The steel ball bearing rolled across my knuckles in a lazy figure-eight, its weight familiar against my skin. Ojiro had just taken down another two-pointer—his martial arts form was textbook perfect, all controlled power and disciplined technique. Jiro called out coordinates from her perch on the fire escape, her earphone jacks extended like metallic antennae. Our little team was running like clockwork, and my point counter was climbing at a satisfying pace.
Then the world lurched sideways.
The building beneath me didn't just shake—it bucked like an angry horse trying to throw its rider. My knees bent automatically, arms spread for balance as the rooftop tilted at an angle that gravity really didn't appreciate. The steel bearing slipped from my fingers, clattering across the suddenly uneven surface.
"What the hell—" Jiro's voice cut off as the sound hit us.
It wasn't an explosion or a crash. It was deeper than that, a bass note so low it bypassed my ears entirely and went straight to my bones. The kind of sound that made your teeth ache and your spine remember it was just a fragile stack of calcium waiting to be rearranged. Every window in the mock city sang in harmony, a crystalline chorus of stress fractures spreading like spider webs.
In the distance, something impossible was happening. The skyline was wrong. Where there had been a cluster of mid-rise buildings, now there was just... shadow. A darkness so complete it seemed to devour light itself, stretching upward until it disappeared into the afternoon sky.
"Oh, you magnificent bastards," I whispered, and I couldn't keep the grin off my face.
The scramble of feet on metal made me turn. Ojiro had scaled the building's side in three impressive bounds, his tail coiled tight against his back—a tell I filed away for future reference. Jiro was right behind him, her usual casual confidence replaced by something tighter, more focused.
"Murano!" Ojiro's voice carried the kind of edge that suggested he'd already figured out what was casting that shadow. "We need to move. Now."
But I wasn't looking at them anymore. My attention had shifted to the street below, where our carefully ordered battlefield had transformed into something much more interesting. Students who'd been locked in combat with robots were now running—not retreating, fleeing—their point totals forgotten in favor of basic survival instincts.
Smart kids. Well, smart enough to recognize a rigged game when they saw one.
The shadow was moving now, and with it came the sound of civilization being politely asked to step aside. Concrete groaned. Steel shrieked. Glass surrendered in cascading waterfalls of glittering fragments. Whatever was making its way through the mock city wasn't bothering with things like "structural integrity" or "architectural preservation."
Then I saw it.
The Zero-Pointer rose above the building line like some fever dream of military engineering, all brutal angles and malevolent purpose. Its single red eye swept across the battlefield and I could practically feel the targeting algorithms running behind that crimson lens. The thing had to be sixty meters tall, maybe seventy, built like someone had asked a child to design the scariest robot possible and then given them unlimited funding.
"Holy shit," Jiro breathed, her jacks retracting so fast they practically snapped back against her earlobes.
Ojiro's tail was pressed flat against his spine now, every line of his body screaming flight-or-fight with a heavy emphasis on the flight portion. "Present Mic said zero points! We're supposed to avoid it!"
I rolled the recovered steel bearing across my knuckles again, the motion automatic now. My eyes tracked the Zero-Pointer's path, calculating angles and trajectories, mapping the chaos like it was just another hand of cards.
"Zero villain points," I corrected, not taking my gaze off the unfolding disaster. "That doesn't mean it's worthless."
The robot's foot came down on a three-story building, and the structure folded like origami. Dust billowed outward in a perfect sphere, and through that expanding cloud of debris, I caught a flash of brown hair and pink cheeks.
A girl. Pinned under a concrete slab that had to weigh half a ton, directly in the path of our new mechanical friend. She was struggling, pushing against the debris with both hands, but physics was being uncharacteristically stubborn about the whole situation.
And there it was. The real game.
I'd spent enough time in casinos to recognize a setup when I saw one. The written exam was the ante—just proving you belonged at the table. The robot hunting was the main event, where everyone focused on the obvious scoring system. But this? This was the hidden jackpot, the side bet that separated the tourists from the professionals.
"The house always has a hidden jackpot," I said, finally turning to face my temporary teammates. Jiro's violet hair was disheveled from the building's tremors, and her dark eyes held the kind of sharp intelligence that missed very little. Ojiro's martial artist discipline was warring with very reasonable self-preservation instincts, his jaw tight with the effort of staying put.
Both of them were staring at me like I'd just suggested we have a picnic in the middle of a hurricane.
