about missing the points they would have gotten if he landed himself. If I hurt my legs this early in a match like this, we'd be screwed. I should have thought about that earlier, but Midoriya doesn't actually have the best mobility right now. Todoroki making a good defense while the team as a whole still has the ability to move is the best strategy. They're tied up with us again. Zach turned his head and he pulled his grappling hook to unwrap it from Shoji's arms. The two of them faced the students right behind them who had just caught up and were moving on the attack.

Didn't want to fight them. We'll just hurt ourselves, Zach thought, though he kept a confident look on his face as he sidestepped the right steel fist passing his face. He reached up under Tetsutetsu's right arm and popped him under the armpit, but he grit his teeth as even just that still hurt his left hand, and it looked to have no effect on the steel boy. He grabbed under Tetsutetsu's arm instead and pushed up while running forward and ducking. He avoided Tetsutetsu's second punch by running by his right side, then he just let go and sprinted right by his opponent's back.

Zach ran forward and his eyes narrowed on a figure running after two girls taller than him with bigger strides. Three... Zach heard Tetsutetsu call after him to stop, but before the short boy in front of Zach could turn, a hand grabbed him by the back of his blue uniform and threw up in the air. "Ahh!" Mineta yelled as he was tossed into the air by Zach's left hand. He flipped himself as he rose though, and he reached up to his head yelling, "You'll pay for that!" Zach had his right arm lifted and he fired while still running forward away from a steel boy he could see chasing him out his peripheral vision. A girl sliding away from a charging Sato did not see Zach's hook until the wire was wrapped around her. Zach spun to his right, using Mina's momentum while she started turning his way.

"Whoa!" Mina shouted as her feet pulled off the ground. Zach planted his feet and spun while grabbing the grappling gun with both hands and locking the length of the wire. Not long enough to hit him with, but if I time it, Zach pressed a button to retract the wire as Ashido melted through the hook lifting her, and he dove to the side to avoid the first purple balls flying down at him. He tssked as he rolled, as Tetsutetsu was able to stop short and avoid running over the sticky balls on the floor. One thing did go right though, as Ashido focused more on landing before the ten second interval about to hit, and she didn't realize Zach had thrown her right in the path of Mineta's attack.

Mina twisted her body as she got stuck by three balls, and she swung both arms behind her to create an Acid Veil using her super move. It dissolved so well that even Mineta's other Pop Offs did not make it through, though when she landed the ding came a second later to Zach's disappointment. Then he grinned as he saw the red circle beneath her, only to snap his head down with wide eyes as his own red circle appeared. He spun, but Tetsutetsu was no longer attacking him either because of the red light under him too. They turned back to see both Shoji and Monoma had jumped up in the air and were coming down after the interval.

"What are you doing?!" Tetsutetsu shouted back. Zach darted his head around though and he spotted the one he was looking for not far from his own teammate.

Zach pointed his grappling gun he shoved a new hook into and muttered, "Sorry Shoji." He fired and slammed the second blunt hook into his friend's shoulder, making Shoji lean to the side and start shaking his head around a second later. He spun towards Zach in confusion, then Zach called to him, "Don't respond to Shinso!"

Shinso frowned as he ran off, and he turned to Shishida and said, "Sazaki's team still has more than us. Think you could get him off his feet?"

Shishida nodded and dropped down on all fours, turning his head and growling in Zach's direction before starting a sprint over. "Tetsutetsu," Zach said, talking to the boy in front of him who was running towards Shoji and Monoma who were still standing near each other, though Monoma was standing still waiting to jump at the next ten second interval. The gray haired boy in front of him with a silver coating over his body glanced back at Zach, and Zach said loud enough for Shoji in front of him to hear, "You two want to team up with us?"

"Not a chance," Tetsutetsu snapped. "We're making this through with all Class B's!"

Zach nodded, then he turned to Shoji and motioned with a nod of his head off the summit. Shoji reached next to him and grabbed Monoma, shaking him out of his brainwashing with a strong jolt of lifting him off the ground. Tetsutetsu's eyes opened wide, and Monoma started turning his head to the six-armed teen hoisting him up with ease. "You should turn into steel," Shoji said, then he tossed off the side of the mountain and Monoma shouted in panic before steeling himself.

"Damn it! MONOMA!" Tetsutetsu shouted, running towards the edge to look off. He swung his right arm out towards Shoji as he ran by, but Shoji jumped backwards and then planted his feet down hard right before the timer reached another interval.

"More than a minute down," Zach called to Shoji as green circles binged beneath their feet with the ripple of blue light. He darted his gaze over to the scoreboard, Twenty five points. Oh man! Kaminari and Jirou at the top with forty?! That's all of- He spun his head to the right just as Shoji and a bunch of others did, as Midoriya was up in the air and just swung a kick from a distance towards the two who had been untouchable so far. The gust was so strong that they were each thrown from the summit, and then as Midoriya's eyes shot open wide at how far the drop was considering the steepness of the mountain, a cement wall rose up beneath the falling teens and softly lowered them down as they fell on it.

Cementoss dropped Jirou and Kaminari down on the flat floor before the start of the slope, and though the two of them were grateful they did not crash down much harder, they suddenly realized how much worse this was than they first thought. "Get back up there!" Jirou shouted, and she started running forward before reaching up and trying to climb using natural handholds in the wall.

"Didn't realize… how tough this was," Kaminari added as he tried to find a spot to climb up himself. He had relied on Zach for getting up this part, and Jirou had relied on Koda, and both of them were climbing the top of the mountain for the first time. Jirou glanced at the boy who was slow on saying that, and she pursed her lips as now was not a time to laugh at Kaminari's half-stupid-looking face with a scar above his right eyebrow.

"Snap out of it and climb faster," Jirou shouted to her right, reaching up herself and climbing with a frustrated and worried look on her face as she heard a ding up above.

Mineta had landed and recovered, Ashido melted the attached Pop Offs from her body, and Zach ran towards them both as they ran towards him. Shoji jumped back from Tetsutetsu who planted his feet and shouted behind him for Monoma to hurry up the mountain, which he was doing faster than others who were thrown off, making his own handholds slamming his steel hands and feet into the rock wall. Mineta, Ashido, and Zach were about to reach each other, with the pink girl and short boy nodding at each other at the final moment before both turning their heads to Zach who got them with his last attack. Zach's eyes narrowed and both fists clenched while his grappling gun was down at his side, and he started stepping side to side while speeding up even more, confusing his opponents who could not tell where to attack with their long-distance moves. Then all three of them flew up in the air with a gust of wind slamming into them so powerful it knocked the wind out of Zach.

Zach winced then snapped his eyes open as he heard Shoji calling up to him. He looked back and saw the edge of the square summit getting away from him. He was spinning through the air, and he saw Mina yelling out in panic not far from him. Mineta was pulling off Pop Offs from his head fast, and he threw them down at the ground he was falling towards to try and bounce off of. For Zach and Mina though, there was Cementoss who lifted a soft wall of cement that they hit and got cushioned by as it dipped down for them. Cementoss lowered them to the ground, then Zach started sprinting forward without saying a word to the pink girl next to him a few feet away. He pointed his grappling gun towards the top of the mountain ahead, and he yelled, "Shoji!"

Shoji was already running to the edge, and Mina gawked at Zach's back she started chasing a second too late, as Zach flew back towards the summit. A ding went off while Zach was in midair and he grit his teeth with a dart of his eyes towards the scoreboard again. Midoriya's jumping up after each interval, and he can move around through the air much easier than running around. He only has to touch at each ten seconds. So he'll be up in a second. Zach saw Midoriya jumping, and he saw Monoma reaching the top not far from where he was about to land. Zach hit next to Shoji whose wrist he had wrapped the hook of his grappling gun around, and his eyes widened more as he saw three different groups running by in front of them between them and Midoriya.

"Shoji, push down on my shoulders," Zach said, right before Midoriya leapt in the air and pulled his left leg back.

Shoji's eyes widened a bit, then he nodded and pushed down on Zach's shoulders which hurt the shorter boy but made him grin as the gust slammed into him. He felt it so strong he thought his feet might be thrown back anyway, but both of Shoji's feet pushed up behind Zach's heels and kept him planted. To their right, Monoma and Tetsutetsu stayed planted down too, though their steel feet skid back almost to the edge they were pushing away from. Kamakiri and Awase flew between their teams, but the other two teams who were between them and Midoriya did not fly off the ground. What is… Zach's eyes focused on the two he recognized the least of everyone there. Those two teamed the first time. Don't know what department they're from, but their teams are together…

Midoriya also looked down towards Ojiro and Sato, and the two who they were each partnered with who they had held onto to keep their feet planted on the floor after his kick. His main focus shifted back up towards Zach though while the teams between them continued running off, not wanting to stay near the boy kicking people away with only strong gusts of wind all the time. There were already a dozen people off the mountain currently climbing up the steep slope, and Kaminari and Jirou's team dropped more than ten behind the lead as they kept climbing.

Zach wanted to focus on Kazumi and Sahara whose powers confused him, and whose teams he noticed on the leaderboard were both still high up. He also thought Midoriya might still be focused on him, but he said, "Shoji, run away from me. Try to stay on the ground and don't answer Shinso again."

"Alright," Shoji said out a mouth appearing at his top right hand. "Good luck. Stay in sight."

Shoji let go of Zach's shoulders and the darker haired boy started running to his left. Midoriya was intercepted by Bakugo a second earlier while he was focused on Zach, and Zach saw that which gave him the chance to run off. "Listen for my voice," Zach added with a shout over his shoulder, and Shoji nodded as he ran the other way. Monoma and Tetstutetsu looked back and forth at the two splitting up, then Monoma told the boy next to him they should just plant their feet down and try to gather more points instead of fighting others for the moment.

