ShuraZero
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Chapter 122: Competition
🕑 Added 2025-10-05 18:11:55 +0000 UTC"Did anyone else see that, or am I hallucinating?"
Kaminari's voice, barely a whisper thick with disbelief, cut through the silence. Dust from the disintegrated earth beast still hung in the air, settling over the forest clearing.
"I saw it, but I still don't get how," Sero replied, his eyes fixed on the figure standing where the monster had been. "He moved… I don't even have a word for it. He was here, and then he was over there, and that thing was just gone."
Izuku brushed the dust from his shoulders, his breathing surprisingly calm.
Kyoka Jiro plugged one of her earphone jacks into a nearby rock. "No vibrations. Whatever he was, he really turned it to dust."
"That was amazing!" Mina Ashido exclaimed, hopping slightly. "Did you see how he ran up that wall? It was like gravity was just a suggestion!"
Iida adjusted his glasses, his expression a mixture of awe and by-the-book disapproval. "While it was an impressive display of skill, it was incredibly reckless. Charging a new enemy alone violates all safety protocols for heroes-in-training!"
"Iida, I think safety protocols went out the window when they told us we have three hours to cross a forest full of earth monsters," Ochako Uraraka retorted, though a smile of pride for Izuku touched her face.
Kirishima clenched his hardened fists. It wasn't from the tension of an impending battle, but from a surge of pure excitement. A wild, toothy grin spread across his face.
"Reckless? That was the manliest thing I've ever seen in my life!" he roared, his voice finally breaking the spell of disbelief that had fallen over the group. "He faced that thing head-on, without a second of hesitation!"
The admiration in Kirishima's voice unleashed the fury Bakugo had been barely containing.
He had watched every second. Every movement. He had seen the way Izuku had launched himself off the ground, a controlled explosion of energy that was a crude, yet painfully effective, imitation of his own combat style. He had seen the inhuman agility, the way he ran through the forest as if the world and its rules didn't apply to him. And he didn't feel a shred of admiration. He felt like he was being spat on.
That damn nerd… The heat rose up his neck, a familiar burn that preceded an explosion. His palms began to sweat, crackling with small, contained detonations. He dares to show off? Right in front of me? Does he think a few circus tricks put him on my level? That he can surpass me?
The idea. The simple, venomous idea that Deku, the useless pebble he had always kicked aside, had not only outsmarted him during the sports festival but might now be surpassing him in sheer combat power, was an affront his pride couldn't bear.
He spun sharply toward Kirishima, his red eyes blazing with renewed fury.
"Manly?" he spat the word with absolute contempt. His voice was a low growl. "You call that manly? That was nothing. It was a cheap trick to impress idiots."
Kirishima blinked, taken aback by the intensity of his reaction. "Hey, Bakugo, I was just saying it was cool…"
"Shut up!" Bakugo cut him off. "Now you're all gonna see what real power is. I'll teach you the difference between that and a nuclear bomb."
And without another word, he exploded. It was a pure, furious detonation. A declaration of war against the forest, against the beasts, and above all, against the shadow of Izuku that loomed over him. He shot into the darkness of the trees, leaving a trail of smoke and fury.
"Get out of my way, you damn extras!" his shout echoed through the trees, an echo of defiance and frustration. "I'll clear this whole damn forest myself!"
Todoroki had watched it all with an icy calm that contrasted sharply with Bakugo's rage. His mind had analyzed Izuku's movements, recognizing fragments of different fighting styles integrated into a fluid, lethal form.
Then he saw Bakugo's reaction. A nearly inaudible scoff of disdain escaped his lips.
Predictable.
He wasn't going to be left behind. He wasn't going to let Bakugo, in his fit of rage, take all the glory. He wasn't going to be overshadowed again, not by his explosive rival nor by the green-haired boy who was proving to be a much greater challenge than he had ever anticipated.
Without a word, Todoroki touched the ground with his fingertips. A ramp of smooth, elegant ice formed before him, creating a frozen path that led into the thicket.
"Todoroki, you too?" asked Mezo Shoji, one of his duplicated hands forming a mouth.
"I'm not letting that loud idiot think he's won anything," Todoroki answered coldly, not even glancing at him. "This is a training exercise. And I'm going to be the first to finish it."
With a grace that was the absolute opposite of Bakugo's fury, he slid forward, chasing the trail of explosions and shouts.
The competition had begun. The energy was electric, contagious. Seeing the two prodigies of the class launch themselves into battle that way sent a collective jolt through the rest of the students. The fear they had felt moments before evaporated, replaced by a fierce and unexpected spirit of competition.
