Welcome to the end of the beginning, and the first real arc that began the story.
Director: College Fool
Writer: Coeur al'Aran
Cover Art: Kegi Springfield
Chapter 12
He'd been close to Mouk before, but never this close. Jaune figured his uncle would forgive him the panic that raced through him, especially considering the situation. His hand twitched for his red armband by instinct, but luckily it wasn't necessary. The giant beast didn't move.
"It's asleep," the Huntsman beside him said, stating the obvious as usual. "This must be where it comes to rest, or perhaps my attack injured it and it needed to recuperate."
"It won't stay asleep if you keep talking like that!" Jaune hissed as loud as he dared. His hand shook as he grabbed the idiot by the wrist and dragged him to the side, so that they could walk about the beast's feet and reach the exit.
"Keep quiet," Jaune whispered. "We need to get outside so I can figure out where we are. If we play our cards right, we can get far enough away before he wakes up." They wouldn't be safe and dry after that, but they'd certainly be safer. If they were near where he thought they were, at least the Grimm up ahead wouldn't be driven mad from last week's bombastic fight against Huntsmen and Huntresses, or yesterday's mad chase.
Whole damn thing would be easier if they'd not caused such a mess.
Mouk let out a loud snort. The beast shifted just a tiny bit, but even that movement was enough to make dust rain from the ceiling of the cave. Jaune and Ren froze, ready to leap behind a rock- less to hide, and more to ensure they wouldn't be rolled over. To his immense relief the beast went back to sleep, its snores echoing off the cavern's walls.
Too close. Much too close. Jaune gestured for Ren to follow and skirted around the edge of the cave. The moonlight from outside provided light, limited as it was, and a destination. The two of them scaled a small mountain of rubble, careful not to dislodge any, and slowly came down the other side in a tinkle of fallen stones.
Only to come upon a huge furry paw squashed up against the rock wall. Mouk's foot, or a part of its foot, knee, and shin, which had been bent in two and laid against the wall as it slept. It was blocking the path quite effectively.
"Damn it…"
Ren thankfully kept to a whisper as he slid down beside Jaune. "Can we climb over it?"
"I don't fancy our odds," he replied. There was only a small amount of space between the top of Mouk's legs and the ceiling, and if he stirred or tried to stand they'd surely be crushed. That assumed he didn't just wake up from them trying to crawl all over him in the first place.
"I see." Ren sighed, before looking at the larger mass. "And I suppose it would be too dangerous to scale his body and walk along it, perhaps climbing down his hip."
Jaune stared at the huntsman like he was insane. Maybe he was.
"I thought as much. I suppose that leaves going around the other way."
Past the head, he meant. It was a risky proposition and why he'd led them to the feet first. Mouk might be fast asleep but that could change at a moment's notice. The last place they wanted to be was right next to his face when that happened.
Still, they didn't have many options. Sneak past Grimm or try their luck back with the Arachne. He'd rather take the immediate death to one where he was wrapped in a web, had his insides melted, and was sucked dry like a smoothie at the leisure of several hundred Grimm arachnids. He'd throw himself into Mouk's jaws first.
"Yeah, but stay quiet," he whispered. "And whatever you do, don't touch him. Ursa have surprisingly good senses of feeling. He'll have learned to rely on it more after losing an eye."
"I'm surprised the Arachne didn't warn him we were coming."
"Maybe they were too far away and underground. Or maybe he can't sense stuff when he's asleep. Either way, they're at least afraid he'll squish them if he rolls over. If we're desperate we can retreat back into the tunnel we came from."
The plan set, the two of them clambered back up and over the pile of rubble and made their way back to where they'd come from, out by Mouk's face and shoulders. It was slow going again, made more so by the fact they paused to hide every time Mouk stirred. Jaune noticed Ren stumbled once or twice as well, evidence that the huntsman's ankle wasn't as healed as he was being led to believe. They couldn't stop for it.
When they reached the tunnel Jaune hesitated and had Ren stay behind. If things went south the huntsman would be the slower to escape. "I'll scout ahead," he whispered.
"Be careful," Ren urged.
"You don't need to tell me that, city-boy. I'm always careful."
Ren held his gaze for a long moment. Again, he saw the reluctance in the Huntsman's eyes. Those same reluctance every Huntsman had when watching anyone else do something. Those same pink eyes closed with a sigh. Ren nodded. "Okay. I trust you."
'At least until you don't,' Jaune thought, turning away. Even so, it was a step in the right direction.
His feet barely crunched as he leapt down from the tunnel, one hand slapping down to cushion his fall. The other itched to go to his bow, but he let resisted the urge and concentrated on the task ahead. Any number of arrows wouldn't be enough. Mouk was too strong, too large, and too close. He would kill them both the second he woke. Jaune paused, brow creasing. It was normal, he supposed. The fear.
He drew a deep breath.
He held it.
And with a sharp exhale, he let it go – and all his fear with it.
Grimm were Grimm, no matter the size. He was a hunter – and a hunter was never prey. With not an ounce of hesitation, he dashed forward. Left, right, over a rock. His eyes picked out obstacles with ease and he adapted quickly, rolling and using solid pieces of rock to get over looser ones. He skirted the giant head, paying no attention to it but rather the path ahead.
"Don't dwell on things you can't change," his uncle had tried to teach him. "If something is going to happen then it's going to happen. Focus instead on what you can effect."
The Grimm would wake up when he wanted to. No amount of awareness would change that. But the faster he and Ren could get through the better. All he could affect was their speed. Like a monsoon, Mouk wasn't something they could stop, just work around.