Zach sprinted straight forward, then he darted a quick step to the right, then left, then he jumped up in the air. The taller and hairier boy with the Quirk Beast who had been charging at him darted his eyes back and forth behind his glasses when Zach made his sidesteps. He was on all fours and he rose his arms when Zach jumped towards him with all his speed behind him. Zach started lifting his left leg like he was going to swing it around for the side of Shishida's head, then he yanked his right leg up in a single movement. He bent his leg and slammed a flying knee into Shishida's face while the Beast boy's eyes were darted to his right at Zach's still-lifting left leg. Shishida's head snapped back and his glasses flew off broken, blood splashing from his nose, then he snapped his head back down furiously and growled while slashing both hands at Zach.

Zach was already dropping, but he curled and fell into a roll he sprinted out of and dodged the ice that hit where he had been, and Shishida still was. The flying knee that made the other boy stumble back while slashing at Zach disoriented Shishida enough that he didn't even see Todoroki's ice coming, and it lifted him off his feet right before the bing that made a green circle appear under Zach's feet. Keep it up Shoji, Zach thought, while sprinting faster to dodge the ice that came out of the trail holding Shishida in the air, while the boy from Class B behind him started clawing at the ice near his feet. It's slow, Zach thought, and he made to dart to the right, only to dive to the left in a roll as the ice sped up towards where Zach was supposedly changing his direction.

I can't dodge him forever, Zach thought as he came out of his roll only to see two trails of ice cutting at him from behind and on his right. He darted his head to the side and saw Midoriya flying through the air towards him, and he jumped up in the air and yelled, "Shoji!" He pointed his grappling gun he whipped out towards the tallest boy on the summit who lifted his right arm and spun towards Zach. Zach fired towards Shoji's arm, and this time he did not retract after getting the hook wrapped around him. "Swing me!" Zach yelled, then turned his head towards the one he wanted Shoji to throw him at as he was starting to come down.

Shoji looked over and thought, You're crazy. He swung his arms so hard though that Zach had to bring his left hand over too as he felt the gun almost get ripped from his grip.

Zach's arm muscles strained as he shot through the air the opposite direction as Midoriya, then he heard the curly-haired boy behind him yell, "Todoroki!" Midoriya could not waste an attack on Zach, as the interval was in two seconds and he would not land by then if he kicked first. Todoroki was aiming his ice all over the place, but he had been focusing on Zach anyway and his eyes opened wide as the boy he was attacking suddenly came flying towards him with a whip of wire swinging him that way.

Zach stuck both legs out getting ready for a double-kick into Todoroki's side, and he yelled, "Let go!" Zach retracted the wire and the hook right before Todoroki lifted his left hand at Zach. Zach pointed the gun at Todoroki, then just like he did at the capture the flag game, Zach fired the hook at his opponent. Instead of blocking with ice this time though, Todoroki just leaned to the side as he saw it coming, then he clenched his left hand over the gun that Zach threw at him after firing. Before he could start melting the gun as he expected Zach thought him would though, Todoroki lowered his left hand and rose his right towards Zach's legs kicking in front of him. He grabbed Zach by the left leg, then Zach's left fist passed in front of Todoroki's face he pulled back at the moment Zach was flying by him.

Zach bent his elbow the instant his fist passed in front of Todoroki's nose, and his elbow slammed into the other boy's cheek even as Zach winced in pain from his left leg covering in ice. Zach kept falling with a lot of momentum and he hit the ground and rolled after passing Todoroki, but Todoroki was lifted off his feet by that elbow, stumbling backwards so his left foot was off the ground when the summit binged with blue light. Both of Zach's feet were on the ground though as he rolled across the floor at the moment of the blue light's passing, and even as Zach screamed out in pain he had his eyes open and saw a green circle appear below him. It's too early in the match, he thought.

He stopped rolling and winced in pain while flipping himself onto his stomach. He planted his hands down below him and then pushed up onto his right leg, glancing down at his left that some ice broke off of as he rolled but still felt insanely cold and frostbitten. Zach turned his head and looked back towards his grappling gun that Todoroki dropped when he was elbowed in the face, then he quickly shot his gaze off of it to look at Todoroki who he saw turning to him. Don't look at it. Pick it up when no one's looking. Zach turned to the right and he started running, wincing with every step of his left foot as half of his leg was still half-frozen. Who's in first? Those guys!? Zach spun his head around looking for them, the same time Midoriya was doing the same instead of chasing after Zach as he saw Todoroki had that covered.

There, Midoriya thought, and he dropped down in front of Sato and Sahara, and Ojiro and Kazumi. He lifted up his fists in a fighting stance and narrowed his gaze at his own classmates, right as Bakugo dropped down on the other side of them, and Yaoyorozu's team of four was running their direction. The two from the support and general studies classes reached towards each other and the tips of their fingers got close with grins on either of their faces, then a half dozen attacks went off at the same time and sent the four people in the center of the teams just below the top two flying. A bing went off and made green circles appear under Midoriya, Bakugo, and Yaoyorozu's teams feet, then Midoriya jumped up and swung two kicks towards the four they sent flying with their attacks. He separated the Sahara girl and the Kazumi guy before they could do whatever it was they had done to get themselves so high in the first place, then Midoriya yelled out in pain as he only just started turning back for Bakugo to slam him with a double-explosion in the side.

Todoroki's after Zach- Shoji spun his head and he crossed all six of his arms at the sight of the boy shooting towards him with jets coming out of his calves. Iida changed directions fast and curved around Shoji's side, and he jumped up and kicked for the bigger teen's back. Shoji got slammed by a kick, and he winced, but he spun around afterwards and reached for Iida's leg. Iida pulled back quickly though and then jumped back and faced his opponent with a serious look on his face, pushing up his glasses with one hand.

"Iida," Shoji said, narrowing the one eye showing out from beneath his white bangs at the class representative.

"Shoji," Iida replied, and he bent his legs with blue light shining out the back of them.

The ground beneath them lost its solidity, cutting off Iida's Reciproburst as Honenuki dropped them into the floor. "Kaakakaka! Two of the top five at the same- WHOA!" Juzo Honenuki shouted in panic as he was suddenly flying off the ground after a touch in his back turned into a push.

"What's going on?!" Tetsutetsu shouted. He and Monoma had been holding on well with the new strategy of just standing still and using the Steel Quirk to plant their feet in the floor. The two of them were rising up in the air now though and had no way of coming back down, just slowly lifting up and a bit to the north without any sign that they would be dropping soon.

"Tetsutetsu, throw me," Monoma said, reaching out an arm towards his teammate rising just within his reach if Tetsutetsu reached as well. The blond next to him covered his body in steel again, then he finished, "I'll knock out the Zero-Gravity girl and drop you down. Get back to the summit as fast as you can."

"Yaa!" Tetsutetsu agreed with a shout, reaching his hand and grabbing Monoma by the forearm firmly. He swung his arm the other way, and with there being no gravity on either of them, he sent Monoma flying down like a rocket, though he was also sent flying in a different direction and spinning around as he had nowhere to plant down before swinging like that. Tetsutetsu's cheeks puffed out and he grimaced with a disgusted look on his face as he did cartwheels through the air.

Uraraka was reaching for her next opponent, when an explosion went off over her head. "Watch it!" Bakugo shouted down, while Monoma went flying off to the side instead of into the summit near Uraraka. She spun her head and saw the boy covered in steel flying towards the stands and a group of people who started panicking, and Uraraka had to put her fingers together and drop everyone she was holding at once. More than four groups just missed an interval though, some of them two, and Bakugo smirked as he saw teams still dropping as another bing went off around the summit. He had shot himself down a second early, and he fired explosions back beneath him after the green light appeared under his feet.

Bakugo looked towards the scoreboard, and he turned his head back and glared towards a black-haired boy who just dove away from an ice spike rising at him.

Shoji and Iida were running towards each other, and their eyes opened wide as the ground below them blinked blue with neither of them ready to slam their feet down from their mid-runs. They brought their legs down fast and came to sudden stops, but either they did not do it fast enough, or they had teammates not touching. Both checked the second option even though they knew that seeing the blue light while their feet were off was almost a sure sign they had been the ones at fault since the light flashed over the summit in a single second. After they looked around though, their eyes widened at the sight of their teammates, and both of them ran off without saying a word to the person they had been fighting.

Midoriya-kun!

Shoji was sprinting the opposite direction as Iida, darting his gaze up and left towards Bakugo and then right at Todoroki. What I get for teaming with the number one from the previous round, Shoji thought, then his head spun farther to the right and his eyes opened wide.

Zach jumped back from Todoroki, then he spun his head to the side and saw Bakugo flying towards him. He twisted his body in midair and swung his left fist forward a bit, only to swing his right instead. It was a double-feint, but Bakugo saw it coming too since it was Zach's right fist he was punching after the first feint, and Bakugo ducked under the left fist that started speeding up and swinging down at his chest, then he pointed a hand at Zach and fired an explosion while still far enough that it was not point-blank and might destroy him. "DIE!" Bakugo yelled, even though it was not meant to kill, and he sent Zach flying back in an explosion that got cut off by a spike of ice a second later encasing half of Zach's body.

Bakugo landed and spun towards Todoroki as green lights appeared under both of their feet, and Zach shivered while in a lot of searing pain stuck in an ice spike not far from them. The green circles that just appeared beneath those other two tied his team up with Zach and Shoji, while the teams of Kazumi and Sahara dropped ten below them and fifteen under the top now. Yaoyorozu, Kirishima, Tsuyu, and Tokoyami's team was five down from the three facing each other in a triangle, even though Zach looked unable to compete with the others. Jirou and Kaminari's team was fifteen down, but they were also fifteen down at the last interval which showed they had just made it back to the top.