"You two can run," I continued, charging the steel bearing in my palm until it glowed with soft violet light, "or you can help me cash in."
Jiro's mouth opened, closed, then opened again. "Cash in? Murano, that thing could step on us like ants! There's no point value!"
"Points." I laughed, the sound probably carrying more genuine amusement than the situation warranted. "You think this is still about points?"
The Zero-Pointer had cleared another building, its massive form casting the trapped girl in shadow. She'd stopped struggling against the concrete slab, her head turned toward the approaching mechanical titan. Even from this distance, I could see the exact moment she realized what was about to happen.
"Look around," I said, gesturing toward the fleeing students. "Everyone's running. Every single one of them is making the smart, safe, logical choice. They're following the rules, avoiding the zero-point robot, maximizing their scores."
Ojiro's tail twitched. "Because that's what we're supposed to do!"
"Exactly." The charged bearing was warm against my palm now, its violet glow pulsing in rhythm with my heartbeat. "So tell me—in a school that's training heroes, what do you think they're really testing for?"
The question hung in the air between us while the Zero-Pointer took another earth-shaking step. Jiro's eyes widened as the implications hit her, and I watched her mental gears shift from survival mode to something more complex.
"They're not testing our ability to follow instructions," she said slowly. "They're testing whether we'll break them."
"Winner, winner, chicken dinner." I pointed toward the trapped girl. "Brown hair, pink cheeks. She's got maybe thirty seconds before our metal friend turns her into street art."
Ojiro followed my gaze, and I watched his expression change. The fear was still there—he wasn't stupid—but it was being overridden by something stronger. His martial arts training had drilled certain responses into his nervous system, and "protect the innocent" was apparently hardwired pretty deep.
"Even if you're right," he said, his voice steady despite the circumstances, "what can we do? That thing's armor plating could probably tank a missile strike."
I grinned, a sharp, predatory expression that was all mine. "His armor is thick, but nothing is invincible. Just get me an opening."
Before Jiro could voice whatever objection was forming behind those sharp violet eyes, movement in my peripheral vision yanked my attention downward. A flash of green—not the sickly pallor of fear, but something electric and alive.
It was the nervous kid from the briefing. The one who'd been muttering to himself while Captain Stick-Up-His-Ass had torn him a new one. Broccoli Hair was sprinting toward the mechanical apocalypse like he'd just spotted his favorite vending machine.
"Is that guy insane?" Ojiro's voice cracked on the last word.
I watched the kid's legs pump harder, his wild green curls bouncing with each step. There was something building around him—a crackling aura that made the air itself seem to vibrate. Green lightning danced across his skin like he'd stuck his finger in the world's most dangerous electrical socket.
Then he jumped.
Not a normal jump. Not even a superhuman jump. This was physics filing a formal complaint and being told to sit down and shut up. The kid launched himself into the air like a green comet, his right arm cocked back, fist glowing with enough concentrated power to make my charged ball bearings look like party tricks.
Holy shit, Broccoli.
My respect for the kid skyrocketed. This wasn't just courage; this was the kind of beautiful, suicidal madness that separated legends from footnotes. The kid was aiming for the Zero-Pointer's head, going for the kill shot with everything he had.
But here's the thing about beautiful, suicidal madness—it usually ends with the suicidal part.
The robot was stable. Balanced. If Broccoli's punch didn't obliterate that metal monster in one shot, he'd be swatted out of the sky like a particularly ambitious fly. Noble? Sure. Effective? The odds were terrible.
Time to rig the game in favor of the house.
"Jiro! I need a weak point! Right leg! Give me a target! NOW!"
She blinked, her earphone jacks twitching. "What are you—"
"DO IT!"
The urgency in my voice must have bypassed her logical objections. Her jacks extended, piercing the rooftop concrete. Her eyes squeezed shut in concentration, and I could practically see her Quirk at work—sound waves penetrating the building, traveling through the foundation, mapping the giant's structural weaknesses.
"Got it!" Her eyes snapped open, bright and sharp. "Main ankle hydraulics! There's a stress fracture in the primary actuator!"
My hands were already moving. Three steel ball bearings rolled into my palm, each one accepting my Quirk's energy until they glowed like miniature stars. The violet light was so intense it left afterimages when I blinked.
Surgical strikes. Precision over power. Make the giant dance to my rhythm.
I flicked my wrist three times in rapid succession, each bearing following a perfect arc through the air.
