Chapter 13: Sports Festival

Firstly, Happy New Year!

Secondly, apologies for the unexplained two-week absence. I went to Mexico to celebrate the New Year with family and I was meant to come back the day after New Year but decided to make it a longer vacation by staying for a few more days. But, now I am back and ready to continue my stories.

The schedule will stay the same, minus this late upload of a chapter, as I have my first class of the new semester tomorrow and want to get a feel of things before making any promises.

Also, for those who read my first novel, check out the newly uploaded chapter for info on that.

Anyway, enjoy!

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After the nutcracking incident, Yuuichi decided to stay away from the underground fighting ring for a while. Not because he didn't want to find what, if any, link there was between the fighting ring and the attempted kidnapping, he just decided to slow down a bit. After all, haste makes waste.

And so, life went on.

Yuuichi continued to go to school, hang out with his friends, play with his sister, and get his weekly business lesson from his father. And his life remained monotonous until a few weeks after the underground fighting ring event when the hallowed U.A. Sports Festival was set to happen.

~

In the Yaoyorozu manor, on a morning like any other, a figure was sneakily making her way down the hallways, taking her time to make sure she went unnoticed.

Peeking over every corner before making her move, she steadily made her way down the hallway before arriving at her destination. Her path forward was blocked, however, by a closed door and one that intelligence says may or may not creak a little when opened. But seeing as her mission lies beyond the closed door, she had to take the risk to open it, and so she did.

Thankfully, the door did not creak, allowing her to continue her mission without any hiccups.

With the door now open, she peered inside to see a clean bedroom with a clear path to her target, the bed.

She could continue to slowly but steadily make her way to the bed before taking her target by surprise, or she could say to hell with it and run full speed. Her brain told her the former had a higher success rate but her giddiness at wanting to complete her mission made her choose the latter option.

So, she got into a runner's stance before bolting towards the bed. As she neared it, she saw that there was movement from her target, so she decided to put more oomph into her running before jumping, putting her on a collision course with her target.

Her decisions had paid off and she landed right on target.

"Oof." said her target.

"Nii-chan! Wake up! It's the sports festival today!" said Momo who had just landed on her brother.

Yes, the figure sneaking her way through the manor was Momo Yaoyorozu whose self-imposed mission was to wake up her brother so he could get ready for the U.A. Sports Festival happening later in the day.

"You're a real ninja, eh? Come here!" said Yuuichi lunging at her before tickling her.

In truth, Yuuichi had realized that Momo was sneaking into his room a few moments before she had reached his door. She wasn't being as sneaky as she thought, but Yuuichi decided to let her continue her little act because it was cute. He didn't know she would jump on him, which he realized when she started sprinting at him and was why he was stirring awake at the last moment. Unfortunately, he underestimated just how fast she decided to run at him, leading to her landing on his stomach.

"Hahahahahaha! Nii-chan! Haha! Stop!" she said in between laughs as she tried to escape from his clutches.

"Fine, fine. Only because I need to get ready." said Yuuichi, stopping his tickling attack.

"Nii-chan, are you excited?!" she asked, probably more excited than the participant himself.

"Not really. It's a little bothersome." he said as he got up from his bed and stretched.

"Eh? But the Sports Festival is so cool! And you've been training a little more than usual, so you do care." she said.

"I didn't say I didn't care, it's just bothersome. And I trained extra because I want to be first place. But, don't worry. Even if I find it bothersome, your brother will still try his best, so you can brag to your friends about me." he said with a smile as he ruffled her hair.

"Hehe. Good. There's one girl who always says how cool her big brother is when I know how cooler you are." she said with a competitive face.

"Hahaha." laughed Yuuichi.

~

After getting ready and being wished good luck by the staff and his parents, who both said would be there with Momo to watch the festival in person, Yuuichi left for school.

Once at the school grounds, Yuuichi saw a throng of people making their way to the stadium much earlier than the event was supposed to start, once again reassuring just how many people watched the event.

But Yuuichi was not one to care about such things so he just made a mental note about it before continuing to make his way to the locker room assigned to his class.

