Hello earthlings! I own nothing except a dysfunctional computer.

"What's this training camp?"

Izuku looked up from the herbs he was mixing together as his mother walked into the kitchen. "What?"

"I just got a letter from your school, saying something about a training camp. What is it?"

"It's just… a thing. A thing some of my classmates are doing. It's in the middle of the woods, and we'd be training with real Heroes. It's not a big deal."

"Are you going?"

"No, I'd rather just stay here."

"Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure!" Izuku had been right in thinking things had gotten harder for his mother since he'd left. The physical work had become even more difficult as she'd grown older, to the point where she could barely work the garden and couldn't collect wild herbs at all unless she paid a village kid to do it. Even when she did that, they still didn't bring in many herbs. Ever since her son had disappeared along with the Dragon King, most people in the village had thought Inko had done something wrong to make her son run away, or that her son had somehow scared off the Dragon King with his half-elf wrongness or something. They still bought from her, since she was the best (and only real) healer in the village, but they were even less respectful and sometimes village kids would threaten to destroy her garden. The woman needed Izuku there.

"It sounds like a really exciting opportunity! You'd get to train in actual combat and work with full-time Heroes!"

Yeah, Izuku hadn't told his mom about him actually being there when the villains attacked his school. Or about Stain. Or the more dangerous exercises they'd had to go through. Or the fact that Shigaraki had just walked up to him and had a conversation when he was coming home but hadn't bothered him since then. Training for actual combat wasn't as much of a new thing as she thought.

"Mom, I want to stay here!"

Inko frowned, pulling Izuku away from the table and making him look straight at her. "Izuku, you don't have to stay for me."

"I- I'm not! I missed the mountain and the village-"

"You've been home for two weeks and you haven't left our house. I know you used to love running around the mountainside, but you aren't doing that. And I know you don't have any friends in the village, besides Katsuki, and he's not here. Wouldn't you rather spend time with your friends, learning useful new skills?"

"I missed you, Mom." And he had. His mother had been the only person who was there for him for so long. He missed her hugs, her warmth, just her. Even if part of him did want to go to the training camp, he didn't want to lose any time with her.

The woman smiled gently, running her fingers through Izuku's hair. "I missed you too. I missed you so much, but you're going to be the next king. I don't like the idea of you being away from me for so long, I'll be honest, but this is what you need to do. I love you and I trust you, and you are going to be a great king. I'd be doing the kingdom a disservice by not letting you go. It's your decision, but I think that you should go to the training camp. It's only for two weeks, and I'll be right here when you get back."

Izuku didn't realize he was crying until he was hugging his mother, rocking back and forth. "I love you, Mom."

"I love you too."

"I… I'm going to think about it."

"Good" Inko rubbed his back gently. "Good."

Two weeks later, Izuku was at UA, ready for camp.

He hadn't been sure what to bring, so he'd brought everything he'd packed when he'd gone to UA. Which, admittedly, wasn't that much. He'd walked back alone for most of the trip, eventually meeting up with a girl named Kendo, who was from the other Hero class. She was really nice and friendly, which Izuku hadn't fully been expecting. The only other person he'd really talked to from that class was Monoma.

"See you around!" she called as she walked off to join some of her other friends. Izuku waved and walked to where his class was standing. It was early, but the only people not there were Tsuyu, Kaminari, Todoroki, and Yaoyorozu. Kacchan was standing a little bit away from most of the class, but Kirishima had an arm wrapped around his shoulder and Kacchan was letting it be there. Which was honestly more than he gave most people, so Izuku was impressed. The two of them had apparently gotten closer while Kacchan was staying with Kirishima's tribe. Ashido and Sero were chatting loudly a few feet away. Shinso was also standing away from the group, talking with Present Mic, whose real name Izuku still didn't really know.

Hagakure, who'd arrived right before Izuku, was catching up with Ojiro, Aoyama and Sato while Koda, Tokoyami, and Shoji stood around in silence. Well, they were using sign language, but they weren't talking. Jiro was fiddling with what looked like a guitar (why would she be bringing a guitar to the training camp?) while ignoring everyone else. Iida and Uraraka waved Izuku over.

"You're friends with Kendo?" Uraraka asked as soon as Izuku reached them.

"Um, I don't really know? We walked part of the way to the academy together, and she seems really nice."

"She's really pretty."

