Discord: .gg/t7bHrdRY7Y
pat.reon: Keanu_Eugene (30+ chapters ahead)
CHAPTER START---
Before sunrise Horizon is already standing in the training area, his Room expanded to the limit, reaching 7km in every direction, just barely enough to touch the lowest clouds.
Wearing only his white and blue Horizon brand hoodie with the middle open to show off the design of his body glove, and a pair of blue shorts.
He swings his sword with perfect two-handed form, slashing at the clouds.
Sensing everyone getting dressed and waking up he feels the Pros already moving.
And he can sense Pixie-Bob approaching him, but she stops 20 meters away.
"You can come closer this time," he yells out to her without stopping his strikes.
"You aren't supposed to be outside without permission, you're lucky Ragdoll's Quirk doesn't work on you or you'd be in big trouble.""I just like to get some training in without people crowding me, waking up early is the easiest way to do that."
"Sword training?" She asks, now standing just a meter away from him, eyes drinking in his physique, tracing every inch of the body glove.
"And Quirk training," he stops and turns to her, then points the sword at the closest cloud. "See that cloud?"
"Yeah."
"I was slashing it."
She looks more closely at the cloud, then turns back to Horizon. "But it just looks like a normal cloud, shouldn't it be like...split down the middle or something?"
"It's water vapor, cut smoke and it just reforms, it's the same thing. My cuts aren't air slashes so they don't push the cloud apart...I'm just practicing my range."
"You need more range than that? For what? You plan to cut the moon in half?"
"Just in case," Horizon shrugs. "Plus it helps me burn energy so I can sleep better."
"Oh, I usually have trouble sleeping too, want some help with that?"
Horizon freezes, then looks at her, not seeing any change in her excited demeanor. "Well, I figured we were at least a day or two from that stage, but sure..."
Pixie-Bob looks confused for a moment, then a look of realization dawns on her, then she just pouts. "I meant we could have a spar!"
"I'd rather not. My Quirk makes sparring boring in most cases, practicing my slashes burns more energy, no offense."
Pixie-Bob glares at him, "sounds like you're scared to fight a real Pro."
Horizon sighs, "well fine, alright, rules?"
"Well, try not to cut me up or anything like that, ok?" Pixie-Bob says while making some space between them, backing to 20 meters away.
"Ok, and how hands-on can I get?"
"As much as you want, but this kitty has claws and I will use them," she swipes at the air a few times between them.
"Worth it," Horizon says jokingly, and sheathes his sword. "Call it."
"Finally, let's see if you're all talk...FIGHT!" Pixie-Bob yells out.
Suddenly the palms of her cat gloves begin glowing blue as her Quirk activates. She bends down to plant her palms on the floor.
Using her Quirk Earth Flow she can mold dirt and rock to form objects or even golems to obey her command, or she can simply alter the terrain to suit her needs.
SHAMBLES!
Before her palms touch the ground to activate her Quirk, she swaps places with his sword and feels his large hands at her hips, holding her aloft in the air to face him. Feet dangling a foot from the floor.
"Counter-Shock!"
"Ahhh!" She screams, but nothing happens. "Huh?" opening her eyes she sees Horizon's visor just looking up at her, then feels his laughter reverberate through her as he tosses her just a foot into the air and catches her.
Holding her in a full and more intimate princess carry. "So, still think I'm all talk?"
"Mmm, no, you win," she folds her arms across her chest, surprisingly not bothered by the way he's holding her.
"I always do, I tried to warn you."
"But why didn't you shock me?"
"I prefer you how you are."
"How is that? Not fried?"
"Pretty."
Pixie-Bob stiffens in his arms, then sighs, "did this spar even do anything for you?"
He tightens his grip on her for a moment, making her much more aware of how close she was to him, "yeah, this is pretty fun, but if you're talking about helping me sleep, nope."
"Well let's see," Pixie-Bob turns to him and taps the side of her headgear, causing a few numbers to appear in her clear visor as the tint becomes slightly yellow.
"What's that supposed to be?"
"A high energy power reader, Ragdoll invented it based on her Search Quirk, it lets us lock onto energy readings if they're big enough. Todoroki and Midoriya have pretty good readings while their Quirk is active and in use."
"Oh, and what's mine?"
"Mmm, it's flat right now but I'm in scanning mode, just activate your Quirk and we'll see."
"Ok---"
BOOSTER SHOT! BOOSTER SHOT! BOOSTER SHOT! BOOSTER SHOT! BOOSTER SHOT!
"---Well?"
"Wow," Pixie-Bob was literally reeling back from the reading she was seeing. He'd dumped nearly half of his power in one go. "You're at 170...that's unreal."
"What's the record?"
"All Might, we met him once at the annual hero rankings ceremony, that was about nine years ago. He scored over a thousand, the scanner doesn't go that high so it broke."
"And my classmates?"
"Well, only Todoroki and Midoriya had readings that I bothered measuring since Kaminari has a set amount of AMPs he can hold. Todoroki got 70 and Midoriya got 50 while using his Quirk to spar with Tiger, but I think he can do more for a big attack."
"Huh, so even holding back I'm still using more energy than them. How do I get one of those scanners?"
"Oh, sorry it's Ragdolls Patent, aside from us nobody gets them. It could be dangerous in the wrong hands," Pixie-Bob gives him an apologetic look.
"Well I guess that makes sense, maybe I'll put in a request to---" Horizon suddenly stops talking and gently sets her down on her own feet.
Suddenly she goes from enjoying his warmth to standing on her own feet as if they weren't just sharing a moment, "what's wrong?"
"Company," he nods toward the woods where the others would soon be emerging from.
