Chapter 52: Cavalry Battle (Part 3)
"You think you can get away that easily, Deku!? Don't underestimate me!"
Seeing Midoriya take to the sky, Bakugo let out a roar. He pushed off of Kirishima's hands, stomped on his head, and shot straight up towards Midoriya like Astro Boy.
Midoriya saw him coming but didn't look back, instead shouting to Tokoyami, "Tokoyami-kun, I'm counting on you!"
Tokoyami didn't speak, but a dark shadow emerged from his chest and said cheerfully, "Leave it to me!"
Dark Shadow intercepted Bakugo, clashing violently with his flaming palms.
With a pained cry, Dark Shadow was knocked back, retreating into Tokoyami's chest. Bakugo, his ascent blocked by the sudden shadow, lost his momentum and began to fall.
"Stop giving people nicknames! My name is Hanta Sero!" A stream of white tape shot out, sticking to Bakugo's back and pulling him back down.
"WHAT PERFECT TEAMWORK!" Present Mic spared no praise. "ALTHOUGH BAKUGO LEFT HIS 'HORSE,' HIS TEAM'S FLAWLESS COORDINATION GOT HIM BACK IN THE SADDLE, SO IT'S NOT A FOUL!"
"Bakugo, watch out!" The moment Bakugo landed back in Sero's arms, he heard Kirishima's panicked shout. Before he could react, the tight feeling on his head instantly vanished.
Bakugo's pupils contracted. His headband, with all his points, had been stolen. Which bastard dared to pull a stunt like this? Do they have a death wish!?
Bakugo whipped his head around and saw a blond-haired boy twirling the headband in his hand, as if to mock him.
"Give that back, you little shit! You wanna die!?"
"So naive, Class A," Neito Monoma said, turning to look at Bakugo with a smile. "Your Quirks were all completely exposed in the preliminaries. As long as we finish within the qualifying ranks, we won't be eliminated. What's the point of fighting your own classmates just for a temporary ranking?"
Bakugo quickly caught on. "You Class B students planned this together, didn't you?" he said coolly.
"Correct, but no bonus points for you. Your class president figured that out a while ago. In my opinion, he's far superior to a dumb horse like you who just chases after a carrot, obsessed with a momentary lead."
Neito Monoma tied Bakugo's headband around his own head and said casually, "Oh, right, you're something of a celebrity, aren't you? The victim of the 'Sludge Incident'? You should tell me about it sometime, for reference. What it feels like to be captured by a villain."
Someone under him warned, "Monoma, that's enough! Someone's coming!"
Monoma's 'horse' moved away from Bakugo. He suddenly turned his head back. "By the way, I was hoping to see that explosion of yours if we met in the finals, but it looks like that won't be happening now. Hahahaha!"
Listening to Monoma's taunts, Bakugo's entire face twisted in rage. "Kirishima, change of plans! I'm going to kill every last one of these bastards!"
If Midoriya were here, he would surely be praying for the troll-master, Neito Monoma. Bakugo hated being compared to others, Kira was a rival he desperately wanted to defeat head-on, and the "Sludge Incident" was an indelible stain on his pride that he hated anyone bringing up.
At the same time.
"Boy! Give me the scarf!" a blond-haired girl with horns on her head shouted, her team charging straight for Kira's.
After dodging their lunge, and after Kira translated for her, Toru Hagakure seemed to make a face at the girl who had been harassing them for a while. "Never! Nyaaah~" she taunted.
The team attacking them was from Class 1-B. The rider was a blond girl with a heavy American accent. She was small but extremely confident, with the颯爽 air of a cowgirl.
Her name was Pony Tsunotori, and her Quirk was "Horn Cannon," which allowed her to fire the two horns from her head and control their trajectory freely. She had fired them a few times at the start, but between Kyoka Jiro's earphone jacks and Ibara Shiozaki's vines, her Quirk had not only failed to land a hit, but she had almost been paralyzed by Kira's Hamon.
