HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Well, kinda.. last week has been hell for everyone. Scary too, despite the fact I don't live in the US. (Have a lot of US friends however so worried about them.)
Anyway, Chapter 6 is finally here! And oh boy, we got a rogue robot running amok? what caused it! Stay tuned and find out!
I will be honest, I am still new to writing and action scenes are still ***VERY*** new for me to write, so thank you in advance, and hope you enjoy it.
Onto the reviews (FFN)
The Casual Noeru-kun: Thank you! I am glad you are enjoying it. I'll be honest, when I was thinking of the 'circle' I kinda forgot about Nejire D: and while yes, she is one of the loveable ones, most of the girls have a part to play within the story in regards to Izuku's abilities. I may change this at some point but for now, she will appear but any sort of 'romance' with her is still up in the air.
AfroAries: I'll see your twenty animal crackers, and raise you twenty-five!
ProjectIceman: You'd think, lol.
alistrikehero: Not exactly the Twinning per se, but the OST really helped me write this chapter. And thankfully it's not the real Tycoon or hell, not even All Might could keep up with that thing.
As for your prediction, read on and find out! :D
Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to My Hero Academia and Final Fantasy XIV, they belong to their copyright holders.
Chapter 6
"Magnificent Rouge"
The sounds of cement and asphalt crunching under heavy metal treads echoed in the now empty road. The zero-pointer hissed out steam as it lowered itself and "looked" through the empty windows of the buildings close to it; a low metallic rumble came from the mechanical monster before it smashed the building and started to tear it down.
Izuku and Yuga watched the monster from half a block away in one of the hallowed building windows, ducking back down before the monstrosity looked their way. They both turned towards the other two applicants with them, the blue-haired boy and the auburn-haired girl, who was looking a little green on her otherwise pink cheeks and also hissed a little as the blue-haired boy very carefully removed her sneaker to check over her injured ankle.
Izuku knelt to the other side of the girl, "Hey, my name is Izuku Midoriya, and aside from your ankle, are you in pain anywhere else?" he asked with a soft tone, a smile on his lips as he looked straight into her eyes. It was a technique he had read and learned about to keep injured civilians focused on something else rather than any pain they were currently feeling.
"Just.. feel a little nauseous, " She spoke gently, staring directly into his emerald eyes, "N-name's Ochako Uraraka, a-and thanks for saving me… I couldn't get away in time when the zero-pointer came out of the ground."
"Yea, I would imagine seeing that big ass robot popping out of anywhere would give even All Might at double take." Izuku mused, earning a soft chuckle from Ochako before she hissed in pain from her ankle.
"As long as we are getting names, I am Tenya Ilda, and should we not be trying to evacuate away from the giant robot?" asked the now introduced Tenya, who now had balled up his workout jacket to place under the foot of the injured girl. Izuku looked at him with a huff before moving his focus towards the injured ankle.
Yuga struck another 'majestic' pose before speaking up, "As much as I would like to agree with you monsieur Ilda, that brutish robot is searching either for us or something at this very moment... but moi, Yuga Aoyama believes that we should make a stand until the time runs out, which should be soon moi thinks."
"But we were told to keep away from the zero-pointer and to avoid it as an obstacle." Tenya pointed out, chopping his arm up and down as he continued to argue with the still posing Yuga. The two kept going back and forth before a clearing of the throat interrupted the both of them; both boys turned their attention to Izuku, who stood up and walked a few feet away before turning around on them.
Ochako was the first to speak up, "Um… what do you think we should do, Midoriya? It looks like you have a plan."
"Going to be honest, I think this is one of those 'damned if we do, damned if we don't.' scenario's." Izuku shrugged as he crossed his arms, "And judging by how it's acting now, compared to when I was distracting it while you two were getting Uraraka from out under the debris, it's malfunctioned."
"Not to point fingers, but do you think one of your attacks against it caused the malfunction?" asked Tenya as he stared at Izuku, who had raised an eyebrow at him. The silence in the room was thick with tension as Izuku stretched gently suddenly, cracking his neck and back with audible pops that made the others wince.
"Never got close enough to the head sadly, so your theory falls a little flat." Izuku's gaze turned towards Yuga for a moment, "Hey Aoyama, could you go keep an eye on what the zero-pointer is doing while I heal Uraraka?"
The french-speaking boy blinked before pointing to the weapon holstered onto Izuku's back, and what he said next caused the other two room occupants to pale, "You mean using that mist that shot out of your gun sword at moi in the alleyway, monsieur?"
