People slowly started returning to the stadium after the break. The students were already standing in the middle of the field and awaiting further instructions from their teachers. The whole country was watching the screens again. Harry, this time without a bloody face, stood among his classmates with his eyes closed and his arms folded across his chest. Midnight slashed the air with a whip and drew everyone's attention.
"And here are the matchups!"
A list appeared on the screen and everyone started looking for their names.
1. Midoriya VS Shinso.
2. Todoroki VS Sero.
3. Mashirao VS Kaminari.
4. Ida VS Hatsume.
5. Ashido VS Potter.
6. Tokoyami VS Yaoyorozu
7. Tetsutetsu VS Kirishima.
8. Uraraka VS Bakugo.
Mina looked at the list and frowned a little when she saw her opponent's name. She looked up to Harry and was surprised to see that he still hadn't opened his eyes. The girl went up to the teenager and tapped him on the shoulder.
"Hey Harry we are meeting in the fifth match!"
Harry didn't react and continued to stand still, Mina tilted her head in confusion.
"Harry? "She waved her hand in front of his face, but the teenager still did not open his eyes. At that moment, Sero approached the two and looked closely at Harry's face.
"I think he's asleep."
"Seriously? How can he sleep at a moment like this?!" Ashido scanned Potter from head to toe and grabbed him by the shoulders "Wake up!"
Harry's eyes shot open and he just stared at the pink girl for a few seconds without a word.
"Oh shit, did I fall asleep?"
"Yep~! We're going to fight, so wake up!"
He blinked a couple of times to wake up and smiled at the girl.
"Well, good luck to both of us."
---
While everyone else was competing in the intermediate competition, Potter continued to sleep. After the announcement of the rounds in which the students will fight, Harry again decided to sleep. Those fifteen minutes of shadow support overwhelmed his brain and needed rest... But he began to have a very strange dream.
Three familiar red stones appeared before his eyes. Two of them, as always, were spinning around the Stone of Pride, but something was wrong... And the teenager couldn't understand what exactly.
When he thought he noticed a slight change, he was awakened by a wave of cold air that reached even his bones. There was a huge block of ice right in front of Harry's face and the teenager shivered. He looked around and noticed only the shocked looks at the faces of his classmates.
"What the fuck just happened?"
"...Todoroki." Midoriya replied dumbly.
"Damn... Who pissed him off?" the teenager sighed heavily and took out his gloves. He hoped he wouldn't need them today... thanks Shoto.
The match between Mashirao and Kaminari ended pretty quickly. Denki stunned Ojiro with his lightning and pushed him out of bounds. But the match between Ida and Hatsume... The girl from the Support Course used their battle to advertise her devices for ten minutes... Harry left early to prepare for his fight with Ashido, so he didn't know that Ida won on technicality.
---
"And we are entering the fifth round! After such... interesting performance from Hatsume, I hope that something different awaits us. Or I'll have to annoy Eraser even more..." Present Mic muttered the last part under his breath.
"These are two Hero Course students now, so this must be exciting! In the right corner of the arena, the Lord of Shadows and leader of the first two events, Harry Potter!"
The teenager flinched at the title 'Lord of the Shadows'.
"...is he five?"
"In the left corner of the arena, the Girl who can melt even Todoroki's ice with her acid, Mina Ashido!"
"Is that all he remembered from our first two events...?" Mina also didn't like Present Mic's introduction.
"Mic, can you think of a better way to introduce our students?"
"There's no better way! And... Start!"
The two students just stared at Present Mic for a couple of seconds with hate in their eyes, but then turned to each other.
"Well?! What are you waiting for?! Fight!"
Potter's shadow began to move and swiftly headed towards Ashido. The girl wasted no time and ran to the side, shooting acid in front of her to accelerate.
Pride rose into the air and the shadow rope tried to grab Mina by the waist, but she was able to dodge the first attack. Unfortunately for her, the rope split into several pieces and tied her head to toe.
Ashido tried to melt the materialized shadow with her acid, but it only glazed down the ropes and damaged her own clothes. In the stands, Mineta shouted in victory.
"Can you move?" Midnight asked from the side of the arena.
"If I could, I wouldn't be standing still, would I?"
"Don't snap at me, brat! Ashido is immobilized!"
"Well, that was quick... Potter moves onto the next round!" Present Mic announced loudly and the crowd responded with excited cheers.
Harry returned the shadows around Mina to their original state and walked over to the girl.
"No hard feelings, right?"
"Sure! But you're telling me about the girl from Support Course from earlier." she answered with grin. A tick mark appeared on Harry's forehead.
"...you remind me too much of Karin."
At the same moment, the blue-haired little girl sneezed.
---
The fight between Tokoyami and Yaoyorozu ended as quickly as the last one. The Dark Shadow did not give Momo any time to use her items and pushed the girl out of the bounds.
"He was in your team, right, Harry? And he also has a shadow quirk. So next round we will be watching the battle between the two Lords of Darkness?"
Toru - still wearing her cheerleader uniform for some reason - asked from behind his seat. Harry's eye started twitching.
"Stop calling me Lord of Darkness. But yes, he was on my team. I can't just bind him with my shadows... Hmm, I need a plan."
