Chapter 17: Sport Festival: Tournament, Part Two

The next match is Sero against Todoroki, and we all know how this match is going to go down from the get-go.

I blinked and all of the sudden an ice spike is a few inches away from my nose. Damn, Todoroki, that's kind of an overkill, don't you think!? If I didn't feel sorry for Sero then, I definitely am now. He really picked the worst card in this scenario, didn't he? Needless to say, the winner is the dual-toned hair teen.

After that, it is my turn.


I stood in the arena, my hands trembling with excitement, with Kaminari standing opposite me in a similar state. I can still feel the cold from Todoroki's ice lingering in the air, unsurprisingly.

"Now that the arena is all thawed out, it's time for the next match!" Present Mic announced, "The fastest woman in this stadium and the queen of lightning! The Empress of Speed, it's Tatsuya Genko! VERSUS! The sparkling, killing boy! Kaminari Denki!"

"Quite a name you got." Kaminari tells me, I could only nervously chuckle at that with my cheeks filled red. Got to hand it to Present Mic, he knows how to hype up the place.

"I'm not sure about the whole Empress of Speed title, though…"

"While all I got is sparkling boy?" He let out a dejectedly sigh, "Man, it's like nobody is taking me seriously…"

When you go all dumb-dumb after expelling too much voltage, it's hard for anyone to take you seriously. Is what I want to point out but choose not to, to keep some of his dignity intact. Besides, lightning quirks are often the most devastating quirks out there, if Marvel's Thor and the Infamous series has taught me that much.

I wonder if he could get a similar weapon to Cole Macgrath, maybe an electric baton of some sort?

"Just to let you know." The blonde electric teen smirks as he took to a stance, "I'm not to go easy on you just because you are cute."

"Um… thanks?" I blinked as I got into a boxing stance as well.

Okay, now how is he going to do this? He must know that electricity isn't going to work with me, so he might go for hand-to-hand. If what I remember from our first Battle Trial on the second day in school, Kaminari isn't too shabby in the CQC category, a somewhat average brawler.

But that was almost a month ago, and a lot can change in that short period of time. He might have improved his combat skills since then.

"Reeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaddddy!? START!"

"This will only take a moment!" Then Kaminari betray all my expectations of him actually using his brain and charge up his AOE voltage attack.

"Um… You know I absorb electricity, right?" I pointed out to him.

"No duh! But! Even if you absorb all that electricity, there's only a set limit of voltage you can absorb at one time, right!?"

Wait, is he planning on–

"So what happens when you exceed that limit, I wonder!? ONE MILLION VOLTS!"

With that, he releases all his voltage all around him, with the electric charge that didn't get grounded flowing right at me which I then slams my hand on the ground and start absorbing the voltage.

True, my body has a limit of amount of voltage I can allow to absorb at one given time, and if I exceed could harm my nerves irreparably. Learn that the hard way when I stuck a fork into the power socket at the age of eight, not a pleasant experience at all.

But I also know that just moving around use up more voltage than I can absorb, and the faster I go means using more voltage in general.

As such, once I feel I hit my cap limit, I immediately dashes forward at him in the fastest speed I am currently capable of. The surroundings blur for a moment, before Kaminari's shocked derpy-looking face appear for an instant which I then land a sucker punch right into, dispelling his electric attack and sending him tumbling across the arena before stopping at just the edge of the ring.

I hear the entire stadium fall silent for a moment, Midnight blinked for a moment before regaining her composure as she looked at my fellow blonde student, and then gave out her verdict, "Kaminari's down! Tatsuya Genko advances to the second round!"

"I-It's over! I blinked and it's over!" Present Mic screams in astonishment, "What a match! That didn't take even a minute to end!"

I quickly ran over to my classmate to check on him; and sure enough, his nose seems to be dented in with trails of blood flow from his nostrils. I've thought I feel his nose broke under my knuckles. Oops… sorry, Kaminari! Please, oh please let it just be a concussion!

I am only willing to leave once the nurse bots arrived and put Kaminari on a stretcher before wheeling off towards the medical ward. On my way back, I ran into the one whose match is after mind.

"Hey, Iida-san." I greeted him with a wave before noticing him wearing some gear, "Um… what are those?"

