Beyond Worlds
Chapter 1: Artifact of the Cursed Hero
A long time ago, a pair of twin brothers was born. One born from the light while the other was born from darkness. These twins were given the titles of Light-Warrior and Drak-Warrior. The Light-Warrior wanted to use the power of light and darkness to enslave the world and rule over all the world's denizens. The Dark-Warrior, however, wanted to proteact all who lived in their world with his power over darkness.
Realizing that his brother would stand in his pursuit, Light-Warrior attempted to do away with his brother. However, their powers were too evenly matched as they both tried to overpower the other. When it seemed like they would never defeat each other, Dark-Warrior gathered all of his strength and power to open a rift to Hell and banished his power hungry brother into the fiery depths and sealed the rift shut.
Despite his victory over his brother, Dark-Warrior felt only despair over what he had to do to his brother. He felt over-whelming regret for what he did as he took off his mask and wept for his brother. At that moment, he was alone in the vast world with no one by his side. But this was not the end of this story, it rwas only the beginning.
-Many Years Later-
It was early morning at Beacon Academy as the sun was just starting to peek over the horizon. In her dorm, Weiss Schnee, heiress to the Schnee Dust Company, was sleeping peacefully as she dreamt of being a world class huntress. Unfortunately for her, the pleasant dream she was having was interrupted by the leader of the team, Ruby Rose, who decided to peekher head from the bed above Weiss's and shouted near her ear.
''HEY WEISS! WAKE UP!" Ruby yelled at the top of her lungs, causing Weiss to shoot up in fright and fall off the bed.
For a few moments, Weiss laid on the floor while her heart was pumping at a rapid pace as she seethed about being woken up in such a manner. When her heart rate slwed down, Weiss stood up and gave Ruby the coldest glare she could muster while shaken in anger. Ruby, for her part, looked at the young heiress sheepishly as she nervously chuckled.
"Uh...good morning Weiss." Ruby said nervously, hoping that she would't be yelled at.
''RUBY" Weiss yelled at the red haired girl. "Why, in the world would you wake up at 4'o clock in the morning?!" Weiss asked after looking at the alarm clock to see what time it was.
Ruby flinched."Well uh...I thought that maybe if we all woke up early, we have some extra time to study." Ruby explained."Besides, you're not the first person I woke up."Ruby told Weiss while pointing at their other two teammates.
Weiss raised an eyebrow as she looked behind Ruby to see Blake and Yang, their other team members, looked hassled and irritated.
"Yes and I wish that she would let us have more sleep." The normally calm Blake said irritably. "Yaeh, same here." Yang agreed with a yawn.
Weiss couldn't help but sigh, deciding to get down to business. "So what's the agenda today Ruby? Weiss asked calmly. Ruby smiled. "Well there is a rumor flying around that Professor Oobleck discovered some kind of huge temple during the weekend that had two statues." Ruby said as Yang's eyes lit up.
"Oh yeah! I heard that rumor too!" Yang said with a smirk. "I also heard that it might be older then the Grimm."
Blake looked at Yang with wide eyes. "How could that be possible? The Grimm has been around as long as humans and faunus."
Yang shrugged her shoulders. "Beats me, but another rumor that I heard said that there was some crazy artifact in there." Yang explained.
"So what's the artifact supposed to be?" Weiss asked with curiosity as she sat on the bed. "I'm not sure." Yang admitted. "Professor Oobleck kind of tripped and twisted his ankle before he had the chance to study it," Yang expained as she crossed her arms in thought. "But from what i heard, when Professor Ozpin found him, Oobleck told him that the statues tried to attack him."Blake shook her head and scoffed. "I think all that coffee he drinks is finally going to his head." Blake told them, earning nods of agreement from them.
Professor Oobleck really liked his coffee.
Weiss turned towards Ruby. "Why did you even bring that rumor up?" Weiss asked her, getting a wide smile from her red leader in return. "I was thinking that during our spring break, that we could have ourselves a little treasure hunt."
In a millsecond, Weiss was on her feet and glaring at Ruby. "Ruby! if we do that we might get in trouble for wondering into a old temple!" Weiss yelled.
Ruby pouted at her teammate. "But Weiss." Ruby started with a slight whine. "Where's your sense of adventure. This could be something that is really fun." Ruby finished, hoping that it would convince Weiss otherwise. This did not work at all and only made Weiss's eye twitch angrily. "NO" Weiss yelled.
this caused the two to begin bickering back and forth. Meanwhie, Blake and Yang sighed as they picked up a pair of noise cancelling headphone and placed them over their ears. They then went to bed in hopes of getting some sleep before classes begin. All the while, Ruby and Weiss continued to argue.
