Alright, chapter 12! Lets get into it!

So, I'm close to finishing up Before's first chapter, which shouldn't take too long. I'm trying to do shorter chapters for my primary stories from now on. Too long chapters really killed it for me while working on Idea.

Creativity: Plus, they make my legs break out in sores.

Author: Did not need you to share that.

Anyway, we broke another milestone for reads per day again, with a new record of 748! Here's hoping we reach 1K in the next few chapters!

What else… Oh yeah! CRAZY stuff in this one! No spoilers, but you will be calling me insane by the end of this.

Creativity: You will. Oh, here's the new Discord Server passcode: R23A8zG

Author: Normally that's my shtick, but I'll let you have that.

Oh, and a Happy Birthday to Kobster the Giant on the Discord server!

Alright, I think that covers everything! I present chapter 12 of Limit Breaker!

Gula groaned as he stretched. What lingering soreness he had felt from his battle with the PTO scouts had faded and he felt a bit more invigorated. The smell of the ocean also helped, now that he thought about it.

As he gathered his things and stepped out of his rented room, his thoughts immediately turned to the desert that made up the majority of the island. Aside from the traps those giant insects had dug (which he could easily avoid via flight) and the heat (which Ki also helped with) he wasn't sure what other dangers would lurk in the vast expanse of sand dunes. He knew water had to be out there somewhere. Those insects had to be surviving off of something out there, and he doubted they got the water they needed from just their prey items. The issue would be finding it. That problem was immediately followed by food. That wouldn't quite be an issue if he could locate a source of fresh water near the ocean, as unlikely as that was. Then he could just catch fish for food, as boring as that would be.

And of course, that all discounted the fact that the desert likely had other dangers. Those giant insects couldn't be the only dangers in the desert. He'd heard from both his siblings when they didn't know he was listening that desert planets were always frustrating to deal with because the harsh environments forced residents to become incredibly tough, vicious and all around dangerous, just to survive. Gula knew he would do well to remember that, even if the desert here was much smaller. With the resources to survive so scattered, the residents would be making use of every scrap they could get, and he had no intention of being among those scraps.

After buying a few canteens, he filled them all with water and purchased a few rations before finding a safe place to take off. That task was borderline herculean, what with how crowded Menagerie was, but he finally found somewhere secluded enough that he could fly to the desert without being spotted. As he shot over the desert, his eyes scanned for oases, wells, any kind of fresh water source that he could make use of. So far, he wasn't finding anything.

"Come on, there has to be something I can use out here…" Gula muttered as he continued scanning the desert. Thankfully, the high elevation would prevent him from seeing mirages, but that still didn't mean anything if there was no water source that he could use.

"If I flew all the way out here for nothing, I am going to get REALLY pissed off…" Gula grumbled under his breath as he kept searching. The heat of the desert wafted up from the sands in waves. Even if the Ki he was using to shield his body was doing its job, he could still feel the waves of hot air rolling past him.

"This is starting to look hopeless." Gula muttered before something caught his eye. He looked a little closer and reduced his elevation to get a good look at what had caught his eye and was immediately confused. He was looking at what appeared to be ancient ruins of some kind, mostly buried under the ever-shifting sands. There was only a few feet of decrepit stone towers, but it was still curious.

Gula flew down and landed near the pillars before examining them more closely. There appeared to be glyphs of some kind etched into the stones, though most of them were likely illegible by now. What was interesting was that they seemed to continue down under the sand, indicating that there was more to read. If Gula could read, that was. Besides, these glyphs looked nothing like the ones he'd seen everywhere else on Remnant, indicating that this language was probably old and not widely written, read or spoken anymore, if at all.

Still, Gula's curiosity was piqued. He wanted to know more about this structure, which meant he'd have to remove the sand. After making sure his things were deposited at a safe distance before flying back to the pillars. After positioning himself between them, he began to power up, the force of which began created winds that blew the sand away from the structure, gradually revealing more and more of the structure, to the point where Gula had soon exposed what looked like the top of some sort of fortress or temple.

