The written exam hall was a tomb of silence, broken only by the frantic scratching of pencils on paper and the nervous, shallow breathing of hundreds of teenagers. The air was thick with anxiety, the kind that preceded life-altering moments.
Madara Uchiha sat in the middle row, his posture relaxed, almost insolent. He stared down at the exam paper with profound boredom.
Question 4: Calculate the coefficient of kinetic friction if the body mass is 50kg and the angle of inclination is...
Question 9: Analyze the geopolitical ramifications of the first recorded Quirk manifestation in Qing Qing City...
Madara let out a quiet, derisive scoff.
(Do they truly believe I will be fighting villains using logarithms and historical trivia? Absurdities tailored for the masses.)
For the past ten months, his curriculum had been utterly singular. He had studied how to shatter bone with minimal effort. He had studied how to mold his volatile chakra into a weapon. He had studied the mechanics of his own evolving body. He hadn't cracked open a single standard textbook.
The paper before him was almost entirely blank. A normal student would be hyperventilating. Madara didn't even blink.
The Uchiha did not fail. If a path to victory did not exist, they carved one into reality.
He closed his eyes for a brief second, centering himself. When they snapped open, the abyssal black irises had vanished, replaced by a glowing, blood-red field.
Sharingan.
Madara didn't look down at his own paper. He didn't need to. Keeping his head perfectly still, facing forward, he let his enhanced vision sweep the periphery of the room.
His gaze locked onto a girl seated two rows to his left—Momo Yaoyorozu. She was breezing through the complex equations with the grace of an artist painting a masterpiece. Her confidence was absolute; her speed, formidable.
Madara focused his Sharingan solely on her right hand.
To the naked eye, her hand was just moving quickly. To the Sharingan, it was a symphony of anatomical data. He saw the precise angle of the pen, the minute contractions of the muscles in her forearm, the exact pressure applied by her index finger, the millisecond pauses between strokes.
In his mind, those raw physical movements were instantly decoded, translated back into the numbers and words she was inscribing onto the page.
Madara picked up his own pen.
Without once glancing down at his desk, his hand began to move. It moved with a terrifying, robotic synchronization with Yaoyorozu's. He wasn't thinking about the answers; he was bypassing the intellect entirely. His hand had become a remote printer, receiving direct commands from the visual data streaming through his eyes. He copied her movements with 100% fidelity.
Ectoplasm, the pro-hero proctoring the exam, walked slowly down the aisle. He paused near Madara's desk, a flicker of suspicion behind his masked face.
The student was staring straight ahead, his expression one of utter boredom, yet his hand was flying across the page, filling in answers at an impossible rate.
(His eyes are open, but he isn't looking at the paper... nor is he glancing around suspiciously. What is he doing?)
Ectoplasm watched for a full minute but could find no concrete proof of cheating. There were no wandering eyes, no notes, no electronic devices. Madara was cheating with absolute genius, utilizing his unique ocular prowess to steal intellectual labor without ever breaking composure.
Thirty minutes later, Madara set his pen down. The paper was full. A perfect score was guaranteed.
A cold, internal smirk touched his lips.
(In the world of Shinobi, information is a weapon. Those who cannot protect their intelligence do not deserve to wield it.)
The academic hell ended, and the true hell began.
Hundreds of students stood before the towering, imposing gates of Battle Center B. The tension in the air was palpable, a mix of excitement and nauseating fear.
Everyone was decked out in flashy tracksuits or hastily cobbled-together hero costumes. Some were stretching nervously, others muttering complex strategies to themselves, trying to psych themselves up.
Madara stood at the back of the pack, hands casually in his pockets. His calm, heavy aura created a natural buffer zone around him, separating him from the noisy herd. He wore his simple high-collared shirt and weighted training gear beneath, looking more like he was going for a stroll than entering a warzone.
High above atop a watchtower, Present Mic's amplified voice boomed out, shattering the tension.
"OKAY, LISTEN UP LISTENERS! THERE ARE NO COUNTDOWNS IN REAL BATTLES! RUN! RUN! RUN! THE EXAM STARTS NOW!"
The reaction was chaotic. The mass of students surged forward like a bursting dam, screaming, yelling, and shoving to get through the gate first.
Madara didn't sprint. He didn't join the stampede.
He walked.
His steps were rapid, purposeful, and ground-eating, but they lacked the frantic desperation of the others. He slipped into the industrial cityscape just as the first sounds of explosions began to echo off the mock buildings.
He hadn't gone fifty meters down the main street when the first target appeared. A 1-Pointer—a fast, mono-wheeled metallic drone—sped toward him, its optical sensors glowing red.
"TARGET ACQUIRED."
Madara didn't shift into a fighting stance. He didn't break his stride. He merely waited.
He calculated the distance, the speed of the drone, and the exact moment it would enter his critical striking range.
In one blindingly fast motion, he pivoted on his heel. He didn't use a flashy technique. He delivered a simple, surgical back-kick directly to the drone's "neck," the weakest structural point connecting the head to the wheel chassis.
CRUNCH.
Metal sheared and sparks flew. The robot's head was torn clean off its body. The chassis skidded to a halt, circuits frying.
"One point," Madara whispered, already turning away before the scrap metal hit the ground.
He wasn't looking for a brawl; he was hunting efficiency.
A loud explosion rocked the adjacent street. Madara glanced over to see Katsuki Bakugo flying through the air using his explosions, screaming "DIEEEE!" as he blasted everything in sight, creating massive collateral damage to the buildings just to take down a few 2-Pointers.