Jirou darted her gaze to the leaderboard and saw them tied with the two teams who had risen to the leaders after they had dropped off. Even though they were tied with Kazumi, Ojiro, Sato, and Sahara though, they were still only tied for sixth place with four other teams. First place now, five above all those monsters, Jirou looked to her right past a panting Kaminari and towards a team she never expected to be in first. Those Class B girls are smart though. I know Kendo's reliable as the class rep and keeping Monoma in check, and Shiozaki shocked me at the final reports, but damn if it doesn't bug me that Mineta's in first. And look at him.

Mineta's smug look was not just unappreciated by Jirou's team. A group of others tied for sixth or tied for eleventh place only five down from sixth were all glaring towards Mineta, Kendo, and Shiozaki who had a strange setup going for them. Shiozaki had green vines sticking up in a semicircle around them near an edge of the square arena. Mineta had put a wall of Pop Offs behind him, things that he would bounce off himself in case Midoriya swung a kick in his direction to try and send him flying again. He was smirking wide and rose a hand that he rubbed beneath his eyes, clearing any blood from them though there was not a lot considering how good he was feeling. His own mood accounted into the effectiveness of his Pop Offs, and boy if he didn't feel good right now. Kendo stood closest behind Shiozaki's vines that rose like cage bars intermittently around them close enough that no one could get through but spread out enough that they could see all their enemies. Kendo's hands were large and held out to her sides, and she was ready to swing them forward to create gusts of wind to push others back if they needed. Shiozaki was also prepared to make their wall thicker if need be, several of her vine-like hairs whipping around at her sides ready to plant more, while Mineta held up Pop Offs he was ready to throw at whomever rushed them first.

That's, Jirou thought, while five other teams attacked the first place at once. Kendo swung her arms, using her own strong gusts as a combo with Mineta's throws to send his Pop Offs at enemies even faster. Two of Shiozaki's vines shot up out of the rocky ground surprising a team that was fastest, smacking Ashido and a pretty banged-up Honenuki backwards before they could reach their opponents. Ashido's Acid she was in the middle of throwing at the vine wall went flying straight up instead, making other teams around them run away for cover from the acid rain about to come down.

Kyoka Jirou bit down and she said to the boy next to her who finally caught his breath, "Get behind me. This is about to get a whole lot crazier." Jirou planted both of her hands down on the ground in front of her. She was close to the edge of the arena anyway, and Kaminari scrambled back with wide, somewhat blank, eyes as he saw what she was about to do. "We're the only ones getting the solid ground now," Jirou said, even as she sounded nervous saying it. "Here goes nothing."

"Can't you go Nightmare just for a second?" Shoji asked Zach, while he pounded away at the ice holding Zach in place. A huge explosion went off behind Shoji that he ducked forward away from, and Zach rose his arms to cross his face in protection. Zach lowered his gaze again and glared at the ice beneath him that did not melt much quicker despite the heat he just felt on his arms from Bakugo and Todoroki fighting it out.

"Even if I wanted to now," Zach said, while swinging his grappling gun that Shoji had brought over to him and smashing its hook into the ice like an ice pick. He chiseled some more off and Shoji pounded some more away, then Zach continued in a strained voice as he pulled at his legs that were encased in ice but not actually frozen as Todoroki was not trying to really hurt his classmates. Zach still winced in a lot of pain as he spoke though, "I managed to convince them, to let me use this grappling gun, by telling them I wasn't going to use my Quirk." Zach kept chiseling away faster, and he said, "So I can't just-" The ground on either side of Shoji's feet dipped down as a crack split between his legs, and all of the ice surrounding Zach broke apart too.

Ashido and Honenuki yelled out in panic as they tried planting their feet on shifting ground at the next interval, while two teams suddenly freed from Honenuki's Softening Quirk found themselves in even more trouble as they fell to the sides. Awase and Kamakiri who had almost climbed back to the summit after their soft fall (thanks to Cementoss) to the bottom, found their handholds vanishing as Jirou shattered the entire summit of the mountain other than a small section on the east side.

Tetsutetsu was about to start climbing up the sharp slope again, but instead of dropping his jaw like most others, he just grinned and started laughing before running up a slope that got easier to climb. Present Mic was shouting out commentary the whole time, but he yelled, "WHAT?!" after the summit tore apart. "ALRIGHT! Standing on any piece of what used to be the summit, I guess still counts?!" A bing happened a second later, and only five teams were all holding on and able to get the points there. Tsuyu grabbed onto each side of the broken chunk that had just stopped moving beneath her, Kirisihima's feet were planted hard and he had all five fingers of his right hand dug into the floor between his legs to hold himself there. Tokoyami's Dark Shadow grabbed the sides of some rocks around him and had them pulled together under him, and Yaoyorozu finished sticking together several pieces that never fully broke apart before she dumped fast-drying cement into the cracks. They were the only team of more than two who managed to still be grounded at that bing though, as most of the others had lost their chances.

Uraraka slowly pulled herself up to her feet while lying on a chunk of the mountain's summit she had flattened out on for safety. She saw the red light beneath her while her legs were sticking off, and she turned her head as she heard Bakugo yell towards her in annoyance as they dropped down to third place. "Bakugo!" Uraraka shouted, having an amazing idea after she thought about what Present Mic just said. "Come here!"

Bakugo shot himself over with a semi-annoyed look on his face that she was telling him what to do, then his eyes opened wide. He tssked and bit down with a frustrated look, but Uraraka said, "It's a good idea, isn't it?"

He said, "Shut up and do it." Bakugo flew towards her and dropped down on the same small rock surface she was on. Uraraka made it weightless, then she touched herself and Bakugo too, right before Bakugo put his hands down on either side of the small rock and blasted below them. A dozen nearby groups spun towards the middle of the cracked and tilted and broken arena to see what looked like a backwards-flying meteor. Bakugo pointed his hands above him and made smaller explosions once they were above the top of the bleachers, and he adjusted with a few more explosions until they were not moving at all. "Hmph," he grunted while Uraraka relaxed and leaned forward to look down at the match below and for any opponents who might try coming for them.

Uraraka glanced behind her at Bakugo who also started looking down but off the other side of their floating island. He had one hand down on the ground beneath his legs, and Uraraka did the same so she would not accidentally fly off the platform. They each stayed crouched while watching their opponents, Bakugo aiming a hand down with an explosion ready for anyone who was going to try something, and when the next bing came at the surface it made green circles appear beneath both of their feet. Neither knew how it worked, but grins spread on both their faces as they knew after that and at the sight of their opponents below that they were on a path to make it in for sure.

No one on the broken-up ground of the old summit was focused up on Bakugo or Uraraka. Staying grounded on a piece of mountain that they knew was actually the top of the summit just became a lot harder, and most of them would not be able to reach the other two if they tried. Midoriya landed near Todoroki who was forming an ice slope towards Iida down in a crack and calling to him to rush up. "Forget about Bakugo," Todoroki said after Midoriya mentioned what the other two's new plan must be. Todoroki frowned with a glance up himself, then he said in a lower voice, "They'll make it in the next round for sure with that, and you're the only one who could stop it. But with this we get Bakugo out of the way."

Midoriya started nodding, and Iida agreed too as he arrived and realized what they were discussing. Most of them were surprised Bakugo would go along with a plan that would keep him out of it, especially with almost half the time remaining in the battle, but if all those sixty-five points were guaranteed than it was clear the team already in third would either still be there or more likely be at a higher position by the end. Green circles appeared under Iida, Midoriya, and Todoroki the same time the first circles appeared below Uraraka and Bakugo. The three of them stood on a wide section farthest from the side of the summit Jirou stood back straight up on with Kaminari behind her. Between their groups were more than twenty others struggling to hold together sections, standing on slanted rocks, or climbing out of cracks in the ground that they kept falling into.

Shoji lifted Zach up and placed his friend on the ground, then he looked down at Zach's legs and said, "You alright?"

Zach reached down himself, and he started rubbing his hands up and down his legs that he was barely finding the strength to stand in. Rubbing his arms that fast hurt his shoulders and biceps too from everything he did the last round, and he was just in almost constant pain now. He darted his gaze towards the leaderboards and said, "We're in fourth right now. But we're tied with two other teams. What does that mean?"

Shoji looked towards the board himself, and he saw their team tied with Ojiro and Kazumi, and Yaoyorozu's team. Bakugo and Uraraka were five up, just five below Midoriya, Iida, and Todoroki's team. And that team was only five below Mineta's team still taking the top of the leaderboard. Shoji's eyes also looked down below the three teams tied for fourth, and he stared at Shishida and Shinso, Monoma and Tetsutetsu, Sato and Sahara, and Hagakure and Koda who were all tied for seventh. Kaminari and Jirou were another five below them, tied with Honenuki and Ashido, and Sero and Aoyama.

Mezo Shoji narrowed his eyes at that nearest screen then glanced back towards Zach who turned away from the leaderboard himself. "It's very close," Shoji said. "What do we do from here?"

"Just over two minutes left," Zach whispered fast at Shoji, darting his gaze around at other groups all setting themselves up after that ground-shattering move that caused a break in all the action. "Most teams aren't going to focus on first place, since they'll doubt ability to pass over them. They'll go for the ones in fourth," Zach said. He turned his head and said while lifting back up his grappling gun and baring his teeth through the pain in his legs that he bent, "That's why we need to go for first, and drag everyone after us at Mineta too."

