Hello everyone, J. Van A is back and feeling a lot better. Ever since I moved into my house I had to sleep on the couch because I had no bed, but on Tuesday I finally got one, so I've been sleeping properly again, yay.

So, this chapter is relatively normal sized when comparing them to previous chapters. I kind of like making them about 2,000 words long because that's pretty simple and you guys don't sit reading one chapter for an hour. I probably will have chapters like those, but I'll probably end up telling you guys about that in advance. (btw, when the team goes into the ruins, that will be a long chapter)

Yeah, I actually forgot to do the whole review response last time, sorry, so I'll do them now.

GrnDrgnzrd: (first review) yep, I see no point in hiding it anymore, Weiss and Yang got magic from Ozpin's gifts. (Second review) Thanks for the support bud.

Nut-lik: No, Ruby isn't wolverine

FoxyFoxation: I haven't yet put Penny in here. I might bring her in after a couple story arcs, but not yet. (oh, and you can bet this is going to be a long series)

(Sassy) Guest: It's balancing out, unless you're getting very analytical with her crossbow like Mossblomma (I'll get to you in a second)

1Fanfanatick: Yeah, I like the two sides to a coin thing I've been tying to get in there, there was also a hint to something about Blake back there.

Mossblomma: You might be right about the whole Ruby's bow should shoot farther, and I'm not that great with aerodynamics and physics (going for business major, nothing in science) but I also don't quite see the use for a crossbow that could shoot two kilometers (sure sniping is good, but it's meant to be a crossbow, not a sniper rifle, yes I know she's a sniper in the show, but not my story). Think about it like this, Crescent Rose in the show is very good on its own, but the ammunition is what also makes it even better, depending on what kind Ruby uses.

Now that that's out of the way

Enjoy

"Alright everyone, it's daybreak, wake up!" Weiss shouted to everyone in their tents as she walked by batting the tent while Blake dumped a bucket of water on the camp fire. "We have another day's ride before we get to Redbarrow, so everyone needs to pitch in when taking down the camp."

"Alright, let's do this," Ruby said bursting out of her tent filled with her typical energy despite yesterday being at death's door. She then immediately went to work on disassembling the tent which, to Weiss, seemed like a red blur.

"Wha- Ruby, I told you to stop putting Zwei in battle armor," Yang said bleary eyed as she exited the tent and blinked a couple times. "Why am I outside?"

"We are travelling," Weiss told her as she walked over to Jaune's tent and swatted the tent flaps. What she didn't realize was that Jaune was already awake, so when she swatted the tent, she managed to hit him right in the face.

"Why?" Jaune complained as he held his face.

"Hurry up, we're leaving as soon as possible," Weiss told him as she walked over to her tent and began taking it down.

"It's still dark out, why do we wake up before the sun?" Yang complained as she pulled on one of the tent's ropes pulling the stake out of the ground.

"It's better to take the camp down before dawn, that way when the sun comes up, we can be leaving," Ruby said as she finished rolling her tent putting it in its bag. "Time to check up on Chestnu- I mean the horses." She pulled her bag over her shoulder as she started jogging over to the horses.

"How can she have this much energy?" Jaune asked rubbing his nose as he started taking down his tent.

"I don't know," Yang said as her tent collapsed in front of her. "I lived with her, and I never figured out the source of her extreme energy."

"Hurry up," Weiss told them as she started folding her tent.

"Chestnut~ Chestnut~" Ruby sang as she skipped towards the horses. She hadn't been able to pet Chestnut for a while, so she needed to pet her adorable horse. Before she reached the horses, Ruby stopped at the sight of Blake standing in front of the black horse petting the side of its face. "Uhh, hi," Ruby greeted her causing Blake to jump.

"Oh, uhh, hi," Blake said as she walked to the pile of horse saddles and began putting one on her horse. "Sorry for all the trouble."

"It's fine," Ruby said as she collected Chestnut's saddle and began placing the pieces on said horse. "We would've helped you anyway."

"Even though I'm a faunus?" Blake asked looking back at Ruby who was confused at the question.

"Why would that matter?"

"You don't really know, do you?" Blake asked as she heaved the saddle up on her horse. "Did you grow up in some remote village?"

"No, Yang and I grew up just a boat ride away from Vale, on Patch," Ruby told her as she started fastening the saddle's belts. "On Patch, we don't treat faunus any different than we do each other, so I guess it's not like how the rest of the kingdom treats them, based on what Weiss told me and your question."

"Patch, an island where everyone is equal, heh," Blake chuckled as she finished securing the saddle to her horse.

"So, what's her name?" Ruby asked Blake as she started putting another saddle on Bumblebee.

"Pardon?"

"Your horse, what's her name?" Ruby asked as she watched Blake put a saddle on Clovis.

"Oh, her name is Nightmare," Blake told her looking away from Ruby.

"Nightmare? A bit dark, but it does kind of fit," Ruby said looking at the horse. "Black and red eyes."

"She chose it herself," Blake said with a little smirk on her face. "Back in Atlas I asked her what I should name her, and when I suggested Nightmare, she agreed."

"You're from Atlas?" Ruby asked her as she began tightening the belts on the saddle.

