The next morning, Squall had just finished setting up his room. He had a single room to himself for the time being. He sat on his bed, looking at his scroll absentmindedly, when Ruby barged into his room.
"Hey, Squall!" The black haired girl said energetically. Squall simply rolled his eyes. "What do you need?" He asked the girl, somewhat less aggressive than the lunchroom the previous day. "Initiation is today! Come on, we're gonna be late!" Ruby grabbed Squall, and used her semblance to reach the cliff in time to see the new students standing there. There, alongside the people he met before was a blonde boy with a sword and shield, a girl with white hair who carried a rapier, a girl wearing all black with a bow, and a girl with bright red hair, clad in armor.
"The first person you lay eyes on will be your partner for this entire mission." Ozpin said as he adjusted his glasses, explaining the goal. Find the relic, and bring it back. "Seems simple enough." Squall thought. Meanwhile, Nora glanced over at Ruby and Squall. "Why is Ruby looking at Squall like that? Who does she think she is?" Nora thought internally. "Everyone, please be prepared." Ozpin stated plainly.
One by one, the platforms launched everyone into the air. Ruby used crescent rose to swing from various tree branches, Yang barreled herself through the air, Nora used Magnhild as a sort of hovercraft to soar through the sky until she landed. Squall simply cast aero to keep himself in the air until he ran out of mana, at which point he casually landed on the ground. "Time to find this relic. But where to look?" He wondered. As Squall began to wander aimlessly around the forest, he heard a low growl. Squall instinctively did a 180 degree turn, to see a large bear like creature, covered in bone like spikes, with sickly yellow eyes. "You're my prey? Fair enough." Squall said, getting into his battle stance.
With a forward rush, Squall hurled himself at the giant creature, bringing his gunblade down hard upon the creature. Jumping back to avoid its attack, he noticed that he had only managed to crack its bone like armor. "Looks like I'll need to apply a bit more force." He aimed his gunblade at the creature, and fired a blast of burning flame at the creature. It hit the monster square in the chest. The monster, seemingly unfazed by the attack, made its way towards Squall. He jumped backwards, backflipping to avoid the creature's attack. Just then, a blur of pink flew towards the creature from behind.
Nora, who had landed not too far from Squall, flew at the creature bringing her hammer down hard on the monster's head, cracking its armor and causing it to turn into mist. "Hey." Nora smiled at Squall. "Looks like we're partners" Squall had a noticeable groan in his voice, which Nora detected. "Aw, come on! We could be a great team!" Nora complained. "Ugh, Fine. Just don't get in my way." Squall groaned. "Follow me." He told her. "You don't have to tell me twice!" Nora slipped merrily along behind him. As they left the area and proceeded further into the forest, a single, giant black feather hit the ground.
"So, where are you from?" Nora asked Squall. The former SeeD decided that it couldn't hurt, and began to answer her questions. "Balamb Gardens." Squall's voice was quiet, and reserved. "What's a Balamb?" Nora asked curiously, tapping her pointer finger on her cheek. "It's a military academy." Squall gave a straightforward and flat answer. "Oh. Is that like Atlas?" The redhead inquired? "The hell is atlas?" Nora was about to answer, when Ren flew past them, clearly having been attacked. "What the?" Squall and Nora immediately turned to where ren was flying from. There stood a tall, slender young man with white hair and a strange sword.
Ren struggled to his feet, and took aim with stormflower, the sound of his bullets echoing as he fired a seemingly unyielding barrage of gunfire. The mysterious youth proceeded to deflect the bullets off his sword, which had two blades. Ren's clothing was torn at the left sleeve, revealing a strange black mark on his arm. "Oh, you have the stigma?" The white haired boy smiled and laughed, before drawing his sword.