"YOU SHOT HIM?!" both Ochako and Tenya shrieked or shouted aloud, causing Izuku to jump towards them and cover their mouths. Yuga, sensing that the shouts could alert the robot, dashed towards a window to see if it had.
"Will you two calm down?" Izuku hissed, hands over their mouths, "I didn't shoot him! I merely expelled the shell with one of my abilities called 'Aurora' to heal his stomach ache from quirk overuse." He slowly removed his hands, glaring at them sternly, then looked to Yuga, giving them a thumbs up.
Izuku sighed gently, "Sorry to do that, but rather not have big and clunky hearing us."
"S-sorry for shouting, I was just scared since I saw you cause explosions with your… um…"
"Gunblade."
"Y-your gunblade…" Ochako stammered a little, still not liking the idea of the strange weapon being used to heal her. Izuku nodded gently but gave her a smile that was understanding.
"Yea, that's a pretty normal reaction, but thankfully I won't be healing you with 'Aurora'… not the best when compared to 'Clemency' anyway."
"Clemency?" asked Tenya, who had remained quiet up to this point, but the random words the green-haired boy was spewing out were just confusing him at this point. Ochako looked a little lost herself and tilted her head.
Izuku chuckled gently, backing up from them as with a brilliant flash of light and sparkles, the trenchcoat-wearing boy now stood in the alabaster white with gold trim medieval knight armor, sword and shield in hand with the flowing green mane out of the back of the helmet. The others all gasped to see such a change occur, especially Yuga who's eyes shot wide open, muttering a 'c'est Magnifique' under his breath.
Izuku slowly walked over to Ochako, who squeaked a little from the imposing-looking knight before her, before reminding herself that it was Izuku under that helmet. The plate covered boy raised his hands slightly, glowing for a few seconds before he clapped his hands together and spoke in a soft tone, "Clemency!"
A bright light shone down upon Ochako as if sunlight sneaking past some clouds with what looked like sparkling feathers descended down upon her. It felt warm to her as she sighed in relief from not only the nauseous feeling in her stomach being lifted, but the pain from her swollen ankle now reduced to practically nothing.
Izuku offered a hand to her, which she took, and hoisted her up on her other foot as she used him to balance herself. Carefully, she placed her bare foot down onto Tenya's jacket to put a little pressure on it, as if to see if Izuku's claims were valid. She beamed up at him with a smile when she let him go and stood by herself.
"That's amazing! How on earth did you do that?" Tenya said in awe, causing both of the teenagers to turn their heads toward him. Izuku rubbed the back of his helmet, and a metallic-sounding chuckle resonated from underneath it.
"It's… hard to explain, but like I offered Aoyama after this is all said and done, we can all hang out with my other friends, and I can hopefully give a proper explanation to how my quirk works."
Yuga spoke from the window, "To see such sparkling brilliance, to heal mademoiselle with such extravagance, Like a 'Paladin' one could find in the greatest of fairy tales!" The boy posed dramatically, causing all three to stare at him for a moment before Ochaco went for her discarded shoe and began to put it on.
"Anyway…" Izuku said, turning back to Tenya and Ochako, "We should try and co-ordinate something, you two seen my quirk in action, and Aoyama can fire lasers out of his stomach from what I saw earlier. What are yours?"
But just as they were about to tell him what their quirks were, the buzzer went off throughout the arena, signaling the end of the exam. The ever loud voice of Present Mic then followed afterword, "ALL RIGHT, LITTLE LISTENER'S! THE EXAM IS NOW OVER! JUST HEAD ON BACK TO THE MAIN ENT-" *ROOOOAR*
Whatever the Pro Hero was going to say was quickly drowned out by the roar of the zero-pointer and the sounds of metallic claws and treads filling the air as it got closer to the building that the small group of teenagers was hiding in. However, Izuku was already out the door and charging the beast with his sword and shield out. Another flash of light surrounded the boy before hurtling the shield at the monster's head and getting its attention on him.
Yuga, Ochako, and Tenya watched for a moment from the window as they saw their new comrade basically rush towards the berserking robot, before they all looked to one another and nodded with determination in their eyes, running out of the building and joining the fray.
"Sir!" Power Loader shouted out to the dean as for the last five minutes, they were focusing on trying to get some sort of control over the area B zero-pointer. While they were still able to see through the cameras around the area and within the robot's 'eyes,' any sort of control had died after the first initial roar.
Nezu looked to the support teacher, his usual smile now almost drawn to a straight line, which looked odd on the beast, "Yes, Power Loader?"
"I haven't gotten control back yet on the zero-pointer in B yet, but I was able to activate it's kill switch when the exam buzzer goes off!"