-Four hours later
It was time for the team to get to their class, which so happened to be Professor Port's class. Yang and Blake were well rested while Ruby and Weiss were exhausted. They made their way into the class and tried to pay attention in class. This was difficult for Ruby because of her normal inability to pay attention in class and the fact she was slightly sleep deprived. Ruby was in her own little world while Professor Port was talking. "Blah blah blah weapons. Blah weapons blah blah blah." Was all Ruby was able to hear the teacher say when the intercom went off.
"Would team RWBY please report to Headmaster Ozpin's office? Thank you." Was what the person making the announcement said before the intercom went silent.
Minutes later, Team RWBY left Professor Port's classroom and silently headed towards the headmaster's office, wondering why they were being sent there.
"So what do you think we're being called to Ozpin's office?" Blake said, breaking the silence.
"Maybe it's about the time we were playing Remnant: The Game in the library." Yang said with a shrug.
Ruby gasped dramatically. "You don't think they're going to take our game from us, do you?" Ruby asked her three friends. "I hope not." Weiss said with worry in her voice. "I kind of enjoy playing that game." Blake nodded in agreement.
They were about to receive their answer to their question as they arrived to Ozpin's office door. They paused for a moment to take a nervous breath as they opened the door and entered the room. They were surprised to see that they were not the only that was in the room. Teams JNPR, CFVY, and CRDL were in the room as well, doing their own thing when they paused to see Team RWBY enter the room.
Headmaster Ozpin, who was currently sitting at his desk, smiled when he saw that they arrived. "Team RWBY, Nice to see that the four of you were able to make it. We were just about to get started our discussion." Ozpin explained as he took a sip from his coffee mug.
"So why did you call us all here?" Blake asked the silver haired Headmaster. "All will be explained shortly." Ozpin assured them. "But first, why don't you and your team sit down?" Team RWBY obeyed him and sat down next to Team JNPR.
Ozpin smiled and took another sip of coffee before looking serious. "Alright then, as I'm sure you are aware by now, a temple was found by Professor Oobleck over the weekend." Ozpin told them as the four teams nodded. "As of right now, I'm assigning all of you to investigate the temple and the artifact that is hidden within."
Cardin chose this moment to open his mouth. "Why are you asking us to look at some old, crumbling temple?" Cardin asked him.
Ozpin turned his attention towards the bulky team leader. "We have reasons to believe that the statues that attacked Professor Oobleck is protecting something potentially dangerous. Therefore it may be in our collective best interests to investigate and make sure that it isn't dangerous. And who better to send then out top four teams we have available." Ozpin explained.
Cardin nodded in understanding. "Alright, I get that. But there's no way I'm working alongside a animal like her."" Cardin stated with a sneer as he pointing towards Velvet who looked down sadly and with hurt.
Everyone that wasn't part of his team glared at him, including Ozpin. "Need I remind you that she is a year above you?" Ozpin asked, narrowing his eyes at the Faunus hater. "You will treat her with respect and as an equal. No exceptions." There was no hint of negotiation in his tone as he gave Cardin a look that unnerved the brunette.
Cardin huffed. "Whatever." Cardin told him and went silent, causing Ozpin to nod. After a few tense moments, Jaune raised his hand. "SO how are we going to get to the temple anyway?" The blonde boy asked, making Ozpin smile. "The same way you got to Beacon in the first place." Ozpin told him.
Jaune gave an uncomfortable look. "Oh crap."
-Meanwhile, outside the office doors-
Cinder Falls, a criminal leader disguised as a transfer student, had her ear pressed on the door and listening on the conversation that the four teams were having with Ozpin. As she listened intently, he smirked in interest.
"Interesting." Cinder muttered to herself as she listened. "Whatever those statues are guarding must be of great value. Looks like I'll need everyone on board with this to steal it." Cinder chuckled darkly as she left the area so no one would find her out, planning on a way to get it before the Beacon students did.
-Airship, three hours later-
Jaune Arc was currently throwing up in a bin that was nearby while Pyrrha soothed him by rubbing his back.
"Why…did it…have to be…an airship?" Jaune said in between throwing up.
Pyrrha gave him sympathetic looks as her leader continued to throw up.
While this was happening, Ruby and Weiss were talking.
