40 Someone to be proud of

The rest of the second round matches weren't that interesting. Bakugo ended up fighting Momo and easily won. Shoto went and fought Deku and to the surprise of everyone including Aiden, he was actually forced to use his fire side. Of course he still won at the end, but just the fact that he was forced to use that side of him made him irate.

Now there we only 4 people left in the tournament, Aiden, Mina, Shoto and Bakugo. It was quite a shock that Mina had made it this far. Although she wasn't weak by any means, nobody in class 1A could have forseen this type of development. Only Momo who had watched Mina's training sessions with Aiden understood how hard she worked in order to stand next to him.

Unfortunately that all ended after her fight with Bakugo. Although her reflexes were greater than before, it was useless against the shock waves that Bakugo produced. After 3 minutes of fighting, she was sent flying off the stage. While the defeat was quite crushing, nobody dared to look down on her. After all, she was able to stand next people like Aiden and Todoroki.

After a few minutes of comforting her, Aiden made his way to the stage and stood opposite a tired looking Shoto. Just from his posture alone, everyone knew that his heart wasn't in it. The use of his fire side must have been to much of a blow to his psyche that he no longer had the will to compete. It was actually quite a tragic sight to behold. Even Aiden, the person who said he didn't care whether he used his fire side or not was disappointed. Against an opponent with a quirk such as his, Aiden had come up with multiple strategies in order to defeat him. But at the end of the day, strategies were just theories. If he wanted to test the validity of his theories then it was impertinent that he face Shoto when he was at his best. This wasn't just for the tournament. It was also practice in case he ever fought against someone else whose quirk had a similar range and destructive capability.

"Oi Shoto." He called.

Raising his head, Shoto's eyes lacked any form of will.

"You said you were gonna be the strongest right? If that's the case then what the fuck are you doing?!" He yelled. "The strongest hero can't lose here now can he? Look at all the pros up there watching us! Think about the amount of kids and people watching from home. Do you think they're looking at your current stature and thinking that's the future number 1?" Aiden continued. "So what if you used your fire side in the previous match! As the future number one you have to show the world what you're truly made of! Holding back half of your power while others are going at it full throttle just proves that you're unworthy of inheriting the title of number 1!" Giving him the greatest pep talk he could come up with, Aiden tried to reignite Shoto's fighting spirit. In order to test his theory he needed Shoto to face him seriously.

"Weren't you the one who said you were born to be the greatest hero! Then fucking do it! Who cares if your father wants you to surpass All Might! Show him that you won't only surpass him, you'll exceed any and every hero yet to be born! Be someone your mother can be proud of! Let her face the world and say that's my son! The number one hero! Shoto Todoroki the greatest hero of his time!"

"I-

"Don't!" Aiden stopped him. "For people like us... Actions speak louder than words."

Constructing two knives, Aiden faced Shoto head on.

"He summoned his knives!" The members of class 1-A were shocked. For the entirety of the festival, Aiden had only used his pole to fight and that was against Tokoyami. For him to use it now meant that he saw Shoto as someone worthy of going all out against.

"Is that a knife?!"

"What is his quirk?!"

"What else can this kid do?!"

Not only class 1-A, even the audience and the rest of the other classes were in a state of shock. As this was the first time that they had seen him construct such a weapon, they felt like the mystery's on this boy kept growing.

Seeing the knife in his hand, Shoto's eyes widened as he felt the sincerity in his actions.

"Shoto." Aiden's voice rang out among the gasps of the audience. "I'm facing you with my everything, so don't you dare think about holding back on me!"

Realizing that everything Aiden had been saying had been for his benefit, Shoto looked up at the cheering audience, at the pros and at the cameras pointed at him. Seeing the smiles on everyone's faces, he remembered back to when he was a child, sitting on the sofa with his mother watching scenes of All Might save people with that famous smile of his. He remembered his mother's warmth and how he cheered for the number one hero. Looking at the audience now, the same feelings he had back then rushed into him.

