The training area gradually filled up as students erged from the locker rooms in their hero costus. So looked like they'd stepped straight out of a magazine, bursting with bright colors, eye-catching accessories, and designs ant to grab attention. Others were much simpler, clearly prioritizing functionality over appearance.
When Reiji finally walked through the door, several eyes automatically turned to him.
His hero costu followed an extrely simple philosophy: utility before appearance.
While most students had taken the opportunity to express their personalities through their uniforms, Reiji had requested the exact opposite. He wanted sothing understated, adaptable, and practical enough to work for both rescue operations and infiltration missions.
For that very reason, he hadn't even asked the academy to make it.
The result was a low-profile tactical suit designed by i Hatsu using lightweight yet durable materials. The predominant color ranged from a dark maroon to matte black, absorbing much of the ambient light and allowing him to blend easily into dimly lit environnts. Reinforced plates protected his torso, shoulders, thighs, and shins without excessively restricting movent, while his joints remained covered only by flexible layers of tight-fitting fabric.
His forearms were completely exposed, along with several specific points distributed near his shoulders and sides. Reiji needed quick access to his own blood to use his Quirk without constantly destroying the uniform; this was a perfect way to implent it.
A dark fabric surrounded his neck and could be deployed to cover the lower half of his face when the situation required it. The main mask remained secured by a magnetic anchor on his belt, ready to be donned in seconds. Thanks to a combination of its design and his Quirk's capabilities, he could partially alter his voice when using it.
The belt was divided into two main modules. One stored stabilizing syringes intended to control potential episodes of blood overload. The other contained small reservoirs of blood prepared for ergencies. Wristbands completed the set, concealing quick-release compartnts capable of launching vials directly into his hands or dispersing them during combat.
Finally, beneath the torso plates, a network of sensors developed by i constantly monitored his vital signs and activated ergency systems if it detected dangerous alterations related to his Quirk.
At first glance, the suit seed far less impressive than many of those present.
And that was precisely the intention.
"Wow..." Mina was one of the first to approach. "You definitely look like a pro hero."
Reiji glanced down at his own uniform.
"I don't think so," Reiji said genuinely. The truth was, all heroes usually had flashy, colorful costus, easily distinguishable from miles away. His suit wasn't even remotely like that.
"What do you an, 'no'?" Mina opened her arms. "Look at ! I tried to make mine look cool."
Reiji stared at her for a few seconds.
His suit was striking, colorful, and presumably resistant to his own acid, aside from that.
"You did it."
"Right?"
"Yes."
The answer was so serious that it took Mina a mont to realize he wasn't being sarcastic.
"Aweso!"
lissa approached shortly after, observing the suit with a much more technical interest.
"What's that about the wrists?"
"It helps increase the ways I can use my Quirk, so I can disperse my blood like projectiles."
"That sounds pretty practical." lissa smiled. "Do they work well?"
"I haven't tested them yet."
"It'll be interesting to see."
Several more people began to approach, one by one.
Uraraka was one of them. The girl's gaze traveled curiously over the various details of the uniform.
"Your suit looks very serious."
"I'm not sure if that's a complint," Reiji replied.
"It is," Uraraka nodded quickly. "It looks like you thought of every detail."
"Not really," Reiji clarified, since much of the design had been i's doing due to the internal system's implentation. "But yeah, I didn't want anything particularly flashy."
"Hmm, I guess it works," Uraraka said sowhat doubtfully, thinking that Reiji's hair color didn't help matters, but that was already covered in the future version of the suit.
'After all, I only told i about the suit a few days ago...'
To be honest, Reiji had completely forgotten to tell i in advance about the specifications for his hero costu. His mind was so focused on what might happen from now on that sothing as trivial as his hero costu for the hero course vanished from his thoughts for a couple of days.
That showed he was human and didn't take it too seriously; he only had to give her a vague idea, and i did the rest. She already had his asurents, which made the process much quicker and easier.
"By the way," Camie suddenly appeared beside him with a curious expression and pointed to his forearms. "Isn't it dangerous to leave areas uncovered?"
Reiji looked at her, taking in the details of his hero costu, and all he could say was... tight. A single piece of black leather, fitted tightly to his body.
