Chapter 5: First-year students

Chapter 5: First-year students

….

Well...

I survived!

That was terrifying! My whole life flashed before my eyes.

At some point during Iida's long lecture, my eyes must've closed, and I even woke up with a bit of drool. 

Iida has this special ability to put you to sleep—I seriously thought that might be his Quirk.

And I'm pretty sure my time with Iida is going to leave some serious scars on my poor mind.

But hey, today was a new day, and with the arrival of the rest of the first-year students, I decided to spend the day helping with move-ins and meeting as many of my classmates as I could as they showed up.

I made sure to be nice and helpful, offering to carry luggage or give directions, and of course, leaving the best and coolest impression possible—especially with the beautiful girls.

Sadly, I wasn't very successful…

First, I met Ochaco Uraraka. She seemed sweet, a little naive but determined. Plus, she was super attractive! Oh, and she had an incredible body that any guy would drool over. To make things even better, she was also in Class 1-A. 

For a moment, I felt like I'd won the lottery or something.

But she's... well, she's the definition of 'impossible to impress.' 

I took advantage of helping her move in to try to do a little trick with my electricity… thinking I'd come off as super cool. The result? She just smiled, thanked me, and then walked off, like I was just part of the scenery… 

So yeah, she's sweet, but I don't know, maybe she has some sort of radar that instantly detects when someone's trying to flirt and effortlessly ignores it.

Naturally, I tried flirting with her a bit more after that, but so far… not even a hint of success.

But hey, that's not going to stop me! Someday I'll make her say, 'Wow, you're amazing!' 

And then she'll definitely want to go out with me… well, once I'm the popular guy everyone likes and laughs with, of course.

...

Anyway, next I met Kyoka Jiro. She was maybe 5'6" tall, with dark purple hair and what appeared to be headphone jacks instead of traditional earlobes. She wore a plain gray T-shirt and a black leather vest with ripped jeans. When conversing she would always squint her eyes as if she was analyzing me before speaking.

Umm, she's pretty cool, has that punk vibe, and isn't much of a talker. 

Though, whenever I talked to her, she made me feel like I'd said something really stupid. She even gave me that look that made me feel like the biggest idiot on the planet.

So yeah, I have to admit, I was a little... intimidated. Not just because of that, but for a few other reasons.

And no, it's not like she's one of those people who are scary at first glance. It's nothing like that. But she has this… vibe. It's like every look she gives says, "Who do you even think you are?"

Yeah, her stare says a thousand things! Believe me.

When I started our conversation, I was super confident, you know? I told myself, "Relax, Denki, she's just another girl…" But the moment I saw her expression, that "I don't care what you say" look, I got nervous. It didn't help that her punk style and those always-present headphones made her seem so cool—like she was in another league. And the worst part was that she kept glancing at me sideways, as if she'd already decided I was the dumbest guy she'd ever met... 

Oh, and to make matters worse, she was also in Class 1-A too.

And no, I couldn't let my image fall so low in front of a classmate before we'd even started classes!

So, in a burst of nerves or maybe panic, I decided to break the ice with a joke. Something like, "Hey, isn't it cool to have someone so electrifying in the class?" thinking it'd come off as funny. 

Her response was... nothing. 

Not even a smile. Just a deadpan look that said, "Seriously?" 

And that's when I realized this girl wasn't going to laugh at my easy jokes. Though she did seem to enjoy make fun of me...

At first, I couldn't think of anything more clever to say—it wasn't easy keeping the conversation going, and it wasn't like I was even trying to flirt with her.

I just wanted to make a good impression… but it wasn't going well. 

She crossed her arms and gave me a sideways look, waiting for me to say something worthwhile. It was like she could see through all my nonsense. My brain was short-circuiting, and every attempt at conversation just went down the drain. In the end, I stood there sweating, trying not to look like an idiot.

Wow, it was like facing a panel of judges. This was way too much for me. Uraraka, help!

