Splitting Up

"Class rep! You were here too!"

Mashirao Ojiro, driven to a dead end by his pursuers, suddenly heard someone behind him shout something inexplicable. Strange as it was, he had no time to look back and just kept running for his life.

A little later, sensing something was odd, he wrapped his tail around a sign and used the moment to look back upside down like Spider-Man. Everyone who had been pursuing him so relentlessly was gone.

He cautiously kept to the blind spots as he retraced his steps. Turning a street corner, he was delighted to find Jilan Jiyu walking toward him! At that moment, the firefighter's uniform Jilan Jiyu wore seemed like the most beautiful outfit in the world...

What could be more moving than seeing a firefighter at the scene of a fire?

"Are you all right?" Jilan Jiyu asked, looking at the conspicuous stains on Mashirao Ojiro's white taekwondo uniform as he ran excitedly out from the corner. "Are you hurt? I can heal you."

"No, but class rep, did you take care of all those enemies?" Though they were some distance away, Ojiro could just make out a number of people lying on the ground beyond Jilan Jiyu. "Amazing, you actually took down that many!"

"I just got lucky. Have you seen anyone else?"

Mashirao Ojiro shook his head gravely. "No. When I was transported here, I saw a group of people coming after me. Once I realized they were enemies, I started running."

So we really were transported to different areas...

"Ojiro, we're in the fire zone right now. Do you remember the overhead map Thirteen showed us? We're at the very edge of the USJ training grounds, as far from the exit as we can get."

Seeing Ojiro nod, Jilan Jiyu continued, "USJ has six kinds of natural disasters: storms, floods, fires, mountains, sand and earthquakes. Assuming two students were caught up in each disaster, at most eight people were left at the exit. With Thirteen there too, we have reason to believe someone has already broken through the gate to get reinforcements."

"I hope so!" An excited smile appeared on Ojiro's face. "Once All Might gets here, we'll be saved."

"No, it'll be worse if All Might comes," Jilan Jiyu said bluntly. "I suspect the enemies aren't particularly interested in us students. The ambushers they sent didn't even use their Quirks. They might well be stalling for time, waiting for us to ask All Might for help. They may have something they can use against him."

Hearing Jilan Jiyu say this, Ojiro's eyes widened, and he laughed in disbelief. "But that's All Might. How could anyone possibly deal with him? All Might is invincible, right?"

Invincible...? Whatever else, All Might has been famous for decades. Everyone has limits. How long can he maintain himself at that limit?

"Maybe. I hope I'm wrong too."

Jilan Jiyu glanced at his watch. Several minutes had passed since they encountered the enemies, and Shota Aizawa might have been fighting them that whole time...

"Ojiro, do you still have any strength left?"

Ojiro shook his head firmly. "This is nothing compared to the sweat I work up practicing taekwondo."

"All right. We've taken care of the enemies here, but our other classmates may still be in danger, so..."

Ojiro immediately understood what Jilan wanted to say. "Should we go save the others?"

"Right. The flood zone and the mountain zone are closest to us. Your tail would get heavy if it got wet, wouldn't it? So let's split up. I'll go to the flood zone, and you go to the mountain zone. Once you've helped our classmates deal with the enemies, take them to the other zones and keep looking for our classmates."

Ojiro nodded and said confidently, "These enemies don't intend to kill us, and their Quirks aren't all that strong. They're only at the level of street thugs. If you hadn't come, I would have hidden, then easily ambushed two or three of them and picked them off one by one."

Jilan Jiyu sighed and said worriedly, "They're just a bunch of cannon fodder. The important ones are the group attacking Mr. Aizawa. I don't think he can hold out much longer."

"Then let's not waste any time. This is where we part ways."

"Wait, take the rope." Jilan Jiyu reached behind his waist, took the fireproof rope hanging from his belt, and handed it to Ojiro. "You'll need it to tie up the enemies."

The two ran to the exit of the fire zone. Ojiro called out a farewell, then used his tail for support as he leaped and climbed into the neighboring mountain zone.

...He looks like a kangaroo, Jilan Jiyu suddenly thought. After Ojiro left, he ran toward the flood zone.

Jilan Jiyu arrived at the flood zone. There were water slides like those at an amusement park, and a large lake in the middle, with a ship resting motionless at its center. From the looks of it, the rescue objective here was probably to get passengers off a ship that had stopped.

If only there had been courses like hero rescue training when the Titanic sailed, the tragedy of that era might never have happened... Of course, it might have been that very incident that led heroes to train in water rescues. Better not to dwell on a chicken-and-egg question like that.

"Have all the enemies here already been taken out?"

From where Jilan Jiyu stood, the lake looked perfectly calm, with no sign of enemies lurking there-unless every one of them had a "fish"-type Quirk.

Then are they over by the ship?

Jilan Jiyu looked at the distant ship, feeling a headache coming on. Did he have to swim over there?

He could swim, and he wasn't slow, but by the time he reached the other side, Mr. Aizawa would have been beaten down by the enemies. How could he carry out the strategy he had in mind of surrounding the cities from the countryside like that?

Looks like I can only go around the edge.

Jilan Jiyu made up his mind. He would circle around the outside of the flood zone, following the rocks that surrounded it. That meant sneaking along the edge of the plaza where the enemies were and reaching his destination without anyone noticing him.

But first, he had to take off his firefighter's uniform. It was orange-red so people could quickly spot him, making it especially conspicuous in a crowd. Now that he needed to sneak over without drawing attention, the uniform was unnecessary.

Without hesitation, Jilan Jiyu took off the firefighter's uniform that had helped him so much and tossed it beside the pool. Wearing only the athletic clothes underneath, he headed for the plaza in the middle.