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CHAPTER START---
Watching Horizon walk onto the stage, back to his showmanship, waving at the adoring crowd, Bakugo can't help but feel his adrenaline start pumping.
His breath became hitched, standing in the entrance tunnel hidden away for a few seconds longer he walks over to the wall and places his forehead against the cool concrete wall.
Feeling his palms already sweating he squeezes his eyes shut, pushing the doubt and anxiety down, like he'd done so many times when thinking about Horizon.
The seemingly invincible wall standing between him, and the person he always thought he was.
"Katsuki Bakugo!" Midnight announces, and he immediately scowls and begins walking out.
The entire world watching him, everyone expecting him to lose, already counting him out.
The doubts from the crowd reaches his ears, breaking his heart but making his blood boil.'Why are they even having another fight?'
'He's Mystery Class, that's unfair.'
'If Endeavor's son lost this isn't fair.'
'Won't he just cut this kid in half?'
His rage just kept building and building, but in the back of his mind, a small voice couldn't help but agree with everything they said.
Before he knew it Horizon was standing in front of him, towering over him as always.
To his eyes it was as if Horizon blocked out the sun, the same feeling he got when standing in front of All Might.
But this was different, this time the monster wasn't trying to protect him, it was staring down at him. Ready and willing to crush him.
Burying those feeling Bakguo glares at Horizon's visor, ignoring Midnight's hype-building speech for the finals.
"Bring out the sword," he demands, earning a confused head tilt from Horizon.
"It got banned," Horizon shrugs. "Some crap about cutting people up isn't a good look."
"If you don't have it, then how am I supposed to count this as a real victory?!" Bakugo screams. "You need to be at your best!"
"I've still got more than enough to deal with someone at your level," Horizon says calmly, taking his hands out of his pockets and letting electricity crackle, jumping between his palms. "Just takes one touch and you're done."
"Counter Shock," Bakguo growls out, now even warier of Horizon's touch, but his plan doesn't change. Blast Horizon to hell and don't let him touch you.
"BEGIN!"
Bakguo immediately rockets forward, clearing the ten meters between them and placing his palm in front of Horizon's chest, a meter of space between them.
In the same instant Horizon had warped one of his cards to him and threw it past Bakugo.
'He's gonna swap and appear behind me!'
Bakugo plants both his feet on the floor, one hand out in each direction. Blasting both his sides at once.
BOOM!
Light and smoke block his vision as both angles are blasted.
"You know I have more cards right?" Horizon's amused voice asks from behind him.
Bakugo immediately spins around and launches into another attack.
BOOM!
This time his eyes open in horror. Dreams and ego are completely crushed in one instant as Horizon's massive hand palms the back of his skull.
Reacting quickly he uses an explosion to spin himself, jumping up and launching a roundhouse kick to the side of Horizon's head.
He can't even feel the material of Horizon's visor before the man is swapped out with a metal calling card.
This pattern goes on for a dozen explosions, Horizon always warping away at the very last moment.
Until seemingly Bakguo gets lucky.
His bare explosive palm makes contact directly with Horizon's visor. Palming his entire face.
The entire audience is shocked, surprised this would even happen, and Bakguo's smile nearly rips his face open as he finally sees victory.
'I'll blow that damn fish bowl to hell!'
BOOM!
Bakguo's suddenly looking at the arena, seeing all the cracks and pebbles caused by his own explosions.
Nothing and nobody in his way as searing pain burns through his clothes and scorches his back.
His own explosion ragdolling him across the concrete and leaving him crumpled in a heap.
"Damn it!" Bakugo punches the concrete and forces himself to stand, bloody knuckles dripping on the arena as he glares at Horizon.
And still, Horizon was completely untouched. 'I was touching him and he still dodged it...that shouldn't be possible!'
Not even the visor was slightly singed.
"He baited me into hurting myself," Bakugo mutters, feeling his arms nearly numb from the constant fighting.
"You know I really wasn't kidding when I said none of you can even lay a scratch on me," Horizon says jokingly. "You just aren't enough."
Bakugo growls loudly, rushing Horizon like a desperate animal.
'I just need time, keep him cocky so he doesn't get bored and end the fight, keep him talking so my arms can rest, then I'll blast this whole damn stage away!'
Surprising everyone Horizon takes a casual fighting stance, keeping one hand in front of him and the other hanging at his side, an open palm taunting Bakugo.
Bakugo's strikes were fast.
Heavy hits.
Each kick was parried by the most casual of motions.
Each punch was easily blocked by Horizon's larger and faster physicality.
For an entire minute, this cycle continues. No matter how hard Bakguo fought he couldn't land a single hit.
'So he's even a monster without his Quirk!' everyone quickly realized. Not knowing he was trained by one of the best technical fighters in the world.
But improvement is the standard at UA, and heated battles bring up a swell of desire that forces improvement.