"Let's go," Shoji said, reaching next to him and grabbing Zach by the back of his shirt. He jumped forward towards another broken rock surface then to the next one and put Zach down, letting Zach not have to jump those first two while letting him get situated as they neared the best team. Zach grinned as he started running forward after Shoji, as in the corner of his eyes he saw one of the other teams tied for fourth with them had the same idea. Mineta's not so far in the lead that they're impossible to knock down. Only fifteen points up, means that within thirty seconds we can tie it up as long as they're not here.

Would a tie in fourth place mean that both teams get to move on? Yaoyorozu wondered as she and her team jumped forward across a bigger crack in the summit than all the others, and a few of them had to steady themselves on a slanted piece of rock before running again. There could be a tiebreaker, but the maximum number of participants to make it through this would have been sixteen if all of the top four teams had four. The lowest number would have been eight, so considering that and the aspect that it seems Bakugo and Uraraka will make it in- Momo Yaoyorozu stopped thinking about the future, and she lifted her hands in front of her chest where a hilt started coming out of a shimmering light above and between her large breasts.

Yaoyorozu pulled out a machete, Tsuyu hopped to the left and avoided a green vine shooting up between some cracks, and Kirishima sprinted forward through a gust of wind. Zach ran behind Shoji, letting the taller and more muscular boy who was built like a tank take Kendo's wind she was creating with her huge hands straight on. Shoji got hit in the crossed arms by a couple of Pop Off balls, but only two, and he called out of a hand appearing on his middle right hand, "What's wrong Mineta? Tired already?" A hand appeared out of Shoji's top right hand, a whole arm stretching out behind it to let Shoji's new hand reach down to his elbows while he kept his arms crossed, and he yanked the Pop Off balls off of him with as much pain as tearing off a Band-Aid.

Zach pointed his grappling gun with the blunt hook on it again, he only had one of each kind now, towards the vines and fired between them at Kendo's leg. A vine whipped around and smacked the hook away, even as Yaoyorozu cut through other vines on the other side. A bing went off, and all three teams got green circles beneath them, but that made the two teams tied for fourth more upset as the team in first kept their lead over them. They heard teams shouting behind them, more of them closing every second, and Mineta's team was desperate to force them back into those attackers. That meant the fourth placers had to push forward the rest of the way fast. Tokoyami's Dark Shadow knocked vines out of the way, and Tsuyu and Kirishima leapt through, only for huge fists to slam forward. Kirishima blocked and Kendo winced as her punch felt like she was hitting something harder than a steel wall, while Tsuyu's tongue wrapped around the other punching fist and flipped her over it.

Shoji grabbed the vines and pushed two away, and he bent down forward for Zach who jumped up a bit onto Shoji's back. Shoji straightened up while Zach lifted his legs again, and Zach rose over Kendo who had Tsuyu all over her, and then over Shiozaki too who lifted her head at the last second as she was desperately trying to keep up a vine wall thicker outside of Kendo now. Zach landed behind Shiozaki and a foot from Mineta whose eyes shot open wide while he was tugging at his Pop Offs with weak pulls of his arms. "You used too many the last round," Zach said.

"You told me to," Mineta started complaining, but Zach picked him up by the front of the shirt despite the protest. Shiozaki's vines shot out of the back of the summit, out from beneath a crack below their large section on the opposite side as Jirou and Kaminari's solid one, the two largest ones in the arena. Zach was not aiming for off of the mountain though, and he tossed Mineta back towards Shoji who kept four arms pushing Shiozaki's vines to the side. If the girl with green hair could focus all her vines on the muscular six-armed boy, she might have been able to wrap him up, but with another team of four trying to attack her and swarming Kendo, she was split in her focus and only realized what was happening after Shoji caught Mineta with his top two arms.

Shoji spun around and started sprinting away while holding Mineta over his head, pulling Mineta's arms down to his sides as he ran. A bing made green lights appear under Zach and Shoji's feet, but Kendo had just tossed Tsuyu up, and even with Dark Shadow pulling her down fast she did not reach the ground in time for her team to get points. And that left Zach in the corner, with the two from the team now tied for first in front of him starting to run away to try and catch Shoji, and the other four with them no longer caring about that, as they needed to get back tied for fourth again.

"As long as he's not touching, the rest of you will move up," Shoji called out at the groups he ran towards who suddenly had second thoughts on attacking a guy most of them doubted their ability to get off the ground anyway. Instead, their attentions turned to Shiozaki and Kendo who made it away from Yaoyorozu's team, only to be blocked by teams tied for sixth and eleventh, and wanting to move up. On Shoji's right past some cracked ground, he saw three teams moving in at the same time for Midoriya who had Iida in front of him while he was down on his knees looking to be in a lot of pain. Midoriya struggled up though, as Iida yelled behind them at Todoroki to get back up there faster as they only had three seconds until the interval.

Shishida, and the two brainwashed teams charging in from either direction thanks to Shishida's partner who was standing farther back, attacked all at once. Tape shot from Sero's arms, and a beam of light fired at the feet of Iida and Midoriya who dodged to the side, right towards where Monoma and Tetsutetsu were attacking from. Midoriya and Iida tried staying close to the ground with their last dodge, and there was only a second left with Todoroki about to reach the pointed rock ledge behind them, fire blasting out his left hand pointed behind him. A big flash of light emitted and Shinso clenched his eyes shut as it happened right towards where he was looking, almost between Monoma and Tetsutetsu, and Iida and Midoriya.

"Light Refraction," Hagakure said while Todoroki botched his landing and fell down the mountain, Iida and Midoriya messed up the dodges they were trying, but Monoma and Tetsutetsu were shook from their brainwashing at the flash and fell into their opponents more than actually punched them. A bing went off, and Hagakure got a green circle beneath her, as did a few of the other teams around them that had not fallen when they were blinded by her Super Move.

Midoriya's team didn't get the points though, and Midoriya bit down through the pain and leapt high into the air with Full Cowling around his legs. He let out a yell of pain from his right leg, but he snapped his eyes open to look at the leaderboard while also flipping himself in the air. Mineta's team did not get the points, but they did not get them either to overtake first, while Bakugo and Uraraka did move up into second with them. Only one of the teams in fourth got the points though, making Kazumi and Ojiro stand alone at five points below the second place teams. There were now four teams tied for fifth just below them though, and as Midoriya yelled, "GEORGIA SMASH!" and kicked straight up with 8% All For One through his leg, Zach yelled towards Yaoyorozu's team that they should focus on the upper placed teams together.

Bakugo fired explosions in front of him and sent his and Uraraka's floating island shooting through the air, while Uraraka held onto its sides trying to make the chunk hold together from the powerful blast. Bakugo had seen Midoriya glance up even though he had been pretending to just need to get off the ground to check the leaderboards in peace, and he yelled down a taunt to the curly-haired boy who winced after the kick and was even more disappointed that he did not destroy the other team's island to make them drop back below.

"Can't do that Zach," Tokoyami said, and Dark Shadow swept forward for the boy who leapt back so he was right on the edge of their bumpy area of the summit.

"Sorry Zach-chan," Tsuyu said, hopping to his side and not sounding very sorry as she said it.

"You'll get right back up there in a second," Kirishima said, and he smirked as he charged forward at Zach who lifted his grappling gun, only for a hook to wrap around his own right arm and pull it to the side. Zach's eyes started turning towards Yaoyorozu who was holding a grappling gun of her own, then darted back to Kirishima fast while lifting his left arm to block. The idea that his classmates thought he was enough of a threat that they needed to do this power play to knock him off the leaderboards for good almost made him feel a little good, but he was way too into the competition to feel anything but dread at the idea of about to be losing all his possible points. Zach prepared to fire, then he just stopped and clenched his teeth while lifting his arm to protect his face from Kirishima's fist.

Kirishima ducked down and slammed a fist forward for Zach's stomach, and Yaoyorozu pulled off the hook as Zach was knocked off the side of the mountain. As Zach hit the slant and rolled down the mountain with no help from Cementoss who was watching carefully and decided Zach could take it without his help, the boy was only thinking one thing. Despite the pain from the punch in the stomach and around his body as he rolled on hard rocks for a few more seconds, Zach thought, When did Yaoyorozu learn to use a grappling gun? Why did… ow. Zach focused on the pain, to remember what was going on, before he could elaborate on that in his head any longer.

Fifty five possible points remain. Miss the next five. Need all fifty others. Can't assume top teams will- Zach struggled up to his feet, feeling some bruises already forming around his body. He looked up the slope that had become gentler after Jirou broke it apart, and he wondered if any of the chunks of rubble over the cracked ground had actually rolled from the summit and could give him points. He started running up and focused on those chunks, but when the bing hit for the minute and forty second mark, Zach did not see any blue light glowing on those rocks. They're- Zach realized as he looked up the slope and saw Kirishima's back not far from the edge on one of the broken pieces of mountain, a green light flashing under his feet right there. The redhead glanced back over his shoulder, and Zach turned angrily and started running along the outside of the slope, jumping from debris to debris on the parts where the mountain was too broken up. If Jirou does it again, Zach thought, there'd be nothing solid to stand on. I didn't know she could break something this big this badly.

"You made this, so hard," Kaminari said, struggling to chase after Jirou in the chaos over the summit.

"Be quiet and make sure you keep both feet down in seven seconds," Jirou snapped, a frustrated look on her face at the blond boy's inability to multi-task. He was not splitting his focus very well, and he was slow at listening to her too, so even though she called to him to 'stop,' thinking he might not realize the time was at an interval, he had been too slow to react and took another step. Top's getting… well it hasn't gotten higher. Two more teams tied for first though, then that Kazumi guy with Ojiro?

