Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, RWBY or anything else I may reference
Magic and Remnant
Chapter 12
Kingdom of Atlas
Nat liked snow. Snow wasn't sand, the snow did not get in uncomfortable places and blast into a person's eyes making them spit it out at the first moment they had. Snow was also a far more beautiful substance when it snowed there was a general feeling of tranquilly as he watched it fall gently to the ground. It was calm and relaxing and a nice thing to read to. It was when snow fell and cold temperatures were abundant, that he liked to witch out his tea for hot chocolate.
This was exactly what he was doing at this current moment in time. Sitting down comfortably in some cafe, with a hot chocolate that had marshmallows, whipped cream, a small amount of cocoa powder and a nice wafer biscuit. In front of him, was his laptop that he was casually typing away writing his book? It was a far different experience to the ones he had a week ago when he had left that godforsaken desert.
He blended in well with the local inhabitants of this snowy kingdom, his pale complexion which was partly due to some Swedish ancestry in his grandparents, enabled him to look like anyone else. His choice of dark colours he had noticed, was a bit odd for the average inhabitant who preferred lighter clothing especially in either white, light blue or light grey. Not that he cared about it, but Qrow had stated that his purely black clothing seemed to highlight his paleness and eyes more then the average Artesian whose lighter clothes seemed to try and give off a uniform colour in appearance. Why Qrow had started to give him fashion advice, he didn't know. But ultimately despite blending in, he could see a few appreciative glances his way, not for his actual looks, he was still rather plain and never dressed fancy. Yet the looks were more about his clothing and the way that as Qrow had said that they highlighted his pale complexion, he seriously hoped he hadn't started some kind of fashion trend.
On the matter of the Huntsman, he was hunting down one of the other suspects they had. Upon arriving at Atlas, the two of them had a far more relaxed time than in Vacuo where there was more of a rush. The two of them had subtly paid for a room in one of the less visited areas of the Northern Kingdom. Qrow wished to try and keep things as hidden and quiet as possible, not something that was easily done when there were constant soldiers walking around with their weapons bared.
Nat had already looked into the mind of one the higher ranking soldiers; there were no standing orders or instructions to look for Qrow Brawen. However, that didn't mean that there might not be someone about who might be looking for the Huntsman just in case. For this reason, Qrow and he had decided that it was in the best interests if they stayed apart from one another and had paid for their owns separate rooms, alongside never speaking to each other.
If Ironwood caught wind that Qrow was in town, then the general would likely storm down and ask Qrow what he knew. If the general discovered that Qrow now had some sort of apprentice following him around, then the General wouldn't buy any type of lie that Nat wasn't special and was just some random kid he had found. Rather Ironwood would suspect that he was some sort of spy. If not then despite his rather plain features, his long hair might make Ironwood think that Qrow had discovered one of the maidens and was protecting her by making her dress like a boy, of course, that theory would fall apart rather quickly. Still, Nat didn't like the idea of having strangers trying to feel up his crotch to see if he was pulling some sort of elaborate stunt. And seriously, he might have long hair which he took good care off, but he certainly neither didn't act like a girl nor dress like one.
The idea of him in a dress was rather ludicrous, yet also an idea of how to embarrass Qrow if he kept going on about the way he acted towards attractive girls. He could just picture the man's embarrassment at having to wear a bright sundress in the middle of the northern kingdom while snow was falling. If YouTube existed in this universe than he was sure he would get a few views.
Either way though, once Ironwood suspected that Qrow might be hiding a Spring Maiden or a person who might be connected to the spring maidens; Or even worse, that he actually knew the existence of his past Nat though. Then if he couldn't wipe the general's mind fast enough, that the general would demand he stay in Atlas for proper training and to become a citizen of the northern kingdom. Not that I'd work, they may have advanced technology that can deal with aura and dust, but his magic still acted like an EMP. Or a simpler way to deal with the problem would be to apparate to the other side of the planet.
Atlas while powerful in this world, was nothing compared to back home where they had vast amounts of technology for not only war but for tracking a person down. Satellites were one thing, sure they aren't anywhere near as useful as tracking magical's because their gone one moment and appear the next, but a lot of places on Earth has security cameras. He wouldn't think it would be too difficult for some government to hack the cameras in other countries, or use the agents and assets stationed nearby, or to contact the local authorities to help look for people or even to put them on Interpol or some other type of way of trying to track a person down.
Earth had practically reached the point, where the government would nearly always be able to track down a person. Safe spots were in very remote places, and the average muggle would eventually have to move toward some kind of muggle store to buy some basic goods to start their new life. And even if there was no credit card used, the facial recognition software back home was reportedly tapped into every single camera for police purposes to help recognise criminals at a faster rate. Magical's didn't need to buy equipment if they were trained enough, but they might have to buy seeds or to wipe the memories of a person who might accidentally stumble across their little camp. And if not, then their money would eventually run out forcing a person to rob a person and then they would get reported or seen on camera and then police were on them.