"Now, what do we have here?" Gula wondered aloud as he kept shifting away sand by powering up or using carefully aimed Ki blasts. While he didn't particularly care for the structure, he'd prefer it to not collapse before his curiosity was sated.

Soon enough, he found what appeared to be an entrance not too far from the top of the structure. He stepped inside and was pleased to find that there wasn't more sand obstructing his way. Oh, there was definitely sand, and lots of it, but it wasn't going to obstruct the pathway forward.

Gula floated through the sand-filled hallways, looking around at this strange place. What was probably most fascinating about it was the fact that the place was filled with Dust. There were red Dust crystals in the corridors to provide light, each about the size of a shoe box. There were decorative patterns on the walls, all inlaid with powdered Dust of varying colors. Suddenly, Gula was glad he was so careful with his blasts when uncovering this place. One misplaced blast and all of this Dust would have gone off in spectacular manner.

As Gula continued further and further down the hallways of this strange place, he couldn't help but feel that there was something… off about it. It wasn't just that the place existed, though that was strange enough, what with the crazy wildlife. No, what felt strange was that despite how ancient the place looked and how long it had gone uncared for (as evidenced by the piles of sand that littered the corridors), It felt like there was something still living here.

"Seriously, why am I so worried about this? I could level this place with one blast right now if I wanted to." Gula muttered to himself as he proceeded down a flight of stairs, deeper underground, against what his instincts were telling him. Even if he was starting to have a bad feeling about this place, he also had a feeling that there was something down here for him. What it was, he couldn't even guess.

Raven was frustrated. One wouldn't guess she was frustrated, since she rarely looked anything other than annoyed by the presence of others, but she was annoyed, nonetheless.

"Where could that kid possibly have gone that I can't find him?" She ground out as she examined the remains of the battleground. The first thing she'd done once she left the bar was have all of her contacts in the kingdoms try to find everything they could about the kid that Qrow had shown her on the scroll, Gula she'd been told, but that had turned up dry. No birth records, no pictures, no addresses, only a small handful of familial connections, which she chased down and immediately dismissed as non-related. The fact that there was no Faunus blood in any of the potential connections was a good indicator that they'd all be dead-ends.

After that, she flew to where the battle Qrow had shown her on his scroll. When she arrived, she investigated the abandoned campsite, but found nothing that would indicate where he had gone to. Of course, she'd also put her contacts in the kingdoms on high alert for anyone matching his description, but she wasn't sure how reliable they'd be. When questioned about him, she simply said he was a potential recruit.

At the moment, Raven was just finishing a sweep of the battleground and heading back to the campsite when she noticed something she'd dismissed on her first pass. The stone tile sparring ring that Gula had apparently constructed. She went down to examine it and frowned. Each tile was cut impeccably smoothly, to the point where you would have thought a professional had done this. However, this was just a sixteen-year-old kid, with no tools as far as she could tell.

"How does he do it…?" She wondered to herself before her scroll started buzzing. She had it on a specially encrypted line, so she knew that it was one of her contacts. According to the code, it was one of her Vale-based ones.

"Yes?" She answered, impatience seeping into her voice.

"Good afternoon, Nevermore. I found some information about that boy you had me tracking." Her contact replied. Raven's interest was immediately caught.

"It had better be good, or we'll have to have another discussion about wasting my time." Raven stated, smirking a bit as she heard a few nervous noises on the other side of the connection.

"Y…yes, of course. Well, apparently, the boy was arrested in Vale a few months ago and a small file was kept on him. According to this, he has no citizen registry in any of the kingdoms, no I.D, not even a scroll. However, he claims he comes from a village located near the Mistral mountain ranges. Wait, not quite. He lives in the wilds nearby and goes there regularly to trade." The contact told her. Raven rubbed her chin thoughtfully. That information sounded familiar. Then it clicked.

"This town wouldn't happen to be on the other side of the mountains, opposite camp?" Raven asked the contact.

"Yes, I believe so. Why do you ask?" the contact asked, though Raven had already hung up and was muttering a string of curses before transforming into her namesake and flying as fast as she could back to Mistral.