The first bearing hit the ankle joint's outer housing. BANG! Metal shrieked as the explosion tore through already-weakened plating.
The second struck the hydraulic coupling. BANG! Fluid sprayed in a pressurized geyser, rainbow-slick in the afternoon light.
The third found the primary actuator rod. BANG! The sound was different this time—not just an explosion, but the death rattle of sophisticated machinery giving up the ghost.
The Zero-Pointer lurched like a drunk trying to find his keys. The head—that crimson-eyed monument to mechanical malice—dipped down just as Broccoli's fist met its target.
The collision was magnificent.
Green lightning met metal in a symphony of destruction that made my earlier explosions look like firecrackers. The robot's head didn't just break—it vaporized, turning into a cloud of shrapnel and sparks that painted the sky in violent shades of silver and gold. The shockwave hit us a split second later, a wall of displaced air that made my ears pop and set every window in a three-block radius singing their swan song.
Now that's what I call a proper finishing move, Broccoli.
The headless chassis toppled backward, its death throes shaking the earth like an angry god throwing a tantrum. Debris rained down in a steel and concrete snowstorm, and somewhere in the distance, the exam's end siren wailed its mechanical lament.
But my eyes weren't on the falling giant. They were tracking a small figure plummeting from the sky—Broccoli, broken, gravity eager to complete what the robot couldn't.
And there, moving across the battlefield on what looked like a floating piece of rubble, was the girl I'd spotted earlier. Brown hair whipping behind her, round face set in lines of absolute resolve despite the way she favored her left leg. She was riding that chunk of concrete like the world's most improvised hoverboard, one hand extended toward the falling boy.
Smart girl. Zero Gravity Quirk, I'd bet money on it. She's going to catch him.
But my vantage point showed me something she couldn't see—a massive piece of the robot's shoulder armor, knocked loose by the explosion, tumbling end over end on a collision course with her path. She was focused entirely on her rescue mission, unaware that she was about to become street pizza.
Can't reach him from here. But I can clear the board for the one who can.
I pulled out my last charged bearing—heavier than the others, dense enough to deliver real kinetic impact rather than just explosive force. The violet glow was steady now, controlled, a scalpel instead of a sledgehammer.
I took a breath. Calculated trajectory, wind speed, the falling armor's rotation. The math was beautiful in its complexity—three moving objects, multiple variables, one perfect solution.
I let it fly.
The bearing struck the tumbling armor plate dead center. No vaporization this time—just a sharp CRACK and a concussive blast that sent the debris spinning off course. It crashed into the ground a dozen meters to the girl's left, gouging a crater in the concrete.
She never even noticed. Her entire world had narrowed to the boy falling toward her, and when her palm slapped his back, her voice rang out clear and strong: "Release!"
Broccoli's descent stopped so abruptly it looked like someone had hit pause on reality. He floated there, inches above the unforgiving pavement, unconscious but alive.
"Holy shit," Jiro whispered. She was staring down at the scene, her face pale beneath the purple fringe. "Did we just—"
"Win?" I dropped from the rooftop, landing in a neat crouch beside the smoking wreckage. The fall should have hurt, but adrenaline was a hell of a drug. "Yeah, I'd say we won."
Ojiro landed beside me with considerably more grace, his tail providing perfect balance. "That was insane. You're insane. This whole thing is insane."
"Insanity is just another word for thinking outside the box." I stood slowly. "Besides, it worked, didn't it?"
Jiro hit the ground last, her boots crunching on scattered debris. Her jacks were still extended, twitching as they picked up the sounds of approaching rescue crews. "The way you coordinated that... it was like you could see the whole battlefield at once."
Because I could, Kyoka-chan. When you've spent years reading tells and calculating odds, everything else is just pattern recognition.
I reached into my sleeve and pulled out a single playing card—the Ace of Spades, naturally. The black spade seemed to absorb the light around it, and when I flipped it between my fingers, it caught the sun like a dark mirror.
Somewhere in the rubble, I spotted what I was looking for. A camera lens, partially concealed behind a chunk of concrete but still recording. The faculty was watching, had been watching the whole time. This wasn't just an exam—it was a performance, and every good performance needed a proper finale.
I turned toward the hidden camera, caught the card one last time, and gave a lazy two-fingered salute. My smirk was all sharp edges and satisfied confidence.
Ooh, I just made a name for myself.