Last Day

“-Chinese progressive and political activist Zhong Tian was discovered missing this morning from his home in the countryside. At the scene was a gruesome sight, with the security detail that was hired to protect the man having been brutally gunned down by still unknown attackers. At this time no group has claimed responsibility for the attack or the disappearance of Zhong Tian, but the Chinese government has blamed the attack on extremists in western China. In response several divisions of PLA soldiers were deployed to the west in order to quell any further attempts at terror attacks or separatism. Not everyone around the world is convinced by this story and once more believe that there was foul play on the part of the Chinese government. It is no coincidence that this took place mere weeks after the beginning of peaceful protests organized by Zhong Tian done in hopes of opening up the country to liberalization, hoping to gain further freedoms such as freedom of speech and the right to assembly. But with no clear evidence to pin blame on the Chinese government there is very little that the international community can do for the Chinese people besides standard in solidarity with their movements. In other news a hostage crisis was just resolved by the young Hero Hawks, aiming to earn his place as Japan’s new number one Hero. Nearly fifty people were being held hostage by a group of masked Villains, locking down the mall looting the various stores that were inside. But by swooping in from a skylight and quickly taking down their leader, Hawks was able to force them to stand down and surrender to police. However, even with this success, some people across Japan have begun questioning whether or not more crimes of this magnitude are occurring because of All Night’s retirement. And on the topic of Heroes, the recently arrived man from the future, now known by the Hero name ‘Spartan,’ made his true debut just last night in a raid on a gang controlled drug warehouse. Police had suspected that the location was being used to store large quantities of illegal substances and acquired a warrant to act, but the Hero seemed to be two steps ahead and charged in to fight the criminals by himself. Nearly one hundred and fourteen million Yen worth of opiates and cocaine was seized by law enforcement following their arrival to the scene, alongside the arrest of two dozen low level criminals subdued by the Hero. It is unsure whether or not this was actually the first crime stopped by Spartan, as there were a number of incidents involving Villains and criminals being stopped by a Hero who left just as quickly as they came. Whatever the case, this reporter hopes they keep up the good work.”

“Knew I should have left that place sooner…”

Aurdel was about to shut off the TV and leave the room when the reporter began to speak again, after looking off camera for a moment. “Ahh… Hmm… It’s just coming in that a robbery was halted in the downtown part of Hoshu. A group of small-time Villains known by as the 'Reservoir Dogs’ attacked a grocery store, stealing the cash register and even injuring the Hero that was pursuing them. However under odd circumstances it seems that they were stopped in their tracks as they tried to get away, with their escape vehicle being destroyed. When Police arrived on the scene to arrest the group, they found no evidence of injuries, the stolen money or any kind of physical proof they were the ones to attack the store, alongside no recordings of the event and very few witnesses willing to come forward. Though the group was arrested, it is suspected that they will be released-“ Aurdel then shut it off, pondering what he’s just heard. How could a group of criminals get away from a robbery with absolutely no injuries? Even more strange was the fact that there was no physical evidence of their participation, it all having completely disappeared. It just didn’t make any sense to him.

It was even more unbelievable given the fact that it was a group that had robbed the store, not a single person. From what he’d seen statistically the majority of the crimes committed were done by people acting alone, often doing so on a whim rather than panning it out. But now here there were four people with a premeditated plan to rob a store, incapacitate a Hero and get away in a previously planted escape vehicle. To him that was evidence enough that there was something greater at play here. Why put all that effort into robbing a grocery Could they have been hired by someone to do it in order to intimidate the owners? Or had they just done it in order to try to show off to other gangs? With not enough information he had no solid answers. It made him want to go down to the crime scene himself to investigate and interrogate the criminals, but he simply didn’t have the time. Right now he had other things that needed to be done, and by leaving now he would be jeopardizing his ability to teach his class. Ultimately he decided that this would just have to be left up to law enforcement as he focused on training his students.