As he made his way to the locker room, he walked past a lot of students that had on all different types of expressions. From students that looked nervous, which were the majority, students who looked like it was any other day, which was a minority, and students who were just raging with enthusiasm.

'All kinds of people.' thought Yuuichi as he continued to make his way to the locker rooms.

Entering the locker room, Yuuich noticed that like those students he passes, many of his classmates also had the same nervous expression, including his friend Kunio. Of course, his other friend, Kentaro, had an expression of enthusiasm that Yuuichi expected.

"Yo." said Yuuichi as he walked up to Kunio who had his eyes closed and head down and looked to be in some sort of non-denominational prayer.

"Yuuichi! I'll win today!" said Kentaro.

"I look forward to it." replied Yuuichi patting him on the arm.

"Hmph!" said Kentaro, breathing out a cloud of steam, showing just how pumped up he was for the Sports Festival.

"Kunio." said Yuuichi as he sat down next to him.

"Yuuichi." he said picking up his head to look at him only to reveal dark circles around his eyes, making him look like a panda.

"Whoa." said Yuuichi.

"What? Is it the dark circles? Is it noticeable?" he asked.

"Just a bit. Too anxious to sleep?"

"Yeah."

"Hey, don't worry about it so much. Just try your best and I'm sure you'll make it far today." said Yuuichi patting him on the back for moral support.

"Thanks. I'll try. Your parents coming today?"

"Yeah. And my sister too."

"Guess you're going to win the whole thing then. To show off to your sister." teased Kunio.

"Well if that's the outcome of my trying then what else can I do but accept it? What about your parents?" said Yuuichi with a grin.

"Yup. They closed the restaurant for today." he said, his expression brightening a bit at the mention of his parents coming to see him.

Kunio's parents hadn't been entirely on board with his decision to enroll in U.A. at first because they wanted him to take over the family restaurant. But after some conceiving, they decided they would let him follow his own path. It also helped that Kunio's passion to save people with his cooking really shone through to his parents. And he also promised that when he retired from being a hero, he would take over the restaurant.

"Mine too." said Kentaro, who seemed to have reigned in his enthusiasm a bit.

"We've never met your parents before. What are they like?" asked Yuuichi, curious about the parents a person like Kentaro has.

"My family runs a shrine in the countryside. My mom was the shrine maiden there before taking over from my grandfather. My dad's a farmer, and they grew up together before getting married." he recounted.

"That's like straight out of a manga." said Kunio.

"Mm. That's what everyone says."

"Are they coming today?"

"Mm."

"Nice. Can't wait to see the two who made a monster like you." teased Yuuichi.

"Oi." said Kentaro, getting a little angry.

"In a good way."

"Hmph."

~

The Sports Festival began with a speech from the teacher plus a short speech from Yuuichi as the class representative before going into the first event which was a maze run.

The maze was continuously changing and had many different traps which eliminated/slowed down many of the students. Not to mention that the students could use their quirks to both traverse the maze and slow down other students which made the field even more chaotic. And the first 54 to reach the end would move on to the next event.

Yuuichi passed the first event by creating a golden cloud, something he remembered seeing in an old anime, and flying over the maze which was not easy either since the school accounted for students doing so and placed airborne traps. Of course, he still managed to circumvent all the traps and ended up finishing in first place with record time.

And while Yuuichi waited for the event to end, he was looking around the crowd and managed to spot his parents and his sister who was fervently shouting in support of him. He also saw Kunio's parents, both of whom he had met sometime in the past few years, and he spotted two people who looked a little like Kentaro. The man was a big burly bearded man wearing farming clothes and the lady next to him was a short but beautiful woman wearing a short kimono with oni horns.

Speaking of Kentaro, initially, he tried to go through the maze normally but after being turned around so many times, his anger got the best of him and he started bulldozing through the walls. Eventually, he made it to the end, but not after destroying much of the maze.

As for Kunio, seeing as he didn't have the brute strength of Kentaro nor the versatility of Yuuichi, he had to use his wits to traverse the maze. He did this by melting walls using a strong acid which he couldn't do often because of the damage it caused his throat, setting traps with oil, and hindering other students with various other compounds.

In the end, all three of them passed the first event.