Izuku stared at his friend, blinking. "Um… I guess she is."

"You hadn't noticed?"

For a second, Izuku wasn't sure what to say. He had never really said it out loud to anyone besides his mom and Kacchan, and he could easily just lie. But he had the feeling that his friends wouldn't really care, and part of him wanted to tell them, so… "I'm gay, so I guess I know that she's pretty, I just didn't really… think about it."

"Oh." Uraraka nodded. "That would explain it, yeah. Well, yes, she is really pretty, take it from me. I'm bi."

"Thank you both for sharing this!" Iida said, smiling at both of them. He was moving his right arm around a lot. His left arm was no longer wrapped in bandages but was perfectly still. "I assure you that, while I won't share this information with anyone, I support you both!"

Izuku smiled back. "Thanks."

The kingdom was kind of complicated when it came to subjects like that. In general, gay marriage was kind of frowned upon. It was why Izuku hadn't told anyone before. He didn't need to give the villagers any more reason to dislike him. But usually queer people weren't really persecuted, just kind of… ignored. It was a weird balance. Some people got a little weird about it, but Izuku trusted his friends. He'd known, somehow, that they'd be fine with it if he told them.

And he was right.

"So you're straight, Iida?" Uraraka asked, looking like she was trying to just make a conversation happen. Which was fair, since standing around was getting a little awkward.

"No I am not. I haven't really found the correct label, but I have had feelings for people of the same gender. Usually that only happens after I've known this person for a long time and care about them deeply as a friend."

"That makes sense." After that, Uraraka paused for a few seconds before saying, in an even softer voice, "How's your brother?"

"He's… well, not fine, but better. He's started using a wheelchair. It's frustrating for him, but I think he's beginning to get used to it. He still acts the same as he always has, even if he seems slightly sad at times."

Izuku nodded slowly. "And what about you?"

That took Iida longer to answer. "I… we've had more tests run on my left hand, and many still believe that it will never be able to move as well as it once did. I have to concentrate hard to make it do anything, and even then it is still shaky. It could have been much, much worse."

"And what about mentally?"

"I don't… I don't know. I'm still trying to…" Iida looked at Uraraka, who was listening closely. They couldn't tell her what had really happened. "I still regret my failure in not being able to save someone who I needed to save. In letting my emotions overcome me and letting my friends be hurt. And I'm still angry and hurt over what happened to my brother. But otherwise, I think I'm beginning to… beginning to recover. I have started talking with a therapist who works with my family, and that has helped."

Izuku bumped his friend's arm with his shoulder gently. "We're here if you need us."

"Thank you."

Tsuyu arrived just then, walking up to them and waving hello. "How was your break going?"

"Fine, what about yours?" Uraraka was practically beaming at Tsuyu as she wrapped the girl in a tight hug.

"It was going well. I spent a lot of time with my younger siblings. Who are we waiting on?"

"From our class, Todoroki, Yaoyorozu, and Kaminari. And Mr. Aizawa."

"Ah. He'll likely be late, won't he?"

Iida looked shocked. "Tsuyu! You should never speak ill of our teacher!"

"I wasn't speaking ill of him. He just likes to sleep."

Izuku laughed, smiling at them. His mother was right. He'd never really had any friends in the village, besides Kacchan. But he was lucky enough to have some of the best friends at UA.

Todoroki and Yaoyorozu arrived a few seconds later, the princess going to join Jiro while the prince walked over to Izuku's group, smiling slightly. "Hello. How are all of your breaks going?"

"Fine."

"Good."

"Well, what about yourself?"

"It's going well. I've been spending a lot of time with Yaoyorozu."

"Is that good or bad?" Tsuyu asked. Izuku wasn't sure why she'd asked that, but Todoroki just shrugged.

"It is better than spending time with my father."

Uraraka nodded. "Right. I forgot that he's the worst."

While they were in Hosu, Todoroki had told the rest of their group about his relationship with his father, the king. Obviously, Uraraka and Tsuyu had gotten pissed while Iida had just nodded, apologizing to Todoroki for not being able to do anything even though he assumed. But there was nothing he could have done. There was nothing any of them could do. He was the king. No one had more power than him. But if Izuku ever really became king…

He definitely would not allow the person who'd hurt his friend to stay unpunished.

"He is… the worst. And Yaoyorozu is a good friend. We spent time in the capital city together."

