Suicidal Todoroki x Midoriya | What it Means to Love

16 | Rise Like a Phoenix

Shoto Todoroki

"The moment we've all been waiting for!" Present Mic excitedly exclaims. "Yes, after being postponed, we have our final round. Who will win? Katsuki Bakugou or Shoto Todoroki?" A sharp tantrum from the uproarious audience fills the air as they cheer and scream.

I remain silent and wait for Midnight to signal the start of the match. "Begin!" she shouts.

Now that Bakugou has been able to observe my slightly altered beginning tactic from fighting Midoriya, I decide to revert to the old tactics I know like the back of my hand. Despite having been explicitly cautioned not to follow through with my typical game plans, I have yet another unpredictable and reckless plan laid out roughly in mind. By defying all the logic I live by, I move one step closer to the shore.

I shall draw the same attack out once more, I think to myself, preparing to execute a colossal attack. High risk, high reward. My logic consists of keeping calm until the climax, but inverting it results in this unprecedented recklessness. Unleashing a larger, colder ice glacier like the one I finished Sero with, I aim it at Bakugou and expect him to break through within seconds.

In the blink of an eye, the entire kingdom of precipitous ice is mercilessly ripped apart from the inside out. Bakugou's sheer explosive power is enough to ripple across the ground and burst a frigid balloon about half the size of the overall length of the stadium. Jagged and smooth bullets of ice shoot out in a cone-shaped radius. Bakugou steps free from the ice debris and marches up to me with palms emitting small orange explosions.

"Hey Half 'n Half," he calls to me with a vicious sneer, "when're you gonna use that other half of ya? You let it out for the damn nerd. Now fight me with it! I'll kill you if you let me down!" He breaks into a run and charges me furiously.

"Get over it, Shoto. Dry your hideous tears. Men don't cry. Now go straight to your room."

"Your emotions only serve to hinder your performance."

"Stop! He's only five!"

"He's already five. It is even more of a reason to push him harder."

Barely knowing how to read and write, and you expect me to be trained to a professional level? Could you not see...all the hate we gave? The hate we received? The hate we tossed back and forth? If you had, none of this would have happened.

Creating a much smaller glacier than the previous one that runs right up to Bakugou, I exert an extensive amount of my energy to cause a thick, staggering wall of ice to rise up behind me. I freeze the ground solid with a slick layer of glistening ice and begin to glide across it towards Bakugou. Ensuring that I'm prepared to grab him, I freeze over the ice on the ground directly behind my feet to reduce the distance I'll be thrown back.

As Bakugou busts through my pillar of ice, he shoots forwards and into my trap. Certainly not anticipating for me to charge back at a raging bull, Bakugou is unable to react in a way that gives him the upper hand as I clasp his arms into my hands. Instantaneously, I've sunk my frozen fangs of frostbite into Bakugou's left arm, forcing it to spread rapidly until half of his arm is devoured by frost. I'm thrust back so I'm breaking the precautionary ice I've created behind myself, but I push back against him before I can slam into my sunlight-blocking wall of ice.

Frostbite begins to settle across my skin.

It's all or nothing.

"What you lead now is a worthless existence to a worthless future."

"Shit, that hurts!" Bakugou hisses, ripping his arms from my hands and launching an explosion directly in my face.

The scalding heat of the flames sears across my face like an incandescent sea of fire as my body is propelled backwards.