Sports Festival: The Race...

Chapter 27 - Sports Festival: The Race...

If there was one thing that Izuku was certain of, it would certainly be that his quirk made him the fastest person here, in the stadium that was. It made him faster than Tenya when he was going at his fastest, it made him faster than when Bakugou came at him using his explosives, maybe even faster than All Might. He still hadn't tested to see if his mind was fast enough to avoid Shinsou's quirk, but he would hopefully work on testing that out when he was done with today's competition. The point was that he was fast and everyone else knew it too.

Yet while he was caught up in his certainty that he would be fast enough to escape the initial crowd, he was dead wrong. He probably should've paid just a little more attention to how some of his competitors' quirks worked in such cramped spaces such as this small tunnel. He had believed to have thought of everything, but this was a very large oversight on his part.

Before the race even started he had been pushed to the back as several others tried to give themselves a better starting position. This had been a bit foreseeable as there were several people with quirks that would make them larger and Izuku couldn't do anything to fight against that. Thus he began the race at the very worst position available to him, the furthest possible back.

Then, just a second before things could really start, he began to sink into the floor without explanation. At first he believed it to simply be his mind playing tricks on him. Afterall, he was a bit nervous about doing well in this and just thought that it was those feeling taking hold. The problem was that his feet had gone under the ground and were still continuing as the race started without him paying attention.

To his surprise, there were several purple balls thrown specifically at him within seconds of the ground consuming his legs. He recognized that those spheres belonged to Mineta who had been in his class shortly before his departure to the general studies department. Despite Izuku being crazy fast, without the use of his legs several of them were able to attack themselves to several parts of his body, making it even harder for him to move. There were several that attached themselves to his hands as he tried pushing himself from the "quicksand". This caused his hands to become securely attached to the ground with him unable to do anything else.

Thank you so much Present Mic, not only did you make me a large target, but you also made it so that every hero here today is keeping there eye on me just to make sure I was worth the calling out. Now I just have to get out of this prison and out of these weird purple balls. Looks like it's time to test out that partial phasing that I wanted to show Mirio….

The only problem with this was the fact that someone else had decided to make Izuku's day even more difficult by covering him with a layer of ice which he couldn't avoid in the slightest. That's when he knew that Todoroki was in this to win, it was also probably used to stop the large group of students from following him directly.

God...that's c-c-cold….Well this has just made the situation slightly worse, ok so I need to figure out a few more things in this plan. Like how I'm supposed to pull myself from the ground when I'm mostly underground with nothing to use….now let's try a different approach.

Naturally his body began to shake, but Izuku was a speedster so he began to shake faster than most people could, in a way that most people couldn't. His body's movements were fast and rubbed against the ice in just the right way that it began to melt as the friction built up. Here the boy smiled and tried to continue this at a faster rate in order to get somewhere in this race at least.

Within a minute after he had been trapped, Izuku took a deep breath the ice around his body had been completely melted with his body temperature returning to normal, slowly but surely. The remembered how he had first practiced this whole partial phasing exercise during the weekend. He had to think of his arm as if weren't an arm anymore, to think about it as just the air around it, to make it move so fast that it was the air around it…..

He smiled as the balls that were holding his hands down simply went through and remained attached to the ground next to him. This was pretty much the easy part because going through the ice would result in him landing face first onto the ground and then having a very difficult time getting through the tunnel. It would be a good place to ice-skate in the future if he did choose to go ahead and do that.

Ok Izuku, there goes the last person who was trapped in the tunnel so it….crap some competitor just closed the entrance, why would they do that...besides the fact that someone wants me to lose...Well, I know that you wanted to save your big trick for the battles, but I have to use it now….

Izuku gently rubbed his wrists and turned them slowly as he eyeballed the closed entrance. Whoever had closed it made sure that Izuku would have an annoying time trying to get through, but he would do it nonetheless. If only the officials would have thought that his goggles were a necessity for use of his quirk, that would have made life much easier.

The speedster pulled his arms as far back as he could and rapidly brought them together with a boom that shook the stadium to its core. Large chunks of ice were ripped from the ground and collided with the stone that had been placed at the entrance. First, there was one large piece that caused a few small cracks to form on the surface, then another, then another. The speed at which the ice flew at the stone door was too much for the structure which the maker had believed to be impenetrable for a mere speedster. Within seconds it looked like one good shove would be enough to make it tumble down...

