Chapter 161: Victory Condition Met
"Teacher, look! What's that behind you?"
The moment Kira said this, Ectoplasm instinctively turned his head. But he immediately sensed something was wrong, stopped his turn, and twisted his head back, slamming his prosthetic foot onto Kira's chest to stop his escape attempt.
"Kira-kun," Ectoplasm said calmly. "That kind of crude bluff won't work on me."
"Sensei, you still haven't noticed, have you? You've already lost," Kira said, turning his head to look at Asui with a smile. "Did you forget... that there's more than one of us?"
"Cough, cough..." Asui coughed, a shiny liquid on her outstretched tongue as if it was causing her discomfort. "Kira-kun, we did it."
What does he mean? They're both under my control!
Ectoplasm realized something and quickly looked down at his prosthetic leg. There, a pair of handcuffs, wet with saliva, was clamped firmly around his ankle.
"Sensei, you thought I was just bluffing?" Kira said, as he broke free from the giant clone. This time, Ectoplasm was too stunned to stop him. "Have you ever heard the phrase," Kira said, pulling Asui along, "'feint in the east, attack in the west'? It looked like I was trying to make you turn your head so I could escape, but in reality, I was deliberately stopping you from looking behind you... and at the restrained Tsuyu Asui."
"Behind me...? What was behind me?" They were currently several meters in the air, with the giant clone as their only foothold. What could have been floating behind him?
He suddenly remembered the Bubble Cutters Kira had used against his clones. He instantly understood. "It was a bubble!?"
Asui, still coughing to clear the bad taste from her mouth, finished his thought. "And it was a bubble... with the handcuffs inside."
Tsuyu turned her head to look at Kira's profile, a sense of amazement in her heart. When they had been swallowed by that giant mouth, her only thoughts had been to push Kira out and to get the handcuffs—the only key to their victory—from him and swallow them into her own stomach.
Her body was like a frog's, and her physiology was not fully developed. When she ate something bad, she couldn't vomit; she could only eject her entire stomach. She had been planning to use this unique trait to create an opportunity for them to win.
But when her tongue had wrapped around Kira's waist, she hadn't found the handcuffs. Her only choice then was to try and push him out of the attack's range...
Asui and Kira had been bound close to each other. After Kira had broken free the first time, he had deliberately stretched out his arm. Although it had looked like he had been recaptured by Ectoplasm, in reality, his hand had secretly grasped Asui's.
Asui hadn't reacted to his touch, but as if by chance, had looked up, just in time to see a Hamon-infused bubble, carrying the handcuffs, slowly floating down from above...
The rest was simple, as Ectoplasm now realized. Kira's words had not only been meant to put him on edge, but also to signal Asui to prepare to attack. He had felt her tongue shoot out, but because it was aimed far away from him, he hadn't paid it any mind, focusing all his attention on the more threatening Yoshikage Kira...
And so, while he was blissfully unaware and congratulating himself on his victory, he had already lost the battle against his students.
"Victory condition met for Team Asui and Team Kira!"
Right on cue, the Principal's voice broadcast from the speakers at the main gate.
As Kira and Asui slid down the giant, sloping clone and walked toward the exit, Ectoplasm landed softly on the ground. He paused for a moment, then asked, "Kira-kun, when did you start to prepare for me?"
"Just as you were preparing for me, Sensei, I was preparing for you," Kira said, turning back with a smile.
From the moment his first sneak attack had failed, Kira had realized that this teacher was extremely wary of him, constantly guarding against a sudden move.
In that case, I'll just play along. I'll "resist" in ways that are within his expectations, making him feel that his preparations were farsighted. And just when he's feeling a sense of accomplishment, I'll hit him with a "surprise" he never saw coming.
(In truth, this was the most troublesome method Kira had thought of to escape. If he had used Killer Queen, he could have instantly disintegrated the giant clone. Even when the teacher had placed his prosthetic leg on him, it wouldn't have been difficult to use a Hamon Overdrive to destroy it, make him lose his footing, and then leisurely break free. But... he was a teacher, after all. He had to show him some respect, to let him think they had won by a lucky fluke while his guard was down.)
After the battle, Kira and Asui went to the control room. Recovery Girl was sitting in the only chair, monitoring the battles in all ten arenas.
"Tsuyu-chan, drink this." Kira handed her a cup of warm water with an apologetic smile. "The soap bubble taste must be pretty bad. Sorry."
Asui took the cup, took a few sips, and shook her head. "It's fine. It was just a little... stimulating."
"That's good," Kira said. After his reply, neither of them seemed to have anything else to say, and they both fell silent.
"Class Rep! Tsuyu-chan! You're back!" Uraraka's surprised voice came from the doorway. "Don't tell me Iida-kun and I finished second!?"
Kira looked at the large screen, which was showing the feed of Uraraka and Iida's battle against Thirteen. Her fighting style had been completely unexpected. "You did great, Uraraka. And Iida did his best, too," he said with a smile.
Thirteen's Quirk was "Black Hole." Anything sucked in by his fingers would be turned into molecules. It was a Quirk that could easily be lethal.
To resist the suction, Uraraka had used her Zero Gravity on both herself and Iida, allowing him to shoot flames from his legs like Astro Boy, while she clung to the handles on his back to keep from being sucked away.
Although Iida had been using his full power, he could only just barely maintain their position. But as Thirteen got closer, the pull of the black hole grew stronger. Just as Iida's engines were about to stall, Uraraka had made a decision. She had let go, flying toward Thirteen, and had used the CQC she had learned from Gunhead to restrain the bulky, spacesuit-clad hero.
"Thirteen-sensei was so gentle," Uraraka said with a wry smile. "If he hadn't stopped his attack at that last second, I probably would have been disintegrated... He let us win this time."
"Uraraka, you have nothing to feel bad about. What I'm about to say might be a little harsh," Kira said, shaking his head. "It's a bit of a contradiction, but a Quirk like Thirteen-sensei's is only suited for rescue. If it's used in combat, it's too easy to lose control and kill the enemy. Therefore, when he pulled you in, he had to stop his attack to abide by the rules of being a Pro Hero. In other words... the moment you decided to let go, your victory was predictable."
Iida walked over, a shadow in his eyes. "Class Rep, are you saying that even if Thirteen-sensei is facing an enemy, he can't go all out, even at the risk of his own life or death?"
"...That's right. That's the limitation of his Quirk. He is fated to never be able to use that dangerous power on a person," Kira said, turning his face away, as if explaining to Iida, but also as if talking to himself.
"When a Quirk is too dangerous, it becomes feared by the people. Just like Thirteen's Black Hole. It can easily kill someone and destroy all the evidence. Even if he did kill someone, no one would be able to prove it. Because of that, every time a missing person's case pops up, people like him become suspects. Even if the police confirm they have no motive, public opinion still turns against them..."
Uraraka's face was a little pale. "Kira-kun, that can't be true, can it? Thirteen-sensei is a beloved Pro Hero."
"Yes. Because he is a beloved Pro Hero, he would never do such a thing," Kira said, turning back to her with a gentle smile. "He is... a Pro Hero."
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