Chapter Ninety-Five
Motioning for Mineta, Shiozaki, and Komori to follow, I took off at a jog, listening carefully for the sound of coming 'footsteps', the noises just a bit too... muted to be the slapping of sneakers on stone. Coming to an intersection I turned right, going towards the attackers to face them head on rather than having them try and jump us from behind, Pixie-Bob surely knowing these tunnels better than we could.
The footsteps stopped, just around the corner, seemingly startled, and I pulled on OfA, crackling as I hit the turn and leapt forward, going full tilt instead of slowing, and as such when one orange-jumpsuit wearing mudman leapt for me, he missed completely, as I hit the opposite wall, seeing two others behind him, arms up, ready to pounce.
"This one's yours!" I called, as I impacted the wall, then bounced off, twisting about to land on the over-extended mudman, kicking him towards my teammates as I leapt forward, charging the other two. I had a feeling it wasn't going to work, but went with my 'classic' ability first, hitting both mudmen, slapping them on the chests and letting rip with enough voltage to put them both down.
While there were twin pops from their heads, their cameras frying, both dirt dudes didn't even flinch, grabbing my arms and trying to pull, to trap me between the two, but, with a bit of All Might's Quirk, it was easy enough to yank them both together, hard, slamming their heads into each other, again doing enough to put a normal person down, even if just for a moment.
They both barely flinched.
As they clumsily swung for me, I, slightly annoyed, turned my hands to lightning and extracted them from the golem's grips, taking a step out of range, before reforming and striking out with two punches, hard enough to kill someone, All Might having made sure I got a handle on my 'newfound strength' in one of our spars. Being Quirk-based, it came with inherent subconscious limiters that'd let its user punch someone else without truly hurting them with practically zero training, though they could be pushed past.
I found that out when I punched the seven-foot-tall man so hard I broke my own arm, just for a moment freaking out the Symbol of Peace, but had since learned how to push up to them without breaking my own body. However, knowing how to do that meant I also could, accidentally, really mess someone up, so I got the kind of 'Quirk Training' that most strength-types got in middle-school to 'get a sense of my own power', really more a one-man seminar than anything else. My idle comment that for someone whose Quirk 'came in late' this was a must had made Toshinori freeze, before laughing fakely and agreeing with me.
Didn't stop me from getting fucked up by environmental damage, as I'd learned a couple days ago with that log, but that was more on me than anything else.
So, ramping up my strength to well over half my 'capacity', sinking that level of force into these mudmen's faces, which caused the dirt to come apart in what would've normally been a very gory display, finally put them down, despite the fact that I knew damn well that Pixie-Bob could've just had the headless 'bodies' keep pressing the attack.
Looking back, I saw the third attacker was bound completely in vines, my three teammates looking to me with interest, and just a tad bit of worry. "She's playing by Master Minion rules," I told them, which just got me blank looks, as I realized I was using another universe's threat matrix. "Power-created attackers," I explained, turning my arm to lightning, and lashing out with a punch, keeping my fist 'real' to slam into its head, shattering it, the struggling man-shaped creation going limp. "Okay, you can drop it."
Shozaki did, gently laying the now headless 'person' on the ground, asking, "Should we press on, or pass down the secondary passage we came across?"
Shrugging, I started to continue down the path we were already traversing, calling over my shoulder, "I have no idea, but we're not looking for one spot, just some of something that's been scattered about. Any direction should be as good as any other."
The others didn't respond as we continued, the tunnel opening up into a large chamber, fifty feet across and half that tall, with four other exits set irregularly around space, while, in the center, three more mudmen were waiting for us, and, as soon as we crossed some invisible threshold, they charged.
I could take care of them in a flash, but this wasn't about me, this was about my team, so I directed them forward, keeping OfA up and running, and, after a moment of hesitation, they moved forward, towards our foes.
Mineta surprised me, the boy bounding forward with surprising speed towards one of the attackers, and with long, for him, ground eating strides. Pulling two balls from his head, he waited a moment before throwing them both forward, aim true, dropping them right where his enemy was going to step, the mudman getting instantly caught and sent careening forward, right into the midget's rising fist, as he leapt up like Mario.
While the strike reversed the construct's course, sending it flat on his back, it was still in the fight, struggling to try and get back up. "You need to hit it harder, Mineta," I advised, the boy looking back at me in disbelief, before turning again to face the now-rising construct, jumping up and hitting it once more, though not that much harder, sending it back down. It still struggled, so with an angry cry he leapt up, coming down on its head, twice, his blows still not strong enough to break-
... That worked?