On a different part of the mountain, the team in fourth only five below the top three was standing close to Sato and Sahara who were only five below them tied with two other teams for fifth. They were near an area that a flash of light just came from, and an invisible girl who had been running off from it was looking with huge eyes at the boy in fourth next to her. "Ojiro," Hagakure said, a nervous tone in her voice. "What are you-" Ojiro lifted up Hagakure, putting his other hand down on her other side from the one he had grabbed at first. "Hey put me down!" She called out as her boyfriend lifted her off the floor. Hagakure's eyes darted towards the scoreboard where she was in fifth place along with the team of two behind Ojiro and all of Yaoyorozu's team. Sato was facing off against Koda though, and Hagakure said quickly to the blond boy in front of her, "Instead of teaming with Sato, we should join-"

"Ohh Ojiro," a sweet voice called out behind him. Ojiro smiled wider and he got a pink blush to his face that made Hagakure and Koda's eyes open wide. "And Sato," the girl with a red ponytail standing in front of her large boyfriend called to Sato and blinked her eyes at him a few times. A pink pulse came off of her body, and Sahara said, "Toss them off the mountain for me, please?"

Sato charged at Koda who started swinging his arms forward with wide eyes, then turned and tried to run only for one of Sato's strong punches to his him in the back and send him flying forward from the force in it. "Maybe too strong there," Kazumi whispered down to the short girl in front of him.

"Enamor works more for some than others," Sahara replied with a shrug of her shoulders. Though it works longer the longer I've been using it, and these boys are like putty… She looked towards Ojiro and saw his arms shaking as he held Hagakure up. Ghe invisible girl in his hands who spun her gaze from Ojiro to the other girl seemingly controlling him looked back and called out for him to fight it. "Ojiro, don't you want to make me happy?" Sahara asked after watching his struggle in surprise, and she took a deep breath then forced another pulse of pink light out of her that made Ojiro's smile lift up more, his cheeks to turn red, and he tossed Hagakure up in the air. Sahara and Kazumi got confused as he did not toss her towards the edge, but then their eyes shot open wide as Ojiro leapt up and spun his tail in midair into something lifting in front of him.

A shriek of pain cut through Ojiro's mind and his eyes shot open much wider, and as soon as he landed he yelled, "Toru!" Ojiro sprinted towards the edge, only to hear a voice behind him call out that made his legs freeze in place.

"Thanks babe," Kazumi whispered, and then he lifted his hands and Ojiro's feet flashed before surrounding in heavy lead. Ojiro spun his head towards the other two, and he saw Sato run back over to Sahara and stand next to his partner with glossy eyes and a lovestruck expression on his face. Kazumi called to Ojiro who was stuck in a mid-run near the edge of the summit, "Where are you going? We're a team right? Don't just-"

"No," Ojiro said, confusing Kazumi and the girl next to him who was staring in shock at the defiant look on Ojiro's face. "We're not a team. And I won't be controlled," Ojiro said, a more frustrated look on his face than a second ago. After last year, he thought, his fists clenching hard at his sides. Ojiro turned and he forced his heavy right leg up, and he lifted his left next and called off the side of the mountain he was nearing, "Toru! Where are you?"

"Hold on a sec," Kazumi ran after his partner, and he yelled out for Ojiro to stop after he stepped off the summit.

Sahara looked at her own boyfriend's back for a few seconds before turning to Sato. Kind of needed their help, but sorry Kazumi. You're in fourth anyway, but guess we should have realized with the guy who pulled out last year that he wouldn't just go along with it. "Come on Sato," Sahara said in a half-whisper like she was hiding her voice from the other two boys they had been teamed up with since the beginning. The only reason they had not joined as one team was because Sahara and Kazumi were partnered for the last match and couldn't be, so it was just technically different teams the whole time even though they had been fighting together. Sahara had told Sato she could power him up when they were making teams, but at this point through the match with the Enamor going for several minutes already, Sato's sole reason for taking part in the Sports Festival was the girl in front of him. His nose even started to bleed as she winked and said, "Now it's just the two of us."

"Haha, haaa," Sato nodded in agreement with a blurry look on his face, and Sahara grimaced at the sight of it.

"Don't lose focus on the rules. If you don't have your feet down at the intervals, I won't forgive- ahh!" Sahara got wrapped around by tape and thrown off the floor, and Sato spun with an unadulterated look of rage on his face towards Sero and Aoyama who dropped their jaws at that look. "Don't kill them!" Sahara yelled down in panic herself, a yell which made Sero and Aoyama back up as Sato started charging them. A nosebleed, Sahara thought while trying to land herself. Can't miss the bing. Hiro's not here to make me sturdy. The big guy's at the point of Too Far Gone. Using a super move on my own teammate, not good. I can't cancel it though and start over!

"Nice, we're in fourth," Kirishima said, grinning next to him at Tokoyami after the ground beneath them flashed blue and green.

Tokoyami had seen Ojiro across the arena slam an invisible figure with his tail, only to run off after her with a look of such frustration on his face. The fact that they had tied Ojiro because of that could not give him much pleasure, but he nodded along with Kirishima and then said, "Yaoyorozu, are you finished?" He did not turn around as they had a box formation, and he needed to focus on Ashido and Honenuki who he sent Dark Shadow out at as soon as he saw them focus his way, before Honenuki would be able to start his Softening.

"Just about…" Yaoyorozu was struggling, and she took a few deep breaths after she finished and then brought her hands to her stomach. So hungry. "Done," Yaoyorozu said, and Tsuyu turned her head a bit to the left to see the cannon Yaoyorozu had created. It was pointed down across the arena towards a big ice fort with three sides leaving only the part facing the inside of the summit open, and there was a roof over it too thicker than the rest. Yaoyorozu got ready to fire, then she called out, "NOW!"

Tsuyu's tongue wrapped around the cannon and yanked it up fast to a spot it clicked to stop in because of the way Yaoyorozu made it. The taller girl fired an instant after changing her target, and an island up above blew apart with Uraraka screaming and Bakugo shouting out angrily.

Jirou yelled out and crossed her arms over her head as rocks rained down, then she spun her head as she heard a loud thud followed by a growl. She gawked behind her at the boy who looked like a beast from Class B who just slammed into Kaminari so hard he was slumped over a broken piece of summit. "Kaminari!" She yelled, and she plugged her earphone jacks into her feet before stomping at Shishida in mid-turn towards her.

The furry boy jumped to his side, then Jirou spun her head furiously as she heard a different boy call out from only a few meters away, "Such an idiot not to be paying attention."

"Don't talk about-" Jirou froze as she saw who it was she was shouting that at through a thin veil of dust.

"Though I guess he's not the only idiot," Shinso said, stepping through the dust and smirking. "Get off the mountain and run as far from the summit as you can while making sure not to bump into anything too hard." Jirou turned and she started running to the nearby ledge, where she carefully jumped down to a protruding rock from her earlier attack, then down again to another one before dropping off and running away, just as two others had done before, one of whom was just at the start of the tunnel and made Jirou spin that way as she realized the best method to get farthest away.

"That, isn't…" Shinso was grinning after the girl he just sent away, then he and Shishida started turning back towards a boy who had been slow to piece together what was going on. He did not know why Jirou started running, and that took him a few seconds, and then he finally processed what Shinso said before telling her to run away. "True," Kaminari finished, and he lifted his hands up with electricity sparking from them. Shinso and Shishida opened their eyes wide, right before Kaminari slammed his hands down and blasted the mountain with electricity.

Zach was about to fire his grappling gun at Shoji who he finally found after running around the edge of the summit. He was calling out, but the top of the mountain was crazy loud with all the fighting going on up there. He saw Bakugo and Uraraka stop in mid-flight down, and they changed directions to shoot back up in the air, and at that same moment a huge wall of ice shot straight up in the air, but not at the two above them. So Zach hesitated before firing, then the flash of yellow went off and covered the summit of the mountain.

"AHHHHH!"

Zach winced at the sound of all those screams, then he saw Bakugo change directions and start flying him and Uraraka who was holding onto his back to the mountain. They were going straight for the ice fort now blocked-in on all sides, and Zach knew those two teams were up in the lead now that Mineta's team had dropped off the top ever farther. "Shoji! You alright?" Zach called to the boy he finally fired his grappling gun at.

Shoji nodded his head slowly, before pulling Zach up with a hard tug as Zach retracted the wire himself. He caught Zach and placed him down on a solid chunk of summit being held together by some hardened green vines that cut through the cracks of all the rocks in this area. 1:16, Zach thought with a glance towards the scoreboards. "Shoji," he said, his voice serious and his mind focused. He checked the leaderboards and saw them on it, down in eleventh place. Midoriya's, then Bakugo's, then Momo's, then Sato and the Sahara girl- Still don't know her Quirk… "We can't miss any of the intervals from now to the end…" Zach continued. Forty more points remain, we're twenty-five down from the lead. Monoma and Tetsutetsu are ten up too with Sato, Mineta's too. Tied for fourth like we were. It was a dangerous place to be… "But we can't just make it," Zach said, turning and looking up into the taller boy's eyes. "We have to catch up…" Four teams tied for seventh. We can't waste time on them, but we also can't ignore them like they aren't in front of us and will get into the upper places before we do even if we take down a top team. Ojiro and Kazumi don't count so three, two without Jirou, and one without Hagakure?! Zach was starting to look closer at the teams that were actually still five points in front of them, three teams that they were about to tie with in three seconds.

