Nothing much changed for Izuku and me after the entrance exam, apart from the fact that Itsuka started to join us in our daily training routine. It turned out that she lived only three blocks away from us. Hence, she was often over at our home now, since her mom worked really late usually. Itsuka even had slept over at our home a few times.
It was very awkward the first time she came for a sleepover, as she for some weird reason insisted that she would sleep in my room, and even had the support from Aunt Inko and that troublemaker Izuku. Because of that I had to sleep on a futon on the floor inside my own room, with Itsuka chatting with me until way past midnight.
She had extremely good battle instincts. In our training sessions, she mastered the kicks I taught her within the first week. Barely a week after that, she showed me her new track of using her enlarged hands as a giant fan that sent overpowering wind gust attacks through pure physical power. She said she had managed it thanks to a certain clip of All-Might I showed her, in which he had used pressure from his punch to dispel a storm cloud.
Despite the fun we had, we had our goals clear. We didn't train just for the fun of it, we trained in the most efficient way it would benefit us when we become heroes. All three of us would hold joint sessions to discuss various information about quirks, villains and hero academies and agencies. We would gather information from news and internet before compiling it into our own personalized information banks.
The letter for all three of us came by the end of the second week. I didn't know why it took so much time, but maybe they were holding discussion about sorting us into classes. I had seen some pretty impressive quirks at the entrance exam and Izuku too had told me about some of the more impressionable ones he had seen, like the guy who could shoot lasers, the floating girl who was saved by Izuku and the Leg Engine guy who displayed incredible speed.
We both went to our respective rooms, we wanted to check the result in privacy. The envelop had a portable holographic projector with a video loaded. It contained All-Might giving the news that he will be a teacher and that this was the reason he had come to this city. He then showed me a few clips of my actions in the battle area, confirming my suspicion that everything as planned and being watched.
He explained that apart from getting villain points from defeating those robots, we were also being graded on rescue points based on how close our actions were hero-like in the exam. Which meant we had to help out those we can and show courage when others are afraid during unexpected situation development.
Most of the applicants were scared to death when that last humongous robot appeared and only focused on running. That was a pity as that was the moment that would have got them the most Hero or Rescue points if they collaborated and fought the robot.
Anyway, we were scored based on our performance and the combination of our villain and rescue points decided the top ten for our hero course:
Top 10 Exam Ranks
Name Villain Points Rescue Points Rank
Kyoya Jin 43 51 1st
Izuku Midoriya 20 70 2nd
Katsuki Bakugo 77 0 3rd
Eijiro Kirishima 39 35 4th
Ochaco Uraraka 28 45 5th
Ibara Shiozaki 36 32 6th
Itsuka Kendo 25 40 7th
Tenya Ida 52 9 8th
Tetsutetsu Tetsutetsu 49 10 9th
Fumikage Tokoyami 47 10 10th
I was extremely surprised how much Bakugo scored based on just Villain points. The guy was a born warrior and must have impeccable Battle Instincts. True Midoriya and I could have matched him if we too just focused on defeating robots. But we had realized the true purpose of the exam and wanted to see if what we thought was true.
Anyway, the U.A. would not have passed a chance to groom us one way or another. Even if we were not in the best class, we would have been put in the secondary one or at least the general class. Also I had researched and found out that the various classes can compete in the U.A. sports festival and and those who performed exceptionally could get upgraded to the best class.
Based on all this, I was never worried for the exam. But it was great to see that our analysis was spot on, gaining us the top two ranks of the exam. I was more surprised by Itsuka's score, she gained 40 rescue points, and unlike Midoriya and me, she had no idea about the hidden parameters. Which meant she had inborn heroic tendencies and was a born hero, similar to how Bakugo could be a very terrifying villain if he went on the wrong path.
Seeing that she could achieve these heights based on just her quirk and her wits, I was extremely impressed with Itsuka. I decided to train her even better to make full use of her talents.