Remnant in contrast just didn't have the global infrastructure yet alone people needed to be able to constantly monitor people. All Nat needed to do would be to find some nice place to set up shop, and apparate to the other side of the world if he ever needed to go shopping. Even if Atlas did see where he was arriving, then they would move their forces to the wrong continent. Despite this, however, Nat would very much prefer it if he wasn't forced into hiding by some general in the military.
So to prevent some elaborate plan and hunt by a military, Nat was separated from Qrow while they were in the northern kingdom hunting down anyone connected in the slightest to Salem. Qrow had decided that he would go talk to a few friends of his which meant combing the back alleys and staying out of sight, while he became the public face of the two of them. That led to why he was in a nice small cafe in Atlas enjoying the atmosphere in the crowded yet rather quiet cafe waiting for his target to walk in so that he could subtly read the man's mind and learn their secrets.
A plan that was working perfectly fine as he waited, even as two of the most famous people in the entire kingdom walked through the doors. A deafening silence became rather prominent as two women walked through the door of the cafe and marched towards the kid manning the counter. The guy looked and blushed slightly as he saw the beauty of none other than the two daughters of the infamous Jacques Schnee the leader of the Schnee dust company.
The younger girl, who Nat remembered was called Weiss looked at the cafe with a small amount of disgust, especially as she saw quite a few people give her some leery looks. The girl was seventeen and would very likely be shipping off to Beacon within a few hours if she hoped to arrive on time, though to do so, she would have to take what was most likely by the equivalent of a private jet. The girl would likely be considered beautiful, and with her light blue skirt and top that had the symbol of her family on it, added with her long hair and pale complexion not to mention the thing but fit figure and the rather delicately shaped facial features, she very much looked like some type of ice princess.
The other girl was obviously her sister who worked in the Atlas Military. Something that was shown since unlike Weiss who seemed to be panting slightly as if she had done quite a bit of physical exertion, the older sister was perfectly fine. The woman's military training showed as he caught her looking around the cafe for any type of spy or attacker. Nat seriously doubted such an attack would occur when there was someone of her calibre around, especially as she had her weapons on her person.
Despite recognising who they were and the type of threat that the older sister was, he quickly moved his eyes back to his laptop although occasionally allowing them to flicker left and right as he searched for his target. He had tracked down a thief the night before who seemed to be involved in the whole thing, once he had read the mind of the thief, he was subjected to the memories of someone who was more important. Apparently, this person chose different locations to meet with the thief preventing anyone from tracking him down, the same went for covering his face.
That was the problem with point-me magic, they were brilliant when a person had a recognisable face, but it didn't work with just clothing. Had the thief's contact revealed his face then he would have cast the spell and ganged up on the man in the dark all alone with the aid of magic. Without it, then the spell wouldn't work, it was similar in a sense if a person wanted to keep a magical map of all the nuclear submarines in the world. Just using the term nuclear submarine or even knowing the type of submarine wasn't enough, instead one needed to have a better look at the ship, to know the minute differences for it to work. The spell didn't require a great amount of detail, but it was why items were a lot harder to detect than a person, well besides when it came to identical twins. If a person couldn't tell the difference between identical twins, then the point me spell was generally useless, as it often ended up pointing to the wrong twin.
Henceforth, he was here in this nice cafe waiting in the corner for what was supposed to be the contact. Once the contact arrived, it was a simple job of waiting for the man to reveal his face and a quick look in the man's eyes before he had all the information he needed and he could continue on this little mission of theirs to track down the people connected to Salem. Something that would make the contact easy to recognise, would be that he would come in at a certain time and sit at a certain table.
Unfortunately, his nice alone relaxing time was disrupted a few minutes later when the two women of the Schnee family walked up to his table. Weiss looked uncomfortable, and Winter was looking at him with an expectant gaze as if he was going to salute her at any moment but had forgotten. He didn't salute in the slightest, but he did have a very good idea of what the two of them wanted.
"Winter we can always find somewhere else to eat" The rest of the cafe despite being relatively quiet as people enjoyed their food or drink, was quite packed at the moment. Not that it was that much of a surprise considering that it was lunchtime currently. But with a packed cafe and two sisters who apparently wanted to find somewhere to place their food down and eat, that left Nat's table as the only one with any spare room left.
"Excuse me, young man, would you mind if my sister and I sat at your table. Under most circumstances, Nat would either give two responses, the first would be that he would leave if he was already finished, and the other would be a lie saying that he was excepting someone. Only this time neither of those worked, and he needed to be in the cafe to ensure he was there when the contact eventually revealed himself. With how influential the Schnee family was, there was always the possibility that Winter might look for nonexistent files about who he was due to any apparent rudeness When she discovered that there were no files, hen questions would start to be asked especially when they started to wonder how he had managed to get past customs without anyone realising it or any video evidence.
"Help yourself" Gesturing towards the table, the elder Schnee gave a polite nod of thank you and sat down next to him, while Weiss sat opposite her which also made her sit opposite to him. That was when they began talking.