The smile returned, a sigh of relief escaping from his lips as he took a sip of tea, "Ah excellent, thankfully it hasn't caused too much damage or hurt any of the applicant's. How much time left until the exam finishes?"
"Ten seconds… five… four… three… two… and killed!" Power Loader exclaimed as the signs of the robot slowly started to fade. The entire room collectively sighed now, if only to gasp in shock as the warning lights and sirens blared in the room, and the "dead" robot sprung back to life and roared once again.
Nezu quickly pressed an intercom button by his chair. Though he had a calm tone of voice, the seriousness to act was heavy within it, "Attention Staff, Code Omega! I repeat, Code Omega! Report to Area B and evacuate civilian's top priority." Taking a breath, watching most of the heroes save for Power Loader who stayed behind as Nezu raised a paw to him, "All Might; Code Epsilon! I repeat Code Epsilon, Area B!"
Letting go of the button, he turned his head towards Power Loader, "I need you here to keep trying to find out what the hell is going on with that zero-pointer." spoke the dean with a nasty tone to his voice, which caused the teacher to flinch before going back to work. Nezu sighed as he watched the various screens of his university staff escorting the applicants away from the training areas, more so from the problem area.
"Sir! Some of the applicants are fighting the rogue zero-pointer!" Power Loader called out as he brought up the viewing camera from the robot's head to only see a shield hurtled towards it before returning to its owner. Nezu smiled at this while keeping his gaze upon the scene before him, paws resting in front of his mouth as he was analyzing and thinking of the events transpiring before him.
'It's good to see your heroic spirit is still there.'
The zero-pointer's right arm crashed down, sending bits and pieces of debris towards Izuku, who dodged the blow before retaliating with a sword swing and 'Atonement' back at it. He grunted in frustration as he watched both attacks not leave that much of a dent in the armor and thinking to himself, 'what the hell did they make this thing out of?'.
His thoughts were interrupted as the robot roared and raised it's left arm up in an attempt to strike the "knight," only for it to recoil when a large piece of building debris nailed it in the side of its head. Izuku turned to his left to see Tenya and Ochako working together, the girl pressing her hands onto large pieces of building debris, causing it to float somewhat, and the boy picking them up and racing around at blinding speeds to various points around the zero-pointer and hurling them with Ochako shouting 'release,' causing the weight to return to make-shift ammunition and denting the metal shell of the robot and recoiling it a few times.
He did ask them what their quirks were, and he was always a fan of demonstrations over explanations.
Lobbing his shield again at the robot to once again keep its attention on him, a brilliant beam of light shot over Izuku's head and pierced through the skirt of the robot. A call out of an outstanding and dazzling shot from behind him made Izuku turn his head for a brief moment towards Yuga.
Even though said boy looked alright (and odd given that he was posed in another elaborate way), Izuku noticed that Yuga brought a hand to his midsection, and a visible wince twitched from his right eye.
'I had a feeling 'Aurora' wasn't going to be enough for his stomach, but having him fight the zero-pointer wasn't on the agenda.' Izuku thought as he dodged another ground smash from the robot's right arm, 'But, his shot did show that we can breach the armor… piercing strikes seem to do it. But nothing I can do as I am now or as a gunbreaker is going to help out here, dammit!'
"Aoyama!" Izuku shouted as he side-stepped past one of the boulders on the ground that was launched at the zero-pointer, "How many shots do you think you have left?"
"A-about… two or three, monsieur!"
Izuku grunted in frustration as he brought his shield up to block some of the smaller pieces of debris that had flown off when another large boulder collided against the 'wings.' He knew the staff would send someone eventually. Still, they were at least ten to twenty minutes out from the main building and then for the heroes to try to locate them. They needed firepower right now, and something that could pierce this thing's metal body and get into the inner workings, or if it could damage the head and render it useless.
As Izuku's thoughts kept racing as he dodged and weaved through the strikes of the zero-pointer, tossing his shield and slamming his sword hard against the shell of the hand and arms. He winced and brought his hand to his head. The pain he was all too familiar with pounded against his brain as the warmth of Hydaelyn washed over him. His head turned towards Yuga after he fired another laser over his head into the forearm of the beast's right side, his eyes under his helmet widened as he struck an epiphany, smiling, he turned his head back to the zero-pointer to see the right arm closing in on him.
The three other applicants watched as a cloud of dust erupted from the slam of the strike, their breaths caught in their throat, seeing as there was no sign of Izuku. Just as they were about to call out his name in some vain hope, a bright sphere of light shot out of the dust cloud, impacting the chest of the zero-pointer, and exploded like a bomb of sparkles only to be followed up by a bolt of lightning after it and striking the same spot.