Midoriya and I found out that both of had been assigned to class 1-A. the next day when we met Itsuka, she said she was in the same class too. We had two weeks left before our new classes would start, in the meantime all those who got selected were given a hero budget to design their personalized costumes based on their abilities and preferences.
I already had a costume, and it was way better than what I would get from this little amount of budget. But who am I to say no to free money, hence I decided to get a stylish Japanese style long coat made instead, called a Haori. It was deep inky black in color and made out of thick fabric that was soft and comfortable on the inside while being durable and tough on the outside.
On its back I had a stylishly embossed Japanese characters of the words 'Golden' and 'Silence', sort of a play on my disability that I decided was going to be my hero name. Whenever I arrived to protect people, I wanted them to know who it was immediately and my name would provide them with hope and calmness.
Izuku wanted to get an additional costumed made too, themed after All-Might, which he would wear on top of the Gantz Battle Suit got for him. But he never got a chance, as Aunt Inko got a costume made out for him. She didn't know we would get a costume budget or that I had already given Izuku the Gantz Battle Suit.
But a mother's love is the greatest, she had pulled up all-nighter to make this costume for Izuku. Hence he decided to wear this instead, on top of the Battle suit, and save the budget money for any future upgrades.
I also helped Itsuka decide on a costume, by her insistent request. The costume I designed was a bit out of her budget, but I supplemented it as I had no lack for money. She had a pretty sweet costume made from extremely durable carbon fiber polymer mixed with other malleable metal alloys. It was form fitting like spandex and colored in green and gold, like Itsuka wanted. She also had a masquerade type simple black mask to protect her identity.
Itsuka and I went to submit our proposal and the further investment I wanted to make in Itsuka's budget to get the costume I designed. The registration office had no problem about me investing additional money and allowed it very easily. Itsuka took me to another cafe treat as a thanks and we spent the rest of the day relaxing at the beach.
From the next day, I increased our training intensity even more. Thanks to the entrance exam, I had come to know of various problems we had and how to improve upon them. Itsuka needed to master rapid body-shifting technique necessary to develop the fighting style I suggested.
Izuku didn't need anything additional for his repertoire, as All-Might had already proved many times in his fights, absolute power counters almost anything absolutely. Hence I told Izuku to just work on increasing his speed and power while maintaining Full Cowl. More his body gets used to maintaining One For All, more power he will be able to draw from it.
However, I was on the complete opposite side to Izuku. Where One for All used Absolute Enhancement of the basic ability of the holder of the quirk, My quirk Aura needed me to develop various techniques for it to be useful. In its base state Aura was at best useful to generate a psychological pressure against my opponents through the release of a lot of it in a quick burst. It had zero combat or support power in its base state.
As for the techniques I had developed, I had Aura Puppetry Arts for control and support, Enhance for boosting my physical attributes, and finally Plus Ultra for recovery and healing. I now needed a mid or long range attack ability to supplement the current gap in my techniques. I had faced this when I was defeating those robots. I could have done even better in the exam if I had a long range or even a mid range ability, preferably one which can be used rapidly in quick succession.
I scoured the Old Man's memories for inspiration, while also going through various Quirks of different heroes. It was then that I saw the picture of my mom and dad in their teens. Aunt Inko had managed to find one from the time all three of them were in school.
My mom was very pretty with navy-blue colored hair and very well-proportioned attractive body. Dad looked a little frail and kind of like a nerd with his plain face and round glasses, but he had that intelligent glint in his eyes and a confident smile that made you trust that he had everything under control.
I decided that I will try to develop a technique based on their quirks. After all, I am their son and their quirk mutated to give birth to mine. So I must be able to trace it back to something similar to theirs.
My mom had a quirk called Hecatoncheires, which basically let her grow corporeal arms out of a sort of ethereal energy. My dad's quirk was similar, called Spirit Hydra and he could manifest a gigantic 9-headed snake made out of energy around himself, like an armored exoskeleton only he can control. Since both of them were energy based quirk I might be able to do it.