"I'm sorry if this is rude," Tsuyu said, "but shouldn't the person you marry be… something other than a friend?"

"That's likely true, but being a prince, friendship is the best we can do. Besides, it would be impossible for the two of us to feel anything but friendship for each other."

"Why? Oh."

"Yes. I'm gay. Or something along those lines. I hope that doesn't bother any of you."

"Of course not! We were literally just talking about how gay all of us are."

"Really?"

Uraraka looked at the two boys, and after they nodded in a way that, at least for Izuku, gave her permission, she grinned. "Yeah! I'm bi, Midoriya's gay, and Iida's… undecided?"

"Yes, that works."

Tsuyu nodded in Todoroki's direction. "I'm a lesbian."

"Thank you for sharing this!"

After a few seconds, Uraraka laughed. "How many other people in this class are queer?"

"It's not polite to share or discuss other's sexualities without their express permission!"

"Oh, you're right, sorry."

Izuku loved his friends. He really, really loved them.

Right after Kaminari arrived, Aizawa walked up, like he'd planned it somehow. The scarily-happy-looking man said something to 1-B's teacher, said something that, at least to Izuku, looked slightly more personal to Present Mic, and then strolled over to where his class was gathered. "Right," he said, grinning slightly evilly. "Everyone's here. Good. Does everyone have what they need? Doesn't matter. We have a special treat for you."

He snapped his fingers, and a boat fell out of the sky.

Most of the kids screamed. Izuku grabbed onto Iida, not entirely sure why, and felt the taller boy wrap his arm around him as they gaped up at the ship, which was hovering in the air a few feet above their heads. Aizawa was laughing hysterically, probably at how terrified some of the kids had suddenly gotten. The only 1-A student who looked unbothered was Shinso, and Izuku knew that somehow the purple-haired boy had known about it beforehand. The rest of the class were slowly starting to realize a prank had been pulled on them. Most of them looked kind of pissed. Izuku was a little annoyed that Aizawa had decided to play a weird prank on them, sure, but he was mostly disappointed in himself. A real Hero and ruler shouldn't grab onto his friend and scream when a boat falls out of the sky on top of him.

In hindsight, maybe that was one of the more irrational things his anxiety told him.

"Aizawa," Present Mic said, shaking his head, "you can't just do that. You probably traumatized these poor kids."

"Eh, they'll be fine." Their teacher was still grinning, and it was one of the most terrifying things Izuku had ever seen. A rope ladder fell out of the bottom of the boat, hanging down next to Kirishima. "Alright, everyone, get on the boat!"

The boat was weirdly comfortable. The inside was one big room and was large enough for each of the twenty students to get a decent-sized chair. 1-B had gotten their own boat but they, apparently, had been told that a flying boat was about to appear right above their heads. Because their teacher wasn't a complete sadist. Izuku put his bag with the rest of his classmates' and sat down between Iida and Tsuyu.

"Alright," Aizawa said. He'd stopped grinning, but he definitely didn't look as annoyed as he usually did. "This is probably most of you kid's first time in a sky- boat. Sky sorcerers on the boat's deck make it fly. That's all you really need to know about how it works. We'll be on the boat until we reach the forest. Don't get out of your seat unless I tell you to." And the man sat down at the back of the boat, next to Present Mic.

Almost as soon as he'd finished talking, the boat lifted off. Through the small windows the class could see the school campus and the surrounding forest. They were really, really high up.

Izuku was kind of nervous. He'd never been in the air before, and while he'd known that flying ships were becoming more common among the nobility, he'd never really thought he'd get to ride in one. Heights… were not his favorite. But, despite the fact that Aizawa had made them all think they were about to be killed by a falling boat, he trusted his teacher. He would never do anything to get any of them hurt. So Izuku leaned back in his chair and forced himself to try to relax.

It'd be fine. He'd just have a fun two weeks at camp, learn some interesting new skills, and then go home and spend the rest of the break helping his mom.

It'd be great.

When Kurogiri announced that there were people looking to join the League and Master had told him to bring them into the bar, Tomura wasn't sure what to expect.

He definitely hadn't been expecting a fifteen-year-old girl and some guy with a lot of burn scars.

"Hi!" the girl said cheerfully, draping herself in one of the stools next to the bar. "I'm Himiko Toga, and I'm a vampire! What's your name?"

"Shigaraki."

"Ooh, that's a nice name!"