"YEAH!" the small teen yelled in victory, while, with the other half of our team had taken out their targets, the two remaining mudmen bound in roots while Komori glared at them, yellow spots spreading in a ring around their necks, the dirt -flesh seeming to slowly evaporate as fungus bore in like a sunny garrote, until the fungirl nodded to the zealot, who shook her captured opponents, the mudmen's heads snapping off easily, their bodies going limp.
And she can do that to people? I thought, but smiled instead, telling them, "Good Job!"
It wasn't exactly combat effective, but with Shiozaki to hold them down, the long timer on her kill move wasn't an issue. Looking around the space, there was seemingly no difference in the exits, and, reaching up with an electrical hand, I dragged three sharp fingers into the rock, scoring a symbol that'd tell us how to get out of here.
Considering the exits, I asked, "I don't suppose any of your Quirks come with sensory components?"
"I can feel whatever touches my tendrils," the vine-haired girl offered, "but I do not think that is what you mean."
"It isn't," I agreed, picking the leftmost one at random and starting to head for it. "But we'll be just as bad off as picking this one as any other. Really wish we had Jiro on our team," I smiled. "She'd probably have this place mapped out in ten minutes."
"Truly?" Shiozaki questioned, impressed. "I thought the talents our Lord had graced her with were more limited, given what I have glimpsed of her tribulations."
Waving a hand in a 'maybe' gesture, I backtracked, "Maybe not that fast, but she's got some serious echolocation props. That's just a skill issue, instead of a raw power one, so the Pussycats are having her work on the offensive aspect of her power instead, like they're having you lift weights and take hits with your vines, along with making an absolute ton of them, instead of training your dexterity with your Quirk."
Clasping her hands, the Christian sighed, "This journey has been truly a test of one's spirit, but, like the apostle, Paul, I will persevere, and be the stronger for it."
Paul? I thought, trying to remember what happened to him, but coming up blank. "Well," I hazarded, "hopefully nothing that bad."
"Mayhaps, but even if I were to face such trials? To be shipwrecked, to be beaten, to be whipped, I would endure!" she declared, flushing slightly.
While I wasn't the most observant of people, I still noticed something a bit off, though whether this was a Lalatina Ford thing, a Castle Anthrax thing, or just plain religious fervor I couldn't be sure. What I did know was that I wasn't touching it.
"Well, it's our Quirks that are being tested, not our faith, so that shouldn't be an issue," I deferred, getting a rueful nod from the woman as we entered another tunnel, at a brisk walk. At Mineta's confused look, I shrugged minutely, while Komori just tried not to laugh, which, oddly, made me feel better, as this behavior of Shiozaki's was apparently known.
Moving forward, we also were going down, which was also a good sign.
What wasn't was when the tunnel evened out, and opened into another fifty-foot diameter chamber, one that was identical to the last one, down to the three mudmen waiting for us.
What was worse was that, stomach dropping as I glanced upwards, one of the exits to the chamber bore the same marking I'd left in the previous room, recreated through Pixie-Bob's power, the fact that we had to be at a lower elevation the only thing keeping me from thinking we'd looped around.
"Alright, take two, I guess," I called out with a wave, a little less enthusiastically, and my teammates, after a similar moment of confusion, moved forward. This time, when Mineta threw his balls, the mudman tried to dodge, but the grapist just tossed another before the first hit, catching the Minion, and then kicking him until he went down for good, confirming to me how these things worked.
As for the girls, they did the exact same thing, only after they'd grabbed and were shrooming their two, there was a flash of orange from the ceiling, out of their line of sight, and some of the dirt that made up the ceiling shifted to reveal a fourth mudman, who almost silently dropped down towards the pair.
It did make some noise, some of the dirt it'd dislodged hitting the ground, but by the time it did so, and Shiozaki looked over, then started tracking upwards, it would've been too late to try and stop the descending Minion from getting the drop on her. Literally.
Which is why it was good that I was on overwatch.
Throwing my arm forward into a spike of electricity, going 'fuck it' in terms of treating these things like people, I speared the dirt-creation directly through the chest, extending lightning fingers for 'grip', and let half my arm snap back, digging in my feet to anchor myself in the process, reeling in the attacker like a fish on the line.