"Of course it would come back to that empty crater! How could something make that crater and not leave anything behind?! Maybe it just stood up and walked away!" Raven ranted in her head. However, as the miles wore on, she forced herself to slow down and review everything she knew and start constructing a timeline.

Assuming that this crazy theory was correct and that Gula had literally fallen from the sky, he would have been on Remnant for about six years. He'd spent most of that time not straying much further than Grassbed village, regularly trading game to them in exchange for whatever he needed. Then he started travelling for some reason. Did he leave on a whim, or did he feel he needed to? Likely on a whim, since he wouldn't have bothered to stay in Vale as long as he did if he had already been targeted. For that matter, he wouldn't have accepted Ozpin's offer for that training trip.

Then, someone showed up that had pushed him into a deathmatch, which he had won. Raven hadn't seen the body, nor had she seen pictures, but she had seen the devastation that had been wrought by the fight, and it was safe to say that Gula had been fighting with everything he had. That alone should be concerning, since it meant that there were creatures out there that were just as, if not more powerful than Gula. After winning that fight, Gula seemingly disappeared off the face of the planet, which brought her to her current problem: She had no idea where to look for him.

Thus, the only other option was to start at the beginning. She'd start at the crater from the crash and start searching every crevice she could to find for clues about Gula's origins.

As Gula marched further down into the ruins, he was starting to seriously consider turning back and forgetting all about this place. Despite his belief that there wasn't anything down here that could even harm him, some primal instinct within him said that this place was to be avoided at all costs. And still he kept walking forward. Why did he keep walking forward?!

But walk forward he did, and he had noticed that the Dust crystals that had lit his way before had dimmed out or were just flat-out missing. Soon he was travelling in the dark. He simply powered up and let his Ki light the way forward. Soon, he could see what looked like the end of the corridor he was walking down. He also noticed a disconcerting number of weapons, armor and the occasional fragments of human/faunus skeletons.

Soon enough he reached the end of the corridor, which opening into a massive chamber that Gula couldn't see the end of. He could see what looked like an ivory statue in the middle of it though, standing about 75 feet tall. It looked vaguely humanoid, though it had a tail and clawed hands, as well as what looked like heavy armor on its neck and back, giving it an almost hunchback look, with yellow gemstones for eyes. The detailing on the statue was incredible, almost as if it could spring to life at any moment. And then the gemstones vanished for a second before coming back.

That wasn't a statue.

Gula immediately sprang back as a deafening roar sounded through the chamber, barely avoiding the claws of the massive beast, which Gula now identified as a giant Grimm, though one unlike any that he had ever seen before. It's massive eye, about thrice as large as Gula's head, peered down the tunnel at him before narrowing.

"You aren't the first to avoid the swing, though I must say I am impressed by your reflexes. Unfortunately, those reflexes won't do you much good if there is nowhere to dodge to." A booming voice announced. Gula deftly covered one of his ears to lessen the assault on his ears before his eyes widened as the Grimm opened its jaws, which began to glow blood-red, energy of that very color collecting in its mouth. Gula immediately sprang back and began charging a Comet Shot, unleashing it in time with the creature's own attack! Gula was surprised by the Grimm's power, though it was far from a match for his own. Just the slightest increase in power and the beam was pushed back and detonate in the Grimm's face! The Grimm retreated, yelping in surprise before hacking and coughing. Gula would have pressed forward, if not for his shock and curiosity about a Grimm that could speak!

"You can talk?" Gula called out, flaring his Ki as a precaution. The Grimm managed to stop its coughing fit before turning to him.

"Well obviously, you just heard me do so. Though I must say that I am deeply impressed by your power. Not since the days that my master walked this earth did I see a human who was capable of such feats." The Grimm replied, surprising Gula with just how well-mannered the voice sounded. The Grimm approached the platform Gula was standing on but stopped a decent distance away before narrowing its eye and lifting a claw.

"Would you stop that glow? I find it unpleasant." The Grimm requested in a tone that seemed more demanding than polite. Gula narrowed his eyes.

"How do I know that the moment I do, you won't try to eat me again?" Gula asked. The Grimm's face contorted into what Gula guessed was the approximation of a smile.

