As Midnight declared that the 42 winners who would go on to the next stage of the festival had passed through to the final stage, Izuku forced herself up unto her feet, and slapped her cheeks to really wake up from her bout of shellshock.
She had experienced a lot of painful things in her life, but… That had been… Something else.
She got quicker out of it than Fuku, who still sounded rather… Not there.
"So… What's next, do you think?"
"AND NOW, THE MAIN SECTION OF THIS TOURNAMENT IS ABOUT TO BEGIN, THE PART YOU HAVE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR! BUT WHAT SORT OF ACTIVITY WILL WE HAVE THIS YEAR YOU MIGHT ASK? WHY SOMETHING THAT CAN ONLY BE FOUND IN JAPANESE SCHOOLS AND NOWHERE ELSE ON EARTH…"
Much like they had done during the first part, Midnight and Chariot snapped their respective tools skywards and between them, another brilliant display of English words burst into existence!
CAVALRY BATTLE
A cavalry battle… Now that was…
"What… What the Hell is that?"
Izuku didn't really get to explain, as several of her fellow students made comments about that(Including Mineta, who for some reason had a bright, red, hand shaped mark over one side of his face), but most notable was Tsuyu, who asked a direct question to their two hosts.
"So we're teaming up, but how exactly?"
"EXCELLENT QUESTION LITTLE FROPPY! THE ANSWER IS RATHER SIMPLE! YOU STUDENTS WILL NOW GET TO INDEPENDENTLY FORM TEAMS OF TWO TO FOUR, AND GET INTO A HORSE OR RIDER FORMATION!"
She motioned to Midnight to continue, and the other woman did so with great enthusiasm.
"The rules are fundamentally the same as every other, ordinary cavalry battle! But with one, main exception!"
"AND THAT IS OF COURSE THAT THE HEADBANDS YOU HAVE TO SNATCH FROM OTHER RIDERS WILL HAVE A VALUE BASED ON THE ACCUMULATION OF ALL OF THE FORMATIONS MEMBERS! THE QUICKER YOU GOT HERE, THE HIGHER YOUR POINTS!"
"So number 42 get 5 points, number 41 get 10, and so on… Except for one!"
"THAT'S RIGHT MIDNIGHT! FOR THERE IS ONE, BIG EXCEPTION, AND THAT IS NUMBER 1! FOR THE LUCKY LADY WHO REACHED FIRST PLACE GETS 10 MILLION POINTS! THUS BY DEFAULT, WHOMEVER GETS THAT HEADBAND GETS THEMSELVES AND THEIR FORMATION TO THE FINALS! WILL OUR DRACONIC HEROINE SURVIVE BECOMING THE NUMBER ONE HUNTED TARGET!? WE WILL HAVE TO WAIT AND SEE!"
Izuku, who had been standing a bit apart from where the majority of the now 42 students had gathered into one mass, just stared at Chariot.
"10… Million?"
She felt her throat go dry.
"Yes, but it's not only our number one, but ALL the higher ranking students who bow will find themselves hunted! Now it will be a game of survival, where anyone can make a comeback! It's now ANYONE'S game!"
As Midnight continued talking, Izuku felt… And saw, in slow motion as every single other student there turned towards her, some slowly, some quickly, and in one instant, as it sank in, she felt the change in their eyes as she suddenly went from another of their fellow students… To a Target.
She… She was back in middle school.
Not Gura… No, she was back in the school where she was Bakugo's punching bag, and everyone there would turn on her the moment they felt a wish to do so.
It shouldn't happen.
Yuei was supposed to be a better place than that.
But in that moment, she felt no better here than she had back then. At all.
"There is more suffering ahead for those at the top. As you must have heard countless times since enrolling at Yuei… This is Plus Ultra."
"RISE UP! AND GO BEYOND!"
"Oh… Well, that should be fine. We're strong…. -Izuku? Oh okay there girl?"
She blinked.
For a moment, she had been completely out of it. She'd actually missed a huge part of Midnight and Chariot's explanations of the finer details of the rules!
As she snapped out of it, the rest had already begun to find partners amongst each other.
Iida and Mei!
The panic in her heart subsided for a bit as she quickly headed over to where Iida was standing, talking with Momo.
As she walked, she could feel the way everyone turned away from her. Like she'd just caught the plague.
Unworthy.
Ojiro was standing in between her and Iida, and he suddenly got a look of… He turned away and stepped out of her path.
Nothing has changed since back then.
Finally though, she did catch up to Iida.
"Iida!"
She didn't even use an honorific, so out of it was she.
"Midoriya-San."
"Iida… Iida-san… You, me and Mei can team up… You in the lead, me as the rider, and as our fourth we can get… Uraraka, she can make things weightless, that can… Mix really well with my wings…"
Iida nodded.