I still didn't know what was happening here. Normally, I'm much more expressive. I couldn't understand what was going on in this conversation to make my heart pound so hard that I could feel it pulsing in my temples. I gasped, trying to catch my breath, not realizing I'd been holding it until that moment.

"Umm, so… do you like music?" I finally managed to say, feeling like a little kid on his first day of school.

She just raised an eyebrow and nodded, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. But to my surprise, after that awkward moment, when I started talking about my old band and a few songs I'd learned to play on guitar, she began telling me about some of her favorite bands. And that's when I saw another side of her—more passionate and enthusiastic, but still low-key. 

Then… even though she looked at me like every word I said was dumb, the truth is she wasn't ignoring me, and she seemed to really enjoy talking about music. Sure, she kept teasing me, but it wasn't so bad.

Honestly, I had fun talking to her.

And to my surprise, after a while of chatting, I realized that Jiro was actually… pretty cool. 

Yep, a potential good friend. 

That's right, instead of trying to flirt with her—which clearly wasn't going to work—I started to genuinely enjoy just talking to her…, like you do with a good friend.

She was the first girl I didn't feel the need to flirt with or feel pressure to act like the "cool guy" or the ladies' man. It was nice. 

Who knew friendship between a guy and a girl could actually be real? Now I finally believed it.

Even if she kept giving me that face of, "Why are you like this?" In the end, I think she helped me chill out and not take everything so seriously here at U.A. It might not be the easiest friendship, but with Jiro, I felt like I had someone who would tell me things exactly how they were.

...

Not long after Jiro, I met the super attractive Itsuka Kendo from Class 1-B. 

She's, well… strong, friendly, and energetic, but also pretty quick to criticize me when I say something she doesn't approve, although at least she wasn't shy about laughing at some of the stuff I said.

Naturally, when I met her, I tried to be smooth, giving her a smile and complimenting her skills, but she just sighed and gave me that "Seriously, Kaminari?" look.

Ah, but the worst part was when I tried showing off my electricity in front of her…

Yeah, that went terribly wrong.

Kendo even hit me on the head so fast I didn't see it coming. And honestly, I deserved it for being careless enough to literally blow up her phone by accident with my electricity heh…

After that clumsy and awful mistake, I assumed she'd be mad and wouldn't talk to me again once I bought her a new phone… At least, that's what I thought after getting punched by her. 

And yeah, that punch really hurt, even though I'm sure she held back a lot. Who knew a cute girl could hit that hard !?

But to my surprise, she didn't stay mad—she even laughed a little, and it was kind of cute. 

I really don't know how being an idiot actually helped me make her laugh like that, but hey, I didn't care about the how—this was the first time I was kind of grateful for being a bit clumsy, because after that, she felt more comfortable talking to me, and we had a pretty nice conversation.

It was a total shock, I went from thinking that after she hit me, she wouldn't want to talk to me again, to breaking the ice and actually having a good time.

To my pleasant surprise, Kendo was really energetic and considerate. She liked chatting as long as I "behaved."

She even laughed at my bad jokes! That was a big deal because even I knew they were terrible, though maybe she was laughing more at the way I nervously told them than at the joke itself. Or maybe she was just trying not to make me feel bad…

Yeah, that's a possibility, given her personality. But that didn't stop her from calling me out whenever I said something she didn't agree with.

After chatting for a bit, she asked me for my contact info before leaving. 

That's right! A cute girl asked for my number before I could ask for hers! 

Hell! That was a major win in my book, even though she couldn't give me her number since her phone was literally blown up… but still, she asked for my number!

Of course, right before she left, she told me I should focus on my training instead of 'silly things,' and there I was, left without a shred of dignity. She didn't even let me celebrate my victory for a few minutes before knocking me down a peg.

She wasn't even a little impressed by my flirting or attempts to act cool… 

And now I knew that unless I wanted to start wearing a helmet to protect me from her punches, I should probably ease up on flirting with her. At least, not so directly… the problem is, I don't know many subtle ways to flirt.

 But I'd have to try unless I wanted more punches or critiques from her.