"Soooooo." Ruby said with a wide grin. "It looks like we got to go on that treasure hunt after all." Ruby told Weiss who simply nodded. "Looks like it, but I still don't believe that the statues really came to life." Weiss stated with a matter of fact type of tone.
Ren, who was sitting next to the two along with Nora, decided to add his two cents. "Who knows whether or not the statues are alive." Ren stated with a shrug. "I'm personally more interested in the statues themselves then I am about if Ozpin said was true or not.
"Yeah!" Nora suddenly said while poking her head over Ren's shoulders to stare at Ruby and Weiss. "And besides, if it's true then I get to smash them both up into pieces." The others couldn't help but smile at Nora's enthusiasm.
-Five hours later-
The air ship finally landed a few miles away from the temple.
The four teams left the temple and trekked through the thick forest. After thirty minutes of walking, they finally stumbled across the temple that the rumors were talking about.
"Wow!" Jaune stated loudly as he glanced at the large temple. "This place is huge!"
"No kidding! This place is bigger than Beacon!" Yang said as she whistled at the size of it. Ren nodded in agreement. "We should be careful; we don't know what could happen in there."
When Ren said that, everyone went into high alert as they crossed over a bridge that was above a deep chasm, unaware that one of the statues at the front of the temple turned its head to look at them. The statue was a dark grey color and had a helmet on that had a V shaped visor. The statue silently pulled it's sword from its back and prepared to slice the four teams before they realize that it's alive. Luckily for the teams, Blake was able to hear the small amount of noise that the statue made with the help of her sensitive hearing.
"LOOK OUT!" Blake yelled as the statue made a swing at them. With Blake's warning, everyone was able to dodge the stone blade before it could kill them where they stood. The large group recovered, they looked upon the statue in shock.
"The statues are really alive!" Weiss stated with wide eyes.
"And it looks like it has a brother." Ruby added as she spotted another statue walking towards them. This statue had a similar design as the one that attacked them, but this one was silver instead of dark grey. When the statue was close enough, it stopped and drew its own sword, prepared to fight them along its fellow statue.
A moment of silence passed before the two statues charged towards the four teams, starting the battle. The Silver statue swiped its massive sword at Yang as she dodged it and jumps on its hand. She rushed towards the statue's head and tries to punch it with her Ember Celica equipped, hoping to deal enough damage to bring it down only for the statue to smack her off its shoulder with its other hand. When she collided with the ground, she was knocked out from the impact and out of the fight.
As this was happening, Ruby and Blake tried to fight off the dark grey statue while the other's tried to fight off the silver statue. Blake saw Yang hit the ground and dashes towards her to check to see if she was alright, leaving Ruby to fight the Dark grey statue by herself. Ruby stares at the massive guardian of the temple with determination, turning her Crescent Rose to sniper mode and aims at the Statue's head. The statue simply stares at her and doesn't move at all. And to her shock, the statue spoke.
"Your heart…is pure." The statue told her with a deep, gravelly voice . "You…are…worthy.
Ruby simply stared at the talking statue. Suddenly she yelled out. "YOU CAN TALK!?" Ruby exclaimed, causing the others, including the silver statue who had picked up Jaune by his collar, to stop what they were doing. "Indeed I can." The dark grey statue told her with a nod. "We both can in fact." The statue looked at its silvery counterpart. Brother, would you kindly but that human down?" The silver statue nodded and slowly lowered Jaune down to the ground and released his collar.
"There you go." The silver statue told Jaune, who shakily walked towards his team. "Please allow me to introduce ourselves. We are the statues of the great Dark Warrior and Light Warrior. I am the statue of the Dark Warrior while my brother is the statue of the Light Warrior." The Dark Statue told them. "We were created long ago to protect this temple and the artifact within, waiting for someone worthy to seek it. For you see, we are able to read hearts."
While everyone was listening to his explanation, Ren walked toward the dark statue with a small frown on his face."So why did you attack our professor if you could read his heart?" The statues looked at each other as if nervous.
It was the White statue that stepped forward. "You mean that weird green hair man? He was running so fast that we were not able to confirm whether or not his heart was pure or not. So we decided to attack just to be safe in case he was not pure of heart." He explained.
The members of the four teams nodded in understanding. Professor Oobleck really needed to lay off the coffee.
"So What is the relic anyway?" Blake asked them, voicing the question that everyone was pondering since they heard of it. Luckily, the statue of the Dark Warrior was more than willing to answer her.
"The artifact that you speak of is a scale that connects two worlds together. This one which is inhabited by humans, faunus, and the Grim alike while the other one is inhabited solely by humans." The dark grey statue answered, earning a scoff from Weiss.
