Hey guys/gals! Sorry, this is going up late but some stuff came up soooooo Monday upload.

First things first, my normal beta (Hiatus) had some stuff come up irl, so this chapter is being uploaded un-beta-ed. I double and triple checked it, fixed some glaring errors, but until I can get it properly beta-ed I'll ask you nerds, to help me out. If you see even the smallest grammatical error let me know as it helps me improve my writing, which is sorely needed.

Second, this arc is going to last a bit longer than I had originally planned. Some parts of the course are going to be shorter, while some will take up an entire chapter. Therefore, I'm making this an official arc: "The Obstacle Relay Arc". Such a perfect name (sarcasm if you couldn't tell). And you guys know what a new arc means…

OPENING: Uncontainable - Set it Off

ENDING: Circles - Pierce the Veil

Third… uh, so this is a bit hard to explain but for the next two months, I will be experiencing a miniature heart attack on a nightly basis. For those of you who are on the discord or have read my profile, you know I am a hockey fan. What you may not know is that I am a HUGE hockey fan and the Stanley Cup Playoffs begin on the 10th. My team, the Washington Capitals, is taking on the Carolina Hurricanes, which will be incredibly stressful in itself but I also make it a point to watch as many games as I can. Even if its a team I have no stake in and couldn't care less if they were eliminated (looking at you, flightless bird scum), I will watch and, like any hockey fan, enjoy every second. Where I am a bit different is that no matter which game I watch come playoff time I always feel stressed as I watch it due to the importance of each game. So here's my long-winded explanation of why chapters might be skipped or delayed until early June.

Just a warning: If the Capitals are knocked out at any point I will most likely get a bit depressed because I can't watch my favorite team for 5-7 months. That being said… #Back2Back

Alright, now that that's outta the way... AH! I forgot! Since it's an obvious thing to happen in any shonen anime, the stereotypical tournament arc will follow after this arc, though there may be a mini-arc in between to break up all the action. This will also serve as the intro to class FH1. EDIT: Screw it. couldn't get the link to work, so just made a poll on my Profile. It should appear at the top of my profile... hopefully. Here are your options:

-Standard. Basic 1v1 tournament (i.e. battle rounds of the Grand Magic Games, or any of the Pokemon Leagues)

-Doubles. Students will be paired off and fight in a series of battles until one team remains

-Hybrid. A mixture of the two that I am keeping somewhat of a secret because… reasons.

Phew, that was a lot. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy this chapter and as always if you have any questions, comments, or concerns don't be afraid to let me know!

Purpose of a Hero

"Thanks, dad. I should probably get going. I've still got school today." Melody's voice, even distorted by the phone, still sounded hollow Carlyle noted glumly.

"Don't hesitate to call," Carlyle managed to get in before his daughter hung up. 'Oh, my dearest Melody. If only you knew the troubles you will face in this cruel world.' With a sigh, the mountain of a man rolled back over and attempted to fall back to sleep… not an easy task by any means with the flood of thoughts going through his sleep-deprived brain. 'Harmony… how I wish you were here. You always knew exactly what to say when someone was down in the dumps. Our little girl is growing up so fast but I can't stand it. Every step she takes forward is another step away from safety. I… I can't help her as you could.' Carlyle scowled at the thought, one that had haunted him since the day his wife died. Suddenly, there was a scuttling sound from the shadows at the edge of his bedroom. "For a rat, your stealth could use some improvement."

"Well, when I don't gotta fear for my life I tone it down. Ain't no reason to use my talents in a dump like this," a squeaky voice said. The voice's owner, a scrawny man with a triangle-shaped face emerged from the darkness and looked at Carlyle with beady eyes. "I don't gotta fear for my life, do I?"

"You always have a safe haven here, Rat. It must be important for you to be here so early. What's wrong this time?" He asked with a large yawn. Rat wrung his hands nervously and glanced around the room as if he were trying to find every single method of escape he could.

"You wasn't sleepin'. Who was you talking to?"

