Thousands of feet above the Island of Patch in kingdom of Vale she fell. Ruby Rose, A Zeonic Mage in training. Born with the gift of magic she was destined to become one of the ruling caster elite of the world.
At a mere fifteen years of age, she was already an adapt of two of the eleven schools of Zeonic Magic. The girl garbed in her green and white student robes, so colored to represent her twin fields of study the magic schools of Creation and Air that she well underway to mastering at her young age.
As she fell from the sky, falling hundreds of feet a second she tightly gripped her chosen weapon. A simple steel bladed scythe, the handle of which woven from a series of rose vines that were hardened until it had the strength of steel and still adorning eternal red roses who's petals shed and regrow almost instantly. A creation of hers using her creation magics. Her thoughts turned distant as she could see the sleepy farm only a small handful of miles away where the father she was forced to leave behind when it was revealed she had the Gift resided.
It had been a standard practice of the Kingdoms to exalt those with the Gift for as long as the the kingdom's existed. Those with the Gift were too dangerous to allow independence even if paradoxically they lived at the very peaks of society. In fact two of the great kingdoms of the world were ruled by Casters. Vale her own home kingdom was ruled by a monarchy of Mentalists. Psychic descendants of the General that led the Armies of Vale, Atlas, and Mistral to a bloody draw against the overwhelming might of the Faunus warbands of Vacuo almost eighty years ago. Conversely Vacuo was ruled by the Ki wielding martial warriors of the White Fang as the Faunus had no one among them that was born with the Gift.
Ruby's eyes opened as the ground came closer to her. she flipped her body from free falling head first to her feet facing the ground as she began to accumulate Zeon into an incantation. It only took her six seconds to cast the spell around her surrounding herself with a powerful air current that slowed from her free fall to a gentle landing on the snow covered ground.
Which led to the reason she was out here in the first place. The other great threat to the world as a whole also known as the Grimm. As she looked out at the Grimm encampment, she counted roughly two dozen humanoid variants of the Grimm, shirtless covered in bones and in some cases not even bothering with clothes in the first place. All of them milled about wielding crude weapons.
Ruby kept low and looked out for the Grimm warbands leader After a few moments of observation she found that this band lacked anything resembling leadership."A broken Warband. Almost not even worth my time to wipe them out." Ruby spoke out loud to herself.
Ruby walked towards the camp as she spoke out an incantation. The outlying Grim warriors took notice. They almost seven feet tall, wielding heavy blades made of Dark-steel and covered in bone plates in lieu of armor and they had just started to walk towards her.
"In locis autem meretricis facta est tibi malum!" The lead Grim spoke out in its own tongue as it closed the gap wielding a massive sword.
Ruby's response was to complete the incantation and flick her free hand at the in coming Grimm warriors as a flurry of wind blades flew out cutting down several of the Grimm that charged her. Two Grimm however made it to striking range of their war blades and both took swings at the young mage with there Blades.
Ruby took her scythe into both arms a twirled it around her deflecting the Grimm's strikes as she spoke out an incantation flinging red rose petals with every movement of her scythe. She knocked one off balance by striking it in the forehead with her Scythes counterweight before she hooked the scythe's blade around the back of its head and finished the short incantation and blasted it backwards away from her with a powerful gust of wind. Seeing as her Scythe was hooked around its neck. This had the effect of decapitating the Grimm as it was thrown back and away from her.
The second charged at her swinging it's crude blade at Ruby forcing her to fight defensively as the she Spoke out another Incantation. The Grim readied for a grand overhead strike as Ruby's scythe was battered aside. Once Ruby completed her incantation she touched the ground as a large spike made of a tree root shot out of the ground and impaled the Grimm on it like a morbid decoration.
"Well that will be it for the perimeter guard, now for the camp itself." Ruby said to herself as she walked forward. She held out a hand and manifested a small orb of Zeon in. Ruby observed the way it flickered and how difficult it was for her to maintain that gave her pause. "I used more of my power than I intended to on the perimeter guards. might had go a bit over the top to finish this up."
Ruby stopped and with her scythe began to draw out a large circle in the snow in front of her. Once that was done she began to use her finger to scrawl signals and runes into the snow with her finger.
Off in the distance she could hear the Grimm begin to rally their numbers to charge from their camp at her. As she kept scrawling out her spell circle she tried to put the approaching horde out of her mind. Once the spell circle was complete she began to pour her own Zeonic power into it.
Once the Warband was almost on top of her, all 14 of them that were still alive at least, she held out her hand and activated the ritual circle. Her eyes began to glow with the Zeonic power she was channeling through her. Once the spell was complete the effects were immediate. First the Grimm were stopped in place and began to float in the air a few inches off the ground as wisps of air circled around them, then a multitude of simple blades. Iron weapons that lacked the permanence to allow them to exist beyond the duration of the spell began to float around the mob as they cursed and swore profanities towards Ruby.
Ruby then stood up straight and made a circling gesture with her hands aimed at them as the air around where the horde was beginning to spin. it only took Ruby a few moments to create a vortex around them, and a few more moments to create a raging tornado from where they were. The Grim inside of it was quickly and decisively destroyed by the tornado of blades that Ruby created with her Magic and with one final gesture she pushed the Tornado in the direction of the now empty Grimm camp.
Moments later all that remained of Grimm camp was a ruin of broken tools shanties and bodies. Ruby smirked in satisfaction at her work. "Maybe next time I'll start with that."
Ruby walked back to where she was expecting the Signal Academy owned transport to pick her up. Although she had more than enough time to spare, and it's not like the transport pilot would be able to do anything about it, she still pulled up a seat on a stump and rested her eyes as she waited for it rather than take the chance of wandering off to explore he once home island.
