Welcome back to another installment of Remnant of Cursed Paradise! I've been feeling a bit under the weather lately, so I'm sorry if there are any typos or inconsistencies in this chapter. If you point me towards them I'll fix them as soon as I can. Also, I'm running a poll! If you missed it last chapter, I ask that everyone go to my profile and take a few seconds to vote on which fic I should write when I'm done with RoCP.
That seems to be all up here, so let's get on to the story!
Chapter 11: Adversary
During the first week of school, I realized something important.
Class... was boring.
That was being said with actual Japanese cram school in mind. I expected Grimm History to be an intense study of the makings of the Grimm and their subspecies, as well as the tactics one could use to defeat them. Suffice to say, some of the teachers at Beacon first seemed almost as unqualified to teach as Taiga, who barely managed to keep her job in between all of her late-night booze binges and her intense "punishment" of students when they didn't do as they were told. She was qualified, yes, and she had a good heart about it, but that was about the extent that she was capable of teaching. This Peter Port was no different.
The first clue that I would honestly be better off learning the theory from a book was the fact that he was five minutes late for class, and when he finally did come through the lecture hall's doors, his hair was singed and smoking from some sort of violet substance. The second clue was his weapon, a crude cross between a musket and a battleaxe. It did fit his profile well, considering the circumstances, but the major design flaw came in the form of the axe blades being situated on the stock of the gun. What kind of person would do something like that? Did he want his arm severed at the shoulder every time he shot?
The class itself, however, was quite strange. There were already several accurate depictions of Grimm on the whiteboards, along with needle-thin descriptions of their movements, abilities and habitats. Peter didn't get into any of that. Instead, he went on a truly impressive tirade about himself as a kid being drafted to defeat a den of Beowolves and wrestling their leader to the ground with his bare hands. Said story lasted upwards of two hours, enough time for me to not only copy all of the notes on the board, but also to continue with my catalogues of my weaponry. Beside me, Ruby was being a general teenager, distracting herself from the boring lesson by drawing, making faces, and other such things. Blake had pulled out an orange book from her pocket and was silently flipping through the pages with a gradually reddening face. Root only knows what kind of horrors laid in that novel. My left was occupied by Ren, and he seemed like the only one in class besides me and one Pyrrha Nikos that was taking notes. While the girl was struggling to keep up with Peter's boisterous and fast dialogue, I could see Ren's eyes straining almost violently to track the letters on the board.
"And who amongst you think you are strong enough to embody these traits?" I snapped back to attention when a slender hand shot up in the row in front of me. Weiss was sitting exactly in front of me, her white hair blocking the lower portion of my view. Almost instinctively, my hand raised as well, and before I could pull it down again Peter's eyes had locked onto mine.
"Arc, why don't you give it a shot?" I stood just as Weiss turned. She looked unimpressed at my unintentional offer, and while Myrtenaster wasn't with her at the time, I felt genuine sympathy for the sword if she decided to relieve some stress through combat. I made my way to the center of the lecture stage. Peter wheeled in a box with a cloth draped over it. Although I couldn't see what was inside it, the sounds of honks and snarls were disturbingly similar to that of a pig's when its den was attacked.
"Let's see how you handle this!" Peter roared. He whipped the cover of the cage, revealing a dark Grimm. It was squat, and indeed shaped like a pig, but that was where the similarities ended. Most of its back was shelled by bony plates, much like some of the large Grimm I'd seen in the forest near the Arc house. Two foot long, jagged tusks ripped out of the Grimm's snout, curling inwards to form nasty home.
This was a Boarbatusk, and it looked angry. My respect for Peter Port went up several notches as I realized that everything I needed to know to defeat it was written in flowing script on the board to my right. So this was a test to see who was paying attention, huh?
It took one look at me and charged, its yellow-orange eyes blazing with fury. I stripped off my blazer and started Tracing.