Speaking of which, training was going extremely well. It was the seventh and last day in the period of remedial classes, and each student saw remarkable progress even in such a short time. One of the signs of his success in their training was a general decrease in body fat and increase in muscle mass for almost all of the students, meaning they had literally become physically stronger. For the ones that would have trouble going toe to toe with an opponent in close combat before it was a real boon, as now they had more real weight to put behind any attacks. They’d also seen an increase in their lung capacity from the repeated long stretches of running, meaning that if they were in a fight it would be a while longer before any of them had to stop and catch their breath. All in all the training was a success, and there was really only one way to test how much they’d really improved. But that would have to wait until later, he had something else he needed to do.

Aurdel slid on his helmet and stepped out of his dorm room, locking the door behind him as he walked out. Only a few of the more lively students were up this early in the day, meaning that there really was no one awake to bother him. At a walking pace, It took him only about five minutes to get from the dorms to the main building. “Hatsume, shouldn’t you be still getting some sleep like everyone else?”

The pink haired girl turned around, covered in dirt, grime and grease, “I was pulling an all nighter, but I’m still going strong!”

“How’d you even get into the workshop? Powerloader locks the door before he leaves after he’s done with classes for the day. And how weren’t you caught working?”

“Well to answer that first question, I built this baby to break in!” She raised a device from a table that sat off to the side.

“It feels like it’d explode just from looking at it, are you sure that thing is safe?”

“Probably not, but it works!” She carelessly tossed it off to the side and he half expected to see an explosion the moment it landed. “And as for your second question, I set up sound proofing on the inside and outside of the room. That way the sounds of my tools won’t be heard across the building.”

“And the explosions?”

“There weren’t any last night, so nothing to really worry about. But speaking of, I made some improvements to my baby!” She slapped the back of the powered suit that she’d designed. “While I couldn’t do exactly what you said, I decided to take some of your advice and reduced some of the armor to decrease the overall weight. Now, most of the armor is in places it is most likely to hit with or be hit against. I also adjusted the frame so it could properly adjust to the new weight of the suit, that means that now the suit has a better range of motion, and is even able to move at higher speeds.”

“Have you made any changes to the equipment or tools?” Aurdel observed as Hatsume picked up a remote, signaling for the suit of armor to demonstrate its new movement capabilities.

“Sure did. I stopped working on making the omni tool for now and put together a few things to make combat a little bit easier. First, the power fist!” She dragged a slab of concrete out the armor, “By overcharging the servos and motors with the built in battery, this suit can punch up to three times its normal strength!” She pushed a button and the suit went into a combat stance. Then, after having a moment to wind up, it let loose a powerful punch. The hole it left in the concrete slab was roughly a foot wide, punching through just about just as thick of a slab.

“Not bad, sometimes you need that extra bit of force to put someone down..”

“That’s not all though, I also designed and added a built-in taser to the suit. That way when you get close, you can just zap them!”

He took a closer look at the suit and it’s mechanisms, “You didn’t put in a way to adjust the power of the taser…”

“I’m sure that if you need to bring out a suit like this, the big bad Villains can take it. “

“Being able to take a punch is going thing, but pulling your punches is another matter entirely. Especially since this looks like it’s discharging a full car battery in a matter of seconds.” He pulled the taser gauntlet off of the armor and set it off to the side, not wanting misfire that results in everyone in a several meter radius being shocked to death. “Anything else?”

“Well, I also built a pneumatic cannon into one of the arms, that way it can non lethally take down targets from a distance.” She pressed a button and one of the suit’s arms raised, then loaded in a beanbag round. After stepping back she had it turn and face the opposite wall, before slamming one of the buttons. “Fire!” The cannon fired with such force that the entire room shook, launching the beanbag at what looked like mach speed. He then watched as it slammed into the wall, went through it, through another wall and another wall until it eventually was out of sight. He was in shock, walking over to the hole and peering through to see just how far it’d gone. “Though, there might be a few minor bugs that I need to work out.”