"Who do we go after?" Shoji thought aloud, wanting Zach's opinion as he darted his own gaze around. He had his left hands lifted, and his mouth appeared on the middle arm while an eye appeared on the top one. He was focusing all around the summit, and he spotted a group digging in with a fortified position around them. Stun batons, Dark Shadow, they're in the final stretch and know all they need to do is hold- and it's not just that! There was one second until the next interval, and Shoji placed two hands down on Zach's shoulders and they both grit their teeth and pushed down to try and not get blown off the ground by the attack that just sent huge ice chunks blowing away in every direction.

Zach realized the same thing Shoji did as the green light went under his feet, and as the top two teams both got closer to reach. Momo knows those guys are going to keep fighting for first now, and if they give away points like that. Bakugo lifted his right arm and grabbed at his wrist while yelling out in pain, then he snapped his head to the side and glared towards Midoriya who leapt away from him, and above Yaoyorozu's team. Zach narrowed his eyes at Midoriya, He knows what they're thinking though. And he also knows that Bakugo's not giving up on the first place that they have right now. So the best move then, is to force it so Bakugo's crazy attacks aren't just lifting his team's feet off the ground. Momo's tied with Bakugo now too, and he always looks like he's gone insane during these fights, but he's focused on everything. Zach saw Momo's team preparing for Bakugo, and for Iida and Todoroki who started chasing Bakugo only for Iida to yell out and start flying away as Uraraka got him with a surprise attack.

Zach and Shoji focused ten meters in front of them, as two people smashed through a big ice chunk that just landed there a few seconds ago. It caught their attention and then both of them focused as they saw who it was, and they immediately decided what they needed to do. The two they had been fighting earlier, two who were tied for fourth place ten above them with eighty-five points, two boys covered head to toe in a steel coating.

"One of us is making it to the finals," Monoma said to the only other team in fourth now, then he panted a few times before grinning at the pair in front of him. "And I see you've lost your allies."

"Let's attack," Tetsutetsu muttered, not in as much of a talking mood as his partner. He slammed his fists together in front of him, making sparks fly out of his metal fists. Sahara took a step forward though despite Tetsutetsu's threatening action, and she lowered her curled eyebrows in a sultry way, leaned back so her slender figure was more pronounced with her bust bouncing at the way she did it.

"Why don't we just work together?" Sahara offered. The two she was talking to did not notice the faint pink glow that covered them for a second, but that idea actually sounded like it might have some good points to it. The two Class B students looked in at each other, while Sato turned his head and looked down at Sahara, a bloodier nose now that was actually pretty busted, a black left eye, and he had a scratch on his left arm. Sahara saw Sato looking down at her with that blank look on his face like he was thinking about what she just said, and she gulped before continuing to use her Enamor on the hesitating enemies in front of her. "They said the top four teams make it, so if we're both in fourth then of course we'll all get in. Especially since we're only teams of two, and don't you think they'd want more people anyway?"

That, makes sense, Monoma thought, and he hummed and started thinking about it himself.

"Hey, what happened to taking them down?" Tetsutetsu growled next to him as he heard Monoma's hum like he was pondering it. "Crushing them? Victory for Class B?"

"There's a better chance of victory if we work together, especially now," Sahara turned her head and stopped the two who were running towards them with that gaze. "When some bottom-feeders from Class A are trying to catch back up to you."

"SAHARA-CHAN! WHY?!" Sato roared, snapping his head back with tears pouring out of his eyes.

Oh crap! Sahara spun and stumbled backwards, and she lifted her arms and yelled, "Cancel!"

Sato's hands were balled into fists, and he was leaning forward with a rabid look on his face. Whether it was because the girl of his dreams was talking to other guys, not focusing on him for long enough, or the fact that he was from the Class A she just insulted too, it made the boy madly in love with her go insane. Even after Sahara cancelled her Quirk though, Sato's rage was still there, though he was starting to question why it was he was so angry in the first place. He did not forget what had happened through the match, and that made his eyes open even wider as he realized what his thoughts had been solely focused on for the last few minutes. "That's your, Quirk?" He wondered to the girl in front of him who had told him it was a power-up, and he was starting to realize what it actually did.

"It's not like-" Sahara got cut off, as a metal hand clamped around the front of her face. Tetsutetsu snapped his head to Monoma who lifted a hand at him to hold on, and the original Steel boy shook his head. He did not know what was going on here, but he was not having any of it. Tetsutetsu lifted Sahara off the ground, then he ran for the edge of the summit closest to them.

"Wait, wait!" Sato started chasing after them as he realized what was happening a second too late. I still, want to win! The boy injured from all the fighting that he still remembered doing was not giving up that easily, especially after he checked the scoreboard for the first time in two minutes and saw they were actually set to make it into the finals. "Tetsutetsu!" He called out, charging faster, only for him to trip over a wire and face-plant on the floor. Monoma was not chasing after Sato, already looking towards the other two who Sahara was trying to get them to team up against a few seconds ago.

A green circle flashed below Monoma and Tetsutetsu's feet, and Zach pulled his grappling gun hook back while it appeared below him and Shoji too. "Nice," Monoma said, then he punched his fists together like Tetsutetsu had before. "But helping us be the only ones in fourth, isn't going to help you take our spot."

"I don't want your spot," Zach said, turning to Monoma right as Tetsutetsu tossed Sahara off the mountain hard enough that Cementoss had to step in. All of the contestants realized by now that Cementoss was as much of a resource as anything, as Mother Russia had not called down any violations of the rules for people who put their classmates in danger by throwing them off the summit. The arena itself was a raised surface, and Cementoss was simply acting as if the area outside the arena was actually soft, though only in the most threatening situations which were happening more often now. Monoma's eyes widened a bit at what Zach said, then his steel teeth ground and made sparks come out as the reason he lost the previous year's Cavalry Battle came back with how Zach finished, "I want to be first."

"So, do, I!" Monoma yelled, and he charged forward.

Up in the bleachers at the teachers' section, Vlad King grinned and leaned forward at the passion he saw on Monoma's face charging like that. In the commentators' booth, Aizawa also nodded as he thought about Monoma's strategies from the year before. The dark haired teacher was staying quiet while Present Mic had been shouting almost non-stop about all the crazy fights, but he thought while looking towards Monoma, The reason Bakugo beat him, he was fine with staying in the middle of the pack. Thought that was his biggest flaw, though he should have been expelled for something else. Aizawa's eyes focused on the person Monoma was charging at, as that shorter kid told his partner to go for Tetsutetsu instead. They got past that though, Aizawa thought. Monoma is actually gifted, and with the drive to win he could do a lot. But this is one time, Aizawa's eyes narrowed on the shorter boy Monoma was punching forward at, he should have avoided the fight.

Present Mic changed focus from the top three teams battling it out for dominance with two of them receiving the last interval of points, tying all of them up as Midoriya was thrown through the air yelling in pain. He yelled about the fourth place team up against Sazaki and Shoji and said they were only ten down from the top where they stood alone at fourth place. The leaderboard was changing too fast for Present Mic to keep up with, and he just yelled, "AND ANOTHER TEAM HITS A HUNDRED! YOWW-" he stopped shouting and leaned forward in the booth while staring towards the middle of the arena, a little off-centered towards the west side at the fourth place team he just mentioned, and specifically a black-haired boy fighting one of them.

Monoma punched his right fist forward, expecting Zach to dodge it so he did not need to worry about how powerful his steel punch to Zach's skull would be. Zach's eyes were focused solely on Monoma, but his peripheral vision caught everything around him. Can't miss another point, Zach thought while dipping down like he was going to dodge under Monoma's arm, then he stepped forward instead and pulled his body in so he was right up in front of Monoma with the boy's right arm passing close by his side. Zach threw his own right arm around Monoma's head, making Monoma's eyes dart towards that hand, right before he felt the left arm hook behind him which Zach's right hand grabbed onto. It hurt because of the hardness of Monoma's body, but Zach was glad his weight did not shoot up as well, and he spun to his left with a hard stomp that way. He lifted Monoma off the ground in a shrug that he threw the steel boy right into some acid flying his way. As soon as Monoma was out of his grip, Zach jumped to his right, and he pulled out his grappling gun with his right hand that had snapped quickly to his side. Monoma hit the ground and started sinking down as the ground was soft around them, which Zach knew was coming before he even saw Ashido too who attacked with her partner. Back when he checked the placings of the other teams above him when he was in eleventh, theirs was the one team five up that he thought would still be in this and fighting against them.

Honenuki started calling out an apology to Monoma that they couldn't get more Class B teams in, and then he yelled out and pulled back as a splash of blood cut out from his left cheek. Zach pulled back and hooked down under Honenuki's shoulder after shooting just past his face which even with a blunt hook managed to scratch him. He yanked Honenuki towards himself, then snapped his own body backwards, and two lines of white tape shot over the top of his body. Zach's right foot slid across the floor below him, as he pressed it down as hard as he could despite the beam of light about to fire at it. The bing went off and Zach saw green, right as the ground only a foot away from his legs broke apart and some sharp rocks slashed his left leg. Zach retracted his grappling hook and leaned up before pointing it towards Aoyama and firing at his belt. The boy with the navel laser knew to protect it though, and he jumped backwards. Sero pointed his elbows up at Aoyama and wrapped them around his chest then started swinging, and the team Zach knew had been tied with him half a minute ago was still going their hardest to catch up too. Aoyama had been blown away by one of Midoriya's kicks earlier and it took him a while to get back, but the majority of the points they lost was because of Shinso whose team just dropped even farther behind after having been tied with them only forty seconds ago. Shinso had told them to run around without getting hit and for them to jump at the intervals, and it took one of Bakugo's explosions shaking Aoyama to realize it when he saw what a still-brainwashed Sero had been doing.

