"Whoa, that's insane. He just slammed that robot like it was a toy."
"Is he some kind of strength-type?"
"He's in Class A too, right? Do we have info on him?"
A bunch of people in the audience who noticed Arthur started talking but most figured he just used his Quirk, so they thought he was just a strength-type. Nothing special. "Above average" at best.
The hype still wasn't anywhere near what Todoroki or Yoarashi were getting.
But experts see the real deal.
The other Class A students falling behind Yaoyorozu, Midoriya, Uraraka, plus the staff like Principal Nezu, Aizawa, All Might, and even the Hero Commission inspectors watching from the stands or on TV… they all clearly understood something.
Arthur didn't use his Quirk at all when he flattened that robot.
That was pure strength.
"He keeps improving every time. His potential's insane," Aizawa muttered, surprised. "It's like watching All Might back in his student days."
"Young Arthur… in terms of both Quirk and physical ability, you really are the best candidate for One For All, but…" In a corner of the stands, All Might's eyes were serious.
Arthur took care of the three robots easily, so even though Yaoyorozu didn't want his help, she still followed along. Unless she wanted to go pick fights with other robots on purpose.
Uraraka, Jiro, and a few other Class A girls also stuck close behind.
Just as other students tried to take advantage…
Arthur suddenly turned around and kicked the remains of the giant robot like a soccer ball, sending it flying right at them.
Those idiots trying to sneak through went tumbling.
"Wait! I haven't crossed yet!" Midoriya thought, almost crying.
"Once you fall, no second chances! If you don't want to get eliminated, start climbing!" Present Mic shouted at the perfect moment.
A bottomless canyon. Hundreds of meters wide. Thin steel cables connecting stone pillars spaced about ten meters apart.
"Thanks, Arthur-kun. I'm going ahead." Tsuyu waved at him, then jumped onto a cable with frog-like movements, climbing forward fast and smoothly.
"Gross. Don't call me that." Arthur raised an eyebrow, looking at the dozen or so cables at the starting point.
"Arthur, aren't you going yet?" Yaoyorozu had made a zipline frame with her Quirk and was about to move, but she turned back when she saw Arthur hadn't moved.
"No need. You go ahead." Arthur chuckled.
Yaoyorozu raised an eyebrow, hesitated for a few seconds, then said, "Then… be careful."
Without realizing it, she'd gotten used to Arthur's mysterious style. And with his strength, this kind of obstacle definitely wasn't a problem.
From their first meeting, she knew how crazy The World's jumping power was.
Tsuyu, Yaoyorozu, and the others had all crossed the first rope and reached the stone pillars in the middle of the canyon…
Then they turned around.
And almost fell straight down.
Arthur was leisurely walking along the cliff edge at the starting point. He summoned The World and chopped off the steel cables connected to the middle pillars, one after another.
"This is way too much! Seriously too much! The transfer student Arthur, is using his Quirk to cut off more than half of the steel cables in one go! Who knows how many people are about to get eliminated!"
In one breath, a dozen cables were severed by The World's hand chops. Three remained and Arthur was still cutting.
The crowd went wild. The complaints barely registered. Most of them wanted to see this kind of hype.
"Ah! Arthur! You…"
Just as Arthur was about to cut the last cable, a familiar shocked voice reached his ears.
He turned his head. Sure enough, it was Midoriya, carrying a robot part on his back.
"…Heh."
Arthur stared at Midoriya for about five seconds, then let out a small laugh. He didn't cut the last cable. He pulled The World back into his body.
With his current physique, he didn't even need The World. A distance of over ten meters was an easy jump.
As Arthur leaped effortlessly across the stone pillars in the middle of the canyon, Midoriya and the other students falling behind…
Every single one of them rushed toward that last steel cable like hungry wolves spotting a fat sheep, fighting over it.
"He's so mean!"
Midoriya shivered, forced to compete with others for the right to use the last cable but he still didn't dare to use One For All casually. He just pushed through the crowd like a normal person, moving slowly.
Arthur's actions were probably going to make a lot of people hate him.
But who cares about some extras who don't even deserve names?
And The World's appearance made all the confused spectators finally realize something.
When he dealt with the robots earlier, Arthur hadn't used his Quirk at all.
He solved it with pure wrist strength.
Up ahead, Yoarashi, Todoroki, and the others who had been leading finally slowed down.
The 400 meter long minefield was huge. Even Yoarashi, who could briefly fly with his wind Quirk, couldn't just breeze through it. One wrong move, one overlooked mine on the ground, and you'd get blasted. So Todoroki, Yoarashi, Bakugo, and the others had to slow their pace, moving carefully while watching the mine positions at their feet.
"Even The World couldn't jump 400 meters in one go."
A voice from behind made Yoarashi, Todoroki, and the others turn their heads.
At the starting point of the minefield.
Arthur had finally arrived.
"Oh! You made it !" Yoarashi shouted.
"But you're too late!" Todoroki said coldly.
They'd already covered over 200 meters.
"I really didn't want to use it, but whatever."
Arthur suddenly raised his hand, pointing his index finger forward. "Za Warudo!!!"
Todoroki, Yoarashi, and the others who had turned to look back saw their vision blur.
Arthur, who had been standing behind them, was gone.
"You half-and-half bastard!" Bakugo, who was slightly behind the two, suddenly looked forward and yelled.
His tone was full of disbelief.
Todoroki and the others quickly turned to look.