"Thanks?" Tomura hated children. He really, really, really hated them. But Master had said that they both would be useful and actually wanted to join the League, which was new. "So, you're a vampire?"

"Well, Mom said I'm just a blood sorcerer. But that's boring and wrong, so I'm a vampire!"

"Ah." Blood sorcerers were rare. "So, you can control people."

"Nope!"

"No?"

"I can turn myself into people, if I drink their blood."

"But that's not…" Tomura looked at Kurogiri, who just shrugged. "That's not what blood sorcery does."

"That's why I'm not a blood sorcerer, I'm a vampire!"

That… that was interesting. The girl appeared to have some weird subset of blood sorcery. While her talent was definitely useful, she seemed kind of unhinged. Which might be a problem, but he'd let Master be the judge of that. Tomura decided to ignore that and turned to the burned man. "What's your name?"

"Dabi."

"What can you do?"

"Fire sorcery." The man, who was leaning against the wall, slowly looked around. "Nice place you got here. I get why you haven't done anything to really hurt the king."

"What the hell did you just say?"

"Hosu was you, right? Yeah, the king didn't care. To really hurt him you've got to attack him directly. He doesn't care how many people under him you kill. But you're too weak for him, aren't you?"

"You-"

"I came because I heard the League was powerful, but are you? Really? To me, you look like a little kid, covered in hands to look creepy or whatever. I'd hoped you'd help me destroy the king, but to me, it seems like you're a couple of weaklings. And you have some great master, am I right? Who the hell is he?"

The man was insulting Tomura's master, his reason for existing. The greatest person to ever live. Who the hell did he think he was? He didn't deserve to even breathe the same air as his master, to be in the same world. Master was so much greater than the man with the burns could ever be.

There was an itch under Tomura's skin, slowly building up. He wanted to turn Dabi to dust, make it so there was nothing left of him to even have to hide. "Leave."

"Nah."

"Ooh!" Toga cheered, whipping a knife out of one of her back pockets. "A fight! I love those!"

Tomura didn't take his eyes away from Dabi, scratching at his arms over and over again. "Take back what you said."

"Don't think I will." Dabi grinned, summoning little balls of… blue fire. The rarest and most powerful type of fire. Not even Endeavor had that power. It was almost beautiful and almost tempted Tomura to not kill him, but he'd insulted his Master. Some insults couldn't stand. He wouldn't let it. The itch wouldn't let it.

The three people sized each other up for a few seconds, Tomura wondering if he could lay hands on both of them at once before being either lit on fire or stabbed. Then they all lunged.

Tomura's arms went through one of Kurogiri's portals. The boy's caretaker somehow managed to look annoyed, even without a face. "Master Shigaraki, these two were favored by the Master. He believes they will be worthy seconds in the army you will build."

"What army?" Toga asked, pulling her arm back through their own portals and flopping back down on the counter, apparently no longer caring whether she got to kill anything or not.

"I think the Master will be able to explain all of that to you." All of the portals vanished, and a bigger one materialized in the center of the room. "Answer one question, though. Why did you want to join the League?"

"Well, I heard about Stain's message." Toga twirled one of her knives, kicking her legs and looking surprisingly innocent. Tomura felt a weird urge to protect her, which was… strange. He didn't protect anything, especially not insane children with knives who thought that they were vampires. "I agreed with it! Heroes are bad and gross, and I want them all to go away, and I thought maybe the scary League I heard about might be able to help me with that!"

Right. Stain. The pain-in-the-ass serial killer had apparently gotten famous. Someone had heard about what Stain had thought and tried to do and it was slowly spread through the criminal underground and among the demons of Uyay. What he'd said was extremely popular among the demons, according to Kurogiri. Tomura didn't bother keeping up with it. Wasn't his problem. Besides, any mention of Stain made him start to itch. He hadn't forgotten how the man had humiliated him. And Tomura hadn't even been able to kill him with a Nomu. He'd gotten arrested, all the Nomus had been destroyed, and they hadn't captured the elfling.

Master hadn't been too pleased about that mess, especially since Tomura had basically wasted all of their Nomus on a mission he hadn't asked permission to do. Kurogiri had been punished kind of heavily. But he'd still let Tomura go and mess with the elfling, which was fun. Even if he wouldn't admit he had the Ruling Sword, Master and anyone with half of a brain knew the truth. And he was so expressive that it was a lot of fun to scare him, make him think he was going to destroy him. Honestly, Tomura wasn't really sure why Master had told him not to kill the boy. Probably because of his big plan.