Meanwhile, the crowd of heroes had been looking at all the students as they encountered the giant robots which were used in the UA entrance exam. When they felt the slight shake of the entire stadium they were all forced to turn their heads at the starting place of the race. Some expected nothing to happen, others wanted to see the boy to come out running. None of them could really wrap their heads around the fact that the boy whose speed was running quickly somehow caused a wall made out of stone to go flying.

As Izuku stepped out into the sunlight he could see that the ground in front of him was littered with bits of ice, debris, and purple balls. He tore off a piece of his PE uniform and wrapped it around his hands. Although he'd gotten used to the strain of the clap, sometimes he simply tried too hard and hurt himself just a little bit.

Once the makeshift bandages were applied to his wrists he chose to tune back in to whatever Present Mic was saying, hopefully not something that would lead to him having a target on his back once more. Anything that wasn't that would be preferred.

"And would you look at that, Izuku Midoriya has successfully made it through all the barriers that were set before him as his competition makes it to the second objective. This race is just getting started as the Green steed is back in the running for first place. "

Without putting any more thought into it, Izuku began to run for the hills. At first he had to remember what it felt like to have legs and was thus a bit slow in picking up speed, that of course was after he fell flat on his face. To start with he simply seemed to be going at the rate a really fast car would go, which wasn't anything too shabby, but then he came across the giant zero-point robots.

He knew that even attempting to fight them would only slow him down and cause him to stay behind, but he needed to put a show on for the heroes so that they would have no choice but to recognize that he had potential. This is when his speed finally caught up to its usual pace….

There was a crack that could be heard around the stadium and a slight rumble as Izuku got past Mach 1 and began dealing with the robots that his classmates had struggled with only a few minutes earlier. The shock wave itself was enough to deal with all the one-pointers that had remained behind.

The two and three-pointers only needed a hard shove on his part to be thrown into each other and into large explosions. This was just the start of the show that he was attempting to put on for the heroes. He wanted to start small and end big, so he decided to take out all the remaining zero-pointers just because he could.

Midoriya weaved through the gigantic legs of the metal contraptions, remembering just how much trouble just one had caused him the first time around. That had been previously, back when he had very little experience with the quirk which he had now made his own. Luckily this time he knew exactly what he was doing, and he knew which parts to take down in order to put on the best show for the heroes.

He punched his way through the leg of one of them, then another and another. His quirk wasn't strength, but the speed made it easy to cleave his way through the metal or easy enough. At least he thought it would, right now he couldn't really feel his right hand which probably wasn't a good thing in the slightest.

Rushing out of the impact zone, Izuku came to a halt and rolled slightly as he forced himself to stop. His right fist was quite swollen and had some blood oozing from the knuckles. Apparently he wasn't invincible, but he was close enough at the moment with all the chemicals pumping through his blood.

He looked behind him and saw that the robots that had been used for the entrance exam were all now no more than scraps of metal on the floor of the arena. The audience which had previously been yelling at the top of their lungs were no silent in shock at how much power one individual could possess. Many thought of All Might as the mere power was displayed before them.

"And the magnificent steed does it once more, he takes on all the remaining robots from the entrance exam in one fell swoop. Now I don't want to say anything just yet but the points that he scored just now would be enough for him to get into UA once more if he truly wanted to." Present Mic excitedly began explaining how much force was required to destroy one of the robots, but Izuku was on the run once more.

He managed to pass a handful of individuals who seemed to be in the business department judging by how lax they seemed to be about not being in the lead. It a bit angering to see people throw such a chance away but he knew that they didn't have the same aspirations as the rest of the students in UA. The business department was one which was about teaching its students how to make the most profit off of the heroes that they interacted with. It was something that had overall decreased the quality of heroes going into the streets to help.

Within a fraction of a second Izuku saw a larger group of students standing in front of him. There seemed to be a large concentration of them at certain points, but he needed to overcome them as quickly as possible. Due to this he went for the obvious gaps in between the groups and pushed his speed even further than he had previously. If he was going to catch up he needed to make up for the lost time.

The one problem with this particular strategy was that he no longer had he had the ground at his disposal. Just as he picked up speed he felt the ground disappear completely beneath his feet and at this this he began to panic. At least the most that he could possibly panic while going over mach one heading into a seemingly pitless hole.