“A few minor bugs?” He pointed at the wall, “Something tells me that there’s more than just ‘a few minor bugs.’If anyone was hit by that beanbag, they’d be dead,” he pointed back towards the suit, “That’s not to mention that you’ve most likely killed anyone that was in that suit if it’s building up that much pressure, and if that didn’t kill them then the sudden release will. Look, it even destroyed the barrel and turned it into a shrapnel bomb.”

“Just a minor setback, I’ll have to find a way to make it stronger so it won’t blow-“

“The hell you are. You’re making sure that your non-lethal weapon is actually non-lethal, and not one that’s guaranteed to kill whoever it hits.” The door to the room flung open, Powerloader came through.

“Hatsume! What the hell are you doing?!” He left the girl to explain the mess she’d made, and began to clean the room.

“Today is going to be a special day for your training,” Aurdel announced, “Since it’s your last day I want to see the collective accomplishments you’ve made with your personal strength and your quirks.”

“Mr. Aurdel, what will this special test be exactly?” Ida asked, being the first to raise any questions.

“I’m glad that you asked. Instead of the normal class that you take part in, you will be taking part in a battle against one person. Me,” he gestured towards himself to emphasize that last point.

“As class representative I must object. You’re a pro-Hero that’s much more experienced and powerful than any of us. Such a battle would present too large of a risk of injury to the class.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll hold back on you guys. And I won’t be wearing my armor either.”

“Does that mean we’re going to see your face?” Ashido asked, “We already have a bet going around about what you look like, and I’d like to win that bet.”

He narrowed his brows behind his helmet, “Gambling is against school rules, but I’ll let that slide. And no, you won’t be seeing my face. For now that will have to stay a secret. And to make sure that you can’t see my face I’ll be wearing a full face mask.” Most of the girls groaned.

“It’s only reasonable for him to want to keep his physical identity a secret,” Yaoyorozu said, “Heroes essentially have to live double lives, and that doesn’t get any easier if you’re recognized wherever you go.”

“That’s right, I’d like to go to the store to buy something without having to knock the lights out of another reporter.”

“Another?!”

“They’re persistent at their job, I’ll give them that. Regardless, I expect you to put your all into this last training session and beyond. Plus Ultra.”

“What makes you think that you need to hold back against us?” Kirishima said, hardening his arms as if he was giving off an effective display of force.

“A number of reasons, chief among them being that I can quite literally break the bones and kill opponents without too much effort put forward due to my strength. That goes even without my armor. And the last thing I need is either killing or maiming any of you by accident, so I’ll be holding back. Besides it takes more effort on my part to hold back than it does to let loose so it’s some practice for me to.”

“Are you implying that you might mess up on holding back?!” Kaminari said, “You can’t say that after mentioning how easy it would be for you to kill someone!”

“That’s not what I said, I won’t mess up and let you get horribly hurt. If I thought that I was going too far then I would end the battle there, then let you all go back to your dorms.” He folded his arms, “Any other questions?”

“Where will the battle be taking place?”

“Remember the training grounds you used for your first combat exercise? There. We’ve been cleared to use the whole area as necessary. Obviously they would prefer it if we kept damage down to a minimum, but some things can’t be helped.” He relaxed his arms, “You can bring any equipment you want too, just be ready to fight hard.”

“When we fought teachers for the midterms we had to either subdue them or escape the area. Will there be a certain win condition for either side of the battle?”

“Another good question. Essentially, your only option is to subdue me and stop me from fighting. That might mean rendering me unconscious, trapping me or finding some other way that leaves me unable to go on the attack. My objective on the other hand will be to fight you all and take each of you down to a level that I find too beat up to continue. I won’t tell you who’s hurt enough, so you’ll just have to find that out on your own as I’ll be pulling my punches even more so against those people.”

“Hey hold on a minute, isn’t this really unfair for us?” Sero protested, “It’ll be really easy for you to beat us since you know exactly what are super moves and how we use them, how are we supposed to beat you?”