Bakugo's mind seemed to settle, his movements less primal and more fluid. His attacks harder, his strikes faster. His eyes could suddenly better interpret what he was seeing.
With one of the most intuitive combat minds in the world, he began putting the pieces together.
It didn't make sense at first, not until he punched up at Horizon's visor, causing the man to swat it away and just touch Bakguo's face before retracting his hand. Proving for what must have been the 20th time in this fight that he can win whenever he wants, pissing Bakugo off even more.
But that punch was just a distraction. A showy strike sure to fail against someone of this level.
All for Bakguo to test his theory and kick with as little motion as possibly toward Horizon's shin.
But Horizon dodges it, casually moving his foot out of the way...before Bakguo made any real noticeable motion forward.
Bakugo immediately leaps backward, heels knocking away the pebbles on the stage, each one a win condition if Horizon decided to put an end to this match, a reminder that he was just playing with Bakguo...all while Bakguo was giving more than he had ever before.
"What's wrong?" Horizon asks, his tone casual even as Bakugo was panting heavily and covered in sweat, still feeling the searing pain on his back.
Bakugo smiles victoriously, "I figured it out!" His words confuse everyone watching, the entire world excited to hear whatever grand reveal he had.
"Figured what out?"
"How you do it, how you always warp to the perfect place, how you always know what to do, how you dodge every hit no matter how sneaky it is! All of it!"
Horizon raises a brow beneath his visor, curious and amused, knowing Bakguo can never have figured out his ROOM.
"Alright, enlighten me," he says jokingly, placing both hands in his pocket as Bakugo takes a few deep breaths.
"Foresight!" Bakugo decrees.
"Foresight?"
"It's how you do it," Bakguo says. "You couldn't have dodged everything naturally, and my last attack was a feint to set up a kick...a kick I didn't even get to throw because you dodged before my leg really got moving...that's only possible if you can see the future."
The entire stadium is silent, staring at Horizon. Minor time manipulation Quirks aren't as rare as warping or healing, but they are usually useless. Gathering and controlling Cronons -the identified time particles, discovered two centuries ago-, most Quirks just used it to slow the time of small objects, Foresight is an anomaly in itself.
"I see," Horizon says, looking around at all the amazed and excited faces. "Well seeing the future is the best way to justify what I did... but that's not one of my abilities."
"What?" Bakugo looked dumbstruck.
Horizon taps the side of his visor, drawing all eyes to his head, "it's my brain...genius. In this world my brain is second only to Nezu himself, but while all his processing power is good for science and management...I've got a lot less than him, in exchange for having a really good brain for battle.
In combat like this where it's just me and you, I can monitor every move your body makes, even the smallest millimeter of movement is noticeable to me. And since I process info faster...I effectively transfer all that intake into my head, and use my perfect reaction time to move.
Get it? I can't see the future, I just start moving after you, and your brain is so slow it looks like I moved first," he shrugs. "A decade of training with mom made me really damn good at close combat like this."
Bakguo's veins bulge, "so you're such a damn nerd that you fight better than us too!"
"Uh...sure?"
"This...this isn't right," Bakugo mutters. "This isn't how heroes fight!"
"Oh god, it's gonna cry," Horizon mutters out in disgust, shaking his head in disappointment. "Are your arms rested enough yet? Just do your final attack and let's wrap this up," he says in a bored tone.
"You...you knew, and you still let my arms recover? Why?"
"Because it doesn't really matter in the end. How hard you, or any hero or villain fights, it's all futile in the end," Horizon spreads his arms, riling up the audience. "Because I am here..."
"RAARRRGGHHH!!!" Bakugo rockets into the air, carried by explosions. Instantly enraged like never before, hearing Horizon of all people use All Might's line, and the entire crowd cheering for him.
Cheering for the next Symbol of Peace.
Bakugo puts everything into his next attack, soaring thirty meters above the arena before rocketing down.
Using his explosions to spin himself like a top, forming a twister of smoke around him as he gathers as much air as possible to make the explosion hit that much harder, all while keeping his eyes on Horizon, standing casually in the middle of the arena.
As he's only five meters away he flips in the air, risking everything and slamming both his palms down at Horizon.
"HOWITZER GRAND IMPACT!"
BOOM!
The entire stadium and the surrounding land are rocked as if an earthquake hit. Midnight and Cementoss are blown away as the deafening explosion rings out, slamming them against the far wall of the arena. Cementoss barely softens the wall in time to catch them and prevent any damage.
And as the dust clears, everyone sees the absolute carnage caused by the attack.
Bakugo was kneeling in the middle of the crater, the entire stage completely dug out, rubble and dirt scattered against the far walls. A hole two meters deep at its lowers point.
He's on his knees, sitting up, hands hanging limply at his side. Bloody and broken, all purple-black and swollen, His entire shirt and much of his pants destroyed, leaving scorch marks across his body, and his head swaying left and right, barely staying conscious as the adrenaline starts to fade.
