Chapter 39 - My SI Stash #39 - Heir to the King by Corvus no Genmu (My Hero Academia) (2/2)
Itsuki didn't pay them any mind, even those whom he recognized from That One's memories. Instead, he kept his attention on the doors thus was unsurprised to see them opening with nary a sound.
The destructive explosion of concrete beneath his feet heralded his entrance into the battleground and sent his observers stumbling in surprise. In a single leap, he managed to cover a whole block and landed feet first against an unprepared one-pointer, crushing it beneath his enlarged girth. Now fourteen feet tall with a toughened hide of thick reptilian scales of golden splendor that easily tanked the rubber bullets of the three-pointer in front of him.
His head had now become an amalgamation of human and dragon, face pressed outwards in a gaping snarl of fangs and five pairs of curved horns erupting at the back of his now hairless skull. His neck had elongated slightly, just above a swan's in length while his arms were now long and thin, bony fingers nearly touching the cemented ground beneath his feet. Itsuki's twin tails had grown in length as well but were otherwise unchanged save the bony spikes at their tips possessing a distinctly metallic sheen.
His throat glowed before with golden light before Itsuki's mouth opened wide and loosed a thunderbolt that sent the three-pointer flying into its fellow machines with an explosive crash of shrapnel. His reptilian lips drew back further, fully exposing his fangs in a primal display. Beneath his golden scales, Itsuki's blood was pumping hot and hard in his veins, a flicker of electricity coursing through them like ravenous serpents as the sparkling machine trembled and died beneath his claws.
That's fourteen points. Not enough. Don't stop. Keep moving.
Three days after the exam and well into the afternoon of the fourth and the U.A. faculty were still going the many applicants to the hero course. A surprisingly large number had passed the written portion of the exams and with more than a few heated… discussions… having broken out over some applicants over their performance in the practical… Well was it any wonder that they had only just now gotten to those in Battleground G?
”So what did you think of that examinee, Shota-kun?”
It was nearing the end of what felt like an extremely long day to a majority of the teachers save for one whom felt it was the end of a week of nothing but pain, torment, and a hell of a lot of misery. Only when he took another long sip of his coffee did Shota Aizawa find the strength to answer. Given that his choice of drink for this day was, in his own opinion, black as his embittered soul, it was this rare but oh so precious drink that made this yearly affair even remotely bearable for the underground hero.
Still in a lot of pain and definitely some torment. Misery?
”Meh.”
Having heard this answer for every question that he had asked the Underground Hero, Shota's self-proclaimed bosom buddy Hizashi Yamada felt his ever present smile twitch in the opposite direction and Nemuri Kayama, recognizing an imminent sign of the End Times, hastily brought up the next set of recordings.
”Examinee No.: 1964, Itsuki Marumaru.” Nemuri brought up the boy's middle school picture on the center screen whilst the rest brought up paused videos taken from the multitude of cameras littered throughout the false cityscape. ”Quirk…” She blinked and pressed her small, red reading glasses further up her nose to make sure her eyes weren't deceiving her. ”Yes.”
”… Wait, what?” asked No. 13 with a small laugh while Shota g_r_o_a_n_e_d and took another long drink of his coffee, dark and empty as his heart.
Snipe guffawed. ”Ya'll are kiddin', right? He actually wrote that?”
Sekijiro Kan rolled his eyes. ”At least it's a better answer than what that one candidate wrote under s_e_x.”
”[Yes please!]” giggled Hizashi under his breath in English, which pretty much meant that everyone in the room heard him clear as day and just as easily ignored him for it. Shota contemplated ways of murdering him via vicious application of his coffee mug up the blonde's nose only to think better of it. The underground hero would have nothing from which to drink his pitch-black coffee if he did that and silence —sweet blessed silence— was not worth the sacrifice of this most abysmally darkened cup of java.
”Marumaru…” Toshinori Yagi tapped his bony chin in thought. ”Wouldn't that mean he's…?”
”Indeed he is but such a thing hasn't stopped him so far.” Nezu answered, sitting back in his plush chair, little paws clasping together in front of his snout as he watched the recordings play out. Barely a few minutes in and already he was starting to put the pieces together and though his jovial façade never faltered, there was a predatory steeliness in his gaze. Interesting… ”Thoughts Aizawa-san?”