“With planning and tactics. It’s always possible to beat a foe stronger than you by acting in spite of what they have, using their weaknesses. You have a few hours to work together and come up with a plan to beat me, use that time wisely.” He then left the students to wonder to themselves how they were going to beat him, walking away with a few questions in his mind. They’d probably think of something. Probably. At the same time Aurdel pulled his phone out from one of his armor’s hardcases, syncing it up to his helmet to listen to the several unanswered voicemails.

“What are we going to do?” Hagakure asked, “We all know he’s really strong, so how can we beat him?”

“Teacher or not, we’ll just have to blast him to bits!” Bakugo shouted.

“Is that even possible?” Kirishima asked. “We all know how quick he can move, so he’ll most likely be able to avoid our attacks. Even if we can land a hit, I don’t think it will be enough to even scratch him.”

“We could try and overwhelm him,” Midoriya suggested, “We attack at the same time with as much strength as we can muster.”

“Clearly the best solution would be to evade him at the beginning of the fight, then lead him into a trap,” Ida pushed up his glasses.

“We could immobilize him, I can easily do that with my ice,” Todoroki looked down at his arm.

“We can do that, but with my quirk we can stop him by floating him up into the air,” Uraraka suggested.

“What if we put him to sleep?” Yaoyaorozu asked.

“I could use my balls to make sure he can’t move,” Mineta said, rather crudely.

“These are all good ideas…” Midoriya said, “But we need to come up with something that is guaranteed to work. I think we can do that if we put all those ideas together.”

“How do we do that?” Jirou asked.

“Well,” he scratched his chin, “He doesn’t have his armor, that means won’t be able to move around in the air. That means we won’t have to worry about restraining him while he’s in the air, just on the ground. He also won’t be able to take as many hits.””

“Actually, I think I might have an idea,” Ojiro spoke up, “Todoroki, how fast can you melt the ice that you make?”

“Relatively fast, it depends on the size, thickness and the area that it’s in. Why?”

“I was thinking of a way to combine some of our ideas. We could take Ida's idea of running away and leading him into a trap, then use your ice and Mineta’s quirk to trap him. Mineta can cover every surface of a room with the balls from his quirk, then you’ll cover it up with the ice. After that we lead him there, melt the ice and corner him into becoming stuck”

“That’s not a bad idea Ojiro, good work!” Midoriya gave him props for the idea.

“A-Ah, it’s nothing. Just something I came up with.”

“But what if that idea doesn’t work?” Kirishima began to point out, “Mineta can’t cover every inch of a room with his quirk, there will be gaps and surfaces for him to stand on and escape. We need to come up with another way to stop him.”

“What if I shock him?” Kaminari asked, “I’m sure that a shock should at least stun him a bit, I just need a way to guide my electricity.”

“I can produce some high voltage wires for you to use,” Yaoyaorozu said. “We can bury it in the ice as well, so that when the ice melts the wires swing down and surround him like a net.”

“We also need to make sure that if he somehow avoids all that, that we can still approach him in a straight fight.”

“Leave that to us!” Kirishima said. “Me, Shoji, Tokoyami, Sato, Ojiro and Bakugo can hold him back.”

“We’ll still need a plan after that, if he somehow manages to get through all six of you.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?!” Bakugo shouted, threatening him. “Are you calling me weak?!”

“N-nono! That’s not what I was saying! We just need a backup plan.”

“I and Hagakure can ambush him outside if he manages to make it out that far, we’ll be able to hide in plain sight. Ribbit.”

“That could work. Then Uraraka, you’ll have to make him float up. Then when he’s in the air Sero and Yaoyaorozu will have to restrain him. Yaoyaorozu, do you think you can make that same catapult that you made during the midterms?”

“I can, I practiced making it for quite a while.”

“What about moi?” Aoyama said, “You can’t have a plan without me.”

“Aoyama. You, Koda and Ashido can be the ones to lead him into the trap. Just make sure that you move fast so you won’t get caught.”

“What about me?” Jirou said, twirling her earphone jack.

“Jirou, you’ll hit him with your quirk until he’s knocked out in the air. I think that’s the best way to beat him.”