"Hey, wait a minute!" Kirishima yelled, the confusion on his face replaced by a shark-like grin. "Don't have all the fun yourselves!" With his Quirk already activated, his skin turning as hard as rock, he charged after Bakugo, his laughter echoing in the clearing.
"If this is a race, I'm not planning on losing!" Mina exclaimed, leaving a trail of acid at her feet to slide at top speed.
"This is highly irregular!" Iida shouted, his engines roaring as he shot forward, though he tried to maintain some semblance of order in his run.
In a matter of seconds, the clearing was nearly empty. Class 1-A had transformed into a stampede of heroes-in-training, each one eager to prove their worth.
Only Izuku's team remained in the clearing, along with an Inko who watched the chaotic retreat.
Ochako turned to Izuku, her large brown eyes shining with excitement and a suppressed laugh. "Wow… Izuku-kun, you really fired them up. I think you hurt Bakugo's pride."
"That wasn't my intention," Izuku said, though a small smile pulled at the corner of his lips. "I just wanted to get rid of the first obstacle quickly so we could organize."
"Well, your idea of 'organization' seems to have motivated them in a different way," Toru said, her voice bubbling with enthusiasm. "It looks like a race now! We can't let them have all the fun and credit! We have to show them what real teamwork can do!"
Momo nodded, a calm, calculating smile on her face. She adjusted her ponytail, her mind already working at full speed. "Their approach is inefficient. They're wasting energy by competing individually. They'll run headfirst into every obstacle, but it will be effective in terms of speed, at least at first."
"Exactly," Izuku said, his smile becoming more genuine. "This is better. Heroes don't wait for orders; they take the initiative."
"Izuku, please, be very careful," his mother said, her voice trembling slightly as she gripped his arm. "I know you're strong, but…"
Izuku placed a hand over hers, his gaze firm and reassuring. "I will be, Mom. But I can't stand still." He turned to his team, his expression hardening with determination. "Ready? We're not going to compete in their race. We're going to win ours. We're going to show them how it's done."
The Magical Beast Forest, designed to be a test of endurance and survival, became a chaotic and glorious battlefield. The guttural roars of the earth creatures mixed with the battle cries of a group of overly competitive teenagers.
"DIE, YOU DAMN PILE OF ROCKS!"
Bakugo was an unstoppable force of nature. Every beast that crossed his path was met with a point-blank explosion that blew it into a thousand pieces of dirt and clay. The air around him crackled with heat and a fury that had no intention of subsiding.
A few yards away from him, Todoroki's style was pure destructive efficiency. He didn't waste a single movement. He froze beasts in place with massive waves of ice, creating grotesque, motionless figures of earth and frost. Or he melted them with precise bursts of fire, using his left side with an ease he hadn't possessed before.
He and Bakugo weren't competing as a team. They were two rival forces running in parallel, each trying to outperform the other in an overwhelming display of power.
"I've got twelve!" Bakugo yelled, launching an explosion that pulverized the head of a golem emerging from the ground.
"I've immobilized fifteen," Todoroki replied with cutting coolness, without even looking at him, as a wall of ice rose and trapped three beasts at once. "Quality is better than quantity, Bakugo."
"SHUT UP, HALF-AND-HALF!"
Meanwhile, in another part of the forest, an unlikely alliance had formed. Kirishima, while charging headfirst into a beast, nearly collided with another human battering ram.
"Hey, watch where you're going, man!" yelled Tetsutetsu Tetsutetsu from Class 1-B, his skin already turned to shining steel.
Kirishima grinned. "Tetsutetsu! They left you behind too? Awesome! How about a little friendly competition?"
"There's nothing friendly about this, Class A! I'll show you what real steel is made of!"
"That's what I wanted to hear! Manly Steel Clash!" Kirishima shouted, and they both charged side-by-side, their hardened bodies smashing the beasts apart like a pair of human wrecking balls, arguing loudly over who had hit harder.
While the vanguard of the two classes pushed forward with a combination of brute force and wounded pride, Izuku's team moved with a tactical intelligence that was, in its own way, even more devastating.
"Ochako, that big log to your left, now!" Izuku ordered as they ran through the trees, his eyes constantly scanning the environment.
"Got it!" Ochako ran to the enormous trunk of a fallen tree, her fingers brushing against the rough wood. Instantly, it became light. With a cry of effort, she lifted it and used it as a makeshift battering ram, sweeping away a group of three earth beasts trying to ambush them from the flank.
"Good work! Keep moving!" Izuku said. "Toru, I need a report on the next clearing! Go high!"