Despite all of that, maybe Stain would actually be useful. People liked the idea of having a noble cause, of not just causing destruction for the sake of destruction. Apparently it was drawing more people and demons to become active villains, which might be an issue in the future if they had some ideals about 'rebuilding society' or whatever, but that didn't matter. It still meant more chaos and more people who might want to join the League and Master's army.

"And I want to destroy everything. I want to burn it all to the ground." Dabi grinned. "That's what you want to do, isn't it, Shigaraki? That's what your League is all about."

"Ooh, destroying everything! That sounds fun!"

Kurogiri looked at Shigaraki, who nodded. It didn't really matter what he thought, after all. Master wanted to meet them, and he would meet them. He didn't need to give permission. Kurogiri beckoned the two into the portal and they stepped in, Toga looking overjoyed, and Dabi looking bored. Once the three of them were gone to meet Master- or at least one of his little puppets- and Shigaraki was alone, he allowed himself to grin.

Maybe morals and Stain's message wouldn't be such big obstacles for the League after all.

And maybe Toga and Dabi wouldn't be completely useless. Maybe they'd actually be helpful. Maybe they'd actually be nice to have around.

To help further Master's goals, he quickly reminded himself, because that was all that mattered.

But still, having an army wouldn't hurt. And having two people who seemed just as… interesting as he was around to help him also probably wouldn't hurt.

"So?" Eijiro asked, leaning back in his seat and looking around at his friends. "You all excited?"

Kaminari grinned. "Duh, I'm excited! This is going to be the best thing ever!"

"Hell yeah it is! We're gonna spend two weeks together, making better friendships and proving how much we love each other!"

From where he sat a few feet away, Bakugo groaned. "Oh my god, Shitty Hair, shut up and let me rest, I'm tired!"

Shaking his head, Eijiro smirked at the boy. "Ok, Blasty!"

"And don't fucking call me that!"

He didn't mean it. Bakugo was actually a really great guy. He was brave and funny and even though he could be a bit… much sometimes, Eijiro really liked him. He was a really manly guy, much cooler than Eijiro could ever even think about being. The two of them had become really good friends while he was staying with Eijiro and Mina. Of course they'd been close before, but they'd become better friends while they were living in the same room. Bakugo had adapted much faster to living with demons than most humans would have. In fact, it didn't seem to bother him at all, which was good!

After one got past his surface, Bakugo was amazing. He just wasn't the nicest person, or his niceness showed itself in weird ways. For example, one time Mina had mentioned something about wanting fish for dinner and he'd hiked through the woods alone for three hours and caught five big fish at the river just because 'he was bored'. So a great person!

Even though they'd never really talked about it, Eijiro knew that Bakugo's relationship with his parents wasn't the best, which was why he and Mina had invited him to stay with them. Almost all of the demons in the tribe liked him, thankfully, even though he'd apparently spent a lot of his time hunting demons. Demons who attacked humans, yeah, but still.

The famous Dragon King. He'd been really active when Eijiro was missing, so he had only heard about him after getting back to his tribe. Before starting UA, Eijiro had heard all those stories about him and how he was going to be in his class and he'd been really nervous, but Bakugo was awesome! He hoped his friend would end up living with him and Mina at the demon tribe. That'd be a lot better than him having to go back to his parents, whoever they were.

The ship suddenly rocked in the air, knocking most of the kids out of their seats. Bakugo caught himself and cussed. "What the fuck was that?"

Eijiro felt the ship going straight down. Was it crashing? Shit, was the ship crashing? The boy turned on his weird gift- the ability to harden his skin. He wasn't sure why he could do that, and it'd only started after the year he'd been missing. And he didn't feel like wondering what was wrong with him right then. With his gift, he could probably stay alive if the ship hit the ground hard, but what about his friends? And he didn't really know if his powers would protect him from a really big fall.

It didn't matter, because the ship touched the ground gently. Just as all of the kids were sighing, relieved, the ship started shaking rapidly.

"Alright, everyone!" Aizawa called, sounding really bored. "Some monsters are attacking the ship. Go outside and deal with them. Also, you have to make it to the training camp before midday. It's that way." He pointed directly behind him before pulling the hood of his traveling cloak back over his head.

