Chapter 21 : Lessons in Defeat and the Inevitable Bracket

I returned to the Class 1-A seating area amidst polite applause and curious stares. My victory against Kaminari had been clean, quick, and completely anticlimactic. I hadn't shown overwhelming power or inhuman speed. I had just used my brain. And for many, that was the most confusing thing of all.

"That was… so clever!" Toru exclaimed as I sat down next to her. "Using an insulator as a lightning rod! Momo-chan must have helped you, right?"

"It was her plan, Yaoyorozu provided the gear," I corrected with a smile. "Teamwork, even before the fight began."

"So unmanly, beating your opponent with a trick like that," Kirishima said from behind me, though there was a note of respect in his voice. "But I gotta admit, I never would have thought of it. You're really different, Tatsumi."

I just nodded, my eyes refocusing on the arena. The upcoming fights would be an invaluable source of data. I watched Iida's match against Hatsume Mei from the support course. It could barely be called a fight. It was a ten-minute product presentation where Hatsume cleverly used Iida to show off all her "babies," or inventions, to the corporate representatives watching, before casually stepping out of the ring and handing him the win. Iida looked utterly confused and slightly humiliated. I, on the other hand, was deeply impressed. That girl was a genius when it came to marketing and manipulation. She didn't care about winning the match; she cared about her objective, and she achieved it perfectly.

Then came the fight I had been waiting for with a hint of anxiety. Momo Yaoyorozu versus Fumikage Tokoyami. It was a battle of limitless creation versus unrestrained darkness. On paper, Momo had a tool for every situation. But I knew her weakness wasn't in her Quirk, but in her hesitation. And Tokoyami, with his aggressive and relentless Dark Shadow, was the worst possible opponent for someone who needed time to think.

The fight began, and my worst predictions came true. Tokoyami immediately applied pressure, sending Dark Shadow shooting forward. Momo instinctively created a large metal shield to block the attack. It was a solid defensive move, but also a mistake. It pinned her to one spot.

"Keep attacking, Dark Shadow!" Tokoyami commanded.

The shadow creature hammered Momo's shield again and again, each blow pushing her back step by step. I could see the panic starting to set in in Momo's eyes. Her mind must have been racing, trying to analyze Dark Shadow, trying to think of the "perfect" item to counter it. A cannon? A net? A light projector? Every option required time and concentration, two things Dark Shadow wasn't giving her.

'Don't think about the perfect item, Yaoyorozu,' I thought in frustration, clenching my fist. 'Think about a fast item! Just create something! The brightest flashlight! A flashbang! Anything to make it flinch and give you some breathing room!'

But she was too trapped in her own head. She was a chess grandmaster trying to plan twenty moves ahead, while her opponent was simply flipping the board. Dark Shadow, with one last powerful push, shattered her defense and shoved her out of the ring's boundary. The fight was over in less than a minute.

I saw the devastating disappointment on Momo's face as Midnight announced Tokoyami's victory. She had lost without even getting to show a tenth of what she was capable of. I felt a sharp pang of sympathy for her. I knew exactly what it felt like to have a great power you couldn't use when you needed it most.

The matches continued. I watched the brutal slugfest between Kirishima and a boy from Class 1-B, Tetsutetsu, who had an identical steel Quirk. Their fight was a festival of brawling that had no strategy whatsoever, but it was filled with incredible spirit and endurance. It ended in a draw after they both knocked each other out simultaneously. It was a display of "manliness" that had most of the crowd cheering.

Then came the most anticipated and most controversial fight: Bakugo versus Uraraka. From the start, many in the crowd pitied Uraraka. But as the fight began, I saw something different. I saw Uraraka, knowing she couldn't win in a direct fight, executing a clever and desperate strategy. She continuously charged low, forcing Bakugo to blast the ground around him and send hundreds of small rock fragments into the air, which she then made float with her Quirk above the arena, out of Bakugo's sight. She was preparing her ultimate attack: a meteor shower.

Meanwhile, Bakugo wasn't holding back in the slightest. Every time Uraraka got close, he would blast her away with full force. The crowd started to boo him, yelling at him for being "cruel" to a little girl. I snorted. They didn't understand. Bakugo, in his own twisted way, was actually showing respect. He recognized Uraraka as a dangerous opponent with a plan, and he was responding with his full power. He wasn't underestimating her. Aizawa-sensei even had to take the mic from Present Mic to explain the same thing to the clueless audience.

In the end, Uraraka's strategy failed. Her body reached its limit before she could release her meteor shower, and she collapsed. Bakugo won, but his face showed no triumph, only a cold annoyance. He knew he had come close to being humiliated. I gained a new respect for both of them that day. Uraraka for her courage and ingenuity, and Bakugo for his vigilance and his acknowledgment of his opponent's strength.

After the first round was complete, there was a short break before the second began. I saw Momo walking alone down a quiet corridor, her shoulders slumped in defeat. I couldn't just leave her be. I followed her and found her standing by a window, staring outside without really seeing anything.

"You fought well, Yaoyorozu," I said quietly as I approached.

She shook her head, refusing to look at me. "No. I didn't even get to do anything. I froze. Tokoyami-san was right… in a real fight, split-second decisions are everything, and I failed."

"You didn't freeze because you were slow," I said, making her finally turn her head. "You froze because you were trying to calculate ten moves ahead when your opponent was already on move one. You saw the whole chessboard. He only saw one move: 'attack.' Against a fast and relentless Quirk like Dark Shadow, there's no time for grand strategy. You need instinctual tactics."

I paused, letting her process my words. "You lost the fight, yes. That's a fact. But you'll learn more from this one painful loss than from ten easy victories. Now you know your weakness. You know that sometimes, a 'good enough' item created in half a second is more valuable than a 'perfect' item created in ten. That knowledge… it makes you far more dangerous in the future."

Momo looked at me, her usually confident eyes now showing vulnerability. But behind that vulnerability, I saw a new flicker of fire ignite. "Instinctual tactics," she whispered. "Thank you, Tatsumi-san. You've given me something to think about."

We returned to the stands just as the second round was about to begin. The giant screen displayed the updated tournament bracket. The first fight was the one everyone was waiting for: Midoriya versus Todoroki. A battle between two overwhelming forces.

Then, I saw my name. The winner of the Kirishima and Tetsutetsu fight (which would be decided by arm wrestling) would go on to face the winner of another match. And my opponent in the second round was… Tatsumi vs. Tokoyami Fumikage.

My heart stopped for a beat. Tokoyami. The boy who had just defeated my strategic partner with a relentless assault. I replayed his fight with Momo in my head. Dark Shadow was incredibly fast. Incredibly strong. And its mid-range coverage was nearly impossible to penetrate. I couldn't use an insulator trick like I did with Kaminari. I couldn't beat him in a contest of pure physical strength because I wouldn't be fighting Tokoyami, I'd be fighting Dark Shadow. My strategy of dodging and baiting might not work against a shadow creature that could attack from multiple angles at once.

I sat down, watching Midoriya and Todoroki walk into the arena. I watched Todoroki unleash his first massive wave of ice, and Midoriya, with a roar, shatter it with a single flick of his broken finger. As I saw the incredible power on display in the arena, a cold, terrifying realization crept into my mind.

Against Tokoyami… against Dark Shadow… I couldn't win the way I was now. I couldn't win with strategy, tricks, or my trained physique. To fight a monster made of shadow… I might have to unleash my own.

The choice made my stomach churn. My next fight might not just be a fight against Tokoyami. It might be a fight against myself.