However the power I faced was the energy requirement. My Aura was by default a type of immaterial energy, which unlike solar, electrical or heat energy, didn't leave any physical traces. The first challenge was learning to manifest Aura into a corporeal form.
To do that I had to increase the limit of the Aura I can contain in my body, because the amount of of Aura needed to manifest even a fist sized corporeal Aura was phenomenal. The way to achieve this was through repeated draining of my aura, straining my body and then recovering.
After a week of intense session, I managed to achieve the minimum Aura needed to manifest a big snake head with a few meter long body emerging from my palm for a seconds. Unlike regular snakes, I manifested it with shark like teeth in addition to four deadly sharp snake fangs.
In addition, since I didn't have massive Aura reserves currently to manifest gigantic snakes, I modified my current incomplete technique to be able to detach the partially manifested snake from my palm. The detached snake body would fly with subsonic speeds like a snake shaped missile, using its body as fuel and the snake's head as a missile warhead that would explode on contact.
I designed it such that I could even store some physical object in the snake head, such as a cannon ball, so that after the body has been used up, the snake head would be able to spit out the stored object in an even higher speed by using the energy used to manifest the snake head to accelerate the physical object. It would be a surprise trump card to attack those who don't know about whether the snake head has something inside it or not.
I also theorized a technique for the future in which I would develop this ability further to have multiple tiny snake heads that can spit out tiny spiral bullet like projectiles instead of a cannonball like one. But that needed superior amount of Aura to manifest multiple snake heads and controlling them to behave like a machine gun, hence I had to be satisfied with my current missile/cannonball version.
-x-x-x-x-x-x-
Once the two week time was up, Itsuka, Izuku and I made our way towards U.A. for the first day of our new class. Itsuka and Izuku were extremely excited, and their excitement was infectious. Izuku fell into his usual routine of muttering various strategies for handling new classmates and how excited he was to to analyze new and interesting quirks. Itsuka and I treated him as our travel entertainment.
Though I was glad Izuku was the successor of All-Might, I often wondered whether Izuku would be better suited to become a General-Ed student and work to become a quirk analyzer. The kid was passionate about all quirks, and had the potential to become a quirk training and analysis specialist. But what could be was of no importance now. Midoriya had to now use his inherent talent in conjunction with his new quirk to become the best hero he can be.
We finally reached U.A, the entry gates huge and impressive as always. U.A looked like an impregnable fortress rather than a school. We got our class assignment slip and school map from the reception and we made way to our new class.
When we entered the class, we saw Bakugo fighting with that stuck up Iida Tenya. Though I don't particularly like Bakugo, I despised Iida more. He was one of those who were cultivated in a specific environment and had a very narrow minded point of view. I just hoped he would not continue his prideful narrow minded mentality or he would face a lot of trouble in future.
Their argument stopped when Iida saw the three of us. He first came and apologized to us, claiming to be lesser than us for not having noticed the hidden purpose of hero entrance exam. He also apologized for shouting at Izuku when they first met and when they were Area B for the practical. Izuku waved his apology away saying it was no big deal.
While they were talking, I noticed two of the students looking at me with very pointed gazes. One was a beautiful well-proportioned girl with a very unique hairstyle, a high ponytail that flared out like a peacock's tail. Another was a handsome kid with two-colored hair, half white and half red. His face on the red hair side had a bad burn, most probably due to a steam or hot water incident.
Right at that moment, we were greeted by the girl Izuku had saved in the exam. She greeted Izuku excitedly and asked him about his arm that had got injured. Before Izuku could stammer out a reply, a human sized caterpillar crawled up to us, which later turned out to be our homeroom teacher, Shoto Aizawa. He asked us to stop the chatter and dress-up in gym clothes before meeting him downstairs at the training ground.