"...I'dd expect no less Midoriya-San… But I'm Sorry, I refuse."
He might as well have driven a knife into her gut.
"Ever since the entrance exam, I've been losing to you, time and time again. It's precisely because you're a wonderful friend… That I cannot follow you now. Untempered as I am."
He turned around in a way that at any other time Izuku would have described as cool, or dramatic, but now just made the knot in her stomach turn even harder.
"Bakugo and Todoroki are not the only ones who see you as a Rival."
He stepped away alongside Momo.
"So, I too… Challenge you!"
He stepped away, and went over to join Todoroki and Kaminari.
"Damn… I didn't expect him to be so cutthroat! So who-"
Izuku turned, suddenly the noise from the godrobe gone, as she felt panic in her heart begin to hammer, as she realized what was going to happen now.
She scanned the grounds for pink hair… And found it…
The pinkette was not looking in her direction, instead talking with Shield, who was together with…
She couldn't even bring herself to look at them.
Instead her eyes were glued to her, to Mei.
Her hand reached out… Stopped… Then fell down again.
She really was back then.
Alone.
Tsuyu.
She ripped herself away from looking at Mei, and scanned for the long, black mane of silky hair, tied in a knot at the bottom.
As she walked, she felt clumsy, awkward, like the middle schooler who had always been the butt of jokes nobody ever liked.
It was like all of her power had just… Gone with a gust of wind. Forgotten. Unimportant.
She found Tsuyu.
She opened her mouth, said something.
The frog girl shook her head.
Behind her was standing the tallest boy in class.
A small giant, easily big enough to carry her on his back.
They left her behind.
She just stood there.
You're alone.
She was alone.
She realized that, then as everybody walked around, talked, made groups amongst themselves.
She was back in time.
Even Bakugo was back in time too, with a small host of people who wanted to team up with him, everyone in 1-A wearing the all too familiar black of Aldera.
The blonde boy actually caught her eyes, then looked away, completely uninterested.
Her sight swam.
She was going to be disqualified. Loose by default.
Worthless little Deku. Never able to do anything.
Why was she even here?
She hadn't even wanted to be here.
She just wanted to go home.
Go home and… And mourn…
She turned towards the exit from the restroom, the one she had come into this place to begin with.
Leaning up against the doorway, a young teenager in the blue and white of Yuei was looking at her with a measuring look.
She was a pretty girl, with long, bright green hair, and equally green eyes.
Questioning eyes.
"-Midoriya?"
Something squeezed her arm.
She looked down on it.
"You… You okay?"
It was… Her eyes focused.
It was Mineta.
She blinked.
Then snapped her head back up towards the doorway.
The girl was gone.
"I…"
Okay?
Her heart felt like it was breaking all over again.
"You… Want to team up?"
She blinked again, almost not believing the words she heard.
"What?"
"I… I mean, it seems nobody else wants to team up with either of us, so… Maybe we could give a shot at this, you and me?
He gave a… Not particularly charismatic smile.
She didn't care.
He was there. A friend. When anyone else had turned their backs towards her.
She actually began to cry.
"S-sure."
"Seriously? Our skins' are saved by this guy?"
I
As the groups formed, there quickly became the case that there were several groups who became the clear powerblocks.
Both in terms of numbers and in terms of power.
Todoroki had gathered himself a crew of 3 others who had a very versatile set of powers.
Bakugo, who had never really bothered to learn his classmates' Quirks, now had done so with a lot of them and teamed up with those he felt would be best suited for the job ahead.
Melissa Shield had teamed up with Mei the inventor, Tokoyami the Birdman, and Aoyama the boy with the laser naval.
Amongst those lesser teams no one really paid much attention to, Shouji, the biggest student in 1-A had teamed up with Asui Tsuyu.
And of course there was the teams from 2B, and the rather unlikely team of a single General student who managed to get into the top 42, and now served as the rider of a group with students from both 1-A and 1-B.
The team most eyes were glued to though, was the rather unlikely duo of Midoriya Izuku and Mineta Minoru.
And not just because of how unlikely it was, but how in spite of how she had a dwarf hoisted on her shoulders, Izuku looked far more intimidating than she usually did.
Legs and arms had all taken on a far more draconic appearance, complete with sharp, brutal, yet elegant looking claws.
On her face the metal had latched itself, the mask being ready for anything unexpected involving the air, and from her back her wings had unfurled, ready to fly at any notice.
Though how far she could take this, was given a sharp limit as the match was about to start.
"AND FINALLY, ONE LAST PRECAUTION AND RULE FOR YOU STUDENTS!"
Chariot sat elegantly, one leg over the other, sitting on her broomstick as she looked down from them from maybe 30 meters above.
