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…
A few minutes after the test ended, All Might appeared in the room and guided everyone back to the surveillance room so that they could review the results of the round.
Once there, both teams stood side by side and waited for All Might to begin giving his verdict.
"Very well, everyone, could you tell me who you think the MVP of this round was?" The hero asked as he looked at the students of class 1-B standing beside him with a testing gaze.
"Was it Suzuki-kun?" Setsuna guessed with a smile, receiving a lot of nods from the classmates beside her.
"That is—" In response, All Might looked like he was about to say no. However, he suddenly stopped mid-sentence, and ended up letting out a fake cough before then continuing "—correct…"
And, as the class glanced at the hero confusedly due to his sudden change in tone, All Might began explaining.
"MVPs are the ones that act in the most efficient way possible and make the best choices during the test, regardless of whether they win or lose at the end. This is why most students also usually guess incorrectly about who the MVPs are, thinking mistakenly that the MVPs can only be part of the winning team… But I suppose this case is a bit of an exception"
As he finished his explanation, he turned to face Suzaku as he crossed his arms.
"Young Suzaku here took the lead in the battle and forced both students on the villain's team to adjust to his rhythm. Focusing all their attention solely on him, and on top of that, strategically guiding them to a corner where they couldn't notice young Itsuka deactivating the bomb…"
As All Might explained, the opposing team and Itsuka turned to look at Suzaku with surprised expressions.
However, their awe only lasted until they noticed Suzaku also looking surprised at All Might.
They swore they even heard him mutter "I did all that?" as he scratched the back of his head.
Nevertheless, they didn't have time to worry about him, as All Might's focus suddenly turned to them instead.
"... As for the villain team, you two got too engrossed in trying to beat and capture Young Suzaku, completely forgetting the fact that this was a 2v2 battle and that young Itsuka was still variable in the test" All Might shook his head in disapproval, before pointing his finger at them and advising "... Had you focused on simply protecting the bomb instead of acknowledging young Suzaku's presence, you could have maybe stalled for long enough so that the time remaining ended, and thus have won by default"
At that, both Ibara and Sen nodded their heads a bit ashamed.
As a result of Suzaku's flamboyant attitude, and the fact that he had fought them completely alone, both of them got carried away at some point in the battle and became completely focused on trying to capture him. Not wanting to end up losing to a single guy.
Their pride got the worst of them.
However, All Might quickly upped their moods after giving each a pat on the shoulder.
"... But well, that's why you are here. To learn and improve, so don't beat yourselves too much young ones. Your teamwork during the fight was splendid, and you did a good job choosing to stay in the room instead of going to look for them directly"
Then, finally, he turned to look at Itsuka.
However, as his mouth was about to open, All Might's gaze turned to Suzaku for a moment.
"Young Suzaku, may I ask why you chose to go along with young Itsuka's plan instead of proposing one of your own?" He asked, causing Itsuka to look at him with a questioning gaze of her own as well.
"She is a smart girl," Suzaku said with a shrug, before adding "I'm not so much about doing plans, so I figured it would be best if I heard her out"
"...!" Itsuka's eyebrows rose faintly upon hearing that.
"I see, being capable of cooperating with others and accepting one own shortcomings is a good thing" The hero nodded his head as he gave Suzaku a small pat on the shoulder.
After that, he went back to the podium of the room and began giving instructions for the next teams in line to prepare.
As the group of students began to move, Suzaku looked at Itsuka and noticed her looking toward the ground with a fidgety look on her face.
"What, did you like my compliment?" He asked with a smirk.
"Shut up" Itsuka gritted her teeth.
In response, Suzaku simply raised his hands as if claiming innocence.
However, their conversation was cut short when suddenly a loud voice appeared from Suzaku's side.
"Oi Suzaku, that was amazing!" Tetsutetsu exclaimed as he looked at Suzaku with glistening eyes.
"Well, I am known for being amazing" Suzaku massaged his chin as he nodded in agreement.
He was indeed amazing.