We assembled at the ground and Aizawa gave us a lecture about how we are heroes now and we don't have time to be involved in social niceties. We should be dedicating every minute of our spare time into improving ourselves as it will be what that saves our lives one day. Though I personally agreed with the ragged and hobo looking teacher of ours, I did think that he could use a bit more tact as he was talking to hormonal and angst filled teens here.
He asked Bakugo to demonstrate how we could surpass our physical achievements through the use of quirks and how we needed to get used to using our quirks now and forget about being regular people. We were heroes and we should be well-versed in what we can do and achieve.
Bakugo threw the specially made training ball while propelling it with a huge explosion. It surpassed 700 meters, as shown by the device in Aizawa's hand. When the students started getting excited and muttered about this being fun, Aizawa threatened that since they want to have fun he will be expelling the one who scores last in these quirk based physical assessment.
Amidst panic, the students got ready for taking the assessment as if their lives were on the line. Everyone had a determined look in their eyes, they were now fully committed to the tests. At first I thought Aizawa might just be making a fake ruse here to let these kids sober up and become serious, but something about the way he critically observed each one of us didn't make it seem like he was kidding.
The first test was 50-Meter dash, quite a few kids stood out in that with impressive results. Looking at the top scores for this test, I got 2.96 seconds thanks to pushing my Enhance and Plus Ultra combo in overdrive, Midoriya got 3 seconds, Iida got 3.24 seconds with his engine quirk, Todoroki Shoto got 4.5 seconds using ice to slide and Bakugo got 5.13 seconds using pure explosions to boost and propel himself in the air.
Others who stood out because of uniqueness were Tsuyu Asui with her frog jumps, Yuga Aoyama who flew for short distances with his laser and Momo Yaoyorozu who created two roller skates from her chest to help her move fast. I theorized that it was because of her unique quirk that she was wearing such revealing and skimpy outfit, despite many of the male students giving her fixated looks because of her attractive physique.
Second test was grip strength test, a test made purely for physical power. Looking at the top scores for this test, I got 602.96 kilograms easily since I only needed to concentrate my Enhance to my right hand while Healing it with Plus Ultra.
Midoriya got 569 Kilograms as he was using One for All at barely 4% to avoid attention grabbing transformation, Mezo Shoji got 540 kilograms as he could sprout multiple limbs and use the to grab it simultaneously.
Fumikage Tokoyami summoned a monstrous being from his shadow and made it grab the machine for 459 kilograms and finally it was Momo Yaoyorozu who created some sort of clamping machine that generated grip strength of 401 kilograms.
Other notable mentions were Itsuka who used Big Fist for 395 Kilograms, Mashirao Ojiro who used his muscular tail for gripping an impressive 371 kilograms, Tsuyu Asui who had an impressive strength of 321 Kilograms and Eijiro Kirishima who scored 318 kilograms with his hardening quirk.
Third test was standing long jump, kind of became a joke for most of us. Ochaco Uraraka, Midoriya Izuku, Katsuki Bakugo, Shoto Todoroki, Fumikage Tokoyami, Yuga Aoyama and me, all managed to completely go past the jumping area. The top scorers below us were Momo Yaoyorozu and Tsuyu Asui who nearly managed to clear the jumping area to, Tsuyu with a huge frog jump and Momo with some kind of wound up spring shoes.
Fourth Test was repeated side jumps, in which the top scorers were Midoriya, Bakugo, Uraraka, Ojiro and me. Just below us were Tsuyu Asui and Kyoka Jiro. Jiro used her quirk Ear-Jacks to rapidly create sound shock-waves on both sides of her to help her side-hop faster.
Fifth Test was Ball throw, which Bakugo had already participated in when he was demonstrating. He shouted at Midoriya about how he should remember his place as a weakling and not try to claw up for fame. Bakugo was convinced that he was the next All-Might and that rest of us didn't amount to anything in front of him and his quirk.
Midoriya got angry at this and lectured about all quirks being equally impressive and that the only limitation to them was our hard-work and imagination. He challenged Bakugo to see the level he had reached with his quirk and increased One For All : Full Cowl to 10 % which made his skin reddish with heat and generated green electric sparks all over his body.