"None of your business," Carlyle said simply. Rat twitched again, pulled out a yellow manilla envelope, and tossed it onto Carlyle's bed. "What is th-"

"Everything I could gather on the Black Order. I...uh, didn't know where else to bring it. All my other contacts have gone belly-up in the past few months." Carlyle stared at the man in bemusement, which caused the Rat to shy away. "They… uh, they're gathering followers... fast. Strong ones too. That Spitfire guy… not even their strongest. Haven't seen the big guy yet, his name is Prophet… he's the one who killed Manticore.

"That is quite worrying. Manticore was quite the hand-to-hand specialist. What kind of Quirk does this 'Prophet' have?" Carlyle inquired.

"No… no one knows. He keeps mainly to himself and away from the recruits. I bet even the bigwigs don't know." This concerned the elder Halloway. 'Specialist is putting it lightly. Manticore could defeat any of the other Top Ten in terms of a physical fight… with the exception of Crusader. To defeat him would take immense power and skill. It's troubling to think our enemy has members powerful enough to take on and defeat two of the best Heroes in North America.'

"Anything else?" Rat coughed and shifted nervously.

"They call their leaders the Five Generals. The Generals, uh, of the North Wind, South Wind, East Wind, and West Wind. The fifth is their Black Ops commander. C-Carlyle…" The rat-faced man frowned and directed his gaze to the floor. "I, um… I don't exactly know how to say this lightly but, uh, Vesuvius joined them."

"What?" While he managed to keep his tone neutral enough not to scare the fragile man before him, in his heart he was seething with rage. 'She finally makes a reappearance. After so long I can finally… no, I'm no match for her.'

"There's more… but, um, I'll let you look through that. Give it to the, uh, police or something if you want. I'll try to get more info, but… I swear that Leech guy can read my thought, he's always giving me this odd smile."

"You said all of your contacts have gone silent? Why exactly?" Carlyle interjected, his eyes boring holes into the file on his lap. Rat paled, which was a feat considering how pasty his skin already was.

"Not silent. Most of them are dead, the others… loyal members of the Black Order. That's the deal they give you. Servitude or death… painful death… slow death," Rat murmured, his beady eyes wide. 'You are as cowardly as ever. How you manage to keep your cool enough to get vital information from the most dangerous places I will never know.' Carlyle thought amusedly.

"Yes, yes, is there anything else or can I go back to sleep? I have a reputable restaurant to open up in the morning, so I can't be sleeping in." Rat actually had the gall to snort at this.

"Reputable? I've seen your food storage. Not to mention the bathrooms." Just as quickly as the bravado had come into his tone, it vanished as he saw Carlyle's glare. "Uh, right. Sorry, so… no, not much else I can tell you that you can't, uh, just read in that file."

"Alright. Thank you for this, Rat. I will make sure this gets into good hands."

Purpose of a Hero

"Hazel was spot on," Melody muttered under her breath as she and Sirius, who was looking a bit paler than normal and avoiding her eyes by examining the mounds of rubble that lie before them, awaited the start of the exercise. If she were being honest with herself...she wasn't doing much better. 'I always hate being center stage. Not to mention my teammates are counting on me to get a winning time. It should be relatively easy to move through the rubble with my Quirk, but that's not my main issue. If I had to guess, the moment this starts and we step into the course, Epiphany will attack while Sirius makes his move. I don't think she'll let me go quietly, so I've gotta think of a countermeasure. I can still only hold my Quirk for sixty seconds under the best of circumstances but with someone breathing down my neck… my concentration will be harder to maintain.' The redhead scanned the first wave of rubble, made to resemble a collapsed apartment building, to try and think of a strategy. 'I need to get into the ruins as quickly as possible. Dodging Epiphany will be a must, but I don't know if she can phase through objects as well. She is a spirit, after all, I don't know how the rules work with that. I could possibly use the same strategy I used last time and aim only for Sirius. She feels all of his pain so I can use that to my advantage… granted they'll be expecting that s-"

"ALRIGHT!" Mr. Holl's voice called over the loudspeaker, instantly cutting off Melody's train of thought. "Now that everyone is situated, let's do this! When you hear the buzzer it's time to go!"