"Oh, these are the support items given to me by Hatsume!" He tells me with a robotic wave of his hand, "She gave them to me in hopes for us to be on equal footing in this match!"

"Uh, huh…" I'm pretty skeptical about her reasons being so noble. In the manga, she isn't the type of person who would do such a thing, and didn't she use the tournament as advertisement of sorts?

"Well, I must be off!" He tells me as he jogs/match off towards the arena, "See you in the quarter finals!"

"Y-Yeah! Sure!" I nodded in response.

When I heard the pink-haired inventor's loud voice echoing through the walls as she starts her sales pitch on her inventions, I let out a small sigh. Iida-san, you just got played…


Thankfully, Kaminari only has a concussion from my strike along with a broken nose that Recovery Girl is capable of mending. He is discharged by the time Iida's match is over, with a medical patch over his nose for his troubles.

The next match after the sales-pitch fight, which I'm sure is going to leave our class president completely dejected about the whole thing since his brother is here in the stadium and is shown such a rather humiliating play, is Ashido against Tokoyami, and let me be perfectly honest, it couldn't be any more one-sided.

Tokoyami's quirk, Dark Shadow, has one heck of a reach and is pretty much a Jojo Stand made manifest. Ashido's quirk couldn't make a single dent in his defense, which he then slowly and surely forces her back till she left the ring, earning him that win within about a couple of minutes.

Now, the next one after them, that's something I'm paying close attention to.

"We are a quarter of the way done with the first round, people! Let's get all pumped up in here!" Present Mic speak up about it, "For this match; he's the definition of hot-blooded, the only member of Class 1-B in this tournament, it's Naru Taikou!"

"SUCK IT, NEITO!"

I let out a small groan and chuckle at his reaction to his introduction. Of course, he is going to use this chance to be as smug as possible. If there's one thing I know about Taikou, is that he likes to rub his victory against people he has grudges with. And boy, does he keep his grudges…

"Um…V-VERSUS! All purpose creation! She came in on recommendation, so her skills are certified, it's Yaoyorozu Momo!"

"That guy, huh?" Sero noted, "Yaoyorozu is going to have a really tough time dealing with him."

"I'll say." Kirishima nodded, "Taikou is pretty tough opponent for Yaoyorozu. His quirk is pretty straight-forward, but he manages to make it work in multitude of ways."

"But Yaomomo is pretty tough too!" Mina argued back, "GO, YAOMOMO! KICK HIS BUTT!"

"Hey, Kirishima-san." I turned to the red-haired teen, "Isn't your match after theirs? Ojiro-san has already left, you know."

"Oh crap, you're right!" He leaped off his seat before rushing off.


'This is going to be tricky…' Taikou knows of Yaoyorozu's quirk, if what occurred during what he dubbed in his head as the 'Mineta Cheerleader Perversion Incident' is any indication, and how versatile it can be in all sorts of situations. 'Creation… with that versality, if I let her have a chance to counter attack, I'll be a goner…'

"START!"

With that in mind, the moment the signal for the match to start is announced, he jumps literally into action by igniting his feet and rocketing towards her and slamming a flaming kick right at her.

"OH! And Naru made the first move!"

She is able to create a shield in time to block his attack, but is pushed back by the sheer weight behind his attack. 'Don't let up! Keep her off balance!' He is then followed by another kick, and another, and another, and another as he let loose a flurry of flaming kicks at her shield, she barely keeping it up with each attack sending her back one step with each hit.

"What ferocity! It's kick after kick after kick! He doesn't even give Yaoyorozu time to breath!"

'Such heavy kicks…! And so fast too…!' The black-haired girl is unable even attempt to counter attack as the relentless attacks force her to keep her guard up and not let her enough time to create a weapon to do so.

With one final kick, Taikou pushes himself off of her shield and lands a good distance away, crouching in a sprinter position. Yaoyorozu quickly use this small breathing time to create a kali stick and prepare to counter her opponent next attack.

What she didn't expect is for Taikou to ignites his feet at such ferocity and then rockets at her to deliver a dropkick at speeds she didn't think he is capable of. She quickly lifts up her shield to defend herself and blocks the attack, but that in turn sends her flying and tumbling back onto her back.

She quickly got back up and prepares to fight back, but…

"Ring out!"