To the average observer, Kanshou and Bakuya would have appeared in my hands after I'd vaulted over Peter's desk and pulled them out of a random cabinet. The Boarbatusk looked around, confused for but a moment, then relocated me and charged again. I jumped cleanly over its writhing form and tried to get a few hits in on its back. Kanshou and Bakuya dug into the plates, but the boar Grimm was moving too fast for me to fully cut through the armor, pulling out of the way before I could bury the Married Blades into its flesh. Nevertheless, I did elicit a squeal of pain from my enemy. I threw Kanshou at its retreating form. The blade sang through the air almost like it had a voice of its own, stabbing itself through the Boarbatusk's body to the hilt, nailing it to the floor with all the ease and practice of a master knife thrower. As it struggled, I stepped forward, Bakuya buzzing pleasantly in my grip. I raised my hand to deliver the final blow-
One moment it was lying on the ground, struggling feebly against the stopping power of Kanshou, the next, it was hurtling through the air at my face, curled into a spiny ball. I let out an admittedly high-pitched yelp and ducked. Kanshou clattered to the ground beside me, having been thrown out by the rotational velocity of the spinning Grimm. It had a long, jagged gash adorning its left side that constantly dripped muddled red ichor, but other than that it appeared no worse for wear, not even seeming to recognize the wound. I grimaced when it came back around and tucked into a ball again. I would need something with sheer stopping power. Nothing as strong as Rho Aias, thankfully, but Kanshou and Bakuya just wouldn't cut it.
Unless...
The Boarbatusk came flying at me again. This time I crouched in a manner vaguely reminiscent of Archer's style, but with none of the hole. I channeled prana to my back, Reinforcing the skin to become just a little softer than iron.
When the Boarbatusk made contact with Bakuya, I forced it upwards, making it slide along my back and off of Kanshou to tumble helplessly in the air. The prana injected into my back gave me the armor necessary to come out unscathed, but the boar wasn't so lucky. I released Bakuya at it in a full-body throw. the black blade appeared as nothing more than a faint, translucent circle, flipping end over end to sink into the Grimm's stomach with a nasty squelch.
Kanshou followed it a moment after, accompanied by another spurting noise. No reason to leave a job half-finished, after all.
Peter looked at me in approval as I turned to face him. "Good, very good," he congratulated. A light smattering of applause came from the other kids in the hall. "Great use of tactics and a fantastic sense of instinct. If I may, how did you hide your weapons in my drawer? I didn't see you put them in."
"I didn't," I replied honestly. "I always have my weapons on me, I just didn't want anyone to know where. Information about an opponent is the greatest key to defeating them."
Peter nodded again, looking more thoughtful this time. "Yes, I understand what you mean. You have a good heart, Arc. I hope to see you become a great Huntsman one day."
Just as I was about to take my seat, a bell rang from somewhere in the hallway's twisting depths. Peter frowned. "Oh, it seems we must save the rest of my story and a full analysis of Arc's battle until tomorrow. Have a good day, children."
We filed out of the classroom, most of the other students looking relieved that the class was over. The only people who didn't have a smile on their faces were Blake and Ren, although Blake's mouth kept twitching upwards, Weiss, who still looked a little miffed that I accidentally stole her thunder, and surprisingly, Nora.
"I wanted to hear more about the way Professor defeated that pack of Beowolves," she whined. Ren sighed and gave her a half-affectionate pat on the head, reassuring her that it would only be one day before the story was finished. That seemed to perk her up immensely, and she began chatting to both Pyrrha and Ren at about a hundred kilometers an hour.
Weiss was glancing curiously at me, curiosity on her face instead of her usual displeasure. "It is interesting," she began slowly, "to note that you say you have Kanshou and Bakuya on your person. Logically, weapons of that size can't be hidden on your form like that without showing a single sign of their presence. It must be hard to hide them so well."
"Well, yes, but I like to think I do a good enough job at it," I replied carefully. It was clear that Weiss was fishing for information, and according the absolutely normal tone she'd adopted, she was very good at it.
