Hello earthlings! I own nothing except a dysfunctional computer.

Of course Izuku was excited for the sports festival. Who wouldn't be?

It was a chance for all the kids of Uyay Academy to face each other in battle and use whatever skills they had to try and murder each other. Of course no one besides those training to be Heroes ever won, but it was still a chance for the other courses to show off whatever skills they had in hopes of getting accepted to a first-year internship.

"Who do you think is gonna win?" was the general question around campus.

"For the first year, it's probably gonna be someone from Class 1-A. They're apparently super strong."

"But what about Monoma from 1-B? I heard that he's amazing!"

"1-A's already faced a villain attack. They have the most experience."

"Ooh, yeah, isn't Prince Shoto Todoroki in that class? He's crazy powerful, right?"

"Yeah, him or that Bakugo kid. My friend told me he has super strong fire sorcery."

"No way! It's gonna be that kid who has the model of the Ruling Sword!"

"The kid who destroyed a building?"

Two days before, Class 1-A was gathered in their usual homeroom. Aizawa was talking at the front of the room, still wrapped in bandages from what had happened at the USJ. On the first day that he'd come back the entire class (well, minus a few people) had tried to hug him but he'd adamantly refused, saying that it wasn't a big deal before getting right into lessons. He was in the middle of a lecture about how not to literally kill your opponent during the sports festival when someone rapped on the door. When Izuku got up to open it, he saw a group of kids standing there. Some of them looked like they didn't want to be there, others looked like they did, but none glared as fervently as the blond kid in the front.

"Well, well, well," he drawled, smirking. "You don't look nearly impressive enough to be a member of the famed Class 1-A. I hope you're a lot stronger than you look, or else it's gonna be an easy festival!"

"He's not even close to the strongest one in here, dammit!" Kacchan shoved Izuku aside, getting as close into the kid's face as he could. "Who the hell do you think you are?"

"I'm Neito Monoma, a proud member of Class 1-B, and these are my compatriots!" Most of the kids standing behind him now looked like they really didn't want to be there. "You don't look like too much of a threat either, spiky. I mean, what's the big deal with you guys anyway? You couldn't even keep your own homeroom teacher safe and you completely wrecked the US!? If it were- ack!"

A tall girl with red hair hit Monoma hard on the neck and caught him as he fell. "Jeez," she groaned before turning back to the slightly dumbfounded Class 1-A and bowing respectfully. "My apologies for my classmate. He doesn't always know when he's gone a little too far."

Aizawa sighed. "Aren't you supposed to be in class right now?"

"Vlad-King thought it'd be good for morale if we went to check out our main competition in the festival. Monoma made up his little speech on the spot without anyone approving it." Then the girl smiled. "But I would like for you to know that this does not mean we have any plans of going easy on you."

"You better not, extras!"

"Kacchan, you can't just call people extras!"

"Shut up Deku, I do what I want!"

"Midoriya, please close the door."

After the door was shut and Izuku and Kacchan had returned to their seats, Aizawa continued. "I hope that proves to you that the school takes this festival very seriously. You have the rest of today and tomorrow to do whatever you want to do to prepare for the festival in two days. I will be very disappointed if at least half of you do not make it to the third round. And make sure that at least one of you gets an opportunity to punch a Class 1-B student."

That wasn't the most teacher-like thing to say, but that was just Aizawa.

For the next two days, Izuku jumped between sparring with his classmates in the gym (of course he couldn't show them all his moves, they would be competition later), sparring with All Might, practicing by himself, eating and sleeping. On the night before, he went out for dinner with Iida, Uraraka, and Tsuyu. They all decided to not go easy on each other if they had to fight each other. Izuku was starting to get excited. He couldn't wait to show All Might what he could really do.

Plus, according to Iida, King Endeavor would be there. Izuku kind of wanted to see the man for the first time. It would be… interesting.

On the big day, Izuku was as ready as he'd ever be. He was warmed up, had eaten what he felt to be a decent breakfast, and had the Ruling Sword at the ready as he marched down to meet the rest of the class and head to the stadium.