Midnight's declaration rung across the stadium, shocking the black-haired girl before she looks down at her feet to find that she has one foot already outside the ring.

'He… has been pushing me towards the edge this whole time…!?'

"And it's OVER! Naru Taikou is proceeding to the next round!"

Taikou pumps his fist, letting out small victory cry. His opponent could only stare in shock as she drops her creations onto the ground, "I… couldn't even…"


"Ah, Yaomomo lost!" Ashido groaned.

"Well, that's anti-climactic." Sato stated in surprise, "Didn't expect it to be so one-sided."

"Yaoyorozu couldn't strike back at all." Tokoyami noted.

"Yaoyorozu-san's quirk is strong, but if she can't use what she creates it's pretty much useless." I pointed out, "I guess Taikou is aiming for that when he made the first move."

"But to think it would end so quickly like that…" Jirou noted.

"Strange, isn't it!?" A very familiar and equally annoying voice shouted at us.

We all turned to the wall that separated the classes into their respective booths, and on top of said wall is 1-B's own notorious blonde troublemaker, Monoma Neito. "For someone of the amazing Class 1-A to be defeated so one-sidedly?! Isn't that girl the one of the recommended students!? How strange for someone of such outstanding stature get defeated so easily-"

"And that's enough out of you."

A heavy chop later, and Monoma's gloating is put to a stop and pulled off the wall by Class 1-B's class president, "I'm so sorry for this." Kendo apologized as she drags him back into the booth.

"Man, what a buzzkill." Ashido pouted.

"I'll say!" Hagakure nodded, I think. It's kind of hard to tell with her being invisible and all that.

The next fight between Kirishima and Ojiro is… pretty average, to say the least.

At first, Kirishima seems to have the advantage as Ojiro has no way around his hardening quirk. But then the tailed teen took a page out of Taikou and keeps on hitting his opponent without relenting, and with enough force that he could push him back a bit at a time. Thanks to this, he is able to push Kirishima make enough to the edge of the ring, and uses his tail to trip him, causing his leg to fall out of the edge and earn him a win.

What can I say? Average win for the most average person in our year.

The match-up afterward is a one-to-one exact to the manga.

It is Bakugou versus Uraraka, and like in the manga, it is pretty one-sided in Bakugou's favor. He keeps on blasting explosions after explosions right at the girl with full force whenever she got close. The brunette doesn't stand a chance at all and each explosion is another burn and bruise on her. But despite all that, she keeps getting back up and kept on charging at him.

Sure enough, the audience around us all starts to boo at Bakugou for his harsh behavior, and then Aizawa proceeds to tear into the Pro Heroes in the audience for acting and judging so poorly.

A moment later, everything came together.

Using Bakugou's own explosions, Uraraka manages to gather enough rubble that she suspended in the air using her gravity quirk. And thanks to Bakugou's own explosions creating a smoke scream around them, he didn't notice it at all until she removed her quirk and sends all the rubble crashing down a top of them in a miniature meteor shower.

Sadly, her plan is foiled with the blonde delinquent blasting away the rubble meteors with a huge explosion. Even so, she gets up to try again, only to fumble and collapse from exhaustion, earning Bakugou that win.

I saw Midoriya slipping away to prepare for the match ahead, the match I know is the highlight in the whole arc.

This time, however, Midoriya is much stronger than the one in the manga, and has more control over the One-For-All. Add to the fact that he has some level of martial prowess due to sparring with me, Taikou and Shinsou, he might be the strongest he could ever be at this point of time.

Is he strong enough to stand up against Todoroki of all people?

We can only wait and see.

"Oh, rough match out there, huh, Villain Face?" Sero's comment brought me out of my thoughts, Bakugou making his way into the booth with a scowl on his face, "Awkward match-ups aside, you do great at playing the bad guy, Bakugou."

"Shut the hell up, all of you!" He screams at us.

"No, really. Nice job in blowing up that frail little girl." Kaminari sarcastically remarked, "Not like me. I held back against mine."

"I'm pretty sure you went full out in our match, Kaminari." I pointed out to him, "Full 100 million volts."

"Aw, come on, Tatsuya-san…"

"Hmph!" Bakugou huffed as he sits down on the seat before muttering out, "What part of her is frail? Idiots…"

…Please don't make me ship you two together, Bakugou…!