"Yeah, Jaune!" Ruby interjected. "That was so cool! How'd you do it? Is there some sort of collapsible mechanism inside the blade that makes it shrink, or is it hollow on the inside so it just crumples away when the blades aren't needed. But, that way we'd still be able to see the sheaths..."
"Maybe another time, Ruby," I laughed. It also served as a good distraction from Weiss' suddenly calm behavior, because soon Ruby had a small group of first years gathered around her as they discussed the various weaponry they'd been equipped with going out of Signal.
I noticed Weiss frowning lightly out of the corner of my eye, but didn't pay it any mind. SHe seemed to be a girl to frown a lot anyway.
Ancient Human History was a much more typical class than the Grimm History. Our teacher, a balding man with a brandy in his hand and a potbelly, started off with a review of the things the students should have learned at their last combat schools. It was all fairly recent for me, so I didn't have much trouble remembering any of the information on the review, but it seemed I was one of the only ones. Beside me, Blake worked quickly and efficiently, and I could see Pyrrha diligently going through the questions a few rows in front of me, but that was about it for people who were paying complete attention to the theories being discussed. Afterwards, he went through a few quick warnings before turning to the notes. Despite the knowledge I had from the review and the books in the library, I couldn't help but be fascinated by the richness of the ancient humans and their discoveries. Apparently, they used to be like the people back in Fuyuki, with modern technology and a fairly carefree environment.
Of course, that was when the Grimm came along and began an apocalypse. In the span of two years, the world had gone dark underneath all the blackness of the Grimm and their taint. Human society was all but destroyed, and it was only in the walls of places like the city that came to be known as Vale and the other bastions that any shred of human morality remained. They built up, as humans tends to do when threatened, a massive supply of weaponry and began an assault to take back their home. Thus was the city of Vale created.
The notes got me thinking about what kind of weaponry was used to conquer the kind of area that Vale occupied. It was almost perfectly suited for human habitation. A desert to the west, bordering the ocean, housed the industrial district, where ocean currents and desert heat were used to generate electricity for the city. The north, reserved for the upper class and commercial districts, were the least ravaged by the Grimm, as well as the most picturesque. To the east was Beacon and the residential district for obvious reasons, and to the south lay the agricultural district and the main gates for the walls.
The Black Walls, another amazing feature of this world's architecture, stood more than a hundred feet high, carved almost entirely out of a mountain range ringing the last refuges of humans on the continent. They were jagged, and "cleaning crews" had to come around more than twice a day to clear the wall's twelve mile length of all of the Grimm that had unsuccessfully tried to break through them. A trip to that would be in order sometime over the summer. I had been too busy speaking with Ruby and the others during the flight to Beacon to take a look out the window and see them, not that it would make a difference. Some portions of the world were literally masses of black shadow from all the Grimm infesting them, so it was understandable that looking out over the plains outside of Vale would be bleak and discouraged.
The professor started talking again, but I found my attention retraining onto Myrtenaster. It was confusing to see Weiss and the rest of team PYWN walk into the lecture hall with only seconds to spare, but that all changed when I saw the sword sheathed at her hip. It was hurting again, but nearly as much as the first time I'd seen it, or even my last encounter with her. The pain I was feeling through the link I'd established between us was diminishing with every encounter, but for what reason, I didn't understand. Maybe Weiss was finally shaping up and acting like a proper swordswoman with her sword? I glanced over the weapon again, imprinting the ideas of its creation in my head and sifting through its history. With every Analysis, the history behind the sword was getting clearer. I could glean farther back into its line of wielders than I had ever had before, but it still wasn't enough to look into its creation. All I could get from searching that far back was a vague sense of rushing water. A blazing wave of energy pushed me back after that. All I could hope for was that the sword would eventually share its secrets with me.