Arthur had appeared a hundred meters ahead, at the finish line of the minefield.
It wasn't just Todoroki and the others.
Yaoyorozu, Jiro, and other Class A students, plus some Class B kids whose names Arthur couldn't even remember.
They had all turned their heads because of Yoarashi and the others, spotting Arthur at the starting point.
Then they saw him disappear from there.
But hearing Bakugo's panicked yell, they turned to look again.
And there was Arthur, who had just been at the starting line, suddenly appearing at the finish line out of thin air.
It wasn't just the contestants.
The entire stadium with 120,000 people went dead silent for a moment.
Then a few seconds later, an insane roar erupted.
In the stands, the pro heroes' faces were full of shock.
"What the hell is going on?! Eraser Head! Isn't he your student? What kind of Quirk is that?!"
Present Mic's eyes were practically popping out of his glasses as he grabbed Aizawa's shoulder and shouted.
"I… don't know." Aizawa said in a rough voice.
The pro heroes started frantically debating Arthur's Quirk.
"What kind of Quirk is that? He crossed 400 meters in an instant!"
"Teleportation type! He's got to be a teleportation user!"
"No, that's not right! He just summoned some kind of life form, so it should be a summoning type!"
"Could it be a rare dual Quirk user?"
"Whatever it is, we need to get him to our agency. This Quirk is insane!"
The place was completely losing it.
Being able to teleport 400 meters in an instant.
Teleportation Quirks, similar to Kurogiri's, are often way more useful than flashy power types like Todoroki's or Yoarashi's.
Arthur didn't even look back. The World and his body overlapped.
He jumped. Even without Yoarashi's whirlwind Quirk, the height and distance he covered were even greater. This made a bunch of pro heroes feel like they were watching All Might back in his student days.
And not just at the stadium. In front of countless TVs, people were blown away by Arthur's Quirk.
Including in a dark, damp, smelly room that felt like a sewer.
"Have you seen this Quirk before?" All For One asked the old man in the white coat behind him.
"Sir, if you haven't seen it, there's no way I have." The old man chuckled, rubbing his nose with his finger. "But I'm getting more and more interested in his Quirk."
Screw it. I can't worry about the mines anymore.
Seeing Arthur almost out of sight.
Bakugo stopped caring about stepping on a landmine.
His palms kept blasting backward, pushing him forward. Even when he stepped on a mine and triggered an explosion, he just kept cranking up his firepower.
He wanted to get as far ahead as possible before he got blown away.
"No time to hold back!"
Todoroki also froze the entire minefield, making the mines unable to explode.
The reason he hadn't done this earlier was because it would also clear a path for other contestants.
But Arthur was already way ahead.
He couldn't afford to care anymore.
Yoarashi, obviously.
The moment Arthur suddenly appeared at the finish line, he was the first to react and go all out with his Quirk, consequences be damned.
Having fought alongside Arthur multiple times, he was used to the guy's ridiculously overpowered abilities.
That's why he reacted first.
Since Todoroki froze a huge chunk of the minefield in one go, other students used his ice path to advance quickly.
Yaoyorozu smoothly created ice skates.
She left the others behind, but still couldn't catch up to the four in front.
"Damn it! He's too fast! I can't catch him at all!"
Yoarashi and Todoroki had the same thought.
Their desperate push finally got them out of the minefield, though it was close.
And they saw Arthur's back.
But he was flying through the air, already way too far ahead.
And the gap wasn't closing at all.
In the first stage, the narrow track area, it was the calm before the storm.
Arthur, appearing at the finish line with The World, had The World glowing slowly like gold.
"First place appears!!! The winner! Class 1-A's Arthur!!! With an incredible Quirk, he went from dead last to first in one shot! Eraser Head! What kind of monsters do you have in your class?!"
Present Mic was practically screaming his lungs out.
"Amazing, seriously amazing! He's leaving everyone else in the dust!"
"What kind of Quirk is this? I think only All Might compares, right?"
"No, this just shows his speed. His strength is still unknown."
"But it's already impressive enough. Most heroes probably wouldn't even see him coming before he took them out from behind, right?"
As Present Mic shouted, the audience, finally snapping out of it, let out insane cheers.
And the pro heroes were mostly stuck on one question.
What the hell was that Quirk?
…
Under everyone's watch, second and third place came in.
Second place: Todoroki.
Third place: Yoarashi.
Fourth place: Bakugo.
Fifth place: Yaoyorozu.
And the names after that got announced one by one.
Thirty-eighth place: Midoriya.
Forty-second place: Yanagi Reiko.
As the big screen showed the top 42, Midnight cracked her whip and shouted, "The top 42!"
Immediately, the groans of the hundreds of eliminated students echoed through the stadium again.
All Might, up in the stands, finally breathed a sigh of relief after seeing Midoriya successfully advance.
Everyone else was eliminated.
Midoriya's final method of using explosion blasts to propel himself forward was pretty spectacular. But he'd fallen too far behind earlier, otherwise he definitely could have gotten a higher rank.
All Might was clearly very concerned about Midoriya.
But Arthur, while not changing his mind, did make All Might feel like maybe he'd decided a little too quickly back then.
Aside from his attitude, Arthur's Quirk, body, and decisiveness in action were all too perfect for inheriting One For All.
Just like Arthur himself said, if One For All and The World fused, it would become the strongest Stand in the world.
...
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guilt_free_daoist
Jo!n d!sc0rd I!nk in synops!s.
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