The roar of the crowd was not a sound. It was a physical force.
Even deep within the concrete bowels of the U.A. Stadium, the cheering of seventy thousand people filtered through the thick walls as a low, continuous rumble that vibrated right up through the soles of my shoes. It was the sound of a modern Colosseum, a deafening tide of expectation that could easily swallow a teenager's nerves whole.
I sat on a wooden bench in the Class 1-B waiting room, my back against the cool wall. While several of my classmates were pacing the floor, stretching, or engaging in frantic, last-minute pep talks, I was focusing on my breathing.
Inhale. Hold. Exhale.
With every breath, I fanned the small pilot light of internal warmth I had discovered in Genji's forest. It wasn't about generating a massive inferno or setting the room on fire. It was about centeredness. By maintaining a steady, elevated internal body temperature, I kept my muscles perfectly loose, my blood oxygenated, and my mind locked in a state of relaxed awareness.
To anyone looking at me, I just looked like a guy taking a light pre-game nap.
"Look at him," Monoma's voice drawled from a few feet away. I didn't need to open my eyes to hear the grin in his voice. "Takeda is meditating. He's already reached a state of zen while the rest of you are sweating through your gym uniforms. It's almost insulting how calm he is."
I opened one eye and offered Monoma a faint smile. He was leaning against a locker, his arms crossed. Despite his usual theatrical bravado, I could see the slight tremor in his fingers. Monoma cared deeply about proving Class 1-B's worth, and that care manifested as intense, vibrating anxiety.
"I'm not zen, Monoma," I said softly, sitting up and stretching my arms above my head. "I'm just hungry. I'm trying to calculate how many takoyaki bowls I can buy at the food stalls after the first round is over."
A few of the nearby students chuckled, the heavy tension in the room breaking just a fraction.
"You and your food, Ren," Kendo said, walking over. She was fastening her red hair into her signature high side-ponytail, her eyes bright and focused. She looked like a leader ready to take her squad into battle. "But seriously, how are you feeling? The media outside is insane. I saw news helicopters circling the stadium when we drove in."
"It's a lot of spectacle," I admitted, standing up. I smoothed out the wrinkles in my blue-and-white U.A. gym uniform. "Back where I used to train, a master once told me that the louder the crowd, the quieter you need to become. If you let their energy dictate your heartbeat, you've already lost the match."
Kendo blinked, processing the advice, and then smiled warmly. "I like that. 'The louder the crowd, the quieter you need to become.' I'm stealing that for my own pep talk."
"Be my guest," I chuckled.
Suddenly, the overhead speakers crackled to life with a burst of static, followed by the booming, boisterous voice of Present Mic echoing down the concrete hallways.
"ALRIGHT, LISTEN UP, LISTEN UP! ALL STUDENT GROUPS, PLEASE PROCEED TO YOUR DESIGNATED STADIUM TUNNELS! THE FIRST EVENT IS ABOUT TO BEGIN!"
The room went dead silent. The joking was over.
Tetsutetsu slammed his fists together, a loud metallic clack echoing in the room as his skin briefly took on a silver sheen. "Alright, guys! Let's show the world that 1-B isn't just a backup class! Let's get out there and crush it!"
"Yeah!" the class roared in unison.
We filed out of the waiting room and into the long, dark tunnel that led to the stadium floor. As we walked, the light at the end of the tunnel grew brighter, and the muffled roar of the crowd transformed into a deafening, thunderous wall of noise.
As we reached the mouth of the tunnel, we merged with the students from Class 1-A and the general studies courses. The atmosphere instantly grew thick with competitive friction.
I found myself walking parallel to the Class 1-A frontrunners.
On my left was Katsuki Bakugo. He looked like a caged tiger, his shoulders hunched, his eyes fixed purely on the blinding white light of the arena. He didn't look at me, but I could feel the intense, crackling heat radiating off him. He was ready to explode, quite literally, out of the gate.
On my right was Shoto Todoroki. He was the exact opposite. He walked with a measured, icy calm that was almost robotic. He was staring straight ahead, his dual-colored eyes cold and calculating.
And right between them, looking like he was about to vibrate out of his own skin from pure anxiety, was Izuku Midoriya. He was mumbling to himself under his breath, analyzing the potential terrain and counting the number of participants.
