My Hero Academia - Under Pressure - Season 2 - Chapter 4 - Bound To Advance
The pairings were revealed for the second round of the Sports Festival, and it certainly got the remaining students talking.
"Some interesting pairs," noted Armed Guard as he looked at some of the sets. "Just remember, while there are 32 teams, only 8 will advance to the final round. You have twenty minutes to find your partner and start to plan. However, not unlike with the previous challenge, there will be one twist to make this challenge truly difficult. It will be administered 5 minutes before the battle royale starts. So you BEST plan for all eventualities. You may break off into your pairs now."
With haste, the students went and got into their pairings. Tonen Keitomo looked at the board and in his mind tried to see who might be the biggest problem for him and his partner.
"So, we're partners, huh? I don't mind that..." came a voice.
Tonen smirked but didn't turn around at first, "Well I hope not given what we've been through, and the fact that I respect you a lot."
Eri Ogata stepped beside him and joined Tonen in looking at the board, "I appreciate your respect. Though as I told a certain 'Shield Hero' once, I want to face you 1-on-1 again after what happened last time."
"You're still torn up about that? I won because of Up Down, not because of anything you did."
"Not quite, I got cocky, but that's neither here nor there now. Even if we advance, I likely won't face you in the final round, I'll just have to wait for my rematch."
"Darn..." teased Tonen. "Then I guess we should focus on trying to make this work, huh?"
He turned to her and smiled, she looked at him and nodded in reply, "Right. So, how about those pairings?"
"We got some tough competition...and how are The Twins together? That keeps happening!"
A sneeze caught their ears and their turned to see The Twins heading towards them, but something was wrong with Ryu as he was in a sneezing fit, "Trade secret, TK."
Ryo was supporting her brother as best she could, "We'll tell you about it later, I'm just trying to get brother to a safe spot."
"Everything ok?" asked Eri.
"Brother gets into a sneezing frenzy if there's high amounts of pollen around."
"I do believe a student from General Studies has something to that effect..."
Ryu sneezed loudly, "Great...just what we need before a challenge."
"If anything, go into your mech form now," suggested Tonen, "the metal should block the pollen from getting into your system."
"Huh, I didn't think about that. Thanks! I hate these fits, there's nothing worse."
"Not true, brother," corrected Ryo as they passed the two and headed to a clearing in the group. "Remember when you were swimming and got water up your nose on accident?"
"Oh yeah...that sucked...that sneezing was painful..."
Eri and Tonen watched them leave before shaking their heads. Tonen couldn't help but laugh, "Ah, the simple things in life."
"Something like that," joked Eri before getting serious again. "So, with so many powers around us, what are we going to do strategy-wise? While our Quirks are great, they're not exactly compatible in a situation like this."
"True, I'm more of a long-range person and you're more for up-close combat."
"Plus, you can bet that we won't be allowed to drift too far apart from one another during the fight."
"You think that's the twist Armed Guard was talking about?"
"It has to be. If this is a tag team event, we need to show we can work in a tag team. Having singular people fighting without their partner defeats the purpose. So we'll need to think about how we can work together within a few feet of one another. Which brings up another interesting question, do we focus on teams that are not in our class? Try and keep it 'all in the family'?"
"No," came another voice, "this time we have to follow our rule."
They turned and saw Kuroda approaching, her partner in the form of Ebirima. Both of them looking confident, yet slightly downtrodden.
"What's up, K-Rep?" wondered Tonen about her statement.
"Just look at the board," she answered with a nudge to the screen. "Not all of 1-B got paired with one another like we did. Plus, even if we did want to just focus on saving our class, we'd only get 16 of us through, and that's not an option given the pairings. So spread the word to the others if you see them, every team for themselves."
"Fair enough," said Eri with an appreciative nod.
Kuroda gave a nod back and then turned to leave, Ebririma gave a small wave, "Good luck you two!"
"Right back at you, Bubble Gum," said Tonen with a thumbs-up.
With them gone, Tonen and Eri looked at one another and started to plan out their strategy. So too did all of the other pairings. Each tried to pair their strategies with who they were and the various tactics they could possibly use.
As promised, when there was just 5 minutes left before the fight, Armed Guard appeared on stage, but he wasn't alone, many attendants were with him.