"Weiss, say thank you it's polite to do so in such a situation" There was a small pained look on Weiss's face as she heard the instructions of her older sister. A pained look which ultimately vanished as soon as Winter narrowed her eyes the slightest bit forcing Weiss to put up a fake smile as she turned her head to the person who had allowed her and her sister to sit opposite him.
"Thank you for allowing us to sit at your table" Looking back at her older sister, Weiss was given a simple nod to recognise that she had done the right thing. Immediately afterwards, Weiss turned back to the wizard and looked at the laptop in a bit of confusion. She couldn't recognise the machine, as not only a person raised in Atlas, meaning that she lived in the most technologically advanced nation in the world, she was also the heiress of the Schnee dust company which meant that her father regularly made deals with companies to supply dust fir their machines. One of the many ways that companies tried to get on her father's good side, was to leave free tech pieces or either her or for her father, the one in front of her wasn't anything like she had seen.
It certainly wasn't a scroll, scrolls were far less bulky than the contraption the boy used, not to mention they were also see through and made of what looked like glass in the centre. This machine wasn't anything like that, it had no sort of holographic projector for its keyboard or was even a touch screen considering that the boy was using some type of device to the side to move things around. It was unbelievably primitive to what she was used to. Yet despite the strange device and the boy's fingers which seemed to blaze all over the keyboard, the device was keeping up with what the boy was typing.
"Uhm what's that, I've never seen such a primitive machine before, where did you find that piece of junk" Winter gave Weiss a sharp look at the lack of manners that the girl had used. Despite this, the special task force member looked interested herself in the device and began reading what the boy was typing although most of it utterly confused her.
"It's called a laptop computer, rather popular in what used to be my village and was created by some kid who was really into electronics. He and the rest of the village are dead now, this Is the last one in the world. " A horrified guilty look was etched onto Weisse's face as she realised what she had just done, it was somewhat amusing and if Qrow had been here, then he would have likely taken a picture to see. The man didn't like the Schnee family since he considered them to be stuck up and arrogant just like the rest of the high society. Personally, Nat preferred rich and stuck up, it was better than being in some type of anarchist system in the middle of some godforsaken desert in the ass end of nowhere.
"Oh I'm so sorry I didn't mean to offend" Nat shook his head as he met the girls gaze, then he moved it to the girls scar briefly. He wasn't any kind of doctor let alone an expert, but scars were supposed to heal unless something major was done. For an ice princess, she had a rather large scar on the side of her face, looking into her memories on the subject, it was revealed that her father had abused her. The reason for such damage, was due to the White Fangs attack and the girl had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time with her father, hence he had hit her to try and deal with his anger management.
Word had obviously not gotten out about the abuse that the girl suffered from, in his world if such abuse or anything similar was just even mentioned in the media, then that person's life and their company was ruined. It was one of the many reasons why he had no respect for the media and hated those who worked in the industry. In his own personal belief, the public had no right to know anything about some sort of celebrity or assumed allegations, as soon a something happened whether it was true or false, the simple act of accessing someone fucked up everything for the accused. In all honesty, he was in favour of the main US Republican candidate for the 2028 presidency's plan to place severe restrictions on media.
It was gaining a lot of controversies, but a lot of people did support the act. It didn't prevent independent news outlets from working, but rather to deal with the massive problems that the public faced due to biased information and untrue stories, it would force all news networks on TV to have a fair and balanced approach to reporting. The same thing would go for reporting on the trials and crimes of people until a person had been charged guilty of a crime and sentenced, then the News would not be allowed to report on it to prevent the massive mob law that followed. Suffice to say, both sides didn't like the idea with Democrats especially hating it since they controlled the mainstream media, but others who had known people's lives to be wrecked or just didn't trust the media at all saw it as a possible new chance for media itself.
Of course, it would never be put into place, there was too much hatred from both sides to prevent that type of thing from going through from both sides. But it was always the left-leaning side who were the most vocal about it, if only because they could be since they refused to give anyone from the opposing side the right to defend their beliefs. It would still be nice though, to actually listen to news which wasn't extremely biased one way or the other, and to just be given the facts of the scenario rather than some political narrative.
Even despite the situation with Weiss's father, he would still defend his beliefs in that if there was a charge of abuse levelled at the man, that it should not be reported to stop the mob mentality. He also didn't agree with random jury people, in theory, they were supposed to be non-biased, but a professional set of jurors would be better than random sods of the street.
But that was neither here nor there; instead, as he pulled out of the girl's memories, he noticed that the girl seemed rather excited to attend Beacon. It was a call of freedom to her, the ability to be away way from her father and spread her wings figuratively. Her sister Winter also seemed to like the idea of Weiss going to Vale, she would prefer that she attended Atlas Academy since from there she could better protect her sister with her connection to Ironwood. But being on the other side of the planet with Ozpin as the head of the school was also rather safe, at least she wouldn't be attending that deplorable ramshackle of an institution ran by lazy good for nothing vagabonds in Vacuo.