"That's completely absurd!" Weiss told them. "That is completely impossible." If the statues had eyebrows, they would raise them at her remark. "And yet your here right now, talking to two moving, talking statues and saying that having two different worlds connected together is too farfetched?" The Silver statue asked her with amusement, causing her to pause for a moment. "Good point." Weiss said with a blush, clearly embarrassed.
"Wait, you said that you two were the statues of the Dark Warrior and Light Warrior?" Velvet asked them. "Who are they?"
The twin statues turned to stare at each other for a moment before turning their attention back to the group. "We will explain who they are once you retrieve the artifact." The Dark Warrior statue stated.
Coco lowered her signature shades. "So you're going to let us through?" Coco asked them as the statues nodded.
"Of course, from what we were able to see, you all seems to be worthy of it. Except those four right there." The Light Warrior statue stated as he turned towards Team CRDL as if glaring at them.
The team looked surprised. "WHAT! Why aren't we allowed to go get it?!" Cardin demanded with a scowl.
"We saw nothing but hatred and cruelty within your hearts, especially in yours Cardin Winchester." The Dark Warrior Statue stated, earning nods from the other teams and a shocked look from Cardin.
"H-how do you know my name?!" Cardin asked them, feeling slightly frightened by the fact that they knew his name.
"Our ability to read people's hearts also allows us to read their memories as well so we know everything about you. And to be honest, I am disgusted at how you treat others." The statue explained.
"So you know everything about us?" Fox asked them. The silver statue nodded. "Yes, and we even know things about you that you don't even know about yourselves." He explained. "But enough about that, you have proven yourselves and shall be allowed to pass." The two statues moved out of their way as they started to move passed them, With Blake carrying the still unconscious Yang along.
While they walked into the temple, they were unaware that they were being followed by Cinder in disguise and Roman, who was just broken out of imprisonment. They watched the confrontation and heard everything that was said.
"We should have gone in while those two walking cinderblocks were fighting the brats." Roman said with irritation towards Cinder.
"You must be patient Roman, good things happen to those who wait." Cinder told her in a calm tone. "Besides, you still own us for breaking you out of your prison."
-Back in the Temple-
As the teams trekked through the temple, they felt curious about who the two warriors that the statues mentioned were.
"Who do you guys think the Dark Warrior and Light Warrior are?" Velvet questioned out loud.
"Whoever they are, they must have been pretty important to have two gigantic statues build for them." Coco answered, adjusting the strap for her handbag/mini gun.
At this point, Yang slowly started to regain consciousness. "Ooooh, what happened?" Yang moaned as she held her throbbing head.
"Um...we'll explain on the way out." Blake told her as she let Yang go so she can walk.
They eventually made it to the center of the temple and noticed a tomb with a cross on its side. "Do you think the artifact is in there?" Fox asked.
"There's only one way to find out." Nora grinned as she took out her war hammer, walked over to the tomb, and preceded to smash the lid of the tomb to pieces. "NORA!" Everyone yelled out in shock and disbelieve.
"What?" Nora asked in confusion. "You wanted it open didn't you?"
Everyone walked over to the now opened tomb to see a skeleton wearing what looked like the remains of a torn up black outfit and like a smaller, slightly broken version of the helmet that the statues were wearing. The broken helmet revealed the skeletal face of the person in the tomb.
In the clutches of the skeletal hand was the artifact that they came here for. The scale of the Dark Warrior and Light Warrior.
Everyone stared at the scale for a few moments. "Soooo...who's going to get it?" Ren asked to everyone, not wanting to get closer to the body.
"I think that you should do it Jaune." Pyrrha told her leader. "WHAT?! WHY ME!?" Jaune yelled out. "Because you're the leader and your closer to it." Pyrrha answered.
Jaune gulped as he reach for artifact and yanked his arm back. When he sighed in relieve, he realized that the skeleton's arm was still attached to the scale.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Jaune screamed like a little girl and panics, accidentally throwing the scale and knocking the hand off.
Ruby quickly runs to the fallen scale and picks it up. At this point, Ruby decided to get a good look at it and was surprised by how beautiful it was. Half of the scale was white and looked like it was made from marble while the other side was dark and looked like it was made from obsidian. The top of the scale had an angle wing and a bat wing adorned on it.
'This is so beautiful.' Ruby thought as she turned back to the others. "Hey guys, you should take a look at this." Ruby called out. Before long, everyone was crowding around Ruby and the scale.