"Oh, right. Yeah if Mandalay saw that she would have yelled at me again..." she mutters.
"Again?"
"We don't have time to get into that," she says as they see everyone entering the training area, with Shinso making his way toward Horizon.
"Well we both have trouble sleeping, so you can tell me later."
Pixie-Bob gives him a mischievous smile before walking away, heading toward another day of training with Kendo and her other designated students.
---8 PM...
After everyone ate, another delicious meal thanks to Horizon, they all got cleaned up and half of the students came back outside to talk a bit.
Or in this case, play cards.
"Horizon!" Mina yells as she sits on the bend across from him, sliding to the side and shoving Sero down a seat or two so she's directly in front of Horizon.
"Mina."
"Let's play," she takes a deck of cards from her jacket and sets it down on the table.
"No."
"C'mon, it'll be fun, just you and me, we can make a small bet if you want."
"Uh-huh, a small bet," Horizon immediately figures out what she really wanted. "And if you win?"
"Oh nothing much, hehe," Mina looks toward a table where some of the girls were sitting with a mischievous glint in her eyes. "I just wanna know who you think are the most attractive girls in our class."
"Right, so this is a game of truth with extra steps, and when I win?"
"How about I do the same but with the boys?" Mina asks.
"No, I don't really care about what you think about anything, how about after you see your hand on the first game I'll make my request."
"Deal!" Mina says. "I don't know many games but, how about this, each of us gets three cards face down. and the highest hand wins, ace is 1. We both start with 10 chips and first to 0 loses."
"Seems simple enough."
"Ready!" Mina says.
"Ok, deal the cards, then I'll think of something."
After Mina deals the cards she places the deck in the middle. As she was dealing Horizon checked his cards,
Queen of Hearts, Queen of Diamonds, and Jack of Hearts. A nearly invincible hand.
He only lifted them up slightly before setting them back down on the table, not wanting her to see the reflection in his visor.
As Mina sets down the pack she raises up her cards a few moments after he sets down his, a wide smile splits her face as she gives him a victorious look.
"You should just give up now," she says.
"Oh really, how confident are you in that hand?"
"I'm gonna win!" Mina declares.
"Ok," Horizon takes out his phone and types out something on the screen, then carefully shows it to her, leaving everyone around them completely out of the loop as they all watch the game unfold. "Keep this between us."
"What?! Seriously? C'mon!"
"If you're so confident then betting that shouldn't be an issue right," Horizon shrugs.
Mina gets a slight purple tinge on her cheeks and she gives him a sheepish look. "Alright, deal, you're on!"
"Perfect," Horizon takes another peek at his cards, after a few seconds he sets them back on the table face down. "I'll raise you all my points," he reaches forward and flips the top card from the deck.
This allows her to better estimate what was in his hand and alter her bets accordingly, but at this point it was useless. She had no choice but to bet everything to match him.
She feels her heart drop to her stomach, looking down at her hand, Queen of Hearts, Queen of Diamonds, and Jack of Hearts. A nearly invincible hand.
'No way, he can't have 3 kings, that's like...one in ten billion odds or something, he's just messing with me to freak me out,' Mina thinks to herself, unable to read Horizon through his visor.
"Alright," she says and flips over her cards. Revealing the Queen of hearts, Queen of Diamonds, and Jack of Hearts.
"You lose," Horizon says, flipping his cards to reveal 3 kinds, a perfect hand.
"WHAT! No way!" Mina jumps up to her feet and stares down in shock, "no way, rematch!"
"No, when camp is over you can pay up."
Mina opens her mouth to argue, but just shuts up and sits down, trying to at least keep some dignity.
"Don't worry you can take your time, the longer you take the better it gets anyway," Horizon says. "But this is what you get for going about it like this, you should have just asked.
In terms of who I find most appealing in our class.
Well, Momo is the hottest, but Jiro is the cutest by far.
Then Toru is cute but she never shuts up.
Then floaty follows Deku around like some pathetic puppy, it's still disgusting.
Then Tsu would be a lot higher, but I'd never let that tongue anywhere near me after seeing her handle rubble and people with it.
And lastly is you."
"Me?" Mina asks, looking slightly hurt by that.
"You'd be almost at the top, but..."
"Because I'm pink, and have horns?"
"No, because my trust issues and common sense demand I not put my dick in a potential acid fountain, that's all..."
Everyone, even Mina winces at that image, unable to argue with the logic in that statement.
"Next time you want to know something, just ask. I appreciate people being direct and not wasting my time, ok?"
"Yeah, thanks anyway," Mina gets up and quietly heads over to the girl's table, and a moment later they all head inside, likely to discuss the results she got.
After they leave Sero leans forward to Horizon, "so...what did you get from Mina?"
"I don't think she'd want me to tell anyone, sorry."
"Awe, c'mon, not even a hint?"
"Nope."
Sero sighs, "alright fine, but how'd you do that thing with the cards, 3 Kings, that should be like, one in a hundred million or something."
"It's 1:132,600. And all I did was use my Quirk, she never said we couldn't. UA Hero Course encourages Quirk use wherever possible, right?"
"Really, how, could you see her card like you sense people?" Sero asks.
"No, I can't do that. All I did was look at my cards, see I had a super strong hand. Shambles it so they swap with her cards without her noticing, then I kept shuffling the garbage hand she got until I got 3 kings from the deck. Simple."
"You did that without us seeing the cards move?"
"Takes a lot more focus but it's not impossible, now if you don't mind," Horizon stands up, sensing the teacher about to tell everyone to get to bed. "I need to go prepare for the rest of my night..."
END CHAPTER---