Nejire wasn't weak by any measure.
On the contrary, she could be considered one of, if not the strongest, test-takers taking the Entrance Exam.
It was just that, compared with Isshun, her attacks felt simply not impactful enough.
Unfortunately for Nejire, Isshun was her only point of comparison when it came to the strength of Quirks.
After all, she got to see him use his quirk in front of her all the time, whereas with Pro Heroes, she only saw videos or clips.
So while yeah, it looked like it did a lot of damage, when you had a friend who reverted all of the damage like it was never there in the first place, the impact was drastically reduced.
All of the wooden logs that she pierced through with the Drill Shot were back to how they were originally, without any indication that they had ever broken.
Both mentally and visually, it made her subconsciously underplay the strength of her own Quirk.
While Isshun had reassured Nejire multiple times on the strength of her own Quirk, Nejire wouldn't be Nejire if she didn't completely believe in him.
She was old enough not to rely on Shun-chan all the time anyway!
But now, seeing the metal armor of every robot she encountered get pierced with ease, Nejire quickly backed that thought.
It seemed that Shun-chan was right!
"Spiral Shot!"
BANG!
Another robot was pierced with her drill shot, adding to her point count.
"Hmm… That wasn't that catchy!"
Nejire complained cheerfully.
Shun-chan might have given her names for the three moves that she knew, Drill Shot, Drill Arms, and Drill Shield, but they were just too boring!
It didn't fit her style, you know?
So far, her favorite one was Nejire Shot, but who knows.
Maybe she'd find a better one!
She flew up to have a better vantage point to find more robots, but on the way, she saw a familiar face instead.
Wasn't that the sheep girl?
Nejire raised her arms in a binocular fashion and furrowed her eyebrows to try to see further into the distance.
"Hmm, judging by the horns and hair color, it does seem familiar…"
Just as she was debating whether to say hi and apologize again, a movement caught her eye.
Lowering her hand-binoculars, she scanned the mock city and saw what had caught her eye earlier.
"It seems someone needs my help!"
She said with a small anticipatory smile, accelerating towards the unsuspecting student's location.
Arriving quickly, Nejire saw a male student holding down a One Pointer with purple vines, but it looked like that was all they could do.
Even now, the One Pointer was still resisting, its wheel screeching as it tried to move while immobilized.
However, that wasn't the most notable thing about the situation.
"RAHHHHHHHH!!!"
The boy was hollering at the top of his lungs.
It seemed that was the reason why he wasn't getting any help from the surrounding students.
"Excuse me!"
Nejire hovered in front of him, waving her arms to get the boy's attention.
"AHHH—YES?!"
"Do you need help!?"
"YES PLEASE!!!"
"Okay~"
While Nejire wanted to help, seeing as they were still in an exam environment, it wouldn't be nice of her to accidentally steal someone's kill if they didn't actually need her help.
With a few shots, the One Pointer sported a few extra breathing holes.
"THANK YOU SO MUCH!"
"No problem! Good luck with the rest of your exams!" Nejire waved goodbye and flew back up to her vantage point.
--<>--
BANG!
After making sure that there wasn't anyone to get caught in the crossfire, Nejire quickly dispatched another robot and then flew up to look for another unsuspecting robot or someone to save.
"That's number one hundred!" Nejire said with a smile, adding on, "Minus a few dozen…"
After losing count after the thirty-something robot she skilled, Nejire became more relaxed.
While she didn't know what the cut-off was, the amount she had destroyed was probably plenty enough!
With this relaxed mindset, she looked around for a familiar face.
"There she is! And… are those more sheep balls!?"
--<>--
"This year has some hits and misses," Eraserhead mumbled.
"What are you talking about, Aizawa?" Midnight countered.
"Look at them giving it their all! Isn't that what youth is supposed to be? Like that loud guy with the purple vines! He reminds me of you, Yamada!"
"Haha! I'll agree on that one." Present Mic agreed. "That blond kid who keeps getting naked is also very youthful! Makes me wanna go "Yeah!" What was his Quirk again?"
"Permeation."
Eraserhead gave a quick response.
"Permeation, huh… so he even phases through his clothes! How unlucky, haha!" Present Mic laughed.