"Where did you learn to fight like that?" The silver-haired teenager suddenly asked, making Suzaku raise an eyebrow for a moment, before looking to the ceiling as if he were reminiscing the old days.
"It's a rather long story" He warned. However, Tetsutetsu didn't look like he cared about that, as his eyes simply gained more enthusiasm the moment he heard that.
"Good grief" Seeing that, Suzaku shook his head with a wry smile, before he cleared his throat and began retelling his long long long story of how he became the strongest human being in all the universe.
"One day I met an old man with dementia who was passing by my city and, after a little talk with him, he started teaching me how to fight," Suzaku said, crossing his arms as he nodded in satisfaction.
"... That's all?" In response, Tetsutetsu couldn't help but ask him with a bewildered expression, evidently having been expecting a much longer and more detailed tale than that.
However, Suzaku simply shrugged and said "Yep" with a popping sound at the end, not willing to go into further details.
"What's with that story?" As Tetsutetsu was having his eyebrows twitch, Itsuka spoke up from Suzaku's side. Making the latter let out a shrug as a smile formed on his face.
"Well, it's the truthful truth, if you don't want to believe it, that's on you"
"Come on, tell us mo—"
However, just as Tetsutetsu was about to try getting Suzaku to speak more, All Might's voice suddenly called out to them and told them that the next fight would begin. Prompting the three to leave their chatter for later, and walk towards the rest of their classmates to watch how the round this time was gonna go.
And like that, the time began passing.
Each by each, Suzaku's classmates began having their turns to participate, with each team having different ways of approaching their respective objectives.
As the minutes passed, Suzaku, in particular, made sure to make mental notes about how each of his classmates' quirks worked during every round that passed.
That would come in handy later. That was for sure.
…
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|The next day…|
…
The next morning, Suzaku managed to arrive at school while being only 10 minutes late, and while he had been rather proud of managing to be 10 minutes faster than the Suzaku from yesterday, the small feat didn't seem to have mattered to his teacher, who berated him quite deeply once he arrived at the class.
After he got reprimanded, his teacher also commented on the combat training from yesterday, telling him that he shouldn't fool around so much during a serious fight, but that he had done pretty well regardless.
Once that was done, his teacher gave way to the next activity that they would be doing for the rest of the class.
Choosing the class representatives.
There was quite the chaos in the entire classroom once the teacher announced that, with everyone in the classroom trying to convince him that they were the best option and blah blah blah. The only exception was Suzaku, who simply leaned back on his chair and prepared to take a nap for the rest of the class, not being interested in the position.
Unfortunately for him, though, his teacher ended up suggesting everyone to hold an election so that it would be more fair that way, causing Suzaku to end up canceling his plans to nap since he needed to stay awake to give his vote, much to his frustration.
In the end, Itsuka was the one who ended up becoming the class representative, having received Suzaku's vote during the elections, and also being a pretty popular girl in the whole class.
The vice-representative, on the other hand, ended up being a chubby pale-blue-haired dude whose name was Shoda Nirengeki, who, according to what Suzaku had seen, was an organized and formal dude who fitted the position.
To Suzaku's surprise though, he himself had almost gotten elected for vice-representative when the votes began being counted, only losing to the guy from earlier by a single vote. Which made even less sense when you considered the fact that he hadn't even offered himself for the position.
The whole matter surprised him so much that, at that moment, he began glancing around the classroom wondering who could have possibly thought that voting for him was a good idea.
However, the identities of his secret fans ended up being pretty clear when he saw Tetsutetsu, along with some other guys whom he had talked to earlier shooting him a thumbs up.
Fortunately, he still lost, so he avoided having the responsibilities of being the class representative shoved on him. Whatever they may be.
Sure, he could have gotten more attention later on when he became a hero if he had become the class representative, along with supposedly practicing what being the leader of a hero team was like, but honestly, Suzaku preferred the way things ended.
If he just needed to stand out from the rest, there were many ways of achieving that, not only by being the class representative.