"Good luck," Melody said to Sirius as the two of them converged at the starting line. The indigo-haired boy just nodded, looking as if he were actively trying to keep his lunch from making a reappearance, so Melody refocused on the task ahead. Seconds later, a loud buzzing noise filled the underground cavern and the two entered the course. Almost immediately and just as she had predicted, the redhead had to dodge the large, wooden baseball bat that soared through the air at her head. 'Predictable, yet dangerous. Not a good combo,' Melody decided as she glared at the spirit, who stood just a few feet away, smirking. Meanwhile, a few dozen meters behind her Sirius climbed over a broken down wall and out of sight.

"Hey again, Melody!" The spirit girl snarled, a manic grin on her face. In quick succession, Melody ducked under another swing of the club and only just managed scoot back out of the way of a kick. The redhead countered with her own, trying to sweep the spirit's legs out from underneath her but to her shock Epiphany just leaped into the air and floated ten inches above the ground. "Surprised?"

"Love to talk, Epiphany but I've got an obstacle course to win!" Melody shouted as she turned, shifted into her Wraith form, and sprinted towards the pile of rubble she'd been eying earlier, the now irate spirit girl right on her tail. Once she reached it, she dove inside. Darkness immediately engulfed her, as well as the chill she always felt when phasing through solid matter. Melody walked through the black space for a few moments until she found an opening big enough for her to disengage her Quirk. 'Deja-vu,' she thought as a chill went down her spine.

The interior of the building wasn't empty like she'd imagined it would be. It looked as if someone had lived there up until the moment the building collapsed. The room she'd materialized in was obviously a dining room with an ornately decorated wooden table and chairs, many of which were broken or reduced to splinters. Broken plates and glass littered the floor, making Melody move even more cautiously. 'At least there's no fire damage,' she mused. The redhead stumbled her way through the dining room, as well as its attached kitchenette, and emerged in a dark hallway. Almost instantaneously she was back in the townhouse in Yonkers. 'Deep breaths, Mel. I highly doubt anything like that would be here… no matter how realistic the Forge made this place.'

All in all, it took her not even two minutes to make her way through the debris, though it felt much longer, and climb out a window relatively unharmed on the other side. 'Well… at least I didn't have a panic attack. That's always good,' she thought meekly. Unfortunately, she had no time to revel in this fact as Epiphany's club was once again on a collision course with her skull. She ducked underneath the weapon and scrambled into a fighting position. Green eyes glared at the semi-translucent girl. "Holy crap! You could've killed me!"

"Sorry, but I can't let Sirius down, so I gotta take you out! All's fair in love and war, right?" The spirit girl grinned and threw her right fist forward, Melody craned her head away but only too late realized it was a feint when the spirit's left hand successfully connected with her jaw. Melody saw stars for a moment but recovered just in time to get out of the way of a large, wooden spear that sprouted from the side of the baseball bat. Epiphany smirked and the wooden spear-bat hybrid began to glow a bright white light. "Nimble, ain't ya? Alright then, take this! Widow's Web!" Melody had zero time to react as hundreds of razor-sharp wooden needles burgeoned forth from the original bat. Several of the needles pierced her flesh in multiple places, causing her to cry out in distress. The redhead quickly shifted forms and exited the intricate web-like structure of needles, wincing in pain at the numerous bleeding pinpricks all over her skin.

"God bless America!" She yelped in pain. 'Feels like a thousand paper cuts. So many friggin' splinters. She really isn't messing around. Stupid Quirk… not having offensive capabilities.'

"I'm not done!" Epiphany roared. Still on the defensive, Melody stumbled out of the way of the spirit's kick and shifted to her Wraith form to avoid another spear jutting out of the bat at a nearly impossible angle. The battle went on like this for several long minutes with Epiphany attacking mercilessly while Melody tried her best not to get skewered. 'She's good. Obviously, she has some fighting experience from when she was alive. That gives her an edge, sparring is so much different than the real thing and I've only had that one in Brooklyn with Laser Mouth.' The spirit again attempted to use her 'Widow's Web' move but this time Melody was ready for it and managed to avoid it as well as giving herself some room to breathe.