"Attention, all of you," he said with an odd look on his face. "As mentioned earlier, there is going to be a twist in the competition. Because if we let you all run free, then many of you would simply run wild and try to do as much damage on your own without your partner. Or one of you would hide as your partner did most of the work..."
The students murmured amongst themselves at this because that was indeed their plan in certain cases. Armed Guard grunted in disapproval at this.
"But that will not be an option because of these."
He motioned to the attendants, and each of them presented suitcases, inside of them were special armbands.
Armed Guard motioned to them, "These are special energy collars. Each one tuned to their own frequency. Once put onto the hosts, you'll find that you only have a range of about five feet from your partner. That means that you can't run wild because your partner will be 'attached' to you. If you try, the bands will literally stop your progress."
The students were shocked by this reveal, though some, like Eri and Tonen, were calm because they predicted something like this would happen.
"Did I say I was DONE?!"
His roar silenced them.
"Good. These bands will keep you in close proximity to one another. The intent is to force you into teamwork, which you WILL need out in the field in various situations. Plus, you can think of this as a special kind of close quarters combat with so many opponents around you. The bands are durable so you won't have to worry about them being destroyed. We've also made sure your Quirks can't shut them off or short-circuit them. Use these remaining 5 minutes to go and revise your strategies. Once Projection sounds the horn, the match begins. Remember, BOTH teammates have to be KO'd or incapacitated in order for them to be eliminated. The attendants will put the bands on you now."
The attendants quickly spread out and started attaching the arm bands to people. Those like Kanagita and Anno had to make sure that the bands would work in their bulked up forms, and thankfully for them they did.
Once Eri and Tonen were attached they quickly went to work on their strategy once again.
Eri rubbed her collar with clear annoyance, "It's a bit snug, but I'll manage, it shouldn't hurt my attacks."
"Mine either as I can shoot my air throughout any exposed skin," noted Tonen as he looked at his collar. "Five feet, huh? Good, we were planning for less than 10."
"True, but this will be a bit more difficult. We'll need to be mindful in case we try and attack two people at the same time."
"Do we want to try that alternate plan of yours? I do defense and keep people away, while you do offense and knock out people that get too close?"
Eri thought about it for a moment and looked around at the other students, she could see they were getting antsy, "For now, that's our best bet. But if you think you can knock out someone with a blast? Do it."
"Ok," said Tonen with a nod, "and if you see something I don't, call it out and I'll send a blast their way."
"Right, let's get through this together."
"Together."
They each gave a smile to the other and then looked once more out at the gathering of students. Both could tell that they were all ready for war, but just how crazy this was to get was unknown to them.
On the sidelines, Armed Guard looked at them all intently. He was joined by Big Brain, who hovered in from behind.
"It's a very curious second round, wouldn't you say?" asked Big Brain.
"I would," acknowledged Armed Guard. "This kind of chaos I don't prefer, but then again..."
"There is chaos in real world, and they'll need to experience that, I agree."
"I see our 'picks' from the evaluations are together, do you think they'll work well in this?"
"More than likely, but only time will tell. As you said, this is going to be chaos. And chaos can destroy any plan or preparation without even trying."
Armed Guard gave a thoughtful noise but didn't respond. Up in the booth, Projection watched the clock and went closer to the microphone as it got to zero.
Once it was down to seconds left she tapped the mic, "The second begins in 5...4...3...2...1..."
She gave a very loud horn sound and the round began.
Immediately the chaos started. The various pairings went and scattered, then started attacking everyone that was in sight.
Tonen and Eri weren't immune to this as a few pairings tried to get the jump on them. They couldn't reach though, as Tonen blasted them away with focused blasts, and Eri used her various martial arts moves to take them off balance and then get them into a position where they couldn't attack.
A duo from General Studies saw this and hesitantly attacked the pair, but it was a mistake. Tonen and Eri gave a look to one another and unleashed a combo. Tonen sent out a burst of air that tripped the two up, and then Eri raced in and used her pressure point combat to incapacitate them.
A buzzer sounded a second after they did it and Projection cried out, "And we have our first elimination! A nice combo movie from Tonen Keitomo and Eri Ogata have eliminated one duo! Who will be eliminated next?"
"Way to draw attention to us," scolded Eri.
"We'll make due," consoled Tonen. "Just keep your eyes open and...what is happening to the bodies...?"