As for practicing the role of a leader… Well, he was more of a lone wolf.
And besides, he wasn't sure he was fit for the role. If anything, instead of organizing and taking care of his classmates like a representative should do, his personality was more fit for being the one that caused a ruckus.
So, in a way, those classmates of his avoided a bullet by not selecting him as a representative. They just didn't know it.
"I wonder what kind of food there will be?"
Anyway, that's how the matters regarding the selection of class representatives ended.
As of now, Suzaku was walking to the cafeteria to finally try the so-called gourmet food that they served there.
Eh? You ask what happened the first day when he, Itsuka, and Tetsutetsu went to the cafeteria to do that same thing?
Well, turns out, because it was the first day and they only had one class during the entire day, the cafeteria did not open. Causing everyone to ultimately go back home hungry.
Yesterday was the same as well, as it seemed that they were still organizing everything before allowing students to enter.
Today, however, that had supposedly changed.
According to his homeroom teacher, Kan Sekijiro—whose name he finally learned after he got the opportunity to ask Itsuka—or Vlad sensei as his classmates liked to call him, the cafeteria should be open this time around since all the preparations had been finished.
This meant that today he would finally skip the process of making lunch himself and have a taste of the godly food that they supposedly served here.
As for what he would be picking…
"Who cares, I only want to eat meat…" Suzaku muttered as he increased his pace to the cafeteria, and began smirking greedily.
"You went out on your own again"
"Hey man, why didn't you wait for us?!"
However, his momentum was stopped when suddenly someone called out to him from behind.
"...?"
Turning around, Suzaku saw both Itsuka and Tetsutetsu just barely coming out of the classroom and sprinting at him.
"Sorry, I was hungry" Once they arrived next to him, he scratched the back of his head and apologized.
"Still, you should have waited for us" Itsuka looked at him with a pout.
"Well, like my dad says, a man should listen to his stomach!" Tetsutetsu, on the other hand, simply laughed it off.
"A wise father you have" Suzaku said, before pointing in the direction of the cafeteria with his head as he asked, "Well, let's go?", gaining nods from both of them.
With that, the three resumed their way to the cafeteria.
Once they arrived, they noticed that it was bustling to the brim with other students.
"I guess we are not the only hungry ones" Suzaku muttered as he and his friends moved toward the huge food line.
They were there for quite a few minutes. However, despite the line's large size, it wasn't that long before their turn came since the hero in charge of serving food seemed to be a very efficient one.
Once his turn arrived, Suzaku picked up a large piece of fillet with seasoned rice and went to look for a seat with a satisfied expression while Itsuka and Tetsutetsu made their choice.
"...?"
Along the way, however, Suzaku recognized a certain slimy head looking for some seats like him and raised both of his eyebrows in surprise.
"Well, if it isn't the good old Arata—" He called out to him immediately, expecting the kid to still be in a sad mood, and thinking of trying to cheer him up by sharing a meal or something.
However, to his surprise, the kid looked anything but sad.
"Oh, Suzaku, what's up bro?" Arata turned to look at him with a surprised smile.
Seeing that, Suzaku couldn't help but frown out of pure bafflement.
"What's with you?"
"What are you on about?" Arata raised an eyebrow, as if not understanding what Suzaku was talking about.
"Are you serious?" Suzaku's mouth twitched.
The guy had gone from super depressed to super normal. Just what did he mean by what he was on about?
"...?"
However, just as Suzaku was about to begin using his interrogation tactics on him, he noticed that on a nearby table, where Arata had been looking before he had called out to him, a certain girl with pink hair styled in dreadlocks could be seen calmly eating her food.
"I see" When he saw that, Suzaku nodded sagely as he shot Arata a knowing look, making this one raise an eyebrow in confusion.
"What?"
"Little Arata has a crush, huh?" Suzaku smirked while patting his friend's shoulder. Causing the latter to panic all of a sudden and begin looking back and forth between Suzaku and the girl.
