"I wonder how much money was wasted on this?"
Natsuki Bakugo stared at the gates of U.A. High.
Katsumi snorted beside him, a sneer plastered across her face. "Didn't you say you'd already seen it before on a screen?"
Natsuki's face twitched, his earlobes turning a faint pink. He had, in fact, seen the building before.
Katsumi had pestered him into coming with her to take a look at the school when they happened to be passing through the area.
At the time, he had confidently dismissed it with a simple, "It's just a building. I've seen enough of them during my life."
And yet here he was, standing at the gates and staring at the sheer size and quality of the place.
He was strong.
But he wasn't shameless.
He had thin skin!
"Let's go inside. We don't know when the exam is starting, but standing around here definitely isn't wise."
Katsumi clicked her tongue. "Don't change the subject!"
Natsuki promptly ignored her and walked through the gates.
The pavement immediately caught his attention.
Smooth.
Flat.
Immaculately clean.
There wasn't even a crack where he expected one to be.
Natsuki lowered his gaze toward the ground for a moment, genuinely impressed by the quality of it.
How the hell did Midoriya manage to trip on this?
He shook his head.
Must be some kind of latent talent.
Maybe it was the protagonist's heel, talent beyond mortal comprehension
Whatever the explanation was, Natsuki doubted there was any ordinary reason for someone to lose their balance on pavement this smooth.
They began climbing the stairs toward the main building when a familiar voice caught their attention.
"Natsu-bro! Kaachan!"
Natsuki looked up.
There stood Midoriya Izuku.
The green-haired boy smiled awkwardly as he approached them. "Good morning! I didn't expect to see you two here."
"Morning, Izu-bro," Natsuki replied with an easy smile.
His eyes briefly moved over the boy.
Ahh~ my potential brother-in-law.
The thought was immediately followed by a phantom image of his sister's disgusted expression
'What the hell is this nerd doing here?!'
Natsuki's mouth twitched.
Not with that attitude, though.
At this rate, Katsumi definitely wasn't going to be getting married anytime soon.
His sister had a rather... peculiar view of other people.
Anyone she considered less gifted than herself barely registered as competition. To her, they were simply beneath her notice.
Those who were talented enough to challenge her, however, were treated as rivals.
Sometimes enemies.
The subject of romance was something she avoided like the plague.
Natsuki still distinctly remembered the first time he'd asked her if she was ever going to bring a boy home.
His fire-resistant palms still remembered the scorching heat of the consecutive explosions that followed.
He had learned his lesson.
"So you're taking the entrance exam too?" Midoriya asked.
"Obviously," Katsumi answered before Natsuki could.
Midoriya gave a nervous laugh.
Natsuki simply shrugged. "We figured we'd give it a shot."
"Give it a shot?" Katsumi repeated before glaring at him with a warning. "We're getting in...that isn't a question..."
"Right. That too."
Yep! He's a bit desperate for there to be a knight in shining armour to sweep her away!
The three continued toward the building together, pulling out the brochures they'd received when they were accepted for the entrance examination trials.
The pamphlets contained a simplified map of the campus and directions toward the examination rooms. Considering the sheer size of U.A., getting lost would have been almost inevitable without some form of guidance.
Midoriya occasionally glanced down at his own brochure while talking with Natsuki about the school.
Katsumi, meanwhile, contributed very little.
Mostly because she was busy glaring at the greenette walking beside her brother.
Natsuki noticed.
He decided not to comment.
No reason to ignite her fuse right now
They continued through the halls until Midoriya suddenly made a confused noise.
"Hm?"
Katsumi's voice came almost immediately afterward.
"Shouldn't the school be empty today?"
Natsuki turned his head.
Only then did he properly notice them.
Students.
Several students were walking through the halls.
Some wore the standard U.A. uniform. Others were wearing the school's sports uniforms.
Natsuki raised an eyebrow.
Midoriya looked just as confused.
"I thought only the people taking the entrance exam would be here today."
"Same," Katsumi muttered.
Natsuki looked around.
This was an entrance examination for prospective first-years. Naturally, he'd expected the campus to be mostly empty of current students.
But that didn't necessarily mean something was wrong.
"U.A. is still a school, a hero school at that" Natsuki said casually.
"You can't expect everything to stop functioning just because they're holding an entrance exam. Schedules change.
People have things to do. Plans don't always go exactly the way they're supposed to."
Midoriya nodded slowly.
"Yeah... I suppose that's true."
