To prevent another incident like this, Vale created its first Academy for Hunters. High in the mountains to the West, a stone Tower overlooked a lush valley where a massive campus had been built to house the Academy. For hundreds of years, it was known as the greatest and toughest school in Remnant. Students who wished to join were given a set of three tasks.

First, they had to build their own weapon before they came to the Academy. Prospective students were given just enough metal and Dust to forge themselves a single weapon of their choice. Many simply created augmented weapons, such as transforming weapons or bladed guns. But a few created true weapons of destruction, bastardizations of powerful melee combat and merciless gunfire.

After they had completed their new tool, they were given a rucksack with food, water, and some basic supplies before being sent off to find the Academy. From the City of Vale, a dense forest, rivers, and a lake stood between them and the Academy. Yet what none of the students were told was that they were also crossing through Grimm-infested territory.

If the students were able to survive the trek to the Academy, one final challenge awaited them. The door to the Tower, the only entrance to the school, was sealed with Aura. Only a student whose Aura was powerful enough and pure enough could open the door that barred them from their training. If they passed this challenge, they were immediately accepted and began their training.

Ruby only just noticed that her mouth was wide open, jaw dropped. She quickly closed it and tried to comprehend what she had just seen. Weiss had just confronted her new friend, Natal, waving her sword around and shouting death threats at him. Then she activated Myrtenaster's red Dust and really, really got intense. Ruby had thought that a battle was going to erupt right before her, and everyone would have been caught in the crossfire.

But Natal had just stayed calm, and took the rapier right out of Weiss's hand! Not only that, but had then proceeded to sheathe it for her, obviously signaling that he wasn't going to fight. He had completely shocked everyone in the room. Few people could stand up to Weiss's wrath, let alone talk back and disarm her.

Ruby thought all of this in about a second, and then began to notice Natal's legs shake a little. She jumped forward and grabbed his arm just as he stumbled back. "Whoa, there. You alright?" She asked.

Natal gave a nervous laugh. "That was a bit tougher than I thought it would be." He looked up at Weiss. "What is that stuff?"

Weiss immediately forgot everything that had just happened once she realized this knight had no clue what Dust was. "It's Dust, you dolt! Don't you have any idea what you were dealing with? I could've burnt your hand off!"

"Never heard of the stuff." Natal replied. He laid his hand on Ruby's, and she let go of him. Standing up again, he looked at Weiss's blade. "But now I'm interested."

"Dust is a natural energy source here on Remnant." Weiss explained. "It has many different forms, like fire, ice, and light. We use it mostly to power tools and factories, but it was originally designed to fight off the Grimm."

"It's becoming more and more obvious that I know very little about Remnant. I'm going to have to amend that." Natal picked up his scroll, quickly moving through the menus.

Ruby was all of a sudden very confused. "Wait, I thought you said you knew nothing about scrolls?"

"I asked what a scroll was." Natal replied. "Now that I know, I can tell you that I've used something similar before." He pulled up a star chart and rotated through the views until he was watching the night sky from the point of a distant star. "Now, where am I?"

"Wait a second," This time it was Jaune who spoke up. "How did you do that? With Weiss's blade, I mean."

Natal pointed past the group of girls in the doorway, and everybody turned to see Pyrrha, Ren and Nora peeking in. "Bet you my armor that Amazon lady is about to tell you."

Pyrrha looked completely bewildered. "How did you..."

Natal closed the scroll and stuffed it inside his armor. "Sensed a pretty strong Aura nearby, and I just pinned it on the toughest looking person around."

Pyrrha regained her composure and addressed the rest of the group. "I came here because I felt a massive Aura spike about a minute ago. It was bigger than anything that a normal student here at Beacon could make, so I decided to check it out."

"Guessing that was from our mysterious knight in shining armor." Yang commented.

"Really?" Pyrrha looked over Natal. "Amazing, your Aura is one of the strongest I've seen." She gave him an interested look. "Where'd you learn to do something like that?"

"Personal trainer," he answered. "By the way, I'm Natal. Pleasure to meet you."

Pyrrha walked in and shook his hand "Pyrrha. Likewise"

Ruby realized that Natal was in a room full of complete strangers, and immediately jumped up to introduce everybody. "Natal, let me introduce you to team RWBY! This is Blake, Yang, and Weiss. Over here is team JNPR. You've already met Jaune and Pyrrha, this is Nora, and here's Ren."

"Nice to meet you all." He frowned. "If we want to continue this conversation, we should probably move to someplace a little more... Open."

