The Exam Ends

U.A. High School's exam monitoring room.

In the dim room, several screens showed what was happening at the different exam sites. Most of the exams were nearing their end, with only one large robot left rampaging through each site, searching for anyone who had yet to reach the safe zone.

"This year's students are all excellent. They've shown outstanding judgment in managing their time and weighing the pros and cons. It's easy to imagine how brightly they'll shine as heroes in the future."

A proctor turned to the tall man standing beside him. "Wouldn't you agree, All Might?"

"Ah, indeed."

Dressed like Superman from an American comic of the last century, his body packed with explosive muscles and his trademark smile even more striking, the man looked like he belonged in a different art style just by standing there. He was the legendary No. 1, All Might!

But now, standing with his hands on his hips, he was frowning for some reason. He watched the few exam sites still in progress on the monitors with a grave expression, seemingly worried about something.

A green-haired boy lay trembling on the ground, staring in terror at the large robot in front of him.

"Young Midoriya... you have to pass the test."

Just then, a sexy, alluring woman in a skintight outfit, who was monitoring another exam site, spoke to the others with a troubled look. "Everyone, the robot at site D seems to have gone out of control. We can't operate it remotely at all anymore."

The sudden crisis instantly drew every teacher's attention. A teacher dressed like a Western cowboy rose from his seat without a word, checked the gun at his waist, and prepared to open the door.

"Wait, Snipe." A nonhuman teacher ran over and checked the equipment, then gave a wry smile. "It's not a malfunction. Control was just transferred to a higher level."

"You mean..."

He nodded, looking up at the ceiling with a sigh. "Who knows what's gotten into the principal this time..."

Jilan Jiyu quietly watched the robot rampage among the examinees, seemingly in no hurry to help.

Then the robot suddenly changed its clumsy attack pattern, using its arms to deal AoE damage. Jilan Jiyu keenly noticed the difference—the robot seemed to have suddenly come to life. Though it continued attacking the examinees, it seemed to avoid attacking the students helping others, whether deliberately or not, and tried to leave those it attacked in relatively conspicuous places.

So U.A. High School's higher-ups were watching this place now...

"One minute left in the exam!"

Mic's booming voice, loud enough to carry across every exam site, announced that the exam was almost over. The whole site erupted in noise, and some people turned to flee somewhere safe.

The robot's arm suddenly began to spin. Like a drill, it punched effortlessly through a building in front of it. Large chunks of brick and stone fell, blocking the fleeing examinees' path.

"No way! The path's blocked!" They stopped in shock and turned to face the robot as it turned its gaze toward them.

Are we going to get attacked? Some even shut their eyes in despair.

I don't know who's controlling it, but it's time to end this!

Jilan Jiyu ran between the buildings and reached a blind spot the robot's eyes couldn't see. He sprang upward and hurled the first crow in his hand, aiming for the joint between its head and body!

The crow became a hidden weapon, lifeless as a stone, and shot straight toward the joint. A second before it struck, it exploded.

As if a remote-controlled bomb had been planted inside it, it self-destructed with precision, blasting a small hole in the back of the robot's head and exposing countless tangled wires inside.

Immediately afterward, another crow flew from Jilan Jiyu's hand. But this one seemed to have a mind of its own, circling in a wide arc before diving into the hole. It flew to the spot where the wires were most densely tangled, let out a dying cry, and followed its brother's fate. Light and heat radiating from inside it made it swell in an instant, and it exploded with a boom.

Though it was only a small explosion, it was a fatal blow to a machine. The red light in the robot's eyes dimmed instantly, and it stopped moving, frozen in the act of reaching down to grab something.

"Did it work?"

Jilan Jiyu breathed a sigh of relief. Unable to maintain his previous position, his whole body went limp and he fell to the ground.

"In the end, I still used it..." Jilan Jiyu tilted his head to look at the motionless robot. He had just used his original Quirk-Killer Queen.

In the manga he had read in his old world, Yoshikage Kira had to summon his Stand to use his ability. But in this world, Stands didn't seem to exist. He only needed to touch an object with his fingertips to turn it into a bomb.

What he had done wasn't actually complicated. First, he channeled Hamon into the first crow, paralyzing its nerves and making it a "dead object." He touched it with his fingertip to turn it into a living bomb. After it exploded, he planted a bomb on the other crow and used Hamon to control its nerves, making it fly into the hole and explode once it reached the target.

Some might have thought it cruel to turn animals into living bombs, but Jilan Jiyu felt no guilt about sacrificing crows. Perhaps he had inherited some of Yoshikage Kira's personality along with his ability. Though he was deeply averse to killing people and didn't want to become a murderer like him, he felt no revulsion at killing a few animals. On the contrary, he sometimes bought live animals at the market and killed them himself to cook, simply to suppress the urge to kill inside him.

There was no need to feel sympathy for things he couldn't communicate with. That was what he thought.

"The exam is over!"

Soon, all the robots at the exam site that had not yet been destroyed stopped moving. Several firefighters suddenly rushed out of some rooms, followed by doctors carrying stretchers.

The examinees who had been rescuing trapped people throughout the exam now followed the professionals, continuing to pull people out and place them on stretchers.

Because people in this world had Quirks, their physiques were much stronger than those of ordinary humans in Jilan Jiyu's former world. Though these examinees had been buried beneath the rubble, most had suffered only superficial injuries. The few with serious injuries were taken to the Pro Hero known as "Recovery Girl" and would probably recover soon.

Suddenly, a head emerged from a pile of rubble, shouting, "Damn it! A mere robot actually got the better of me, the great Tetsutetsu!"

His skin was like steel all over, and he hadn't been hurt at all. He had simply been pinned down by something that fell from above, leaving him unable to move, and had only just recovered.

Though he was shouting, his whole body was still wedged in place, so he could only wait obediently for the rescuers to clear away the earth around him. Even so, the exposed part of his face kept twisting into fierce expressions, seemingly threatening them not to tell anyone about this embarrassing incident.

And so, the entrance exam for U.A. High School's Hero Course came to an end.