Natsuki glanced at the passing students one more time before returning his attention to the brochure.
It was probably nothing.
'You're jinxing it! ×6'
His inner thoughts echoed with the collective deadpan of the remaining tailed beasts inside his innerspace
Eventually, the three reached their assigned classroom.
To Natsuki's surprise, all three of them had been placed in the same room.
He looked at Midoriya's name, then Katsumi's, then his own.
What are the odds?
Not that he particularly cared.
The written examination passed without incident.
Nearly two hours later, the candidates were finally allowed to leave the examination hall.
The exam itself hadn't been particularly difficult.
The theoretical questions were manageable. The questions regarding Quirks were nothing Natsuki couldn't handle.
The real problem had been the questions regarding heroism.
They leaned heavily toward the idealized image of what a hero was supposed to be.
Saving everyone.
Putting others before yourself.
Choosing between people in danger.
Questions where the obvious answer was supposed to be the morally correct one, even when the circumstances made that answer unrealistic.
Natsuki understood what they wanted.
He simply didn't agree with it.
Wanting to save everyone and actually being capable of saving everyone were two completely different things.
If two people were in danger and only one could be saved, then there would be a point where a hero had to make a decision.
There wasn't always going to be a perfect answer.
Apparently, U.A. wasn't particularly interested in that kind of answer.
Natsuki was fairly certain he wasn't going to score particularly well in that section.
The rest, however, had gone fine.
After the examination, the applicants were given some time before being directed toward the auditorium.
Natsuki took his place near the beginning of a row.
Katsumi sat down beside him.
Midoriya approached the seats a moment later, only to stop when he realized Katsumi was sitting in his seat.
He didn't say anything.
He simply moved to the seat beside her.
Natsuki glanced between the two.
Katsumi clicked her tongue.
The expression on her face made Natsuki's eyes twitch.
Katsumi, my dear sister...
If you're that revolted by the thought of Midoriya sharing your seat, why the hell did you sit in his seat?
He wisely kept the thought to himself.
The room eventually settled down as Present Mic stepped forward.
His booming voice immediately filled the auditorium.
Natsuki listened as the rules of the practical exam were explained.
One-point villains.
Two-point villains.
Three-point villains.
The scoring was simple too, it felt like a but like a game if not for the brutal competition for points
Destroy the robots.
Earn points.
Simple? Try doing it with 50 students competing with you for a street...
Natsuki listened carefully as Present Mic continued explaining how the applicants would be evaluated, how the battlefield would function, and what they were expected to do.
Then Natsuki's attention sharpened.
Something was missing.
He subconsciously waited.
He knew there was supposed to be another part of the explanation.
His eyes drifted toward the crowd.
Come on...
He was waiting for the familiar voice.
The one he remembered from the original story.
Tenya Iida.
Four Eyes was supposed to be the one to point out the problem with Present Mic's explanation.
Natsuki's gaze moved across the room.
Nothing.
He couldn't see him.
Present Mic continued speaking.
Natsuki frowned.
His eyes lowered toward the brochure in his hands.
He checked the information again.
One-point robots.
Two-point robots.
Three-point robots.
And...
Nothing.
His expression slowly changed.
It wasn't that Present Mic had forgotten to mention something.
There was no Zero-Pointer.
Natsuki's fingers tightened slightly around the brochure.
Wait.
He remembered the Zero-Pointer.
Not perfectly.
His memories of the story were blurry in places, and there were plenty of details he'd forgotten over time.
But this?
He remembered enough.
The Zero-Pointer wasn't there to provide points.
It was there to create an overwhelming situation.
A situation where an applicant couldn't simply destroy a robot and watch their score rise.
It tested what someone would do when faced with something they couldn't reasonably defeat.
Would they run?
Freeze?
Panic?
Abandon someone in danger?
Or would they face adversity, even without any benefit for themselves?
That was the entire point.
And yet there was no mention of it.
Natsuki looked toward the crowd again.
Still no Iida.
Damn.
His eyes narrowed.
Is the plot diverging this much already?
First, the strange presence of current U.A. students.
Now this.
Something that was supposed to happen wasn't happening.
And Natsuki had no idea why.
Present Mic continued explaining the examination.
This time, Natsuki listened even more carefully.
Whatever U.A. had planned for them, it was clearly different from what he remembered.
And judging by everything he'd seen so far...
He had a feeling this entrance exam was going to be a lot more troublesome than in the canon
End of chapter 6