“And with that, it seems we have a solid set of plans behind us,” Ida said, “Mr. Aizawa, what do you think?”

They looked to their teacher, “I can’t say if it will work or not, that has to be your own judgement. And I can’t give you advice on how to beat him either. This fight will be the product of your training. However, I will say it was good for you to think through the various scenarios that might happen. Whether or not you’ll be able to properly respond in the moment is another question I don’t have the answer to.”

“So is that a yes or a no that our plan is good?” Mineta asked, an eyebrow raised.

“You’ll figure that out soon enough. Now if you’re done chit chatting, you should get back to your training. You won’t do well if you haven’t prepared yourself for a fight.”

“You’re right,” Midoriya said, “Let’s get to it then!”

“Plus Ultra!”

Starting Line

Aurdel looked around the training grounds, it was five minutes past the time that the class and the battle was supposed to begin. But nowhere in sight was any of the class. It was quiet, so quiet he could clearly hear his heart rate. It was very unlikely that they’d forgotten about the class, or that they’d made the very simple decision that a fight against him wasn’t winnable and just weren’t going to show. Rather, they had likely spent their time working to set up an ambush inside the city and had come early. There was no rule against doing that, but it was still a cheeky move to rely on. It was also one he didn’t want them to learn to rely on in the future. He turned his head and jumped the moment he heard the faint sound of something rapidly approaching. Mere moments later a laser shot through the position he’d previously been holding. Aoyama. “Mr. Aurdel, we’re over here!” Ashido shouted, “We decided to show up a little early!”

“No problem with that, but you just gave your position away.” With that he jumped into action, literally going into the air as a flock of bird dive bomb attacked him. Less than a second later he was charging after them, not wasting a single movement, he proceeded in large strides down the streets in their direction.

“You’re kidding! I knew he was fast, this is just crazy!.” He chased after them, weaving through streets and alleyways between buildings. Ashido sprayed her acid against the walls the group passed, timing it so that when he came through the rubble would collapse onto him. But he managed to avoid the rubble, not taking a single hit. “One of us is going to have to slow him down, he’s gaining on us too fast!”

“Worry not madam-“

“Thanks Aoyama!” The boy was cut off as Ashido spun him around to face Aurdel, laser pointing right at him. Aurdel jumped to the side as he fired, clutching a piece of exposed rebar before tearing it out. The boys eyes shot up as Aurdel ran up the wall before coming back down, using the momentum to his advantage. Without a second thought Aurdel smashed the focusing glass of the boys belt with the rebar, causing him to curl up from the pain of being struck and losing his belt simultaneously. One down, nineteen left. He sprung back up as Aoyama clutched his stomach, continuing the chase. With the pace that he ran at it was more than easy to make up for lost ground. “Why can’t you run a little slower?!” Aurdel picked up a number of chunks of rubble from the ground, chucking them at high speeds towards the two students. “Acid Veil!” Ashido sprayed her acid to form a protective barrier, stopping and melting the projectiles before they could hit her or Koda. But it was in his way, so he quickly scaled around it.

“You can’t outrun me.”

“Luckily for us that is not the plan Mr. Aurdel! Recipro Boost!” Ida came charging out of nowhere, a sudden ramp of ice forming in front of him. Skating through the air he came at Aurdel at high speeds. Not fast enough to be unable to avoid, but still fast. “Recipro Extend!” Then just as Ida had his back turned, he quickly brought himself back to face Aurdel. The boy kicked him hard in the back, throwing him off of the wall and onto the concrete below. They fought dirty, so he would too. And so rather than get up right away and continue the fight, Aurdel instead chose to lay there and fake being unconscious.

“Huh?” Midoriya said, “Ida, how hard did you kick him?”

“I kicked him hard, but it shouldn’t have been enough to take him down with one blow to the back.” The other students slowly came out from the assigned places, wearily surrounding him from a distance.

“Hey, what’s going on? Are we still doing this plan or what?” Kaminari complained.

“I don’t know, I think we might have already won?”