Potter watched the fight between Tetsutetsu and Kirishima with interest in his eyes. The two guys had virtually the same quirk, so the fight became a skill competition. Both used boxing techniques in their attacks, but most of the time just punched each other in the face. Harry began to think that too few people are using Martial Arts today. Finally, both students fell to the ground unconscious at the same time.
"Well, if one of them used his legs to attack, the fight would end faster. Why isn't anyone learning Martial Arts today?" Harry muttered under his breath, but Ojiro heard him.
"For a long time, I also did not understand the reason, but in the end I realized that I was a little wrong. With the advent of Quirks that greatly change the very structure of the human body, people had to adapt. For example, because of my tail, I cannot use Martial arts of the pre-Quirk era to the fullest, so I mix a few and use that as my own style."
Harry looked at his classmate and blinked.
"Huh. I didn't think about it, although it's so simple... But even so, I am upset with such an attitude towards Martial Arts. Maybe I should organize some kind of club...?"
"A club? You'll teach Martial Arts?"
"Boxing, Kickboxing, Capoeira, Karate, Muai Thai, Aikido. I know these ones myself and can teach at least the basic kata. But I'll think about that later."
Harry also knew how to handle countless weapons thanks to the teacher he found through Giran, but Ojiro does not need to know about this.
Fight between Bakugo and Uraraka... Well, all Harry could do is think 'Gender Equality' and look at the brutal beatdown. Katsuki didn't care about his opponent's gender and fought like a beast, almost completely overwhelming Ochako at every turn. But even if Harry was the first to agree that one cannot hold back against any opponent - Aizawa had hammered this into his head long before the festival - he could not help but feel bad for the girl.
"It was difficult to watch." Mina shook her head a little "This looks too brutal..."
Bakugo stepped out of the left exit from the side of the seats and Sero perked up.
"Ohh... Rough match, huh, villain-face?"
Tsuyu leaned forward slightly to look at the newcomer as well.
"Awkward matchups aside, you do great at playing the bad guy, Bakugo."
"Shut the hell up, all of you!" he growled.
"No, really, nice job blowing up that frail little girl." Kaminari said, pointing at Katsuki.
Bakugo plopped down into his seat and folded his arms over his chest.
"Nothing frail about her."
After that, Cementoss repaired the arena and two tough guys clashed in an arm-wrestling match. Kirishima was able to get the victory from the hands of Tetsutetsu. The red-haired teenager held out his hand to his opponent and he took it. Harry could swear that a bright light was coming from their handshake.
"Well, that was manly." Tsuyu said.
"Deku vs Todoroki is next! I'm so excited!" Mina said punching the air.
"Deku?" Harry asked in confusion and several heads turned in his direction.
"Do you even try to listen to what's going on in class? That's Midoriya's nickname." Kaminari chuckled.
"Seriously? How in hell I've missed this until today? Damn, I need to socialize more." he rubbed his temples and frowned when he felt the cold leather of his gloves.
"Ah, I get it, Izuku - Deku. Let me guess, Bakugo gave him that nickname?"
"Yep! I don't know what happened between them before, but he called him that from the very first day!" Toru raised her hand with the cheerleader ball up.
"...why are you still wearing that?"
"And we're moving on to the next match!"
Present Mic shouted and the students turned their heads to look at the arena. Midoriya and Todoroki stood opposite each other, waiting for the Mic's signal. Harry put his elbows on his knees and rested his chin on his hands to take a closer look at the match.
'Well, let's see if my little angry speech did something.'
"Both of these competitors have won top marks in the festival so far! But there's only room for one of these greats in the ring! It's... Midoriya versus Todoroki!!!"
The crowd cheered with anticipation and everyone could see the tension between the two classmates.
"Start!"
As soon as Present Mic sounded, Todoroki sent a block of ice towards Midoriya, but he raised his hand and shattered the attack with one flick of his finger. The green-haired teen stumbled backward from the force of his own blow and Shoto created an ice wall behind him so that he would not be blown away by the shockwave.
"Whoaa! He smashed through!"
"He broke his finger again... At least not his arm." muttered Harry.
Todoroki stamped his foot on the floor and the ice began to rapidly move towards Izuku again. But he repeated shockwave and broke another finger.
"And he smashed it again!"
The scene was repeated for the third time, and it was at this moment that Kirishima returned to class 1-A.
"Gah, they already started!"
In the arena, Todoroki began to tell something to Midoriya, but the screams of the crowd made their words impossible to make out. Even Harry could not read his lips as the teenager was standing with his back to class 1-A.
"Hey, nice job getting to the next round, Kirishima!" Denki waved to his classmate.
"Thanks, I'm up against you next, Bakugo!"
"I'll kill you."
"Ha ha ha! I'd like to see you try!" the threat murder did not faze the teenager in the slightest "But man. You and that Todoroki... You can fire off as many of those crazy-strong attacks as you want..."
"As many as we want? Don't be an idiot." Bakugo did not take his eyes off the fight in the arena. "Strain your muscles and you'll tear them. Run too much and you'll be out of breath. Quirks are still physical abilities. Even this guy's gotta have some kind of limit."
"He's shivering." said Harry, also looking at the arena "After three attacks, his body is already freezing."
"Yeah, I guess you're right... So against insta-kill man, Midoriya's trying to stretch him out." Kirishima nodded and finally sat down in his seat.