The second event turned out to be a team event wherein nine random students would be grouped together in an event of quirk-baseball, which is self-explanatory. The three friends didn't end up on the same team, but they didn't end up on the teams that played each other either which gave the three of them the opportunity to all make it to the end.

Since Yuuichi was the first to finish the first event, he was chosen as the team captain which was not settled easily since many of the students wanted the opportunity to shine for the hero scouts. But seeing as it was ordered by the teachers, the students couldn't whine too much.

Yuuichi took the center field position because his versatility allowed him to cover a broader area and have a better view of the entire field. As for the pitcher position, he gave it up to a General class student whose quirk allowed him to stretch his arms like one of those sticky hand toys.

Long story short, Yuuichi's team ended up winning 5-2 with Yuuichi scoring one home run. Kentaro's team won 7-3 with Kentaro scoring two home runs and Kunio's team won 3-2, barely edging out the win after Kunio used olive oil to make the ground slippery, allowing him to just barely reach the base before being out.

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After the second event, the remaining 27 students were allowed to take a break while the rest of the students, and those of the 27 who wished to, participated in fun events.

Originally Yuuichi was going to rest before the final event, but after looking at his sister pleading with him with her puppy dog eyes, he decided to participate in the fun events.

After participating in two fun events, Yuuichi rested for a bit before the remaining students were called out for the final event.

The final event was always battle related because heroes' battle prowess is always important, and this year was no different. The final event turned out to be a free-for-all where all 27 students would be free to attack and fight with any other student even being able to gang up on other students. And each student would have a bracelet that would light up when they gave up or were defeated and would allow the students to have their location pinpointed for a drone to fly to take them away from the field.

Yuuichi found it interesting they chose the battle royale format, Kentaro was pumped up and was practically on fire from how excited he was, and Kunio was a little nervous but had gained confidence throughout the event.

And before the event started, the three of them came to an agreement that they would try to not fight each other until the very end. They would not pull their punches against each other, they would just avoid each other for as long as possible until they could avoid each other no longer.

The stage for the battle royale was the entire stadium with a cityscape to add another layer of complexity. Each student was blindfolded and put somewhere random by the teachers before the event started.

When Yuuichi took off his blindfold, he saw that he was put on a rooftop with one of his classmates and she saw him as well. She was a girl with a quirk that let her create electricity in her feet allowing her to run fast and speed up her kicks.

Seeing each other at the same time, Yuuichi decided to react second. She thought he was caught off guard and rushed him with her quirk, but Yuuichi was waiting for her to move first. As she neared him, kick at the ready, Yuuichi constructed a purposefully weak wall to slow her down and obstruct her vision.

Continuing forward, her kick destroyed the wall but blocked her vision long enough for Yuuichi to construct a palm that hit her right as the wall broke, knocking her away. As she tumbled backward, Yuuichi constructed another palm right above her and slammed it down but she narrowly dodged it by using her quirk to boost her jump backward.

Unfortunately, she was too caught up in trying to dodge that she didn't notice that Yuuichi had constructed an Iron Maiden in the path of her jump. Shutting it as soon as she was in there, Yuuichi turned up the heat on his construct while she tried to escape before she finally gave up and he let her go.

Right as he was about to descend the building, Yuuichi sensed an attack coming and constructed a barrier that blocked the attack but destroyed the floor under him causing him to fall.

As he fell, he noticed the floor on which he was about to land was covered in caltrops which was not a problem for him with his barrier.

Unfortunately, he misjudged the caltrops as mere caltrops when in reality they were explosive caltrops that blew up as soon as his barrier touched them, causing him to drop down another floor. But with his barrier still up, Yuuichi was only temporarily deafened by the sound and a little dizzy from the force of the explosions.

And the owner of the caltrops seemed to have known that would happen because he took advantage of the moment when he was slightly discombobulated to launch more caltrops at Yuuichi's barrier. Except for this time, they didn't explode but began to drill into his barrier.

Even though Yuuichi was intrigued by the caltrops, he wouldn't let that distract him. To get rid of the caltrops, he exploded his barrier outwards, catching the student off guard from the force of the burst barrier and the heat wave that came along with it.