Crap, I didn't see this coming. This is just like the pit from the festival from last year...it better not have alligators or I'm going to have a word with the teachers...Wait, you need to focus on getting out of this scenario. Your legs are going to be useless for the next few seconds so you can forget about them, your hands however...no they've been used too recently and doing another clap could result in an injury which would prevent me from using them again….well I have no options but to try and get a good angle….

Izuku had little time to align the shot this time and simple clap his hands in front of him trying to get the force going downwards to propel him upwards. This was a strategy that surprised many of the students who were just about to start that portion of the obstacle course. Somehow none of the referees for the match thought to help him and simply believed that Izuku would be fine left to his own devices.

While that was mostly true, it didn't take into account that he was currently flying higher than he should've with a quirk like his. Of all the students in the crowd only one truly recognized who he was and that he desperately needed his help.

"Ok gauntlets don't fail me now…." The student jumped away from the crowd of students and jumped into the ravine where he began to utilize his quirk. "Picture, believe, and expand…." With an open palm in front of him the boy who belonged to the UA Support course opened what many thought was a portal. "I actually got it on my first try this time!"

He went to through the portal and disappeared from view, shocking more of the heroes as this portal closed and another opened next to the "flying" speedster. Popping out from this portal the suport student took a hold of his falling friend and tried to create another portal while still holding onto the speedster who seemed to have bruised wrists.

The velocity that they had would remain with them even after going through the the portals that he could make, so all that he could hope for was that enough of the portals would be able to decrease the momentum and this way he could survive.

With that in mind Francisco Ramon did his best to imitate a rescue mission and began creating portals that he and Izuku would go through with the exit of the portals aiming upwards and thus cutting of the speed before it could increase to the previous amount. In total it took him about half a minute to be able to completely do this but it was well worth it, or it would;ve been if he could have retained enough energy to take another step. At least he was in better shape than Izuku who….

"Why..." he asked weakly as he emptied the contents of his stomach on the ground next to him. Unable to use his hands as a support he was instead on his elbows holding his stomach in pain. If only Cisco had warned him about what the consequence of such travel could cause then maybe he would've asked to continue falling. "I mean thanks…" Izuku then stood up and weakly began walking towards the third obstacle which already had people crossing it.

"Yo Izuku you should rest a little, you don't look like you should even be standing much less running at the speeds you usually do, you just threw up everything that you had in your stomach. Take a break…" He tried to stand but collapsed before even getting to his knees. "You know I think I'm going to be the one resting...I'm simply drained. You should go and run if you have to…but take this…"He threw the standing boy a small pill with a green nauseated face on it.

"Um what is this for? Not that I'm not grateful for it, but what exactly is it?" He was a bit uneasy about eating anything at the moment given how his stomach was feeling. Maybe it would cause him to vomit the rest of his stomach so he couldn't do it anymore, who could really tell him what it was…

"It's a fast acting pill I designed to treat nausea, just toss it in your mouth and you should feel the effects within seconds...good luck, I'm just going to stay here and rest for a bit…."He then leaned backwards till he was flat on the ground and closed his eyes.

Izuku tossed the pill that he was given into his mouth and felt much better within seconds, now he only had to catch up with the rest of the competition, not that the commentary was being very helpful in telling him what to do at the moment.

"It looks like my green horse won't win anymore, but won't you look at that, it looks like Bakugou and Todoroki from class 1-A are fighting it out in the middle of the minefield and have slowed down significantly. This could be either of their game as they are reaching the final stretch. Now let me hear all of you scream for who you want to win!?"

Izuku heard the announcement and smiled, it was the smile of a hero who would rise to a challenge that would certainly be for the crowd. It was obvious that his hands were out of the equation as he needed to let them heal for as long as possible. Taking one last look at Cisco who was now napping, Izuku decided that he should get the guy something to show that he was thankful for his effort in saving him.

There was a small spark of electricity emanating from him as he began to vibrate with energy. His pupils dilated and his hair stood at its end, now he was truly ready to give them a run for their money. He took a single step forward….

….and he was off, faster than most people's eyes could capture. There was a crack of thunder and only some of the heroes turned their attention away from the two students who were already in the tunnel. Those that watched Izuku watched with fascination as the speedster's speed was built up rapidly.

