Izumina Week 2020

Nighttime Stroll / Lost Together

"So, this is our lives now, huh."

"Ashido, I... I'm pretty sure we'll be okay."

"I'm pretty sure you're more lost than I am, Midoriya. And I'm so lost I have literally no idea where we even are anymore. I'm just getting ready to accept the inevitable."

Izuku sighed at her, what he had learned she considered a joke, and took another look around the place, shining his phone's flashlight around to see if there were any determining signs that might tell him where they were. There were absolutely none. A forest was about as distinguishable as any other forest more or less anywhere in the world, especially at night.

He couldn't disagree with Mina on this one - He had absolutely no clue where he was.

"I don't see anything that looks familiar..." He admitted, glancing back towards the pink girl. She was looking up at the trees, like she was looking for a familiar-looking branch or something with a mark on it that they could identify and work backwards from. "You see anything?"

Mina shook her head. "Nope. We've gotta be a while off the main path now, I don't think we're gonna find anything like that anymore." They had been wandering for a while now, and the possibility that they had just been going in circles was starting to make itself unpleasantly plausible in Izuku's head. Whatever the case may be there, it seemed like Mina was right. They had gone so far from the path they had been on that they had essentially left any clues that might have told them where they were behind hours ago, back when they still had daylight.

"How did we even get this far off track..." Izuku wondered aloud, looking around again, hoping to see something he'd missed previously. Maybe a tear of cloth or something?...

"I've got no idea." Mina shrugged. Given the fact they were, well...Completely and utterly lost, with no phone reception, no clue where they were, and in the dead of night, she was remarkably calm. Almost upbeat, even. Certainly not her usual bouncy self, but all things considered she seemed cheerful. "Gonna be honest - I'm more impressed than anything." She added on. "Points to us for screwing up this bad, huh?"

Blinking, Izuku looked at her. She had... What he could only describe as an expectant smile on her lips, like she was expecting praise or a laugh for that. What was he supposed to say to that?

Especially given it was his fault she was even in this mess in the first place.

"You uh.... Do you have any ideas?" He asked, hoping to steer the conversation in another direction.

Glancing around, Mina seemed to search for something to give her an idea, as though something would call out to her. She paused when she saw a slight patch of blue that peeked between the criss-crossing mess of tree branches and leaves. "That way. There's at least a bit of light there. That's something."

Training outside of areas that were exclusively owned by Yuuei was something that the second year had really ramped up. No longer were their classes relegated to just the grounds, but now they ventured out more, as their tutors tried to get them more used to varying environments. It helped them to gain perspective, they claimed. To feel the world a bit more organically. Everything in Yuuei was pre-planned, Present Mic had said. It didn't represent the real world fully.

For all the funding and resources at the behest of their school, artificial environments could only prepare them for reason world scenarios to a certain extent. And there was really no way to tell what environments they would find themselves within anymore. Times were changing in the world of Heroes, and all the funding in the world wouldn't help create a true natural feel to the real world.. They had to be ready for anything.