"You don't, but I will say that I'm entirely too fascinated by you to bother eating you right now. Besides, I haven't had a visitor in ages. I lost track how long I've been trapped down here after the second millennium." The Grimm answered. Gula's eyes widened a bit.

"You've been down here for over two thousand years?!" Gula exclaimed. The Grimm's 'smile' widened.

"Likely more akin to four thousand, but it hardly matters now, does it? My kind are immortal, though not invincible. But enough about me. I want to hear more about you. After all, not just anyone can overpower me in the manner you did. Like I said, not since the days of my master was there a creature of your form that was capable of besting me. Who are you and where do you come from, may I ask?" The massive Grimm inquired as Gula indulged the Grimm and let the aura around him die down a bit, though not entirely. He still wanted to be able to see the giant Grimm, after all.

"Well, considering I'm talking to a multi-millennium old Grimm, I nothing can sound as crazy as what I'm about to say. Well, my name is Gula and I'm not actually from Remnant. I'm from a planet called Vegeta, named after the king of my species, the Saiyans." Gula told the Grimm, who made a strange noise in its throat.

"I don't exactly have a point of reference, but your story does sound quite far-fetched. So then, Gula of the Saiyan race, how exactly did you come to this world? I imagine that the tale is quite fascinating." The Grimm prompted. Gula rolled his eyes.

"Not really. I got on my father's bad side even more than usual and he banished me from home in secret. Apparently, I lucked out, since it wasn't too long after that the planet was blown up by an intergalactic tyrant. That's actually related to why I came here in the first place." Gula explained. The Grimm made that weird noise again, and Gula realized that it was a sound of amusement.

"You really are a fascinating creature. Very well, then. You've told me your history, so I shall deign to share my own. My master was one of two brothers, each possessing equal and opposite power, immeasurable. The two competed endlessly in creation, each seeking to outdo the other, leading to the creation of my kind. I was among the first of my master's creations and saw this feud continue for many a cycle. Until one day, the two brothers decided to end their stalemate by creating one final creation together, giving rise to mankind. I never wandered much further than my master's domain, but I would occasionally hear whispers of mankind, of their prowess in the arcane, but I didn't give it much thought. I was still a young Grimm and weak of mind, little more than a beast at my master's beck and call, after all." The Grimm regaled. Gula filed that information away. It could prove useful later. Besides, it sounded like this was stuff that was lost to time, which gave Gula a small amount of satisfaction that he knew about it. However, the Grimm wasn't done talking.

"Then, something strange happened. A human came before my master, demanding that another human be returned to life. My master obliged at first, though when it was revealed by my master's brother that he had been tricked into returning the human to life, my master returned him to death. It is my understanding that the human was then cursed with eternal life." The Grimm continued. Gula cocked his head to the side.

"Wait, living forever? How exactly is that a curse?" He questioned. The Grimm swiped its tail in an irritated manner.

"Well, being trapped underground and unable to die without being killed calls to mind the thought of being cursed, but that's just my opinion. Now, where was I? Ah, yes. The human managed to build an army and set about waging war against my master and his brother, but it did not end favorably for them. My master used his power and wiped the planet clean of all humans before he and his brother abandoned the world, taking the power of the arcane with them. Without my master, I became wild, truly mindless. But I did not stay that way. Through survival and battle, I became stronger, more intelligent. I rose to become one of the mightiest of my kind. And then, something strange happened. I felt a pull, similar to that of my master. I could tell that it wasn't my master the moment I felt it, but I was intrigued, nonetheless. I journeyed back to the land of my master, only to find a human commanding my kin. The same human who had once come before my master, in fact. However, despite their strength, I was unimpressed and refused to follow their commands." The Grimm continued yet more. Gula was more curious about this 'arcane' that the Grimm kept mentioning. Ki was one of two military superpowers that decided how your military fared on the intergalactic stage. The other was magic. If Gula was to take what the Grimm was saying at face value, then it sounded like Remnant initially had the makings of a world that could fend for itself, if it had been allowed to continue on its original course.

