Chapter 40: Echoes of Power
The brief intermission between matches was a quiet, tense affair. The sixteen finalists were separated from the rest of the students, guided to a waiting area closer to the arena floor. The festive atmosphere of the earlier break was gone, replaced by the grim, focused silence of gladiators preparing for single combat.
Shoto Todoroki stood alone in a quiet, concrete corridor beneath the stands, the distant, muffled roar of the crowd a meaningless hum. He was trying to center himself, to cool the simmering frustration from the first two events.
Suddenly, the air around him grew heavy, thick with an oppressive, radiating heat. A massive shadow fell over him.
"Shoto."
The voice was a low, guttural rumble, like grinding stones in a volcano. Todoroki did not need to turn around. He knew that voice. He knew that suffocating presence. It was his father, the Number Two Hero, Endeavor.
"Do not disgrace me," Endeavor's voice boomed, the sound bouncing off the narrow corridor walls. "Your performance against that tape-dispensing nuisance should be swift, absolute, and demonstrate the full extent of the power I have given you."
Todoroki's hands clenched into fists at his sides. "I will win with my own power," he said, his voice as cold and sharp as splintered ice. He refused to turn, refused to give his father the satisfaction of a face-to-face confrontation. "Not yours."
A harsh, contemptuous scoff echoed behind him. "Your mother's power? That fragile, defensive ice? Did you not see the boy who commands the desert? That is absolute power, Shoto. A power that both defends and crushes without limit. Your ice alone is insufficient. You will lose to the sand boy if you continue this childish rebellion." Endeavor took a step closer, the heat intensifying. "Use your left side. Fulfill the purpose for which you were created!"
Todoroki did not reply. He stood rigid, trembling with a silent, all-consuming rage, until the oppressive heat finally receded and the sound of his father's heavy footsteps faded away. He was alone again, but the quiet corridor now felt like a furnace, the air thick with his father's suffocating ambition. And in his mind, a new, furious resolve had been forged. Gaara was no longer just a competitor. He was now the benchmark. The obstacle his father had thrown in his path.
When he walked out into the arena for his match against Hanta Sero, his expression was colder and harder than it had ever been.
The match was not a fight. It was a statement. Sero, with a confident grin, launched his tape, attempting to quickly bind and throw Todoroki out of the ring. But Todoroki simply stomped his right foot.
The crowd gasped as a colossal, monstrous mountain of jagged ice erupted from the stadium floor. It was an attack of such overwhelming, disproportionate scale that it dwarfed his earlier display in the tunnel. It was not a strategic move; it was a raw, emotional outburst of frigid rage, a silent scream directed at the flaming figure he knew was watching from the stands. The glacier completely engulfed the terrified Sero, freezing half the stadium and ending the match in an instant.
As the crowd sat in stunned silence at the sheer, brutal power on display, Todoroki slowly turned from his frozen opponent. His eyes scanned the stands, passing over the faces of his classmates until they found him. He locked eyes with Gaara. It was not a simple look of rivalry. It was a cold, hard promise. A declaration. You are next.
Gaara met his gaze, his face an unreadable mask.
A short while later, the next match was announced. "From Class 1-A, a man of unbreakable spirit and fists, EIJIRO KIRISHIMA! Versus, from Class 1-B, the cunning copycat himself, NEITO MONOMA!"
In the stands, Monoma stood up, a wide, theatrical, and utterly insincere smile on his face. He was seated a row behind Gaara. As he moved to step into the aisle, he feigned a stumble, his body lurching forward. His hand shot out, landing squarely on top of Gaara's head for a single, fleeting second.
"Oh, my deepest apologies!" Monoma said, his voice dripping with condescending charm. "I did not see you there. It is rather difficult to notice someone so… quiet."
Gaara did not flinch. He did not turn. He simply registered the touch and the mocking tone, dismissing it as the meaningless posturing of an insignificant fool. He had no idea of the nature of Monoma's Quirk. He did not know that a seed of his own power had just been stolen.
Monoma walked away, his smile widening. As he approached the entrance to the arena tunnel, he paused for a moment in the shadows. He looked at his own hand, flexing his fingers, a new and unfamiliar power tingling just beneath the skin.
All this time, they've been hogging the spotlight, he thought, a genuinely arrogant grin spreading across his face. The survivors of the USJ. That angry one, the icy prince… and their pet monster. Well… He clenched his fist. It is time for the star of Class B to finally shine. And I'll do it using their own precious monster's power against them.
He stepped into the light.
The match began. Kirishima, all manly confidence, hardened his entire body and charged. Monoma stood his ground, that same mocking smirk on his face.
"Come now, Class 1-A! Is that really all you—?"
He stopped, his expression changing to one of intense concentration. He placed a hand on the solid concrete of the ring. The stadium floor trembled.
Kirishima skidded to a halt, his eyes wide with disbelief. Gaara, in the stands, leaned forward slightly, his placid mask cracking for the first time with a frown of pure confusion. What is he doing?
A chattering, grinding sound filled the air as a wave of reddish-brown sand erupted from the concrete, forming a perfect, churning tsunami. It was an exact, flawless replica of Gaara's own power.
Kirishima roared, activating his ultimate defense, "Unbreakable," his body becoming a jagged statue of hardened flesh. He dug his feet into the ground, bracing for impact.
The sand wave hit him. It did not break him, but the sheer, overwhelming, irresistible force lifted the unbreakable boy off his feet and carried him, struggling and roaring, across the ring and deposited him unceremoniously on the grass outside the boundary.
Victory by ring-out.
A profound, absolute, and total silence fell over the entire stadium. The crowd, Present Mic, Class 1-A—everyone was frozen in a state of stunned disbelief. They had just witnessed the impossible.
"W-W-WHERE DID THAT COME FROM?!" Present Mic finally screamed, his voice breaking the silence. "MONOMA HAS SAND POWERS TOO?! IS THIS A REQUIREMENT FOR THE HERO COURSE THIS YEAR?! WHAT IS GOING ON?!"
The students of Class 1-A were on their feet, yelling in a mixture of anger and confusion, until Yaoyorozu finally realized. "His Quirk… it's Copy! He must have copied Gaara's Quirk!"
But in the stands, Gaara heard none of it. His entire world had gone silent. His placid, emotionless mask was gone, completely shattered. His teal eyes were wide, not with anger, but with a deep, chilling, and utterly alien shock.
It was the feeling of being violated.
He watched Monoma on the stage, who was now theatrically dusting sand from his hands, bowing to the stunned crowd. He was using his sand. His power. The thing that had defined his entire, lonely existence. His curse. His shield. His only friend.
It was being used by someone else. As a trick. As a gimmick.
Gaara unconsciously brought a hand up to his gourd, his fingers tracing its smooth, hard surface, as if to reassure himself that his own, true power was still there. He had been a monster, a weapon, a student.
But he had never, ever, been unoriginal. Until now.
~~~~
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