"Wait, this is part of the camp?"

The man didn't answer. The ship shook rapidly. The kids looked at each other and walked up onto the deck, where they could see what looked like a giant snake-worm-thing. It had the bottom of the ship in its jaws with its fangs stuck in it, which made it seem like a snake even though most of its body looked like a worm's body. Did worms have fangs? Or mouths at all? Anyway, the ship was shaking. If they'd been in the water, it definitely would have sunk by that point.

Sero shook his head slowly. "So… this is like… a test for the training camp?"

"This goddamn school is fucked up." Bakugo muttered, and no one disagreed with him.

Midoriya was the first one to move, pulling out his giant green sword and racing towards the snake-thing. He jumped off of the ship, landed on the snake-thing, and stabbed it on the top of its head, causing the monster to let go of the ship and try to bite him, but he had already jumped away and was sprinting off into the forest and out of sight. The monster crawled away from the boat, probably to chase him. All of that happened before the rest of the class had even moved. The boy was really fast.

As one, the class ran forward, vaulting off of the side of the boat. Eijiro landed neatly and started running. He definitely was not fast, but he could still hear the snake-thing bumping into trees and hissing. Which made it more like a snake, even though it looked like a worm. Which was confusing.

Bakugo, Todoroki, and Iida had pulled away from the rest of the group because they were faster, stopping the snake-thing in a small clearing. Tree branches were lying everywhere, and Midoriya was in front of the monster, waving his sword at it while Bakugo and Todoroki blasted it with fire and Iida ran around trying to find an opening. Without really thinking about it, Eijiro leapt in, punching at the snake-thing to try and distract it. It wasn't really working, but it didn't have any armor, so he was doing some damage at least.

When Uraraka casted a spell that lifted it into the air, the snake-thing stopped paying attention to Midoriya for a few seconds, which led to Iida launching the half-elf into the air and him stabbing it in the chest. Uraraka released and the thing fell back to earth, where it hissed and flailed around for a few seconds before stopping. The kids grinned at each other, except for Bakugo. He looked kind of weird as he stared at the monster.

"You ok?" Eijiro said quietly, tapping his shoulder. The other boy startled but relaxed when he saw who it was.

"Yeah, 'course I am. Just don't like snakes. Or snake monsters. Fought some once."

"Oh, that's really cool!"

"Yeah, it was damn cool. They didn't look like this thing, though. Not as big. Less… worm-like."

"Well, it's still really cool!"

Before Bakugo could respond, he looked up at something behind Eijiro and groaned. "Goddammit, the hell is this?"

Eijiro and a lot of their other classmates looked around to see another snake-thing, towering above them and hissing. And it was in the direction Aizawa had pointed, blocking their way to the camp. And it was already almost midday.

It was going to be a long few hours.

"Well?" Tomoko asked, bouncing up and down excitedly as she stared at Ryuko. "How're they doing?"

"So far they've defeated three monsters. Good, but probably not good enough to meet the deadline."

"Aw."

"Any standouts?" Shino asked Tomoko, who had pulled out her crystal ball, probably bored of having to have Ryuko tell her everything. Her friend and the youngest of their little group was very… excitable. They'd already talked about the other class, who were apparently doing much better, even though 1-A had been the one to actually fight villains. That didn't make very much sense.

The green-haired woman squinted at her ball, waving her hand over it a few times before nodding, becoming completely serious in the way she usually did when she was using her magic. "Ah, I found them!"

"Good." Ryuku wasn't paying attention, concentrating on controlling the snakes, but Shino nodded at her friend.

"Let's see… there's a half elf-boy, he's good. No one in the class is bad, but it looks like he's a standout. Yawara said he's a standout academically as well, and socially. There's also the prince, and a knight. I think it's the Iida boy. He's not using one of his hands, but he's still doing very well. I know that everyone in this class has seen real conflict, but those three are definitely standouts."

"What about the Dragon King? Isn't he with them?"

"Yeah, but he's… not calm, even in this situation. He's very capable, but he seems very angry, which isn't always a good quality in battle. But those three are calm. They're helping their classmates when needed. And the Dragon King is mostly keeping to himself, to be honest."

Shino nodded slowly. She hadn't really been expecting those results. To be honest, she'd had high expectations for the Dragon King, even after hearing about what had happened at the Sports Festival. But she'd been wrong, apparently. Lots of potential, but too much anger to really live up to that potential, at least in her opinion.