"IN ORDER TO ENSURE THE PEOPLE WATCHING WON'T BE HURT, I'VE SET UP A BARRIER AROUND THE ENTIRE THING!"
She twirled her rod, as for a brief second, a brilliant, shining giant, translucent purple dome appeared over the tournament grounds.
On the walls around, which also shone with the same purple, brilliant green runes appeared.
Then it faded away.
"DON'T WORRY! IT WON'T ZAP YOU OR ANYTHING, BUT IT WILL PREVENT BOTH YOU, AND YOUR QUIRKS FROM LEAVING THIS AREA UNTIL THE MATCH IS DONE! NOW! LET THE 15 MINUTES OF BATTLE BEGIN, ON THE 3!"
Every student tensed.
"1!"
"2!"
"3!"
I
The moment the 3 sounds came, izuku was about to take off… Only to find the very ground beneath her having turned to sticky mud!
"What the hell is this!?"
Someone's quirk obviously.
Izuku didn't really care who's.
Two giant wings tightened, then BEAT down with enormous force, so strong it almost toppled the teams that had been rushing them from the sheer force they generated?
She soared upwards!
The sky was hers.
She couldn't go too far up though.
The top of the invisible dome was too low to get out of reach of any ranged attack.
She quickly maneuvered herself to glide to the side, rather than just remaining still in the air, but this proved to be a mistake.
As she glided, something shot up, and encased her leg!
She was about to twist around, when something with massive force wrenched whatever it was that had grabbed her downwards!
Still… Strong though it was, her wings were stronger, and she remained in the air.
"It's Tsuyu and Shouji!"
"Thanks captain obvious!"
It wasn't obvious to Izuku… But as she tried to keep herself airborne from the force from below, she was hit by something else, something with enormous explosive force and sound that smashed into one of her wings.
"GAARRRGGHHH!"
She came crashing down, the other wing, keeping her and more importantly Mineta from being crushed by the fall by acting as cushioning as they hit the ground.
Both wings engulfed the two of them as huge shields, even if one was more battered than the other.
As she staggered to her feet though, another massive scream came from Fuku following another massive explosive force and sound, and one of his wings slapped towards something… It hit nothing, though it did disperse smoke from…
It was Bakugo's explosion.
The boy had seemingly left his horse(Upon which he was now back unto) to get airborne, then unleashed a massive explosion!"
As she snapped around to face him, his grin was something else.
"Like it Deku? I spent every single day for quite a while breaking my limits, JUST for this!"
"Holy shit! His explosions have gotten stronger!"
"Does that guy have NO self control at all!? That was stupidly lethal!"
In that moment, two things happened.
The first was that another team that had come in from the side, had its rider grip the now limp shredded and battered cloth of one of Izuku's wings with a smug smile, his fist closing tightly around it.
The second, was that Izuku wrenched her head(And Mineta) backwards, as a blue beam shot past her face, clearly aiming for her head.
The world froze for her then.
A blue beam of brilliant, dazzling light.
As it slammed into the barrier at the side of the arena and dispersed, it might not have had quite the same force as it might one day grow into, but Izuku could not have cared about that.
She recognized that blue gleam, the shimmer and almost hauntingly blue ray.
She hated it.
She hated it with a passion that dwarfed anything she had ever seen save Nui herself.
Two eyes of white and green, was replaced by emerald hellfire, as she snapped around to the source and ROARED!
The force of the roar was massive, like some sort of mechanical monstrosity imitating what it thought was a tiger's roar… But it was not the volume that struck everyone there.
It was the aura, the Murderous intent that for a brief, brief moment shook every single heart there that day save two equally as unnatural women.
A sense of fear down every spine, a feeling that there was something wrong there with them. Something unnatural and unholy that did not belong on the Earth!
An abomination that had stepped out from the primeval darkness of myth and story… Then as quickly as it came, it vanished.
Izuku just stood there panting, as she glared at the team, with Shield and Mei completely forgotten as those emerald eyes focused on Aoyama.
The man who had taken her baby from her.
The little… Boy who…
He was crying.
She blinked.
Then suddenly reality snapped back and she jumped backwards, soaring through the air, before slamming into the wall, where her sharpened toes gripped into the stone, and, not really noticed by her, went right through the invisible barrier with no problem.
It was like time had stood still for a moment, then suddenly everyone realized simultaneously that the moment was over.
Time started anew.
"WOW, NOW THAT'S A PROPER START I'D SAY! WE'RE NOT EVEN TWO MINUTES IN AND YET TEAM BAKUGO AND MINETA ARE ALREADY GOING ALL OUT, BLOWING AWAY ANY HESITATION!"
She spoke with a cheerfulness that beguiled the fact that almost everyone else still felt like their souls had been rattled around inside their mortal coils.