Shota repressed the urge to default to his standard answer for the last several candidates and easily ignored Hizashi unabashedly learning forward excitedly with an extremely wide grin on his smug face. ”He's ambitious but ambition doesn't make a hero, only reckless idiots. They see the end goal and how to achieve it as quickly as possible without any thought or concern for the consequences.”
”Ambitious? Hell, hard to argue that. He's gone and gotten da most villain points out o' the 'ole lot with plenty o' time still left to spare,” said Snipe, tallying the number of robots Itsuki was destroying on the screens.
”Aye, and stealing a lot of them from his fellow applicants to boot.” Sekijiro noted with a small frown as the video displayed Itsuki charging in and crashing horned head first into a small horde of robots before any of the other applicants could so much as blink in stunned surprise.
”I was wondering why Battleground G had so much more wreckage compared to the other areas…” muttered Higari Maijima, metal-tipped fingers tapping agitatedly on the armrest of his chair. ”At least the first years in the Support course will have plenty of scrap to work with this year…”
”True, true,” agreed Nezu. ”Young Marumaru is certainly ambitious as any examinee would be but not to the degree you think, Shota-kun, Sekijiro-kun. Look. Pay attention not to what he's doing but why he's doing it.”
The faculty exchanged confused looks but paid closer attention than they had been, trying to see what it was that their pint-sized principal had spotted before when they were watching the examinees live.
”He's targeting the larger threats.” Ryo Inui murmured, leaning forward in his chair, clawed hand reaching up to cup the muzzle strapped to his snout. ”He's not going after the three-pointers for the points, it's because he sees them as a more active threat compared to the one and two pointers.”
”Given that he's destroyed a bunch of one-pointers simply from stepping on them that's kind of an understatement I think,” said Hizashi with a smile.
”Yes, yes, but look at that, right there.” No. 13 pointed at the monitor that displayed Itsuki standing between a three-pointer and a horde of students caught by surprise at its sudden emergence from a nearby building, arms spread wide as he advanced on the machine. ”He's making himself the bigger target, drawing the shots aimed at those unprepared or unable to defend themselves.”
”Heh, no shortage of rescue points either then, yeah?” Snipe chuckled.
Nezu nodded and looked at the timestamp at the upper corners of the recordings. ”Indeed but that's not all. Look… There! Do you see what I see?”
They looked and saw Marumaru suddenly straighten, neck twisting to look one direction before his head twitched towards the left then the right before he suddenly turned around. He stood facing the end of the street where the massive zero-pointer was only just starting to arise from its hidden compartment with fangs bared and claws at the ready.
”Wait, replay that.” Ectoplasm leaned forward as Nemuri did so. His eyes narrowed. ”Well, well, well… He's looking in the direction of the other battlegrounds isn't he? He's somehow sensing the zero-pointers emerging before the one in his area shows up.”
Snipe whistled. ”Boy howdy… He's got a bit o' precognition in him don't he?”
”It's hardly surprising. Most transformation Quirks result in a wider range of senses than the human norm,” said Ken Ishiyama, frowning thoughtfully and tapping a squared finger to his nonexistent chin. ”Especially those of that variety…”
”Indeed, indeed, quite the variety indeed,” said Nezu with a smile. ”I think that Marumaru-kun will continue to surprise us!”
”Gods damn it!”
Even forewarned by That One's knowledge, Itsuki was still an extreme bundle of tightly strung nerves long before actually receiving the letter from Yuuei. Having All Might suddenly appear in his home via holographic projection, twice as bright and loud as he was in person no less, did not help him any. As it was, he'd need to go dumpster diving for another chair again and scrounge about for some more wood for the ceiling.
Again.
Quickly dusting off his head as he shrunk down to his more humanoid form, Itsuki Marumaru picked himself off the floor of his humble abode and tried to not stare too hard at the image of a beaming All Might dressed in a rather gaudy yellow suit. Really, the man could, and hopefully would if That One's Recollections were any indication, dress in far better attire than that in the future. The Symbol of Peace spoke of Itsuki's performance in the exam, the unorthodox answer that he gave in the essay portion of the written exam that sparked a fierce debate amongst the faculty, and for the practical—
”You scored amongst the highest in villain points in the practical portion of the entrance exam, Young Marumaru! Not that you were lacking in another, far more important, aspect of being a hero though!”