"Interesting stuff. So what happened after you refused to listen to this new leader?" Gula inquired. The Grimm was all to happy to answer.

"I left and wandered the world, seeking battle. Imagine my surprise when I happened across a human colony. It seemed that humans had returned to the world, in spite of my master's efforts. They were hardly comparable those gone, however. Not even a spark of the arcane was with them. However, the lack of challenge bred arrogance and complacency within me, which the humans of this island found a way to exploit. They constructed a trap to contain me so that they would kill me from safety. However, no weapon they possessed could pierce my armor. Still, I was trapped and could not escape. They eventually built walls around my prison, sealing it so that no light would ever break through the cracks." The Grimm concluded. Gula pondered the tale a bit before asking more questions.

"Where did you learn to speak?"

"Well, I was already one of the most intelligent beings on the planet when I was captured, making my imprisonment all the more humiliating. After I was trapped, I would regularly hear the humans speak. After some time, I learned your language and used to occasionally whisper to my captors. It was very entertaining to see them lose their minds when they realized I was speaking to them. More than once I drove them to kill themselves, oh how gratifying it felt to hear their screams as they threw themselves from the peak of my prison." The Grimm reminisced. Gula winced at the thought.

"Oh, how silly of me! I still haven't asked you why you came down all this way. Oh, and tell me about the surface above. I imagine that much has changed in the last few thousand years." The Grimm inquired.

"Right. Well, remember how I mentioned the galactic tyrant that blew up my original planet? Well, I recently learned about that because two scouts from his empire recently came to Remnant in preparation to render it devoid of life, so they can sell it. I killed both of them, but there'll be more coming, and I won't be able to defeat them all at my current level. I came here originally to train and get stronger so that when they show up again, I'll be ready. As for what the surface is like, your prison is almost entirely buried under a desert. I managed to excavate an entrance near the top, but I only spotted it because there were some stone pillars sticking out of the ground and I can fly." Gula explained. The Grimm made that chortling sound again.

"Well, well… You are a fascinating creature. Since you've been so entertaining, I'll provide you with some assistance." The Grimm replied, scratching its claws against the sides of the prison. Gula's eyes widened.

"If you're offering to spar with me, the result will be you, and possibly me, being buried under several hundred tons of rock and sand." Gula pointed out. The Grimm laughed again before turning back to Gula.

"Oh no, I have no intention of engaging in battle with you. However, I did hear tell of another trap that was used to kill another of my kind, similar in stature to me. It was mere mutterings I heard from my captors, but they mentioned a construct of some kind that was capable of using those crystals that my captors used to decorate this prison, as well as light it, to imprison a victim by increasing the victim's weight. The prison is to the north of this place and was originally situated in the center between four mountains. The landscape of this world has not changed so much in these last few millennia that the mountains would be completely gone, and these prisons remain. Of that, I am certain." The Grimm instructed Gula. Gula couldn't believe it. Was there a machine on Remnant that could control the gravity in a localized area? That could be the answer to all his problems! Gula stood to leave but paused for a moment before turning back to the gigantic Grimm.

"Say, do you have a name? It's kind of weird that I got your life story but not your name." Gula pointed out.

"Ah, thank you for mentioning that. The humans who trapped me here referred to me as Magna Malum, but I found the name tiresome. I refer to myself as Tark." The Grimm, now identified as Tark, informed him.

"Well, it was great to meet you, Tark. Now, I have a gravity machine to track down." Gula called back as he jetted out of the prison. Tark chuckled to himself as slowly scratched the walls.

"I have a feeling that we'll be seeing each other again, Saiyan." Tark mused to himself as it stuck a finger down one of the hallways and scraped a few bones out of them before tossing them in its mouth, crunching them in thought.

Ozpin frowned as he looked out the window, gazing at the Atlesian fleet that had touched down on Beacon's landing platform. General Ironwood was already on his way up, and he had a feeling what had brought him along with his students. Well, aside from the shadow war.

As he listened to Goodwitch mutter angrily about the fleet, he heard the elevator arrive and turned to speak with his friend. After Goodwitch opted to let herself out of the room and James and Ozpin had a brief exchange about the aforementioned shadow war before getting into the second topic that Ozpin had anticipated and was more willing to engage in.