“There’s no way that guy could only take one hit, you saw how he fought those Villains!”

“Maybe he was under the influence of something at the time? It could be that he’s a glass cannon who can’t take a hit without his armor on. It’d make sense, he wears it all the time.”

“I’m not so sure,” Asui said, putting a finger to her lips. “Remember that training session we had with the other teachers, the one where All Might was pretending to be a Villain? We thought that he was supposed to be dead for the purpose of the exercise, but he was actually just pretending to be dead and escaped.”

“In that case, we should restrain him,” Todoroki said, “I’ll use my ice to-“

“Not on my watch half and half!” Bakugo shouted, “I’ll just make sure that if he’s down, he stays down!”

Midoriya protested, “Don’t! If he’s actually down then we don’t need to do anything!”

“Don’t stop me!” Bakugo shouted, Aurdel counted the seconds “AP Shot: Auto Cannon!” Just as Bakugo put his other hand in front of his palm to concentrate his bursts, Aurdel sprung up from the ground and threw the piece of rebar he was holding. Hitting the gauntlet with the rebar threw off his aim dramatically. Instead of hitting him with the explosions, he ended up spraying the other students and the surrounding area. The few projectiles that came his way as he jumped up, bouncing from wall to wall of the nearby buildings, were easy to avoid. By doing this he easily put himself out of range of a number of the students, simultaneously destroying whatever plans they had set up for a trap. Midoriya, Bakugo, Sero, Ida, Uraraka, Todoroki, Asui and Tokoyami quickly followed, scaling the walls in order to push him from all sides.

“Everyone!” Midoriya shouted, “We need to-“

“Out of my way!” Bakugo shouted, blasting past Midoriya and towards. The first attack that Bakugo tried to make was easy to avoid, it was a feint. Then, as Bakugo tried to redirect himself in the air, Aurdel spun around and grabbed his legs, slammed him back-first into the ground with a solid and loud thud. Then, with mere moments to react, Aurdel pulled the pins off of the two grenades bracers, before pulling them off his arms and tossing them in the direction of the others.

“Watch out!” Todoroki shouted, raising a large barrier of ice as the two gauntlets let out a wild and directionless explosion. As Bakugo tried to stand back up Aurdel picked him up by the collar, punching him in the stomach before throwing him at his classmates. Ida was the one who quickly ran forward to catch him, not realizing that made him the next target

Aurdel sprinted across the roof, charging at Ida. Sero shot off tape from both arms to try and slow him down, but he was able to avoid being directly hit and instead grabbed the tape. This allowed him to pull Sero in and throw him, leaving him to collide with Todoroki one the ice had disappeared and sending the two stumbling off the roof. Midoriya sprinted up from behind and tried to land an attack, but with his reaction time it was easy to dodge. He then grabbed him by the arm and swung him like a baseball bat into the two already dazed students, knocking them off the roof as well. Uraraka and Asui jumped down to make sure they were alright..

“This is supposed to be you pulling your punches?!” Sero said, showing back up on the ground and exasperated. Tokoyami, who’d been off to the side waiting, had chosen now as the time to strike. With Dark Shadow attacking, Aurdel found himself suddenly ensnared from behind. Sero saw the opportunity to restrain him and made his way back up top, surrounding Aurdel and Dark Shadow both with tape in order to more effectively contain him. Aurdel struggled, moving around the rooftop and dragging both Tokoyami and Dark Shadow with him as the tape began to pile on. Prying one arm loose he was able to grab a flashlight he carried with him, turning it onand forcing Dark Shadow to loosen its hold. Once that happened Aurdel quickly ducked out and grabbed Dark Shadow by the now tape covered surface. He then dragged him over and threw him off the roof, throwing him towards Bakugo, Ida and MIdoriya who were on their way back up. Ida caught him, meaning that Midoriya and Bakugo kept going. The moment they reached the rooftop the two of them began their attack, the two trying to attack from opposite sides.

