AUTHOR'S NOTES:
This is a very important announcement, I would like to inform that the user who will be getting there OC team in this story as the secondary team will be PhantomFoxy. We have agreed that we could use each other's OC's in our stories. Also, I highly suggest you go check out PhantomFoxy's RWBY story as well, where the team she commissioned to my series as secondary characters are the main characters.
That is all! Now, get ready for the longest and best chapter I have written yet! Enjoy!
Odin's point of View.
Yeyrah and I must have been wondering these woods for what seemed like long, excruciating hours now. However I knew inside that it couldn't possibly be any longer than around an hour. We still have had zero luck in the process of finding the relics that Ozpin. We even started using the sounds of distant gunfire and growls in an attempt to find the relics, but we have still had no luck.
"You know, it will be really nice if we actually knew what we were looking for." I said, bushing aside a large branch from one of the lower sitting trees that was annoying in the middle of our current path.
"Trust me, I have no arguments on that statement." Yeyrah responded in her serious, regal sounding voice.
I was walking behind her on our trail, and this could be for a number of legitimate reasons. One being that I said I'd cover our rear...The other being that I couldn't help but to stare at her crystal blue wings that she had yet decided to re-hide under her cloak. I wanted to ask why, but something told me that it was an odd subject for her. However I wasn't able to stare much longer as she caught me deeply staring into her wings. I could feel the embarrassed blushes begin to rise to the surface of my cheeks as she but her arms on her hips.
"I hope your not scared by them?" She said, her voice still sounding very serious and regal...but this time with a hint of annoyance.
"N...no...that's not it, I promise." I quickly responded, my mind barely able to make the words.
"Then what's the point in staring?" She asked in return.
"Well...It's just...Why hide them in the first place if your just gonna leave them out the rest of the time?" I asked, wondering if I was gonna regret spitting out what I was truly thinking.
There was a small pause, however it was just long enough for things to feel awkward as she stared directly into my eyes.
"Is that it?" She asked to my surprise.
"Well...yea." I said, a hint of confusion in my tone.
"Well for one, you didn't react negatively when you saw them so why does it matter? And two, you obviously have zero clue how uncomfortable it is to have to keep these things strapped down to your back for any longer than thirty minutes." She explained, her voice slowly losing the sound of annoyance. "Does that answer your question?" She continued.
I paused for a small second. "Yes...yes it does." I said.
However once I murmured those words, yet another question popped into mind.
"Wait! One more thing." I asked, keeping Yeyrah from continuing to walk our current path.
She snappily turned around. "What is it?" She asked.
"You may be alright with me seeing them...but what are you gonna do once we encounter other students?" I asked.
Yeyrah began to respond, but was cut off by yet another sound of combat...This time a lot closer than usual. We looked at each other as if to confirm what we were both obviously thinking.
"Guess your about to find out." She said as she turned and began running toward the noise, flipping out her cloak to re-hide her wings.
I watched closely as she slid it one, noticing that she had to tuck in her wings under her belt. However if you didn't pay close enough attention you wouldn't even notice that she had to do this as she seemed to accomplish the task with great speed, managing to get the cloak back on in around three seconds.
Once I was done observing this I slightly shook my head to snap back into the current event. I pulled EarthShaker from my back and prepared for combat as Yeyrah and I ran towards the noise. I was trailing slightly behind her once again, this time watching as she maneuvered through the forest with great agility, whereas I depended more on my size and pure strength to plow through the thick brush and braches scattered throughout her path. I could already guess that our fighting styles were going to be far different.
As we grew closer to the sounds of combat it seemed that whatever was going on was getting far worse. The sounds of explosions, gunshots, and Grimm growls growing far more frequent and much louder as we escaped the tree line of the forest, finally revealing our current problem.
We were now standing just on the edge of the thick area of the forest, staring into a large, empty plain of land that had a single grey structure in the middle. However the most eye catching thing were the three students who seemed to have stumbled onto a very large patch of assorted Grimm. I attempted to see if I could recognize any of the three students, but they were all just blank faces to me. However it seemed that they were all fighting with very exceptional skill. I gazed up at Yeyrah.
"You think we should help them now, or just observe until they really need help?" I asked, crouching down and putting EarthShaker stock to my shoulder.
"Hmm...lets just watch for now. I don't wanna have to get involved if we don't have to. Plus, that structure there could hold the relics." Yeyrah suggested, to which I responded with an agreeing nod as I lowered EarthShaker and began observing the students.
They definitely looked as if they have all had combat experience before. They were to far away to be able to make out there weapons or clothing, however I could tell that each one had there own unique fighting style. One of them seemed to be very large in stature and fought with very aggressive, tank-like moves. Another was quite the opposite, using speed to their advantage as they continuously kept throwing out and catching some sort of weapon that I still couldn't make out. The third seemed to keep distance and attack from range with some sort of rifle, occasionally attacking at close range at what seemed like a last resort. I almost wanted to see what these three looked like now, as there techniques and teamwork seemed to be like they have done this all before.