"So, do you have any information about the boy I mentioned? I certainly hope it wasn't any rogue Atlas experiment." Ozpin inquired. James rolled his eyes at the little jab and instead placed his scroll on Ozpin's desk.

"After you contacted me, I was reminded of an investigation the Mistral government asked me to help with a few years ago, so I contacted the two specialists that had been assigned to the investigation and had them do some digging, using the details that you provided. Honestly, I find the implications to be a bit… well, I hope I'm wrong about them." James began before highlighting several screens, which contained a few reports, images and the information that Ozpin had sent to the General.

"Six years ago, a meteorite crashed near the Mistral mountains, about an hour's walk from a village called Grassbed. There had been a global surge in Grimm activity and since Atlas had the only spare troops capable of entering the area, the Mistral council requested I send a team to investigate. They were able to find traces of foreign elements in the crater, but not the object that had made said crater. We figured that someone had taken it before we could arrive, since the region is known for bandits." James explained before Ozpin started to see the pieces falling into place.

"Six years ago is about a year-and-a-half before the boy started trading with Grassbed, he claimed that his parents lived closer to the mountains while he moved closer to the village, his unnatural strength and the color discrepancy between his hair and tail, his illiteracy, the corpse of the creature he did battle with… James, are you suggesting that Gula is an extra-terrestrial being?" Ozpin asked, his fingers dangerously close to dropping his coffee. Ironwood just frowned.

"At this point, it's the only explanation I can think of that makes all of these details make sense. I'll keep looking for another possibility, but there's too much evidence for us to dismiss the possibility out of hand." James muttered. Ozpin sat in his chair with a sigh and placed his coffee on his desk before rubbing his brow. James mirrored his sentiment.

"As if we didn't have enough to worry about with her, now we have a potential alien invasion over our heads." James grumbled. Ozpin held up his hand.

"I wouldn't go that far, James. We've only had three arrive on this planet, with the arrives spaced out by six years. Additionally, the first arrival killed the two that made up the second, meaning that if we are facing down an invasion, we already have a potential ally. Of course, this all assumes that this extra-terrestrial theory is true. I suggest you send a team back to the crater with additional equipment and search for more clues. We'll both keep an ear to the ground for any sightings of the boy. And remember, James; no one can know of this." Ozpin instructed, his voice dropping to a dead-serious tone with the last instruction. Ironwood nodded before turning to leave.

Ozpin rubbed his temples again, trying to relieve the headache that this ludicrous situation was giving him.

"I believe that the two of us are overdue for a very long talk, young man." Ozpin muttered to himself before taking a long draught from his coffee.

"A very long talk, indeed."

And there we end it! So, who saw Tark the talking Grimm coming?

Creativity: Why?! I mean it literally comes out of nowhere!

Author: For one, worldbuilding. For two, I feel that RWBY could definitely do with exploring the concept of the Grimm more. My original theory for who or what Salem is was that that she was a Grimm who had learned and evolved to the point where she became human. I think they did her backstory better in the show, but I think mine would have been a good one as well.

Anyway, for those who want a bit more background, Tark is one of, if not the oldest Grimm on the planet, being older than Salem and Ozpin themselves. As for design, I drew heavy inspiration from Fyrus from Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, and Dehaka from Starcraft. Incidentally, I envision Tark's voice to be VERY similar to Alarak's (Again, Starcraft) though slightly more guttural.

And don't worry, this isn't the last we've seen of Tark. I like him way to much to just use him once.

Creativity: And now Gula knows the legend of Remnant's creation!

Author: Well, kind of. He's got the framework of it, but he doesn't have any names to slot in.

And also for those of you wondering, Salem still can't control him. He's too intelligent and powerful for her to brute-force control him.

Well, I believe that covers everything! Discord Server is above, please join if you have further questions or just want to chat!

Oh, and credit to mediaocrity4, who inspired Raven's codename of Nevermore in their ongoing series: RWBYond.

Now that covers everything. Have a wonderful day, see you next time!