Mouk grumbled in his sleep. One of its forepaws, the size of a small building, drew back in towards its body. The huge palm rushed for Jaune's face. The hunter sprinted toward it and leapt up, catching himself on one of the beast's giant claws. The palm was moving to its body now, ready to crush him against Mouk's flank. It also dragged huge swatches of rock with it, dragging along the bottom of the cave.
Well, if he couldn't go under, then it would have to be over. His feet swung as he used the claw as a pivot, himself as the pendulum. With a lurch he managed to swing himself up, landing on the top of its paw scant seconds before it crushed him. He leapt off, hitting the gravel with a roll and a grunt of pain.
Breathe. Hold. Let go…
Move on. Keep moving. If you stood still you died. Jaune dashed ahead, finally clearing the monster's shoulders and coming around to its face. He slowed his pace, then, taking a deep breath and holding it. Self-control was everything.
When was it not the case? He moved silently, as he always did when stalking a deer. His back pressed against the rock face as he passed by Mouk's face, then the top of his head, and finally emerged beyond.
But not to the sight he wanted.
/-/
Ren breathed a sigh of relief when Jaune emerged unharmed from behind the beast, but that relief was short-lived. The hunter's expression was dark, his scowl legendary. "What's wrong?" Ren asked.
"His shoulders are bunched up against the wall as well. There's no way through."
"He fills the cave from head to toe?"
"More like he plugged the whole thing up," Jaune said. "He's bigger than the cave and has to curl up to fit in it. It looks like a tight fit."
He tried to not let his despair show, clamping down on it with his Semblance. "What do we do now? Do we go back and try to find another way? Wait for him to go away?"
Jaune frowned. "It's not my first choice, but those people who died down there wouldn't have done so if they had another exit. If the Arachne alert him when he wakes up..."
"If they do?"
"We die. He can camp out there a lot longer than we can hold out between them."
Well... that was grim. Was this what happened to the lost city? Caught between a spider-hoard on one end and Mouk on the other, left to starve or die of despair? Ren tried not to think about it.
"Should we wait back in the tunnel we came from?" Ren asked. "It's a safe spot between him and the Arachne."
Jaune hesitated. "Not too far. I don't want us missing when he leaves- or the Arachne feeling free to move in when he does. I don't know how much of them backing off was the light, and how much was Mouk. We need to stay close, and the moment he leaves, so do we."
"You're the guide," Ren surrendered.
They avoided the tunnel and moved back down towards Mouk's legs, which Jaune felt would be a little better hidden. If Mouk woke up and tried to move towards the exit he'd kick dirt and rock in their direction, perhaps the result of the pile of rubble they'd clambered over before, but he wouldn't see them.
The pile of rubble itself provided the cover, the two of them pressing themselves in behind it and against the cave wall. That allowed them to lay on their bellies on the slope, with several tonnes of rock and detritus between them and Mouk. Ren dug down into it and managed to find a spot where he was kept steady, but Jaune wasn't having quite so much luck and kept squirming.
"There's something under this," he hissed. "It keeps poking me."
"It's probably a rock. We are sat on a pile of them."
"If it was a rock I wouldn't be having so much trouble-ah!" Jaune brought his hand out from under him.
"Is that… a knife?" Ren stared at the object. It was modern-construction; steel or some other allot. It was also pulverized and bent. "Is it yours?"
"No, it came from the rubble."
More evidence of SDC activity? Ren watched as Jaune sheathed the knife in his belt, obviously deciding he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. The hunter pushed aside some more rubble while Ren kept an eye on Mouk. It didn't take him long to find some additional goodies buried in the mound.
"Some small dust crystals – might be something we can use." Jaune stored those away. "Crushed rock, some dented scrap metal. Not sure we have the time for that. And… a tube?" The last time, Jaune lifted into the air to get a better look at. It was a dull and scratched thing, a bit wider than a wrist that might once have been brilliant silver but was now scoured and lost its lustre. The 'tube' was open at one end, while the other had a strip of some soft metal on the other. While the hunter didn't seem to recognise it, Ren did, reaching over. If was what he thought it was...
There were no internal mechanisms that Ren could see, but it was unmistakably elaborate once upon a time. It was light, too... but stronger than it looked, if it's lack of dents were compared to the bent knife from before.
"It's a bracer. A type of arm armour." It didn't seem to have any obvious mechanisms like Ember Celica, but it had the same sort of metal feel. Or did it? Even in his hands, the silver metal felt warm, and light, and not of any sort of manufacture he'd ever seen. Pity it didn't seem to have a matching set. Did the original owner escape with the other, or was it lost somewhere else in this hollowed-out mountain?
"I know. Never seen one like that before," Jaune commented. "I always wanted a better one to help stop the bow from catching on my wrist, but..." he began to reach out, before stopping with a quick look towards Ren.
Ren hid a smile, guessing why. "You can have it."
"Thanks," Jaune said, as politely as he could. He lowered his sleeve just far enough to expose his arm. Underneath the sleeve was something that was probably technically a bracer- a bit of leather wrapped around the wrist at least. Jaune removed it without a second thought and slide his arm into the newer bracer, hand emerging from the other side as the soft silver bracer covered his forearm.
And then it tightened.
It was so sudden, neither had time to react before the metal moulded itself to Jaune's arm. Jaune looked at Ren, eyes wide in alarm. Ren looked at Jaune back, unable to answer. But before either could freak out... it was over, as easily as that. Ren reached forward, tentatively touching Jaune's arm.
"Is that- are you ok?" he asked, still trying to be quiet.
