Chapter 38: The Unraveling Comet
The world became a blur of roaring wind and the distant, thunderous pulse of the crowd. For Rock Lee, soaring through the air in a desperate, calculated leap, there was only one target. Below him, the battlefield had become a chaotic tapestry of ice and explosions, but his focus was singular, a burning point of intensity fixed on the laughing, retreating form of Katsuki Bakugo.
As Lee reached the apex of his jump, his hands moved with a fluid precision that belied the chaos of the moment. He began to unravel the thick, white bandages from his forearms. They were not mere wrappings; they were an extension of his will, a tool he had mastered in the silent crucible of the dojo. The white streamers trailed behind him like the tail of a comet, beautiful and ominous.
"WHAT'S HE DOING?!" Present Mic's voice screamed over the speakers, a perfect reflection of the stadium's collective shock. "IS HE FLYING?! NO, HE'S FALLING! WAIT, HE'S THROWING HIS BANDAGES?! WHAT IS GOING ON, FOLKS?!"
Down below, Bakugo was still reveling in his triumph, the ten-million-point headband a glorious trophy in his grasp. "That's right, you damn extras! This is where I belong!" he roared. "Hey, Tape-Arms! Get me out of here before these losers get any ideas!"
"You got it, Bakugo!" Hanta Sero yelled from his position as part of their 'horse.' He shot a long, glistening strip of his tape through the air, which slapped securely onto the back of Bakugo's costume. "Reeling you in!"
Sero began to retract the tape, pulling his victorious rider back towards the safety of their team. But it was too late.
Lee, now descending, cast his unraveling bandages like a fisherman casting a net. The white cloth, guided by his incredible precision, shot through the air. One strip whipped around Bakugo's ankle, the other around his wrist, cinching tight.
The effect was immediate. Sero's confident pull suddenly met with a massive, unexpected resistance. He was no longer just reeling in Bakugo; he was now in a mid-air tug-of-war with Rock Lee. The crowd gasped. The other contestants on the field stopped their own skirmishes for a moment, their eyes wide with disbelief as they watched the impossible drama unfold in the sky.
"WHAT THE HELL?!" Bakugo roared, feeling the sudden, jarring pull. He looked back and saw Lee, suspended in the air by the connection, his dark eyes burning with an unyielding fire. "LET GO OF ME, YOU DAMN EYEBROW FREAK!"
Pure, incandescent rage filled him. He began to unleash a series of powerful, concussive explosions from his free hand, aiming them directly at the white bandages. BOOM! BOOM! The blasts rocked the taut cloth, but it was surprisingly durable, woven for the rigors of Lee's training. It began to fray and singe, but it did not break.
Lee ignored the explosions. He ignored his own rapidly diminishing altitude. He focused, his muscles coiling, and pulled. Using his own body as a counterweight, he began to reel himself in, hand over hand, pulling himself closer to Bakugo along the length of his own bandages.
He was a spider climbing its own web, closing in on its prey.
The sight was utterly surreal. Sero was frantically trying to pull his team leader back to safety. Lee was pulling himself forward with relentless force. And Bakugo was trapped between them, a furious, exploding puppet on two sets of strings.
With a final, powerful heave, Lee closed the remaining distance. He was now face-to-face with a stunned and furious Bakugo. In a single, fluid motion that was almost too fast to see, Lee's right fist shot out, powered by the full force of the Second Gate, and slammed directly into Bakugo's stomach.
It was not a devastating blow, but it was sharp, solid, and perfectly placed. A choked grunt of pain and surprise was forced from Bakugo's lungs. In that single, split-second of shock, as Bakugo's body instinctively reacted to the impact, Lee's other hand moved. His fingers, deft and precise, plucked the ten-million-point headband from Bakugo's grasp.
He had done it.
But the price of the exchange was immediate. The explosions had taken their toll. With a sharp, tearing sound, the scorched bandages finally snapped.