"We're taking that spot!" Sero yelled, spinning around and swinging Aoyama through the air as they still had time before the next interval. He grabbed above Aoyama's belt, and the blond boy put both hands up behind his head and shoved his belly forward, firing another beam towards Shoji and Tetsutetsu who jumped away from each other near the ledge that shattered from the beam. He fired again and hit near Ashido who backflipped away, then fired again and hit the floor just beneath Honenuki who was grabbing up at his face after he got off of his knees.

Ashido yelled out for her partner, while Zach ran towards where Monoma was getting up to his hands and knees. He grabbed Monoma by the right arm and yanked with all his body strength up into the air in front of him, and he blocked a jet of flames flying his way. Zach released Monoma and turned as he saw Todoroki attacked by Tsuyu and Bakugo at once, and he thought while turning towards where Aoyama landed next to Sero, still tied with him and Shoji in sixth place, Their fight is getting closer to us. They've been making each other miss intervals, the lead's only fifteen away. If we miss a single one though, we're done for sure. More than half the teams have given up. Shit. Zach spotted Sato climb up to the solid surface and put down his partner who looked at him in surprise and said something, only for Sato to turn away and nod while saying they were staying in this until the end. If the rest of us had missed the intervals- no wait, they only missed two? Zach realized there were not two teams tied for sixth, but four tied for fifth as Honenuki and Ashido did not get points at the last interval either, and Sato and Sahara were still in it too. Monoma and Tetsutetsu managed to snag the last interval as Monoma came aboveground with Honenuki's power wearing off before the forty second mark. That meant the team of steel boys was only five down from the leaders now, though Monoma was struggling to get up as even encased in steel he felt pain in these last attacks.

"Don't let up!" Tetsutetsu shouted towards Monoma, turning from his opponent he just knocked back onto his knees with his strongest punch.

Shoji felt all three of his right arms shaking and he winced as he pushed them down at his side, then a mouth appeared on one of his left arms and he yelled, "Last chance!"

Monoma nodded while pushing himself up more. His head lifted, then his eyes shot open wide at the sight of all the people rushing towards him.

"Get his legs off the ground!"

"Knock him off!"

"Get him!"

Monoma saw his own classmates, people from Class A, and a girl in the support course all running at him. There were thirty-five seconds left, and four teams directly below them ten points away. If I just hold on for five more seconds! Monoma screamed out as he planted his feet down, determination and anger and daring filling his voice.

No one slowed down. Sato charged even faster, and Sero pointed his elbows out and winced but fired even more tape to start wrapping around Monoma. He got Monoma's arms and pulled them tight to his body, and Sero yelled to Sato to help him. Ashido told Honenuki to wait, the pink girl darting her gaze around at everyone with her who were supposedly working together to get Monoma away. It seemed like she was telling him to stop, because the others had a plan that involved throwing Monoma and not sinking him into the floor. Zach pretended not to see Ashido, but he bit down behind his lips and thought, She's risking it for everyone if she tries something before we can get him away. And if I attack them now- "Do it!" Zach yelled.

"RRAAAA!" Monoma screamed again and tried pulling his arms away from his sides. Tetsutetsu spun as he heard those shouts, and he started running over only to be tackled to the ground and have six arms wrap around him. Tetsutetsu gasped at the strength of the boy who started standing up while holding him in an even tighter bear hug to the point Tetsutetsu could feel his steel grinding. He knew it must have hurt Shoji to keep doing this, but Shoji was not letting up, and that made Tetsutetsu slam his head backwards and hit Shoji in the chin and top of his chest. Shoji spun around towards the edge not far from him, blood coming out under the mask that always covered the bottom half of his face. Sato threw while Sero yanked his arms as hard as he could towards the west side of the mountain too, and they called out for Shoji to 'catch' since they didn't think they'd be able to throw Monoma all the way off the ledge.

Zach saw Shoji throwing Tetsutetsu off the ledge, something he did not see coming as he was too focused on the fight he was in and just believed in Shoji's ability to keep his feet on the ground. As soon as he saw that though, his focus left Monoma completely while he was still being swung through the air. Instead Zach turned and charged at a pair who turned their heads towards him, and Zach pointed his grappling gun at Honenuki's face, making the boy with wavy sand-colored hair flinch because of the same hook that cut across his cheek an interval earlier. Zach never fired though, and Ashido who was preparing to melt the hook opened her eyes wide at the last second as Zach just kept sprinting full speed at them, even with blood coming down his left leg from the rock shards Aoyama blew past it. He slammed his left fist forward and nailed Mina under her lifting right arm to block, hitting her in the side and knocking her into her partner who finally tried to use his Quirk, but a second after the interval had just given them all points, and made all of them only five away from Monoma and Tetsutetsu, and ten away from Bakugo's and Midoriya's teams who just missed another interval themselves to put Yaoyorozu's team solely in the lead. Zach did not know the point distribution as he attacked though, he only knew he had ten seconds to be touching the floor again, while the two in front of him were not.

Sato spun seeing Zach attack Ashido and Honenuki at the same time, then his body got surrounded by tape, and a beam slammed into the floor between him and his partner. Then a cannon fired and Sero and Aoyama blew off their feet as the ground beneath them exploded. "Behind you!" Zach shouted at the boy he was in the middle of following-up throwing Ashido into. The two Zach was talking to might have thought it was a bluff, if Zach himself did not jump backwards with giant eyes looking behind them.

Ashido spun and she threw Acid as a counter to whatever caused that shadow to come over her. She and Honenuki both dropped their jaws though, at the sight of a massive ice spike taller than the stadium that just shot up behind them and slammed the menacing Dark Shadow away. There was a lot of smoke and ash rising up around the arena all at once, and Dark Shadow had become stronger thanks to the sun being blocked out more and more. The bigger creature that just slammed Sero and Aoyama off the mountain after they had been lifted by Yaoyorozu's attack, got smashed hard by Todoroki's ice, but the huge spike blew apart from two different sides a second later. Explosions and giant black claws tore the huge spike to bits, then all those huge ice chunks lifting up went flying down faster as Midoriya spun a kick above them all.

Yaoyorozu's team would have dodged, but with one second until the interval, the ground beneath them turned soft and their bodies sank right into it. Midoriya sent himself flying down between all the ice chunks he started a meteor shower with towards a spot none would hit down, where Todoroki and Iida both were. Bakugo slammed his hands side to side and weaved between every falling piece of ice, then he fired above him and sent himself rocketing down for where Todoroki and Iida were standing. Todoroki pointed his left hand up, and Bakugo started spinning around as he flew down, a tornado of wind surrounding him as he used his explosions to propel him faster.

Twenty seconds hit and Present Mic did not know what to shout anymore. Every single place marker just changed, and it seemed like complete madness on the arena. Sero and Aoyama decided not to try and get back, collapsing at the base of the mountain and looking up over it with wide eyes at the collision about to happen. All top four teams missed the interval, with Monoma and Tetsutetsu climbing up the side of the mountain they had fallen off, and they were suddenly tied with two other teams. Bakugo and Uraraka were only five above them, as was Midoriya's team, and Yaoyorozu, Tokoyami, Tsuyu, and Kirishima were ten up from the fourth place teams. Then the explosion hit at nineteen and a half seconds.

Fire slammed into Bakugo and an explosion went off so large that the wind threatened to throw everyone away, and it almost succeeded with the majority of them. Sato tried holding Sahara against him as they skid backwards, but even he was lifted off the ground and thrown from the arena while feeling a huge powerful heat pressing into their faces. Ashido and Honenuki were blown off the mountain, and the group Honenuki had sank down at twenty-one seconds were pulled from the ground by the force of the blast. The explosion melted ice chunks blown into even smaller pieces as they were blasted off, and Iida was already running away from Todoroki who told him to get away, but he was lifted off the ground and thrown away as well. Midoriya shot through the air and intercepted Iida, then he spun around and kicked the other way, towards one of the sides of the explosion where Todoroki was flying off too, along with chunks of the summit. Tsuyu was pulled from the ground in a second, thrown up in the air and when she threw her tongue down to try and grab hold of Kirishima who lifted an arm for her, her tongue was just blown back too because of the force of the hot wind. Yaoyorozu tossed Tokoyami a blanket she had been making, and Dark Shadow rose up large enough to lift a hand and catch Tsuyu before she got blown too far.

Shoji had been running towards Zach already before Bakugo started his Howitzer Impact. He reached him just as it went off and tried to catch him, but the wind was too fast that despite their distance, Zach's feet were lifted and he was thrown up. Shoji had an arm sticking out of his top left arm, reaching above his head and holding Zach by the lower left leg, getting his partner's blood on his extended hand because of that. Zach winced at how hard Shoji was grabbing his leg which would have hurt even if it were not scratched up. He gasped out from the heat of the wind pressing against him, and he forced his clenched eyes open after they had shut from the force of the blast slamming into him. Shoji pulled him to the side, and they avoided a rock chunk, then Shoji pulled the other way and sidestepped himself to dodge a larger chunk of ice that shrank half its size before passing them yet still was the size of a tank. Then Shoji pulled down and planted Zach's feet on the ground, and they both ducked as Mineta went flying overhead. Where did he even come from? The two of them wondered while hearing Mineta's scream get fainter behind them.

Zach tried darting a glance at the leaderboards but there was too much smoke and dust in all directions. "Hold this position," Zach said, and Shoji nodded while keeping one hand down on Zach's shoulder so he would not get blown away by an explosion they would no longer be able to see coming.

"Uraraka!" Bakugo shouted, spinning around and looking for his partner while standing inside of what used the be the summit. His shirt was gone and he had burns on a lot of his torso, he was panting and his hands were shaking at his sides with some of the worst pain in his life filling both arms. He listened for the response, then he blasted explosions from his palms which made him yell out in pain even though they were normal ones.