Taking a sliding step to the side, and taking a note out of Sero's playbook, I flicked my retracting arm out, sending the Minion into a whipping motion that was supposed to end right at the point of impact, but there was more to it than I thought, my timing off, slamming the dirt-person into the ground, which made it come apart, the whipcrack instead making the debris explode off the end of my electric arm, sending it everywhere as I let go and let the limb fully retract.
"Dude!" Mineta called, eyes wide, and I realized that it kinda looked like I'd meant for that to happen, in a 'flick the blood off my blade' way.
"Might've been a bit much," I commented idly, looking at the rest of the wall, my vision sharpening slightly, trying to find any other hint of hiding enemies, but I couldn't see more than a couple cameras on either end of the chamber. "Looks clear. You two got those mudmen?"
"Their filth shall be cleansed!" Shiozaki replied with fervor, hands clasped as if in prayer, vine-hair out and holding the Minions steady while Komori shroomed them out of existence.
I blinked. "... okay then."
Not sure what else to say, I just turned and made a jogging circuit of the room, trying to figure out where to go. I got a slight breeze from two of the four exits, but that was it, and, given the cave's built-in HVAC system, that meant I'd only be closing in on the air vents, though it'd make sense for those to be in the lowest floors. Going with that logic, as soon as the others were done, I waved them over, and started to jog into the slight breeze, having burnt through close to ten minutes already, and with no idea of how deep we'd need to go.
"We're getting a sense of things, so we can afford to double time it," I explained for the benefit of the others. Personally, I would've just torn down the passageways, relying on my own reflexes, as, even when someone was setting a trap, as it seemed Pixie-Bob was doing, varying your speed and making snap decisions down multiple routes could help both in losing a pursuit and surviving setting off traps.
I kept moving, as I tried to know how I knew that, as the fights I'd had before coming to this world were always 'stand and fight' scenarios, knowing my fat ass couldn't outrun any attackers, so it was put them all down or go down. But, even jogging, the feelings of the stone walls, lit by green lights, with the occasional pseudo-worked feature here and there seemed... familiar.
And not in a good way.
I sparked a little, keeping my pace steady as I ran through the tunnels, always going down, feeling as if this place wasn't cold enough for some reason, glancing back to see Mineta was breathing a little hard, but with the practiced in-out of a long distance runner, probably able to still keep pace if I kicked it up a notch, while the girls were clearly not as inclined. They'd done well enough in the Sports Festival's race, but that had not only been broken up by random fucking bullshit, it'd been a smooth, straight shot, as opposed to our current broken-field course, which made getting into any kind of rhythm impossible, and made conserving momentum a much trickier proposition.
They could do it, only the barest indications of possible issues now present, but, if this turned into the kind of running-bullshit-battle my class' first day turned into, it was going to be a problem. Though, as weirdly keyed up this entire place was making me, maybe things wouldn't be that ba-
From ahead of me, part of the wall twitched, and I leapt forward, calling OfA into my arm and plunging it into the solid rock, which gave way like it was cardboard, less than an inch deep, and I felt fabric under my figures, pulling out the hiding mudman,with one hand, clawed electric fingers ripping into its dirt skull with the other, causing the struggling figure to go limp as I tore through it's pseudo flesh, turned, and tossed it down the corridor, resuming jogging just ahead of the others, seeing a different portion of the wall twitch behind us, but that was all they did, the mudman hiding behind it not moving.
"They're in the walls," I noted, more keyed up, twitching a little, but... we passed by another one without issue, and I realized it was only Toru's Quirk, instantly highlighting movement to my vision and zooming it in, that let me spot the hiding enemies at all.
Can she not do that, or does Hagakure think it's normal, some part of me wondered, as my teammates sent worried looks to our surroundings. "Well, that's not very spore-ting," Komori grumbled.
"I think they're meant to hit us on the way out," I said, spotting another, tapping the thin layer of rock with just enough force to make it shudder, but, while I was ready for it, the Minion didn't attack. "Which means getting the 'evidence' is going to be a third of the problem."
"A third? But if we've got it, we're halfway there!" Mineta argued.
Taking a moment to map out the tunnel ahead, I spun around to jog backwards, looking to the other two, giving them a prodding glance. Both frowned, but Shiozaki slowed a little, realization dawning. "Once we have the truth, we shall be beset on all sides, by the forces of inequity!"
The grapist frowned, still not getting it, and our fungirl smirked, explaining, "Once we've got the goods, we'll be up to our gills in stalk-ers!"