As we stepped out into the blinding sunlight of the massive stadium bowl, the noise of seventy thousand screaming fans washed over us like a physical wave. The sheer scale of the arena was breathtaking—a giant oval of green grass surrounded by towering stands of cheering civilians, pro-heroes, and media cameras.
"AND THE FIRST-YEARS ARE ENTERING THE STADIUM!" Present Mic roared over the loudspeakers, his voice booming with infectious energy. "ARE YOU READY FOR THE GREATEST YOUTH GLADIATOR SHOW ON THE PLANET?!"
The crowd answered with a roar that shook the very concrete beneath my feet.
We gathered in front of a raised stage where the R-Rated Hero, Midnight, was standing with her signature dominatrix-style crop. She cracked her whip against the stage floor, commanding absolute attention.
"Quiet down, everyone!" Midnight purred into her microphone, though her smile was predatory. "It is time for the student pledge! Representing the first-years is Katsuki Bakugo from Class 1-A!"
A ripple of murmurs went through the crowd. Class 1-A looked nervous. Class 1-B looked annoyed.
Bakugo stalked up the steps to the stage, his hands stuffed deep into his pockets. He stopped in front of the microphone, stared out at the sea of faces, and spoke with a flat, unwavering arrogance.
"I just want to say... I'm gonna be number one."
The stadium fell into a stunned silence for a split second, before instantly erupting into a cacophony of boos and angry shouts.
"What the heck, man?!" Tetsutetsu yelled from beside me, his face turning red with frustration. "He's completely painting a target on all our backs!"
"Classic Bakugo," I murmured, watching the explosive boy stalk back down the stairs, completely unfazed by the hatred directed his way. I didn't feel angry. Honestly, I respected the honesty. Bakugo didn't play political games. He wanted to be the best, and he didn't care who he had to walk over to get there.
"Now then!" Midnight announced, ignoring the rowdy crowd as a giant holographic roulette wheel appeared in the air behind her. "Let's see what the first event will be! This is where many of you will see your dreams crushed before they even begin!"
The wheel spun rapidly, clicking through various labels: Maze, Tug-of-War, Scavenger Hunt... until it finally clicked to a halt on a bold, red font.
[OBSTACLE RACE]
"The Obstacle Race!" Midnight cheered. "All eleven classes will participate in this four-kilometer race around the outer perimeter of the stadium! As long as you stay on the course, anything goes! Now, all participants, take your places at the starting gate!"
The Starting Gate: The Bottleneck
The starting gate was a massive, arched tunnel leading out of the stadium. It was wide enough for maybe ten people to run abreast comfortably, but with over a hundred eager students trying to cram through it at once, it was a recipe for a human traffic jam.
I stood in the middle of the pack, surrounded by a sea of nervous teenagers. I could smell the sweat, the nervous energy, and the heavy air of competition.
"Ren," Kendo whispered from my left. She looked at the narrow tunnel ahead of us, her eyes narrowing in tactical analysis. "This is a bottleneck. Someone is going to try and trap the crowd early."
"I know," I said, dropping into a light, springy athletic stance. "Keep your center of gravity low, Itsuka. Don't let the crowd dictate your rhythm."
I closed my eyes, tuning out the shouting of the crowd and the countdown clock ticking down on the massive stadium screens.
Three.
I connected my feet to the concrete floor. I didn't use Rooted Stance to lock myself in place; instead, I used the sensitivity of my Earth Attunement to feel the distribution of weight in the crowd around me. I could feel where people were leaning, who was about to lunge forward, and where the gaps in the crowd would form.
Two.
I took a deep, centering breath. On the exhale, I willed the air around my shoulders to thin out slightly, creating a pocket of reduced air resistance. At the same time, I visualized the soles of my shoes having absolute, frictionless contact with the ground until the moment I chose to push off.
One.
GO!
A massive buzzer blared, and the crowd surged forward like a human tidal wave. Shouting, grunting, and the sound of heavy footsteps filled the enclosed space of the tunnel as over a hundred teenagers fought for every inch of space.
Immediately, my prediction came true.