"You son of a—"
"Don't worry, my friend, I know all about women" Suzaku suddenly said as he pointed at himself with his thumb, causing Arata to raise both of his eyebrows.
"Really?!"
"No, not really" Suzaku shrugged, before patting his friend's shoulder once again and turning around to leave "But I won't bother you with what you were doing. Carry on"
Arata didn't say anything to his leaving friend but simply stared at his departing back with a pissed-off expression as he muttered, "That guy…" before turning around and gulping in nervousness.
Back to Suzaku, after he left Arata to continue with his mission of conquering a maiden's heart, he found out that both Itsuka and Tetsutetsu had already found a seat, and were waiting for him.
So, without wasting a second, he walked in their direction.
"Oh, Suzaku-kun"
"...?"
However, as if today was the day of meeting people before eating, Suzaku was suddenly faced with yet another familiar face on his way.
It was the infamous protagonist of this world.
"Sup Midoriya" Seeing him all of a sudden, Suzaku nodded at the boy, who was walking along some frie—Actually, Suzaku remembered them, they were the gravity girl and the running guy from the show.
They sure looked different from what he remembered, or rather, from the little he remembered.
Being in real life truly made it hard to recognize characters like them. If it wasn't because they had certain features he still remembered, or because of some obvious details like the turbines on the guy's leg, he wasn't sure he could have been able to realize it was them.
"Hm" The timid boy returned the nod, before falling silent.
Then, just as Suzaku was about to walk away thinking that their conversation had ended, the girl beside him asked in a loud voice "You know him, Deku-kun?"
Facing the sudden question, the boy was conflicted about what to answer. Despite being neighbors, they hadn't shared more than a few greetings ever since they met two days ago. So, saying that he knew him…
Fortunately for him, though, Suzaku answered first.
"We are neighbors. I'm on Class 1-B, nice to meet you" Suzaku offered a handshake.
"Oh, a fellow hero!" The running guy said, before taking his hand and presenting himself in a real formal tone "I'm Tenya Ida"
The next one to take his hand was the girl "I'm Ochako Uraraka, we are from Class 1-A"
"Suzaku Suzuki" He introduced himself, and then, just as he thought that this time the conversation had ended for good this time, the girl gasped and clapped her hands as if she knew about him.
"You're the one that ranked first on the practical exam?!" She asked aloud, causing many of the people who were eating nearby to stop and turn to look at him with surprised gazes.
Midoriya and Ida were not an exception either, since as soon as they heard Uraraka's question, both turned to look at Suzaku with confused expressions before their eyes widened as if they had just remembered that they saw his name on the ranking's first place.
"It was you?!" Ida asked in shock as he adjusted his glasses.
"You were the first place?!" Midoriya also asked, bewildered by the fact that his neighbor had been the first place in the exam and he hadn't noticed.
Suzaku simply shrugged as he said "Somehow it happe—"
"So you were the bastard?!"
However, a loud and enraged shout interrupted him mid-sentence.
When he turned around, he saw a teenager with spiky blond hair walking towards him with a furious expression.
Immediately, he recognized him as well.
'The guy with anger issues' He squinted his eyes, recalling this annoying character of the show that he thought of beating up many times while he watched the Anime.
Now that he had him in front of him, though? Beating him up was no longer a fantasy.
At that instant, Suzaku's fist tightened, wondering how punching his angry face would feel like.
However, a second after that, he calmed himself.
-Sigh...-
He barely knew the guy, and right now they weren't in an anime where people could be one-dimensional.
Besides, who knew? Maybe in real life he was actually a nice guy, and there was no reason to punch—
"You damn side-character… You dared steal away first place from me?!"
—Alright, that was enough reason.
"Yeah, what are you gonna do about it?" Suzaku walked up to the guy, looking down at him with a smirk on his face, as he was a tad taller than him.
Though he wasn't one to often seek conflict on his own, this time he felt different.
He recalled the guy's behavior from the show, and if the brat in front of him was any similar to what he remembered, this guy seriously needed a beating to get his attitude in order.