Under the tabletop, I Traced Myrtenaster, making sure to use my body to his the tiny flash of light that signalled my ability as the white rapier came to rest on my lap. The connection deepened ever so slightly, and under the vague impression of a conscious being there came muddle, drifting flickers of steel and thought. Metaphysical things I couldn't fully comprehend came and went, little snippets of life that rushed through the blade from the pommel and gathered at the tip before cycling back into the pommel. It was interesting, watching the sword think. Most weapons couldn't even tell friend from foe, but those with Resonance of Steel were special. Blades like Myrtenaster, who had a Resonance of Steel only matched by a dozen of the swords in Archer's arsenal of thousands, were full of a kind of life so different from humans it was fascinating.
Then again, I emulated almost the same brainwaves and thought patterns. It seemed that I really was a sword in the body of a human after all.
As if it could sense me (which it probably could), Myrtenaster's thought slowed to a stop, then tenderly reached out with a tendril of steely emotion and accessed my mental barriers. I lowered them, only briefly, just enough for the sword to get a taste of the mana I was exuding. It drank the power in, greedily at first, then slowly as its reserves filled, bubbling with-
Wait, reserves?
I ground to a halt in the process of examining its history once again, focusing so fully on the sword that I forgot to control my Reinforced Strength stat, which spiked into the D range before I could control myself again. the pencil I was holding took the brunt of the force, almost shattering at the pressure placed upon it. Myrtenaster had partaken of my prana, my life force. Instead of the energy soothing the consciousness inside the sword and dissipating, however, it focused into a single stream of energy and entered a pool of light buried in the base of the hilt. But swords didn't have those pools. Even the strongest of Noble Phantasms, such as Excalibur, were simply tools used to shape prana before ejecting it in the form of an attack. Swords didn't have Magic Circuits; it was against a sword's very nature to be its own being.
But here was Myrtenaster, the real Myrtenaster, drinking in my prana like water. And it was storing it as mana, inside a bona fide Magic Circuit. I scanned over Myrtenaster again, feeling for those things that I hadn't before.
Myrtenaster was completely and utterly different from what I first thought it was. At first, I ignored my Analyzed knowledge of it and believed it was made of very high quality, white-tempered steel. Instead, there was a blend of metals that I didn't even recognize that rippled through the blade like waves in a pond. From steel to titanium to flecks of diamond, there were some of the strongest materials that could currently be made inside the composition of the sword, along with more than fifty other metals I didn't know how to describe. A deeper look confirmed my last theory.
Myrtenaster didn't just have one Magic Circuit, it had thirteen. Thirteen Magic Circuits working at a capacity of about twelve units of prana per Circuit were lodged in a linear fashion inside Myrtenaster, running from the pommel to the very tip of the blade.
Blake watched Weiss move carefully, repositioning herself in her seat to get a better view of the sheath at her hip. Contrary to what she'd just seen Myrtenaster, the Schnee heiress' rapier, was sitting in its position at her side, dormant for the moment. But then, how...
Her eyes flicked back to Jaune's lap, where Myrtenaster also lay unattended. His pupils were dilated, and his green-bordering-on-blue eyes flicked back and forth as if in some frenzied thought. She saw a hand reach out to gently touch Myrtenaster's tip, and focused on both it and the real sword.
To her shock, the ring of steel that kept the real Myrtenaster sheathed began to reflect greenish light onto Weiss' uniform. The source of the glow was a series of faint green lines, spreading across Myrtenaster's blade and grip. She trained her focus on the two swords fully, her notes completely left in the dark. The fake Myrtenaster was glowing too, from a point where Jaune's hands touched and the lines originated. Gold gently replaced the green, and a new presence grew in the room, one that charged the air with the taste of steel.
Jaune's eyes closed, as if he were prepared to dive into a pool of deep, dark water. His breathing immediately slowed to match her own pace near-perfectly, and the lines changed once again, from gold to blue this time. A new presence joined Jaune's enhanced one, a heavy smell of fresh snowfall and peppermint that weaved in and out of the steel like a loom's string. Both presences suddenly died, and Jaune's eyes snapped open. For a second, his eyes changed from their shifting yellow-green color to a pure silver, like gleaming steel, before fading back to their original hue. He glanced down at Myrtenaster, concerned, and waved his hand over it.