"YOU CAN DO IT SHOTO!!" A cheer louder than any of the others broke out. Turning to face the person in the stands, he saw the figure of a woman in her early 20s. She had white hair flaked with patches of red. Shouting his name above the rest, she did it with a heartfelt smile on her face.

"Fuyumi nee-san..."

Seeing her little brother look at her, Fuyumi was momentarily startled but quickly gave him a smile and a thumbs up.

"GO TODOROKI-SAN!"

"DUDE YOU'VE GOT THIS!"

"SHOW THEM WHAT CLASS 1-A CAN DO!"

(Play YOU SAY RUN!!)

Seeing his sister here to support him with the combined cheering of his classmates, Shoto's eyes began to water. Wiping away his would be tears, he turned back to face the patient Aiden. With fire burning in his eyes, he swore that he wouldn't let anybody else down and promised to give it his all.

"You've got your fire back... Good." Aiden smiled and dashed towards him.

Not waiting for him to close the distance, Shoto instinctively raised his hand and created a ice glacier in order to stop him in his tracks.

"Slash."

Waving his knife at the incoming glacier, Aiden shot a sharp arc of astral energy towards it. Like a hot knife passing through butter, his slash easily cut through the giant glacier and split it in two.

"Incredible..." All Might and the pros muttered in unison.

Running through the divided wall of ice, his eyes never left Shoto's body for a minute. Unlike his previous matches, Todoroki's glacier was too thick and exceeded the range in which he could shift through. With no other choice he was forced to face the attack head on.

Bursting with energy, Shoto created more and more glaciers and sent them his way. Tearing through them, Aiden's speed only seemed to rise.

Feeling the threat in front him getting closer, Shoto raised up his left arm.

"Is that-

"Is he going to-

"YES SHOTO!" Endeavor screamed.

[A/n: RELEASE THE HOT FIRE!!]

Releasing a sea of flames in his direction, Shoto planned to force him back and then press on with his attack. Seeing the torrent of flames coursing towards him, Aiden felt his heart accelerate. The attack was way to wide for him to dodge. If he even attempted to shift above it, he couldn't guarantee that he'd be able to completely avoid it.

Tightening the muscles in his legs, he increased speed even more and raced towards the flames.

"What's he doing?!"

"He's actually facing the flames head on?!"

"WHAT!!"

Pushing the majority of his astral energy into his right arm, he let it flow into his knife. Feeling his construct on the brink of shattering, a weird grin grew onto his face.

'Is this what Mike meant when he said fighting is fun?'

Shaking those thoughts out of his head, he deconstructed the knife in his left hand and let the additional energy flow into the knife in his right.

'Its ready.'

Back in the USJ, Aiden told Shigaraki that he wasn't a impact/shock type of fighter like All Might. His specialty relied on inflicting slash and-

"PIERCE!!" Thrusting his knife towards the torrent of flames, a ray of purple light shot out of his knife and pierced through the flame attack. Bypassing the attack, Aiden's attack didn't stop there as it continued to travel forward and brushed pass Shoto's cheek leaving a thin cut behind.

Startled by the attack, he lost focus and allowed Aiden to reach him.

'Shit!'

With no more time left to construct a new weapon, Aiden decided to deal with this old school style. Clenching his right fist, he drove it upwards until it met Shoto's chin.

'YESS!!'

Feeling his fist connect with Shoto's chin, he tightened the muscles in his arms to the extreme and with all of his force, he pushed as hard as he could until Shoto's feet left the ground and his body was in the air.

With the few seconds brought to by his opponent being airborne, Aiden refocused his astral energy and shifted above him.

Widening his eyes, Shoto watched as Aiden constructed the pole he used against Tokoyami.

'This is it huh...' He smiled peacefully.

"SHOTO!!!" His sister screamed.

Feeling his left side heat up, he raised his left arm and stared at Aiden.

"Checkmate."

Smirking at the word, Aiden watched as the flames approached him before saying a sentence that shook Shoto to his core.

"You're in my range."

Hearing these words, Shoto watched as Aiden's figure vanished into purple specks of light. Feeling a presence behind him, his eyes widened in shock as he felt a sharp pain erupt from his head.