"Not quite that, bad," I corrected, turning back around, as we turned a corner, "But anyone we meet is a potential threat. Speaking of which," I added, hearing a bestial roar echoing down the stone hallway in front of us, as well as a familiar female voice, under the chorus of battle. "Catch up but don't run yourself ragged," I commanded.
"What?" Mineta started to ask, as I shifted mental gears, turning OfA up, while transforming forearms up and shins down to lightning, throwing myself forward, arms out as I hit a corner, absorbing the force like a spring as I turned, shoving myself down the next hallway, the wind of my passage whistling past my ears, hitting another corner before I caught the flash of movement that was the ongoing battle.
The guy who could make scales was going at it with a mudman, filling it with shards but not getting much out of that, while Shoji was trying to grapple two more with his multiple arms, three more attackers floating in the air weightlessly, while Shishida, in full beast-mode, was grappling with a Minion as big as he was, a ten-foot-tall loam-lug that swung large rounded fists while wearing a bright orange harness that read 'Villain' in black letters.
Uraraka ran towards the brutish Minion, clearly in an attempt to tag it with her Quirk and take it out of the fight, but one more mudman was entering the battlefield, from the ceiling, the same way they'd gone after my team.
If it worked the first time, I thought, announcing my attack as I'd learned was proper to identify myself to other heroes. Leaping forward a yell of "Bolt Kick!" felt a bit ridiculous, but it got the girl to look my way, eyes starting to widen in fear as she saw me head for her. However, to her credit, she realized I'd miss her in less than a second, and looked upwards, to see the falling mudman, throwing herself to the side to dodge him even if I hadn't intercepted the Minion.
Slamming into it, with a flying kick that caught it directly in the chest, most of my momentum transferred into the dirt-construct, sending it flying off with enough energy on impact that I would've snapped a rib, if it had any, but these were made of stronger stuff than most people.
Landing next to my classmate, I reached out as she started to say, "Thanks, Kaminar-" before grabbing her and yeeting the girl at the big Minion, getting a squawk of surprise from the brunette, but she adapted, twisting on the fly, slamming her hands onto the creature's broad back, a pink flash all the indication I could see of her Quirk activating. Grounding herself on the creature, she was thrown backwards as Shishida's efforts suddenly paid off, easily able to overpower the loam-lug, tossing it up into the air.
Meanwhile I'd turned, running over to Shoji, the man's many arms having wrapped around the two mudmen, my clawed hand coming down, to deliver not one blow, but five, technically, these things having some sort of internal 'threshold' that, after that point, made them lose cohesion, regardless of how weak each individual hit was. Though, considering scale-boy's troubles, the threshold for 'damage' was a lot lower than it should be, the boy's projectiles hitting like rubber bullets, but not stopping his foe. That was why Mineta had been able to take one out, his many hits likely equating to one of my own.
That wasn't how people worked, where there were different thresholds to bruise, rattle brains, break bones, and so on that you could try and aim 'between', but that was how Pixie-Bob's creations worked. Well, possibly, or that was just how she was making her creations work here, given how much damage her previous 'villains' had taken under the lake, but those had been reinforced, while these were truly just animated bags of dirt.
My team rushed in, or at least the grapist did, as I slammed my claws into the mudman's head, each digit digging in separately, combing to crush its soil skull as it suddenly lost cohesion, pointing to the other mudman Shoji gripped while looking to Mineta, who nodded, heading our way, and I pulled back.
Leaving the two, I turned to help the scale-boy, whose name still escaped me, but Shishida was already punching his opponent into a fine paste, so that worked. Looking back, Mineta had thrown a ball, using it to bounce upwards in a flying punch that slammed into the side of the mudman's head, Shoji pausing mid-punch himself.
The little guy threw a hand out, grabbing the Minion's head while standing on his shoulders and turning in a roundhouse kick that held a surprising amount of force, not quite enough to put it down, but the ball-headed boy saw his classmate's chambered punch, nodded to him, and jumped backward, three fists clustered together on one arm slamming into Minion's head, blowing it apart.
All that was left were the floating opponents when the last two members of our team ran in, breathing hard, both stopping and taking in the battlefield before them, both girls looking dispirited. "Fungirl, you do your thing!" I ordered, pointing upwards. "Shiozaki, grab them and hold them still." Looking over to Uraraka, she seemed a bit distressed, and I asked, "Can you keep them up there or would you rather she take care of it?"