Madara watched the display with undisguised disdain.
(Fool. Wasting massive amounts of energy on an empty performance. This exam isn't a beauty pageant; it's a test of competence.)
Madara veered off the main road, slipping into a quiet side alley.
It was a trap. Immediately, three massive, hulking figures emerged from the shadows. Three 3-Pointer robots, heavily armored and designed for brute force, boxed him in.
"Excellent," Madara muttered, his blood-red eyes scanning their armaments. "Nine points, delivered to my doorstep."
The first robot lunged, swinging a massive hydraulic arm capable of crushing a car.
Madara activated his Sharingan fully for just one second. The world slowed down. He saw the trajectory of the arm, the shift in the robot's weight.
He didn't retreat. He ducked under the swing with millimeters to spare, the wind of the attack ruffling his hair. In the same fluid motion, he leaped, landing silently on the robot's shoulder joint.
He used no weapons. He needed none.
He flooded his right fist with chakra, hardening it beyond steel. He drove a single, concentrated punch directly into the robot's armored chassis, right over its central processor unit.
BANG.
The armor buckled inward like tin foil. His fist punched through metal and wiring. The robot convulsed once and died.
The second robot immediately fired a volley of rubber missiles.
Madara didn't run. He stood on the chassis of the downed first robot. He moved with minimal effort, tilting his head and shifting his torso just enough to let the missiles streak past him, harmlessly striking the walls.
Before the smoke cleared, Madara kicked off the dead robot, launching himself at the second one. He spun in mid-air, delivering a chakra-enhanced roundhouse kick that slammed the second robot's head laterally, knocking it off balance and sending it crashing into the third robot.
The third robot staggered, trying to regain its footing.
It was too late.
Madara was already above it. He dropped from the sky, bringing his heel down in a devastating axe kick—the "Bone Crushing" technique he had perfected over months of hitting solid rock.
His heel connected squarely with the top of the robot's helm.
CRUSH.
The machine collapsed in on itself under the overwhelming vertical force, flattened like an empty soda can.
Madara landed softly amidst the wreckage of three destroyers. He dusted off his shoulder.
"Forty points."
He looked around. He had destroyed a few stragglers on his way here as well.
"Fifty points total."
He paused, doing a quick mental calculation. Based on previous years' estimates and the number of participants, fifty combat points should be more than sufficient to guarantee a spot in Class 1-A.
Any further effort would be a waste. His chakra reserves, while grown, were still finite. His body was still human. Continuing to fight just to rack up a high score was inefficient and childish.
(There is no need to attract excessive attention from the faculty yet. Let the spotlight shine on the idiots who crave applause.)
Deciding his exam was over, Madara calmly withdrew from the streets. He scaled a low-rise building with ease and sat on the edge of the flat rooftop, his legs dangling over the side.
From his vantage point, he watched the chaos below with profound boredom. It was like watching ants scurry.
He saw students gasping for air, bleeding from minor cuts, fighting desperately for every single point. He saw the boy with engines in his legs (Iida) sprinting around, and the girl who could make things float (Uraraka) touching robots and sending them crashing down.
Madara pulled a small plastic water bottle from his thigh pouch and took a measured sip.
"Boring."
And then...
The water inside his bottle rippled violently.
A second later, the entire rooftop he was sitting on vibrated.
A deep, grinding sound of massive gears and crushing concrete drowned out the noise of the battle below.
Madara slowly lifted his head.
At the far end of the main street, rising from behind a cloud of dust that choked the cityscape, a colossal shadow blocked out the sun.
It was a metallic monstrosity the size of a skyscraper. Its hand alone was bigger than a house. It crawled forward, crushing buildings beneath its treads as if they were made of cardboard.
The Zero-Pointer.
The fighting below ceased instantly.
"Oh my god! What is that size?!"
"Run! It's coming this way!"
"Forget the points! Just survive!"
The exam dissolved into mass panic. The herd mentality took over, and everyone turned and fled away from the path of destruction.
Madara, from his perch on the roof, stared at the giant robot with dead, unimpressed eyes.
(Zero points... So it is merely an environmental hazard meant to induce fear. A moving obstacle. There is absolutely no strategic value in engaging it.)
Madara capped his water bottle and stood up, stretching his neck.
Since the exam was nearly over and his score was secured, he decided he would simply leave the arena via the back route behind the buildings, avoiding the stampede entirely.
He turned his back on the approaching titan.
"A waste of time," Madara muttered, preparing to jump down the opposite side of the building.
But, just before he leaped, his sharp hearing picked up a sound that cut through the noise of the fleeing crowd.
It was a weak, pained moan coming from directly in the path of the colossus.
Madara paused.
He stopped his forward motion and turned his head slightly over his shoulder, looking back down at the street.
Through the dust, he saw her. The brunette girl who made things float—Uraraka. She had tripped, and her leg was pinned beneath a large chunk of concrete debris. She was struggling in vain to free herself.
The towering shadow of the Zero-Pointer was looming over her. It was perhaps thirty seconds away from crushing that section of the street into dust.
And then Madara saw something else.
He saw Midoriya. The green-haired boy had stopped running. He was trembling, his entire body shaking with fear, but he wasn't looking at the exit. He was looking back at the trapped girl.
Madara's eyes narrowed slightly.
(Is the idiot actually going to intervene?)