Midoriya stopped himself from going back into the preparation room when he heard the sobs behind the door. 'Of course she's broken up over it. Why wouldn't she be!?' He clenched his fists, winching from the shot of pain from his broken and healing fingers, 'I said I want to return the favor, but in the end, I couldn't do anything at all! Even so, she…'

"Good luck out there. I'm rooting for you."

Her encouraging words echoes in his mind as he rubs away the tears threatened to spill over. He wouldn't let her down. Her, All Might, Taikou, Shinsou and Genko, he'll take their encouragement and pressed on!

A sudden heat stopped him in his tracks as Endeavor of all people walks out from around the corner.

"Oh."

"E-E-E-E-ENDEAVOR!?"

"There you are." The flaming Hero walks up to him, the flames on his huge frame that parallels All Might's make an intimidating presence, "I was looking for you."

"F-For me?" Midoriya wonders.

"I saw what you did out there." He tells him, "That's an amazing quirk you got, creating such a force with just a flick of your finger. In terms of power, it seems in par with All Might's quirk."

The green haired teen flinched at that observation, 'D-Does he know!? No, he doesn't from how he explained it… but it has to stay a secret from him, especially him! If he finds out…!'

"W-What are you t-talking about?" He fumbles through his words before nervously walking off, "W-Well, I have to get going–"

"My boy, Shoto. He has a duty to surpass All Might."

That sentence stopped him. Endeavor took that as a sign that he is listening and carries on.

"His match against you will prove a valuable test for that. So give it your all. Put up a good fight against him."

Words of Todoroki spilling his reasons for challenging him echoes in his head. Of his abusive childhood, of his estranged relationship with his father, of his conviction of denying him everything by not using the part of him that he got from said father, everything just flashes in his mind.

Now that he has heard the words from Endeavor himself, Midoriya now fully understand the depths of Todoroki's hatred towards him. The sheer abhorrence he has towards the man that made up half of his blood, and his quirk.

He understood it right there and then. But at the same time…

"That's all I have to say." Endeavor turns away to head for the stands, "Sorry for my bluntness–"

"I'm not All Might."

"Hm?"

The number two Hero stopped in his tracks as he turns to face him, "Well, of course you're not–"

"That's right. I'm not." Midoriya continues, before looking back with a scowl on his face, "And Todoroki-kun isn't you!"

The man's eyes narrowed at that proclamation as the green-haired teen walks toward the stadium.

Midoriya now knows what he has to do.

To Be Continued…


Omake

"Guess who made it to the second round!?" Taikou walks into his class's booth with his fists in the air as he made it to his seat.

"You did excellent out there!" Kendo congratulated him.

"It was amazing, Taikou!" Pony stated with a smile

"I knew you had it the moment you send that girl flying back with that kick!" Tetsutetsu nodded in agreement as he fist-bumps him, "Man, that was badass!"

"I'll say!" Setsuna patted his back with a grin, "You'll made it to finals no problem!"

"Haha, I wouldn't be so sure." Monoma points out, his entire class turns to face him, "The only reason he won is because his opponent isn't well-suited against him. Pit him with someone like, I don't know, Todoroki? He'll be absolutely destroyed."

"I'm sorry, who made it into the tournament?" Taikou points out as he walks up to him, "Look, I know you don't like me because I hang out with our 'enemies' but you don't have to be such a dick about it!"

"I'm just making a logical observation." He stated with a shrug of his shoulders, "I'm also saying that only got lucky with her, and luck wouldn't hold out for you for long."

"…" Taikou huffed as he walks away and took his seat, "Of course, I knew that…"


Man, that cliff-hanger! Haha, I'm such a stinker, aren't I?

Now, this chapter is a bit tricky to write, especially with how I'm planning this arc to go. Some of the fights in this arc is pretty short, or self-explanatory in the whole Ojiro against Kirishima bit. Sure, Kirishima could harden himself against Ojiro's attack, but it is proven in the anime that Ojiro could push him back with his tail and with the rule of the tournament, it's possible for him to win.

That's my reasoning, anyways.

Now next is the highlight of the arc, the one match that has been hyped since the start of the arc.

How it will go, that's anyone's business!

On a side note, I want to say that ideas for any Omake is still open and if anyone has any ideas, please let me know!

With that, I thank you for reading this!