Jaune barely responded, looking at the armour with wariness, and... awe? "Is it supposed to do that? It's a perfect fit," he breathed, raising it to look at it better in the soft moonlight. "It almost feels... warm."
Metal like that - if it was metal - shouldn't be warm. It should be as cold as the temperature here. Ren tried not to let his alarm show- that was like no Huntsman armour he'd ever seen. Most bracers fastened, not tightened on their own.
But, like Jaune, the moment for fear was already over. Whatever it was, it wasn't hurting Jaune. That would be enough for now- and even Ren knew that dwelling on this too loudly might spell their doom.
"Come on, let's not risk any more trouble," Ren urged, pulling Jaune back down. Funny how now it was his turn to urge quiet and caution. Funny how all it'd taken was a piece of armour to unsettle him. Ren took his own breath and tried to reach down for his semblance. It was harder than ever to reach.
He was honestly relieved when Jaune didn't argue, and when the hunter instead brought out his strange ammo fabricator and opened the lid, prying some loose pieces of scrap metal from the pile inside. It started to whirr, though thankfully it was a very quiet noise. "It's for arrows," he explained. "Might as well use this metal while it's here."
Ren nodded. No one else was using it. As the familiar calm returned, he looked at Jaune looking at his new bracer, which almost glowed in the silver moonlight until he lowered his sleeve and looked at the pile it and the broken dagger had come from. All he could do was wonder. Why?
Why were there weapons and armour in the rubble? Why here in Mouk's lair? What else was buried within the rubble?
And would they themselves be buried amongst it as well?
/-/
The beast stirred after four tense hours.
It was a slow, grinding thing, like the rocks of the mountain creaking and groaning as some golem rose from its slumber. So too was it with Mouk, who pushed out with both feet that dug into the cave wall, gouging out huge chunks of rock with a mighty crack of splintered stone.
Ren and Jaune ducked low, the former concentrating as he brought his Semblance forth and expanded it like a bubble to cover the two of them. The strain it placed on him was pronounced, but Ren gritted his teeth and ignored it. Even if Jaune had proven his resolve, this wasn't a place to take chances.
Mouk's stretching complete; the beast took a moment to scan the cave. Its head passed their hiding place by, warm breath snorting out to disturb some of the loose stones and send them skittering down over their still bodies. It sniffed once, coughed, and then rumbled to itself as it shifted its weight so that it could sit upright in the huge cavern. Sadly, it made no move to leave.
Ren's brow beaded with sweat. If it were just the drain on his aura it would be bad enough, but semblances worked off the soul. His was already threadbare, working on little sleep, less food, and an aching ankle that hadn't yet had time to truly recover. Aching ankles seemed minor when Mouk's fetid breath was washing over them. He glanced to the side. Jaune hadn't moved a muscle.
To his relief the Semblance held. Mouk growled and grunted but had no idea he wasn't alone. The monster licked its claws, shuffled about in the cave, and otherwise gouged more space out of the walls, presumably widening the size of its cave. Why would it need to do that? Ren wondered. The cave was already large enough for it.
One of Mouk's paws slammed down, shaking the ground beneath them. More stones rained down. He could see it from the corner of his eye, the paw touching the wall they were against, though fifty metres or more to the side. It was in front of the tunnel they'd entered through. Had it smelled them? Had it somehow detected their entry?
It looked so. Mouk reached into the tunnel with one clawed paw, and it appeared just wide enough for him to fit and reach through, the arm reaching in up to the bicep, where it became too thick. Mouk huffed and reached around inside, perhaps looking for them. The beast's noise was enough to drown out any of their own. It was enough to make Ren want to take the chance to flee, but Jaune shifted over to whisper into Ren's ear.
"Stay down."
"It knows we're here," Ren hissed back. "It's looking for us!"
"It's not." Jaune sounded confident. "Look, it's not angry. If it knew we were here it would be growling at least. Instead he's moving slowly, lazily. It's not us he's after."
"Then what is it after?"
Jaune didn't answer. He obviously didn't know. Ren took a deep breath and looked back, relieved for their angle which gave them a decent view of the arm, but blocked Mouk's face from sight, hiding them in turn. The Grimm didn't sound like it was going wild, the gruff noises more ones of frustration, concentration, or just occasional noises made on instinct alone. That turned to a squeak, however, one slightly more excited, and Ren watched as the hand was drawn back.
The giant paw came out and scraped a large pile of rock and stone with it, some of which glittered in the light. Dust, he realised. It had scraped rock and dust crystals off the tunnel, and perhaps off the very cave walls itself.
Wait, did that mean the dust scrapes weren't SDC at all, but Mouk? Why?
His question was answered a moment later, though not in any manner he might have expected. Mouk used both paws to scoop up the rubble, raised it to his face – and then bit down into it with a horrifying cracking sound. Rock splintered and broke and pebbles rained from its mighty jaws as it chewed. The noise was unbearable, like a bucket of stones thrown into a wood chipper. The occasional shattering of dust also punctuated the air like glass thrown against a wall.
"Why would it be eating the rock!?" Ren whispered. When Jaune didn't hear him, he repeated the question louder – almost having to shout it. The noise was that horrific.
"I don't know. The only time I've seen animals eat rocks was-"
Whatever it was, Mouk drowned it out with noise. Ren watched as Mouk finished his first handful of rock and rubble and reached in for another. It searched around again, and he could imagine the beast's claws carving great chunks of stone free. When it came back, yet again Ren saw the tell-tale shimmer of dust among the stone.