Yuuichi took the opportunity to rush the student while he was caught off guard and punched him in the stomach without any constructs. It seemed he was physically weak because the punch was enough to knock him out, evident by his bracelet lighting up.

Taking a moment to shake off the residual explosive dizziness, Yuuichi constructed wings before flying back up the hole in the ceiling and onto the roof. Landing on the edge of the roof, Yuuichi decided to scout his surroundings for any nearby students.

With the height of the building he was on, he was able to see most of the cityscape. And it seemed there was no one all that close to him, at least not as close as the earlier two students.

The closest student was two blocks away and they were currently fighting another student, evident by the sound coming from that direction.

So, Yuuichi decided he would wait out the fight and let any students come to him. After all, the only way to win was to be the last one standing. And he had shown enough of his strength and wits from the earlier two events and the two fights to impress any scouts.

But it seemed the school had thought of people taking advantage by hiding in the outskirts of the cityscape, waiting for the end, because they announced that the cityscape would be shrinking. This forced the students to move away from the edge of the cityscape and further into it, increasing the chances of running into other students.

Yuuichi hearing this was a little annoyed at having his moment of rest ruined but understood what the school was trying to prevent. But that wouldn't be enough to stop him.

Constructing wings, Yuuichi took off and went to the center of the cityscape before landing on top of a building where he promptly laid down to rest.

Of course, he didn't try to sleep or nap because that would be reckless to do. But he did manage to rest for nearly a half-hour before he was interrupted.

In the time he was resting, the students had been whittled down to 5, including Yuuichi, and one of those five was knocking on Yuuichi's door.

Hearing someone come up the stairs, Yuuichi stood up, dusted himself off, and looked at the door. As the door opened, Yuuichi was ready for a surprise attack but instead, a smile graced his face seeing that the student was none other than Kentaro, who had a similar smile.

Looking at each other for a few moments, no words were exchanged before the fight began.

Kentaro's body got a little bigger and musclier, his eyes got redder, and he started letting off steam. This was a move that Kentaro rarely used because it traded off an increase in his abilities for his rationale. A berserker move.

Yuuichi seeing this, decided to reciprocate in full and use a move he had only practiced but never used in combat. Putting a majority of his focus on creating the construct, a Buddha with his eyes closed and hands clasped in prayer, appeared around him so bright it blinded spectators and so hot, the ground under it started heating up.

Kentaro seeing the construct and feeling the heat, only smiled even more before roaring and rushing Yuuichi.

Seeing the state Kentaro was in, Yuuichi knew his rationale had gone down which meant more simple and straightforward moves, but Yuuichi knew that his instincts had also been turned up a notch, which also meant the fight wouldn't be easy.

Kentaro reached the construct and delivered a straightforward punch that Yuuichi blocked with the construct's hand. But Yuuichi underestimated Kentaro's strength, and the resulting force was enough to push him off the roof.

Yuuichi then used the construct's arms to grab onto the building, slowing his fall before nearing the ground and dropping down.

Kentaro knew Yuuichi would be pushed off the edge and had run to the edge and jumped off with an elbow drop ready for Yuuichi when he landed.

Yuuichi dodged the incoming elbow drop causing Kentaro to land on the ground with a big burst of dust that he fanned away by clapping the construct's hands. In the crater, as if he had not just hit the ground from a few stories high, Kentaro stood up and rushed Yuuichi.

Yuuichi slammed his hands onto the ground before chains burst out from the ground and surrounded Kentaro, who continued his rush, only slightly slowed down by the chains.

Yuuichi then grabbed the ends of the chains and pulled them, tripping Kentaro and allowing Yuuichi to spin him around, crashing him into buildings before slamming him down into the ground.

Not letting him get up, Yuuichi constructed an Iron Maiden around him, surrounded it with chains, and turned up the heat.

Unfortunately, Yuuichi did not know that Kentaro's berserk form is not a one-and-done power-up, but rather it increases as he gets angrier. And being locked in a tiny and hot space was getting him angrier.

And with that increased anger, he was able to break the construct, roaring like a beast let out of its cage. And before Kentaro could direct his anger at Yuuichi, one of the remaining students thought it would be a good time to third party and decided to attack Kentaro.