As the dust settled, the three applicants and the two teaching staff watching from the cameras looked upon a most peculiar sight, in place of the knight that was there but a moment ago stood Izuku, wearing a deep red outfit that looked straight out of medieval France.
With a tight-fitting red coat with a large coattail that hung off his waist in the back, a green frilled ascot hung down the front with black leather gloves and thigh-high boots, all of which had accents of golden accessories to add to the flair of his attire. His green hair was tied back into a fluffy ponytail with a red tri-corner hat sitting upon his head, a large green feather sticking out of the side.
What was most curious was the oddly shaped rapier he held with his right hand, as where the blade and handguard had met, it dimmed a red color with strange markings along the side which were a more pronounced reddish color. Floating above his left hand was an odd-looking gem housed in some sort of casing that looked right out of a museum. It glowed a deep red similar to the markings on the blade. What was odder was that the gem seemed to follow almost entirely with any sort of movements the boy would do with his left hand.
Their focus on his new outfit was interrupted with another mighty roar of the zero-pointer, only to watch as Izuku, unphased by such, started to run up the arm. The zero-pointer rose it's other arm up and attempted to squash him. The hand came down, and the sound of metal on metal echoed out to cause those watching to wince from the auditory pain, though they could see the red garbed boy reach out with his left hand and the gem, and his voice shouted, "CORPS-A-CORPS!"
A beam of light shot out instantly out of the gem and reeled the boy towards where it latched onto the beast's head. As quickly as it appeared, it blinked out of existence as Izuku pocketed the gem on his belt to his side to free up his hand and grab onto one of the edges of the head. Izuku thrust the rapier into one of the beast's eyes as the shattering of glass could be heard once he pulled it out.
Thrusting the rapier in again, he was making quick motions with the weapon, which had caused the beast to roar and bend it's back up as if in pain.
"RIPOSTE! ZWERCHHAU! REDOUBLEMENT!"
Izuku cried out as he swiftly struck into the gaping hole he had made with the rapier. The first was a simple few thrusts of the weapon, digging deep to the machine's innards. The second strike was a wide slashing of the letter "Z" across its face, opening it up more to the outside world. Finally, the rapier was thrust deep in once more, but with a swirl of his wrist, ethereal like points similar to his blade appeared and widened the hole even more.
The zero-pointer was now trying to recover from the quick and brutal attacks, struggling to right itself as Izuku let go of his hold, backflipping off of the enormous beast with a tremendous leap shouting, "DISENGAGEMENT!"
As he righted himself in mid-air, he swung his blade in a cross that hurled another bolt of light in the same cross action he had done. Landing on the ground with a short skid, Izuku lightly tossed the rapier out of his hand and then retook it with a different holding position, the blade now pointed to the ground as he took the gem and swung his hand over the top of the butt of the rapier hilt, a 'click' was heard as the gem now attached to the pommel of the sword.
The zero-pointer was able to finally recover from the onslaught, and just before it could move, Izuku's voice rang out once again as the entire sword and gem began to glow a brilliant white, "VERHOLY!"
Spinning orbs of light appeared above the robot, descending down quickly in a column-like rotation before striking the ground and a pillar of light bloomed out of the circle of orbs. The pillar of light reached over to buildings around them as the right arm of the zero-pointer had been torn off from the impact of the ability.
Izuku grinned devilishly at the robot and rose the weapon in front of him, his left hand close to the gem as it began to glow brightly, "Time to say good night… SCORCH!"
Pulling his hand back as if the gem was something hot and untouchable, a sphere of glowing red with a circle vertical around it appeared in the hole that Izuku had made prior with his rapier strikes, and from it blossomed into a fanned out windmill-like explosion, blowing the head clean off of the zero-pointer's body and tossing it into the building to its left side. The body sputtered and seized before slowly powering down before the red-clad boy as Tenya and Ochaco had moved from the building they were located in towards Yuga, staring at Izuku.
Easing himself up, Izuku turned himself around and tossing the strange rapier and gem up and spinning it like a baton, performing a few tricks and ended with him adjusting the front lapels of his jacket like a showman before catching the weapon, separating the two in a spin of his body, and sheathing them to his belt. Izuku was panting and bowing to his friends, with only Yuga clapping at the performance.
Izuku rose up and began to walk towards them, a big smile on his face as sweat seemed to run slightly down his cheeks. Tenya was the first to reach him, followed by Ochaco and Yuga, "Mirdoriya, What on earth was that?! But more importantly, are you alright? We had thought you were crushed before you… changed into that rather garish garb!"
