Chapter 77: Ingenuity

Inside a house with the moon already brightly shining outside, two boys could be seen sitting across from each other over a coffee table.

The room was clean and orderly, besides a few pieces of old newspapers, one of which was called "Insight Into Local Heroes: Get to Know Them."

It depicted those who weren't shown in all that limelight—those who didn't receive as much attention but did enough that people in the community should know about them.

There was HexaDexterity, a local who helped with the aftermath of villain attacks and rebuilding, using his increased limbs and strength to speed up the normally arduous task.

Then there was the Spray Hero, Enkai! A local neighborhood hero, he helped with fires but often interacted with the community more than they were used to.

Apparently, the reason his hero's name was his own was that he didn't want to create a barrier of a fake "facade" between him and those he helped.

Others describing their accomplishments were highlighted in neon yellow, making them stand out.

In front of a newspaper, which was hung on the wall in a glass frame, Suijin sipped his tea with his hands while Shoji calmly put it down.

The serenity continued for a moment as the boys let the heat fill them up, warming them on this chilly day.

Of course, closing the window may help with their chill, but the atmosphere of being cold on the outside with the internal heat from the tea warming them up was peaceful.

And though Suijin wanted to ignore anything associated with it, he did have to go back tomorrow.

So, stifling a sigh, the boy asked, "How's school been?"

Shoji shrugged at his words, picking up the kettle to re-pour his fourth cup of Oolong tea, his favorite brand, as he appreciated its subtlety.

"Not much. I had to choose my hero name since that's what they did before their week-long Hero Shadowing, and I was with my dad. Then we had a group race across Ground Gamma, where we used our gains to see who was the fastest."

'I… see. I guess I'll need to start thinking about what my hero name would be. But in other news, racing? It must've been rough for Shoji since that kind of thing doesn't suit his quirk,' Suijin thought.

Recalling Ground Gamma from the pamphlet available in their entrance exams, there were many obstacles designed to make quick movement on the ground next to impossible.

"What group were you in?" Suijin asked.

Shoji took a moment before answering, "If I remember correctly, there were Tsu, Ida, Uraraka, and Sero."

While Shoji returned to his tea drinking, Suijin had a dumbfounded expression on his face.

'Are you serious? That's who they assigned to you! Were they trying to make you lose?'

Suijin reevaluated Aizawa in his mind, replacing the lazy appearance with a more sadistic and cruel one.

Needless to say, Suijin didn't want to ask Shoji where he finished, as his prediction was dead last with a considerable gap between him and fourth.

It would simply be unbelievable if Shoji DIDN'T finish last in that group.

Still, Suijin was forced to answer when Shoji, with a slight upturning of his lips, said, "Do you want to know something interesting about that?"

He phrased it as a question, but knowing Suijin's overbounding curiosity, it may have been defiance.

Suijin was thinking that maybe one of them fell, and he got fourth or third, unlikely but entirely possible.

Shoji let the anticipation come to a boil as he purposely took a particularly long sip, enjoying his tea along with his friend's growing impatience.

Finally, when he sensed that Suijin couldn't take it anymore, he put the cup down and said,

"Out of that entire group of Ida with his jets for legs, Tsu with their frog-like flexibility, Uraraka with her Zero-Gravity, and Sero with his Tape….. I finished First."

Suijin sat there for a moment, staring blankly at Shoji before his brain reset as the bigger boy got up to return his dishes to the sink. "WAI— HOW?"

Shoji tapped his head with his fingers, telling Suijin to 'think' as he left the room.

And as Suijin wondered if his classmates actually regressed during the Hero training, Shoji was reminiscing on his time with his father.

"You've understood how to increase your strength, so I don't need to instruct you on that any longer. Instead, I'll be teaching you how to use those arms of yours to fight."

"And me!"

Shoji looked at his mother, dressed in a recently famous exercise wear her company produced, a purple top over her sleek black bodysuit, with her similarly colored hair and eight pure black eyes resting upon her face.

He noticed the excited expression on her face, remembering that she was taking MASSIVE amounts of time off work since, according to her,

"How could my son AND husband be at home while I'm not there working."

What ensued was a proper *ss beating.

The rules were that he was to get attacked by his mother, and he was supposed to grapple with all of her hands and webs.

While doing so, his father would be attacking him, and he was supposed to fend off the attacks of the other multiple armed men.

Later, once he was done with the week and going back to school, it was explained that the exercise improved his reaction time, along with his quirk-to-hand understanding.

His father had said, "You've only had to use two arms your entire life since you're so strong, but in the future, you may face someone even stronger than you. By that point, you'll need to use not just two, or even six, but all your arms, legs, eyes, hands, and feet; you'll need to use everything to defeat such a foe."

Even now, Shoji couldn't help but nod at such sound logic. Since he was more familiar with his quirk, he noticed that creating and manipulating extensions of his body was easier than ever.

Thus, all he had to do was make a long string of arms to catapult him into the air, and then, using the makeshift glider that he had done before with Uraraka in the festival, he 'glided' to the finish line, beating everyone else.

"Ingenuity."

That was the praise he got from All Might, and remembering so brought a smile to the boy's face.

Meanwhile, as Shoji was putting the dishes away, Suijin was still having a mental breakdown trying to process how Shoji coming in first was possible.

"-you bastard."

Waking up in a hangry mood, Suijin cursed at Shoji as they walked out of the local shop, with him carrying his breakfast and a coffee to wake him up.

Shoji, who was enjoying his own homemade drink, raised an inquisitive eyebrow, irking Suijin even further.

"Don't you dare pretend not to know! You getting first, J-Just how did YOU manage to do such a thing? Were you lying to me? But then I could easily verify such a thing, so that'd be dumb. But maybe you are that—"

Not wanting his friend to die from both his carlessness in words and actions, Shoji pulled Suijin by his clothes, stopping the distracted boy from walking into oncoming traffic.

"WH—"

HOOOOOONNNNNKKKKKKK

Suijin was silenced by the long honk from the poor driver who almost hit the kid, and Shoji's glare, though Suijin couldn't tell which of his actions caused said glare.

Maybe it was both.

Still, the boy piped down, dropping the subject and talking to the now-pissed-off driver before they returned to their walk to school.

The rest of the morning was uneventful, and after getting "Checked Up" by Recovery Girl, along with a stern scolding about how he was too "reckless," he was sent out with a piece of paper.

"This is your hero name form; it was supposed to be mailed to you, but we had an issue with our systems and thus couldn't get it out in time, so I'm giving it to you. When you're done, turn it in to your homeroom teacher."

Thus, Suijin walked down the hallways, looking at his reflection, wondering just what he was going to call himself.