If she was any other person, then Wakana might have been surprised that all six of the second years she brought to the exam would be moving on to the second half of it like the other teachers here with her.
Her current companion Emi for example, the greenette woman letting out a sharp whistle and standing up to look over the railing somewhat in disbelief.
"Wowzer, Cherry what have ya been feeding those kids?" Emi questioned as Oswald the last of the six began his walk to join the others that had finished.
The boy ignored his now missing foot and quickly replaced it with the branch of a tree broken in his fight.
The pinkette even gave the third years that he just fought a taunting wave as he left them.
Wakana chuckled.
"Now now, Emi. You know quite well that our children's work is all their own." Wakana teased the young woman.
Emi huffed and turned back to her, crossing her arms.
"C'mon Cherry you really want me to believe that you didn't specially train them to deal with the U.A. crushing?" Emi said slightly scoffish.
"Hado interned with me during her first year, and you want me to believe she got to that level without help?" Emi questioned, no doubt referring to how Nejire had spent most of her time daintily leaping between skyscrapers in the urban area and was able to send massive spirals to strike down like a god on high.
Wakana wished at times like this she could smile.
"Of course we helped our students to train themselves," Wakana replied, tilting her head.
Emi's disdain with U.A. wasn't hard to parse out, Emi had been critical of U.A and their students plenty of times before, with most people rather simply putting it down to the fact that most hero schools had a rivalry with U.A.
Shiketsu was their most famous rival publicly, but the bad blood between Ketsubutsu ran far deeper than people outside the industry would ever know.
But Wakana knew that Emi's dislike was a more personal grudge she held close to her chest.
Wakana remembered when Emi was young and tried out for U.A. and like many a child failed the exam.
Her modest score, was mostly made of rescue points, and Wakana remembered even more blatantly how it had been just one point shy of getting her in the hero course.
Wakana was also old enough to know that the grievances that Emi held with U.A. weren't all completely false.
U.A. was a bit grander than it truly was and calling their heroes students spoiled wouldn't be inaccurate.
A majority of the courses were often unified by their spite of the hero course, their current first years being an outlier.
And maybe, if it was over thirty years ago she would agree that U.A. wasn't all that it was cracked up to be.
But now though? There was a reason their students were living past graduation and making names for themselves.
"But it is quite crass of you to think we would train them, much less need to tell them about that quaint yearly tradition you started Emi dear." Wakana told her patting Emi's shoulder as a bit of pink crossed Emi's cheeks.
With how common it was now many of the others forgot that the crushing of U.A. had only been started during Emi's third year, and that she had led the very first assault on U.A.
Something that hadn't been thought of before by any of the previous examinees, much less think it would go nearly as successfully as Emi's assault ended up being.
"There's no need to be embarrassed, Emi, that little tradition of yours has and will teach our students better than to assume safety when in the field." Wakana told the woman, motioning for her to come and sit with her again.
Emi shuffled on her feet for a bit but did sit with her again.
"Well, that wasn't my intention, I was aiming to humble them, but I'll take life lessons." Emi commented, crossing her arms and tilting her head and asked "Sooo, would you happen to know where they're thinking of taking on a work study?"
Wakana chuckled.
"Oh, I know that all of them have already made plans for once they pass, and I believe that Lemillion is rather hopeful to perhaps work with you next year." Wakana answered, and that last part seemed to shock her.
"With me? I mean I know that he's been working more of the underground sect after interning with Sir the last couple of years, but I thought he'd be looking for someone more topside if he wasn't going back to Sir again." Emi pointed out.
And then times like this she was glad she didn't have a traditional face.
She likely wouldn't be able to refrain from scowling at the mention of Sasaki.
"I believe that Lemillion's plans are to be a twilight hero, his quirk shall make him very effective and helpful in breaking up the trafficking rings that you handle, and he wants to help as many people as he can, not just walking around and waiting for villains to come to him." Wakana informed Emi.
Togota was still healing and wouldn't be starting a work study this year like the others planned to do.
But he did have a firm idea of where he wanted to go and what he wanted out of a work study, and mostly patrolling was not it.
Togota wanted to actually do something, to do more than boost moral or numbers, and use his quirk to actually contribute to something.
Midoriya-Kun had suggested either Emi or Edgeshot, and Hado insisted that Togota would love to work with Emi.
And he would, Wakana knew that Emi would let Togota carefully dip his toes in the world of the underground without letting him mess with anything too dangerous.
Working with someone like Emi would also let him get a better idea of a healthy mentorship.
Wakana watched as Emi considered the idea of it and was about to say something but the loud series of explosions from the field put their conversation on hold for the moment.
The field was covered in smoke and with fire and ashes being kicked up into the air, fake lava pouring out from the volcano in one part of the field.
Wakana felt her heart twinge as she watched the fire rage across the field.