“Detroit Smash!” Midoriya shouted, coming in with a strong right fist. Aurdel stepped back and allowed the two to essentially stumble into each other. WIth Midoriya punching Bakugo and Bakugo blasting Midoriya, he didn’t have to do nearly as much work. He grabbed the two of them by the collar, slamming them face first into each other and knocking their heads together. Then, after giving them a moment to let the blows set in, he performed a pair of brachial stuns. The two of them collapsed like a bag of bricks onto the roof. Bruised, beat up, but only unconscious

Seventeen left. He dropped from the edge of the roof and scaled his way down, Todoroki and Sero continuously attacking him at range with their quirks. Right, he’d mix things up. Grabbing hold of one of the railings he swung into one of the mid-level floors, going in and hiding just around the corner

“Follow him!” Todoroki said, the two boys going in his direction. The moment they walked through he attacked from the side, performing the same effective stun to take them out of the fight quickly. He then used Sero’s tape to restrain the two of them. Fifteen left. He threw his shoulder through the relatively thin walls, emerging back out on the other side of the building.

The others were all there and attempting to reorganize, their plans having quite literally fallen apart in front of their very eyes. “We must retrieve the others, we cannot leave them where they are now!” Ida said firmly.

“Are you kidding?!” Mineta wailed, “You saw how he took them down, how are we supposed to beat him?!”

“I don’t know, but I have to agree with Ida!” Kirishima said, hardening his arms. “We wouldn’t be doing our jobs as Heroes or acting very manly if we didn’t try to save them!”

“That’s easy for you to say, you can probably take a hit from him!” Kaminari complained, “The rest of us will most likely go down in just one punch. I say we ru-UUUUUUUUUUUN!” Kaminari’s suggestion turned into a cry as Aurdel threw out a looped piece of tape like a lasso, him and JIrou. He then dragged the two of them up, facing only a little resistance as he used more tape to restrain them completely and left them hanging from a windowsill. Thirteen left. Aurdel jumped back down to the ground, ready for whatever came next. Kirishima charged him head on, striking with his hardened fists and creating tears in his clothes. They were strong, stronger than he’d expected, but they were nothing that he couldn’t handle. Aurdel allowed him to get a few hits in, before striking back himself. First with his knee he broke Kirishima’s attempt at a constant advance, then by constantly throwing his elbow against his hardened arms he was able to eventually cause him to crack. Some of the skin on Kirishima’s arm broke from the repeated attacks..

“Kirishima, duck!” The boy ducked as Ashido shouted, spraying acid and covering Aurdel’s mask with it. Quickly he pulled it off. “Huh?! You have more than one mask on?!” Aurdel kicked Kirishima to the side, then charged towards the other students..

“Uraraka, now!” Yaoyaorozu shouted.

“Release!” Only then did he realize what they’d been doing. He tried to dive to the side, but the foil was too large to be avoided. The foil was covered in a strong adhesive, one that would be near impossible to remove in a state like this

“Unless you can sweat enough to loosen the glue, you won’t be able to get out of that foil,” Yaoyaorozu announced, “Give up now and hand victory over to us or else you’ll have to fight until you’ve run out of air and fall unconscious.” He’d underestimated them and hadn’t thought of what elaborate plans they’d come up with, but he wasn’t going to hand over such an easy victory. He held his breath and kept fighting. With Ida and Tokoyami moving out of sight, alongside Ashido and Kirishima being unable to attack him without destroying the foil, that left him to fight Yaoyaorozu, Koda, Uraraka, Mineta, Sato, Hagakure, Asui, Ojiro and Shoji. Of those students, Ojiro, Shoji and Sato were the strongest brawlers and thus were the primary targets.

Ojiro bounced up and whipped around his tail, Aurdel threw it back with his arm. Sato attacked with a flurry of punches, he easily bobbed and weaved. Shoji tried to use his arms to grab him and hold in place, but Aurdel easily broke out of it. He punched forward and struck Sato’s midsection, hitting his liver. With both the pain synapses firing off, the loss of balance and focus, it was a near instant knockout. Twelve. He grabbed Ojiro by the tail and swung him around, throwing him and Shoji together with a violent impact. Hard enough to knock them out cold, but not to cause any severe lasting damage. Ten.