It turned out, however, that the student that attacked was one of those who ran and hid, hoping to get first place by using their wit. And their attack on Kentaro was nothing more than a red flag being waved at an angry bull.

Kentaro roared before rushing the student who was paralyzed in fear at the incoming attack from Kentaro but was luckily saved by Yuuichi who blocked the attack with his construct body. By blocking the attack, however, his focus was shaken by the force and the construct was dispelled.

Kentaro saw this and rushed Yuuichi, lifting both arms up to slam them down on him, clouded by anger and unrealizing that it might seriously harm Yuuichi. But Yuuichi was not one to give up so easily and remembered that Red Onis are usually linked to fire while Blue Onis are linked to ice. Since Kentaro was a Red Oni, maybe he was weak to cold which meant that Yuuichi would have to use his Lunar Constructs.

Even though he had been keeping it a secret, he realized that this might be the only way for him to stop Kentaro's rampage. And helping a friend is more important than keeping his secret.

So, as Kentaro was about to slam his arms down on Yuuichi, Yuuichi quickly constructed a Lunar Dragon's Head that used an icy dragon's breath to both cool him down and stop his attack before the dragon bit Kentaro and flew upwards before turning back around and slamming him into the ground.

And realizing that the only way to snap him out of his berserk mode was for him to wake himself up or knock him out, Yuuichi decided to do just that. Creating a Giant Lunar Palm, he slammed it on Kentaro before encasing him in a solid cube and lowering the temperature of the construct.

Kentaro struggled in the cube but it seemed that Yuuichi's hypothesis was correct, Kentaro was weak to cold. A few moments in the cube weakened his rage before he returned to normal and promptly passed out.

Breathing a slight sigh of relief, Yuuichi dispelled the construct before turning around and chaining up the student who tried to sneak attack Kentaro. He tried to escape but was panicking and was unable to do so, so he gave up.

With that admittance of defeat, it was announced that the final event was over, much to Yuuichi's surprise.

As to why it was over even though there were supposed to be two remaining students, neither of which was Kunio unfortunately, it turned out they knocked each other out simultaneously sometime during Yuuichi's fight.

And with the end of the final event came a loud cacophony of cheers for the winner.

Hearing the cheers didn't do much for Yuuichi, but looking at where his family was and seeing his sister look so happy for him, did more than enough.

~

After a short intermission where the stadium was cleaned up and all the students were healed by Recovery Girl, the award ceremony started.

In first place was Yuuichi, in second was Kentaro, and in third was a student from 2-A. 

As to why the student who hid and ran didn't get third place it's because there was more to the event than just being one of the last people standing. How many students you knocked out, how you did it, and how long you lasted were all part of the criteria.

One thing that stood out to Yuuichi was that when Kentaro was getting his medal, not everyone cheered. In fact, some of them looked scared of him. Thankfully, Kentaro was not one to care about such things and only looked bitter that he lost to Yuuichi.

After the awards ceremony, the Sports Festival was over.

~

In an office somewhere in Japan.

"The higher-ups want you to mentor someone and possibly lay the groundwork for them being your successor." said a man sitting on his chair, face hidden by the shadows.

"No." said the figure standing in front of his desk.

"That's an order."

"Fine." said the standing figure through gritted teeth.

"Check out the U.A. Sports Festival for any prospects. Their internship should be coming up and it'll be a good excuse to make contact. Dismissed." he said waving the figure off before going back to reading the newspaper.

"Asshole." mumbled the figure, as she left the office.

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AN

Gasp! Who could that be?!

I'm sure some of you can guess just by what I wrote. A weak way to incorporate her but it's to the point.

Also, let me know what you thought of the fight. Still not entirely confident with writing action sequences but I think I've gotten much better.

Also decided to just narrate/summarize the sports festival because it's been done so many times it's kinda boring now. But it is a setup for what comes next so I had to do it. And I made it extra long as a makeup for the missed chapters.

I do want to say though that I won't be doing his high school years extremely detailed. I'll just jump to important parts of it like the Sports Festival, Internship, Hero Study, etc.

And for Kentaro's parents imagine Nakiri Ayame as his mom and Sig Curtis from Fullmetal as his dad.

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