Was that the secret to Mouk's incredible size and strength? Had it ingested dust alongside the rocks it ate, and that had somehow reacted to make it grow and grow? Studies on dust did to people had yielded nothing long-term, but there was no telling if Grimm was the same. It made a twisted amount of sense, even if the reason as to why it ate dust and rock did not. Or was it-
"The carvings!" Ren gasped.
Jaune glanced his way. "Huh?"
"The carvings, Jaune. Your legend! The Ursa that ate the moon. Don't you see?" It was obvious he didn't, so Ren continued. "Your legend said the Ursa grew large enough to eat the moon, but that wasn't it at all! That cave we were just in had dust in the ceiling, remember? If that sparkled like the moon and stars, then a Grimm eating it would be considered the same. Mouk didn't literally eat the moon; he feasted on the dust the people here called their night sky. Maybe he was even the one responsible for wiping them out!"
He could imagine it easily, and the earlier cave they had been in explained it well. Mouk must have been 'just' a large Ursa once, and he chased people into the caves but couldn't fit through the final tunnels into their home. He set up outside instead, in the previous chamber they'd been in and this one. For whatever reason he started to eat dust, growing too large to leave by the same route he had come in, and yet also unable to kill the humans inside.
Maybe the reason why the monster had been able to reach its size wasn't indolence or foolishness on the Kingdom's parts at all. Maybe it had simply gone underground as a tiny Ursa, and then ingested so much dust that it grew and grew, unchallenged and impervious from harm, until it had grown so large that it could burst its way out of the mountain on its own. Like a caterpillar to a butterfly, Mouk had made the mountain his chrysalis.
Wait… what if there were more Grimm like Mouk? How many other lost or buried Grimm had survived untold aeons, just waiting to break free? Grimm got smarter and stronger with time, but if Remnant was covered in titans just waiting to grow large enough to break free of Remnant's crust...
Or escape its oceans, or leave the lost lands, or simply be found in forgotten corners of the Kingdoms...
The thought was dizzying. He almost felt ill. That sort of menace, just waiting to wreak havoc upon the world? He felt like a man who had just discovered the apocalypse, and the worst part was that he knew no else one would ever believe him.
A hand tugged on his shoulder.
"What!?" he snapped.
"Shh!" Jaune held a finger to his lips, reminding Ren of the situation. The hunter pointed to the side. "Let's go now, while he's distracted."
"Now? We could wait until he leaves."
"He might not. Most animals sleep after eating to better digest their food. No telling how long that takes him but we don't want to be trapped in here for days and days."
"Won't he have to leave to defecate?" Ren asked.
Jaune snorted. "What do you think we just laid on for the last few hours?"
Ren froze again as a different sort of revulsion wracked him. Rock, rubble, chipped dust and discarded weapons, all of it ground into a fine paste and mounted in an oddly-shaped pile by the cave wall. A rock pile, with ground dust, like the sort that must pass out of Mouk eventually...
Ren's face twisted in displeasure and he pushed himself a little further off the… off the dung. He'd had his face pressed against it. Gods, he'd rooted around in it.
Gods, Jaune was wearing something that had been in it for goddess knows how long! And he'd known!
At least that explained why there had been weapons and tools in it. Mouk's prey, no doubt, and forgotten fighters who'd tried to slay the beast. It might have even been the reason the monster was eating rock in the first place. A blade or piece of armor must irritate the stomach. Maybe Mouk had hoped to use the rubble to fill his stomach and aid digestion of large material – material like the metal blade or bizarre bracer they'd found earlier.
At least something made sense, even if he'd have been just as glad for it not to.
"Right," he said, fighting back nausea. "Lead the way."
Jaune slowly shifted his body to the left, in the opposite direction from Mouk. The two of them shimmied across the pile of dry dung, keeping flat against it in order to increase their surface area and reduce the risk of a landslide. Jaune reached the ground first and paused. Mouk was still loudly grasping away inside the tunnel.
"Now," Jaune mouthed, and Ren nodded, landing beside him and concentrating on keeping his footsteps silent. He extended his Semblance at the same time, using it to shield them both. There was but two hundred metres to the exit, a huge hole gouged out of the rock face, no doubt where Mouk had erupted from untold years ago, perhaps even centuries. They made their way slowly towards it, caution over haste as Jaune led the way, pausing for the two to hide every time Mouk brought back his monstrous paw and began to eat.
At one point the monster shuffled away – and Ren dreaded that it might come and find them. Luckily it paused at a back wall, pushing its rear against it and letting out the most terrible noise. It was echoed by growls and pained grunts from the giant monster.
Passing rock, dust, and whatever else he'd eaten sounded as painful as one might have imagined. Once Mouk was done with the unsavoury task he used his hind legs to push it into a pile against the wall, creating another mound of rock and material, before he moved back to the tunnel and began to reach for more. It was their chance to move again.
Ren's foot caught something not a hundred and fifty metres from the exit. His ankle twisted, and he fell hard, just managing to bite back a cry. He fell to one knee, teeth gritted.
"You okay?" Jaune hissed, rushing back.
"My ankle…" Ren reached down and picked up the offending object that had tripped him. It was round and metal, and as he turned it to face him his eyes widened. It was a charred Bullhead pilot's helmet. Not his pilot's, but some other unfortunate soul. He dropped it in shock, though luckily Jaune was fast enough to catch it.
Not the object that slipped out, however. The skull, stripped clean of flesh and partially digested, cracked onto the floor and shattered into a thousand pieces.
The grinding sound of tooth and rock paused ominously.
Jaune dragged him back up. He didn't have to shout 'Run.'