"That all?" Melody taunted, trying to hide how labored her breathing was already. 'Sirius must be nearing the finish line by now. I've gotta get a good enough time for the others to make up for my weakness. That means I've gotta shake Epiphany again. There has to be some way to get away from her indefinitely. Hm, I wonder…' The redhead grinned as an idea entered her head. She'd seen an entrance not far from the starting line but hadn't wanted to risk it. Now, she had little choice. She ran towards the center of the street and briefly activated her Quirk, smiling widely as she immediately deactivated it. "Sorry, Epiphany! I've got a race to win!"

"Like I'd let you get away! My ultimate move: Frenzied Roots!" The spirit girl bellowed, slamming her bat onto the asphalt. The ground rumbled for a moment before splitting under the strain of roots growing from the ground, each as wide as the wheels of a monster truck. The roots tore through the earth right at Melody, whose smile didn't wane. 'I knew she was a fan of Overgrown, but this has gotta count as plagiarism.' Right up until the roots were five feet away, Epiphany felt confident she'd won. Her opponent hadn't moved and showed no signs of doing so. Then, the girl's form shimmered into her alternate, and if Epiphany was honest with herself frightening, form and slipped into the ground beneath her. "WHAT?"

Purpose of a Hero

Meanwhile, in the partially collapsed sewer tunnel below, Melody grinned to herself. "Can't believe that worked. Thank goodness for the Forge's want to make everything as realistic as possible." Pleased with herself and her quick thinking, the redhead turned and sprinted in the direction of the finish line. However, she soon found this task to be more difficult than she'd expected. The sewer system was a complete maze, with dozens of twists and turns, side tunnels and steep drop-offs. There were several times that Melody forgot she was in a training exercise and started to feel nervous… then she'd remember she was in a training exercise and start to feel nervous for a completely different reason. 'I can't dawdle. My team is counting on me. Alright… I've gone far enough. It's time to resurface and see where the heck I am,' Melody decided and glanced towards the ceiling, which was only two feet above her head. 'Screw it.'

The redhead reached her arms above her head and clasped on to the largest pipe she could see with all the strength she could muster. Once she'd established her grip, she took a deep breath and began to sway. 'Just like a swing,' she thought as she kicked her dangling feet forward and then pulled them back quickly. A few kicks later she had a decent rhythm going… until the pipe snapped. Her back and head slammed into the stone floor hard enough to make her see stars. "Ow, okay… let's not do that again," she groaned. It took her another moment to collect herself before she shakily got to her feet. "I've got to get out of here before too much time passes. There's gotta be a way up that doesn't include crappy gymnastics or giving myself a concussion."

Then she saw it. A few hundred feet down the narrow tunnel to her right was a ladder. "Ask and you shall receive." The rungs of the ladder looked rusted and a few were missing. Gritting her teeth, Melody began to climb until she reached a manhole cover, phasing through it and appearing in the streets above. 'No sign of Epiphany or Sirius. Maybe I've lost them? Even so, I have no idea where the finish line is. Dangit, this place is so much bigger than I thought it'd be. Just how big are these underground training facilities anyway? Mr. Holl said two former teachers built it with their Quirks… I wonder what they were.' After getting her bearings, sorta, she began her trek towards where she thought the exit might be. However, as with most of this exercise so far, things didn't go her way for long. She never even saw the roots creeping towards her until they wrapped around her legs and dragged her down. Luckily she managed to bring up her arms to avoid face-planting the asphalt. "Are you kidding me? Where do you keep coming from?"

"You sure are a slippery little devil, Melody. Too bad the Two-Bit Heroes are… uh, not so slippery. Wait, that doesn't make sense. The Two-Bit Heroes are stickier? Sirius help me out," Epiphany said, glancing over her shoulder at her teammate, who just sighed and shook his head.