He didn't know if it got any better later on, but no one could blame him if he gave the little runt some character development earlier than expected.
No, judging by his classmates' reaction, they would surely thank him.
"You...!"
The response seemed to fuel the anger of the teenager, who grew a vein on his forehead as he stared straight into Suzaku's face.
"You damn bastard, acting all tough… You were probably only lucky on the exam" The blond hissed, narrowing his eyes as his blood began boiling.
"Sounds like a skill issue to me" The red-haired shrugged with a taunting smile on his face. Adding fuel to the conflict.
"You bastard, you only surpassed me because of that Rescue-points bullshit!" The blonde spat, his frustration visibly building up. "... had that not been there, you wouldn't have even touched my shadow…!"
"Yeah, I didn't tryhard it as much as you did… Which makes it even more sad for you to have lost to me" He gave a small pat on the guy's shoulder, awaiting at any second for the guy to burst and begin throwing hands—Or rather explosions.
However, just as the blonde seemed to be on the verge of attacking him, Ida got between them and stopped the conflict.
"You two, stop it!"
"Move away you damn four-eyes!" The guy yelled at him, trying to reach Suzaku but being held back by his classmate who struggled to calm him.
"Suzaku, you picked up a fight?" Then, suddenly Itsuka's voice came from behind Suzaku and caused him to shrug as he shot her an innocent smile.
"Hey, he started"
"What's with this guy? Does he want to fight?" Tetsutetsu also appeared from behind him and shot the blond guy a hostile look. Preparing to help his new friend in case things got violent.
However, a calm pat from the red-haired teenager on the shoulder was enough to calm him down.
"Chill, the matter's already over. Let's go eat, my food is freezing" Suzaku pointed at the table with his thumb, gaining a nod from Tetsutetsu, who scoffed at the explosive teenager, before turning around and walking towards the table along with Suzaku.
Itsuka followed behind them, but not before muttering some apologies to Uraraka, Ida, and Midoriya, who by the way was looking at Suzaku with shocked eyes as he muttered "He taunted Kacchan..!"
Ignoring certain shouts that said "Don't run away you damn bastard!" or something along those lines, coupled with several piercing gazes from the students that had been enjoying a peaceful meal until then, it wasn't long before the three of them arrived at their table and began to dig in.
It took the hall a few minutes to calm down, and while the blond guy still looked like he wanted to throw hands, the arrival of certain teachers who had been called after their little stunt deterred him from trying anything further.
However, the piercing gaze that he shot Suzaku for the rest of lunch didn't pass unnoticed by either of them.
"What a guy" Suzaku muttered as he let out a sigh.
Lunch went like that for a while, with the three talking about classes, commenting on the taste of the food, Tetsutetsu trying to know more about Suzaku's backstory, talking about yesterday's combat test, villain attacks on nearby cities, etc…
In a world with superpowers, there were quite a lot of topics to talk about.
When the school bell finally marked the start of a new class, they began leaving the cafeteria and went to their next class.
However, as both Itsuka and Tetsutetsu talked with each other, Suzaku couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.
He felt a tad weird. Similar to having a bad feeling, but not quite there.
It was, in a way, similar to when you prepared profusely for something, but at the last minute felt like you forgot to do something.
It wasn't exactly like that, but very similar…
"How weird" Suzaku muttered, giving the cafeteria in the distance a weird glance and squinting his eyes before shrugging his shoulders and continuing his way to class.
If he didn't know what it was, then it probably didn't matter.
Thinking so, Suzaku shrugged the matter off and followed after his friends. Ready to face yet another boring class he had thought heroes wouldn't have to do in this school.
…
-To be Continued…-
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(A/N: Another chapter is completed, and Suzaku finally meets the official cast, aside from the infamous protagonist, that is.
Let's see if you bunch can figure out what made Suzaku feel weird at the end of the chapter
Also, MHA ended... Quite a moment I picked to make this ff, huh?)
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