It was paired with simple white boots, two matching white wristbands, and a thick collar made of so kind of tal.
He could easily give the heroine Midnight a run for her money with his suit.
"The holes were a deliberate choice," Reiji replied, returning to the topic. "My Quirk expels blood from my body wherever I choose. If it covered my entire body, I'd end up destroying the suit every ti I fought."
"That makes sense," Shoji murmured, keeping up with them. He wasn't overly expressive, but he occasionally made a comnt.
While Reiji continued socializing with everyone around him, two pairs of eyes were fixed on him.
Katsuki Bakugo watched Reiji with a frown, his mind processing the multiple scenarios where they fought and the explosive boy erged victorious. It wasn't pure ego; rather, it was his path to becoming a hero.
If he wanted to beco number one, before All Might, he had to be number one in his class at least, and that ant defeating Reiji in combat.
He even dared to listen to how his Quirk and suit worked, all to gain an extra advantage over his opponent.
In contrast, the other sight in the distance was far more disturbing.
Mineta Minoru seed to be crying blood as he watched Reiji interact with all the girls in the class without any problem.
"That damn handso boy..." he muttered to himself, walking beside Koji Koda, who turned around at Mineta's murmur and was startled by the aura surrounding him. "I'll be just as popular with the girls too."
Hearing his conviction spoken aloud, the shy Koji beca alard and moved slightly away; even Mineta didn't notice in his internal monologue.
"I swear!" He declared to himself, his eyes practically drooling at the sight of Camie, Mina, and Momo from behind. If only he had half of Reiji's fa, then he could indulge his every whim without a problem.
"Yeah..." Mineta murmured, his mind playing out his own little movie. "Sleeping in a girl's lap would be amazing..."
That was all it took for Koji to look for help elsewhere, accidentally bumping into Pony. This made the little boy even more alard and completely embarrassed.
"Sorry, my mistake," the boy barely whispered. Pony, on the other hand, stared at him, not quite understanding what he'd said. His Japanese wasn't very good yet, especially when the person next to him wasn't speaking clearly. Even so, he thought he'd actually heard what he said.
"Yes, we have to give it our all in training!" he exclaid in English, with a burst of joy that only made Koda even more embarrassed.
Just then, a huge shadow fell across part of the training area.
"ALRIGHT, YOUNG HEROES!"
All Might's voice echoed across the field.
The conversations gradually died down.
The students began to gather in front of him.
Reiji walked alongside the others, his gaze fixed on the enormous training building that lood before them.
"TODAY WE WILL CONDUCT A SIMULATED HERO-VILLAIN BATTLE!"
Excitent imdiately coursed through the group.
"You will work in teams and face a threat capable of destroying an entire city!"
Several students tensed.
Others smiled.
Bakugo seed particularly interested.
All Might pointed to the building behind him.
"YOU WILL HAVE TO STOP A BOMB!"
***
The battle projected on the screen showed Iida and Sero speeding through the training building. They were the team of heroes, facing off against Shoji and Jiro, the villains.
The difference in fighting styles between the two heroes was obvious even to those who weren't very experienced watching battles. Iida tried to use his speed to close the distance quickly, while Sero used his straps to move between structures and cover blind spots. On paper, the combination seed efficient. One would press directly with his great speed while the other would sweep away potential ambushes.
The problem was that they were acting as two individuals pursuing the sa objective, not as a team. The plan had probably been to find the bomb and see what to do then.
The problem was that the speed difference between them was significant, and they tended to spread out too much for their own good.
And in a simulation where ti was limited, that could be just as detrintal.
Reiji watched the screen with his arms crossed.
His expression remained as calm as ever, but his mind analyzed every action of the four mbers. He had been training to analyze fights of this kind, though mostly with recordings of heroic events, so this felt a bit more 'real' than what he usually did.
On the main monitor, Jiro had just used his headphones to transmit vibrations through a nearby wall. The sound echoed through several corridors simultaneously, creating a false sense of position that forced Iida to slow down for a mont.
"They're going too straight," Reiji murmured. "Shoji and Jiro have the ability to detect their location by the sound of their footsteps. They should take advantage of the distance between Iida and Sero to ambush one of them."
The voice that answered ca from his right.