That battle took a great deal from her. She felt exhaustion in her very soul from how far she pushed herself to complete that task for the kingdom. But with that Grimm camp wiped out, she was officially a graduate of the Signal Zeonic academy. One step closer to earning even a small amount of freedom and her Caster Licence.
Once she had her Caster Licence the Kingdom would lift many of the restrictions that Mages in training suffered from. As she day dreamed of a day years from now she heard a familiar voice calling from behind her.
"I figured it was you, we don't get storms like that on Patch that often." Ruby's Father Tai said from a respectable distance leaning on a tree.
Ruby sighed out and turned to her father "You know better than to do this, you don't approach a mage in training without the authorization of the Academy"
Her father took off and folded his arms. she noted the sword hanging off his belt and the old style Kingdom of Vale military plate armor on his torso. "I haven't seen my own daughter in seven years, half of your life. I think they would understand me at least wanting to make sure my little girl is healthy."
"Well you made sure, leave before my pickup arrives." Ruby shouted. "Or else..."
"Or else what? I'm a vet, I spent ten years on the west walls keeping the Faunus out..." Tai spat out. "Are they going to really kill me over a two minute conversation with my daughter?"
"You know they will. Once I become a fully licenced Battle Caster we can be a family again." Ruby said sadly.
"In another five years... So much can happen in that time." Tai said looking down. "We just had a Warband land on Patch from the Grimlands a full continent away.
"We know what may happen if I don't complete my licencing. It would only take one mistake for me to ruin this whole Island with the power I wield." Ruby said as she found her resolve.
"We both know your a better Mage than that, you don't need a card in your wallet, or a sheet of paper on the wall to tell you that!" Tai protested
"And yet that sheet of paper is the difference between me being an ally of the kingdom, or a fugitive of it." Ruby spat out. "A Fugitive mage can do more harm by themselves than any amount of Grimm or Faunus!"
Tai shake her head "You make it sound so black and white... But fine... I got to see you one more time... Maybe next time we see each other we'll actually be able to Legally be a family..." The words "If there is a next time" are left unspoken.
"Yeah... I love you daddy..." Ruby said as she turned away from him. she listened to his footsteps disappear back into the woods... I took every bit of her will to not turn and walk away with him.
Ruby fought back tears, as she was left in silence, she tried rediscover her focus, tried to compose her emotions. she gripped the handle of her scythe as tightly as she could as she fought the urge to scream out. She remember her teachings, how the Gift of magic is one that comes with inherent danger. She remember all the horror stories of entire towns being wiped off the map by a rogue mage that lot control of their magic.
She remembered her promise to never become another horror story for her teachers to tell their students...
Weeks later, Ruby rose stepped on the transport from the Capital city of Vale to Beacon with her scythe in hand. Ruby was now officially a fresh faced and early graduate of the "Signal School of Zeonic arts" and Ruby prepared herself to face her new life at the "The High Academy of Beacon" for the first time she chose to reflect on the faces of friends left behind.
It was true that most mages choose to go straight from their "Low Academy" straight to a life in one of the many Zeon towers for private study for many years. Particularly talented mages such as herself though try to test their limits at a "High Academy" such as Beacon for the prize of becoming a licenced Battle caster of the Kingdoms, one that would allow her the freedom to wander the lands as she choose so long as she used her powers to protect the kingdom when called upon.
As she found a comfortable spot to lean on inside of the transport with little more than her scythe and the clothes on her back she pondered her future. The transport screen told much about the school she was attending. How it was founded by a line of legendary Casters who were said to be masters of several school of magic, almost unheard of considering even being versed in two schools of magic was seen to be the rare sign of a prodigy in the Zeonic Arts.
The School itself recently expanded its scope to also house several wings of practitioners of the "Ki Arts". The Ki Arts are a form of Physical fighting that was invented by the warrior monks of Mistral during the Faunus wars. if Zeonic magic required a honing and strengthening of one's soul to be able to use effectively. Then the Ki Arts required a honed and trained body. One would have to practically dedicate themselves fully to the art of Ki to have a hope of being a competitive fighter on either the circuits, or on the front lines against either the Grimm or the Fanus.
Ruby smiled as she thought "I bet my sister is besides herself at the idea of some iron boded men lurking around the campus." Before she remembered than in a few hours, she would see her sister for the first time in almost two years.
"Eh, I won't see much of her either way, I doubt that since we practice different schools of magic that'll even see much of her." Ruby thought to herself out loud.
Her thoughts were distracted as she felt a bump against her distract her from her thoughts, she found herself looking at a young blonde hair man wearing a white chest plate as he looked at her and apologized "Sorry ma'am" the young man said as he went back to talking to a man in a suit. Ruby ignored the blonde's warriors conversation but noted that he didn't look the part of someone training to become proficient in Ki. let alone magic.
Ruby sighed and went back to her own thoughts, in a few hours the transport would land at Beacon, and her new life would begin.
She just prayed that she was ready.
Welcome t the first chapter of "Overpowered" A Ruby fan fic based on the idea that the Magic of the world was not taken away from Humanity when the Gods left it. Your going to see a very different take on events in this story than my other AU fic. Dust Eater and I'm pretty excited to see how it unfolds as well. Table Top RPG Users might notice that I'm using terminology from the Table Top RPG "Anima Beyond Fantasy" here. I figured and over the top version of the world deserves and over the top magic system.
But not every cast member in this story is a Magic user and no two people came to Beacon for similar reasons. Next chapter we introduce The Crown Prince of Vale who comes to beacon to learn how to be able to do more than use his Psionic powers to solve his problems. If you like what you see then I'll see you next chapter.