Up ahead at the front of the pack, Shoto Todoroki didn't even bother to run. He simply reached down and touched the ground with his right hand.
A massive, jagged wave of ice erupted from his palm, sweeping backward through the tunnel with terrifying speed. It was a beautiful, ruthless move designed to freeze the feet of the entire participant pool in the first five seconds of the race, leaving them trapped like flies in amber.
"Here it comes!" someone screamed.
Students in the front rows were instantly trapped, their shoes fused to the expanding ice sheet. Others tried to jump, only to lose their footing on the slick surface and crash into each other.
But I was ready.
I didn't jump. Jumping in a crowd like this meant losing control. You couldn't change direction in the air, and someone would likely knock you down.
Instead, the moment the wave of ice reached my feet, I activated my Minor Kinetic Displacement—or rather, my element bending cover.
I didn't try to stop the ice. I simply matched its frequency. I willed a microscopic layer of high-pressure air to form between the soles of my gym shoes and the freezing ice.
I didn't freeze. I slid.
Using the momentum of the crowd pushing from behind, I transformed the icy trap into a perfect skating rink. I tilted my body forward, precisely shifting my center of gravity, and began to glide across the surface of the ice at high speed, effortlessly weaving through the struggling, cursing students.
"Whoa! Look at Takeda!" I heard Tetsutetsu yell from somewhere behind me. He was tearing his feet out of the ice using sheer brute force, his skin turned to heavy steel.
I didn't look back. I was moving too fast. I reached out and caught Kendo's wrist as I glided past her. She was struggling to keep her footing as the ice tried to claim her shoes.
"Lean into it, Itsuka!" I said, using a gentle application of kinetic push to guide her momentum forward. I didn't carry her, but I gave her the necessary vector to glide across the slick surface with me.
"Thanks, Ren!" she gasped, quickly finding her balance and using her own physical agility to maintain the slide.
Together, we burst out of the dark bottleneck of the tunnel and into the blinding sunlight of the outer stadium course.
We were in the top tier. Up ahead, only a handful of students had escaped Todoroki's opening gambit.
Todoroki himself was in the lead, skating smoothly on a self-generated path of ice. Right behind him, blasting through the air with continuous mini-explosions from his palms, was Bakugo. Behind them were a few others who had managed to leap over or evade the ice: Kirishima, Iida, and a girl from Class 1-B named Setsuna Tokage, who was floating her separated body parts forward in a bizarre but effective display of movement.
"AND WE HAVE OUR FIRST BREAKOUTS!" Present Mic yelled over the speakers. "AS EXPECTED, SHOTO TODOROKI OF CLASS 1-A TAKES AN EARLY LEAD WITH A MASSIVE ICE FIELD! BUT LOOK AT THAT! SEVERAL STUDENTS ARE ALREADY CATCHING UP! CLASS 1-B ISN'T LETTING HIM GET AWAY SO EASILY!"
The course opened up into a wide, dirt-paved canyon surrounded by high concrete walls. But as we rounded the first corner, the path was completely blocked by a wall of towering metal.
It was the faux-villains from the entrance exam.
Dozens of the massive, multi-million dollar Zero-Pointer robots loomed over the track, their glowing red eye-sensors locked onto us. Surrounding them were hundreds of the smaller, one-, two-, and three-pointer droids.
"Target acquired," the synthesized voice of a Zero-Pointer boomed, raising a massive, heavy metal arm to strike the ground.
Todoroki didn't even slow down. He looked up at the towering metal giants with absolute indifference.
"They went to all this trouble, and this is the best they could come up with?" Todoroki muttered. "If my old man was watching, he'd be embarrassed by how easy this is."
He swept his right arm in a wide, fluid arc.
An absolutely massive glacier of ice erupted from the ground, racing up the legs of the Zero-Pointers. The ice didn't just coat them; it expanded into their joints, freezing the hydraulic fluids and encasing the massive robots in towering, frozen sculptures.
Todoroki ran right under the legs of a frozen Zero-Pointer, continuing on his way.
"He stopped them!" a student behind us cheered, rushing forward. "The path is clear!"
"Don't go!" I yelled out to the crowd, pulling Kendo to a halt. "Look at their balance! He froze them while they were leaning forward!"