The sword, instead of pulsing with energy again like Blake expected it to, vanished with barely a trace. The only indication that the sword had been there in the first place was a ghostly image of it that was dissipating into twinkling white light. Blake felt her eyebrows furrow even further. Something wasn't right here.
Was this strange ability her leader and partner had related to the light that had healed his hands earlier? She had detected a trace of something else there as well, a taste not unlike that of sunny air over a grassy plain that permeated the room. So, did that mean that Jaune had more to him than he would be willing to admit?
Her ears twitched, and Blake felt an inexorable curiosity rise within her. She was, after all, a cat, and didn't cats like mysterious things?
I allowed the presence of whatever being governed the laws of nature on this planet to unravel the false Myrtenaster in my lap. The creation of the fake sword allowed me to sympathize with the real one's existence much better than if I had just tried to without a conduit. It was the forging of the fake sword that allowed me to glean so much more from the real one. not only did it have Magic Circuits, it- no, she- had a functioning mind and the ability to generate od. It was a slow soul, but it was a soul.
It might not have been the first time I'd met a non-human with a soul, or even a non-humanoid with a soul, but it was most definitely the first time I'd heard of a sword developing one. Most animals didn't have souls as defined by the Magus Association, just a brain and a set of instincts that could somehow sense the leylines in the Earth and follow them to more habitable areas. The Gobi desert, for example, was utterly deserted because Gaia had completely abandoned it in favor of the flooding rivers to the east, in China. Leylines just seemed to flourish where people and animals could prosper. Or... maybe, it was the other way around, where the Earth flourished as the leylines grew and strengthened. It would certainly make sense.
The Magic Circuits inside Myrtenaster were a lot like the leylines in the planets, both Earth and Remnant. While there was a vast difference between the capacity of the three, they were starkly similar in construction. The Earth didn't have nearly as many leylines as it should have, most of them having been tapped dry by Magi years ago, and Remnant had a measly three, although all three of those were several times more powerful than even the Fuyuki leyline, which was suspected to be the strongest leyline on the planet by far. Myrtenaster's, by comparison, were dismally small but incredibly versatile. The soul inside her form probably couldn't handle a lot of prana, since it wasn't designed to channel a huge amount of it. In contrast, Myrtenaster's control over her prana was probably excellent, able to filter and refine prana to its highest and most efficient purity before releasing it.
What an incredible blade. I looked inwards, to that hill of endless swords, and manually stabbed Myrtenaster into the ground right next to Excalibur. As far as I cared, she deserved the honor.
The bell rang, and as I got up, I realized that Blake hadn't stopped staring at me. What, was she still concerned about me for some reason? Had she seen me Trace Myrtenaster?
I shook myself gently about that. Even if she had, she would come to me for an explanation. I would simply wait until she did, and not bring anyone other than my team into the truth behind my abilities. I had a semi-secret identity to keep up, after all.
Weiss was glancing at me as I left the classroom, an odd look on her face. She traced patterns on Myrtenaster's hilt as I stepped past, Blake and a chattering Yang close on my heels, but I didn't experience the feedback from the sword's customary jolts of pain. Was Weiss contemplating my words? Was I getting through to her and saving them both in the process?
Weiss didn't understand Jaune Arc. He was an uncouth man, that much was for sure, and his appearance seemed slightly different every time she looked at him. He was able to pull a pair of giant curved swords out of seemingly nowhere, was delusional enough to think that her Myrtenaster was an actual, living being, and... well, that was about it. There wasn't much more about him that really stood out. If it weren't for his strange combination of height and hair color, she doubted she would recognize him in the average crowd.
On the other hand, Jaune was a good person. He was kind, courteous, and he didn't speak out of turn unless there was something wrong with whatever was being said. Add to that his combat prowess, and Weiss found herself imagining that with a few years of training, he could pose a threat to her father's personal bodyguard.