A half-elf. A prince. And a knight. She'd definitely keep an eye on them once they arrived.

If they ever got there. One thing was for sure, it definitely wasn't going to be before midday.

"What the hell?" Bakugo raged, glaring at the sun like it'd offended him. Which it might have. "It's practically sunset! How far away was the goddamn camp?"

"At least we're here now."

Finally, they'd arrived. Everyone was exhausted. The ones who had sorcery or other magic types were exhausted in that way too. Most of them had bruises and cuts, and Tsuyu had sprained her wrist somehow. But they were fine. Hungry, but fine. And they'd made it to camp.

To be honest, it was a little bit of a letdown. Everyone had talked about it like it was absolutely amazing, but to Tsuyu, it just looked kind of boring. There was a big central building, and a few smaller buildings gathered around that. There was also a huge outside pavilion with benches and fireplaces. The entire place was surrounded by trees, which would be effective against any intruders. Especially since, reportedly, the Hero team had worked in these woods for years.

"Hello!" someone called. A younger woman with short brown hair walked towards them, smiling widely. Behind her were two other women, one with light blond hair and one with green, and a man with dark hair. All of them were wearing skirts and a skintight shirt. Behind them trailed a little boy, who looked angry. He was wearing a cap with some sort of fake horns sticking out of the top. "My name's Shino Sosaki, and this is Ryuku Tsuchikawa, Tomoko Shiretoko, and Yawara Chatora. Welcome to camp!"

"They didn't make the deadline," Aizawa muttered, appearing out of what looked like nowhere.

"Ah, yes, we're going to work on that. Don't worry. For now, though, we've prepared you dinner! Class 1-B has already eaten!" The woman gestured towards the pavilion, where the tables were nearly covered with food. Tsuyu could practically feel the other students drooling. "Keep in mind that the rest of the two weeks, though, you'll have to make all your own meals on top of your training. The list of meal shifts are in each of your rooms."

That was alright with Tsuyu. She was used to cooking for her younger siblings. It might even be fun, especially if her friends were with her.

As most of the class headed eagerly towards the food, Izuku stopped and smiled at the young boy, who looked even angrier after being acknowledged. Before Tsuyu could warn her friend to not mess with children when they were acting like that, he said, "Hey! My name's Izuku Midoriya! What's yours?"

In response, the boy kicked him between the legs and ran away. Izuku doubled over, and Tenya ran over to him, saying something about how the kid should learn to be more polite. Tsuyu was pretty sure Kaminari and his friends were all laughing as they walked by.

Sosaki sighed, walking over to kneel next to Izuku. "Are you alright?"

"I… I think so." With Tenya's help, Izuku forced himself to his feet, still wincing in pain. "Who was that?"

"I'm sorry. That's my cousin's son, Kota Izumi. He's… living with us here, for now. His parents were Heroes who died in action a few months ago. Since then he's kind of… had a grudge against Heroes."

"But he lives with you!"

"He doesn't think of me as a Hero, and I'm grateful for that. Most of the time he doesn't let my friends near him."

Shiretoko, the one with green hair, sighed. "I know, it's sad. I wanna play with him, but he won't let me!"

"It's best if you kids try to avoid him while you're here. He'll probably spend most of his time hiding somewhere, so don't be offended."

Izuku nodded. Tsuyu walked towards the pavilion and sat down at a table next to Ochako. She quickly piled the meats and roasted vegetables onto her plate. While normally she did like to eat bugs, she was very hungry and most humans didn't cook with animal spirits in mind.

"Alright, everyone!" Sosaki announced, standing up on top of a table. "As most of you know, we're a Hero team that works mostly in these mountains, responding to demon threats and helping during natural disasters. My codename is Mandalay, and my friends' are Pixie Bob, Ragdoll, and Tiger. We live and work here, so be respectful. No coming into our main building without permission unless it's an emergency or part of an exercise, please. No leaving this area unless you're with at least one other person. There are some pretty dangerous demon tribes around here."

A few feet away from Tsuyu, Ashido flinched. No one seemed to notice besides Kirishima, who rubbed her arm gently, Kaminari and Sero, who both looked at each other with concern, and, strangely enough, Bakugo, who sighed and rubbed her arm along with Kirishima.