"It's so shiny!" Nora stated, earning a nod from everyone. "It's certainly looks kind of cool." Fox remarked. "What do you think it's made from?" Weiss asked.
"By the look of it, I think it might be marble and obsidian." Pyrrha guessed.
"We should probably get out of here and talk to the statues and pick up Team CRDL" Blake told them. After everyone agreed, they left the room and headed to the front of the temple where they saw the statues and Team CRDL, the latter looking bored and irritated.
Sensing that they were out of the temple, the statues turned towards the three teams. "Ah, I see that you found the artifact okay." The dark grey statue commented. Ruby nodded and held out the scales. "Yes sir, he found it without a hitch." Ruby stated with a broad smile.
Velvet walked up to the statues. "So will you tell us about the Dark Warrior and Light Warrior?"
The silver statue nodded. "Of course. The Dark Warrior and Light Warrior are-" Whatever he was about to say was silenced when something came flying towards his head and collided with it, causing his head to explode, destroying the Silver statue.
Everyone watched in horror as the once great statue crumbled as he died. "BROTHE-" Just like his brother, the dark grey statue was interrupted by something hitting his chest and exploding in impact. Fortunately he did not start crumbling away like his brother.
Everyone gathered around the statue of the Dark Warrior who looked like he was in agony.
"Oh my Oum! Are you going to be alright?!" Coco asked him, taking off her glasses which showed her horrified face. The statue started to grunt as he tried to get up, but failed to do so as he fell back down. "I'm afraid that I will not be alright, I feel my life energy fading from me." The statue told everyone. "Who...would do this to my brother?"
"That would be me." A man's voice said. Everyone looked towards the source of the voice to see Hei Xiong or Junior as most people known him as, walked out of the shadows with his signature missile launcher slung over his shoulder.
Yang's eyes turned red as she angrily growls at him. "Junior! You backstabbing j***!"
Junior raised his and defensively. "Now now Blondie. No hard feelings, but he was bad for business. Now how about you brats hand us that artifact you have and this won't get ugly."
Velvet's eyes widen. "Wait? Us?"
Junior smirked. "Yup, my friends and I want that artifact. Isn't that right everyone?" As he said this, more people started to appear from the shadows of the jungle.
The teams were shocked when they noticed Roman Torch wick was among the group. "ROMAN!? How did you get out!?" Ruby exclaimed in shock. Roman chuckled at her question. "Well you see Red, I had help from my lovely assistant Neo and my allies right here." Roman explained as he pointed towards Cinder and her minions.
Emerald and Mercury were wearing the same type of suit as their boss Cinder was but Mercury's suit was grey while Emerald's was green. Cinder smirked as she waved towards Ruby. "Hello there, remember me?" Ruby glared at the women who she fought while Homecoming was going on.
Blake was staring at Adam will he smirked at her. "It's been awhile hasn't it Blake?" Adam taunted. "Adam!" Blake said with narrowed eyes.
"We waited a long time for this." Melanie said. "This time, we will win." Her twin, Militia, added. Yang smirked towards them as she cracked her next and fists. "Looks like it's time for round two."
Just then, the dark grey statue started to shutter and crumble apart. "Ru...by." The statue said in a low voice. Ruby turns to the statue with a worried expression. "Are you going to be okay?" Ruby asked him. He shook his head no. "I'm afraid that I do not have much time left...please avenge my brother for me." Ruby nodded her head while hot tears started to stream from her eyes. "I...I'll try." Ruby told him shakily. He stared at her for a moment, as if smiling. "Thank...you." These were the final words he said before his body collapsed into rubble, his life finally ending after so long.
All the Beacon students looked down sadly for the new friends they just met. Nora started to cry with clutching Magnhild as Ren wrapped her in an embrace. While Ruby felt deep sadness and grief for the two giant statues she just lost, an even more powerful emotion was quickly overtaking her. Rage. She felt nothing but pure, unadulterated hatred for the people that did this to them. Activating her semblance, Ruby quickly covered the distance between her friends and the people that angered her so much.
Her first target was Cinder, who barely had enough time to block when Ruby swung Crescent Rose at her. Cinder was able to hold Ruby in place as she tried to make a grab for the scale they came here to steal that was still in Ruby's hand. When her hand grabbed the scale, a shining light shined, blinding everyone in the area. Then suddenly beams of light rocketed out of the scale and collided with everyone in the area. When the light died down, everyone was gone and the forest was dark once again.