"You didn't Miss Schnee, they died several years ago in a Grimm incursion. I've long since gotten over their deaths" Weiss continued to hold up her guilty look for a few more minutes before she tried to see what nat was doing on the strange device. But before she asked that, she decided that there was a far more important question that could be answered.
"Where are you from, I don't recognise the accent. Because you're certainly not from Atlas despite how hard you try" Winter gave another glare to her sister for being so rude, sometimes it was hard for her to believe that she was related to her sometimes. Yet it was nice to see her interested in something other than escaping their father, it was too much of a shame that the look in the girl's eyes as she looked at the laptop was one of desire.
"Some small village in Vytal, after it burned down I ran into a huntress who decided to take me along with her. We arrived a few days ago to try and get some medical treatment for her; she passed away a few days ago." Playing the sympathy card, Nat noticed the even more guilty and sad look in Weiss's eyes as she was told a fake story about a fake huntress who was now dead. He went for the dead huntress thing, because Atlas had fewer holidays and started school earlier than the other kingdoms meaning that there were no kids around his age out and about besides those who would be moving to other continents. If he gave the image of a tourist, then Winter wouldn't ask any questions, on the other hand, she may do the whole "give a child an opportunity thing by becoming a Huntsman and then joining the military in Atlas" thing.
"What are your plans for the current moment," Winter asked curiously, the boy was young and could likely be trained to an acceptable level in the combat school before Atlas Academy. With no sort of Kingdom, family or village to hold him down, then it would be a lot easier to get the boy to love Atlas and willingly join the special forces unit after a certain amount of time. Plus with years out in the wilderness, he would be able to share his experiences with the class and assist in the training of other students.
"I fly to Vale in a few days, from there I'll return home and scatter her ashes where I found her for the first time. Then I'll return to Vale and see if I can get a job that can put me into school and then university, try to make something of what I've got left" He put on a fake sad expression as if he was in silent mourning over the death of his made up friend, something which got Winter to give the briefest of soft looks before they hardened again.
"Perhaps it's a little early boy, If you would be willing then I could get you a place in combat school, I'll explain the situation to the teacher and even contact General Ironwood about giving you citizenship. In return, however, you will be the top of your class in not only combat school, but you will also attend Atlas Academy and be the top student there where you would then join the Atlas Military" If he was someone else, then Nat would have jumped at the chance, the woman was offering free education of the highest standard for several years and a guaranteed job at the end of it. He had read stories back home where people chose to enter the military because those were the only realistic prospects they had to expand their education or get an actual job. But he wasn't that person, he was in Atlas to discover who was connected to Salem and why, if he agreed to Winters offer, then he would be subjected to more education that would last several years and would force him to conform to an authority.
In contrast, by being Qrows apprentice who had connections to Ozpin, he could likely get some sort of certificate to say that he was already qualified at the combat school level. Perhaps he might get some other things such as a new secret identity, not to mention while he could be part of Ozpins group, he would not be some random ass soldier for a country that wasn't his own. Even then, he wouldn't be a soldier, the pay was shit the hours were shit, the good things about joining military life that he had gathered were the friends made and the training given, plus the ability to play with fancy toys. The latter sounded pretty appealing, he wondered from time t time what it was like to fly a fighter jet or to drive a tank. Actually owning a tank in this universe would be one of the best choices there could, with a big gun and thick armour, Grimm would be a lot less annoying.
Fuck he wished he had a tank.
"I thank you for you offer Miss Schnee, but I don't want to be a Huntsman anymore, I've lost too many people who are close to me and I don't want it to happen again." Looking inside the woman's mind, Nat was greeted with an annoyed Winter at having her proposal rejected due what she saw as him giving up just because he had seen a few people die. In her mind, she saw him as weak.
"I see" The woman's disapproving face was removed when the waiter came with a pile of cakes and a pot of tea. This arrival of food and drink, took the attention away from him allowing him to return back to his job of looking for this contact. He knew it wasn't anyone else in the cafe so far, he had already briefly gone through their memories one by one allowing him to strike off their names from any possible list that he might have had.
After a little while, his contact finally appeared. They were human, dark skin and eyes, then again it would be best to be human if a person wanted to disguise themselves properly in Atlas, and faunas were treated worse in this kingdom than any other, and always drew suspicious looks. The contact was nobody who looked special, they did have the muscular physique of a soldier of huntsman, but on average Atlesians were more physically active than other kingdoms due to a stronger sense of duty for the military, and the fitness thing that was going around countries.
The contact approached the table he was supposed to and briefly spoke to the young couple who were already there and handed them a small amount of Lien. By the looks of it, the amount was enough to cover the price of their meal and the annoyance of being asked to leave their table plus a little extra. After sitting down and ordering from a waitress, the contact sat staring towards the door most likely waiting for the person Nat had found last night to walk through and speak to him.