"Holy… What was that?"
Mineta's voice was absolutely shaking, as was the boy at large.
"Just some… Bad memories… I don't want to see that… Beam again.
Izuku, who was anything but emotionally calm and stable at the moment, felt surprising clarity at just how much she Hated that Quirk.
Hated it beyond words. Beyond reason.
As the great cavalry battle began again, very few teams actually turned to face Izuku and Mineta again, despite just moments earlier having been the single most attractive target on the field.
Only Bakugo seemed undeterred by the shock that had just happened.
His team was less so.
"Seriously dude? Let's find someone else."
"Yeah let's-" "Fuck that!"
The boy was clearly focusing on Izuku in spite of everything else.
"We're taking her down! Total and complete victory-"
And there he suddenly stopped, as out of nowhere the team, whose rider had been gripping Izuku's now tattered and useless wing, swooped in from behind and snatched the headband Bakugo had been wearing right off.
"Too simple really class A."
The entire formation, suddenly bereft of their headband and thus the key to their success, turned around sharply to face the new challenger who had now put some distance between them.
"Give that back! I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!"
"He got us!"
The blonde boy seemed undeterred by the threat, instead smiling smugly as he replied while calmly snapping the clasp of the band around his neck to join his team's original one.
"When it was announced that the first event was a race with 42 winners, it didn't take a genius to realize that the point wasn't to win the race… So long as you got in within the 42 first, it was all good. It was the perfect chance to hang back and study and observe the Quirks of everyone else. So that's what we did, while you glory hungry morons in 1-A rushed ahead at full speed."
Kirishima, Bakugo's front horse, was shocked at the statement.
"The whole class was in on it!?"
The blonde boy chuckled.
"That wouldn't have been a bad idea, but everyone was onboard. Our good Catholic Girl for instance… But most of us just focused on scoring modestly, rather than chasing for some fleeting first place, like a horse chasing after some dangling carrot in front of it… Like some others I could mention. Even now, rather than wanting to actually win, mr. Horsie here just wanna beat your dragon girl… Good luck with that."
Then he promptly turned around.
"Kirishima… Plans changed."
The three horses looked up at their blonde leader, who was fuming.
"Before we go for Deku… I'm gonna murder every last one of them!"
Izuku observed it, and the following battle from the safety of the wall.
"N-nobody is coming after us."
Mineta seemed baffled by that.
He was right.
Now that Bakugo was gone, nobody seemed particularly interested in going after her and Mineta next.
In fact, every time they looked over in her direction…
Fear.
Clear as day, every single one of the team from 1-B seemed scared of her, with her own classmates also seeming very weary of engaging with her.
Scared.
Was this what a Hero should instill in people around them?
Why was she even here?
How did this make her a better hero?
Doubts she hadn't really realized were there crept out.
She had been far, far too worried about having to go out on stage and perform for the entire world to see, to realize they were there.
And now… Somehow, the idea that everyone was looking at her was the last thing on her mind.
She wasn't comfortable with it at all.
But the fact was that everything else overshadowed it until it was just a dot of black in a sea of shadows…
She just wanted this to be over with.
"So, just so you know… I haven't been able to fix up the wing. Those damn explosions have to be many, many times stronger than last time… But also when I stretched all out I tore surprisingly easily."
Well that was… Great.
One more bad thing to put on top of the others.
"Maybe we could fix it up with blood?"
"Later…"
She did not know how much blood that might take, and this was not the time to experiment.
Her eyes went back to watching the various groups duking it out while giving the pair on the wall a wide berth.
There was… Something wrong.
Mineta agreed.
"Ia it just me, or… Or are the rest of the guys out of breath already?"
"Yeah…"
It wasn't just his imagination.
A lot(Though not all) of the people duking it out was suddenly extremely tired.
Some were stumbling, threatening to topple over and getting their team taken out, while other teams had to actually go on the defensive despite the clock ticking away.
Why?
Did her scream have fatiguing powers?
Could she add that unto her ridiculously long and seemingly expanding list of powers and abilities?
…No… If that was the case, it would be uniform.
It wasn't. Kacchan and his group didn't seem particularly winded, but...
Meanwhile other groups, like Todoroki's had one member(Kaminari) who had taken the brunt of it.
They weren't the only ones who had noticed either, she heard that through the mutter from the stands above.
She tried to ignore that, along with the commentary from the 4 different announcers.
How they managed to avoid speaking over each other she had no idea.
"That… Aura of yours was really something…"
Her aura? That took her aback.
"Not the scream?"
Mineta snortes.
"Nah, it started before the scream… Trust me I could tell. It would be kinda stupidly hard not to, given where I am."
He hesitated a bit before asking.
"Do you… Really hate Aoyama that much?"