Mouk roared from behind them, turning and scratching its claws against rock as it tried to propel itself towards them. Ren hadn't even realized he'd dropped his semblance, taking what energy he could and using it to ignore the throbbing pain in his ankle as he staggered for the exit. He didn't dare look behind. He could hear the monster's approach – not running, but rather using its paws to drag itself through the too-small cave.
Something struck his shoulder from behind and pushed him down. Jaune pressed a hand over his mouth and kicked the two of them behind some rock, hoping to lose the beast as it hunted them. The giant shadow passed over them, and then by, and Ren watched in horror as Mouk shifted its frame in such a way as to block the exit entirely. It was a Grimm that had grown old; intelligent. It knew what they wanted and knew how to prevent their escape.
There was no way it would leave now. It would keep them trapped here as long as it needed.
"Start a fire," Jaune whispered. "I'll distract it."
"Are you crazy?"
"Crazy, desperate, it's all the same at this point. We don't have a choice anymore." Jaune ducked out and drew his bow, nocking an arrow and drawing the string back. "Oi!" he yelled. "Come on, you big bastard. I'm over here!" He loosed the arrow. It plinked uselessly off Mouk's snout.
The beast roared with more fury than such a nuisance warranted. It shifted, keeping its hind legs out the entrance, and lunged forwards with its forepaws, stretching out to reach the hunter. Jaune dashed back, staggering over the uneven terrain. Even then he barely escaped, the claws sailing by less than a metre from his body – what seemed so small a distance when Mouk's size was taken into account.
But there was no time for panic. Ignoring the pain from his injured leg Ren dug into his pack and brought forth one of his remaining flares and what little tinder he had. There wasn't the time to start a proper fire, but he was able to pop off the top off the flare. It sparked to life when he struck it and he held it against the wood, hoping against hope that it would take.
It didn't. Falling into the underground water must have soaked it.
Please, he begged, trying again. The flare was bright, loud and an angry shade of red, but the sparks were just that and the wood was heavy and damp. He tried again, panic mounting as Jaune continued to dance with Mouk. The heat warmed his face. The sparks burned his hands. In a final attempt he shoved the flare into a hollow and blew into it, trapping the heat as best he could. Come on, please. We need this!
"Hurry!" Jaune screamed.
A little bit of smoke wafted out. Ren blew on it, nurtured it. It sizzled. Mouk roared and slammed a paw down. Jaune howled out as a rock clipped him. Ren blew again, harder.
With a fading sizzle, the flare spluttered and died.
"No… No, no, no!"
He threw aside the used canister, searching for another. His hands brushed against metal, plastic, wood, but no flares. It had been the final one. They were left with just flint and steel, which Jaune had currently.
"We need fire!" Jaune shouted. He ducked over a pile of rock and slid down the other side, before the entire thing disappeared in an explosion, Mouk's paw tearing through it. The hunter was lifted with it, along with several tones of loose rock that pelted against his body. "Arghh!"
"It's not working," Ren yelled.
"Then do something!"
Something? Against Mouk? He was already injured but even had he not been his knives wouldn't have been able to do anything more than prune the beast. The exit was blocked. They were trapped. The only escape would be the tunnel, but Mouk had one paw covering it. Ren slammed a fist down against the ground and dragged himself to his feet, leaning on a pile of rock-dung to stay upright.
A sharp pain bit into his hand and he drew it back, wincing. He hadn't reinforced his hand with aura so a tiny amount of blood dripped free, and was also stained over the red crystal he'd cut himself on.
A red dust crystal.
Ren lunged for it, ignoring the pain and digging both hands into the rubble until he could grip the crystal and pull it free. It was about the width of a fist and a foot long. It was red, and not just from his blood. Dust crystals aren't as good as ground dust, he recalled Jaune saying. It needs something more to cause a reaction.
It needed refining, turning to a purpose, but failing that even industrial dust could be set off if you it had the right reaction, if it was introduced to the right catalyst.
Jaune cried out as more rock battered him. Unlike Ren, he had no aura to protect him, and red started to flow down his face. He'd managed to escape the monster's claws but that meant little when every sweep sent an avalanche of rock, dust, and discarded weaponry through the air. His trousers were tattered and ripped, and blood ran from a hundred tiny cuts and scrapes. He rolled on the floor to try and avoid the next blow. It came down behind, missing but kicking up enough air to lift him from his feet.
Jaune barely had the presence of mind to keep hold of his bow. He landed on one shoulder, rolled, nocked a stone arrow and loosed it in the vague direction of Mouk's eye. A paw came up to block it and the arrow snapped on the monster's thick skin. It wrenched the paw away and screamed its fury at him, blasting the hunter away with sheer force of air alone. His back slammed into a rock. His head hit it too. He slumped to the base, dazed, as Mouk dragged its body towards him.
A new figure leapt between the two, pink eyes and black hair, along with a long red crystal wielded like a baton in one hand, Stormflower in the other. Ren's chest rose and fell as he faced down the giant head and shoulders. The sudden appearance was enough to make Mouk stop, but only for a second. The Grimm snarled and reached out toward him.
Ren placed the barrel of his gun against the raw crystal.
Stormflower barked. The crystal shattered. Dust rushed through it, dust from his bullet – finely refined and processed into something that spat fire and death. That self-same dust shot through the cracks in the larger crystal, burning and reacting as the heat boiled it from the inside in an instant. There was a bright flash of light, red and angry – angrier than even Mouk's single eye. A second later, the world was engulfed in flames.
