Season 3 Chapter 1: An Emergent Shadow/ The Godfist's Responsibility
You. Yes, you. You're evil, aren't you? Don't deny it. You created a method. Evolved and refined it through 1800 years of experimentation. Until it was the most perfect way of taking lives. Think about it: you spent 1800 years learning how to take away a divine gift from living creatures. 1800 years perfecting the way to put a living being to a cruel, torturous end. You wrote the book on causing pain. The pain of physical agony. The pain of being ripped out of this world. And the pain of the ones who remain. Every orphan left behind. Every widow. Every weeping father and mother. They are your responsibility. Write it proudly on your skin, o Godfist. Glorious ender of lives. Bearer of the death touch. The Reaper manifest. This is your legacy. From now until Armageddon come, a mountain of corpses, a sea of blood, and a red sky, scorched for eternity, blackened with your sins.
"What the hell was that…"
A dream. Very rarely did the Successor of the Divine Fist of the North Star dream at night. As a result of his intense physical training regimen and rigorous conditioning, he had the ability to fall into a deep, dreamless sleep whenever he wished to rest. This was crucial, since it was a state that accelerated his body's ability to recover naturally, enabling him to repair even muscles that had been pushed beyond their breaking point to the absolute limit, within a few hours. Essentially, this allowed him to perform intense full-body workouts every day, vast increasing the rate at which he could increase his strength and muscle mass. In addition to its training benefits, this ability to rest was also crucial to functioning properly as an Assassin. In a life where death could come at any moment, being able to rest one's mind and nervous system in order to be fresh could make the difference between living and dying.
Thus, dreams were extremely rare for Jaune Souther.
Even after Kenshiro's death and his failure to save the village, he had been able to sleep peacefully, if only due to the way he had programmed his body. There had been one or two exceptions, but almost never did he see anything in his slumber. And on this occasion, he had. That could mean only one thing.
That wasn't an ordinary dream, Jaune concluded.
He was able to recall it perfectly. Playing it back once more in his mind, he focused on the voice of the speaker.
It was not a voice he had ever heard before, which was strange. Dreams were supposed to be constructed with information the brain had obtained. In other words, out of memories. But this voice was nowhere to be found anywhere in his past. He could say this with absolute certainty, since the mind training techniques of Hokuto Shin Ken also taught him how to be able to access any and all past memories with crystal clarity.
It was a woman's voice.
And a voice unlike any he had heard.
It had been calm. Serene. Musical, even.
Somehow, despite all logic, Jaune found that voice beautiful.
Felt that it caressed him gently. Soothing him. Relaxing him. Bringing him a sugary sweet sensation of ecstacy… even as it told him that he was a monster.
And every word had been accompanied by an image.
Every image was one from his past. Scenes from his life. Of him using Hokuto Shin Ken to end the lives of criminals, murderers, rapists.
He had done that. He had put these humans to death, because his heart had told him it was the right thing to do.
Was this voice trying to guilt-trip me?
It was a futile endeavour.
Jaune knew he wasn't innocent.
He never pretended to judge anyone from on high.
The iron rule of Hokuto Shin Ken:
The Successor who considers himself a god is unworthy of his power, and shall be struck down from on high by the anger of the God of War. The Successor is human, and his heart is moved by love. The choice to grant death is made with the acknowledgement that death is granted in return.
He knew that he was not a notch above the people he had killed.
I am human. I have killed, and will one day pay for my sins. That is the responsibility of the Godfist.
In ending the lives of others, he had been guided by his heart, which had told him that the actions of those individuals could not be accepted. That if they were left unchecked, they would cause yet more pain and death to countless others.
This was the source of Hokuto Shin Ken's invincible strength. Not the iron body of its practitioner. Not the impenetrable techniques of its movements. But the fact that the Successor could relate to humanity as a whole. Knowing that one day, he would lose his life for taking the lives of others, and accepting that, gave the Successor his enormous power.
And yet, despite how Jaune reminded himself of that… a tiny sliver of doubt found its way into his heart.
Yes, everyone he had killed was an incorrigible monster who would likely never change.
But what if they could have? Those people had families too. People who loved them. Waited for them to return.
I took that chance away from them.
He shook his head.
It was unlikely. And even if it was possible, he had to think of the victims. Of the millions who had been hurt. Who had been killed. He owed it to them, and their survivors, to cleanse the world, and make it safe to live in.
Bearing the sins of the world, huh?
He scoffed.
He was no Toki, and he knew it.
No saviour.
Just an ordinary boy who had been blessed to grow up in the shadow of giants.
Troubled, he knew he would find no further sleep that night. His breathing was shallow. He was disturbed. He could restore his calm through breathing exercises, but he didn't feel like doing so. For whatever reason, he wanted to stay awake.
He looked down at the figure lying in bed next to him.
Weiss.
Asleep, she looked so small.
So delicate.
Like a sculpture of ice, that could be shattered at the lightest touch.
He shook his head firmly.
No. Even if it kills me. Even if I must return from death. No harm will come to you. This I swear.
Leaning down, he kissed her forehead gently.
Thank you.
Weiss did not know. And if Jaune had his way, she never would. She would never know that she was his one of his anchors, holding him back from losing himself.
Despite all his training, he was just a seventeen year old boy who had been trusted with the power to end lives as he saw fit. It was taking its toll on him. And Weiss was keeping him sane.
