Nutricula

Diogenes

"I've never seen anything like it! In a come-from-behind victory, Akatani Mikumo, without using a Quirk at all, has taken first place in the Obstacle Course!" Present Mic screamed over the uproarious cheers of the audience. Izuku heaved, catching his breath, before scanning the audience to find Yamikumo in the crowd. Once he did, he gave thumbs up, causing the crowd to go even wilder. "Just look at that confidence!"

As the final student ran in, a light beeped and the gates closed immediately. "Oops!" Midnight said as she re-appeared on the concrete dias in a vaguely magazine-like pose in a cloud of smoke. "No more students than forty-two! Sorry, students forty-three to a billion, but you gotta sit in the bleachers and sulk until the next Sports Festival! We'll provide you with some activities after the next event, but for now! Romance! Drama! Bloodshed! Only here, at UA Hero Academy!"

Izuku distantly wondered if being a part of the Hero industry also meant being a part of the entertainment industry as well.

"Regardless, congratulations to the students that did make the cut! As such, here are the results!" Midnight called out, "In first place, Akatani Mikumo, of General Education Course class 1-C! In second, Todoroki Shouto, of Hero Course class 1-A! Third, Bakugou Katsuki, of Hero Course class 1-A! In fourth, Yoarashi Inasa, of Hero Course class 1-B! In fifth, Shiozaki Ibara, of Hero Course class 1-A! And all the rest are on the screen behind me!" With that, Midnight thrust her cat-of-nine-tails at the Jumbotron behind her, illuminating a huge grid showing Izuku's stolen face, three of his classmates, and the boy he had been texting on and off the past month. Underneath them was a long, sprawling list that ended at the number 42: Aoyama Yuuga.

Izuku felt vaguely sorry for Aoyama.

"These forty-two students have earned the right to advance through the UA First-Year Sports Festival!" Midnight exclaimed, to everyone's cheers and, Izuku noted, to the Gen Ed classes' jeers from the stands. Counting the classes quickly, Izuku quickly determined why the Gen Ed Course was reacting so badly - the only Gen Ed students to get through were, incidentally, him as Yamikumo, and Shinsou Hitoshi. Everyone else was in the Hero Course or, in the case of someone named Hatsume Mei, in the Support Course.

"And now, the second event!" Midnight announced, snapping Izuku back to reality. He couldn't miss this. "What could it be?! What could it be?! I already know what it is, of course, but I shiver in anticipation thinking about how you'll react!" As the screen spun like a slot machine reel, moving through things like "Test of Courage", "Battle Royale", and "Kokkuri-san", it slowly slowed down before landing on three words.

Human Cavalry Battle

A weirdly hanafuda-styled Principal Nedzu appeared to the left of the event name, and to the right of the name appeared a bunch of cranes. The audience went wild over the very concept of the Cavalry Battle, but Izuku had a few concerns. Luckily, so did his competitors.

"Excuse me, kero," Tsuyu-san raised her hand, "How would a Cavalry Battle work as a one-man event?"

"Excellent question from Asui Tsuyu, in-" Midnight quickly looked at a tablet. "-Fourteenth place! Indeed, this will be a team battle! Our students will freely form groups of two to four students, and the rest you'll understand from this diagram!" Midnight pressed a button, and the image on the screen fizzled out to a picture of Number Thirteen, Blood King, and Present Mic all carrying All Might. "Basically, it's just like any other cavalry battle! You become a huge mass of sweaty bodies and you run around and try to snatch other teams' headbands! However, there's a special naughty twist to this little battle of ours!" Midnight held up a white headband. "Each individual student has an increasing amount of points, and each team's headband will be the cumulative amount of points from each student based on their placing in the prior event! For example, if you placed forty-second, like Aoyama Yuuga from Hero Course class 1-A-" (An anguished "Madame!" arose from the crowd of muttering students.) "-Then you'll get 5 points! Forty-first place gets 10 points, and so on!"