Even from inside of the small room under the bleachers, they could hear the spectator's noise. There were a lot of people there. Great. More people to watch Izuku embarrass himself…

Nope. He was not going to embarrass himself. He was going to do great.

"So," Uraraka chirped as she sat on Izuku's table, "who do you think is gonna win?"

"I don't know! I think it could really be anyone in the Hero course! Maybe it could even be someone from one of the other courses!"

"It's gonna be me."

Both of the young Heroes turned to look at Shinso. This felt like the first time he'd said more than two words at once since the USJ. The purple-haired boy sighed and rolled his eyes. "I'm going to beat all of you."

"No way, Purple! It's gonna be me, one hundred percent!"

"Both of you are wrong. I'm going to win."

Izuku looked back and forth between Shinso, Kacchan, and Todoroki, all three of whom were on their feet and glaring at each other. Everyone else in the class wisely backed up to give them room, sensing the danger of being blown up, turned into an ice statue, or being forced to do something embarrassing in front of everyone outside.

After a tense second, Shinso huffed. "Sure. Whatever."

"I'm going to win because my father is in the audience and I refuse to disappoint him."

"I didn't ask for your life story, Icyhot!"

"I'm not giving it to you. I am simply stating some facts."

"Ugh, what's with the way you talk? Sound like a prince or some shit."

"I am a prince."

"Shut-"

"Listeners, please quiet down!" Present Mic's voice boomed out from the arena. "It is time for the first-year-sports-festival! We will now be announcing the classes competing today! First is one you've likely heard of- Class 1-A from the Hero course!"

As the crowd outside clapped and cheered, Izuku walked hesitantly outside, looking nervously around. The Sports Festival was mainly to determine the aptitude of the next generation and was one of the biggest events of the year for UA. Normally it was crowded by Heroes scouting future prospects and civilians from all over the kingdom who were lucky enough to gain entry looking for entertainment, but this year the king's heir was one of the competitors, as well as the princess from the neighboring kingdom, so it was even more crowded than usual.

And there was the king himself, looking bored and disinterested in the commotion around him. He was very, very muscular and intimidating, and his beard and mustache looked like they were actually made out of fire. Beside him sat a young woman who was likely his daughter, Princess Fuyumi Todoroki. On the other side was a beautiful older woman who looked very similar to Yaoyorozu- likely her mother, Empress Tomoe Yaoyorozu. And yes, Izuku was very aware of how weird it was to have two members of royalty- one an heir to their throne, the other not but still very powerful- in his class. Living in the same building he lived in.

"These kids are only in their first year but have already been through a full on villain attack and came out stronger! Would one of you step up and give a short speech?"

He meant one of the class representatives, obviously. But Kacchan apparently took that as permission to walk up onto the small stage in the center of the stage and say, completely deadpan, "Just so all of you know, I am going to win," before walking back down.

"You can't just say stuff like that!"

The rest of the speeches for the other classes were much less threatening and had more promises to work hard and value teamwork and do their best. Once the stands had quieted down, Present Mic retook the area's attention. "This Sports Festival will have three phases. The first one is… drumroll please… an obstacle course!"

Crap. Izuku was naturally pretty good at normal obstacle courses, sure, but nothing UA did was ever normal and the ones Aizawa made him run sometimes were much harder than they had any right to be.

"The first fifty people to complete it will get to move on to the next round. Use whatever skills you have to conquer each obstacle. The only rule is that you can't hurt your classmates in any way. Go line up outside of the stadium, and we'll begin in five minutes."

Four minutes later, Izuku was staring at a length of ground lined with spikes in front of him. If this was only the first-year part of the festival, he really did not want to think about what the second and third years would have to do tomorrow and the next day.

"Alright, listeners! Try to win, and try not to get seriously injured! GO!"

The first person to move was Yaoryoruzu, pulling her usual weapon- a long, silver staff- off her back and using it to vault forward, pushing herself up and away from the ground. Todoroki, with a ramp made out of ice, Bakugo, with his explosive sorcery powering him up, and Uraraka, with one of her flotation spells, quickly followed. Izuku whipped out his ruling sword and used the extra strength it gave him to leap over the spikes.