"I hardly think that's important. We're close to the exit now. Can we please just get this over with? I'd rather not get any more injuries," Sirius complained. Melody was slightly surprised by the condition her foe was in. Despite not having been involved in either of the two fights, he was covered in scrapes, bruises, and a nasty looking black eye. 'Jeez, remind me never to let him or Kira go anywhere together. I don't think the school could pay for the damages.'

"Bah! Whatever you buzzkill. Same plan as before, then?" The spirit asked, to which Sirius nodded an affirmative. 'I can't let him get away. If what he said is true the finish line is close by, not to mention… I think attacking him is the only way for me to defeat Epiphany.' The moment the indigo-haired boy began to run away from the two girls, Melody charged at him. When she'd closed about half the distance, Epiphany stood in her path. "Wood Wall!"

"Sorry about this!" Melody cried as she sprinted straight through the massive wall of wood as well as Epiphany herself, which the spirit unquestionably did not enjoy.

"No! Get back here coward!" Epiphany screeched. Ignoring her, Melody finally got close enough to her opponent, switched back to her normal form and swept Sirius' legs out from beneath him. The boy hit the ground hard and wheezed when the redhead placed her foot on his chest, applying just enough pressure to make it hard for him to get a complete breath. From ten feet away, Epiphany glared at her but made no move to advance.

"Like I said, sorry but I won't lose. My team is counting on me," Melody said and grabbed the small metal canister that hung from the back of her utility belt, something that hadn't been a part of her initial design but rather an addition she'd requested at her father's suggestion a few weeks back, and held it aloft threateningly before faltering. 'Does mace work on spirits? My punches and kicks seem to land just fine most of the time so she definitely is at least somewhat solid. Can she change her intangibility? Welp, only one way to find out I suppose.' And with that, the redhead sprayed an orange-colored plume of dust at the spirit, specifically towards her eyes. Epiphany cried in pain and brought her hands up to her face, while Melody smirked and took her foot off of Sirius. As she began to run towards where she assumed the exit was, she was almost immediately crashed into by a large, wooden hammer.

"You jerk! That friggin' hurts!" Epiphany bellowed, rubbing at her eyes with one hand, tears streaming down her face while holding the hammer in the other. Melody, who'd slammed into a derelict bus, gasped in pain and struggled against her wavering balance. 'Something… something feels broken. Not good.' Taking his opportunity, Sirius got to his feet and ran.

"Damn! Get back here!" The spirit girl shouted as Melody stumbled past her and after the boy. 'This has been going on way too long. I wonder if the other matches will last his long?' Melody thought as she ran. By her estimates, it'd been fifteen minutes since they first entered the ruined city, which was three times what she'd predicted it would take. 'Doesn't help I've got an annoyingly persistent spirit on my tail. Speaking of which…' The redhead sighed and shifted into her Wraith form as a flurry of wooden needles shot through her ethereal form. However, she was forced to stop her Quirk as a blinding pain seared through her skull. 'Da-dangit, I've been using my Quirk too much. No time to stop and take one of Mrs. Holl's pills. I've gotta just push through it.'

"There it is," Melody muttered to herself. As the trio turned around a corner, all of them seemingly focused on the final goal rather than their previous fight, the large climbing wall that marked the end of the course loomed. At the top, she could just barely make out the short-statured Andi and the reptilian Diana.

"That's it! Twisting Roots!" Epiphany shouted and slammed her bat onto the ground. Just as before, the ground tore itself apart as large, thick wooden roots burst forth from it and surged toward Melody. At the last second, and ignoring all the pain she'd been feeling so far, the redhead phased and nearly blacked out as a result of the sudden onslaught of pain. She cried out in agony and her form faltered as she fell to her knees. For just a brief second, Epiphany saw the girl's face and a shiver went down her spine. While her form was usually pretty creepy, this was just downright terrifying. The upper half of Melody's face was normal, not even turning ghostly like it normally did. From her nose to her chin, however, had completely changed. It looked as if someone had melted the skin from her jaw and just left behind the grinning teeth of a skeleton. Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, the visage disappeared and both Epiphany and Sirius collapsed to the ground, wheezing and coughing. "What?"