"Aye, aye, captain!" Toru's voice came from the treetops. A moment later, her voice sounded through the small communicators Momo had made for them. "Bingo! Five beasts ahead! Two of them are bigger than the others! Looks like they're guarding some kind of nest made of rocks."
"A nest… interesting," Izuku muttered, processing the information. "That means they'll be more aggressive and territorial. We can't afford a long fight. Momo, get ready. We're going to need a shortcut. And something to distract them."
They reached the edge of the clearing. The five beasts saw them immediately and roared in unison, making the ground tremble.
"Okay, we're not fighting all of them," Izuku said quietly, crouched behind a bush. "We're going over them. Momo, ready?"
"Ready," she replied, and a professional-looking grappling hook launcher began to emerge from her arm. She passed it to Izuku. At the same time, she created several small metal spheres. "Sound bombs. I'll throw them to the right, and hopefully they'll look that way for a couple of seconds."
"Perfect," Izuku said. "As soon as you throw them, I fire."
Momo threw the spheres, which landed on the other side of the clearing with a sharp sonic screech. The beasts' heads turned in unison toward the noise. In that instant, Izuku stood up, aimed at a high, sturdy branch on the other end, and fired. The hook bit hard into the wood.
"Ochako, the rope, now! Inko-san, hold on tight to me!" he ordered.
Ochako touched the taut rope, nullifying its weight. Izuku swung across the clearing, securing his mother with one arm, while the girls followed closely behind. Ochako propelled herself with her zero gravity, Momo used a pole she created at the last second, and Toru simply leaped from branch to branch. They landed on the other side just as the beasts realized the deception, roaring in frustration below them.
At the finish line, next to the lodge, the Wild, Wild Pussycats watched the forest with a growing sense of disbelief. They had expected the students to arrive one by one or in small groups, tired and bruised, within the three-hour time limit.
"Hey, Mandalay…" said Pixie-Bob, her eyes fixed on the distant column of smoke and the strange icy mist rising from the forest. "Are you sure the instructions for the earth beasts didn't say 'apocalypse level'? Because I think I made too many."
"Too many?" Mandalay replied, crossing her arms. "It looks like they're having a fireworks festival in there. And I hear yelling. Way too many battle cries for them to be victims."
The first clear sound they heard was a deafening explosion, followed by a furious scream.
"I BEAT YOU, YOU DAMN HALF-AND-HALF BASTARD!"
Katsuki Bakugo shot out from the trees like a human cannonball, landing at the finish line in a skid that kicked up dirt. A second later, Shoto Todoroki slid to a stop beside him on a sheet of ice that evaporated instantly. They arrived in a dead heat, and they both hated it.
"We arrived at the same time, idiot. It's a tie," Todoroki said, his voice devoid of emotion but carrying a competitive edge.
"A tie means I didn't win, which is the same as losing!" Bakugo shot back, turning to face him, small sparks popping from his palms.
Before they could start a fight, the rest of the class began to arrive in a chaotic, euphoric wave. Kirishima and Tetsutetsu arrived arguing loudly about who had smashed more rocks. Mina and Sero slid in, laughing their heads off. Iida arrived running at a perfect pace, though with an expression of exhaustion from having tried, and failed, to maintain order.
The last group to arrive was Izuku's. They didn't seem as exhausted as the others, though their clothes were covered in dust and leaves. They landed with a calm and cohesion that contrasted with the boundless energy of the rest.
The Pussycats looked at them all, at the forty students who were panting, laughing, and arguing in the clearing.
"They were supposed to arrive in three hours…" Mandalay muttered, looking at her stopwatch. "They did it in fifty-one minutes."
She turned to the class, recovering her composure with a clearing of her throat.
"I don't know whether to be impressed or horrified," she declared loudly, though a small smile played on her lips. "I guess a little of both."
The clearing filled with laughter and sighs of relief. The first test was over. Kirishima walked over to Izuku and clapped him on the back so hard it nearly knocked him over.
"Midoriya, that was incredible!" he said with a huge, toothy grin. "You really lit a fire under all of us! After what you did to that first beast, nobody wanted to be left behind! It was like you challenged all of us!"
Bakugo, who was nearby, heard the comment and let out a "Tch" of pure disdain before walking away to get his luggage.
Izuku looked at his classmates. Bakugo and Todoroki were still glaring at each other, but there was a new level of grudging respect in their eyes. Ochako and Toru were celebrating with Mina. Momo was speaking quietly with Iida, probably explaining why her strategy had been superior.