"Hmm." I heard Yeyrah emit from above me.
"What's up?' I asked, rising from my knelt position.
"There's only three of them. Either one of them somehow doesn't have a partner yet or we just can't see the fourth." She said, crossing her arms as she stared deeper into the battlefield.
"Maybe the fourths in the building." I suggested.
"Hmm...That's a possibility." She paused. "What do you say we go find out?" She suggested, a smirk coming across her face as she flicked her wrist, a large blade of Ice building around her forearm.
I would be lying if I said I didn't get nervous at this point, however something deep inside wanted be to get in there and fight. I looked at Yeyrah and nodded.
"Let's get in there." I smiled.
We then both began running into the battlefield, our weapons drawn as we grew closer to the creatures. It wasn't long until both of us were engaging the creatures. The first thing I came in contact with was two beowolves. I switched EarthShaker into its greatsword form and cleaved through the two in a single swing, leaving them bisected behind me as I continued through the battlefield. The next creature to notice me was an averaged sized Ursa. I stopped in my tracks and watched as it stared me down, releasing an ear-piercing growl as it began to charge towards me. I took a knee and switched EarthShaker back into its railgun form, then began lining up a shot with the white bone armor covering its skull. It wasn't long until I was able to release the charged shot, watching as it made impact with the armor, completely ignoring it as the round passed completely through and exited out the opposite end of the creature, sending it straight to the dirt with a satisfying thud. I rose back to my feet and began running towards one of the larger student that was originally down here, not taking the small amount of time I had to observe him but instead began attacking some of the Grimm sneaking from behind him.
As I began engaging the targets behind him, I also watched as he began to notice my presence. However he wasn't able to watch for long as more Grimm quickly re-caught his attention.
It wasn't long until the two of us had our area cleared. We began to look at each other, but were interrupted by a massive hissing sound coming from the other end of the battlefield. The two of us snapped our heads in the general direction of the sound, immediately noticing that the two other students and Yeyrah were now fighting something I never would have expected to see this soon in my experience as a Hunter... a King Taijitu.
"Well I'll be damned." I heard the student I helped say as he ran past me to help, his voice very deep.
I decided to do the same and began running towards the massive beast myself, its size seeming to get even bigger as I grew closer. The creature may have had very powerful attacks and massive speed, however it was practically stuck in one place at this current time. I took a knee and began to take aim with EarthShaker, but then realized that I didn't know where its weakness was.
Naturally I began to observe as the other students attacked, hoping that I noticed that they knew something that I didn't. Of course to my luck I noticed that the student with the long distance weapon was repeatedly taking pop shots at the creatures two heads...I guess it wouldn't hurt to do the same. I re-shouldered EarthShaker and took aim at the right head, the began charging a shot, eventually releasing the trigger and watching as the shot exploded upon contact with its bone-plated head. It didn't kill the creature, however it did seem to knock out one of the heads.
However this attack managed to catch the attention of the other head, as it began to slowly move in my direction, completely ignoring the other students. I began to jog backwards as I shouldered EarthShaker once more, charging up another shot...without effect. As soon as I began holding down the trigger EarthShaker let out an unwanted hiss as the side panel popped open and ejected the dried out dust crystal onto the ground. I felt my heart begin pounding as fell to the ground in an attempt to fish out another dust crystal from my ammunition pouch, ultimately failing as my nerves took over. I looked up at the approaching King Taijitu, noticing that Yeyrah and the rest of the students were to far behind to draw its attention for me.
It wasn't long until it was directly over me, its two heads now completely awake once more as it reared back, all the while letting out a menacing hiss. I brought EarthShaker up over my head in greatsword form and braced for something that was going to hurt far more than I wanted. However instead of feeling a massive force come down on me, I instead heard a loud explosion come from overhead. I opened my eyes and looked back up at the recoiling King Taijitu, noticing that one of its heads was once again falling to the ground unconscious. I also noticed that there was a large area of smoke where the head was originally sitting. I began looking around for whoever attacked the creature, eventually looking behind me and seeing tow very familiar faces: Naomi and Xion.
Xion had one of his silver fuel tanks grasped in his hands, tossing it in the air and catching it in his claws. He looked down at me and smiled, then returned his gaze back to the King Taijitu. I watched as he took the silver fuel tank in his hand and create a spark directly on the nozzle of the tank, then chucked the tank at the other head of the massive Grimm. Once the tank struck the head, it exploded into a massive ball of fire. This answered my short curiosity of where the first explosion came from.