Thanks to magic, Nat had to do no hard work that most people would be forced to endure when it came to trying to so the activities that one might assume with a secret agent. There was no tailing off a target, no getting close and watching them from a long distance or having to disguise their appearance in the open with elaborate disguises. A person with magic made the best spies as they could read the mind of their target with the briefest amount of eye contact, turn themselves invisible, and apparate away once finished, pulse they could always disguise their weapons better. Muggles did have a tendency to get confused when they saw a wand for the first time, they stopped calling it a useless twig when it was shown that a wand could be used as a portable heavy artillery device.
In this man's case, he was able to glean that the attack on Vacuo had been part of an elaborate plan that this person didn't have the details too, but did know the basic strategy. In short, the plan was to use Atlas to actively destabilise all the other kingdoms, the attack on Vacuo was a test and not the proper thing. This man, however, did know someone who was effectively the head of Salem's operations in Atlas, a man who this man had memories off. It sucked to be that poor sod. Unfortunately, before he could get any more details a large scene was made as Winter shouted at the man Nat was reading the mind off.
"You halt right there, you are under arrest"
Crash
The glass shattered all over the place as the target threw himself out of the window and sprinted as fast as he could, away from the building. There was a panicked look on the targets face as he saw Winter Schnee rush straight after him leaving her sister behind with a stranger as she went to pursue a not known criminal, but one that the Atlas Military had been desperately searching for. What Nat managed to get from Winter before she started zipping about at ridiculous speed, was that it was just luck that she had seen the man and there was no operation planned.
Unfortunately for Winter, Nat could not allow her to capture the target. If the target was captured, they would likely be interrogated. This man may only know the basic details of Salems plans, but it was enough for Ironwood to begin making obvious preparations in defence and broadcasting what he knew to the rest of the world. A sudden build-up of military production or troops in places that Sand her cronies might be planning to attack would very quickly lead to the other side discovering that Ironwood knew the basics of the plan and was trying to stop it.
They were noble but utterly stupid intentions. The person in charge of Salems Atlas operations would both be discovered and killed. Or would be forced to retreat but either way a replacement would be needed and new plans put in place. This would be a disaster from an Intelligence point of view as while Ironwood may have prevented one plan and stopped a lone spy or two, he would leave Atlas more exposed than ever. A caught spies replacement would be more careful than his predecessor, more ruthless and more efficient.
In contrast, with his magic, Nat could find the head of Atlas operations and gain all his knowledge. Afterwards, though, he would endeavour to ensure he kept this person in power as well as the target. If he kept the people in power, then he could constantly keep reading the head of Atlas operations mind and learn plans and other things that would be in place. He could then use that inside information to what effect he thought would be best, in other words, it was counterintelligence. The head of operations would be his own personal spy in Salems network and they wouldn't even know it in the slightest. To get this though and ultimately save more lives he had to stop Ironwood and Winter from capturing the contact and ruining everything.
Essentially, he was doing the tactics of the British during WW2 in the battle of the Atlantic. They had cracked the enigma code and constantly intercepted messages about targets for the U-Boats to attack or their positions. With this info, a lot of convoys were saved and kept safe however a lot of convoys had to be sacrificed with nothing done to save them. If u-boats were constantly found on purpose and convoys were always protected and avoided u-boat flotillas, then the Germans would have known that the British could read their communications. If they figured that out, then they would have changed the machine entirely this would have been a disaster for the intelligence community.
It was the exact same position here if he prevented the targets capture, then he would likely prevent the head of Atlas operations being replaced. If the head of operations wasn't replaced, then he had a spy on the inside that gave him vital information that he could pass on from time to time to people like Ironwood. And with that spy, then he could give false information reports to Salem and hamper her own plans or save a much-needed asset.
Ironwood was likely a very skilled tactician in the field when fighting enemies, but when it came to intelligence he seemed to be far too impatient. He preferred force too subtly, the problem was, that force made people think about what type of enemy they were fighting. If people began to wonder why so many troops were in place, then they would begin to wonder what were they expecting to fight to require so much firepower. This would bring panic and fear which would attract the grim and could be used against them.
Casually, he got up from his table with Weiss and quickly gulped down the rest of his chocolate and put his laptop away. With a quick farewell to the girl, he left the cafe and headed the opposite direction of Winter until he walked into a nice alleyway and started using magic. First was an invisibility charm well technically it was a camouflage spell that worked like a chameleon's skin, but with enough power, it effectively became an invisibility spell. Once that was done, he apparated onto the rooftop and then continued to keep apparating following Winter from a safe distance.
The target had already escaped to the back roads and sides of buildings to prevent cars from intercepting him, however, he now had inter and several Atlas soldiers chasing him. Nat realised it was too late to wipe the memories of Winter and the others due to the security cameras, but he could help the target escape which was what he did. It wasn't anything too magical flashy, he aparated close to a moving car and used magic to puncture a weel on an upcoming car on the other side of the of the alleyway. With a screech and magical adjustment, it struck the entrance hitting all of the police officers with enough force to sending them flying back onto the floor.