The force blasted Ren from his feet and hurled him back into the wall. The crystal – what was left of it – fell from his fingers, and Stormflower fell too, clattering under him as he landed with a pained cry. His hand burned, the skin feeling like it had melted off entirely. He ignored the pain and pushed himself up onto hands and knees.
The cave was on fire.
Nothing in it was flammable, at least not be the conventional sense, but flames raced around fuelled by dust itself, and as each reached piles of rock and more dust they grew and grew, some exploding from the sheer heat. Stones fell like rain on their heads, shot through the giant cave like shrapnel from the world's largest grenade. One pinged off Ren's face as he stood, drawing blood. He gripped it with one hand, stooped for Stormflower, and staggered over to reach Jaune.
The hunter stirred when he shook him. "Jaune," he hissed. "Please Jaune, you need to wake up." Nothing. Frustration over took him, and he shook harder. "Wake up!"
"J-Je-" The boy's eyes groggily opened, then raced the rest of the way. "Ren?"
Through blood, soot, and ash, Ren gave a relieved smile. "You asked for fire. I delivered."
Too much so, one might say. He knew that as he dragged Jaune up. The smoke from it had nowhere to go, trapped between Mouk's bulk and the cave walls, some rushing through the tunnel but not enough. Much of it pooled on the ceiling, a slowly lowering veil of death that might suffocate them, if Mouk didn't kill them first.
Not that the giant monster had the attention for it. Mouk thrashed and howled as rubble and dung piles exploded, spreading fire further. His fur was on fire, his face on fire, his snout and his paws and much of his shoulders. The crystal had exploded outwards in a mighty wave, washing over both him and Mouk, though he'd had his aura to protect him. Mouk hadn't been so fortunate, and stuck as he was in the cave his face paid the price. Mouk's howls were desperate, even as they themselves threatened to deafen the boys.
Another explosion to their left cut such thoughts off, more rock hurtling by as another refuge pile exploded when heated. Mouk kicked out with both feet at the noise, shaking the cave and causing more dust to fall from the ceiling. In an attempt to escape, it brought its legs inside, trying to turn so it could crawl out – and for a moment exposing the exit.
"Now!" Jaune gasped, staggering out of Ren's grip. "This is our chance!"
They staggered across the distance as Mouk thrashed and kicked to try and put out the fire. The smoke had started to billow out now, and would surely attract more Grimm, not giving them much chance to get out – if they even knew where `out` was. Ren focused on his breathing, on his aura, on ignoring the pain from his leg.
A shadow pooled under him. He pushed Jaune out of the way and dove in the opposite direction. One of Mouk's paws crashed down a second later, splintering rock and kicking up dust. It was followed by a second, not by intent but by Mouk's own panic and anger. The monster hurtled by, no doubt intending to rush out of the cave and to a place where there were no flames to harm it. On all fours it hurled itself at the entrance.
The entire mountain shook as it cracked into the stone above, its frame too large to easily fit through. It must have been a tight squeeze years ago but constant growth from eating dust had only made it worse. In a more normal state of mind it might have been able to shimmy through, but Jaune and Ren were thrown from their feet as it reared back and slammed into the entrance again, trying to widen it with its own body, paying no attention to anything but its desperate desire to get outside. A third time it crashed into it, and this time the rock face began to give way, though not in the direction it would have liked.
The two of them could only watch in horror as an avalanche of rock poured down over the entrance, sealing it shut, sealing them inside with Mouk and the flames and the smoke.
They were trapped.
"Damn idiot!" Jaune snarled, and for a second Ren thought the hunter meant him, before Jaune nocked another arrow and sent it sailing into Mouk's face. "You bloody fool! You've buried us all under the Lunar Tears, you bastard! You happy!?"
Mouk didn't look it, then again it didn't seem to even register them anymore. Some smoke brushed over Ren's face and he hacked and coughed, fighting to breathe past the acrid taste. They were going to be crushed by Mouk, burned to death, or be forced to suffocate. There were no other options now. He reached down and brought out his weapons, prepared to sell his life dearly.
Jaune stared at him like he was a madman, even as Ren reached out for him.
"I've heard it said a man can't choose the time of his passing," Ren recalled. "Only the manner in which he does. I won't say it's been good because we both know that would be a lie, but still. If I have to die out here, for what it's worth… thank you for sticking with me."
Jaune stared at him, wide-eyed and confused.
"You're mad," Jaune breathed. He took one look at the guns, then Mouk, and finally the fire surrounding them. "Damn it all," he hissed, nocking another arrow, one of his last. "You're not the kind of person I'd ever expected to die alongside, but… you weren't a bad sort."
"For a Huntsman?" Ren finished, a sardonic smile on his lips.
"For a city-boy," the hunter countered, disagreeable to the last. "You ready?"
For death? No. He'd never really considered it before, and in a way, he'd wondered if he could even feel fear, in part thanks to his Semblance but also the things he'd seen, the loss of his father, his village, and everything he loved. He did feel it, though. His hands shook and his heart beat like a drum. Still, he nodded. It was time to do what true Huntsmen did when their backs were to the wall- kill Grimm or die trying.
Mouk's eye blazed between the smoke and smog, glinting like a ruby set in a sea of black. The beast realised its fate, its prison, and now looked determined to take them down with it – as they were to do the same. They were two parties doomed to death with not even the promise of escape should the other die. And yet they would both seek it, if only out of hate.
No. Not hate. Grimm hated. Ren... Ren was too tired for anything so heavy.