With the newly empowered physique, Midoriya threw the ball out out and scored 2,658 meters, surpassing Bakugo's score by over three times and shutting his tirade up. When Bakugo got pissed and tried to attack Midoriya, Aizawa Shoto captured him with the bandage like scarves he always wore and erased Bakugo's quirk. Midoriya recognized Aizawa Shoto through his actions, identifying him as the Pro Hero who worked in the shadows, Eraserhead.
After Aizawa lectured Bakugo and Midoriya to keep personal grudges away from hero business, he resumed the test. Ochaco Uraraka scored an infinity in the ball throw, getting shouts of admiration and shock from most of the class.
Pumped up with Midoriya and Uraraka's performance, I decided to use my newly developed technique that I named Orochi's gaze. I manifested a big snake head with a few meter long body emerging from my palm. Unlike regular snakes, it had shark like teeth in addition to four deadly sharp snake fangs. The snake head grabbed the ball in its mouth and I fired the snake off from my palm.
The detached snake body would flew with subsonic speeds like a snake shaped missile, using its body as fuel. The snake-head then spat out ball like a cannonball, boosted by the snake-head's energy propelling it in even faster speed. This impressive technique scored me 4,365 meters on Aizawa's machine.
Momo used a small portable cannon to achieve 854 meters and Tokoyami threw the ball using the shadow monster to score 820 meters, letting them both join the top five ranker for this test. Other notable students were Bakugo, Shoji, Ojiro, and Itsuka.
Sixth Test was Sit-Ups, with top ranker being Me, Midoriya, Shoji, Tsuyu and Ojiro. It was nothing difficult for Midoriya and me, as we did a few hundreds of it anyway to warm up.
Seventh Test was Seated Toe Touch, with the top ranker being Shoji, Me, Midoriya, Tsuyu and Ojiro. The frequency at which we were becoming top ranker made me realize that we might be more physically focused than the rest of our class. But that might change as our classmates get more serious about our hero activities.
Eighth Test was Long Distance Run, with the top ranker being Me, Midoriya, Iida, Bakugo and Todoroki. But Tsuyu and Momo were close in heels and had nearly surpassed Todoroki, if not for his Ice making them watch their step. When all tests were over, Aizawa gave us a 5 minute break to catch our breaths before announcing our result.
Not surprisingly, the final first ranker after compiling the results was me, Second was Midoriya, Third was Momo, Fourth was Bakugo and Fifth turned out to be Tsuyu. Close behind in points were Shoto, Shoji, Ojiro, Iida and Tokoyami. Koji Koda turned out to be the last of us with his points. He was a bulky guy with a quirk called Anivoice, which allowed him to speak with all kinds of creatures, such as birds animals and even insects.
However, his quirk was geared more towards versatility than power, which was shown clearly when the only test he somewhat excelled in was the Ball Throw, in which he called down an eagle to take his ball and fly away, and the long distance run, where he again called up a bunch of birds to hold him in various places such as arms and back, and help him run faster.
However, Aizawa relieved the terrified Koji by saying that this was only a ruse to make them all work harder, which Momo Yaoyorozu backed up by saying that it was very obvious he was just using that to motivate us. While everyone relaxed and celebrated, Aizawa warned them that the real journey as a hero began from the next day and that we all should be prepared.
As Aizawa left, I followed him and confronted him at the side of a building where he seemed to be waiting for me.
"What do you want ?" Aizawa asked with a lazy glare.
[Why did you lie to us? It was not a ruse, your gaze, tone of voice and body language, all suggested that you were very serious about what you said. You definitely marked one of us for failure, maybe more than one. What changed your mind?]
Aizawa stared at me for a few moments before sighing "Seems like I have another perceptive one apart from Yaoyorozu. Well yes, I had planned on failing quite a few, including your buddy Midoriya, who took an unneeded risk during the entrance exam."