Winter went to continue on, however, with another subtle piece of magic, the crash of the car had hit some "rather shoddy workmanship" on the brick house causing the entire wall to collapse onto the police officers on the floor. Despite her pursuit of a criminal, Winter cared more for those around her and instantly grabbed hold of the police officers and yanked them away from the falling bricks. Once they were safe she leapt over the crashed car, but it was all ready to late. The target had managed to escape.
Later that day
Old abandoned Dust mine
"You idiot, do you know what would have happened if you had gotten caught. I gave express orders that you were not to be seen in public, not only did you disobey me, but you nearly got caught by Winter fucking Schnee. If that fucking car hadn't crashed then you would be in a fucking cell where I would have to send in an assassin to deal with the shit that you almost caused"
The leader of Salem's operations was a rather imposing man. The man's grey hair was cut short and a scar ran across his right eye leaving him partially blind. The scar had been an injury he had received when he had first encountered Salem after he had been abandoned by his comrades and left for dead. He wore dark clothing with a shotgun attached on his back and a powerful revolver attached to his thigh where some bullets were also holstered.
The man wouldn't win any beauty contests, but that dark look in his eyes would certainly send a message to people that he had seen warfare and death. In fact to anyone that knew his service record, then they would know that he had served multiple tours and was considered a talented soldier before he had been left abandoned at the hands of rampaging Grimm. It was because of his connections to Atlas and its military why he had been assigned to run this area of operations by Salem.
"I got a message from one of my thieves, he said he needed to share some information with me that couldn't wait." There was no angry yell from the chief of operations, just a loud smacking sound as he plunged his fist straight into the person who had been Winters target. From around the local area, groups of White Fang members carrying boxes of dust and other weapons and machinery went back to work as the glare of the man in charge promised pain to those who failed in their job.
"And you believed them, did you eve once considered you idiot that it could have been a trap" The target held his cheek painfully, despite his aura healing the damage done, it had still been incredibly painful.
"Of course I did, but the thief has always been loyal and never betrayed us before. Also, that Schnee bitch didn't pounce on me as soon as I entered; it was by coincidence that she was there. As soon as she spotted me I ran" Matthew Obsidian head of the Atlas operations nodded slightly, for a brief moment the target looked like he was going to get off free with his actions.
"I will not tolerate failure or stupidity from my subordinates" A loud bang rang throughout the old abandoned caves of the once famous dust mines. A loud bang that was followed by a thump as the newly created corpse hit the ground blood pooling around the head first. "That goes for the rest of you, fail me and you'll meet the same fate. And someone clean this shit up" Panic-stricken workers quickly rushed to get back to their jobs ensuring that they were not the next person on Obsidians list. There was also two volunteers who rushed towards the piece of useless flesh that had once been human to clean it up before they got yelled at or punished.
High above in the large caverns, Nat took pictures of what was going on and recording the entire situation. If he ever needed to convince someone of his opinion of information then having evidence was useful. The Faunus on the ground wouldn't detect him thanks to the magic he had put in place to hide, among the rocks. Even if things did somehow break into a fight, then he had spells around himself to hide his appearance.
The leader of the northern operations, this Mathew Obsidian was the one he was interested in. As the head of Atlas operations, he was bound to know far more of the general plan than others, getting into his mind would likely prove valuable. Of course, that didn't mean that Nat didn't have his own guess at what the plan was, the attack on Vacuo as a test and the current political, economic and military aspects made things undeniably clear to him.
More than likely the general plan was to make Atlas into the bad guys of the world, essentially they wanted to make the other kingdoms look at Atlas, like NATO did Russia. As the only kingdom with an army, there was always suspicion from the other kingdoms in how they would use it. Ever since the Great War there had been a strong force located in Vacuo to guard the precious Dust supplies, as Nat had seen when he had visited Vacuo previously, this raised a lot of tension.
Vacuo hated Atlas as they saw the kingdom exploiting them without giving anything in return. After all their mining and drilling for dust had destroyed the once beautiful lush landscape of Vacuo into nothing more than the rest of the sandy terrain. Vacuo was nothing more than a small lone settlement near its huntsman school and a lot of wanderers in the desert. If there was to be a rise in tensions in Vacuo, then there was a chance that Atlas equipment and interests would be under attack.
Naturally to deal with this situation the army would be brought in, with Vacuo having no government and there being nothing like a United Nations, then things would escalate quickly. An attack on Atlas members would bring anger from the Atlas people who would demand that more force is sent to protect their interests in Vacuo. Sooner or later, someone would get trigger happy and as soon as a casualty occurred, then it would be a full-blown war. Atlas would declare that to protect their people, that they needed to take over to ensure peace which would be seen as a very aggressive act by Vale and Mistral.