Her mind drifted to other matters. Namely, the strange pulsing feeling she could feel in Myrtenaster's hilt as she caressed the length. It was almost like there was blood flowing in the sword through one giant vein. She had thoroughly checked the sword during Grimm History; the notes were easy enough, and there was no way that the bumbling buffoon who ran the class was actually spewing any knowledge worth knowing. Grimm were dealt with in facts and battle, not stupid fairy tales or stories of valor. There was nothing out of sorts with her sword, and in fact everything seemed to be working at optimal efficiency. Could it be possible that Jaune had something of use to say when it came to her precious rapier?
No, of course not. That would be preposterous. Myrtenaster was a sword and only a sword. That was all there was to it.
Hesitantly, she tested the Dust Injectors as Jaune passed, inserting only a tiny amount of red Dust into Myrtenaster's reactors. The blade glinted faintly with an unseen flame, but she disregarded that.
No, it was the slight wince that Jaune sported when she did so that caught her interest. Was he able to capture the hints of energy flowing through Myrtenaster's hilt? His Semblance was an unknown at that point, and it could easily be that he was a rare sensor. It would certainly explain why he thought that Myrtenaster was "hurting" when she used it; the sensation of fire superheating metal wasn't particularly pleasant, and if he was strong enough feeling that sensation as a sort of empathy would be possible.
Still, Weiss Schnee was not one to take the first explanation for a situation. She would look at the possible causes of each explanation and decide on the one that matched Jaune's behavior most thoroughly. It was the Path of Swathi, the school of thought that had been drilled into her by her mother from the moment she could talk. It had not yet failed her, and she had a feeling that it wouldn't begin to do so now. With naught but a flick of her wrist, her Scroll was pressed to her ear, a phone number already punched into the holographic screen. The dial rang twice, then a cool female voice answered, "Schnee Dust Company, personal offices. Who is this?"
"Melanie, it's Weiss. I need a favor." Weiss could almost see her longtime friend jolt with suprise. "I need you to look up everything you can on Jaune Arc."
When Weiss returned from wherever she'd walk off to, she was sporting a small smile, and her eyes didn't seem like the hard chips of a glacier they had before. She managed to smoothly integrate herself into our contemplation about Combat Practice. Ruby was animatedly explaining her fighting style to an interested Nora, while the rest of our little clique watched in amusement and added tidbits of information where we could.
"What about you, Jaune?" Weiss asked after a moment. "How do you fight? We know you use swords, a spear and a bow, but other than that we don't know much about you."
"Well..."
Her fingers drummed against Myrtenaster's hilt, sending a slight but rhythmic throb through the sword as she waited for an answer. I glanced down at it for a single millisecond, not enough for anyone other than a highly-trained Huntsman like Ozpin or Gillian to notice, and focused an apology through our strange link. It- no, she- accepted readily, understanding my intent almost instantly and taking... delight in its- her- owner's question? What a truly interesting sword.
"Fine," I told her. That wasn't what she expected, apparently. Her mouth twitched open slightly, and her eyes widened just a fraction before a glint of eagerness flickered to life behind her pupils. "You can figure it out during Combat Practice," I continued. That little, niggling bit of self-worth and pride that fought against my Distortion smirked inside the recesses of my mind as Weiss' face fell and changed from expectancy to bemusement.
Before she had a chance to pursue her inquisition further, Blake appeared behind me and dragged me away. I glanced around. Ruby and Ren were already at the end of the hall. "Let's go, Jaune," she admonished
"Sorry," I said. She stopped, satisfied with both my apology and the distance she'd put between me and Weiss.
"Let's get going," Ren said, clapping his hand on my shoulder. "I've heard form some of the older teams that the Algebra teacher is a hardball, and we've already wasted half of our time."