"Respect other's privacy in the hot springs- oh yeah, there are hot springs on the other side of that wall on the west side, for those who want to bathe, respect others' privacy in general, et cetera. Also all you guys will be sharing two buildings, so divide up however you want. Anyways, we'll be waking you up at sunrise, but until then, you are free to enjoy the camp or just go and sleep!"

Ochako nudged Tsuyu excitedly, and the frog spirit nodded, jumping up and following her friend towards the hot springs.

They quickly put on the towels and eased into the warm water, Ochako sighing happily. It was nice. Tsuyu usually didn't like water as warm as the water she was in, but all water was good water most of the time. She smiled at her friend. "This is nice."

"It really is! I love it here!"

A few other people had slid into nearby pools, talking and laughing with each other. The pool nearest to the girls contained Kirishima, Bakugo, and the rest of that group. Bakugo looked angry that he had to be there. Which was how he usually looked, but he looked less angry whenever Kirishima smiled at him. Which was interesting.

A few feet away was Hagakure and Tokoyami, Hagakure leaning across the land to talk to Ashido about… something, Tsuyu couldn't hear what. Tokoyami was sitting quietly, which was what he did. Tsuyu liked him.

Then there was Sato, Aoyama, Shoji, and Kota, all gathered in one pool. Aoyama was talking, and the much quieter other three were listening. Or at least pretending to. Everyone else in the class was somewhere else.

"You wanna share a building, right?" Ochako asked after a few minutes of Tsuyu observing people.

"Of course I want to share a building. Are we going to try to share with the boys as well?"

"Yeah, of course!" Ochako beamed. She had a very pretty smile. Which Tsuyu knew, because she was doing what she usually did, which was only observing. But Ochako was a very pretty girl. When Tsuyu had asked her permission to use her given name, she hadn't made any comments about it but had only nodded and smiled. When Tsuyu had gone into a completely separate room from her to take off her clothes since she wasn't completely comfortable with her friends seeing what she actually looked like yet, she hadn't said anything. And she hadn't said anything about how Tsuyu 'looked different' with only a towel on, the way some kid had done when her clothes had gotten stuck to her body while swimming. It could be that she just hadn't noticed, but Tsuyu preferred to think she was just being polite.

Ochako was one of those people who were both very talkative and very thoughtful and quiet at times. It made her difficult to read, but somehow Tsuyu didn't mind.

"You wanna go to bed?" Ochako asked after about thirty minutes. Tsuyu nodded, got out of the pool, and went to the locker room to change into clothes. The two girls were walking back to the big sleeping buildings when they heard voices.

"You're sure this place is completely safe?" Aizawa whispered from somewhere up ahead.

"Don't worry," someone else said. Tsuyu thought it was Chatora, but she couldn't be sure. "We're very well hidden. We're also guarded by Ryuku's pets."

"The monsters?"

"Yes. So even if we are found, we'll be perfectly well-defended while we get away. But we won't be found. The existence of this camp is a secret known only to the school and the king."

"Even from the League of Villains?"

"They're the ones who attacked your kids, right? Yeah, they can't find us. Not even the one with the black mist who makes portals. Don't worry, your kids are fine."

Tsuyu heard her teacher sigh before she nodded at Ochako that they should continue walking. It probably wasn't polite to eavesdrop.

So their teacher was worried about the League attacking again. That was probably fair, given their history. Also whatever had happened in Hosu. While it didn't seem like the boys had ever actually interacted with a member of the League, it seemed like a really big coincidence for them all to be there at the same time.

The idea of them coming back terrified Tsuyu. Especially the man with the hands over his face, the one that'd almost killed her, the one she still dreamed about almost every night-

They'd be fine. The camp was apparently hard to find, and even if it was found, they were surrounded by extremely capable Heroes. It'd be fine. Tsuyu had to be rational about all of it. She was the older sister, oldest daughter, the rational one always, after all.

Ochako looked nervous too, so Tsuyu squeezed her hand. She smiled gratefully, and the two ran to the building where their friends had already picked out a group of mattresses for the five of them, making sure not to take a step too close to the dark woods.

Yeah sorry I couldn't resist giving some of my favorite headcanons about my characters. I know it was a kinda bad way to work them in, but I wanted to include it at some point so there you go, info has been dumped. Also yay training camp arc! Leave a review with questions, constructive criticism, and/or words of encouragement! Later, potaters!