My warning came a split second too late.
The massive robots, frozen in mid-stride and top-heavy with the weight of Todoroki's ice, began to groan. The stress on the metal was too high. With a deafening shriek of shearing steel, the giant frozen robots began to tilt forward, collapsing toward the track below where dozens of students were running.
CRASH!
The massive metal torsos slammed into the dirt, kicking up a blinding cloud of dust and debris. Several students barely managed to dive out of the way, while others were cut off by the massive pile of smoking, frozen wreckage.
"That bastard!" Bakugo roared from the air, blasting himself over the falling debris. "He did that on purpose to block the path!"
Kendo stared at the wall of fallen metal and ice blocking the track. "He did. He created a hazard on purpose. Ren, how do we get over that? It's forty feet high!"
I looked at the fallen Zero-Pointer in front of us. It was a chaotic pile of jagged, frozen steel plates.
"We don't go over it," I said, a small, focused smile playing on my lips. "We use it."
I ran straight toward the wreckage.
"Ren! What are you doing?!" Kendo called out, running after me.
I reached the base of the fallen robot's massive metal arm, which was sticking up into the air at a forty-five-degree angle. I didn't slow down. I channeled a focused stream of the Breath of Fire into the soles of my shoes. I didn't create a visible flame, but I made the rubber of my soles incredibly hot and tacky, maximizing my grip.
At the same time, I leaned into my Air Attunement. I created a low-pressure vacuum directly in front of my chest, essentially causing the atmospheric pressure of the stadium to pull me forward and upward against the surface of the metal arm.
To the cameras and the crowd, it looked like I was simply running up a near-vertical wall of metal, defying gravity with nothing but sheer athletic speed.
"LOOK AT TAKEDA FROM CLASS 1-B GO!" Present Mic shouted. "HE'S RUNNING UP THE WRECKAGE LIKE HE'S STROLLING IN THE PARK! IS THAT PART OF HIS KINETIC QUIRK, ERASER HEAD?!"
"He's using air pressure and high friction," Aizawa's tired voice droned over the microphone. "He understands the geometry of the wreckage. It's a smart use of a simple power."
I reached the top of the fallen robot's torso, forty feet in the air. From up here, I could see the race spreading out below me. Todoroki was still in the lead, but Bakugo was closing the distance rapidly.
"Up here, Itsuka!" I called down, extending my hand.
Kendo, who had used her enlarged hands to climb the jagged edges of the robot like a ladder, reached the summit a moment later, breathing heavily but wearing a grin of pure exhilaration.
"That was amazing, Ren!" she gasped, looking out over the course. "Look! The track opens up into a canyon up ahead!"
"Let's not lose our lead," I said.
I looked down the other side of the forty-foot pile of metal wreckage. It was a steep, jagged drop back down to the dirt track.
I didn't climb down.
I grabbed Kendo's waist with one hand. "Hold on tight."
"Wait, Ren, what are you—?!"
Before she could finish the question, I leaped off the forty-foot summit.
Kendo let out a small, startled shriek, wrapping her arms tightly around my neck.
As we plummeted toward the ground, I opened my awareness to the rushing wind. I didn't fight the fall; I embraced it. I shaped the air beneath us into a thick, compressed cushion of high-pressure resistance—a localized Atmospheric Shield.
We didn't crash into the ground. We drifted down the last fifteen feet as if we were falling through thick water, landing lightly on our feet in a perfect, shock-absorbed crouch.
I let go of Kendo's waist. She stood up, her cheeks slightly flushed, smoothing down her gym uniform. She looked at me with a mix of awe and mild exasperation.
"A little warning next time, Ren?" she said, though she was smiling.
"I'll put it in the itinerary for the next obstacle," I replied with a wink.
We were now firmly in the top five of the race. Up ahead, the canyon walls fell away, opening up into a massive, yawning chasm that looked like it had been carved out by a giant sword.
This was The Fall.
The chasm was easily several hundred feet deep, with no bridge across. The only way to get to the other side was a series of narrow, braided steel cables stretching across the abyss, connecting to various raised stone pillars scattered throughout the pit.
Todoroki was already halfway across, casually sliding along a cable on a narrow rail of ice he was generating as he moved. Bakugo was flying over the chasm entirely, using his continuous explosions to bypass the wires altogether.