"The second floor would be ideal for that," Momo said, her eyes fixed on the screen. "There are too many interconnected corridors. Ambushing them there would cause the other teammate to get lost in the hallways before they could even reach the other side."
Reiji glanced at her briefly.
The answer was correct, and he had thought of it himself.
Not only had he identified the problem, but he was also thinking about how to maximize his teammates' advantages.
"I thought the sa thing," Reiji added.
They weren't just sharing ideas; the truth was, they were both teams, and their next match was on. They had decided to analyze the fight together to understand each other's thinking.
Reiji turned his attention back to the fight.
On the screen, Sero had just been montarily trapped when one of his ribbons was intercepted by several arms that erged from a corner.
It wasn't a particularly sophisticated ambush, but because of what Momo had pointed out... It had gone relatively well, managing to neutralize him just as Iida arrived at full speed to help his partner.
Reiji watched as the fight between Shoji and Jiro against Iida quickly turned in favor of the 'villains,' not only due to the nurical difference, but also because Shoji was perfectly capable of defeating Iida with his physical strength alone.
It wasn't long before he also neutralized Iida without much trouble, losing without even having found the bomb.
"A strategy without coordination is just a bunch of good ideas fighting each other," Momo concluded while watching the screen.
The statent made Reiji smile slightly.
It was exactly the problem they were seeing.
Sero had good ideas.
Iida did too.
But they were both executing them separately.
"Thinking alike doesn't always an working together," he replied. "But it helps a lot, I think we've got that sorted at least."
Momo nodded in agreent.
A short distance away, lissa was discussing sothing with Todoroki while pointing to different parts of the building displayed on the screen. They both seed to be analyzing access routes and possible defensive responses.
The two of them were opponents.
lissa provided information, analysis, and conclusions. Todoroki made decisions, suggestions, and action plans.
It was a fairly natural division of roles: lissa represented theory, and Todoroki, practice.
"Do you think they'll do the sa thing?" Reiji asked.
Momo followed his gaze.
"Probably," her answer ca without hesitation. "lissa seems like the type of person who plans everything in advance."
"And Todoroki," Momo gave him a once-over, recalling what she'd seen of him the day before. "He's too rational to ignore a plan."
Reiji nodded.
That was precisely the conclusion he had reached. What was interesting was that Momo had arrived at the sa conclusion by observing the exact sa thing.
'She just needs real-world experience, but she's already a good strategist.'
The results appeared on the screen. Victory for the villains.
"It's our turn now," he said as he changed the screen, showing that it was ti to assu their roles. "I hope you have a good plan to counter them."
The sentence finally made Momo look away from the screen.
"What?"
Reiji maintained a completely natural tone.
"I don't intend to discuss plans," he said, shrugging. "I'll follow whatever you have."
Momo stared at him for a few seconds.
She clearly hadn't expected to hear sothing like that.
"Why?"
Before she could answer, Uraraka appeared next to the group.
"Did we interrupt sothing important?" she asked with a curious smile.
Behind her arrived Kaminari, Tsuyu, and Mineta.
"No," Reiji replied. "We were just fine-tuning the last details of our match."
Mineta glanced at the screen. It had been his turn, and surprisingly, he and Tokoyami had won against Toru and Koda.
"If I can give you so advice..." he said with an air of superiority. "You just have to go for the strongest one and take them down."
Everyone stared at them, perplexed. Clearly, they had the advantage in their match, and above all, their balls had been very useful in immobilizing Toru and Koda, but it wouldn't work the sa way against lissa and Todoroki.
Without waiting for him to say anything else, everyone imdiately ignored him.
"Good luck in your match. Todoroki and lissa seem to be very strong," Uraraka said, observing the pair who were too focused to notice anyone else. Kirishima and Denki nodded in agreent.
They couldn't say anything more because a voice ca through the speakers.
"Next match. lissa Shield and Shoto Todoroki as heroes." Several students imdiately turned their heads. "Momo Yaoyorozu and Reiji Toga as villains."
The four nodded in unison, all focused.
"You have two minutes to prepare."
Momo stood up.
Reiji did the sa.
"I hope you have a good plan," the boy said with a smile, passing through the large doors into the practice area.
***
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