A few of the students chose to turn their heads around and could only see for a second the speed of the boy. That was then followed by them being pushed to the side by the wind that followed. Heroics, Business, Support, General Studies, all of the departments were pushed aside as Izuku took center stage and sped past them with the speed of a god.

A few recognized him as the kid who had been restrained at the start of the course by a few of the students. The show of power made them wonder how he had even found himself in that position to begin with. They now knew who the top candidates were and this kid was certainly one of them.

Some of Izuku's classmates knew who it was when they heard the sound barrier being broken. Because of this they found a way to keep themselves grounded so that they wouldn't be blown away just like the rest of their competitors. This strategy worked well for them, up until the point where Izuku set off the remaining mines.

Even here Present Mic couldn't find the words to commentate, it was simply too amazing seeing something like a person covering this much ground. Even Aizawa was impressed by how much the boy had grown, though he still internally sighed as Izuku put out his best for the world to see. The League of Villains had already paid attention to him in the USJ. Doing well in the festival would only raise attention to him, it would make him an even larger target. Though the boy had heart he still had a tendency to not see the entire world for what it was….

Izuku, by doing this you've made your life much harder...All Might's time is coming to an end. Izuku didn't no that yet, but he would know about it soon. When All Might does go then the villains aren't going to worry about coming after you….

Clearing the minefield, Izuku sped up just a little more and saw that Bakugou and Todoroki were neck-to-neck. Both of them were trying to prevent the other from advancing any further while almost at the end of the the tunnel still seemed to be structurally sound, though the ground was a bit torn up.

Knowing full well that the ground would slow him down in its current condition, he chose to take to the walls. He hadn't done this before and it was probably the most risky thing he could do. Still he had to bet it all if he wanted to win right now, to get where he'd wanted to be since he was a quirkless child.

His feet came in contact with the side of the wall and he couldn't feel any slippage. He continued running, not sure if he could catch up, but he knew that he didn't care anymore. He'd shown that despite being held up at the start he could easily place in the top three.

Just before the exit he caught up, and he saw Katsuki's eye flicker in his direction for a mere second. The green-haired boy smiled for his childhood friend and continued as he surpassed both of his competitors. There was plenty of anger in Bakugou's eyes as he was left behind and forced to watch the kid he bullied surpass him.

If only Izuku had seen the end coming he probably would have slowed down and not gone flying like a bullet out of a chamber. He traveled quite far, the middle of the field, and landed quite brutally. The initial impact hit his foot which sent him rolling onto the ground. He had gained too much speed to stop by natural means and now had to resort to using his own body as a brake.

After a few seconds, he opened his eyes to look at the sky above. The audience was roaring with approval as he had shown them quite a show. At least he thought they were roaring, the impact had made his ears ring just a little bit and he couldn't tell what was what. As he turned his head towards the tunnel he could see that Bakugou had exited the tunel followed closely by Todoroki.

The green-haired boy tried to get up in order to congratulate his classmates on their top spots, but he heard a ripping noise. He looked down at himself and realized that the PE shirt was no longer there and he was in fact shirtless. His hearing returned to normal and that's when he began to hear Present Mic summing up the events that had just occurred in his own quirky fashion.

"See I told you my green stallion would come through and get the win. Now if anyone finds Snipe or Cementos tell them that I expect my money by next week. As for the obstacle race...it looks like Izuku Midoriya from class 1-A comes in first. Not only that, but he appeared to have been carrying a passenger along with him in the form if Minoru Mineta from General Studies. Now I wouldn't recommend attaching yourself to a bullet, but if you can handle it then props on you…"

Izuku slowly turned his head towards the ground and saw the deathly pale boy shaking violently on the ground. His purple grape shaped hair was a few shades then should be expected and it looked like he was trying to regain his breath. How he managed to hold on was a total mystery, how he got on was another, but he had managed to secure second place for himself. It certainly wasn't bad for someone who had been kicked from the heroics department on the first day of school.

Third and fourth place didn't look too happy either as they were suppose to have been first and second. Though the fourth place student didn't seem to mind so much, third place seemed like he wanted to kill someone.

I did it, the first event is mine, and I need to do two more of these and then I can keep going. It's a good feeling, winning after having to lose so often. Is this how all the heroes feel in their battles, how All Might feels? Lets see how much I can heal before the rest of the students get here, I think the minefield might have blown a few of them farther than intended…