"But we do have quite a bit of versatile Quirks in this batch of students." Vlad King added on. "Not much when it comes to firepower, though."
On the screen, a short golden-haired girl was shown wielding a long lance and charging a Two Pointer whilst riding a metallic horse.
On another, it showed a gray-haired girl immobilizing a One Pointer and reaching for the shut-off button.
While most students used their Quirks effectively, in terms of raw firepower, most examinees didn't have any that stood out.
Present Mic nudged his best friend. "Isn't that pretty convenient for you?"
"...It doesn't matter if it's more convenient or not. As long as they have the potential, they're all students." Eraserhead gave a bland response.
After a while, another student caught the staff's attention.
"That cheery girl is racking up both Rescue and Villain Points pretty quickly, and her control over her Quirk is exceptional…" Vlad King noted.
"She hasn't missed once either. Either she's naturally talented with long range, or she's practiced quite often." Snipe added on.
"Student Hado is indeed quite exceptional." Nezu agreed.
In terms of both Rescue Points and Villain Points, Nejire Hado was overwhelmingly above in both aspects.
While her skill set was quite limited, the efficacy of the moves themselves was quite good, with no situations where her drill bullets didn't do any damage.
In addition, her air maneuverability was high, with no instances of losing balance or becoming flustered.
While the Entrance Exam might not be difficult for someone at Student Hado's level, seeing as she even had the leisure to rescue her fellow classmates, it seemed even her mentality was quite good.
In a sense, Student Hado could be considered a perfect hexagon when it came to having no visible weaknesses.
'Was this because of the guidance of Student Shunkan?'
It was a thought that popped into his head.
Of course, Nezu didn't speak in definite answers.
While Nezu wouldn't disparage Student Hado's natural battle intuition when it came to maneuvering around the robots to find the optimal weak spots and capitalize on them, her base ability was simply too high.
Ragdoll had mentioned that Student Hado and Student Shunkan often spent time at a nearby mountain, but Nezu had been unable to obtain footage of any training sessions.
However, when he investigated afterward, aside from a few footprints, there was no evidence of any Quirk training.
"A curious possibility." He mumbled.
"Did you say anything, Nezu?" Eraserhead asked, thinking he heard something.
"Merely just a stray thought," Nezu said, looking over all of the screens and the dwindling Villain Bot counts. "I believe now is a fine time to deploy the Zero Pointers."
--<>--
"So your name was Tsunomaki Shiza!" Nejire nodded, petting the floofball in her hands with an expression of bliss on her face. "That's a pretty unique name, Tsunomaki-san!"
"Is it?" Shiza tilted her head.
Nejire had already considered the Entrance Exam completed. While she couldn't find the hidden Zero Pointer, it must have been too scared of her to come out.
Shiza had also decided to stop running around searching for Villain Bots.
The 47 Points felt enough, and the number of Villain Bots would have definitely decreased enough, making it hard to find more.
"So where'd the name come from?" Nejire asked.
"Have you perhaps heard of the Roman Empire?" Shiza asked. "One of the Roman emperors was named Caesar—"
"Roman Empire? What's that?"
Shiza's soft smile stiffened slightly.
"...You don't know about the Roman Empire?"
Suddenly sensing that she might be in trouble, Nejire locked in. Losing the fluffball in her hands was not an option.
"Uh—I know what it is!" Nejire put a finger to her head, as if recalling nonexistent memories.
"It was a super strong Empire, and they were based in Rome, yeah…"
"..."
Shiza went silent.
But before Shiza could even do anything, a loud noise interrupted them.
THOOOOM…
RUMBLE…
--<>--
A/N: I can't think of a good name for drill shot that Nejire would like without it being cringe...
If you have any good ideas for the name of Nejire's moves, feel free to gimme some!
Also, didn't post last week cause i was outta state attending a sibling's graduation. I was planning not to write this week either cause i had midterms but 2 weeks with no chapter after saying i could do weekly again is actually tragic.
However, HOWEVER! i found a new writing strat that actually helps me a lot. Set a 5 minutes timer and try to write an outline of everything you might want in the chapter, and after the 5 minutes just organize what you want and write after that!
Its surprisingly very helpful and stops sudden blanking out when writing it all at once cause you have a general outline.