She shook her head.
"No… Just his… Laser beams… Or… whatever they are. They don't hit with the force of something moving at light speed… But they have mass…"
She almost laughed.
Even now, as her thoughts were swimming one moment, and solid the next, she still fell back on her second nature to overanalyze everything about Quirks, heroes and power.
"That's… Actually a really good point. Imagine if he was like Kizaru. That would be fucking terrifying!"
"No… If they were actual laser beams with the kind of force to be a deadly weapon against Humans, they would just superheat the liquid inside what they hit, and make them instantly explode that way. Same thing that would happen with a real laser sword. One Piece's giant laser explosions aren't realistic at all."
"Gee, that… That just makes actual lasers sound way better…"
Silent came back again(or what passed for silence on this field), before Mineta asked.
"You… You know a lot, you know that? Like… You have an answer for everything really. On the… Boat, you just knew what to do. When we talk about shit in the cafeteria, you always know something nobody else does."
She chuckled, rather devoid of humor or mirth.
"I really wish you could solve all your problems in life just by knowing enough stuff… It doesn't work that way though."
"Yeah that's… Not really wrong. You would not believe how little I got out of being the smartest guy in class!"
"This guy's smart? I'll believe that when I see it!"
In her own mind, Izuku had to agree with the assessment, but out loud she asked a question:
"Why… Why are you here, Mineta?"
For a few moments, a painful, awkward silence reigned as the sounds of battle all around the arena really began to pick up steam.
"Look… I get you guys aren't exactly impressed by it… But I really did want to become a Hero to be cool. And to-"
"No, I get that part. I mean… Why are you STILL here? Even after everything that happened… You can't be… That desperate for a girlfriend that you'd risk life and limb for one."
Honestly she just… Wanted to hear someone else's thoughts on it.
Why to be a Hero.
It was… Starting to get hard to remember.
It shouldn't be… But it was.
"Well… It's… Okay, so just to put it out there? I wasn't exactly popular in middle school. At all. Or the school before that. I've never been popular in my life."
She nodded.
"Yeah… I know that feeling."
"Wait… You… Seriously? You? What's not to like?"
A lot.
There was a LOT not to like about her.
"You hated the fact that nobody liked you, so you wanted to become a Hero to reinvent yourself. I get that part…"
She did.
His motivation was a lot more base, and frankly fueled by less savory urges to put it mildly… But she understood the sentiment.
There were about 4 minutes left.
She'd almost forgotten the big battle beneath.
Instincts saved her.
She jumped sideways, as the entire wall(Or rather the invisible barrier) became coated in a thick, sharp, jagged layer of thick ice.
She twisted in the air and landed on her feet, amongst several other teams from 1-B, all of which suddenly gave her a wide space to herself, scattering away like leaves before the wind.
The team that had attacked them however, did not scurry away.
Instead it was like all of them(Well other than Kaminari) were eager, if rather nervous, to face the Dragon.
"We're… Coming for you… Midoriya."
Todoroki glared at her, but she couldn't help but notice he'd snatched away quite a lot of other's headbands, who now were snuggly around his neck.
She felt… Well she wasn't sure. Her feelings were so jumbled together it was hard to make sense of them…
But fear was not amongst them.
On the contrary, she felt anger and just a wish that they would Go away.
She felt her metal teeth snap together into a snarl?
Mineta's reaction was a bit different.
"Th-that's your cool line? We're coming for you? That's… So lame man."
Todoroki, who had been keeping a calm expression, got it replaced with a rather annoyed one… But only for a second.
"Yaoyorozu."
The girl at the side nodded, and conjured up… a shotgun.
She blinked in surprise.
"Bang!"
Izuku saw the bullets in real time.
Just like it was during the fight with Shigaraki, it was like her senses for that brief moment sped up something fierce.
This time, though, she didn't move to dodge.
If she did that, Mineta was likely to be hit by one of the pellets as the gunshot expanded from the barrel.
As she moved forward, she briefly noticed that the metal of the small bullets were red.
She felt the cloth around her arm expand into a shield.
Then pain.
She once roared a metallic scream as she buckled backwards, as suddenly, she and Fuku both felt pain!
She jumped backwards, but not near the same degree as before, as she felt the cloth snap back around her arm.
"GAAAAHHHHH!"
The small bullets, which were shaped like sharp, many pointed stars, had embedded themselves sharply into the cloth.
Now they slammed into her flesh directly.
The PAIN!
IT WAS SEARING!
HEAL HEAL HEAL!
For the first time she tried to actively FORCE her generation to kick in… And it didn't happen.
"GAAAHHH! WHAT ARE THESE FUCKING THINGS!?"
She didn't know.
But it did not take a genius to figure out it was the reason her healing factor was suddenly cut off.
