Chapter 7

The two students stepped down from the stands to the arena while the others laid back to watch. Though the evaluations were going to be made for each of them, it was still a good idea to observe and learn from their classmates. They may see them every day and have become close friends, but there was still the chance of them actually fighting one another head on in the tournament. They were in class C after all, so the odds were going to be in the favor of those who made it to the combat phase, just like right now. The battles from here on out, Yuto and Akane were sure that they were going to be interesting.

"If both sides are ready…" Midnight paused, glancing over to them both for assurance.

After giving her a nod, they both took their places.

"Begin!"

With no time wasted, Kento widened his stance to prepare, activating his quirk, and took in a deep lungful of air. At the same time, Emiri crouched down to brace herself for his coming attack. When his chest could inflate no more, he belched out a giant ball of fire that swiftly bolted down her path. Quickly, at the last second, she jumped out of its way, but he only followed it with another blow, and then another and another. She forced herself to jump all over the place to try and dodge them, but after a while, it was beginning to take a lot of much needed energy. Sadly, it became too difficult for her to be able to get close enough to land a hit on him. Kento's quirk was good on the offense, but he mostly used it to keep his opponents at a distance, and that's exactly what he was trying to do. No doubt that this strategy was to either force her to use up all her energy and give up, or to drive her out of the ring. From the outside looking in, it certainly looked like she was cornered, but Emiri was smart. Everyone has a limit to their quirk, including Kento, and she hadn't even begun to use hers. She wasn't out yet.

One fireball after another went, crunching the cement floor as it landed, and making the area really heavy with smoke. Emiri jumped out of the way and then right back to where he hit to allow her body to be consumed in the temporary smog. Thankfully, this would buy her some time. Just ten seconds was all she needed.

Kento wiped the sweat off his brow with his arm as he took a moment to catch his breath. It seemed like a reasonable time to do so now that he made her do all that work dodging; plus, he wasn't able to see her, and that wouldn't be smart to strike where she wasn't going to be. Knots began to form painfully in his chest and the back of his throat was stinging as if he had drunk a gallon of hot sauce. It was almost guaranteed that he was going to have to deal with a terrible case of acid-reflux for the next few days due to this. If he hadn't exerted so much in the maze runner before, it probably wouldn't be so bad. He had to finish this match soon. The one on one battle phase was supposed to be the final event for the tournament, but knowing his teacher Midnight, there was a possibility that there was something else planned. Who knows what kind of challenges were to come next?

The smoke dissipated into the air, revealing the surprising sight of Emiri lying on the ground. Her body was still, leaving Kento a bit panicked. Had he gone too far? Instinctively, he rushed over and knelt down beside her. There were some tears in her hero costume and a few scrapes on her skin, but nothing appeared to be really major, which gave him some relief. Maybe she just passed out. Either way, she didn't look fit enough to continue fighting. She was still his classmate, so the very least he could do was take her to the infirmary.

He went to reach down to pick her up when suddenly, a hand caught his arm. Her piercing blue eyes opened, boring right into his soul as she forced her quirk to seep into his skin and overtake his body. Kento aggressively tried to fight against her to save himself, but he had exerted too much physical strength. He couldn't believe that he fell for such a dumb trick, and right before Midnight was about to call the fight too.

It didn't take long for her power to clasp ahold of his human skeleton. At that point, his body was like a living doll, completely unable to move until she made him do so. With a cocky smirk, she stood up with him following suit. Still holding onto him, she walked. Everyone besides their class was in awe as she confidently led his body to the line outside the arena. The rules were the same for everyone in the battle round of the tournament, and because the fight was not officially called to an end, Emiri still had a chance to win. Keeping her hand directly on his skin, she moved it up his arm to his back and pushed him hard. Kento's body was released from her quirk, but it was too late. The buzzer went off when he stepped over the line.

"Kento Arima is out of bounds! The winner of this battle is Emiri Yamada!"

Many students cheered for her as they made their way back to the stands. Cementoss took a few minutes and re-solidified and smoothed out the arena.

"Next battle is Eita Yashi versus Mariko Nakamura."

The two classmates stood from their seats to head down as the other two came back. Akane felt a twinge of panic once those names were called. The top six were the only ones to fight today and now four people had gone down, which meant that her opponent would be… Yuto turned to face her, his eyes reading the same stunned emotion. They knew the time would come for them to fight, but neither one of them expected that it would be this soon. It was a bit uneasy knowing that she would have to potentially hurt her close friend. He could sense her skepticism and showed her a soft smile to assure her that everything was still going to be okay between them.