He lay back down on the bed, wrapping his arms around her, and feeling, to his pleasure, her nuzzling closer to him, rubbing her face against his chest, even as she unconsciously grinded her hips against him, ending up causing a certain part of hers to squeeze against a certain part of his.
That was another thing.
Since the finals of the Vytal Festival, Jaune and Weiss had always slept together. And they had experimented plenty… but always within certain limits. They had both reasoned that there was no need to rush things, and had agreed that things would change once both of them had crossed the age of eighteen.
Jaune looked at her face as she slept. At her smooth, reddish lips, irresistibly alluring.
It wasn't an easy promise to keep. But keep it he would .
"Well, it's never too early to train," he said.
Getting out of bed, he stretched slightly, feeling the stiffness leaved his lower back and shoulders.
Come to think of it, I've been at Beacon for a while. I obtained what I came here for. Information on the origins of the Grimm. They were originally humans, and were transformed into what they are now by Salem.
Now that he had learnt that much, wasn't it time he started travelling again? He couldn't just stay here forever.
Yet, Beacon had, in a strange way, become his home.
He cared about the people he knew here.
Teams JNPR and RWBY. Team CRDL. Team CFVY, whom he was just starting to get to know. The teachers. And even Ozpin.
Well, I'll have to search for her eventually. Salem. That voice I heard in my dream. That must have been her.
I could set out. Look for information, then come back here.
It'd take a few trips, but I'd eventually know where to look for her. I don't have to leave Beacon behind to do it.
Jaune put on a t shirt and changed into a pair of briefs and shorts to go out and do some mobility exercises and technique drills. Instead of going out the hallway, he opened the JNPR dorm's window, and jumped down to the lawn below.
Dawn was still an hour or so away, and the air was nice and cool outside. A pleasant breeze was blowing. Jaune leaned his head back and allowed it to wash over him.
Before he could start his training, however, he felt something rapidly approaching.
He immediately leaned his torso back, going into a partial arch to allow the incoming blow to pass over his head and chest harmlessly.
Straightening up, he turned around to see the one who had aimed the strike.
The figure was made entirely of nearly pitch-black organic matter, which Jaune immediately recognized as the substance Grimm were made of.
However, unlike most Grimm, this one did not have an animalistic appearance.
Instead, his shape was humanoid.
He stood over six feet tall, putting him level with Jaune. From the size of his frame, a powerful skeletal structure was evident, with thick bones. An immense musculature rippled, the black mass he was made of flexing and relaxing with every movement he made.
To top off his appearance was a face that was a somehow human, yet not so.
His features and their arrangements were indeed indeed, as was the shape of his head. However, there were differences between him and an ordinary human.
His teeth were sharper, his jaw stronger, and his eyes were an eerie shade of red.
"So you're the famed Godfist, eh? Well, it's evident you do your daily training. But that applies to me too.
And without your experience advantages, the playing field… is in my favour."
Jaune narrowed his eyes at the strange visitor.
"Who are you?"
"Uh uh. You don't get to ask that yet. Fists first. Words later."
Jaune glared at him.
"Works for me. You had your chance."
Jaune flared his Aura, deepening his breathing, increasing the amount of the energy flowing through his body, and thus, his physical abilities.
Even as he did so, he attempted to scan the Grimm's body by projecting his Aura. This was another of his abilities. By extending his Aura, he was able to gain a sort of sensory field that gave him information about whatever lay within it. He could use it to determine the anatomy and pressure points of an opponent within his range. But on this occasion…
"You have no pressure points?"
Jaune muttered, incredulously.
It was true.
The being had a massive store of Aura, or Ki, but it was not flowing, as it would in a living creature, due to constantly moving within their body. In the case of this Grimm, it was almost entirely stationery. His body felt far denser too.
Jaune's eyes widened.
"You don't have any internal organs."
With a sudden burst of speed, he moved. To an ordinary human, he would have seemed to disappear from sight entirely for a moment, until he reappeared diagonally behind the mysterious humanoid Grimm.
No sooner did he do so than he struck out with a blow towards the Grimm's center of mass. If he could not destroy him by attacking his pressure points, he would simply have to crush him entirely with the Futae no Kiwami. An opponent of this level was too dangerous to allow to survive.
To his shock, his fist was caught.
No matter. That's just the first blow. Try and block this.
Since the Grimm's palm had taken the first impact, if he delivered the second one while his molecules were still disturbed, he would be able to shatter his hand, if not his entire body.
As Jaune drove his body forward forward from the legs, he suddenly felt his progress halted, as the Grimm's grip on his fist tightened.
Impossible! He stopped the movement of my entire body with arm and grip strength?
Jaune clenched his teeth, pulling back. The Grimm released his grip, allowing the Godfist to step back and regain distance.
"Not bad," said the dark one. "But you do realize: techniques specialized in dealing with humans… are no use against me."
"Who that hell are you?" asked Jaune.
He's ridiculously strong! That physical strength alone dwarfs mine! He might be twice, no… three times as strong as me. And his speed isn't the slightest bit inferior.For the very first time in his life, Jaune was facing an opponent whom he had no idea how to defeat.
The strange Grimm smiled.
Incredibly, his face was almost handsome as he did so.
"My name is Behemoth. And I am Salem's vengeance. Her son."