Jaune had felt the beowolf stalking him for a long time, but with how little a threat it posed he had been too lazy to do anything. Of course, there was the another presence rapidly approaching but he would cross that bridge when he came to it. After all, it was a beautiful day, the temperature was good, the forest still green, the breeze was wonderful, and this part of the woods was just delightfully shady. Wait no, the grimm had decided to move.
"I wish you guys would stop making this mistake," Jaune mumbled to himself before whipping around and punching the beowolf out of existence. To reveal a girl standing there half afraid and half awestruck. Both stood in the incredibly awkward silence. Jaune broke the eye contact and looked up at the sky.
"So…" Jaune started. "Nice weather we're having huh?" by the time he looked back she had already begun walking away. "Hey wait up," Jaune yelled after her. "Hi my names Jaune, so I noticed we were traveling in the same direction and I don't know about you but I feel safer in numbers, n-not that you can't handle yourself or anything….." She just let him ramble on, surely he would catch on that she was ignoring him eventually. Right?
A few hours had passed and tried as she might she couldn't ignore him. Maybe it was the lack of anything else to pay attention to. So she just let him ramble on as she absorbed the info like a sponge. She had listened to his spoken bibliography and come to the conclusion that he was an idiot if some of his stories were true an incredibly strong idiot.
"Uh." He furrowed his brow in confusion. "I was going to ask you something but it just occurred to me that I never asked you what your name was." He said looking towards her. "Sorry about that by the way." There was a pause as she weighed her options. On one hand, he definitely wasn't a racist, after she got off the train she had decided that hiding her ears would be for the best while she attended Beacon but she didn't have time to do so before she found Jaune killing the beowolf. So her ears were on full display and he hadn't so much as looked at them. On the other hand, while he had been nice so far she knew first hand how people could change.
"It's Blake." She decided that just telling him her name wouldn't be a bad thing. He smiled.
"So, where you headed?" He asked genuine curiosity clear in his voice.
"Vale." Her answer was short and universal enough that she thought he wouldn't push it further.
"Gonna take the Beacon entrance exam?" She turned in surprise. "I didn't mean to make an assumption it's just, the weapon on your back kinda gives it away." She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, when she thought about it his logic was sound.
"Yes, I am." She responded a few seconds later.
"Cool." He said. "That's why I'm headed to Vale to." After that they fell into a comfortable silence, one that she hoped would last.
~Time Skip~
The rest of the trip was uneventful. They had talked to each other a little more but nothing overly meaningful. Other than a heated debate on whether or not comics were high literature an argument on which they had agreed to disagree and a few encounters with grimm which Jaune usually obliterated with ease. Once Beacon and Vale were within eyesight Blake stopped. Jaune took a second to react before facing her questioningly.
"Hey you alright?" He asked tilting his head slightly.
"Yeah I'm fine," she said fishing something out of her pocket while looking towards the city. "Listen I need you to keep a secret." He nodded slowly.
"Ok, no problem what is it?" His face held a more serious expression.
"While we're in Vale and going to Beacon I'm going to hide my ears." Jaune's eyes widened in surprise and he looked like he was about to protest before she cut him off. "You can't change my mind about this and believe me if there was another alternative I would." Jaune looked towards the ground.
"I get it." He responded. "And hey, I know you told me more out of necessity than anything." She flinched he had saw through. "But thanks for trusting me anyhow and if you ever need someone to talk to I'll be there alright?" She smiled. "Now onward to Beacon!" he yelled while pointing towards the tower.
~Time Skip~
"You have been assigned numbers 41 and 42 after the opening speech wait for your numbers to be called. Good luck." The computer voice stated before their number shot out of the machine. Jaune and Blake nodded towards each other before taking the numbers assigned to them and walking to the gathering of Beacon hopefuls in the courtyard after a few minutes a blur passed through the crowd and getting their attention. Once the blur reached the front it transformed into a man. He was wearing a white dress shirt haphazardly tucked into his brown dress pants, his glasses sat diagonally on his face and his green hair stuck straight up completing his "Mad Scientist" look. He stood next exact opposite, a short, and portly gentleman dressed in a fine red suit. A large mustache as gray as his hair upon his upper lip. He wiggled it slightly before he spoke.
"Welcome to Beacon Academies Entrance Exam!" His voice boomed across the courtyard. "Today we will be testing your strength, speed, and skill." All at once his expression softened. "Why this reminds me of my youth, back then I was like you self-trained with no transcripts. Why I had to-" He was cut off by the other man.
"Yes yes professor Port that's all well and good but we don't have the time for that tale right now." The green haired man seemed to teleport as he spoke. "My name is doctor Oobleck and this is professor Port as you heard we will be assessing you, before we leave for the training facility where the exam is held are there any questions?" Blake followed Jaune's eyes as he seemed to predict where Oobleck would be every time he moved, she would have to ask how he did it. A young man near the front raised his hand.
"Yes, you what is it?" Oobleck rushed forward to where the questioner stood.
"Uh, why do we call you doctor instead of professor?" Oobleck closed his eyes for a moment before responding.
"Because." He started pushing his glasses up allowing the sunlight to glint off hiding his eyes. "I didn't go through eight years of education and study just to not to rub my Ph.D. in everyone's face. Now let the examination begin!"
~Imagine a Line Break Here~
The physical portion of the exam consisted of three parts. A simple strength test where you hit a machine as hard as you could, a speed test where they timed how many laps of the courtyard you could do in fifteen minutes, and after the data was collected from these events a bracket would be made of the top students and a small tournament would be held to test battle skills. Numbers were drawn randomly and Blake was thankful she had gone early her test going smoothly and efficiently. Jaune was still waiting to be called. He looked nervous.
"Jaune are you good?" She asked. Why he was nervous was beyond her even in their short time together she knew he vastly outclassed every other applicant including her. "You have nothing to be nervous for your going to do fine." He gave a small smile in return.
"42!" Port's voice called out. Jaune jumped a little then quickly stepped up and got ready. "Alright, young man just like the others hit it with all you got." Jaune nodded and dropped into a stance closing his eyes in focus. Before launching with a speed unseeable to even Oobleck's eyes. They all heard the strike before the saw what happened the boom was so loud you could have thought a bomb went off, the building shook from the force. The room was in silent awe as they looked to see Jaune's fist buried deep into the metal, the machine crackled with electricity the scale had error flashing across it as it tried and failed to comprehend what had hit it.
"BRAVO MY BOY! Never have I seen in all my years of teaching no hunting someone hit that hard." Port walked over clapping and once he got there "patting" Jaune on the back. "Now pull your fist out of there we have to see how fast you can run.
The rest of the test had gone similarly for Jaune, his speed test shattering records and for the tournament, Jaune wasn't even seeded with an opponent they had simply told him that no further assessment was required. Not that those in the tournament minded.
Then came the written exam. Which Blake had aced and Jaune had passed...Barely.
"How did you do so bad?" Blake said alarmingly. "You just had to circle the answer they wanted to hear."
"Look I spent literally all my time training and reading comics and I get really bad test anxiety." Jaune defended himself. "Plus I still got in so ha." Blake just smirked.
"You know you still have to actually pass the classes right? Jaune just lamented.
"We will cross that bridge when we come to it all right?"
END
Hey back again with another Worlds Strongest. So yeah about Hero of Tomorrow I will update it but I'm just having trouble with it right now and it's just not coming to me but it's not dead I promise.
Anyways this story is still going strong and is incredibly fun to write. So tell me what you think and if it's not up to snuff I will strive to do better
Cya Next Time I Post
~Golath