"Holy- You okay Midoriya!?"
Momo, not missing a beat, but wearing a surprisingly determined smile(Seeming both relieved, and pleased with herself), now conjured up a huge, gray tarp, which she and her companions used to separate themselves(If rather awkwardly) from direct contact with Kaminari.
Izuku got one, brief moment of wondering what the hell was going on with that before the world lit up in a barrage of lightning.
More pain.
This time shared by her, Fuku AND Mineta… Along with a lot of the other teams around them.
There was no respite though.
While she buckled forward, she suddenly felt her entire lower body encased in ice.
The plan was a good one.
Wait until the last minutes, before in quick succession unleashing what was clearly a well planned stratagem to take advantage of everything they knew about Izuku to take her out of the equation.
There was just one problem with it.
The shotgun's bullets… Whatever the hell they were made of, had only embedded themselves into her arm.
With another roar, half in utter pain, and half in dizzying rage, Izuku ripped herself out of the ice and raised her leg skyhigh… Before bringing it down.
It was pure luck that the force from her claws did not cleave the opposing team in half from top to bottom, and instead soared just to the sides of them, cleaving up the earth, and slamming into the barrier, which suddenly rang like a massive church bell!
She took heavy, deep breaths but this time there was no roar of green energy from her mouth.
Nor was there any of the murderous intent she had unleashed earlier.
Between her and the formation in front of her, was now a massively deep, if not extremely wide chasm, cut into the ground and going far, far down, but because of the shape, it was now like they were standing at the edge of some peninsula, while the edge of the chasm was rapidly crumbling as the support down below that the earth ultimately rested on had been cleaved.
How far down did that go?
Iida, along with the rest of the team, backed away slowly.
"As expected… You are not one to go down easily Midoriya-san."
"Wha-WHAT YOU PULLED OUT A FUCKING SHOTGUN MAN! YOU CAN'T FOLLOW THAT UP WITH COMPLIMENTARY SMALLTALK!"
"Actually that's a good point, I was under the impression we would be using a Rifle, Yaoyorozu-San."
"I… Well I am more familiar with shot-"
The team leader was having none of it.
"Focus! We need a new approach."
Izuku, in pain and ANGRY raised her good hand up and sideways, planning to simply cleave down and forward and rip the foundations of the earth out from under them… But was cut off by Mineta finally snapping and with a scream suddenly throwing his balls all around towards the opposing team.
Todoroki, without even changing expression, created a shield of ice in front of the team, at such an angle and height that any that went over it ended up behind them… While also keeping it so thin and clean that neither side had any problems seeing what happened next.
What happened next, was that those of Mineta's balls that ended up hitting the ground, suddenly exploded into dozens of smaller balls… that slammed into the opposing team from behind.
Mineta immediately stopped as Kaminari fell forward with a cry, dragged Momo and Todoroki with them, while Iida slammed into the thin ice sheet face first.
And then they were stuck like that, neither being able to get out or move around.
The Dragoness and her rider just stared at what had happened with total surprise on their faces.
"What? Since when did that happen?"
"I… I don't know. Could you always do that?"
"If I could, don't you think I would have used that before?"
That was… A good point.
The four now stuck together were rather lucky.
By pure happenstance, Todoroki had managed to not hit the ground so they were still in the race, and it was near the absolute end of part 2, and pretty much anyone not caught by the combination of lightning and ice was already giving the entire section of the field a wide berth… And of course, their enemy was Izuku.
Any other team would not have hesitated to go over and take this golden opportunity to steal their headbands… But Izuku genuinely did not care.
Instead she turned around to be ready and on guard if someone else tried to take her on in the last two minutes.
I
DTR was leaning over the railing, looking for all the world like he was lazying about… Which he kinda was.
He was using the unnatural temperature of the barrier in front of his face to cool off in a way nobody else did, given no one else was actually physically touching it.
His eyes though were plenty busy behind his shades as he surveyed the battlefield below.
Du Nord's had done her true purpose and job here well.
A lot of the students, just as hoped, had gone through a Quirk mutation.
The irony though, was that it was mostly related to class 1-B, not 1-A, who had been the intended recipients.
If he had to take a guess, he would say it was probably due to this being their first taste of something resembling real battle, whereas their counterpart had been through a much more intense affair where all of their lives had been under direct threat.
They were more comfortable with battle and stress.
The twists and turns of life.
Not that he was particularly biased in this regard.
He did not have any particular favoring or investment in class 1-A as a whole, only individuals within that class.
Despite accusations from Vlad and Aizawa, he genuinely considered all of them his precious students.
He simply had a duty to see Midoriya Izuku through to the end, that superseded almost anything else.
The changes to the quirks differed dramatically drastically across the board.