My classmate grimaced, before shaking her head. "I can handle it!" she stated with determination.
"Don't wear yourself out too fast," I warned, but she shook her head again, and I smiled at the girl's spunk. "Okay, you three okay?"
Shishida, having shrunk down to his normal size, exchanged glances with scale-boy. "We're fine. Didn't expect the big one," the hairy teen commented gruffly.
"First one we've seen," I agreed.
"And did one come from the ceiling?" Ochaco demanded. "What's up with that?"
Komori piped up, shiitake-cap irised eyes focused on the floating mudmen, who'd all come down with a bad case of yellow spots, "And they're in the walls, shroom!"
The 1-Bers looked to the vine-haired girl, who nodded. "Truly, in this vile place malignance dwells within its very partitions, behind a thin layer of normalcy."
"She means they've got a bit of wall they hide behind," Mineta translated, which caused the other team to all look around with worry.
"I'm pretty sure they're there to restock the rooms and hallways after we clear out the first set coming down, but some might pop out," I offered, seeing a large bit of the dirt to the side twitch. Reaching up and snapping off a coin, making a mental note to publicly ask Momo for a resupply, I extended my two fingers, lightning playing upon them as I started to spin up the charge. "But they're there."
Smoothly lifting my limb, I dropped the bit of iron into the railgun and pulsed it, a burst of electricity springing up a fractional moment before the loud Crack! rang out, a section of cave exploding inwards, revealing not just a blown-out orange harness, but an entire new tunnel, the airflow enough to visibly blow the dust into the chamber.
"Wow, you found a new mush-room!" Komori chirped, and I shot her a flat look at the terrible pun, the girl grinning unrepentantly. Meanwhile, dirt started sloughing off the bound mudmen, which didn't hit the ground like I thought it would, but instead floated out into large brown clouds, all of it rendered weightless.
That had... possibilities.
Meanwhile the two boys from 1-B were staring at me, with an odd amount of worry. "I've got good eyes," I shrugged. They were still staring at me. "So, uh, yeah. Also, is it just me, or are the mudmen oddly tough?"
That got me odd looks, of a different variety, until Shoji replied, as if it was obvious, though the multi-armed man's tone held no reproach, "Criminals are often much tougher than civilians."
"Well, yeah," I started to reply, until, pausing, I pinged my inner Denki-model, and got an explanation that that they weren't just tougher mentally, they way they would be back home, but physically as well, and not just a little, which was part of the reason that Heroes were needed in the first place, which he had just accepted as fact, but... "Oh, right, Atlas, duh."
With pretty much everyone having that ability, the rigors of a criminal's life would necessitate training themselves up, which also meant that the local Martial Arts scene was probably, well, anime levels of ridiculous. Using Quirks would be illegal, and there was likely some heteromorph discrimination that, in the name of fairness, would actually make sense.
Note to self, look up local dojos, I thought, as the gains from Martial Talent would probably be sizeable.
There was a shower of dirt as Uraraka let her Quirk go, which snapped me out of my thoughts, and the others out of staring at me. "So, we go that way, you guys pick a different one?" I suggested, motioning towards the new avenue I'd opened.
"I, uh, sure," Scaley nodded.
"And thanks for the help, Kaminari!" Uraraka added with a smile.
Smiling back, I promised her, "Anytime. Also, we've been following the air currents, but I'm not sure if that'll actually help."
"Better than wandering," Shishida shrugged, not moving from his spot.
Are they worried we'll jump them? I wondered, but turned my back on them first, listening for footsteps in case his actions were indicative of a guilty conscious, and waving over my shoulder with a call of, "Good hunting!" before I started to jog for the newly opened exit, the rest of my team falling in behind me.
It was only because I was listening, with ears enhanced by OfA, that I heard Scales mutter, "Dude, what the hell?"
"Oh, that's just Kaminari," Uraraka dismissed. "He's a little intense, but not in a bad way! Now, let's get going!"
Frowning, as we picked our way through the tunnel entrance, and headed down once again, I looked to Mineta. "Am I intense?"
The small man motioned to the shredded harness he was stepping over, then opened his arms to include the entire tunnel I'd uncovered. "Dude."
"... Fair enough."
AN: The Next Four Chapters Can Be Found on and Subscribestar! Also, on , my new project Multiversal Glimpses is in development and can be accessed, which will start to be posted here in Early April!