Initiation, as it always has, began on a cliff overlooking the surrounding forests. We were "greeted" by a tall, slim man. He wore glasses and a gray suit, and made no effort to hide his distaste of new students. He looked annoyed and made no eye contact. His voice was cold and smooth.
"Greetings, students," he spoke, forcing the welcome, "I am Professor Candid Veritas. You'll find out early on that I'm not one for sugar coating my words; and I expect that to be evident in my instruction today. Some of you may be wondering why such an elite school would allow so many students into one year."
I glanced back at at the crowd of at least 75 other people behind the launching platforms as he said this, and was happy that the guys and I had come out early and waited.
"The truth is, none of you have actually been admitted. You see, we here at Inferno include initiation as part of a student's application. We seek to teach all who apply the tasks of being a huntsman. Therefore anyone whose aura reaches a critical level will be pulled from the forest and sent home, hopefully with a better grasp on what it takes to be a huntsman."
A deathly silence filled the air.
"But now," Veritas continued, "It's time for the fun part. As always, each of you will be launched to various locations in the forest. You will use your own landing strategy to land safely on the ground. The first person you make eye contact with shall be your partner for the rest of your time here. Together, you will make your way to the landmark at the edge of the forest, retrieve one relic, and bring it back here in one piece. On your way you will encounter threats, and you are expected to face them efficiently, or you will be pulled and/or killed."
Azure, who stood next to me, simply winked at the death thing.
"SO WHAT'S THE FUN PART?" Limerick asked.
"I get to activate the launch pads!"
CH-BOING!
After getting my chains out of a tree, I made my way through the dense armada of trees in an effort to locate the rest of team JAKL. Early on in my journey, I realized something: Veritas was serious about the death thing. At first when he talked about threats, I thought he just meant Beowolves and Ursai; but no, those guys were there but the real threat inside this forest was everything else. This place was filled to the brim with frickin' Redcaps and Trogres.
Allow me to explain, Redcaps are a parasitic form of Grimm that can possess corpses, preferring to go with fallen warriors. They haunt battlefields with rusted, broken weapons and scare the living crap out of me, except when I fight them. Trogres are even worse: practically bulletproof, these mother lovers are big, armored brutes that will always fight with a club. If they can't find a club, they'll make one out of what they can grab: trees, lampposts, Azure, other Grimm, etcetera. Naturally, these guys don't make good friends, the Trogres, I mean.
About half an hour of fighting into my venture, I discovered cuts in a tree accompanied by the scent of freshly decayed Grimm. The cuts looked clean and accidental, so I assumed that they were made in an ambush by a fine blade. I remember thinking Boris is a fine blade, so I followed the trail of cut, smelly trees, expecting to find Limerick. As I grew closer to whoever was plowing the trail however, by picking up the smell of a freshly killed Grimm carcass, I realized that Lim didn't do this. The Grimm smelled burnt; and I don't mean explosive burnt (as Lim liked to carry grenades), I mean electric burnt, like someone offed these Grimm with a power station.
And when I got to the head of the trail of devastation, I finally realized the consequence of my mistake: the red headed biznitch from yesterday, the one with the trident. Well that explains the electric thing, I thought. Then she turned around and made our partnership final.
"Are you KIDDING ME?!" we shouted simultaneously, in perfect harmony, I should mention.
"This is wrong," she said, "I'm not supposed to be partnered with some scrawny nerd."
"You want some advice? Quit believing in destiny, then you won't be as disappointed in the future."
"DISAPPOINTED DOESN'T BEGIN TO COVER IT! Obviously, I wanted to be paired with someone who has actual skill!"
"By actual skill, do you mean possessing above average intellect and versatile weaponry?"
"Yes," she grew more agitated.
"Well," I said, gesturing to myself, "you're wish has been granted, Sea Monster." She gave me a death stare.
"Sea Monster? Did you just go there?"
"Yes, I did. And it works too. The sea colored clothes, the trident thing, the deceptive good looks; you'd make the smart men run and the foolish men drown." Her frustration did not subside.
"Are you done? We need to get moving."
"WAIT!" I cried out, "I'm all for getting out of here, but shouldn't we at least introduce ourselves? You don't want me calling you Sea Monster the whole time, do you?"
She stopped, turned, flipped me off, then held out her hand.
"Sierra Torrent."
"Jasper Steel." I took her hand in mine, shook it, and followed her lead because, honestly, I had no idea where I was. I wondered how the guys were doing. Then I thought about Rain. I doubt she's doing too well, if she's shy around people, imagine how she is around monsters.
We walked on for about 15 minutes more until I stopped her.
"Do you see those?" I asked, pointing at some spider webs in a nearby tree.
"What? Are you afraid of spiders?"
"You're the one who should be afraid. They're all over your hair."
