Midoriya's team and Todoroki's team met in the central third of the field with that sense of inevitability reserved for two events destined to occur regardless of what the other forty participants did.
Mineta observed from the flank.
Not because his team had nothing to do. But because what was about to happen between Midoriya and Todoroki was the kind of thing he had understood in the anime as narrative, and in person, with the two of them on the same field and only meters apart, it carried a different weight.
Midoriya is about to tell him something no one else has. Something about his father. Something about fire.
And Todoroki will hear it, whether he wants to or not.
Hatsume activated the gadgets on the sides of Midoriya's formation, giving them that maneuverability that wasn't raw speed but unpredictability in trajectory. Tokoyami positioned Dark Shadow defensively. Uraraka prepared to adjust weight if the formation needed to change direction quickly.
Todoroki's team responded with Iida accelerating toward the point of engagement, Yaoyorozu raising her composite shield, and Kendo amplifying her hands to stabilize the left flank.
It was Midoriya who spoke first.
Mineta couldn't hear clearly from where he was—the crowd noise was too loud—but he could see the way Midoriya spoke: direct, with that intensity of someone who has thought something through for a long time and decided this was the moment to say it, even if the timing was terrible for a conversation.
Todoroki responded.
Something brief. That calm of his which, in this context, was not calm but the surface of something intensely hot beneath.
The two teams made contact.
Todoroki's ice covered the ground in front of Midoriya's formation. Hatsume compensated with lateral stabilizers. Dark Shadow pushed against the front of Todoroki's formation. Kendo used her large hands to absorb the momentum.
And in the midst of all that, Midoriya kept speaking.
Mineta saw the exact moment something changed in Todoroki.
It wasn't visible in his expression, which remained unchanged. It was in his shoulders. In the way someone carrying something very heavy shifts when that weight moves, even if it doesn't disappear.
There it is.
Midoriya is telling him something about who decides who he is. That the fire is his too, even if it comes from his father. That denying that part of himself isn't victory over Endeavor, it's giving Endeavor exactly what he wants.
Todoroki hears it, whether he wants to or not.
The team exchange continued. Iida changed direction twice. Yaoyorozu adjusted the shield's angle. Hatsume activated something new Mineta hadn't seen before—a rear thruster that pushed Midoriya's formation straight forward at the moment Todoroki created a lateral ice barrier.
Todoroki's band came within Midoriya's reach.
Then Todoroki did something neither team expected.
He raised his left hand.
Fire appeared.
Not the small, controlled flame of someone using a familiar tool. It was the flame of someone who hadn't used it in years, and when he finally did, it came with the full accumulation of that time. Large. Bright. The kind of flame that has been waiting to emerge for a long time.
The stadium fell silent.
For exactly two seconds, UA Sports Festival Stadium was quiet—an event Present Mic would spend years describing to anyone who would listen.
Then the stands erupted.
Present Mic:
—SHOTO TODOROKI IS USING FIRE!! FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE SPORTS FESTIVAL HE'S USING BOTH QUIRKS SIMULTANEOUSLY!!
The heat reached Mineta on the flank. Not intense, but real. The kind of heat that reminds your body that fire exists as a physical phenomenon, not just a visual effect.
Midoriya, in his formation, smiled.
Not a tactical satisfaction smile. Something else. The smile of someone witnessing another person do something they needed to do and feeling genuinely happy for it, even if it cost them points in the process.
That, Mineta thought, watching. That's what makes him different.
Todoroki's fire created a heat wave that pushed Midoriya's formation back—something Hatsume hadn't fully anticipated, breaking part of the team's coordination.
Midoriya's band was briefly exposed.
Todoroki took it.
The score changed.
Todoroki's team gained fifty additional points.
Midoriya's team lost points—but Midoriya still smiled, which was the most confusing thing Present Mic had ever described in years, delivering it with the enthusiasm of someone who doesn't fully understand what they're witnessing but knows it's important.
Mineta turned his attention back to the field.
The exchange between Todoroki and Midoriya had lasted ninety seconds and altered the state of the field in ways beyond the transferred points.