Fear and anger in the other kingdoms would be directed towards Atlas as many would see Vacuo as the underdogs and want to support them. Atlas in response to this would likely cancel the trade and anything else to do with the other kingdoms, as they would feel like Vale and Mistral would be ganging up on them. They would then likely start to impose conscription and build up their armed forces as well as guard any of their interests outside of their homeland.
Violent protests from Vale and Mistral citizens would lead to attacks on Atlas people and property, Atlas would likely respond with force to such attacks. When casualties from both Mistral and Vale occurred, then the kingdoms would likely be forced to listen to their people less they risk a very violent revolution and would have to go to war with Atlas.
A full-scale war would initially be in Atlas's favour if they could move quick enough, but they would have to face all three other kingdoms. Also, there would likely be a sizeable contingent of forces from Menagerie that in return for the support that the kingdoms of Vacuo, Vale and Mistral would recognise them as an official kingdom. This support would likely be born out of anger and revenge from Faunus citizens who would want to harm Atlas as it was seen as an oppressive kingdom by then, as well as by not angry citizens who would see war as the best way to show that humans and Faunus were equal.
War brought tension, hatred, and fear. These things brought the Grimm, however, a war on Atlas would likely send a lot of Faunus into the White Fang. If the group was working for Salem, then the woman would have increased manpower for her future attacks. However things weren't as simple as that, the operations in Atlas, were likely to slowly build a simmering distrust and hatred of the other three kingdoms by Atlas. Essentially, if they could stage terrorist attacks and other things, then the anger in Atlas would rise, drawing the Grimm.
But the war would be merely a means to an end. The war would be a good way to keep the huntsmen and militaries and kingdoms distracted and cause tension, but the true fight would likely be to gain the artefacts hidden in each kingdom. This would then leave Ozpin and his merry group to try and fight Salem and the rest of her group without the support he needed.
This lead to his theory of why Ozpin was the headmaster of Beacon. The man likely observed all the students in the school to see if there were anyone special Students who were exceptionally talented or connected and held certain views on things. Students who were willing to break not only school rules but also kingdom laws to try and combat a certain threat without even knowing who they were even up against. Once Ozpin had found a certain student, he would then likely try to subtly push them in certain directions or give help or perhaps just ignore or bend the rules. Ozpin used the school as a secret recruitment facility where he could be first to take the best and brightest before anyone else had them. Another likely reason was to ensure that he could keep an eye on one of the Relics at all time.
From what little he knew about the relics, Nat was pretty sure that all four were required to have the most effectiveness. If one was kept permanently out of the hands of Salem, then such an action could likely keep any war between Salem and Ozpin going as neither side would have all the power needed.
In theory, Ozpin could have scattered the relics all over the planet and not told anyone, but that was far too risky. With an army of Grimm in the world, there was no way of knowing if Salem was able to have them constantly searching the world until she eventually found them and got them to her side. On the other hand, if they were guarded, then while Salem did know about their location, then it also meant that any attempt to try and grab a relic would be met by not only force but also the high possibility that someone could take the relic and run. Whether to an unknown location or somewhere else to be known, but they could run which would mean that an assault was all for nothing.
It was the same theory with horcuxes, he hadn't studied the subject as it was highly illegal and he couldn't get his hands on such knowledge, but he had theories on how they worked. If a Horcrux was used to store a piece of a person's soul after death, then how did one even bring back a basic body to be reborn in. A spirit might survive floating about, but besides possessing a person or baby, then it would not be effective not to mention that a spirit to regain their magic power would have to have their old body back to become as powerful as they were before. Otherwise, if they inhabited the body of an infant magical child, then there was no way of even knowing if that child would ever gain the magical power needed to be another dark lord.
It was for this reason, why he leaned more towards the belief that to create the body from a spirit, that it required the sacrifice of a Horcrux. Like a game where you only had a certain amount of lives, he was of the opinion that to be able to come back that a Horcrux had to be sacrificed to make a new body. If his theory was correct then it would explain why horcuxes were always unique in appearance and always guarded and in certain places. A random stone on the beach or on the ocean floor might stop anyone from finding it due to it being hidden and camouflaged, but if a person needed it to sacrifice then it was useless. They would never find the stone and the same went for a blade of grass or a random object thrown into space. Your enemy may never get a hold of it, but you can never use it for its purpose.
These relics were likely in the same position, only the enemy was far more numerous. They couldn't drop them into the water because of large amounts of aquatic Grimm, not to mention the pressure of an ocean. They also couldn't throw it into space as the people of this world are yet to develop that ability. Something which Nat did feel a slight amount of pride from, his planet had done something several decades ago that this "sort of" more technologically advanced world couldn't do.
But that all came down to the whole point of starting a war; with a war, then the kingdoms would be far less safe and far more suspicious. Buildings would be destroyed and safe places looted or no longer safe, it could force Ozpin and his group to move in the open with relics to either find a new place or to stay away from where Salem's forces would be located. If they were in the open away from the protections of cities and its populace, then it would be a lot easier for Salem to win.