She yelped, frantically brushed the imaginary spiders off, saw my grin, and punched me in the arm.
"Anyway," I continued, rubbing my arm in pain, "These aren't normal spider webs. Their patterns are chaotic, even sadistic."
"Well, they are spider webs."
"Yeah, but most spiders are organized in their web-making. Also, look at those trees; something slashed through them."
"Is there a point here?"
"My point is that those are single gashes; meaning that one large claw cut them."
A chill went up both of our spines.
"What d-do you think could have a claw like that?" she stuttered. I gulped.
"We may," I stated grimly, "-be up against a Gallow Walker. A big one."
She started to scream, but I covered her mouth so that she wouldn't alert it of our presence.
Gallow Walkers can strike fear into anyone. Once they mature, they completely abandon the Grimm ideal of attacking humanity and retire into forests. There they ambush anything that moves and kill for the fun of it. Even other Grimm fear them.
Sierra removed my hand.
"What was that for?" she asked in a frustrated tone.
"I just realized something."
"Care to share with your partner, partner."
"Grimm are normally attracted to negativity, right?"
"Of course. Everyone knows that!"
"Well, do you find it strange that we've been arguing this whole time and haven't seen a single-"
I turned and froze, for we found the Walker and it was BIG. It had a head and abdomen about the size of an average Beowolf and four, long, slim, segmented legs, each ending with a massive claw. It's body glowed like that of a Death Stalker. It didn't seem to notice us yet.
"Do you have a plan?" I asked Sierra.
"Umm... yeah," she whispered, "you pet him, and I'll... RUN!" She broke into a sprint. The Gallow Walker turned.
"Oh come on!" I grappled tree to tree after her. She was quick. I could hardly catch up with her.
It was quite the challenge to lose the Walker. It ran at a significant speed, slowing only to cut away the brush in its path. Fortunately for us, we managed to lose it. The both of us agreed that fighting that thing wasn't worth the time or effort. It was then that we realized that we may have found the relic-altar-thingy. It was a large circle of pavement with the Academy's seal etched into it. It was encircled by numerous pedestals, each holding a relic. Sierra and I looked at each other, nodded, and dashed toward a pedestal.
"It's the relic! It is!" I proclaimed as the Sea Monster snatched one from its pedestal.
"It's also," she examined it, "-headlight fluid?"
I fell to the ground laughing.
"Did you just say headlight fluid?", a female voice interrupted. I stopped laughing and gazed in the direction of the voice. I saw a girl emerge out of some brush.
She had black hair which she wore in a bandana. She wore a white tunic with a black corset as well as a black sash (she wore it as a belt), black pants, and bell-bottom boots; she kinda dressed like a lady pirate, just more conservative. She had slightly tanned skin and beautiful, jade eyes. Her weapons, from what I could tell, were dual flintlock pistols with multiple blades attached to them. She had the posture of someone who doesn't take much crap.
"Yep," Sierra answered, "Is this even a thing?"
"Not anymore," a familiar voice came from the same direction as the girl.
"Azure!" I cried as my jacket-wearing, guitarist, best friend stumbled out of the partially trampled bushes. It was then that I realized that both Azure and I had partners, meaning (best case scenario) Team JAKL would only be three quarters complete. I quickly masked my disappointment.
"Jas! It's nice to see a familiar face; that girl is mean!"
We embraced, you know, as all bros do, from time to time.
"I feel for you, man."
"Hey, Goldeneye," Sierra intervened, "In case you haven't noticed, we're still kind of fighting for our lives here soooooo can we hurry this process up? That Walker's still out there and we don't know if it's still following us!"
The girl in black did a face palm.
"Well that's just great," she said, sarcastically.
"What's wrong?" I inquired.
"We've got a Trogre on our tail," Azure blurted. The girl punched him.
Sierra pocketed our fluid. At this point I heard multiple gunshots, explosions, and swords off in the distance.
"Well you might as well take a 'relic'," the Sea Monster suggested to the pair. The girl simply walked over and took one, but before anyone could do any more, an explosion sounded off nearby followed soon after by adolescent screaming. Lim and Kayne for sure.
"I TOLD YOU THE GRENADE WOULD BOUNCE OFF THAT TREE!"
"SINCE WHEN DO I LISTEN TO YOU?!"
The pair ran into the clearing.
"Redcaps," Kayne panted, "We fought bravely but Limerick screwed us and they came at us."
"It's not like you actually hit one, man," Lim snapped back.
"Any combat school dropout knows better than to randomly throw grenades at the enemy!"
"Oh, so now you're a drill sergeant!"
Before anyone could stop them, they were halted by a large rumbling. The ground beneath us pulsed and cracked as if something was moving beneath it. Then, from a completely separate direction, a giant vine came twisting out of the foliage; I am not kidding. Everyone got ready to flee, for we had no idea where the thing had come from.