Todoroki's fire had recalibrated every team's perception of what it meant to face Todoroki's team. Before, it had been ice plus Iida's speed plus Yaoyorozu's shield. Now it was that plus fire—fire on a scale no one had anticipated.
The mid-range teams that had been calculating whether to attack Todoroki to accumulate points now immediately revised their calculations.
Which meant Todoroki's team would face less pressure in the next few minutes.
Which meant Bakugo remained the only worthwhile target for the top teams, and mid-range teams would compete among themselves for ranking positions.
I have six hundred seventy-five points. I need one more band to feel secure in the qualifying zone.
He scanned the field for the right target.
1-B's Awase team had a base of 130 points plus a band stolen from a smaller team. Total: 210 points. Solid physical formation but no ranged defenses.
1-B's Yanagi team had 100 base points. A telekinesis quirk useful defensively but requiring sustained concentration, meaning under pressure the defense could weaken.
Kendo, now on Todoroki's team, had left her original team incomplete, and a recently reorganized 1-B team had less coordination than one operating together from the start.
Awase, Mineta decided. Two hundred ten points. No ranged defenses. If Asui covers the flank and Shoji absorbs frontal impact, the window exists.
—Awase team, —he said quietly. —Three o'clock.
The three processed the direction without further explanation.
The approach to Awase's team took forty seconds because the field was active enough that moving straight was less efficient than diagonal movement, taking advantage of gaps left by repositioning main teams.
Awase saw them at twenty meters.
The 1-B student had a contact-welding quirk, able to join surfaces by touching them simultaneously. Defensively useful for anchoring the horse formation. Offensively limited in Cavalry Battle due to the need for direct contact.
Good static defense. Poor defense in motion.
Awase's team chose static defense: horse members connected using the welding quirk, creating a formation difficult to destabilize with a simple push.
Mineta didn't attempt a simple push.
He launched four spheres in a fan, one at each end of the formation, sticking them to points where the horse members contacted the ground. Not enough to immobilize completely. Enough to force any movement to first break adhesion, which took time.
Asui used her tongue to apply lateral pressure to the formation's left flank.
Awase's team compensated by pivoting right.
During the pivot, the rider briefly faced away from Mineta.
Shoji raised the formation two more centimeters.
Mineta extended his arm.
Awase's rider's band was thirty centimeters away.
Twenty-five.
Twenty.
Awase's team finished the pivot.
The rider reoriented toward Mineta, hand outstretched toward his band.
Both arms reached simultaneously.
Mineta took Awase's band.
Awase's rider touched Mineta's band but didn't grab it—Shoji had raised the formation at the last moment, so the hand reached the band but couldn't close around it before the distance increased again.
The team retreated.
Two bands stolen. Six hundred seventy-five plus two hundred ten. Eight hundred eighty-five points.
Solid qualifying zone. Second from the bottom among the top four if the field doesn't change further in the next…
Mineta checked the stadium timer.
Five minutes forty seconds remaining.
Much can change in five minutes forty seconds.
What changed was Shinso's team.
They had been accumulating patiently for the first ten minutes, stealing bands from teams unaware until too late. The result: 850 points and a field position clearly showing which teams were in the qualifying zone and which weren't.
Mineta's team was in the zone.
Shinso's team, with 850 points, was thirty-five points from entering it.
Thirty-five points was a band from any minor team.
Or Mineta's team's band.
Mineta saw them reorient.
Here we go.
—Shinso's team is moving toward us, —he said.
—I see, —Asui replied.
—Shoji, Ojiro, listen. —Mineta spoke quietly, the stadium noise absorbing it before anyone outside the team could hear. —When they reach verbal range, you'll hear things that sound like normal questions or comments. Don't answer. Nothing. Even if it seems innocent. Even if it seems insignificant.
—The quirk is verbal? —Shoji asked.
—Yes.
Shoji processed calmly.
—Understood.
Ojiro looked at Mineta from below.
—How do you know what it is?
The same instinctive question he had asked before, now clearly insufficient because they were about to confront the team directly.
Mineta made a decision.
—Because during the UA entrance exam, there was an incident where several candidates responded to a purple-haired boy's questions and stopped moving on their own. —Pause. —It wasn't random.