Of course just like the other head, this head came crashing to the ground with a massive crack. I quickly rose back to my feet to send a finishing blow to the head, but before I could manage to rise Naomi went flying by me with even greater speed than Yeyrah. I watched as she jumped atop one of the head, wrapping her massive scissors around its neck...then snipping through the creature as smooth as butter. However once she did this the other head began to rise in a squeal of pain, immediately shifting its attention towards Naomi.
I wasn't going to allow it to even touch Naomi.
I switched EarthShaker into its greatsword form and leapt up onto the creature before it was able to rise up far enough to escape my reach. It let out another squeal as it attempted to shake me off, but to no effect. Once I had a clear shot at its neck I delivered a clean swipe, using my strength and the pure weight of EarthShaker to slash through the neck in a single, clean sweep. It was defeated.
Naomi and I jumped down from the massive carcass, meeting back with Xion, Yeyrah, and the other students. We all joined each other in a circle to catch our breath, finally giving me a chance to observe the other students.
"So...should we be playing the name game now?" Xion said as he looked at the other students, nodding at Yeyrah and I in the process.
"I guess so." The large student said. "Names Arges Night, this is my twin brother Liliel." He said, gesturing towards the smaller Huntsmen.
Arges may have said they were twins, however if he wouldn't have said so than I wouldn't have guesses that they were even related. They didn't even appear to be twins. Arges was very muscular and built, seeming to wear full metal plate armor topped with multiple pouches that covered everything except for his thighs, forearms, hands, and head. It seemed that under it all was a yellow undershirts along with a black jacket and blue jeans. His weapon was also very large, seeming to be that of a large crossbow that looked like it could transform into something of a large circular saw, all consisting of dark grey and gunmetal colors other than a few small bits of yellow detailing. It was a truly mean looking device.
However Liliel was almost the opposite. He was very small and skinny. His outfit consisting of a dark grey undershirt topped with a white duster, grey jeans, and a pair of black gloves. Even his armor was much lighter, consisting of nothing more than a leather chest piece and gauntlets. His weapon was what looked to be a type of mechanical throwing glaive of very large size, seeming to be able to transform into a multi-barreled pistol. I noticed that he wore a black headband as well, which led me to notice the only two things that made these two look similar to each other: They both had short brown hair and gold-ish eyes.
"I can speak for myself Arges." Liliel spoke up, receiving a stern look from his brother.
"Yes, and I'm Phoenix Glacier." The other student said. "Nice to meet you all, and thanks for the help." She said.
Phoenix was a female huntress of small stature... and odd clothing choice. She wore a white, long sleeved shirt with red sleeve tips and a red circle in the center. She also wore a pair of tight fitting jeans that were tucked inside a pair of black knee high shoes. Her hair and eyes were very noticeable as well. Her hair was varying colors of red that reached down to her back in a long braid, almost resembling a cartoony fire. Her eyes were actually two separate colors, the right being violet and the left being an odd shade of green. Her weapon was fairly similar to what I expected: A very skeletonized long distance rifle, however as she holstered it I saw that it was capable of transforming into that of a longer than average rapier sword.
"Well then...hello there. I'm Odin Longbow." I said, sticking my hand out to shake all of theirs, to which the three of them happily returned the favor.
"Yes, and I'm Yeyrah Delana. Pleasure to help and meet you all." Yeyrah said, her voice now sounding more regal than serious as she gave a slight bow to the three students, her ice covered forearm beginning to quickly evaporate into the air.
"I'm Naomi Katara! Nice to meet you!" Naomi said, her voice as cheerful as always.
The three of us then looked over at Xion, awaiting for him to introduce himself. However it seemed that he was to preoccupied with reattaching his fuel tubes to the remaining tanks still attached to his belt, his tail wagging in the process.
"Umm...that's Xion Pyralis. He has the attention span of...well..." I was cut off be Arges.
"A dog?" He said, to which everyone responded with a slight giggle.
"Precisely." I smiled, looking over at Xion who seemed to finally catch wind on the conversation.
"Hey! You guys making fun of me?" Xion spoke up, yet in more of a kidding type of tone.
"Don't worry Fido, your cool with us." Arges responded, once again receiving a multitude of giggles from the rest of us...even a small chuckle from Xion.
Once we all got our laughs and introductions out of our system we began to speak about the actual task at hand.
"So, there's only three of you here?" I questioned.
"That means one of you doesn't have a partner yet, correct?" Yeyrah added in.
"No actually." Phoenix said. "The forth is inside that building getting the relics, she should be back any second."
"Gotcha." I responded.
"Yea, actually it probably wouldn't hurt to check on her. Make sure everything is okay." Liliel spoke up.
"Agreed." Arges said as he turned and began walking towards tha large structure, to which everyone followed closely behind.