1-B's resident lovable idiot, Tetsutetsu Tetsutetsu, had changed the metal of his transformed state completely from steel to something resembling wavy Damascus Steel, just far shinier like pure and polished silver.
Tokage, a girl with powers like Buggy the clown had increased the speed of her body parts flying around many times that which it had been.
The de facto boss of the class, Kendo, had seemingly mutated her Quirk from just being able to magnify the size of her hands manyfold, to her entire body(Unfortunately for her, she was the rider, which had not allowed her to put this newfound power to good use).
This year's master of Telekinesis(of which there was almost always one a year) Reiko, had developed both to be several times stronger in terms of limits, but also the rather frightening ability to now directly do the same to Living things.
Rikido Sato, a boy who got superhumanly stronger by eating sugar, now clearly had his reflexes make a similar jump, allowing him to put that superhuman body of his to full use.
Overall though, most of the Mutations had been rather straightforward.
Clear cut improvements to make the user stronger.
That meant they still hadn't gotten into the REAL mutations yet.
He smiled, thinking back to the last time he'd seen this process in action, which had led to 3 snake heads with the ability to shoot different kinds of beams from their eyes, each with their own effects.
Ah, good times.
They would probably see those kinds in the final matches.
Out of class 1-A though, only one of them had gone through a mutation so far.
And it was a bit… different from all the rest. Well except for one.
Mineta and Monoma had both been touching Midoriya when… Well, the curtain had been pulled back just a bit.
He had felt horrid feeling before… But not from a Kamui.
Only from the source of all of this.
That was dead and gone though.
He had Hoped that would be the end of that… But mayhaps not.
He would handle that later though, for now, he was focused on the results.
Monoma, this year's maniac, was currently leading his team in the usual pissing match between the classes you saw each year.
His opponent, Bakugo and his team, was struggling. Seriously struggling.
For all his power training, the Blonde boy understood how much power you could use against normal Human targets… And so he wasn't able to leverage his power in the way he'd used against Izuku earlier in the match.
And of course, there was Monoma himself.
Like Mineta, he'd gone through, not one, but 2 different mutations at once, if his wife's estimation was right.
And just like Mineta, it wasn't entirely clear what those mutations were just yet.
It had definitely extended his time(As it had been far, far more than 5 minutes that was his usual limit), but if that was just the limitations being stretched… Or he could now copy quirks permanently, was unclear.
If the latter, he was now the potentially strongest student of his bracket by far, and definitely in his own class.
Not that it helped him and his team in the moment though, as Bakugo and his team, suddenly, and without any time to spare, broke through their defenses and snatched all of their headbands in the literal nick of time.
They weren't the only ones though, as over on the other side of the field, Mei's team underwent something similar… Just with a different set of actions leading up to it.
"The idiot child lost it would seem. Rather spectacularly too"
"Yeah… I have a suspicion why… But man, is not going to make many friends amongst the higher ups for that display."
"I doubt she cares much about that."
He smiled.
"I know. It's one of the reasons I'm fond of the child… Insane though she might be."
"Yes… You always do get too attached to the problem children."
I
"AND IN FIRST PLACE, THE DRACONIC TEAM OF MINETA RANKS FIRST AFTER UNRIVALED DISPLAYS OF POWER!"
Izuku let out a huge, huge sigh of relief, as she let Mineta finally get off of her shoulders.
She was tired, annoyed, and weary… But they had won in the end.
Now she just… Well the first thing she was going to do was go pick these stars out of her arm.
Fuck they hurt. They dug deep, deep into her skin, and went right through Fuku's cloth poking out way outside.
"We won… I can't believe… oh shit… You okay?"
He flinched as she ripped out the stars, tearing Fuku's cloth in the process.
"SECOND WE HAVE TEAM TODOROKI, WHO DESPITE THEIR COMEDIC AND HILARIOUS BUNGLING AT THE VERY END STILL MANAGED TO GET OUT OF IT WITH SECOND PLACE!"
Had she been looking over in the direction of said team, she would have seen a brief, brief flash of fire… Before it quickly went out again.
"AND THIRDLY, WE HAVE TEAM BAKUGO, WHO'S BURSTS OF MIGHT AND POWER BLEW AWAY ALL COMPETITIONS… BUT ALSO HAD THE MOST VARIED PERFORMANCE OUT OF ALL OF THESE TEAMS! WILL THEY REPEAT THAT FOR THE FINALE!? OR WILL THESE YOUNGSTERS GO ALL THE WAY TO THE TOP!?"
"Oh gooood! Just what we OWW! FUCKING NEEDED! He couldn't just have gone out while being fucking OWWW! HUMILIATED! Oh NOOOO! He just had to OWWWW! GO TO THE FINALS WITH US!"