Suddenly, from atop the vine, a veritable giant slid down. I realized that I recognized him: the kid with the purple hair who didn't want to show off his weapon. Looking at him now, he seemed to be a capable fighter. He wore his hair in a simple ponytail and was equipped with a mesh-like chest plate as well as chain mail leggings and sleeves. Obviously he had a thing for plants because he also wore gauntlets and shin pads made of bark. Actual tree bark. His height stood out as well, because I'm a couple inches short of six feet while he was close to seven. He stood with a holier-than-thou attitude to him.
"Greetings fellow students!" He spoke with the same attitude.
As he finished, a muffled gunshot sounded off, followed by repeated slashing. You may be thinking, Jasper, you've been hearing gunshots this whole time, so why is it a surprise now? My answer: The sounds were coming from inside the twisted cocoon of the vine. More slashing and gunfire until, out from the vine, emerged Rain. And she was pissed.
She was equipped with the gauntlets she had shown me the night before, but also came dressed in a black and white hybrid between track suit and mesh armor. Her eyes currently wore their shade of brown.
She marched to the tall kid.
"ARE YOU KIDDING? WHAT IN REMNANT QUALIFIES THAT AS ACCEPTABLE HUNTSMAN PROTOCOL?!"
"I'm not sure what you're referring to," the boy responded with a nervous tone. You'd be nervous too, what with a Rainstorm staring you down. It was pretty funny to watch, because Rain (who was about five feet tall) had to look up to meet his eyes.
Rain laughed at his ignorance, "I was just minding my own business, you know, trying not to die, when a giant vine comes winding through the forest and drags me with it! I thought I was being kidnapped or something!"
"Well, you kinda were," I replied honestly.
Rain snapped her head in my direction. The instant she saw me, her irises went green. She yelped like she did when I saw her last night.
"Jasper!" She seemed surprised. "What are you doing here?"
"Getting groceries. I seem to have gotten turned around." She laughed. Sierra rolled her eyes and turned to Rain.
"Please stop. Behavior like his shouldn't be encouraged," she argued.
"Hey," said the girl in black, "In case every single one of you forgot, we're in a hurry here!"
"Hurry?" Rain looked surprised.
"Wot hurry?" The big guy asked (I think he mispronounced what).
"Allow me to explain," Azure volunteered, "Jasper and the redhead were chased here by a Gallow Walker, Limerick and Kayne were ambushed by a hoard of redcaps, and Jade and I are being tracked by a Trogre."
So her name is Jade, I thought to myself.
"So now that we have that cleared up," Sierra suggested, "Let's get out of here before any of us end up eaten."
Kayne raised his eyebrows, "You mean retreating?"
"We're not retreating," I told him, "We're advancing toward future victories! Now grab your headlight fluid!"
The other pairs did as I said, then we were off. The cliff was visible from the clearing, fortunately, so we knew where to go. We cut through the suspiciously weak and few Grimm caught in our path during this trek, I got a basic grasp of the others' weapons and fighting styles.
Jade, the girl in black, as mentioned previously, had two fancy pistols with blades attached to them and tethered by black ribbons. She used them in a variety of ways, mostly preferring to wield them as either rope-darts or cutlasses. She had a style resembling my own, choosing to use her tethered guns as grappling hooks and maneuver around her enemy.
Twig, as the tall kid so happened to be named, had a weapon similar to Kayne's. It was a bill hook/rifle combo with an extending barrel. The blade/stock could also jut out and become capable of stabbing. He was also able to control plants, but I didn't think it was his semblance though. He was an adept marksman and a lethal axe wielder. He used vines to ensnare his enemies just before delivering a fatal blow.
Rain was also an interesting fighter. She wore these sort of stilts that physically enhanced her speed. That, partnered with Tonitrui and Fulgur, made her as quick and as lethal as Limerick. She would launch herself at her enemy, stab them, and leap off with the assistance of a gunshot from her gauntlets. What surprised me was how she handled her enemies with a cold, quiet, composed style.
Sierra also proved to be someone who you wouldn't want to go up against. She utilized her physical speed in her fighting style; stabbing, slashing, shocking, and mainly extending her sai into a trident only when she needed to block. Thankfully she wore good perfume, otherwise she would smell like fried electronics all day.
By the time we had gotten to the base of the cliff, we had cleared out a large number of Ursai, Beowolves, and Redcaps. We stood at the base, taking a quick break from the genocide of evil creatures. I looked up. The ledge was marked with flags bearing the school's crest: The Lion With the Mane of Fire.
"Well, we made it," I panted.
"Now we just need to get up there," Kayne remarked.
I volunteered to scout ahead and swung a Hell-Claw over the cliff and zipped up after it.