Their connection was severed. Bakugo, freed, was violently reeled back towards his team by Sero. And Rock Lee, his prize clutched in his hand, began to fall.
He was dozens of meters in the air, with nothing beneath him but the hard, unforgiving ground of the arena. A stadium-wide gasp of horror filled the air. His own teammates stared upwards, their faces pale with terror.
"LEE!" Kendo screamed.
He was falling, the wind rushing past his ears. He had the headband, but what good was it if he was disqualified for touching the ground? His body was still in the air, a warrior who had won his duel but was about to lose the war.
And then, from below, the garden of salvation appeared.
Ibara Shiozaki had been watching the entire aerial battle, her hands clasped together, her expression one of intense focus. The moment the bandages snapped, she acted. Her vine-like hair shot upwards from her back, not as a shield this time, but as a living, growing net. The thorny vines grew at an incredible rate, weaving themselves into a thick, soft cushion of green directly in Lee's path.
He landed not with a crash, but with a soft, deep thump, sinking into the living cradle of thorns and leaves. He was safe.
Bakugo landed hard amidst his own teammates, clutching his stomach, his face a mask of pure, murderous rage. He had been beaten. He had been outsmarted. He had been publicly humiliated. He let out a raw, inarticulate scream of fury that promised a terrible reckoning to come.
For a moment, the arena was in a state of confused limbo. "Is he out?! Is Team Lee disqualified?!" Present Mic yelled.
Midnight raised her whip, conferring quickly with the referee bots at the side of the field. A tense silence fell.
"The ruling is in!" Midnight finally declared, her voice echoing across the silent stadium. "The rider, Rock Lee, did not touch the ground himself! He landed on an extension of his teammate's Quirk, which is still connected to the 'horse'! Therefore, it is a legal move! TEAM LEE IS STILL IN THE GAME!"
The crowd erupted in a mixture of cheers and disbelieving shouts. On the field, Shiozaki's vines gently, carefully, lifted the fallen rider and placed him back atop the shoulders of his teammates.
He was immediately met with a barrage of frantic, worried voices.
"Are you an idiot?!" Kendo scolded him, though her voice was thick with relief. "That was the most reckless, insane thing I have ever seen! We're finished if you fall!"
"Dude, a little warning next time!" Kaminari added, his own heart still hammering in his chest. "I think I had a heart attack! A really awesome, cool heart attack, but still!"
Lee, breathing heavily, secured the ten-million-point headband back on his forehead. He looked at his teammates, a tired but grateful smile on his face. "I apologize for causing you worry," he said. "But I believed in you."
His simple, earnest faith in them left them speechless.
"They've recovered the ten million points!" Present Mic roared, his voice filled with renewed excitement. "But the battle is far from over! Team Todoroki and a royally furious Team Bakugo are closing in!"
"We cannot endure another assault like that," Kendo said, her expression hardening as she saw the two powerhouse teams begin to advance on them again.
"Then we shall not invite them in," Shiozaki said calmly. Her vines, which had just been a safety net, now began to writhe and grow around them once more. They wove themselves together, thickening and hardening, until the team was completely encased in a massive, impenetrable dome of dark green, thorny wood. "Saintly Shield of Thorns!"
For a few precious minutes, there was a tense quiet. The other teams circled the dome like sharks, unsure how to breach it. But the peace was not destined to last.
A wave of intense cold washed over the dome as Todoroki unleashed his ice. At the same time, a series of massive, concussive explosions from Bakugo began to hammer against the other side. Ice and fire, working not in concert but in a chaotic, competitive fury, began to blast away at the living fortress.
Cracks appeared. The dome groaned under the strain. And then, with a final, combined assault, it shattered, exploding outwards in a shower of green splinters.
Team Lee was exposed once more, now trapped in a deadly triangle between the two most powerful teams in the competition. There were no allies. There was no escape. It was a three-way war to the bitter end.
With a final, desperate roar from the crowd, the final, frantic minutes of the Cavalry Battle began.
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