She sighed as her mind going back to decades ago, even though the flames were the wrong color Wakana couldn't help thinking about Dabi and their last ten years together where she insisted on him not cutting his hair.
Wood and fire didn't mix but she would never regret those last ten years and being able to enjoy watching the flames dancing on his skin.
God did she miss that man sometimes.
"They're getting more detailed with these little disasters every year aren't they?" Wakana commented as she watched the actors place themselves all across the field.
"Yep, think this will be the attack spot this year or will they just deal with volcanic aftermath?" Emi asked.
Wakana hummed tapping the side of her face.
"Perhaps, though I wonder who they would get to play the villain. I doubt Endeavor would agree to come and I can't think of any other agency that would have enough fire-based heroes or sidekicks to cover the exam." Wakana replied.
Even if the lava was fake the fires weren't all small ones and maybe there were others that could play the role of villain safely, but she doubted it.
"I'm going to stretch my legs, want me to get you anything on the way back?" Emi inquired as she stood up stretching her arms behind her head.
"No thank you, say hello to your students for me." Wakana told her, waving her off.
Then she busied herself with a game on her phone as she waited for the ten-minute break to be finished.
She had a pretty good idea of what her students were going to do once the break was over, they might not have trained with a volcano situation specifically, but the kids would know how to improvise and adapt for it.
The past users might even have some advice but both Amajiki and Hado asked them to only watch the exam and not interrupt since they didn't want to cheat.
Oh, the two of them were sweethearts.
Emi returned a minute before the rescue would start up and Wakana had the pleasure of watching as her students burst out of the room before the walls of the false room fully came down along with Emi.
Hado was zipping through the air along with Amajiki flying over another area, the two clearly getting a large overhead survey of the field while Miyake was rushing for the city with Togota on his back.
Haya and Oswald though had stayed back leading a group of the other examinees in making a triage and comms unit to take the 'wounded' and even set up a large landing zone for the eventual 'arrival' of backup that would double for their flown in wounded.
And for the first half of the exam things were progressing smoothly as the examinees worked mostly in sync with each other.
Then the wall nearest to the triage broke open and the 'villains' entered the field.
Emi whistled loudly.
"Dang, they got Best Jeanest, I wonder who got him to agree to this, do you think it was Kugo?" Emi guessed watching just as interested as Wakana was as Best Jeanest and his sidekicks advanced into the field.
Coils of all sorts whipping out from around Best Jeanest, towards the triage area and would have likely taken hostages if Oswald hadn't reacted nearly as quickly and had wrapped his hair around the coils and held them back.
Haya had focused on evacuating the wounded with most of the examinees, which of the two who had told Hado and Amajiki to stand down and continue search and rescue Wakana wasn't sure, but someone must have.
Since the two whipped around to head for them before backing down and returning to search patterns.
"Your candy boy is lasting longer than I thought he would." Emi said looking impressed.
"Well Mellow did intern with him during his first year if you recall, and he learned quite a few tricks from him." Wakana reminded her viewing companion.
Still, it was quite impressive that Oswald had been able to meet Best Jeanest blow for blow, especially since he couldn't control as many strands of hair as Best Jeanest could move coils.
The whipping of threaded coils met by thick pink strands of taffy caused some damage but for the most part Oswald was impressively holding Best Jeanest at bay while the others held off the sidekicks or move the wounded to the new spot that Hado and Miyake started clearing for them.
However, as one would expect, Oswald could not keep Best Jeanest back forever and started to lose ground but otherwise kept the number three hero back from reaching the civilians that were still there.
But even that would have to give.
She couldn't see everything that was going on between the two since they were a bit too far away for that.
Even from far away though she noticed the thinner silver-y wires that suddenly came out and then cut through the hair keeping him back and one must have been wrapped around his neck from how still Oswald got.
What neither could have predicted was the shaking of the earth from another examinee accidentally knocking down a nearby tower.
Which meant that no doubt to due to the sharp properties of the silver-y wires Best Jeanest must have cut into Oswald's neck as he fell, and she was on her feet to call for a stop to the exam on grounds of a possible medical emergency.
Amajiki though proved to be faster.
The boy had been helping to move the wounded and had to have seen it all firsthand, and upon seeing Oswald's neck be cut into, quite reasonably, lost it.
All in a matter of a few seconds Amajiki's body became almost ten times larger and a large mass of tentacles that were immediately slammed into Best Jeanest, which the hero wasn't expecting but able to react to.
Meaning he was able to dodge and tried to get away.
Seeing this Wakana sat back down and was ready to enjoy the show.
Emi silently watching with her mouth hanging open as Amajiki proceeded to send the number three hero on the run.
Gang Orca: Yes it is quite nice to be able to help with the exam, it's quite a fulfilling experience
Best Jeanest: hmmm, perhaps I can give it a try
Gang Orca: If you see my lizard child do say hi for me, he's taking the exam with his friends
Best Jeanest: I shall if I see him