She wasn't that difficult to deal with, but the reason she could be so bold was simple: the 'horse' she was riding. No, it wasn't a horse. It was a beast that looked like a lion.
The beast's name was Jurota Shishida, and his Quirk, just as his name suggested, was "Beast." Normally, he was just a young man with a thick head of hair, but once he used his Quirk, he became an unstoppable beast.
What surprised Kira even more was that, although he was on all fours, he was still wearing a pair of glasses. This put Kira on high alert, and he didn't dare to face him head-on.
The reason was simple—Is that guy under you Winston!? Kira desperately wanted to shout.
A beast wearing glasses, with a glint of intelligence in its eyes... it was hard not to think of that one gorilla from the old games who would go into a primal rage the moment his glasses were knocked off.
"Kira, what are you talking about!? They're coming again!" Jiro said anxiously.
Forget it, no time to hesitate. Winston or not, at worst I'll just let him rampage through the other teams.
Kira grit his teeth. "Ibara, get ready!"
The beast roared and charged at them. But Kira's team didn't move. Ibara lowered her head, her hands in a prayer position. A wall of vines, several meters high, instantly erupted from the ground in the beast's path, blocking its way.
"It's no use!" Pony Tsunotori shouted triumphantly. "You have been reinforced! Fast!"
The beast let out a roar and slammed headfirst into Ibara's vines, blasting a hole large enough for them to pass through.
The beast leaped into the air, aiming to crash into Kira's team.
Ibara's vines needed sunlight to grow quickly, and she had to concentrate to control their direction, which meant she was rooted to the spot like a sapling. Her classmate, Pony Tsunotori, clearly knew this weakness. She also knew that the hastily grown vines couldn't possibly stop Shishida.
Hand over that headband! Pony thought gleefully, her hand already outstretched, ready to snatch the floating headband.
Seeing the ferocious beast charging at them, Yoshikage Kira yelled, "Ibara!"
Just as the beast was about to land on them, a towering wall of vines shot up from the ground, obscuring Kira's team from view.
The last wall was several meters high and couldn't stop them. This one is only three or four meters tall. How could these hastily grown vines possibly stop the beast!? Shishida didn't think twice. He planted his feet on the wall and began to tear at the vines with his claws. Soon, he had ripped open a hole the size of a head.
Pony's head poked through triumphantly. She laughed. "Keep silent (Surrender)!"
This was a checkmate. If they tried to run, Ibara would have to sever the vines, and the wall would collapse, no longer blocking their path. But if they didn't move, once he tore through the wall, Kira's team would have no room to dodge.
However...
"Hagakure, sorry!"
Kira's hands tightened. Ignoring her yelps, he tossed Toru Hagakure's small feet into the air, seating her firmly on his shoulders. He then spun around and pressed his hands onto Ibara's hair. Instantly, golden ripples of Hamon spread out.
Hamon could be conducted through living things, and that included plants.
Ibara's hair turned a brilliant gold, and the vines she had grown were dyed with the same radiant color. In that instant, dozens more vines burst from the ground, growing at a frenzied pace and surging toward Pony and her team.
A moment ago, Shishida had been able to tear through the vines with ease. But now, infused with the golden light, they had become impossibly tough. His claws couldn't even scratch them. What's more, the vines were growing thicker, and the hole he had just torn was already beginning to heal.
If Ibara's vines were like ordinary plants before, then after being infused with Kira's Hamon, they had been transformed into something far stronger, like tempered steel.
Pony watched as the golden ripples spread across the vines. Her pupils contracted, and she tried to pull her head back through the hole. But at that moment, the vines surged from behind, as if supercharged, and rushed toward them.
"OH, MY GOD—!"
With a final, pained cry from Pony, their team was trapped, like a bird in a cage, completely ensnared in Ibara's prison of vines.
The beast's form was bound tightly. The golden light gradually faded, leaving only the head of a beautiful, horn-helmed girl with a look of pure despair sticking out of the vine wall...
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