“Grape Rush!” Mineta suddenly sprouted out of nowhere, popping the balls off his head and throwing them onto the foil that covered Aurdel. There were dozens of them, mostly covering one side of the foil. “Just try breaking out now!” He shouted, blood dripping from his scalp due to the effect of using his quirk like that. Unfortunately for them this would work in his favor. He dropped to the ground, falling onto the side that was covered with the balls and getting them stuck to the pavement. Because the balls were better at staying attached to the foil, it meant that he was able to rip off the foil using the strength difference.

“Stop moving so much!” Ashido tried to spray acid at him and Mineta tried to throw more of the balls as he got up, quickly jumping from side to side near the building in order to avoid the attacks. The acid went straight past him and burned through the walls and the supports, leaving it in a precarious situation. He then repeated the process, jumping to each nearby building and tricking Ashido into weakening them. Soon enough he’d formed a ring of buildings ready to collapse. “Ah… I think we’re in trouble.” Aurdel elbowed his way through one of the weak walls, setting off the chain reaction of collapsing buildings. The debris poured down like an avalanche. When he came back out he found Yaoyaorozu, Koda, Mineta and Asui trapped under it. That just left four-

“Now!” Uraraka shouted, the four students beginning their attack. Aurdel found himself temporarily blinded as Hagakure refracted the scattered light, shining it away from Dark Shadow and towards him. At the same Uraraka used her quirk to float him off the ground, moving back as Ida and Tokoyami using Dark Shadow began to strike him.

It took a second for his vision to recover from the bright light, after that he fought back. Being weightless made it harder to do so but he’d fought his share of zero-g battles. Aurdel managed to grab Ida on one of his passes, using the chance to flip him and pull himself closer toward the ground. At the same time Dark Shadow tried to strike him, but being weightless allowed him to quickly move to the side and gain momentum to strike back against the sentient quirk and throw himself over to Tokoyami. From there he was able to grab Tokoyami by the collar and drag him up before throwing him back down towards the ground. Three. Fighting against him in this state would be difficult for them, and the three of them knew it. They gave each other a look of concern, before realizing what had to be done. “I suppose as class representative, with no other choice… We must concede this battle,” Ida said, defeatedly.

“Just what do you think you were doing fighting them like that?!” Recovery Girl shouted at Aurdel, whacking him with her cane. “If you’d done anything more, you would have given them serious and permanent injuries!”

“They knew the risk going in. I told them that I would be pulling my punches, but not going easy on them. However, I suppose I may have misjudged how much they could actually take.” He looked at the students of Class 1-A, almost all of which were lounging in the common room of the dorm that had been turned into an ad-hoc nursing station. Almost everyone was covered in bandages in one place or another, ice packs resting on bruised body parts, casts on bones that were damaged. “Are they going to be good for their licensing exam tomorrow?”

Recovery Girl sighed, “Yes, they’ll be fine for their exam. Their injuries will heal overnight. But that doesn’t excuse what you did. Please try to be more careful in the future, the less that I have to use my quirk on students the better.” She left the room, leaving an awkward silence.

He scratched the back of his head, “I suppose all I can say is that I’m sorry for taking things too far, I wanted to give you a fair chance to prove yourselves.”

“How did we do?” Midoriya asked, surprising him. No one seemed to protest that question or made any other comment.

“Given the circumstances, you all performed incredibly well. You surprised me with your coordination and the use of your quirks, you did much better than I expected.” There was silence again.

“Are you saying that just because you feel bad?”

“No,” he shook his head, “You all genuinely did well, and I have high hopes for your licensing exams tomorrow.” That seemed to clear up the air a little, removing some of the tension. With that he left them to get their rest, going to his own room. There he pulled off his mask and sat down at his chair, deciding to take one look at his phone before he went out for the night. There he noticed that there was another voice message, one from someone by the name of Sir Nighteye.