"Hero profession is not a joke, we face threats, injuries and death on a daily basis. After barely a few short years of training, the kids I am training will be thrown out into the dark world outside to fend for themselves. I would rather expel the less talented students now than watch them unable to cope up later and die."
[Why didn't you then? Why pass everyone?]
"Because the interaction between Bakugo and Midoriya woke those lazy students up, who were living in the delusion that they were in the hero course to have fun. Midoriya made them realize that they will have to work hard to develop their powers to the maximum extent to have a chance to survive and live a decent life in the World of Heroes. Since they learnt this lesson without needing me to expel anyone and teach it to them, I saw no point in going through with my plan."
[You seem brash, arrogant and a bully at first glance, Sensei. But you hide a heart of gold within that scraggly exterior. I look forward to being taught by you and surpass you as a hero one day.]
"I look forward to that day too," Aizawa said while turning away with a wide creepy smile on his face. Gloomy and serious look suited this crazy teacher of mine more, he was creepy and scary when he smiled.
-x-x-x-x-x-x-
We all got to know each other well after the tests got over and we could relax. The cheerful friendly ones like Ochaco Uraraka, Mina Ashido, Toru Hagakure and Itsuka acted as the link for easy conversation amongst us. Even Bakugo made a slight friendship with Kirishima, After Kirishima tanked Bakugo's explosion with a single palm without flinching, thanks to his hardening quirk.
Shoto was a quiet one, barely talking to Shoji and Momo, while shooting me a few looks every once in a while. One thing that really annoyed me in this chatting session was that most of the Class thought me to be a girl based on my long hair, slim body and androgynous face. I made those that exclaimed this out loud dance like a creepy cartoon character using my Aura Strings.
That resulted in a lot of them asking about my quirk, as they had seen me manifesting a snake with Orochi's Gaze, while right now I made them dance like a puppet and I also possessed very impressive results in the physical tests such as running, jumping, grip test etc.
I told them that my quirk was Aura Strings and that I was able to do all those things because of controlling myself and the objects around me with my Aura strings. When someone asked me about the snake, I said that it was an advanced application of my quirk and I can't discuss it freely. This made me seem more mysterious, earning me more frequent glances from Momo and Shoto, but I didn't care.
Iida and Ochaco joined Itsuka, Izuku and me while going home. Izuku seemed more than happy with this development, his eyes all for Ochaco. He even adopted his hero name to be 'Deku', a derogatory name Bakugo had coined on him for being weak when he was little. The reason he so easily changed his mind about being called Deku was that Ochaco said she liked it and seemed like a good Hero name to motivate people. The poor guy was crushing so hard that it was funny to watch.
The next day we had multiple classes that adhered to regular school curriculum, such as Language classes, Mathematics, Science and Literature. Itsuka and I even enjoyed a tasty lunch together in the main cafeteria, prepared by the world famous Cook Hero, Lunch Rush. When he got time, he clarified a few of my questions about some recipes I had tried making at home when Itsuka had slept over.
However, towards the Afternoon came a class that many of us were looking forward to excitedly, Hero Basic Training. It was being taught by the all time favorite, the Hero No. 1 of Japan, All-Might himself. He came in wearing a retro Sliver-Age costume of his, looking extremely fancy and flashy. Only he could make his corny actions seem so natural.
He gave a pep talk about this class being one of the most important ones that will prepare us for our future as a hero and told us to prepare for Battle Training. Were also required to wear our costumes during this training, the very same that we asked to be made for us when we joined U.A.
It was different for me since I already had my own protective costume, but U.A did prepare the fancy black Haori with Golden Characters I asked them to prepare. Hence I wore the Haori on top of the protective costume I had, feeling mysterious and cool with the Haori on. Some of my classmates such as Kaminari, Uraraka, Ashido and Tsuyu commented positively on my decision to have my Hero Name engraved like that on the back of my Haori.
After getting used to our own costume and admiring other's impressive ones, we assembled in the area made by U.A for Battle Simulation.