The bulding was far larger up close. It appeared to be extremely old as well, as the concrete it was almost entirely made of seemed to be on its last leg.
"So, the relics are in there?" I asked, looking down into the darkened doorway of the structure.
"Yep. Just head down the stairs and then go into the larger room on the right." Liliel said, acting out the directions with his hands.
"Alright, thanks." Naomi responded.
It was at this time that we all heard footsteps coming from inside the structure. They didn't sound human however, as they they sounded much heavier. However it wasn't long until whatever was making the approaching noise decided to show itself through the darkness. Out walked, not the other student, but instead a creature of Grimm that I have never even remotely heard of or seen before.
It walked outside of the structure almost nonchelantly, as if paying zero attention to us. Naturally, Naomi, Xion, Yeyrah, and I rose are weapons and prepared to strike the creature down. This was sonmething that seemed like it would be an easy task as this Grimm was far smaller than any creature I have ever came into contact with. However, as the four of us began to attack, the other three students shouted out in panic.
"Stop!" Liliel screamed.
"Check your target!" Arges added in.
"Friendly fire!" Phoenix continued.
This was truly confusing, however the four of us did stop our attack and instead began paying closer attention to the creature that just emerged from the structure.
It was a faunus...of Grimm origins.
The faunus appeared to be female, yet resembled that of a small beowolf as it had a black tail and ears much like Xion's. However it also had the same white bone spikes that most creatures of Grimm had rising off of its elbows, shoulders, and parts of its back. It also had a very similiar white and red bone mask covering its face, causing its balck hair to be windswept as it came out the back of the mask. However the closer I observed, the more I could tell that this creature was just an odd breed of faunus. It was actually wearing clothes. I could notice a long black cloak draped over its back, all wrapped together with a dark grey sleeveless undershirt and a pair of ripped up jeans and tattered, black combat boots. What skin was showing seemed to be of a darker complexion, almost appearing as if its skin was just very tan. The most interesting thing that I noticed was that it was holding a weapon, something that immedietly gave away the fact that this was just another huntress in training.
The weapon was currently closed up on the faunus's side, the only thing I could tell about the weapon was its color scheme of gunmetal and dark purple detailing.
"You mind lowereing your weapons?" The faunus asked, its voice very feminine, but powerful at the same time.
The four of us just stared in confusion, not one of us obeying its command to lower or weapons.
"Look, either lower them or I'll do it for you." She commanded, placing her hand on the folded up weapon to her side.
I truly wanted to lower my weapon, however something inside wouldn't allow me. I had a feeling that Naomi, Yeyrah, and Xion felt the same way, as they were all just standing there with weapons drawn...just wouldn't bother to attack.
"Look guys, she's friendly." Arges spoke from behind us.
"Yea, she's a student like us." Pheonix added in.
I knew they were telling the truth. Why else would they just be standing there if this truly was a Grimm? Plus, Grimm can't speak. Nor have I ever even read anything about a Grimm like this. These thoughts caused me to finally lower my weapon, eventuall holstering on my back once more.
Naomi, Yeyrah, and Xion soon followed, however none of us spoke in the meantime.
"Well...my apologies miss..." Yeyrah spoke up, her voice trailing off towards the end.
Before the faunus responded, we all watched in awe as the white and red bone mask covering her face simply desintegrated into the air, leaving behind a faint trail of ash in its place. This reveiled her face, immedietly giving away the fact that she truly was just another type of faunus. Her face was that of a human, her eyes being a very deep blue color.
"It's quite alright." The Grimm faunus responded, removing her hand from her weapon. "It happens far more often then you might think. Oh...my name is Okami Liber." She then stopped and giggled slightly. "Sorry for the scare."
We all stared once more, each of us not able to think of a responce.
"I asume your hear for the relics?" She questioned as Arges, Liliel, and Pheonix walked over to her.
She then pulled out two small statues from one of the pouched on her belt. The statues resembled that of Grimm, hers appearing to be a beowolf.
"Are those the relics?" I asked, gesturing to the small statues.
"Precisely." Okami responded, handing off one of the small beowolf statues to Arges and Liliel. "Theres an entire room down there full of statues like this that resemble different Grimm. Each pair of two people grab a single statue." She informed.
"Why'd you grab two beowolfs then?" Xion spoke up, bringing up a good question in the process.
"Well, we heard that the two pairs of people who grabbed the same statue will end up on a team together. So, I figured it would be nice to end up on a team with people I know. I take it your gonna do the same?" She asked, gesturing to tht four of us.
We actually didn't know this, however I could tell that it brought a smile to all of our faces. The four of us all glanced at each other and then nodded. I looked back at Okami and her gang.
"It seems that's exactly what were gonna do, thanks for the help." I said as we turned and began walking into the pitch black structure.
Time to find some relics.