At the top of the cliff stood Veritas, monitoring his scroll.
"Mr. Steel," he looked up at me, "you shouldn't leave your friends."
"I'm not, I'm just trying to figure out how the others can get up here."
"How indeed. Especially now that the Walker and the Trogre have found their prey."
"Wait. What?"
A high pitched squeal pierced my eardrums.
"You'd better hurry, it sounds like a girl is in trouble."
"Believe me, that's not a girl."
I swung back down to the base to confirm Veritas's tip. Sure enough, the stupid Gallow Walker had come back and this time he had a "friend". Unfortunately, the Walker already had a target (Sierra and I) so he wasn't likely to turn on his Trogre pal any time soon.
Azure looked around, "So, uh, what's the plan, guys?"
At that moment the Trogre charged while the Walker stood back. Jade used her pistols to shoot the tree trunk from his hand to disarm it. In its confusion, the beast launched forward to grab the closest thing to it: Azure. You'd think that it'd be funny to see your friend get swung around violently by a giant monster; it's really just sad.
The monster swung Azure, who knocked Jade and, consequently, Lim and Kayne to the side. Azure screamed.
"Azh," I called, "You have a semblance! Use it!"
I watched Azure's eyes glisten in the thought. Then I heard his digital watch beep as it flashed three sevens. The Trogre lost his grip, dropped Azure and, as he hit the ground, Dischord accidentally fired and shot the Grimm fatty in the face. Azure ran back to a safe distance.
Sierra looked puzzled, "What was that?"
"His semblance: Luck."
"That's dumb."
"Say what you want, he's alive."
Before the Trogre could find another weapon, Limerick threw a grenade that detonated and knocked the creature off balance. Jade took advantage of this and used her ribbon to trip the giant. Once it fell, Kayne and Azure joined in and the group released all of its fury on the thing. Poor fat bastard.
It was a good thing that they didn't need my help because the Gallow Walker struck. It tried stabbing at Sierra and I, but Rain and Twig countered its advances. I swung to the bug's rear in an effort to find a weak spot. As it turned to face me, I saw only one possible weakness to exploit.
The Gallow Walker is quite armored and its legs are no exception, but there is a spot on each leg with little to no armor: The upper leg. Unfortunately, none of us could reach that height and get a good hit on it. It was then that I thought of the most awesome and most amateur plan known to man.
"SIERRA! RAIN! KEEP HIM WHERE HE IS!"
At my call, the girls attacked the bug in a manner that confused and distracted it. I ran to Twig, who was about 20 meters back.
"Twig, can you make a slingshot?"
"Worth a try."
Twig grew a Y-shaped tree and vines to connect the branches. He drew the vines back behind me.
Twig looked up at me, "Are you sure about this?"
"Not at all."
"If you miss and go splat, at least it will be hilarious."
"'Tis how I'd want it to be."
Twig released the slingshot, and I flew. In those few seconds of extreme velocity, I extended the blades from my Hell-Claws, held them in opposing orientation (so that one tip pointed forward, and one pointed back), and triggered the flamethrowers. The result: A FLAMING CYCLONE OF DEATH that sliced through the spider with enough force to sever each of its four legs. The remaining husk of a Grimm fell to the ground, wriggled for a bit, then died. The four of us gathered around the evaporating corpse. The others simply stood back.
"So yeah," Sierra said with an awkward tone, "that happened."
The concluding ceremony took place in the evening in an amphitheater sort of area. I couldn't see too much, since it was dark, but school banners were everywhere. The coolest part was that they glowed.
As the ceremony progressed, each team that successfully made it out of the forest was introduced, given a leader, etcetera. Lyle became the leader of Team LMNT (Lament), which to me sounds really depressing but I digress. The next team called up consisted of Azure, Kayne, Lim, and Jade. Yeah.
Professor Arcane introduced them.
"Kayne Shinsei, Limerick-" (etcetera, etcetera) " - and Jade Sombre. You found the Gavino Brand fluid. From tonight on, you will work as Team JAKL (Jackal), led by Jade Sombre."
Ouch. I mean, I knew since we found Azure in the forest that Team JAKL wouldn't be complete, but to throw salt in the wound, it was complete. I would have been sad about it if I wasn't in that new-outlook-on-life-after-near-death-experience sort of feeling. As JAKL left the stage, Sierra nudged me forward, because apparently I didn't think it was our turn. Arcane gave a warm yet far-off look as we, the spider-squishers, took the stage.
"Jasper Steel, Rain Harvester, Twig Recluse, and Sierra Torrent. Together, you recovered the Free's Nice-Dynamic headlight fluid. From tonight on, you shall work as Team JSTR, led by Jasper Steel."
Well that makes me feel better, I thought as Sierra gave a look of disbelief.
Looks like it's Steel: 1, Torrent: 0.