"Looks like we'll have to face each other. We're still friends, but I don't want you to hold out on me, okay? Come at me with all you've got… Besides, I want to earn back the title of First Place."

Her complexion softened into a friendly smile to hear those reassuring words. Yuto had never given her a reason to distrust them, so she was content to know that everything would work out in the end.

They both turned their attention back to the match. Mariko and Eita took their place on the opposite sides of the field. Same as before, Midnight asked if they were ready. Once they gave her the signal, the air horn went off, allowing the fight to begin.

Mariko took the first move by swinging both her arms up into the air. As soon as she did that, the air intensified into a large gust of unrelenting force right in the direction of Eita. His unusual inhuman-like appearance was his quirk, Dermal Armor, which allowed his dense outside skin to shield him from any and all attacks. He encased himself into a protective dome as his ultimate defense, like an armadillo tucking in its body. Mariko's forcefulness left him pinned to the ground. Same as Emiri, he was trapped, that is, unless Mariko left him some kind of opening to move closer.

Those who were watching were able to see Mariko's attack pattern pretty easily. There was a small three second window between each force. She would start with one hand each, then return using both to maximize the blow. Eita's armor was tough though, and his body was physically stacked with muscle. It would take much more than that to get him to move out of bounds. For now, he was going to let her run out her energy, which wasn't a bad strategy, but from a hero's perspective, it wasn't really saying much about his combat skills. That might be something he would have to work on in the group later.

With little to no results of her blasts, Mariko sprinted over towards him. She continued to wave her force blasts to keep him grounded in one spot until she was able to be merely a few inches away from his body. Planting both hands on the rough exterior skin, she concentrated the rest of her energy into the palms of her hands. She could only use this once, her official trump card, and with the limited amount she had right now, she had to make it count. At this close range, her ultimate force move was sure to push him completely out of the ring.

The moment the air began to whirl around her fingers to his armor, her body was instantly shoved back. Mariko fell hard, but quickly collected herself before her body went over the line. Eita was pretty strong, she knew, but she didn't realize how far he had actually sent her just from one punch. It was completely unexpected of him. Now that his body wasn't retracted, his front was exposed. She took advantage of this opportunity to blast him again, but unfortunately, the extended range between them made the offense fall short. She was almost out of juice. It wasn't looking good.

Eita stomped his large dense feet slowly over towards her, taking his time to not over exert himself. Force after force, she tried to keep him away or at least get him to stop to buy her some time to think of another plan. Sadly, he wasn't going to give her the satisfaction.

When he was finally standing directly under her, he waited for her to do one more blast. She waved both hands, but to their surprise, there was only a faint sigh of wind. She overdid her quirk. Exhaustedly, she huffed her chest to catch her breath and wiped the sweat off her face. Eita sympathized with her, giving her credit for giving it her all, but this match was called before it started. He knew she couldn't win. Before she could try landing a regular punch on him, he pulled her arm forward and using her weight managed to get her face down to the ground. He held her arms behind her back to keep her immobilized, not that it was really necessary. There was nothing else she could do now. Midnight approached them.

"Mariko Nakamura has been defeated. The winner of this match is Eita Yashi!"

Eita helped Mariko up and allowed her to lean on him as they made their way back to the stands. Akane and Yuto took one more glance at each other, their faces both asking the same question – are you ready? Not that they had much of a choice. There wasn't any need to fix the arena, which gave the clearance to move on.

"Our next battle is Yuto Hatsumodo versus Akane Hattori."

Her stomach flipped once her name was called. This was it. This wasn't the first time that she had to fight in front of other people, but she was a bit nervous, feeling everyone's eyes watching her as she stood up with Yuto. Just knowing that they were going to evaluate her quirk and skills with open judgment was a little unnerving. Sure, that was all a part of a hero's job, but somehow, she didn't want to disappoint them or look bad. It was always different when it came to being judged by your peers. They walked down the stairs out into the open area. Yuto took his place on the left and Akane went to stand on the right. She took a deep breath to calm herself because whether she liked it or not, they had to fight and she was determined to win.

Yuto gave her a friendly smile. "No hard feelings, Akane, but I can't go easy on you. I'm leaving with that title."

Her lips curled a smile as she let out a faint chuckle. She admired his confidence, but he shouldn't count his chickens before they hatched. They'll let the match decide who deserves to be first place. Midnight stepped forward.

"Ready?"

Nod.

"Begin!"