Eri turned to the two students she just put down and sure enough they were gliding across the ground despite not being able to move on their own.
"Uh..."
"Oh yeah, forgot to mention," interjected Projection, "all duos who are eliminated will be transported to safety thanks to special mini-bots made by The Tinker! That way they don't get hurt by the rest of you. Be mindful as they get transported away though! They can literally trip you up."
"I'm really starting to hate her commentary..." noted Eri.
"Forget her, we have to keep going...look out!" cried out Tonen.
Tonen pulled her out of the way just as a huge blast of energy came by her and the two turned to see a Class 1-A student waving, "Nice dodge, bet you can't do it twice!"
He fired again and the two dodged once again, starting a mini-battle in a war between all the students around them.
Near a corner of the arena area was Goya, smirking as he twirled some makeshift spheres. Behind him was a rather dark individual. He had a Goth-like style, and he was facing the literal corner while Goya stood by him in a way that was shielding him from attention and harm.
"Despite the smile on my face, I must admit this isn't what I had in mind for this round," mused Goya. "I could easily take out half of them by myself."
"If that were true, why not do it already?" stated the goth-child.
"Even I have limits, and if I leave the wrong person untouched, I'll be vulnerable to attack. Not to mention, you. Your Quirk would easily secure us a victory if you would actually use it."
"I can't, it has a range beyond five feet."
"And you can't use it on me because...?" asked Goya, now annoyed.
The goth-child gave a low laugh, "I've never tried it with another human...the results could be...hehe...disastrous...for you. I'm pretty sure you want to live to fight in the next round, correct?"
"I do."
"Then here we remain. We have a terrain advantage here as they have to come to us and they can't sneak up on us. Use your psychic power and keep us safe, I'll only use my Quirk in an emergency. But given what I've heard about you Goya...you're 'good enough' to not have that happen to us, correct?"
"Ha, ha, ha. My reputation precedes me. Oh, and look as I show you that it's deserved."
Goya looked just ahead of him and noticed a pair of support students trying to dodge some attacks from others. He extended his hand and trapped them in his psychic field then flung them against the wall hard. So hard that they fell to the ground unconscious. The buzzer sounded once again and the students were hauled off.
"Victory is assured," boasted Goya.
"As if it matters..." muttered the goth-child.
The clash between the students continued, and the more chaotic it got, the more the duos had to think on their feet in order to survive. Quirks were being used in all sorts of ways. Elemental attacks, strength and speed bursts, all that could be done to survive, they did.
But, they also had restrictions on them that they couldn't avoid. One pairing was Anno and Oshibu, which usually would be a worthy combination due to the insane strength of the shark and the blitzing power of the speedster.
However, due to the distance restriction, Oshibu couldn't race around, and thus had to do short bursts within that restriction to attack. Anno meanwhile could use his strength, but only when people got close enough, and few were willing to go up against him due to the very clear power advantage he had.
"Come on!" roared Anno as various duos avoided him, "Feel the power of the shark!"
"This is totally killing my jam," lamented Oshibu as he sped around his partner in limited capacity. "I could easily get us a win if we didn't have these bands!"
Others had to make due in other ways, such as with Ueno. Who was not with one of his Class 1-B teammates, but with a girl from Class 1-A. It was one of the girls who took down the laser grid and she was rather perturbed at her current partner's "dizzy status".
"Of all the people to be stuck with..." she muttered angrily before looking back at him. "Will you hurry up!? We need to find my TRUE partner and rain havoc upon the rest!"
"Sure, whatever you say..." replied Ueno, head spinning as usual. "Oh, watch out..."
A bladed student rushed towards the girl, but Ueno tilted his head and sent him flying in another direction due to his momentum shifting Quirk.
"Well...at least your Quirk is somewhat useful..."
"Always good to be appreciated."
As the battles continued the eliminations were rather slow to come by. Minutes had passed and only 4 of the 32 teams had gone by the wayside. Mainly because they weren't offensively-minded Quirks and many took advantage of that. With the whittling field though left many who were indeed able to make use of their situation and powers to the fullest.
During one clash, a series of students were fighting in a semi-open area when all of a sudden a swarm of items flooded the ground area.