While they were the first five, the rest of Class 1-A quickly followed. "Wow, Class 1-A's off to a great start!" Present Mic's voice boomed. "Several of them have even taken the lead in the competition! Ooh, but 1-B's not doing so badly, and even some members from the other classes are contenders!"

The next obstacle was a group of rock monsters that one of the teachers had created. Many of the students hesitated as they faced them, not sure what to do in the face of such big, destructive enemies. Not 1-A. They charged straight in, each of them quickly defeating or finding ways to avoid the robots. Izuku cut one of their heads off with his sword and dodged between its legs as it fell, not looking back.

After about a minute of dodging small objects being magically thrown at him and conquering minor enemies, Izuku arrived at a huge ravine. How had UA had time to dig this? And how was he supposed to get across it? It was likely too big to jump over, but the only other way was to climb to the bottom and then back up. Todoroki was in the process of making an ice bridge, but there was too much danger of slipping off of it. He was pretty sure that Yaoyorozu was just going to follow the prince across and that Kacchan was going to somehow use explosions to propel himself, but it was possible that he wasn't going to. So where did that leave Izuku, if most of his toughest competition got ahead of him? He would ask Uraraka to use her magic to get him across, but he didn't want to put her in that position.

As the general group caught up with the first five (or, at this point, one of the first five since Todoroki, Yaoyorozu, and Uraraka were already across and Kacchan was in the process of doing the explosion-bounce-thing, a pink-haired girl grinned. "Ooh! This is the perfect time to test my new baby! I can't wait, I can't wait, I can't wait!" She pushed a small button on her belt and a long rope shot out and latched onto the opposite wall, yanking the girl along with it. As soon as she reached the other side, she released another rope back the other way. This one she also attached to the opposite wall before running off. An invitation to come across? Izuku didn't know, but he decided that he trusted Todoroki's ice bridge more than he trusted that tiny rope.

One slightly treacherous rush across, Izuku was in what he thought would be the home stretch- a flat out race. Kacchan and Todoroki were in the lead, with Yaoyoruzu close behind them. The girl was fast, but she couldn't beat the boys using explosions and an ice floor, respectively, to propel themselves along. Izuku held the Ruling Sword tightly and ran after them as fast as he could, letting the sword give him as much power as it could before his legs broke. He wasn't sure how many people were in front of him, but a lot of them had passed him while he debated using Todoroki's ice bridge, and it was probably better to try and pass as many of them as he could, right? The Ruling Sword made him a lot faster than he was normally, so maybe he'd be able to pull into the top fifty. He wanted to be number one, as would be fitting to the hopeful future kind, but that wasn't likely to happen, and definitely wouldn't if he didn't start running right now.

And he ran. He ran as fast as he could, not really paying attention to anyone or anything but his footsteps hitting the ground. He was so focused on the running that he almost didn't hear Present Mic screaming, "And the winner of Phase 1 is… Izuku Midoriya!"

"What the hell?" Kacchan yelled as he burst across the finishing marker, just a few seconds behind both Izuku and Todoroki. "What do you mean, the nerd and the half-and-half bastard beat me?"

Iida shook his head as he crossed the finish line a few people behind. "You should be ashamed of this unsportsmanlike behavior, Bakugo! You are representing our class in the eyes of the kingdom?"

"What does that even mean? You saying that these two pieces of shit beat me? Ha, no, extras!"

"Kacchan, calm-"

"Don't tell me to calm down, Deku!"

Izuku had won. Somehow, he had won. He wasn't exactly sure how that had happened, but he'd actually won the first phase! And everyone from 1-A had gotten into the top 50! Uraraka grabbed his arm. "I'm so happy for you!"

"Thank you! Good job!"

"Thanks!"

"Alright, listeners!" Present Mic yelled after the crowd had calmed down slightly. "Congratulations to everyone who passed and to everyone who didn't, there's always next year. Everyone should report to their class's room and wait for the announcement of the next phase! Go beyond! Plus ultra!"