After Algebra, lunch came readily and happily. My stomach grumbled of its own accord as I sat down next to Ren. The cafeteria, a room that easily dwarfed the ballroom we'd slept in our first night, was split into six tables, each one the length of a football field. Ruby poked at the fairly healthy meal, picking off her lettuce with a look of disgust on her face. "Anyone want this?" she asked.
"I'll take it," I muttered, and soon there was a second salad on my plate. Ruby had left behind only her steak sandwich, potatoes and a cookie, something that the inner dietician inside me, painstakingly forged by Kiritsugu, Taiga and Sakura, went berserk about. I ignored it and dug into the meal. To my right, Blake was casually munching on a tuna sandwich, a book that looked strangely similar to the Legends of King Arthur propped open with a finger. She scanned the page idly, and if it weren't for the fact that I'd spent a lot of time around Rin, I wouldn't have been able to tell if she was actually reading or not. I leaned over her shoulder, trying to get a peek of the contents.
"...That can't be right," I muttered after a moment. Blake blinked, snapped out of her reading stupor, and glanced at me. The third paragraph on page thirty one described the way that Sir Pent, who I was assuming was the analogy to Sir Kay, would often cheat his way out of gambles and run off to Camelot with the money as a gift to the Royal Treasury. The thing was, Saber herself had told me that Kay was nothing less than an honorable fellow, always keeping his promises no matter what happened to impede his progress. According to history, he had committed suicide several days after Saber was slain by her daughter. Saber had choked up for a good while after that, and it took Rin displaying one of her rare compassionate moments and consoling Saber for nearly a half hour before she'd come out of the dojo.
"What do you mean?" Blake asked. She glanced at the paragraph I was tracing with my finger. "According to the history books, Sir Pent would often steal from the peasants. He was known as the "Thief Knight" later in life because his skills in robbery were so great that he would sneak off to enemy territory, disguise himself as a soldier of the opposing army, and win all their rations in a series of gambles. It's the reason why gambling was outlawed by the Vale and Atlas militaries more than six hundred years ago."
"But that doesn't fit in with his character," I argued. There were obviously subtle differences in the legends here and on my old world, but it seemed that Saber's legend was so great that it spanned even into alternate realities. Not without a few minor differences, of course, such as Excalibur being forged by a legendary Faunus smith as the holy blade Escalvatine, but overall the basis of the legend was the same. "There's no way the King would continue to employ such a thief as a knight, even if the knight in question was of blood relation. The King had a notorious mistrust of his own blood, I believe. No, Pent was as honest a person as the King, probably more so."
As Blake and I continued to discuss the legitimacy of the legends about The Nameless King, Ruby and Ren had started their own conversations. I must admit, Ren was a fantastic listener, because he not only tolerated all of Ruby's random tangents, but even excused her whenever she realized she'd gone on one. Sure, most people would do the same thing out of principle, but there was a hint of patience hiding behind his magenta eyes that seemed ever-present. He definitely made for a good martial artist, and a natural attention span and near-godlike patience from having to handle Nora for presumably years would only increase his abilities further.
"Yes, but Sir Raff would probably be a fantastic fighter as well as a chaste individual," Blake argued. I frowned. Galahad was certainly depicted in the legends as chaste, and Saber had told me he wasn't nearly as debaucherous as the other knights in her care, but that didn't mean he wasn't a typical knight, either.
"I wouldn't doubt the limits of his swordplay. He did kill the king's traitorous daughter after all. The trouble I have with this legend is him being chaste to the point where even a kiss between husband and wife was enough to make him 'blush and turn away'. That's just overkill."
"Afternoon, everybody!" I turned. Yang had plopped herself down on Ruby's right, carrying an assortment of foods that would probably give a normal person a combination of high cholesterol, diabetes and a good three times their daily vitamins and minerals. Nora made a beeline for Ren, who looked both annoyed that his brief reprieve of the redheaded girl was interrupted, and relieved that he was in a more comfortable zone with her. Pyrrha slowly and deliberately took her seat next to Nora. The little, inner me smirked contently at the wide array of (admittedly) delicious foods spread across her tray. Weiss dropped her nearly-covered-in-green plate next to Pyrrha and gave me an angry glare.
