Jaune woke up slowly as his eyes tried to adjust to daylight.
Today was his 11th birthday… after unlocking his aura when a car almost crashed into him two years ago, his father reluctantly told him that he'd start his huntsman training when he became eleven, his mother has been training him in auric arts and body conditioning ever since as a preparation for his training.
He was reluctant to get up though. No doubt his sisters went wild with the decorations and the cakes again… though he supposed his family's size had a part in that. He got up and started to dress. A black button up shirt with very top unbuttoned and a pair of black cargo pants, he was ready to get down stairs after a visit to the bathroom.
Jaune wasn't expecting such a somber mood in the living room… he looked to his father, Jonathan, a forty-nine year old veteran huntsman with a height of two meters, broad shoulders, bulging muscles and pale skin, blond hair adorned his head while his shining blue eyes was looking down.
He turned his attention to his mother who was busy consoling his father, a forty-nine year old woman whom his father met when he was attending beacon, she looked young for such an age, barely looking above thirty-five. She was a tall woman with a height of 184 cm, Curvy yet almost amazonian with her muscles, She had light brown hair with light brown-almost hazel eyes and tan skin. He looked towards his sisters, only four of them present as the oldest three were either already huntresses or still in training in Shade Academy. Why they chose Shade over Beacon was still a mystery to him. All of his sisters had the trademark blonde hair and blue eyes of the Arc clan just like himself.
He decided he didn't like the mood and didn't want to enter but his youngest sister noticed him before he could make his escape.
"Jaune!" Lavern shouted, turning all the eyes in the room to him.
"What's going on?" Jaune asked.
His father looked at him with an unreadable expression. "My brother… your uncle died yesterday." His father replied, Jaune had only met his uncle once… and was not affected by the news. "I see." Jaune said, "We shouldn't party then?", His sisters began moving to remove the decorations. "We'll talk later Jaune." his father told him before Jaune moved back to his room.
Back in his room he decided to read, moving to his bookshelf he started to examine all the books he had been reading since his mother started to teach him about aura. From Auric arts to Arc history, first aid to camping, though he learned most things from his father when they went camping, And books about weapons, Namely about Sabre techniques and stances, gun operation and maintenance.
It was a couple of hours later that his father called out to Jaune. Moving to kitchen he found his parents sitting at the small table. His father looked at him with a somberly expression while his mother had guilt written all over her face.
"Jaune" His father began, "I wanted to talk about how your uncle died."
"How did he die?" Jaune asked, His mother moved to talk but his father spoke first.
"He and his team was sent to deal with a grimm nest south of Vale. While they were fighting the swarm your uncle fell into an opening that the Alpha was going to ambush them from… He died fighting the Alpha while his team made to safety."
Jaune didn't know what to say… he always thought that this was something all huntsmen had to come to terms with and chose to stay silent.
"What we want is Jaune…" his mother began before his father could, "Is for you to be safe. And we think you choosing a far less dangerous career is going to be a good start."
Jaune stumbled back at his mother's words. "Are you saying you won't train me to become a huntsman!?" He practically shouted.
"It's for your own safety!" his father quickly said, "I don't want you to face the hardships of the life of a huntsman."
"But cowering down while other people protecting me isn't what i want! I'm an Arc! It's my duty to become a huntsman!" Jaune was livid at this point.
"We're just trying to protect you!" his father shouted back just as angrily.
Jaune grit his teeth but didn't say anything else. He simply went back to his room and started to plan his escape.
One Week Later
Jaune went over the stuff in his bag. Food? Check, Water? Check, First aid kit? Check, Clothes? Check, Survival kit? Check, Scroll? Check, A mass-produced Arming sword from the Arc house armory? Check, Satisfied, Jaune let a long breath out, he was dreading what would happen if his family ever caught him sneaking out but he didn't have any other choice. Tonight his parents were absent thanks to a militia meeting of the town of Orléans and his sisters were asleep upstairs. Jaune slowly got up and went to the front door, put on his black hiking boots over his white ankle socks and stepped outside, starting to move without even looking back.
One Month Later
Jaune was perched on a thick branch up a tree sleeping when a sudden ringing of bell woke him up. He had been traveling Northeast towards the city of Vale when he decided to he'd just sleep on a tree nearby a village as it would be safer than sleeping deeper in the woods. He saw that a group of mixed grimm, mainly Ursai on front lines mixed with Creeps with beowolves on the flanks were rushing towards the village from Northwest while town's militia mixed with a pair of huntresses were hurdling the townspeople towards the hall, Deciding to help he started running towards the southern gate.
After seeing him the huntress pair decided to call him over, "You look a bit too young to be in the wilds with a weapon on you"
Jaune decided to skew the the truth, "I was getting trained until grimm ran over our village, I have my aura unlocked and i can help."
Huntresses not wanting to place a child in front of a grimm horde told him, "you can help defending the town hall" before pushing him towards its direction.
Running towards the town hall Jaune could see women and children entering the basement of the building while civilian men at the 2nd floor had guns of varying sizes, mostly pistols and old rifles, while militia occupied the defensive structures surrounding the the town hall, one of the militia noticed Jaune running towards them.
"I haven't seen you in the village before kid, whose son are you?" Militiaman asked.
"I'm not from this village sir, i was nearby when the bell sounded. Huntresses sent me here to help with the defence." Jaune replied.
"Grab a gun and get upstairs, we can't have you standing in our line of fire swinging that sword around." told him the militiaman.
Jaune grabbed a semi-auto rifle along with a handful of clips from a nearby pile, the rifle was a Valean RSC-18 from the Great War, now bought by militias as a cheap surplus rifle throughout the kingdom, and made his way to join the civilians on the 2nd floor. Loading the rifle he waited anxiously towards his first taste of combat.