Izuku stumbled a little and looked with a hurt sort of gaze on his face at the blue-haired boy, "G-Garish? But performing such feats of agility and magic require one to look good while doing it, right?"
"Not when they look like a mixture of a Christmas tree and a french renaissance nobleman!" Tenya chopped the air before he stopped and raised an eyebrow at Izuku, "Wait, 'magic'?"
Before any more questions could be asked or Izuku to even begin explaining what he had meant by 'magic,' A loud crash of something hitting the damaged road behind the other three with an ever-familiar voice shouting.
"HAVE NO FEAR! FOR I AM…. apparently too late?" All Might had begun to speak his catchphrase but then stopped to see the utterly destroyed zero-pointer down the street. His blue eyes looked to Izuku, who gave him a soft wave and a big grin, which was thankfully not seen as the others had looked away to the Pro Hero.
"Well! To see such heroic spirits in all of you! It makes this old hero's heart swell with pride!" he flexed as the applicant's raced towards him, all in looks of pure awe from the presence of the number one hero. Ochacho had looked back to gush this to Izuku when she gasped in fright, getting the attention of those all around her.
"MIDORIYA!"
All eyes were now on the green-haired boy as his body shimmered lightly, sparkles disappearing around him as the red clothes he was wearing simply vanished off of him, revealing the workout clothes he had started with at the beginning of the exam with no weapons, rolling his eyes back and began to fall forward.
A burst of wind whipped around the three other teenagers as the boy fell into the waiting arms of All Might. He shifted the boy lightly in his arms to free a hand to press against a communicator in his ear, "Sir, one of the students seems to have passed out for some reason- Yes, of course. I'll take him there once the others show up." He moved his hand down from the communicator and held the boy close, as the others soon caught up to their fallen comrade.
Nezu sighed gently as he watched the events unfold on the large monitor before him, sipping his tea when he seen the heroes Midnight and Present Mic reach the small group by the 'corpse' of the zero-pointer and All Might explaining to his colleges before racing off with the passed out Warrior of Light.
His attention turned towards Power Loader, who was grumbling words he knew the teacher would never repeat in his classroom. He cleared his throat to get the metal-headed man's attention, "Report."
"Damndest thing, no matter what system I check, everything just keeps reporting "ok" until the kid blew it's fucking head off."
"Language."
"S-sorry sir…" Power Loader flinched slightly, "Anyway, once we get the pieces back, we can have a more thorough check of whatever made that thing go rogue." He finished as Nezu nodded to the teacher.
"Good, take it to our robotics hanger and wait for me there. I would also like to work on this, as well. But I wish to see the rest of the applicant's safely leave the grounds, and we take care of those that are injured first." Nezu said, then sipped his tea. Power Loader nodded and headed out of the monitoring room to await the furred dean at the mentioned hanger.
As the monitors continued to play and display the various staff member's helping out evacuating the arenas and university grounds, Nezu sighed gently as he placed his cup on the saucer, "What is your take on it, Mog?"
Descending down from the darkened rafters came the tiny Moogle as it floated beside Nezu, who was staring at the screens, "To be honest, kupo? Izuku did great taking out that big robot thing!" It exclaimed happily before floating towards one of the monitors, "But why was it starting to act like a beast is what confuses me, kupo."
"Indeed, and your assessment of our dear Warrior of Light is spot on. He acted how I expected him to." Nezu smiled brightly at this, though his beady eyes still watched the various monitors, "Still, to think that a mere mock-up of 'The Enigma' I had planned to see if the blessing of Hydaelyn would unlock more of his abilities, would come to life and act similarly to the original."
"Good thing it didn't have its weapons, kupo?"
"Indeed, rather not have Midoriya or any of the youngsters applying to our halls be dealing with 'Time manipulation'... at least not until their third year." He mused much to the jargon and worried look of the Moogle beside him, "In any case, I'd suggest you return to the boy's home for now and keep an eye out on anything suspicious... If you see anything, you know what to do."
Mog nodded and saluted, disappearing in a puff of smoke. Nezu sighed as he took one last sip of his tea and watched the clean-up crews start gathering the zero-pointer. He climbed down of his chair and proceeded to head to the hanger himself, all the while thinking dark thoughts.
'Is this a declaration of some sort… or someone playing a game that I have yet to have all the pieces to.'
High above the mock cityscape and floating within the air, a dark-robed being smiles under the cowl after witnessing the battle that took place. A gentle chuckle soon escapes their lips as a chaotic looking portal of darkness appears behind them.
"Three down... Fourteen to go…" is all they say before disappearing into the void.