It was a rather brilliant strategy, the likelihood of Salem being able to infiltrate Ozpins personal group was low, although not impossible. As such, Salem would likely play to her own strengths to remove Ozpins strength which was the protection of the kingdoms, as for Ozpins group Salem likely had a strategy for them. Ozpin was in charge, he knew the plans and what to do to counter things, he was also at this time long since suited to his new body. This presented a problem to Salem, she would need to kill Ozpins older form to at least temporarily cut the head off the snake.
This would be difficult and would require far more power than a huntsman could do with the man so experienced. It would require the use of magic to give an opponent a decent chance. In this world, there were only five now six sources of magic. The first and original source of magic was Ozpin himself, he was a wizard and had directly created the next four sources of magic which were the maidens. Lastly came him, his magic was not of this world yet still effective and dangerous.
To defeat Ozpin, Salem would need one of the maiden's powers. This was something she had already done partly, if Qrows memories on the attack were correct. Even so, Salem's maiden could not just outright attack Ozpin as he would be surrounded and easily defeated by his backup. If Ozpin was to be killed, it would be when Ozpin didn't have help and would be distracted by far larger things such as a war with Atlas. Even then though, his attacker couldn't just come out of nowhere, they would have to study Ozpin from a distance to get to know him. If a war broke out, then there was a possibility the gates around Ozpin would be closed preventing anyone entrance to his general location or be shot. To get around this, a person would have had to be at the Academy for a certain amount of time, the most likely way would be to pose as a student.
However they couldn't attack Ozpin straight away, an attack would lead to an immediate inquiry about every single student in the school. An attacker would be found quickly and dealt with. But there was more to war then just attacking, there was the morale front and if Salem was smart, she would realise that even if she killed Ozpin then she needed to discredit him and his followers. If nobody trusted Ozpin, then that left him in a weak position, as nobody would want to help or provide sanctuary. Also for Salem's plans to succeed in getting the relics, she would need to keep the war going on as long as possible and prevent communication between the kingdoms. There was an easy way to accomplish this and leave humanity blind, destroy the CCT towers, something that would be left very exposed in a war as troops would be forced to fight other troops.
It was all a very complex and elaborate plan he had theorised, he could be wrong about everything and something more complex or simple could be up. However for now without more clues, this was his best theory on what exactly Salem wanted to achieve by causing trouble in Atlas and was also why he couldn't just destroy the group or tell Ironwood what was happening. If an entire group is gone silently or not, then Salem would suspect something, and if that happened then she might pull agents away or change her entire plan. Instead, the best plan in the meantime would be to subtly stop and halt Salems plans. Maybe a phone call to the police a few minutes before anything happened pretending to be a guilty member of the group.
Any plans to stop Salem and her plans would require a careful thought process. and a weighing up of what could afford to be sacrificed to ensure that Salem didn't know about a spy. If he sacrificed too little, then Salem would likely figure out that there was a spy, and if he sacrificed too much, then Salems plans would succeed. This situation required a very careful balancing act, but ultimately if he had to let it tip, then it was best to reveal to Salem that Ozpin had information.
If a war occurs due to public support, then stopping a war could lead to civil wars in multiple kingdoms still leaving them weak. On the other hand, even if Salem does get rid of all the people working for her in the kingdoms and recruits more people, then it would be far easier for Nat to find the new people and repeat the process. A war between the four kingdoms was not a desirable outcome, had it not been for the sheer weakness it would leave the world in, allowing for Grimm to easily kill everyone, then he would choose to allow the attacks to occur.
As he watched the leader of the Atlas operations leave for a more private space, he followed using silent apparition until the man was entirely out of sight and did his thing of reading the mans mind while staying hidden. Multiple plans came from the man's mind, bribing certain individuals, staging riots, assassinating young people, one of which was none other than Weiss Schnee; Spreading false information, giving speeches and recruiting for the White Fang, confirming his theory that the group was working for Salem. There were plans for gathering key military information on the Atlas military, stealing high tech equipment, stealing dust to force the price to rise, mass protest, creating human supremacy groups to enact more terrorism. They also had plans of Destroying infrastructure and normal terrorist's attacks as well as kidnapping and selling people into sexual slavery and blaming it on certain groups as well as many more ideas.
There was a massive bonanza of ideas that just this group was planning on enacting. What was worse, was that they were only one group in one Kingdom. Salem had more than likely at least a few smaller other groups in Atlas with the same idea as well as similar groups in every other kingdom. Nat was certainly no secret intelligence agent like MI6 or CIA, but ever he could tell that there was going to be a lot of chaos that would destabilise the world and plunge it straight into chaos.
Yet he would not act straight away, with something this big he should spend time thinking carefully about it. He needed to weigh to pros and cons of every action he could take regarding this and not just lash out suddenly with no idea of what the consequences were. With this in mind, he apparated away to his hotel into his room leaving no trace of what had happened.