"Todoroki! Final thirty seconds! Hang on!"
Yaoyorozu's voice was thick with desperation.
They had managed to snatch the ten-million-point headband using Iida's Recipro Burst, but they had almost nothing left to withstand Bakugo's relentless assault. Iida was down to a normal walking pace due to the stall, Kaminari had fried his brain with his earlier discharges, and Yaoyorozu had already exhausted most of her stamina and lipids.
It was all on Todoroki now, but the difficulty level was astronomical.
Bakugo's Quirk relied on his sweat; the more he moved, the more he secreted, and the more powerful his explosions became. It was a "slow-starter" ability that gained momentum the longer the fight lasted.
It was the exact opposite of Todoroki's ice.
Todoroki could hit with maximum output from the first strike, but the more he used it, the more its power waned. Furthermore, the frost generated by his Quirk lowered his body temperature, causing a significant drop in his physical performance. It was a Quirk built for short-term suppression.
In a head-on fight, the match-up wasn't necessarily bad for him—if he could end it before Bakugo's engine fully warmed up. But once he missed that window, his chances of winning plummeted. And that was exactly the situation they were in now.
"Don't look down on me, you half-and-half bastard!!"
Bakugo's roar pierced through the sound of continuous blasts. Todoroki shifted his gaze to see Bakugo's eyes, wild and glinting with a lethal intensity.
"You're gonna win?! Don't give me that crap!! You're talking in your sleep if you think you can win while only using half your power!! A half-assed loser like you doesn't stand a chance!!"
"What did you say...!"
Todoroki felt his skin prickle; his left side began to throb. He instinctively suppressed the heat that tried to flare up, but it was too late—he could already feel the warmth rising.
"Todoroki! Watch out, here he comes...!"
Without a moment's pause, Bakugo's right palm came flying in. Todoroki tried to freeze him, but the blast shattered the ice before it could take hold.
"Ha!! I thought you weren't gonna use your left?! Huh?! That's why you're a half-baked loser!!"
The rotation of Bakugo's arms accelerated as he transitioned into his next attack. His speed and power were on a completely different level than when the match began. The sheer volume of his strikes was overwhelming.
Todoroki realized, with a sinking feeling, that his defenses were starting to crumble.
Suddenly, Bakugo's palm slipped through his guard and slammed into his left shoulder. The impact, accompanied by a deafening roar, sent a shockwave through the entire horse. Even Iida, at the front, felt the horse wobble dangerously.
"What's the matter?! You half-assed brat!! I thought you were gonna win?! With only half your strength!!"
"You...!!"
Todoroki was furious. He was beyond furious.
He'd never had a high opinion of Bakugo's crude behavior, but hearing this guy lecture him about his left side ignited a primal rage. You don't know anything, he thought. You don't know about the old man, you don't know about my mother—you don't know a damn thing!
And yet you talk like you understand.
Todoroki grabbed Bakugo's arm with his right hand to freeze it. He managed to stop his movement for a split second, but because he was at his limit, the ice was brittle. Bakugo shattered it with a blast and escaped effortlessly.
"Your power's dropping!! Running out of gas already?!"
Bakugo's counter-strike blew Todoroki's guard wide open. Immediately after, an explosion slammed into his exposed stomach. The blow felt like it turned his stomach inside out, knocking the wind out of him.
Bakugo didn't stop. He pulled his body back like a drawn bow, readying his next move. Todoroki knew instantly that the next hit would be the strongest one yet. Realizing he couldn't dodge in his current state, he gritted his teeth to endure the impact.
"If you're such a weakling that you can't even give it your all, then stay away from her!! Me... and her... we're both using every single thing we've got!! And even then, it's not enough, so we're puking blood just to keep crawling forward!! And you think you can beat that?! DON'T MAKE ME LAUGH!!"
A massive explosion went off. The shockwave vibrated through the air. The accelerated palm strike entered Todoroki's field of vision.
"A half-baked loser with a slug's spine should just SHUT UP AND DROP DEAD!!!!"