They were all outside now. Team JNPR was sitting on a set of benches across from team RWBY. Well, most of them at least. Jaune and Ruby both stood by Natal in between the two teams. Ruby felt a little nervous. She didn't like being in the spotlight that Natal had made for himself, but she wanted to defend her new friend. She had no idea why, but she felt that it was necessary. She was also nervous because Yang kept glaring at her. She knew what her sister was thinking, and it made Ruby really, really uncomfortable. I do NOT like him, Yang. I just want to be a good friend. Why do you always go so overboard... She seriously considered using her semblance to disappear in a flurry of rose petals, but decided against it.

Natal was the first to speak. "Before I'm subject to a flurry of questions I'm sure you all have, I have just one I'd like to ask." He turned to Weiss, somber. "What did you mean when you said that you recognized me?"

Weiss sighed. "Before I came to Beacon, I fought a large Knight in the same armor as you. He had threatened to kill my family, and forced me to meet him in an abandoned castle to settle the matter. He challenged me to a duel, where I defeated and killed him." She straight at Natal, anger etched across her face. "He called me Snow Angel."

Natal laughed. "The Snow Angel thing was just a tease." He put his hand to his chest. "But I'm certain he wasn't in this armor."

There was a big flash of light, the sound of metal sliding against metal, and then silence. Ruby realized that she had covered her face with her hands. As she slowly lowered them, she saw everyone where they were before, teams RWBY and JNPR in their seats, Jaune, Natal, and her standing before them all. Except now, Natal was wearing the same armor as Jaune, except where Jaune had a black hoodie, Natal had a blue one, and wore black pants.

Ruby looked at everyone else's reaction through the corner of her eye. On the RWBY side, Blake looked impressed, Yang was showing her signature diabolical smile, and Weiss was sitting with her arms crossed, muttering something along the lines of "show off."

Team JNPR, on the other hand, was caught completely off guard. Pyrrah's jaw had completely dropped, Ren looked like he'd just been slapped in the face, and for once Nora was completely speechless.

Ruby snuck a quick look at Jaune, watching his reaction. Surprisingly, he reflected none of the emotions of either team group. He simply stood there looking at Natal, neither surprised nor impressed. "That's going to be confusing" was all he said.

Ruby found it quite amusing seeing the two next to each other. They looked like twins with completely opposing color schemes. One had a black hoodie and blue pants, the other a blue hoodie and black pants. One had blond hair and blue eyes, the other had brown hair and brown eyes.

Natal gave everybody a moment to compose themselves, then crossed his arms, raised an eyebrow, and asked "Any questions?"

Ruby and Juane were both knocked backwards as both teams rushed to Natal, frantically asking him questions and feeling his armor, unable to believe their eyes. It was then that they saw Natal's character come out. Unlike how he had presented himself earlier, Natal quickly shied away from all of the attention. When he realized that he wouldn't be able to escape their curiosity for some time, he simply gave in and let everyone talk over each other and feel his armor.

"He handles himself a lot like the both of you." Blake said, suddenly between the Ruby and Jaune. Neither were that surprised, compared with everything that had happened today, watching Blake both talk to them and be a part of the fray madly dashing at Natal rated as one of the least confusing.

"Yeah, he really does." Ruby looked over to Jaune. "He's obviously a lot more like you, though."

Jaune blushed. "Thanks."

Typically, when any girl complimented Jaune he rolled with it. He would go on about how great he was in an effort to impress them, telling them of his natural blonde hair, or of how he was a team leader, or, more often than not, about his "singleness." But he never acted like that around Ruby. When she complimented him, she could trust that he would take it seriously and appreciate it. That was one thing that she liked about him: that she could speak her mind to him and not be misinterpreted or ridiculed.

Ruby walked over to Jaune and they stood, side by side, watching as Natal tried to get himself out of the mess he'd made.

Jaune's great that way, She thought to herself. Sure, he may be overbearing at times, but he's dependable, honest, and respectful to me. Whether it's because he likes me or because he just wants to be a good friend doesn't matter. She looked over at him. He was smiling, watching Natal struggling to get Nora off of him.

Jaune must have noticed her looking, because he turned his head just a little to look back, and gave her a smile. Ruby quickly ducked her head down. She tried to get her cheeks to stop blushing and stop smiling to herself. I don't know what it is about him, but whatever it is, I like it. It make him different.

My kind of different.

So this is that romance I was talking about. I know, I'm not that good, but trust me, if you could see the story as it is on my computer, it's much better than this. thanks for staying interested and I hope to finish the series by the Volume 2 premiere!

Until next time, read on!