"Wires," Kendo noted, looking down into the dizzying, foggy depths of the chasm. "Great. I have good balance, but I'm not an acrobat."
"You don't need to be," I said, stepping up to the edge of the chasm.
I looked at one of the thick steel cables. It was swaying slightly in the high mountain wind that funneled through the canyon. For most students, this was a terrifying test of balance and nerve.
But I had spent ten years learning how to interact with the world's physics.
I stepped onto the cable.
I didn't balance on it with my toes. Instead, I used my Earth Attunement on the steel of the cable. I didn't bend the metal, but I connected my own center of gravity to the molecular tension of the steel. I treated the cable not as a tightrope, but as an extension of my own body.
At the same time, I willed a steady, low-pressure stream of air to blow gently against both sides of my body, creating a natural gyroscopic stabilization.
I began to run.
I didn't shuffle my feet or put my arms out for balance. I ran across the narrow cable as if it were a wide, paved sidewalk.
"What the... how is he doing that?!" a student from the general studies course yelled as he crawled slowly along a neighboring wire.
Kendo watched me for a second, then shook her head with a smile of disbelief. "You really are something else, Ren."
She stepped onto the wire behind me. She didn't have my elemental stabilization, but she was a highly trained martial artist with incredible core strength. She used her enlarged hands to grip the cable for extra balance, moving forward at a steady, respectable pace.
Halfway across the cable, I felt a sudden shift in the air pressure above me.
"MOVE IT, BACKGROUND EXTRAS!"
Bakugo roared as he flew directly over my head. The concussive blast from his palms sent a violent shockwave through the air, causing my steel cable to whip and buckle violently.
Any normal student would have been thrown into the abyss.
But the moment the cable began to whip, I dropped my center of gravity instantly. I didn't fight the movement of the wire; I flowed with it. I allowed my knees to absorb the vertical wave of the cable, using a quick pulse of my Molecular Anchor to keep my feet firmly glued to the steel.
Bakugo looked back over his shoulder, expecting to see me falling. When he saw me still running casually across the swaying wire, his eyes widened with a flash of pure, unadulterated fury.
"You damn nerd!" Bakugo screamed, though the momentum of his own explosions carried him forward toward the other side of the chasm.
I didn't answer him. I just kept running, reaching the other side of the abyss and stepping back onto the solid dirt track.
The final obstacle of the race was a wide, flat plain of churned-up earth. Dotted across the landscape were hundreds of small, pink warning flags sticking out of the dirt.
"AND WE HAVE REACHED THE FINAL BARRIER!" Present Mic roared, the excitement in his voice reaching a fever pitch. "THE MINEFIELD! THESE MINES ARE LOADED WITH HIGH-PRESSURE AIR AND PINK PAINT! THEY AREN'T LETHAL, BUT THEY WILL BLOW YOU SKY-HIGH AND COST YOU THE RACE! KEEP YOUR EYES ON THE GROUND, FOLKS!"
Up ahead, Todoroki had slowed down significantly. He was walking carefully, using his left foot to tap the ground to detect the hidden mines before stepping.
Bakugo, on the other hand, was now in his element. Since he was flying above the ground using his explosions, the mines were irrelevant to him. He was rapidly closing the gap with Todoroki.
"Out of my way, Half-and-Half!" Bakugo roared, swinging a massive, explosive palm toward Todoroki's head.
Todoroki dodged, countering with a sudden wave of ice.
The two frontrunners were now locked in a fierce, high-speed battle for first place, detonating several mines in the process as they kicked and blasted each other across the minefield.
I reached the edge of the minefield, Kendo arriving a moment later.
"We can't just run through there," Kendo said, panting heavily. "The ground is littered with them. And with those two blowing things up ahead, we won't know where the safe spots are."
"I know," I said, looking out over the field.
I closed my eyes and placed my palm flat against the dirt at the edge of the minefield.
[Earth Attunement: 31.20%] [Technique: Seismic Feedback]
I sent a low-frequency, microscopic vibration through the soil. It traveled across the dirt plain at the speed of sound.