"Todoroki!"
Just before the strike connected with Todoroki's face, a metal plate produced by Yaoyorozu slid between them. The metal took the brunt of the blow and was sent flying by the follow-up explosion. The resulting blast still buffeted them, but avoiding a direct hit from what was surely a finishing move was more than they could have hoped for.
"Tsk!! Don't get in my way, you exhibitionist!!"
"Wh-What?! Exhibitionist?!"
Yaoyorozu faltered at the insult. Taking advantage of that split second, Ashido's acid began melting the ground beneath Yaoyorozu's feet. Todoroki tried to shout a warning, but his voice was drowned out by another of Bakugo's blasts.
An instant later, Yaoyorozu's foot slipped, and the balance of the entire horse collapsed.
"Kamina—"
"I don't think so!!!"
Bakugo unleashed a blast directly at Kaminari. The sudden attack caught Kaminari off guard, causing his eyes to roll back. While malicious collapsing of a horse was a foul, the smoke from the explosion masked the movement, and no penalty was called.
"Now... die for real!!!"
"Bakugo...!!!"
Knowing his defenses wouldn't make it in time, Todoroki found himself reaching out. He aimed for the headband hanging around Bakugo's neck.
At the exact moment Todoroki's fingers snagged Bakugo's headband, Bakugo's hand closed around the ten-million-point headband. Todoroki tried to grab it back, but a blast blew his hand away.
"Todoroki!! The time!!" Iida's voice screamed.
『Fifteen seconds left!!』 the announcer yelled.
Todoroki was—
"Yah-ho!"
—interrupted as Nico Midoriya suddenly appeared.
She wore a smile so bright it felt out of place in this carnage, and her palm was reached out toward them. For a moment, time seemed to stand still... then, without hesitation, Todoroki used his Quirk to freeze the headband in his hand, encasing his own fist in ice as well.
Immediately after, the headband—along with his frozen fist—was yanked toward Nico. Bakugo was in the same boat; the headband gripped in his hand was being pulled toward her with incredible force.
"—Hah!! You always get carried away way too fast!! You moron!"
Bakugo triggered an explosion right on the headband. He must have controlled the output, because the fabric didn't vaporize; instead, a tattered, scorched headband remained in his grip.
In that same instant, the force pulling the headbands weakened, and they fell limp.
『TEN!!』
"I already figured out your Quirk's weakness!! You can't handle instant changes in the shape or state of your target!!"
Just as he had done to Todoroki, Bakugo launched himself through the air toward Nico.
"Wait—?! Retreaaat! My minions—Ack?!"
"Sorry, Nico!!"
A strand of Sero's tape latched onto Nico's shoulder. As she tried to pull back toward her horse, her body was yanked to a halt mid-air.
『FIVE!!』
"NICOOO!!"
"Waaaaah?! Don't come over here, you pervert!!"
『FOUR!!』
Bakugo's hand reached for the headbands around Nico's neck. She tried to swat him away, but because of the tape anchoring her, she was off-balance and couldn't mount a proper defense.
『THREE!!』
The tape reached its breaking point and snapped with a loud crack. At the same moment, the wire at her feet reeled her back toward her horse.
As she flew back, the headbands were no longer on her forehead.
Bakugo, also being pulled back to his own team, clutched two headbands in his hand—one he'd taken from Todoroki, and another he'd just snatched.
『TWO!!』
"—DAMMIT! JUST YOU WAIT, YOU JERK!!" Nico screamed.
『ONE!!』
"—!!!!"
『TIME UP!!!!』
The moment the buzzer sounded, Bakugo squeezed the headbands in his fist, his lips curling into a tiny, jagged smirk.
That visible flash of joy lasted only a second. But to Todoroki, it looked blindingly bright.
Unlike himself, who had been forced into a corner and could only focus on defending, Bakugo had never stopped thinking about how to fight until the very last millisecond.
As Todoroki watched him, he felt a sharp, heavy pang of envy for whatever it was that Bakugo had just grasped.
***
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