Akane immediately activated her quirk, this time by choosing to bulk up her entire body. Her costume began to tighten snuggly around her building frame as her skin turned bright red. The color drained from her hair, turning it almost jet black and her height went up an additional three feet. Now, she was ready. Yuto allowed her some time to step more towards the middle to give her a chance before he decided to send her falling out of the ring. Once she was close enough for him, he teleported his body right in front of her and landed a powerful hard punch to her torso. It caught her a bit by surprise at how quick it was, but the impact wasn't enough to actually hurt her thanks to her strong core. Yuto's ability allowed him to teleport from one location to another by phasing his body through the air, but he was only limited to jump up to a hundred foot radius. However, that didn't matter since he couldn't leave the arena now.

He moved around her blind spot to land a few more blows near the back of her head and joint areas, hoping that one of them would at least weaken her. Since they were close, they each knew in depth about each other's power. Yuto was pretty aware that he didn't possess the strength to harm her, but if he could force her to exert her power by withstanding all of his small blows to try and catch him, he might have a good chance at winning. Akane, even though she didn't talk much, she was a truly exceptional observer when she really focused. One hit after another, he punched as hard and as fast as he could. His attacks were so quick that before she could raise an arm to stop him, he had already teleported away from her. This was going to be an annoyingly long battle for sure. All eyes were in amazement watching them, especially class 1-A.

"I've never seen anyone move like that." Commented Kaminari from his seat in the stands.

"This is just like watching professional boxing matches. This is the most common pairing of them all, the big and strong versus the small and quick. Even those matches tie often, so I wonder which one will win." Added Sato.

"I don't know about Hatsumodo, but my money is on Hattori because she has an incredibly built, athletic bod!" said Mineta.

"You should've seen her in the gym. She could lift some serious weight. I'm stoked to see just how strong she really is." Kirishima added, which only struck an unwanted nerve in Bakugo's body. Of course they would pine after the mysterious girl… She wasn't that strong!

Midoriya paused from his writing to carefully watch what she was going to do. With Hatsumodo hitting her from all sides, how was she going to be able to get away or fight back? From the looks of it, none of his hits seemed to be affecting her, but he couldn't seem to find anything that would indicate her coming up with a plan. The other two fights beforehand had most of the opponents trying to force them to run out their quirks, taking all the blows and saving them for one good retaliation move. However, in this situation, his movements are so swift that it might be impossible for her to try and do the same. It seemed that Yuto had the upper hand right now.

Out of nowhere, something she did caught his eye. Through the blurriness of his movements around her, she remained grounded in her one spot, totally still except for her hand. She was tapping her fingers on her thigh. Deku's brow furrowed as to why that was when he noticed it was moving rhythmically. He immediately went back to focus on him and was able to understand what she was doing. Hatsumodo was teleporting his body in a specific pattern, moving front to back with only two hits, then diagonally across with three hits. She was timing him. In a situation like this, where you can't evade, it's important to plan ahead of what your enemy will do next and use it to your advantage. Akane's hands curled into a fist. Now she was going to do it!

Right when he was about to move diagonally to her blind spot, she turned around and caught him by the arm. With little to no effort at all, she yanked him over her head and threw his body hard on the ground. Over and over, she tossed him around like a rag doll. Yuto tried to teleport out of her clutches, but his body smacked the pavement so hard and so fast that he could feel that some of his bones had broken up, leaving him completely limp and useless. Akane ceased her actions when the room fell quiet. Looking down, she saw that his arm had completely popped out of the socket and he was in a bloody tattered mess. She almost dropped him, setting him down as she deactivated her quirk. He looked so terrible that she could feel her heart drop to the floor. Midnight immediately ran over to them.

"Yuto, are you alright?" she asked, placing a hand on his head.

He coughed out a small stream of blood, which caused her to instantly freak out. He did not look good at all. Shit! It happened again! Why the hell did he have to attack from behind?!

"I-I'm fine…" Yuto said rather hoarsely. She completely knocked the air out of his lungs and it was actually painful to breathe. Turning his head, he glanced over to see her wide-eyed, horrified face. He knew exactly what she was thinking. "Hey, hey, don't be like that… I told you to go all out on me, didn't I?"

Right then, she could feel her face fighting back the tears forming in her eyes. All she could do was shake her head no to him. How could he say that in that condition? He may have given her permission, but it was stupid for her to even try. It was still too much, just like before, just like it's always been with her. If only he could see how he looked right now. Yuto frowned at her. She shouldn't blame herself for this. To show her that he meant it, he forced a soft smile. Unfortunately, she could not bear to see it.

"Let's get you to Recovery Girl." Midnight waved over to Cementoss and Thirteen to give her a hand. They brought over a gurney and together they carried him out of the arena, leaving the two of them behind.