Ren dove left as the monster lunged for them. He rolled hard, strafed three shots across the beast's flaming snout and then lunged for the cover of some rocks, wincing as a paw sheared through the rock above him, tearing it away with a might crack. He stood behind it, firing again and again. Mouk stomped forwards, directly under a glimmer of light in the ceiling. Ren shot it out. The crystal exploded, showering more fire down onto the titanic Ursa.
Something else touched the left side of Mouk's snout, bursting into a bright flash and a mighty clap that blew the smoke away. The flash bang arrow - Jaune still had one? - did little to harm it but the bright light seared into Mouk's eye, blinding him temporarily and giving Ren a chance to relocate, even as a paw slammed down on the position he'd been stood in, reducing everything to rubble. It flailed again in search for him, but Ren ducked low and rushed toward the creature's body where it least expected. He dug his blades into the skin on the underside of its paw.
They flexed and almost snapped. The skin was too leathery and too thick, but maybe Jaune was right when he said Ursa had good senses of touch. Mouk certainly reacted like he felt it. Ren leapt back and rolled past its hind-leg, slipping away as it swatted down at its feet. A wall of flames confronted him, singing his hair. He ducked back and looked through them. Jaune was stood on an outcropping of rock. He was trying to open his quiver, the ammo fabricator.
Ren dashed through the flames with his hands over his face. They lapped and burned at him and he had to roll as he landed to put out some smouldering parts of cloth. He staggered over to Jaune, one eye on Mouk as it kicked out with both legs at the wall Ren had just been at, cracking through it and causing a slide of rock to cover the entire area.
"I'm out of arrows," Jaune said, noticing him. "Trying to – damn it – see if it's ready for another." He had a hold of the dagger from earlier and was using to try and pry open the quiver. By the looks of it, the fabricator didn't think it was ready. They didn't have the time to wait.
"Mouk's hide is too thick," Ren reported while he could.
"I know." Jaune grunted. The fabricator ceased its whirr. "Damn thing is near enough invulnerable as it is. The only thing that ever pushed it back was fire." He shot Ren a look. "How did you set that dust off?"
"Heat and sparks. I shot a round into it – discharging the dust and causing a reaction with my dust ammo. I remembered that story about you throwing some into a fire and recreated it."
"Heh, guess you do pay attention." Jaune reached down as the fabricator opened up, releasing a single shaft of impure steel. Even the flights were metal, and he knew it wouldn't fly far or accurate. Luckily that wasn't a big deal in so confined a space. "I've got an idea," the hunter said, gasping in the smoke. "One idea, one arrow, and one shot. Want to hear it?"
Ren smirked. "Surprise me. Just tell me what you need me to do."
"Distract it."
"I had a feeling it would be that…" Ren sighed and dashed back off the outcrop, rushing to the right and firing two quick shots off towards Mouk's eye. The gun in his left hand clicked on the second, running dry. The weight of the right suggested there wasn't much left. He paused to take aim, making a target of himself as he took careful aim and fired.
The shot pinged off the top of Mouk's brow, actually bouncing down into the eye. There was a sickening squelch as it disappeared into the organ, but to Ren's surprise the monster ignored it. Well, survived it. The way Mouk howled certainly suggested he'd felt it.
The crimson orb locked onto him immediately. Mouk's teeth, sharp and pitted from chewing through rock, were bared in the smoke-filled cave. Each tooth was bigger than he was, easily topping two metres.
"You're certainly an ugly one," Ren shouted, trying to keep its attention even as it dominated his. It was the first time he'd seen the beast up close. "I can see why so many huntsmen and huntresses fell to you! But I'm different!"
The head lowered towards him. Ren's glanced left and right, and realised he was trapped between a wall of fire several feet thick and Mouk's paw. There was no escape, and Mouk's mouth opened in preparation to tear into him. Ren took a deep breath and prepared himself for the end.
"I am not afraid!"
It turned its head to devour him whole.
"MOUK!"
The furious scream cut through the cave, freezing the beast in its tracks. Whether it could recognise the name – its own – or whether it reacted to the anger, Ren didn't know. Its snout slowly turned to the left, however, to where a figure stood on the other side of a roaring inferno, bow stretched before him and an arrow nocked to it. The shaft was silver in colour, but the head was red as crystal. Jaune's didn't just hold his bow steady but expanded it. A slight shift, a little jolt- that was all it took for Jaune's short-bow to expand to a long-bow almost as tall as he. With a mighty force, Jaune pulled the taught string further, waiting for the moment as his bracer shined in the crackling flames.
"FOR EVERY SOUL YOU HAVE DEVOURED, AND EVERY LAST VILLAGE YOU RUINED, AND FOR EVERY TIME YOU MADE ANYONE SNEAK ACROSS YOUR GODS FORSAKEN HUNTING GROUNDS, I'VE GOT TWO WORDS, DUKE!" Jaune screamed, voice raw with emotion and smoke.
The moment Mouk's face passed in front of him, Jaune was prepared to release the shaft.
"EAT THIS!"
The sound of the bowstring against Jaune's silver bracer was loud enough. The arrow itself shot from the bow like a missile, propelled through the fire – where the red crystals strapped about the shaft heated and sparked, shining bright red. The shot was true, short-range and aimed at a target ten times the size of a normal archery one. The steel tip plunged into Mouk's eye, though like Ren's bullet earlier it didn't do enough to actually destroy the over-sized organ.
It didn't have to. The dust exploded a second later – lashing fire out across the cornea and bursting back into the eye itself, splashing blood and other goo out onto the floor. Mouk screamed. The eye closed.
It would never open again.