The entire class was full of energy as they went into their waiting room. Kaminari was leading a lively discussion about what the next phase would be. "It's probably going to be a team thing," he announced. "UA usually does at least one team thing every year, and the last thing is always the battle thing, so it'll probably be this."

"I'm so excited!" Ashido squealed. "This is my first ever Sports Festival!"

"What about the ones from your old town? Did you ever go to the ones in whatever city you lived near?"

The pink-haired girl frowned and shook her head, slightly sadly. "I'm a demon, Kaminari, remember? We don't get to go to human school. This is my first year ever."

"Oh shit, I'm sorry, I forgot!"

"It's fine, I'm just so glad they let me in now!"

That had kind of sombered the mood in the room. After living together for several weeks, most of the class had pretty much gotten over any weird biases they had against demons, but not everyone on campus had. And it had taken some of them longer than others. Personally, Izuku kind of understood what the demons were going through. After all, he was a half-elf, and while it wasn't exactly the same, he understood how sometimes humans could suck. But he also understood how it could take some people time to understand that not every group of the species they'd been taught to fear their entire lives were bad. Maybe it would be easier if they spent more time around the demons, but both of them were in 1-A and while Ashido was very social, Tokoyami… wasn't.

"When I'm queen," Yaoyorozu finally said, "I am going to work to improve conditions for peaceful groups of demons in the kingdom. I would like all of my people to be treated equally."

Ashido swallowed hard and nodded. "Thanks, Yaoyorozu."

"My father will never allow that."

Everyone turned quickly to look at Todoroki, who was standing in the corner, arms crossed. "He didn't want to let demons into UA at all. He'd vastly prefer it if only humans were allowed at the school, but Nezu wouldn't back down on letting non-humans into the school and he figured letting in demons was a logical next step. It makes my father very angry."

""It will not be your father's kingdom, Shoto. It will be ours."

The two of them stared at each other for a long moment before Jiro tentatively said, "Um… Yaoyorozu, I thought you weren't going to be a queen?"

"Not of my country, yes. But I will be queen of this kingdom when I marry Shoto."

"Holy shit! You're what?" Jiro stared at the taller girl, looking the most upset Izuku had ever seen her. "But… why?"

"Because, Jiro, it is what is right for the kingdoms. They need a stronger alliance."

"Yes, but… but… You shouldn't have to be forced to marry someone you don't want to!"

"It is different for royalty. We have an obligation to our kingdoms."

"It's dumb!"

Jiro looked like she was close to crying, and Izuku wasn't really sure what to do in this situation. The girl was obviously upset about something. She turned away, crossing her arms and blushing slightly, seemingly realizing how random her outburst was. "Whatever."

"I don't see the issue. Why do you not want me to marry Shoto?"

"Because I don't like how your parents are forcing you to do this!"

That seemed to throw Yaoyorozu off guard, but before she could retort, Present Mic called out, "All right, students! Come on out to the stadium so we can get the next round going!"

The next round was something called a cavalry battle. Apparently all the students had to get into teams of three or four and try to steal the headband that each of the team's leader would be wearing- all of which had the team's point value written them. Most of them were only for five hundred points. Izuku's was for a million and, no matter what team he was on, he had to be the leader. That wouldn't be very fun. The other members of the team had to literally carry the leader around, which sounded awful. The top five teams with the highest number of points at the end would be able to move on

"We've gotta be a team!" Uraraka cheered, grabbing onto Izuku and Iida's shoulders. "I used to play this game a lot when I was younger, and since I know a spell to make people lighter, it'll be a lot easier. Plus Iida's super strong and-"

"I apologize, Uraraka, but I can not be on a team with you."

As the two smaller teenagers gaped at him, Iida quickly continued. "My family is closely entwined with the Todorokis, due to the fact that we both are prestigious noble families. I'd already told my mother that during the team battle, I would work with him. I apologize, but I must do what my mother asks me to do."

Izuku sighed. Apparently the school festival was a lot more political than he'd realized. It hadn't seemed like that big of a deal to him, but maybe he just didn't get it? "I understand. Good luck to your team!"