In my mind's eye, the minefield lit up like a grid. I could feel the hollow spaces where the mechanical trigger plates were buried. I could feel the high-pressure air canisters waiting to be released.
I didn't see mines. I saw a map.
"Follow my footsteps exactly, Itsuka," I said, standing up.
I began to run.
I didn't run in a straight line. I ran in a bizarre, zigzagging pattern across the field, stepping precisely in the four-inch gaps between the buried pressure plates.
Step. Pivot. Jump. Step.
To the crowd watching on the giant stadium screens, it looked like I was dancing through a field of death with absolute, impossible foresight.
"WOW! LOOK AT TAKEDA FROM CLASS 1-B!" Present Mic yelled, his voice cracking with excitement. "HE IS RUNNING THROUGH THE MINEFIELD LIKE HE HAS AN X-RAY VISION QUIRK! HE HASN'T SET OFF A SINGLE EXPLOSION!"
Aizawa leaned into his microphone, his voice sounding genuinely impressed for the first time all day. "He's not using vision. He's sending vibrations through the soil and reading the return frequency. It's a highly advanced application of a kinetic detection ability. Very impressive."
We were closing the distance. Up ahead, Bakugo and Todoroki were still locked in their furious duel, completely ignoring the race in their mutual obsession with beating each other.
Suddenly, a massive explosion erupted from the back of the minefield.
BOOM!
A huge shockwave of dirt, pink smoke, and metal debris filled the air. Out of the pink cloud, riding on a massive sheet of metal from a destroyed Zero-Pointer robot, came Izuku Midoriya.
He had gathered dozens of buried mines into a single pile and detonated them all at once to launch himself across the entire field like a human missile.
"Whoa!" I muttered, watching Midoriya fly directly over our heads, holding on to his metal shield for dear life.
Midoriya's trajectory carried him right past Bakugo and Todoroki.
"AND OUT OF NOWHERE, MIDORIYA FROM CLASS 1-A TAKES THE LEAD IN THE MOST INSANE WAY POSSIBLE!" Present Mic screamed.
Bakugo and Todoroki both looked up, their eyes wide with shock as Midoriya soared past them. Abandoning their duel, both boys instantly turned and began to sprint toward the finish line after him.
I was only a few yards behind them.
I tapped into my Breath of Fire one last time, flooding my leg muscles with warmth and pure, unadulterated kinetic energy. At the same time, I used my Air Attunement to thin the air in front of me to absolute zero resistance.
I didn't try to win. First place would bring too much immediate media scrutiny and focus that I wasn't ready for yet. I wanted a high rank, but not the absolute top spotlight.
I crossed the finish line in a dead sprint, mere seconds after the frontrunners.
The final stretch of the tunnel led back onto the main stadium floor. As I burst out into the sunlight, the crowd let out a deafening cheer.
I slowed to a walk, panting lightly, the pleasant heat of my internal fire slowly fading back to a pilot light.
I looked at the massive holographic display in the air above the stadium.
[OBSTACLE RACE RESULTS]
Izuku Midoriya (Class 1-A)
Shoto Todoroki (Class 1-A)
Katsuki Bakugo (Class 1-A)
Ren Takeda (Class 1-B)
Itsuka Kendo (Class 1-B)
I smiled, thoroughly satisfied. Fourth place. High enough to prove that Class 1-B was elite and that my "minor kinetic quirk" was highly versatile, but not so high that the media would ignore Midoriya's miracle or Todoroki's pedigree to focus solely on me.
Midoriya was on his knees a few yards away, crying tears of pure joy and relief. Bakugo was standing nearby, trembling with a silent, furious rage. Todoroki was staring at his hands, his expression unreadable.
Kendo walked up beside me, leaning her hands on her knees as she caught her breath. She looked up at the scoreboard and let out a bright, ringing laugh of triumph.
"Fifth place!" she gasped, looking over at me with eyes full of gratitude. "I made the top five! Thank you, Ren. I never would have gotten past that minefield without you."
"You did the running, Itsuka," I said, patting her shoulder. "I just read the map."
As the rest of the participants began to filter into the stadium, I looked out at the roaring crowd.
The first event was over. The world had seen what Class 1-B was capable of. And the pilot light in my chest was still burning bright.