The clip that showcased the highlights of his performance consisted mostly of how he had done in the early on in the exam. How Itsuki had quickly overtaken the pack of examinees and the devastation of his methodology when eliminating his enemies. Seeing it from the outside elicited a strange sense of déjà vu though it was not Itsuki himself that knew why. It's just like…
Then came the zero-pointer.
Itsuki leaned forward, clawed fingers clenching tightly upon his knees. He watched as his past self took a hesitant step back against an overwhelming force, the fear and trepidation clear even on a draconian visage and then… Then his past-self's eyes flashed gold for the tiniest moment, too fast to be spotted even when he was actively looking for it, and his past-self's eyes moved down towards the zero-pointer's massive treads.
The video changed perspective, showing the cloud of dust flowing outwards from the encroaching zero-pointer like a veritable tsunami and there, formerly lying invisibly and unnoticed by all but the sharpest of senses, an unconscious girl lay, a vague shape lost in the growing fog of debris. A moment passed, the tread getting dangerously close only for it and the rest of the zero-pointer's massive body to suddenly be brought to a grounding halt.
Another angle, one aimed downwards from atop a nearby skyscr_a_p_er showed the cause. Itsuki stood before the zero-pointer, claws digging deeply into its armored body as his feet dug a slow trench in the asphalt beneath him. His body was growing, already twenty feet tall and changing more and more. His neck became more serpentine and a growth of spikes erupted around his clavicles, eerily reminiscent to the same horns that adorned his head. His arms grew to ridiculous lengths, stretching thinner and yet somehow became stronger as thin membrane sprung unseen between his imbedded and now elongated fingers.
Itsuki flinched, rubbing his left arm as the phantom pains of holding back the transformation in his arms whilst the rest of him was changed had hurt far more than he had realized. A few more months, he reassured himself, and then there'll be no holding back. Then we can make our power known.
His pants were tearing apart along the legs but managed to not tear asunder completely. Lightning danced along his tightly gritting fangs and the muscles of his arms were bulging from the strain of holding back both the massive machine and completing the transformation. His past self was slowing the massive machine down but he alone wasn't enough to stop its advance.
”A true hero is an inspiration for others to follow in their example and you certainly were that Young Higuchi! Your actions earned you and your comrades a lot of rescue points!”
Thick, thorny vines ensnared the dreadful treads from the ground while long strips of tape flew through the air from on high, binding the massive limbs tightly to a massive torso. A girl with a frog's tongue ensnared the unconscious examinee and whisked her away. Only when his fellow examinees were out of the way did Itsuki finally act.
With a ferocious roar, Itsuki's head lunged forward, jaws clamping tightly over steel as lightning erupted upwards from his throat and into the gargantuan machine with explosive force, toppling the robot back just enough for gravity to pick up the slack. The zero-pointer fell with a massive, earth trembling crash.
Almost mirroring his draconic reflection on the video, Itsuki had a pleased and slightly vindictive sneer on his face at the sight.
The screen cut back to a beaming All Might, hand held up in a congratulatory thumbs-up. ”However, don't consider this the crowning moment of your career, Young Marumaru! This is merely the prologue, the first step, of your story, your journey! This is the start of your hero academia!”
Itsuki loosed a breath he didn't know he was holding.
He had done it.
He was in the hero course and —according to the paperwork he had received— he was now a part of Class 1-A and—
”Oh…” Oh shit.
He was in Class 1-A.
Surrounded on all sides by people that That One knew and by default so too did Itsuki. People whom he had only seen in passing at the exam, had never spoken more than a few words to at best, and yet knew them explicitly in ways that no stranger should ever know. Classmates and peers that he'd have to pretend and acknowledge as little more than strangers and novices than the pros he knew that they would become.
”Gods damn it.” He fell back onto his sleeping bag and looking up at the cobweb-ridden rafters of his current home. It was another unfamiliar ceiling finely aged with dust and the tangled skeins of spiders, just one of the many forgotten warehouses left to rot in the Arkanis district. Far from the first warehouse that Itsuki had come to call home, this latest one at least was far enough away from the seedier parts of the city to warrant any wannabe villains scoping it for a potential hideout or a well-meaning but far too overbearing hero trying to do what they thought was the right thing.
Just another day for a guy who had spent the better part of ten years trying to make sense of the life he inexplicably found himself living. The future was already tremulous and if certain events were to play out exactly as they had from what That One had seen… This is the only chance, the only way to change things.
Too many lives were at stake. They'll forgive this. They have to.
They'll forgive him. They must.