"No, no, I'm originally from Vacuo, but after some events, I ended up in Atlas for a while," Blake said looking down at the ground as she finished putting the saddle on Clovis. "Either way, I'm here now, and that's what matters right now."

"So, are you two having fun?" a new voice asked catching both girls' attention. When they turned around, they both saw Weiss standing there with a tent bag over her shoulder. She then walked over and put the saddle skirt on Snowflake's back. "You guys can bring the horses to camp so we can load up the saddle bags with our supplies. I'll take care of Snowflake's saddle."

"Alright, if you think you can handle it," Ruby said raising an eyebrow at the princess as she tried picking up the saddle. As Ruby was walking away with Blake, Weiss had managed to put the saddle on Snowflake's back, but before they could leave the horse's area, the saddle slid off the horse's side forcing the princess to let out a stream of curses. "And I guess I'm staying."

"I'll handle these three," Blake said taking Bumblebee's rein from the farm hand then began walking the three over to the camp.

"Hey, Blake," Yang called out to her as she brought the horses over. "We finished packing up, come help us load up the saddlebags."

"Alright, if you want we can distribute some of the weight onto Nightmare's saddle," Blake suggested as Yang started piling on several camping supplies into Bumblebee's saddle.

"We could, but Bumblebee is a strong horse," Yang said patting the yellow horse's shoulder earning a happy neigh from the mare. "She'll probably get mad if she thought we were taking it easy on her."

"Your horse seems very expressive," Blake said as Bumblebee walked over. Before Blake could even say anything, Bumblebee raised her head and placed the bottom of her jaw on top of Blake's head before lifting it up and going back down, resulting in the horse patting the faunus.

After a couple seconds of that, Nightmare stepped in uppercutting Bumblebee's head with the bridge of her nose making the horse stop petting its master. After Bumblebee recovered, she let out a sad whine then started walking away from Blake over to Yang. Yang calmly hugged the horse and started stroking its cheek.

"Hey, I'm sorr-"

"It's fine, really," Yang said letting go of Bumblebee's head. "Bumblebee can be emotional at times, but she doesn't have any bad feelings toward Nightmare."

"That's good to hear."

From behind both of them, they heard a strained cry then a sudden thud. They turned around and saw Jaune laying on the ground covered in a pile of camping supplies with only his hand sticking out from the pile.

"Guys, can you help?" Jaune asked as his hand suddenly went limp.

The rest of the day was relatively normal for the group. While they were riding, since three of the four girls had never gone on adventures before, and Blake wasn't willing to talk, they had asked Jaune about his journeys.

He eventually told them of the times he went travelling with CRDL to Mistral at the request of Ozpin. While they were there, the team of knights had travelled to the southern reaches of the continent searching for ancient artifacts with a scribe who was a friend of Ozpin's. In the middle of an ancient ruin they were surrounded by three griffon grimm who were said to be guardians of the ruin. A fight broke out and CRDL fought the grimm, but while they were occupied by two of them, the third had went after Jaune and the scribe. So, since Jaune didn't have any fighting capabilities, he simply used his shield to defend the scribe and himself. It was only after three minutes into the fight that the scribe chanted some strange words and the grimm was immediately incinerated.

After Jaune got to that part of the story, the group of five made it to the town of Redbarrow, which was a simple little hamlet. Most of the houses were either wood or, how Weiss described them, peasant houses, being made from simple materials. The town did have a stone tower in the middle of the town with long red banners streaming from the battlements. Near where the tower was, was a simple tavern that seemed to be busy. After putting the five horses in the tavern's stables, the group went in.

Yang immediately went over to the bar and started drinking mead after dragging Jaune along in an attempt to hear more of his stories. Ruby immediately walked over to the bartender and handed him a small sack filled with money to pay for Yang and Jaune's drinks before informing him to not serve her any more after the coins she gave him ran out. After that, Blake, Weiss, and Ruby rented rooms from the barkeeper. The only problem was that there were only two rooms open.

In order to not have the group leave in search of another inn, Weiss agreed to using only two rooms, which got a confused look from Blake and Ruby. After telling Yang and Jaune which rooms were theirs, the three girls went into the larger room in hopes of there being more than one bed. They were wrong, simply put. The room did however have one bed, a rather large one the three could easily sleep on. After Blake and Weiss shared some uncomfortable glares, Ruby convinced them both to go to bed, having Ruby sleep in between the two girls.

The next morning Jaune woke up completely exhausted underneath a simple bedframe. He only came to realizing that he was under the bed after he tried getting up only to bash his skull on the wood. That roused the blonde blacksmith who swiped her hand under the bed until her palm touched his forehead. After she had a light grip on his head, it suddenly got tight as she forced his head into the floor effectively knocking him out.

Yeah, I could've made the ending a bit longer including the actual dialogue, but I figured that I might as well try my hand at descriptive writing which I hardly ever do since I like dialogue better. I am good at fight scenes when it comes to descriptive writing, so when the team gets to the ruins, expect some long fights that actually happen in a matter of minutes.

Well, I'm a tad bit tired, I helped out my father today with some manual labor (yeah, boo), so I'm a bit sore, but now I can go sleep on my bed that finally came in.

Everyone have a nice day,

-J. Van A