"Wow, that's a lot better than I expected," Horizon's voice is the only sound in the arena, the dust, and smoke blowing away to reveal him standing behind a blue energy shield in the shape of a dome nearly at the edge of the crater, just barely within bounds.
"You...how?" Bakugo mutters weakly.
"Antibacterial Curtain," Horizon raises his right hand to tap the blue shield. His left hand was still outstretched, releasing the shield from the palm.
His new ability, Antibacterial Curtain, named after the curtains in hospital operating rooms. A modified version of his healing energy, instead of dispersing away from itself to permeate others, it is attracted to itself, hardening to form a shield.
His inexperience with this ability leaves much to be desired, not that he can let that be noticed.
He immediately drops the barrier and begins walking over to Bakugo, putting his left hand back in his pocket.
"You...had that... the whole time?"
"Only since after USJ," Horizon admits. "After meeting Nomu I realized there was a lot of merit in defense, so I decided if I'm going to be a hero, eventually I'll have a moment where I need to stand my ground and protect the people behind me, so I made a shield ability," he shrugs, as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
"You just made an ability," Bakugo mutters in disbelief. "You can just make new Quirks?"
"That's one way to look at it," Horizon was now standing directly in front of Bakugo, forcing him to look up at him. "Still working on something to deal with Super-Regeneration, but I'll get there eventually..."
Looking up at Horizon, Bakugo couldn't hold back his emotions anymore, tears freely streaming down his face.
In all his years watching All Might he's seen the hero gets hurt, get cut, take hits...bleed. But here stands Horizon, completely untouched by anything they threw at him. By anything Bakugo threw at him, in this moment the shadow he casts dwarfed even All Might, and Bakugo hated it more than anything.
"This isn't supposed to happen," Bakugo doubles over, his forehead nearly touching the ground, arms hanging at his side. "This isn't how heroes win!"
Nobody understands what he means, only Deku could find the meaning in his words, and it hurt him to see Bakugo brought so low.
"What the hell does that mean?"
"You can't be a hero! Heroes put their heart and soul into everything they do! But you...you refused to take us seriously! You just came out here and mocked us! You're not a real hero, you refused to give us your all!" Bakugo screams, his voice cracking and straining with each word.
"Is that what you really think this is?" Horizon asks in a serious voice. "Bakugo, it's not that I refused to fight seriously, I'll never make that mistake again...but you just aren't enough to make me fight seriously, none of you are, and even if you were, I'd still win, because unlike you, I have a reason to fight."
"Reason to fight?!"
Horizon raises a foot and steps on the back of Bakugo's head, the blonde immediately forces his broken arms to move and press against the ground to support the new weight, and Horizon just begins talking to the world, with both hands in his pockets, and the second best student under his boot.
"Most of you don't have any real reason to fight. You're a bunch of pathetic childish fanboys that only want to be heroes because you think it's cool. You put your life and the life of everyone you love at risk every time you suit up, but you're too selfish to think about that, right?
You never think about anyone past yourself, past what you want, just a bunch of pathic wannabes that don't understand the true cost of being a hero.
You have everything, but you're here risking it all for people you don't even know, for strangers that you'd never even talk to...you put your own home in danger to save them...HA! As if anyone with that reason can ever beat me.
Everything you are, just like most of the people in our class, is fanboy nonsense. 'Inspired' by heroes to throw your life away and let your family suffer for strangers...see even if we were equals, I'd win.
Because you fight for strangers, and I fight for my family...for my parents."
Everyone stares in surprise, not expecting such an intense rant from him, all while Bakugo struggles to keep his body off the ground.
Horizon's voice becomes slightly sad, "my parents taught me everything they knew, I am everything they are taken to heights unimagined. I love them more than anything in this world...but now I'm all alone in this world...but one day I won't be.
I'll take everything my dad taught me about medicine, and everything my mom taught me about fighting and being an adventurer...and I'll use it to fight for my future, for the family I'll have one day. For them, for my kids, for the people who matter the most to me.
That's what my foundation is built of, and every improvement I make gets stacked atop it, and gets supported by that.
And what's yours again? Fanboy trash about wanting to be like All Might and throw your life away for strangers? Right?" Horizon laughs at that.
"And yet you act surprised when everything you did, all the blood and sweat and work, everything you are, crumbles against me...built on a pathetic foundation like that. You don't even have a reason to fight, and you'll never be enough, so get off my stage."
CRACK!
He presses down, smashing Bakguo's head against the floor with his foot, instantly knocking him out.
"HORIZON WINS!" Midnight announces, to the surprise of absolutely no one.
His rant reached the ears and hearts of hundreds of millions of people, including the man who would be his Hero mentor, and a major catalyst for his rapid rise to the top of this world...
END CHAPTER---