Tonen and Eri were outside of the range but saw them nonetheless, Tonen was very confused by this, "What the-"
Before he could finish though the devices detonated. Some were explosive, some were smoke, some were flash bangs, but they all were devastating in their own way.
Many duos were injured by the attack, two groups were eliminated due to their proximity to the explosive charges.
Smoke filled the immediate area, and since he was not affected by the explosions, Tonen exhaled sharply and shot the smoke up with a burst so that the area could be cleared once more.
"Where did those explosives come from?" asked Eri looking around. "I don't recognize that Quirk."
"It's from him."
Tonen pointed to a duo who was still standing despite the explosions. In front was a smallish boy who was in a snickering fit. He had a special pair of goggles on his head and various straps and pockets on him, and in his hands were more of the explosive devices that had just been launched.
"Hagiken Tokuhei. Support Student. Quirk: Explosive Mindset. I know that sounds like a bad pun, but it's literal here. He has the ability to go and make all kinds of explosives with simple parts. Explosives, smoke bombs, flash bangs, incendiaries, shape charges, you name it, his mind can get it done so long as he has the parts. Frankly, given his potential...I'm glad he's trying to be a hero and not a villain."
Hagiken continued to snicker as he observed the carnage of his bombastic onslaught, "Boom...boom...boom..."
"He will be a problem," admitted Eri.
Tonen grimaced as he realized the truth of the matter, "It's worse than you think, look who his partner is."
She looked right as a duo charged Hagiken, before they got close though, two blasts of water hit them and sent them back. Chuya appeared in her water form before reverting to her normal form. She saw Eri and Tonen looking at them and glared back before focusing on more pressing matters.
"Reload your arsenal," Chuya said to her partner. "And prepare for a very special attack, I have some targets in mind."
"Tick...tick...tick..." Hagiken replied, snickering again as he reloaded with bombs from his pockets.
With the explosive barrage paused for the time being, the students tried to rebound before getting picked off. But it wasn't so easy for some of them.
Wasuke, for example, found himself in quite a predicament. His partner was from General Studies and didn't have an effective Quirk for this kind of battle. To combat this, Wasuke did his best to play defense via his shields halves. Even growing them as big as he felt he could while still being mobile to protect his partner.
The problem was that many of the other combatants realized that this was his strategy, and slowly started to overwhelm him. Wasuke fought off multiple students and duos, and to his credit, he was able to beat back many of them. But eventually, the numbers got too great.
As he formed his shield to block a major attack, another student raced in and KO'd his partner.
"No!" he cried out when he realized what happened, dropping his shield as a result.
When his defenses opened, another energy blast came in and his him square in the chest, knocking him out as he fell to the ground. The buzzer sounded to signal their finish.
"Oh...that was hard to watch," commented Projection over the speaker. "But hey, props to Wasuke Bohiko for holding out as long as he did. That took a lot of guts, and a very hard shield!"
As his unconscious body was taken away alongside his partner's, the battles raged on.
Flying in and out of the fights were The Twins. Ryu was in full mech form and Ryo clung to his back and was using her drones in a variety of ways. Including ramming them into people to open them up to attacks by her brother.
As he decked one individual to the ground she cheered, "Well done, brother!"
"Thank you, sister!" Ryu answered back as he soared around some attacks. "It's not the easiest road to victory, but if we can weaken enough teams, others will pick them off and we'll outlast them!"
"I'll keep my drone eyes open to see who might be a worthy target next."
Through her Quirk, she looked up to two drones that she had deployed as the match started. They hovered over the battle arena and through them she saw just about everything. She could see how many individuals were left and the drones could even tell which ones were weak due to previous attacks.
As they scanned the battlefield they found a target and relayed it to her.
Ryo patted him on the shoulder, "Brother, a duo of Support students are open on the far side, let's rush towards them and take them out!"
He smiled from inside the armor, "Will do, guide me there!"
Ryu righted himself and Ryo adjusted him so that he could launch himself like a rocket to their foes. He blasted off full power and raced towards the unsuspecting students.
But before they reached them, the drones alerted Ryu to something else, "What? What do you mean were about to get hit-"
An odd light field crashed into them. The Twins fell to the ground separately and looked for its source. To their surprise, it was a duo of girls, they held hands and pointed the others at them. To the side of one of the girls was Ueno, and to the other was the student who had been firing blasts at Eri and Tonen.
"What did they..." started Ryu.
