Shoto Todoroki stumbled, half his body frozen solid.
With a thud, he fell awkwardly, his left side hitting the icy floor, frozen, jagged shards scraping against his flesh.
A painful grunt escaped Todoroki's throat.
Then, with a thought, he burned.
Fire became a pool as it left him, turning the icy floor red.
The ice under him melted, the surrounding temperature increasing to an unbearable degree.
But Todoroki's right side was still frozen, melting at a snail's pace.
Ice Age was not an Ultimate Move he had practiced even once in the last month during training. If he was being honest, then he hadn't even planned to create another Ultimate Move. Not because he hadn't wanted to, but he had known that he wouldn't have been able to master it before the Sports Festival.
Zero Bullet was different.
It had taken him Luke's assistance for weeks, day and night, to gain initial mastery over it.
Not to mention, even after six weeks had passed, he still couldn't use Zero Bullet without damaging his fingers.
To him, it didn't matter if he could use five Zero Bullets, pairing one finger from each hand. If he couldn't use the same set of fingers without needing instant healing assistance, then it was a half-completed Ultimate Move at best.
Then, how could he have started working on another Ultimate Move, with the previous one not even remotely close to being completed?!
However, after being scolded by All Might that day, Todoroki had begun thinking…
Not about how to create an Ultimate Move, but how to level up the tricks he could already use.
And that thought had finally led him to Ice Age.
As a foundation, Todoroki had used his Heaven-Piercing Ice Wall. It was an enormous glacier that needlessly froze everything in one direction, reaching toward the sky. He could also use it successively, covering a large area under ice.
Todoroki couldn't help but realize that this move, though strong, wasted a lot of his power.
Instead, what if he channeled everything into one move, keeping the ice limited to the ground, instead of turning it into a glacier?
Such an attack could cover a distance as wide as the UA campus easily.
It would also render him incapable of using his ice side for some time, as he would be frozen solid.
The move was not feasible if he were fighting one-on-one. But the Battle Royale gave Todoroki the best chance to test out his idea to use it on a crowd of Villains, if it ever came to that.
Now, he just needed to get back to his feet as fast as he could.
Because, even if many students should have succumbed to his ice, getting caught by surprise, even more must have survived.
And all of them would be coming straight toward him…
…
Todoroki was neither entirely right nor completely off about his observations.
First, because of this being his first time using Ice Age, he had not only overexerted himself to cover as much ground as possible, but he had also overestimated himself and his Quirk. The ice had indeed covered the entire city, almost draping the entire region within the Laser Boundaries. It was also thinner compared to his usual attacks at lower scales, though.
Second, due to the complex and tall structure of the buildings, the ice had not covered their innermost and uppermost areas as thoroughly as Todoroki imagined.
And, because of that, many students survived who should have been too frozen to do anything if they had been on the outside.
Momo, Hagakure, Shoji, and Monoma, who were playing the long game, were such students.
But there were only four of them.
Many didn't have as much strategic patience as they did and were already heading toward the city's inner region when they ended up getting frozen under a thin layer of ice.
Among them, those who could instantly activate their Quirk managed to survive the Ice Age.
Yuga, Tenya, Mina, Jiro, and Tokoyami from Class 2-A, and Kaibara, Kamakiri, and Shiozaki from Class 2-B all survived by directly countering the thin layer of ice using their Quirks.
Uraraka used her Quirk on herself, temporarily floating, surviving it, too.
But these were the simple cases of survival.
There were two odder cases as well.
First was Luke, who, just after getting frozen, used the Scale Gauntlet on his right hand to burst apart the thin layer of ice… once again managing not to use his Quirk.
Second, surprisingly, was Midoriya.
Ice Age had instantly frozen Shinso, Fukidashi, and Midoriya, who were about to attack some 2-A students, finally.
Even though the layer of ice was thin, it had indeed been fast.
Before Shinso could have given any command to Midoriya, it had frozen the three of them.
Mental commands had no use when Brainwashing was in question. Shinso needed to say everything loud and clear, keeping it simple. So, the moment he was frozen, he had also lost his hold over Midoriya.
And the moment that happened, black-green strands of energy burst out of the frozen statue representing Midoriya, freeing him… keeping him in the game.
Many were as unlucky as Shinso and Fukidashi, needing Pros' instant rescue.
Tsuyu had survived the Ice Age by jumping high, but she couldn't last in such a cold environment due to her Quirk's nature. There was no option to just go out of the Laser Boundaries as well. So, she was forced to use the Emergency Switch.
Kaminari and Sero, who had been fighting a team of Kodai, Awase, and Shoda from Class 2-B, had all succumbed to Ice Age as well.
In total, Todoroki had kicked eight students out of the Battle Royale instantly. With the number of students standing at just twenty-five before, it meant these weren't the weaker part of the bunch, either.
At the stadium, whispers, mumbles, praises, and cheers had overtaken the crowd, Todoroki's face planted across various panels.
But… Todoroki had been right about one thing as well.
Some, if not all, would definitely go to him, guessing his precarious state.
Suddenly, at the stadium, all the panels showing Todoroki changed and were replaced by loud, flashy explosions.
It was Bakugo, grinning his way toward the central area with his mouth scorched as if… he had burnt himself!