"Whatcha doin?" Nora asked. When I explained the conversation we'd been having, she gave me a thoughtful frown. "hmm... Jaune doesn't seem like a historian, though. You seem more like a thug!"
A thug? A... was she serious? I mean, I was pretty tall in this body and the rippling effect of the almost-green hybrid of our eyes gave me a piercing glare, but I hardly think that counts as thug-like.
"She's right," Weiss said snidely. "Everything about you, from your mannerisms to your clothing, screams 'ruffian'!"
"Rude," Ruby muttered. Weiss rolled her eyes.
"I'm just saying what everyone's thinking." You know, I'm starting to think my Luck is even worse than E-, because nobody spoke up in my defence after that. Blake, her good mood seemingly ruined, turned back to her book with a barely visible nod towards me. I started up a casual, if not slightly stiff, conversation with Pyrrha as the time ticked slowly by.
Well that's that! To be honest, not a lot happened here in terms of time passing. We've developed a fairly important character further, done a bit of exposition on how prana works for nonliving creatures, and given Weiss a reason to research Jaune Arc further. Next chapter will see the possible introduction of another Type-Moon character (sorry, still not Jackie). To the people who actually think ShirouxMyrtenaster is going to bee the pairing of the story- and I've already gotten three PMs about this- it's not. Shirou will be paired with someone, and I can't say who yet, but it's not going to be a sword.
Now, onto reviews!
SwindledInSweden: Thanks for the tip! I'll fix it when I have the chance, but it may not be for at least a week. I've got graduation and college placements to go through, then I'm leaving for London for a week. I'll try and go through this, though. As for the switch, I thought I'd gotten all of these (they're typos). If you could point me to the offending areas, I'd be grateful.
Charasu Ondore: Funny pairing, but not gonna happen. It's the same reason I don't like people shipping Ruby with Ozpin and Roman. It just seems pedophilic, and as much as people will argue that it's true love, I draw the line at Shirou Emiya lovingly caressing a nine year old murderess. Sorry, pal.
Guest: I don't know where you got that information, but it's almost entirely false. Beacon seems to be analogous to college, and as far as I'm aware age has never been discussed within RWBY canon. The most popular fanon is that all of the first years except Ruby are seventeen, while Ruby herself is fifteen. I took a few liberties with Jaune being sixteen in this case, but I still think he doesn't fit the part of college student- maybe a senior in high school, but not college.
Scrumptious Egoi & ARSLOTHES: heh.
Vandenbz: I really can't thank you enough for recognizing this. Most of the girls' character developments in canon's first season are based on which team they're on and what positions they hold. Weiss isn't going to drop that cold nature so quickly, Ruby isn't going to mature as much as she does in canon, and Blake isn't going to feel as pressured and tormented by her heritage because the members of her team all actually accept her. People are undoubtedly going to give me shit about this later, but thanks so much for recognizing it now.
& wolfzero7 & Fateful Archer: Originally I was going to go for SBRR, then the StRawBeRry and SheRBeRt options came into the mix. In the end, I decided to forego the scene with Shirou pretty much having a minor breakdown about his team name in favor of honoring Monty's Color-Naming rule. It's the least I can do for the guy that brought us such a fantastical series. PWYN I didn't have much of a chance with. If anyone figures out a color name with the letters PWYN in it, please tell me and I'll change their name on the double.
Victory3114: Well... actually, no, that was just bad writing on my part. I do imagine that Saber had enough Charisma in her to naturally command the attention of a room even in picture form, though.
That seems to be it for now. Only one more post before I might take a week's hiatus. There's always the chance though. Also, don't forget to vote. I'm honestly leaning towards the FSN/The Gamer fic myself, if only to reinforce my knowledge of FSN for the non-crossover fic.
EDIT: Fixed a few typos. Thanks, SilverIceRing.