"Do to us...?" finished Ryo.
The girls looked at one another and then prepared for another attack.
"Let's start with the one on the left, shall we? Onaki Imazume. Quirk: Particles. She can emit special particles that can do various things depending on what they hit, as well as the kind of particles she chooses to send out. I don't pretend to understand the science of it all, but it clearly works."
"On the right, we have Izuro Honokuri. Quirk: Short-Circuit Field. She can emit a field of power that is devastating to machines of certain levels. But there's a serious limit on how far she can push it. But...if she happens to be connected to someone with an ability to send out waves of particles? Those powers combine to create a field that virtually no machine can withstand. You can guess what's about to happen now, right?"
The Twins got up, but they could feel that something was very off with them.
"Sister, this isn't good."
"I know, brother. We did our best, though, right?
"Of course. One last charge?"
"Wouldn't have it any other way."
Though he struggled to do so, Ryu got back to his feet and formed up his mech body one last time. Ryo called in all her drones and aimed them at the duo for a final strike. She hopped onto her brother and the two went forward.
Onaki and Izuro aimed true and again sent another short circuit wave at them, as well as nearby, encompassing a decent area. The drones hit the field and died instantly. Ryu hit the field and tried to fight it, but soon reverted back to his human form and once again crashed to the ground with his sister.
The two looked at each other and then looked up at the girls in disgust before sticking out their tongues and saying, "Get your own shtick!"
The other young man laughed and stepped forward as he held out his own hand, "Fair enough."
He fired an energy blast at them and they were done.
"Ouch!" called out Projection. "The Twins go down. You might have been surprised by that teamwork, but it's not against the rules! It's just not something you would have expected."
While the three students who took out The Twins were happy at the result, Ueno's head stopped spinning so that he could look at his friends as they were taken away, "Sorry guys..."
"Don't say you're sorry! Those twerps were the enemy in this competition!" criticized Onaki with a glare to him."
"Call them 'twerps' again? I'll put you in the wall with my 'somewhat useful Quirk'. Now let's go."
Head back to spinning, Ueno turned and went the opposite direction, the other three reluctantly in tow.
Tonen and Eri were still hanging on in their own end of the battle area. They had taken a few hits from broadsides and lucky strikes from other competitors but had been able to bounce back.
Keeping their momentum going, they went and did another combo move which eliminated another duo. When they were done they took a small breather.
"How are you doing, Eri?" Tonen asked while making sure no one was immediately near them.
Eri panted somewhat heavily but shrugged when he looked at her, "I'm hanging on. I know now to work better on my endurance training once we get back to class!"
"Ha, ha, nice. I think I'll join you in that. I definitely haven't been in this kind of a fight before."
"None of us have, I bet. How many teams are left?"
Tonen did his best to quickly survey the scene, "Hard to tell, I think 10 teams are out, but it could be more, and it could be less."
"Shall we up the ante then?" she asked with a sincere look.
"Might as well."
He quickly knelt down and rolled up each of his pant legs. This confused her, "What are you doing?"
"Did you forget? I can only expel my air through exposed skin. All the attacks I've done have been through my arms or head. I have a feeling I'll need more 360 blasts and my legs will help with that. It's either this or risk my clothes getting blown off."
"I don't need to see that."
"Good, I don't want you to see that, we're not that close."
They smirked and laughed lightly at the joke, but it was broken up by a shaking of the ground.
"Sanda's nearby," realized Eri as she did her best to stabilize herself.
"Yeah, he's with Hana I think," Tonen recalled. "They could spell trouble if we get too close, Hana can meld with this terrain and sneak attack us easily."
"That would be bad. Let's head in the opposite direction for now."
All set, they headed away from the quake and towards a group that they felt they could take. Little did they know that someone was watching them as they did.
Tonen and Eri worked together to kick back a scale-filled girl and her bug-eyed partner. But no sooner had they done so than Eri looked up to see something falling towards them.
"Oh no," she said as she realized what it was.
Tonen didn't need to look up as the objects in question were now at his eye level and falling all around him and Eri. They were explosive devices.
Above the two, Chuya used her aqua form to launch her and Hagiken into the air, to which he dropped as many explosive devices as he could down at the two of them.
Hagiken snickered as he saw his devices swarm them, "Boom."
*credits*