"I'm Fine." She lied.
"AND IN FOURTH PLACE THE DARKHORSE OF THE RUN, TEAM SHINSO! THE ONLY TEAM WITH A STUDENT NOT FROM THE HEROICS DEPARTMENT! NOW THERE'S A RARITY FOLKS! WILL HE RISE EVEN HIGHER!? WAIT AND SEE!"
She had no idea who that was, or who were the folks on his team.
She was about to rip out another star when suddenly she heard a voice from behind.
"I got some plyers you can use to open the cloth pieces. So you don't have to tear them open each time."
She stiffened.
Then turned around, where, sure enough, Mei had come to her, with a smile and some pliers in hand.
She felt…
"AND FOR THE FINAL TEAM WE HAVE TEAM TETSUTETSU! THOUGH A TEAM LESS HAPPY WITH THEIR VICTORY I HAVE NEVER SEEN BEFORE IN THIS ARENA! LET'S SEE HOW THIS LITTLE DRAMA PLAYS OUT!"
Before she could work out all the very complicated feelings she had in that moment, she was interrupted by said drama, as two teams suddenly came out of nowhere and surrounded them.
One was Mei's own team, and the other was team Tetsutetsu.
Izuku had never really gotten to see Mei being Mad before.
The closest she had was at the very end of the invasion and that was from behind, and she had been completely out of it.
The blonde girl's eyes burned blue, pupils pure, shining azure wells.
"What. Was. That?"
Izuku blinked at the sheer anger in her voice.
She wasn't the only one infuriatingly mad though, with Tokoyami also being clearly pissed off, with Aoyama being more confused.
Team Tetsutetsu was similarly confused.
No, not confused… baffled was the better word.
"Yeah, what was that?"
The team leader, the same boy who had been rather rude outside of class 1-A's classroom asked in one of the most confused, puppy voices she had ever! heard.
He just did not understand what was happening.
Neither did Izuku for that matter.
Mei however, didn't even look at her, as she instead used her pliers to pry open the space the bullets had used to get in, and despite a bit of pain, extracted one with far less pain than her just ripping them out.
"Exactly what It looked like. I encourage you to be on the prowl to the very end, only to betray you at the finish line, destroying our cohesion as a stable team, allowing team Tetsutetsu to swoop in and take our headbands at the finish line with no time to recover."
She said it in her absolutely normal tone, and with her usual smile.
Izuku just felt… Numb.
"Why?" Several voices cried out in various states of anger, confusion and shock.
"For Izuku-Sama of course! I don't know why she decided to enter the Festivals after all despite making it clear she didn't want to go, but once she did, my goal shifted from going as far as I could go, to go as far as I could go while also ensuring that Izuku-Sama goes on to victory. Thusly when the second round turned into a team battle, I realized it was the PERFECT chance to get rid of YOU. You are the only person here who can challenge Izuku one on one, as the final stretch always are composed of, and so removing you from the field, will now have gotten rid of the only one here who could realistically challenge Izuku-Sama in the finals!"
The only thing Izuku actually felt as she looked at her friend in pure shock, was the periodic bursts of additional pain as she removed the crazy shaped bullets of red.
"You planned this dastardly and sinful scheme to betray your friends from the start!?" One of team Tetsutetsu, a girl with Vine hair, proclaimed in utter disgust.
"No, this was actually my second plan. Once I realized that nobody wanted to team up with Izuku-Sama, my first plan was to team up with you and then ditch Shield at the last second for her, forcing her team to readjust on the spot. But then Mineta joined forces with her after all! Giving me the perfect opportunity to take her down from the inside! However, you are mistaken in one regard. I am not friends with any of these three. We have never had any actual conversations before today, and as a clear rival to Izuku-Sama, Shield is by definition my natural foe."
Izuku felt her mouth agape, like a dead fish, just staring at her.
Her best friend in the world.
Before she could say anything though, sound returned to their world.
She hadn't even noticed it being absent.
"AND THERE YOU HAVE IT FOLKS! A SHOCKING BETRAYAL FROM WITHIN FROM OUR INVENTOR! ALL FOR THE SAKE OF HER TRUE FRIEND, SHE TOOK THE DIVE TO BRING TEAM SHIELD DOWN WITH HER! A HERO OR A TRAITOR!? OR BOTH!? I SHALL LEAVE THAT QUESTION FOR YOU TO DECIDE! BUT FOR NOW, THE QUESTION REMAINS BRIGHT AND BOLD! WILL HER SACRIFICE BE IN VAIN AS THE REMAINING FOES MANAGE TO OVERCOME THE ODDS… OR WILL MIDORIYA IZUKU REACH THE VERY TOP AS HER FRIEND GAVE EVERYTHING TO ACHIEVE!?"