Ojiro looked at him for a second, then nodded—recognizing specific information instead of instinct and able to act on it.
—Got it, —he said.
Shinso's team reached twenty-five meters.
Mineta looked at Shinso.
Shinso looked back.
The same look as before. Mutual recognition. Two people who know the other knows.
At this distance, they could hear each other if they spoke loudly enough, although the stands still produced background noise.
Shinso spoke.
—Eighth place, —he said, conversationally, neither shouting nor whispering. —Not bad for someone with an adhesion quirk.
A statement about Mineta's performance. Designed to provoke a confirmation or denial. The basic trap structure: make responding feel natural because the statement concerns the listener.
Mineta didn't respond.
Shinso continued, tone unchanged.
—The way you intercepted Kaminari's team earlier. That was quick for someone without an obvious tactical reason to do it.
Another statement. Another invitation to respond.
Mineta didn't respond.
To his left, Ojiro hesitated, nearly responding. Mineta felt it in Ojiro's left shoulder—the brief moment where the brain readied a response.
No.
Mineta briefly placed a hand on Ojiro's shoulder, silent. A physical anchor before the response could emerge.
Ojiro didn't respond.
Shinso's team kept approaching.
Fifteen meters.
Ten.
Shinso changed tactics. He stopped speaking to Mineta and looked directly at Shoji.
—That arm formation is unusual, —he said. —How many do you have?
A direct question about Shoji's quirk. The type that in a normal conversation would provoke an automatic answer—inquiring about someone's quirk at UA was normal, merely conversation.
Shoji didn't respond.
Shinso looked at him for a second, then at Asui.
—You crossed the ravine via the lateral wall, —he said. —I saw it from the edge. How much weight can your tongue support?
Asui didn't respond.
All four of Mineta's team stayed silent as Shinso's team completed the approach.
Five meters.
The stadium again slightly lowered the volume in that corner. Present Mic noticed.
—Something interesting is happening in Sector Four! Shinso's General Studies team versus 1-A's Mineta team, and nobody is saying anything!
Shinso looked at Mineta from four meters.
Mineta looked back.
You know I know. And I know you know I know. And we both know this exchange will be decided in the next twenty seconds before time runs out.
Shinso did something Mineta hadn't anticipated.
He smiled.
Not the smile of someone who's won. The smile of someone who found something unexpected, genuinely interesting.
—Well played, —Shinso said, in a tone not seeking a response but simply stating a conclusion.
Then Shinso's team turned to another target.
Mineta watched them leave.
His own right hand, prepared with spheres the entire exchange, slowly lowered.
It wasn't retreat, he thought. It was calculation. The time they would have to steal our bands didn't justify exposing the quirk when other teams were available.
Shinso is patient. That makes him more dangerous than most.
—Kero, —Asui said quietly.
—Yes, —Mineta replied.
It wasn't conversation. It was confirmation that both had processed the same thing.
The final five minutes of the Cavalry Battle passed with that sense of compressed time when too many variables move simultaneously for the brain to process them chronologically.
Bakugo's team absorbed three more attacks and didn't lose any bands.
Todoroki's team used fire twice more, each time with more control than the last, as if Todoroki were learning in real time how to use something he hadn't in years, and that learning was visible.
Midoriya's team maintained their points, neither attacking more top teams nor losing bands to smaller teams.
Shinso's team stole two more bands in the last three minutes, reaching 1,150 points, entering provisional qualifying range.
Which meant Mineta's team, with 885 points, would be out if the count ended there.
No.
Mineta scanned the field with four minutes twenty seconds left on the clock.
I need another band. There's time. The field keeps moving.
Where is the right band?
He scanned the field with the focus of someone who had been saving this question for the moment it became urgent—and that moment had arrived.
And he found it.
Sero and Kaminari's team, which had survived the Shinso encounter and accumulated 200 points with two stolen bands during the chaos, was forty meters away, attention divided between Tetsutetsu's team approaching from the north and Bakugo's exchange chaos to the south.
Two fronts. Divided attention. And Kaminari still at sixty percent brain capacity.
That's the band.
—Sero team, —Mineta said. —Now.
End of Episode 30.