Meanwhile, Melody felt a surge of energy flow through her and her migraine disappeared completely. With the finish line in sight, she charged for the rock climbing wall and began pulling herself up, completely unaware of her two adversaries lying on the ground below her feeling as if all their energy had been sapped. Epiphany gave one last confused look up at her fellow redhead and promptly vanished, leaving Sirius to try and gather himself.

Purpose of a Hero

"Round one is over! Melody gets the narrow victory with a time of sixteen minutes, thirty-five seconds, while Sirius notches eighteen minutes, seventeen seconds. Well done. Absolutely some areas you could both improve in, which we will go over when all is said and done but otherwise a good match. Now, Andi and Diana get going to your starting positions," Mr. Holl announced over the loudspeaker. While the half of his class not participating in the current event watched from the viewing area, Derrick had excused himself to the observation room, a secret room with feeds from cameras in each area that covered every nook and cranny. With his next pair of students preparing themselves, the teacher took a moment to reflect on what he'd seen. "I didn't think she'd reach this point so quickly. Harmony told me that the girl's grandfather hadn't reached this stage until he was seventeen or eighteen. It seems that Quirk is getting more and more powerful. This… could be a serious problem." Derrick knew what he had to do, but was extremely hesitant to do it. After a few moments of mental gymnastics, he sighed and called for Diana and Andi to begin before fishing his cell phone out of his pocket. He quickly dialed a number and held it up to his ear as it rang.

"Halloway Pizzeria, how can I help you?"

"Carlyle. We need to talk."

Purpose of a Hero

"Epiphany I don't know!" Sirius whined as he got checked out by Mrs. Holl, who was swearing at her husband under her breath. Ever since he'd forced himself to the top of the climbing wall, the voice of the spirit girl had been pestering him about what had happened with Melody. "It was like all my strength just drained out of me."

"Yeah, I could feel it too. It's odd, so far she's only shown the ability to evade attacks with her Quirk. Do ya think she might be hiding something?" The voice in his head asked. Sirius sighed and shook his head.

"I don't know. Mrs. Holl, is there anything odd about my condition?" The school nurse looked at him with an eyebrow raised and simply shook her head.

"Mostly cuts, bruises, some pretty bad trauma to your eye. What did you say happened to that again?" As Epiphany laughed at him in his mind, Sirius blushed before answering.

"Ran into a stop sign." Leena hummed at this and had to fight back a grin. "So there's nothing wrong, like, inside? Maybe a concussion or something?"

"No. Honestly, your story about losing your energy is quite baffling to me. None of your injuries could have caused something like that to occur," the nurse said before walking over to the curtain divider around his bed. As she exited she spoke again, this time sounding threatening. "I have to go check up on Ms. Halloway. Don't you dare even think about moving around too much. My Quirk got rid of your pain, but that's no excuse to go aggravating your injuries just because you can't feel the damage you're doing."

"Yes ma'am," Sirius replied meekly and was left alone with Epiphany once again. It still didn't make sense to him. 'Melody doesn't really seem like the kind of person to keep a secret like that. She's even explained her Quirk in great detail several times, so why did she never mention this?' He pondered. Thinking back on the incident he recalled the girl's expression during the chase had gotten increasingly more pained with every use of her Quirk. She'd even yelped in pain when she used it to dodge Epiphany's last attack. "I'm lost."

"As usual. Though… I can't help but think that maybe she was hiding something from us. I mean, people like to keep their secrets. We're a prime example."

"Yeah, but still. It seems like such an odd thing to keep to herself. Maybe… maybe she didn't know she could do it? Or she can't control it? Or… uh, something along those lines. I dunno, whatever it was it looked like she didn't even notice."

"It felt… similar to when you, well…" The spirit trailed off and Sirius was once again left by himself in silence.

Purpose of a Hero

What's this? There's more to Melody's Quirk than meets the eye? Find out what more there is in *checks calendar* Eight Months! I don't think that's a lie either. One upload a week makes things go by slow. Anyway, onto the preview!

NEXT TIME ON THE PURPOSE OF A HERO!

Chapter 19: Sibling Rivalry!