"And to you as well, Midoriya."

After he'd walked off, Uraraka shook her head. "Huh."

"What's wrong?"

"I always thought being rich made life a lot better than it is when you're poor, but maybe I'm wrong. My parents wouldn't try to tell me who to marry or who to team up with. They just want me to be happy and do my best!"

"Yeah, I couldn't imagine my mom doing something like that."

"So do you want to be teammates?"

"Of course! Are you sure you want to, though? I mean, I'm the ultimate target."

"Yeah, I do!"

Izuku grinned. "Great! Now we just need to find one more person!"

"I'll do it!" the pink-haired girl who materialized out of nowhere next to Izuku chirped.

After jumping about three feet in the air, Izuku cautiously asked, "who are you?"

"Mei Hatusme, from the innovations and new technology class! You're the boy who won the first round, right? Lots of people will be paying attention to you, so it'll be the perfect opportunity to show off my babies!"

Izuku looked cautiously at Uraraka, who shrugged. This girl was weird, but she didn't seem likely to sabotage them for whatever reason. "Ok. Sure. What can you do?"

"Well, I have all this cool tech that I made myself. I call them my babies. They're super useful and helpful and-"

"Do you have anything that can grab stuff from a long way away?"

"No. I only brought one, and I used it up during the obstacle course." Hatsume sighed. "It's not very useful if you need to fit more than two pieces of rope yet, but I'm gonna make it better soon."

"We need someone who has long range attacks. But most of those people have been picked up already…" Izuku scanned the group of students. He was right: most of the students who would be able to reach out long distances and take the headbands had been taken already. He and Uraraka could possibly do it, but it;d be hard. And he had no idea about Hatsume's capabilities…

Then he saw the student standing next to the wall. And grinned.

"You want me to be on your team," Tokoyami said slowly, looking at the trio carefully.

"Yeah, of course! You're super strong, and don't you have some kind of long-range attack? I remember you talking to Mr. Aizawa about that on one of the first days."

The bird-headed demon sighed. "I do. Sadly."

"Why is that bad?"

"It's a parasitic being that lives inside me. Most of the demons in my clan also have them. We used to be some of the ones that were sane during the day but would lose control at night. A wizard put a spell on us that essentially contains all of our insanity into a small being that we can control most of the time. The only downside is that if we unleash them in the dark and lose control, they can take over us."

"Oh." Izuku knew that there were three types of demons: the peaceful ones who only ate animals, took on humanoid appearances, and tried to stay as far away from humans as possible but were usually hunted down and killed anyway. They weren't commonly known because no one really wanted to think that maybe the human's sworn enemies weren't all bad. Izuku hadn't actually known they existed until arriving at UA. Ashido was one of these types.

There were also the demons who had full control of themselves and could think rationally, they just liked eating humans and killing each other. These types were usually solo or had very precarious alliances with each other. They'd been the ones that Izuku, Kacchan, Uraraka, and Iida had fought off in the village.

And then there was the third type- those who wanted to be peaceful but lost control of themselves whenever it got dark. They were the most dangerous. Izuku had never heard of something like what had happened to Tokoyami's family happening, but it was possible.

"I understand if you don't want to use it-"

"You misunderstood me, Midoriya. Since there is no danger of it suddenly getting dark, there is no danger of me losing control. I've done things like this before, and it should all be fine."

"Well, in that case, would you like to join our team?"

"Yes."

Izuku grinned widely. This seemed like a pretty good team- Uraraka there to make him lighter as they had to carry him and to help defend, Tokoyami to go on the defensive, and Hatsume to do… something. He still didn't really know what she was capable of. But maybe they'd be able to literally carry Izuku into the next round.

I'm not writing the rest of the cavalry battle because I don't really remember what happened in it, and I kind of rushed through the ending of the obstacle course because I was bored and really wanted to get to the Todoroki part. I'm sorry about that.

Anyway, leave a review with plot suggestions, constructive criticism, and/or words of encouragement! Later, potaters!