Akane did not want to see her classmates staring down at her, so she avoided it by dropping her head to the ground. Midnight gave a light pat on the top of her head in comfort.

"It's alright, Akane. He'll be okay."

Although she was trying to be a good teacher, she didn't want to hear those lies. She didn't deserve to be in first place.

Midnight took the mic and spoke. "The winner is Akane Hattori!"

It was excruciating to hear it out loud, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back. Without thinking, Akane walked as fast as she could towards the exit. There was no way that she was going to go back to join the others, not after that. It didn't matter that the classmates had cheered for her victory, nor did it matter that the teachers tried to call her back. The only thing that mattered was getting away.

She disappeared through the door and bolted down a dark hallway until she found what she determined to be a quiet, safe room. Closing the door behind her, she slouched against the wall and held her knees to her chest. Her evaluation was sure to be shot now, especially after leaving like that. How the hell was she supposed to be a hero when she couldn't do one match without nearly killing someone? She hated that most about herself. All her life she vowed never to be like her real dad, but by having this difficult quirk, it was becoming clear that she might never be able to control it. She was just as destructive and brutal as her old man. If that was the case, what was the point of her even staying at U.A.?

Back in the bleachers, the students eventually took notice of her absence, which spiked the opportunity for some juicy conversation. Some of the comments were about how they should evaluate the fight, but most of it was about Hattori and why she didn't come back. They all waited to hear Midnight proceed with the next event, but she decided to conclude it. There wasn't much time left for the class anyways. Aizawa and Professor Kan took the liberty of collecting all the evaluations from the students before getting them ready to head out. Before leaving, Midnight asked to leave her class with Mr. Aizawa to try and find Akane. Classes A and C asked all sorts of questions about what happened and offered to help find her, but she refused. As a teacher, this was her burden.

Midnight walked through the same exit she left from and searched all down the hallway until she finally found her hiding in an old office room. Just seeing her so upset made her heart sink. This wasn't the first time either. She knocked on the door before letting herself in.

"Akane?"

When she got no response, she knelt down beside her. Akane pulled her arms away from her face. There was a faint shimmer from her green eyes, which pulled on her heartstrings just to see them.

"Akane, you should be happy that you've won the match, and the maze runner. You fought well. That's not something you should beat yourself up over… Is it because of Yuto?"

She nodded.

"He didn't seem to mind that you went as far as you did. What you did meant that you respected him as a fighter, that you were acknowledging his power the exact same way he was with you, and that's nothing to be ashamed of. You should always give it your all when it comes to a battle."

The student's complexion continued to read depressed, which was probably normal considering that they've had this talk before, but it was just as bad to see that she still had this problem.

"Your quirk is quite powerful, but that doesn't mean you have to let it consume you. We can still find a way to manage your power. When you become a hero, almost every dangerous situation you're put in will involve someone getting hurt. It could be others or it could be you, and it's not something that we can always prevent. But if you wish to better your control, you need to have more confidence in your ability to use your quirk. Thinking that you're always going to hurt people will no doubt make that become a reality. You need to believe that you are capable of control."

There was a long pause as she stared at her, hoping that her words offered the proper guidance. Akane's look didn't change. Midnight contained a frustrated sigh that she really wanted to let out. It was pretty challenging trying to help someone who barely talked. Regardless, she was still her teacher. As long as it takes, she will sit here until she feels better. That's the least she could do.

"Ms. Kayama, I fear that I am becoming the very thing I never wanted to be… I've failed so many times that I think my quirk can never be fully mastered."

Midnight was a bit surprised to hear what she had to say. So that's how she felt…

"It's not true failure until you give up on yourself. When I first came to U.A., my quirk was just as difficult to control. I would always exert my sleeping gas all at once instead of carefully concentrating its amount, like I do now. I would end up putting the entire class asleep, even the teachers. Do you have any idea how many days of training I had to go through to get where I am today? A lot! Even today, I still learn a new trick or two that helps me later on. What matters is believing that your problem has a solution. This is only your first year, Akane. Give yourself some slack."

Maybe she was right, maybe there was a way to actually resolve this and she just found a thousand ways that didn't work out. Hattori knew that she was only saying this because she was her teacher, but then again, she was a U.A. teacher, a person with credibility to her position and as a hero. It would be pretty damn prideful and also ignorant for her not to listen. They would have to come up with a solution to this eventually, but for now, she felt better enough to get up and get back out there. Akane gave her a reassuring smile and together they got up and left the gym to rejoin the others on campus.