It would have killed any other creature but Mouk wouldn't have it; too large, too powerful, or perhaps too scared to die, as fire wracked its face. Like the injury that had claimed its first, the fire had robbed it of vision, justifying its fear even as flames crawled up its legs. Dust crystals sparked and cracked, their energy only giving fuel to the flames. Fire rose, as the smoke of its own fur cinders began to choke its face.
Mouk reared back and up, striking the cave ceiling with its mask and slamming out both paws, catching the walls and causing them to crumble. Each time the ceiling stopped it and sent it back down towards the flames on the ground, the massive beast rose again harder, practically bucking itself inside the cave. The cave itself began to give way, huge chunks falling from the ceiling to explode on the ground as Mouk screamed. With a thunderous crash, the wall exploded up outward.
The titan broke through the mountain. And then he ran away, stumbling blindly through the forest outside, screaming as flames chased it. Some were those that caught on the trees. Others it would never outrun so long as it kept its hide. Behind it, the smoke from its own searing flesh rose into the sky, over the Lunar Cry Mountains and up to the sky... All the way to where a cracked crescent moon hovered overhead, watching all that transpired.
Ren saw the moon, and the blind and terrified Ursa's flight, when he stumbled up the pile of rubble out of the cave. So too did Jaune, right beside him. The two were leaning against each other but gasping in relief as they took in the fresh air they could. Survival was sweet indeed.
"Is it over?" Ren gasped, finally able to speak again.
"I... I don't think Mouk is going to bother us anymore," Jaune said, watching the same sight as him. In the distance, trees toppled with abandon, and birds flew around the moving mountain. Some of those birds were nevermore, just as curious as they followed the unfathomable sight. The screams of the blind bear could still be heard, even as it entered the distance.
"And it looks like he's taking his host with him too. I think we're good for the moment," he said, even plopping down on the stone with him. With his and Ren's bags behind them- grabbed as they'd fled the burning cavern- he looked in no hurry to move.
"Finally," Ren gasped, dropping his guard for a moment too. Right now... right now, not worrying felt good. It was all he had energy for, even as he closed his eyes and felt...
"Is that... the sun?" he asked, cracking his eyes open again. Indeed, it was - just cresting the mountain range to the east, the Lunar Cry mountains cast great shadowy tears over the foot hills and valleys to their west. They might, if you looked just right, be seen as something like tear-stains- especially with the mountain streams that flowed towards the valleys that lay beneath. Mountains that framed the moon, and the rivers of tears that flowed through Mouk's valleys...
They seemed drier, now. Less wet than they had before.
"It stopped raining," Jaune noted, stating the obvious. They wouldn't be able to see the sun or moon were the sky still cloud-covered. "The worst of the monsoon must be passed. It should be scattered showers from here on out."
"Finally," Ren repeated, glad to hear that as well. His clothes, still damp, weighed down his weary bones. Weary as he was, he was still wary, and watched the evidence of Mouk's retreat.
"Did we win?" he wondered. "Mouk's still out there. I don't think even fire can kill him. He may be blind, but we're still in his domain. There's still the other Grimm," he recognized.
"But he's not a threat to us, or anyone else, any longer. That's just as good. Take your victories where you can, Huntsman," Jaune advised. "We survived. Out here, out in the Grimmlands, that's enough. You keep going, you keep moving forward, and if you're strong or wise enough you live to see another day." He raised his head to watch the sun rise. "Another dawn…"
Ren stared at it, too, this time looking away from where they'd come from and towards where they'd go.
It was beautiful.
If they'd passed the foothills and river-valleys before, they'd reached a gently sloping plateau that led to the mountains themselves. The soft shadows covered gentle hills and flatter forests, reaching out to the distant mountains with a gentle slope and interspersed with long rivers. In the distance, at the base of the mountains, Ren could even make out a lake- one shaped like a curious tear that no doubt drained into the valleys behind them. It was far less hilly than where they'd come from, and the shallow mountains behind them had dispersed entirely. They'd passed through rather than over them, skipping the climb entirely.
It was amazing to see what they'd passed these last many days. It was welcoming to see what they had ahead. With the moon hanging above, watching over them, dawn had never felt so wonderful. It was both beautiful, and a reminder that they were still alive. He was still alive. They'd survived, lived to fight another day, and enjoy the struggles that came with it.
"Are we safe yet?" Ren asked. "If Mouk's no longer a threat... are we out of the Grimmlands?"
Jaune laughed again, but not as mocking as he might have.
"Not quite, city-boy. What we just came from, what Mouk's domain was, that was the Grimmlands with an Overlord. The sort no Kingdom could conquer, and even Huntsman have to tread carefully."
Ren's heart fell. "Then this…?"
Jaune nodded.
"This is the Grimmlands where there's simply no one else to contest."
"Welcome to the Old Frontier. Population: Two."
End of Mouk Arc.
And... that's a wrap. A climatic battle inside a mountain against a mountain-sized bear, courtesy of Coeur. With fire, flares, and enough explosions for a Michael Bay movie. Who said this romp through the woods would be realistically boring?
Kudos to Coeur to writing this after a lot of real-life busyness, and especially for doings on vague directions. Not every idea could be fit in as intended... but you know what? That's fine. Better than fine- because Coeur was able to make what he could work. Not everything can get narrative dropped to the extreme. Some things... will just be able to be looked at later, as they should.
For now, our boys are exhausted but alive, and with their next destination in sight. It should be safer... but are they out of the woods yet?
Of course not. But what could possibly be lurking in woods near Lake Tear?
/
Next Chapter: 3rd March
P a treon . com (slash) Coeur