"Is everyone alright?" Yaoyorozu asked the others around her.

"I'm, fine," Tsuyu said, then she turned to her right. "Thank you Tokoyami-chan, and Dark-Shadow-chan," she added as she looked up at the dark creature's eyes.

"We're still in first, I think-" Kirishima began, then his eyes opened huge as someone was sprinting towards him through the dust and smoke.

"KIRISHIMA!"

Kirishima's mouth twisted into a huge grin and his body hardened all over. "TETSUTETSU!" Kirishima ran forward and he slammed a punch forward right as the other boy did the same.

"Don't run off on your own," Tokoyami started, chasing after Kirishima, only for a bright light to force Dark Shadow down again. Bakugo was just flying past though, and he flashed Dark Shadow as a precaution to not be attacked more than anything, before yelling out his partner's name again.

"Kirishima-" Tsuyu started calling, only to get cut off for some reason. Yaoyorozu turned her head, her eyes opening wide as she saw a blond boy behind them who had approached silently, not inside of a steel casing. Monoma's right hand was around Tsuyu's face and he lifted her up like that, then he turned to steel right before the short girl he lifted kicked back at him. Tsuyu winced in pain as she kicked a steel wall, and Yaoyorozu called out her name. Monoma was panting, but he was glad the first team they found, after climbing back up and missing two intervals, was the first place team. He turned with a grin on his face and threw the girl he was holding off the summit edge not far behind him, then he crouched and jumped to the right to avoid the stun baton Yaoyorozu jabbed at him.

Present Mic shouted about ten seconds, and about Monoma and Tetsutetsu getting another five to bring them up tied for third. Bakugo's team was tied with them, missing the last interval, while Midoriya's moved up to tie with Yaoyorozu's in first. Zach spun his head as he heard about Midoriya's team, and he looked up towards a screen he could see as the dust had settled in the last few seconds. He spotted the three standing on a piece of summit, nowhere near the actual fighting stage. Whether or not they brought the rubble with them across the arena floor on the inside of the stadium, or if it had landed there on its own was unknown. Mina and Honenuki missed the cut! Zach thought as he spotted the two who he thought were going to stay with them until the end. It's only five of us now! Zach heard his own team get called out as being tied for third too by Present Mic, then Mic yelled asking what would happen if more than four teams made it in the top four places.

Bakugo found Uraraka, her leg trapped under some ice. He blew it away, and he yelled at her to put her feet down on the ground. Then he froze, and instead of rushing off to go blow Midoriya's team off their rubble across the stadium, something he thought he needed to do in this final ten seconds, he reached down for his partner.

"It was a trap, Kirisihima," Tokoyami said to the boy in front of him who skid away from Tetsutetsu.

"Lies," Tetsutetsu snapped back. "It's me verse you, Kirishima buddy. Let's take it-"

"Get him," Kirishima said, turning to Tokoyami. The darker boy could not cut in on Kirishima's fight normally, but Kirishima heard Yaoyorozu shout Tsuyu's name and saw Monoma out the corner of his eyes. Present Mic shouted about it too, and Tokoyami stepped forward and sent Dark Shadow at Tetsutetsu. Monoma hopped over, and his body turned to steel as he punched for Tokoyami's back, to stop him from knocking Tetsutetsu off the ground.

"TIME UP!"

Present Mic shouted it, and the ending just came with an odd calm over the mountain's summit. Most of the smoke and dust had already been settling or fading away, and only a few people were still moving on top of the summit anyway even though everyone thought it was still intense up there. The final seconds of the match had just slowed for everyone, and only as it ended did they realize there was very little going on. Zach and Shoji looked around the summit they were standing on a very small piece of, dipped down between some others and a few meters in from the edge. Yaoyorozu's team missed another interval at the end, dropping them from tied for first, into second place. Bakugo's team got the five points, with him holding an arm under Uraraka's left shoulder and her right arm up over his back held by his other hand that was still shaking as he held her steady on her feet. The two of them with bandages on their heads looked exhausted and beat-up, and they turned and looked up towards a scoreboard after Present Mic's call. They had tied with Yaoyorozu's team by just standing there, just like the other team of two just across the mountain who were panting and beaten as well.

Yaoyorozu's team cared that they were not getting first, and they did not like that they were not getting the points, but it did not actually matter that they missed the last point allocation. Unfortunately for the ones who picked a fight with them in the final intervals, it did matter that they were not touching the ground. Kirishima had jumped up in Monoma's way, slamming a fist in his face and stopping him from attacking Tokoyami. And without Monoma stopping Tokoyami, Dark Shadow slammed Tetsutetsu off the ground with a second left in the match. So while Yaoyorozu's team did not get the points they needed to stay in first, Monoma's did not get the points that would have moved them from tied for third with two others to tied for second with three other teams. Monoma did not have the opportunity to think about how he had messed up at the end though, as Kirishima's final punch knocked him right out.

Tetsutetsu slammed his fists down on the floor at his sides after seeing the scoreboard. He saw the screens split to show four camera angles: two teams of two standing and supporting each other, a team of three who collapsed on their small safe haven far from the arena, and a team of four split with a tall girl off the mountain helping her shorter friend to her feet and the other two standing side by side with victorious looks on their faces. All of them had tears or rips in their uniforms, and Midoriya, Todoroki, Bakugo, and Iida all had very little of their uniforms remaining on their bodies, most of their shirts shredded and pant legs torn up. Tetsutetsu slammed his fists down again, and he muttered under his breath, "Damn, Class A."

Present Mic shouted the names of the winners, and then he called out in agreement with Tetsutetsu. The stands started filling with louder and louder cheering, people up on their feet screaming and clapping as were people watching on tv all over the country. Present Mic pulled his microphone up to his face while leaning up over the booth counter in front of him, "…And all eleven, are from the hero course: CLASS A!"

---

A/N Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed the King of the Hill battle, as it was a lot of fun to write and imagine going on in my head. Kind of tough keeping track of all the points, team positions, intervals, and it really messed everything up when I realized at 00:00 there would be a final interval, making me go back and change up like all the scores and numbers so there were 35 available in the final minutes and... Well anyway, I just hope it came out well! Didn't really know who was going to make it in the finals myself, though there were certain people I wanted to get in for sure at the start, and the others were lucky enough to get on their teams. A Class-A party in the finals again, though Class B had a pretty intense part of this chapter. Also added in a couple of OCs, hope you guys liked Kazumi and Sahara. Anyway, again thanks for reading, reviewing, following, and faving so far you guys! Leave a review below telling me what you thought of the chapter and predictions you might have for the rest of the Sports Festival! Review responses:

SatanicLover666Illuminati chapter 57 . Aug 7

nicuuuuuu

Thanksssuuuu

D-Koy24 chapter 57 . Aug 7

Nice chapter... I never even watched the for sports festival arc but I'm ok!
... Team Todorozu...

...

..."... I'll kill you..." I stared blankly into the distance.
(Somewhere Bakugo sneezes "The fuc's stealing my shtick?!" He growled)
~Sorry for not reviewing past chapters, was on holiday! *beat drops* ...yeah anyway I know u missed my awesome reviews *poses with hands on hips and chest puffed out*

Hahaha, as soon as I had Mic say it, I knew the shippers would have something to say. Thanks for the "awesome" review as always, and I hope you enjoyed the chapter!

An Average Jo chapter 57 . Aug 7

Team Todorozu? Oof.
Will you finish the story though? Kinda worried you'd leave halfway through.

At least they couldn't partner again... Thanks for the review. Think I will likely finish this. I have an ending in sight, and yet it's still my favorite fanfic to write all the time. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!

Geckomom chapter 1 . 19h ago

bakugo is goona be suuuperr mad

He was pretty pissed at Zach there at the start, but good ol' Kirishima was there to make him cheer up! Accepted not getting the first at the end of the second event here too though... Thanks for reviewing!

Guest chapter 57 . Aug 7

God daaaaamn
That's race was intense! I'm really Glad that Zach and Kaminari made it first - just shows how far they've made it since the start
as much as I like the ship tease you've built around Zach and Momo, I really like the dynamic you've built around Zach and Kaminari - this chapter just shows how their relationship and skills have grown - this arc has an exciting start I can't wait to see how you build off of that!

Thanks a lot! Over the last ten chapters there's been a lot of build-up around their characters from the whole kidnapping arc to now, (though unfortunately Kaminari shorts-out before the end of this second event, yet he might have gotten some revenge for Jirou there...). XD Anyway, glad you've been liking the relationships between characters, and I hope you continued to enjoy the arc!

Guest chapter 57 . Aug 7

Ah~ A internship arc at Mt. Lady's agency with our favorite not-a-ship students, Zach and Momo. Oh well, one can dream…

"Zach, why didn't you ever call me when I gave you my number?" "She gave you her what?" I can imagine a fun internship between them... ;) Thanks for the review!

Guest chapter 57 . 19h ago

I think you're the best writer I've ever seen on this website and I've been reading and looking all over this website for six or seven years. The pace that you keep with this story is amazing, I never feel bored or like it's a grind to get through a chapter. I almost like this story better than what it's based off of. Heck, I have a tab open all the time with this story on it and I check it everyday to see if you updated it. I just wanted to tell you that someday you could probably write your own book and as long as you say the title I'll probably read that and it might become my favorite book ever.

Thank you so much! Really appreciate it when I hear someone is this into my work. I'm going to be continuing with my writing outside of fanfiction after I graduate and attempt to publish a book actually, so I'm glad to hear that you think I could do it. :) I hope you enjoyed the newest chapter of Death, and thanks again for such an amazing review!