~~AAAND START!~~ (Abdication)
Salem lay amidst blue flowers, soaking in the sunlight. The mountain she was on still had scars from her battle long ago, but the flowers had covered most of it. She could sense they had aura… it felt rather pleasing. The peaceful scene, with its gentle breeze and softness, kept her grounded. The Archdemon had taken the whites of her eyes. What color was left in her skin had faded… her body was dying.
Yet, she preferred this to the ice.
"Your blouse is undone," Yang said, walking up to her.
Salem took her in for a moment. Every time she saw Yang, something about her had changed. Salem doubted it really mattered, but for modesty, she fixed a single button on her shirt.
Yang sat next to her and ran a hand through her golden mane. "It's nice here… for being a battlefield and all. It's chilly back in Mistral."
"This mountain is actually a volcano. That and the flowers keep it warm here."
"Oh."
"Why have you come, Yang? You still have time…"
"I wanted to talk to you." Yang looked out over the flowers. "You convinced Raven to change the contract, right? I really appreciate that. Blake… I really needed to see her."
Salem exhaled quietly, closing her eyes to focus on the sun's rays. "And…? Did you come to a different conclusion?"
Yang laughed lightly. "She slapped some sense into me. Literally. I was telling her about what I was going to do, and she just got angrier and angrier… She asked me what she needed to do to make me understand what I was-what we are-capable of. She said my decisions had the power to tear her apart, and that she'd rather miss the world than me…" Yang shook her head. "Even if it hurt, I was willing to lock myself away forever. I'd convinced myself I didn't have a choice. I wasn't even going to fight it when the time came. But, I can't do that to her, and I can't do that to myself."
"You're not going to succeed me?" Salem asked, feeling twinge of anger spark within her.
"No, I will. But, I want to try things my way, you know? And, maybe I can't fix anything, but maybe things will change. Getting frozen's kind of a last resort."
Salem smirked. "You remind me of myself."
Yang shrugged. "I don't think we're that alike."
"No… You may be better." They sat in silence for a while. "Have you gained more allies?"
"Yeah. My sister and her friend showed up, and a bunch of my friends from Vale are here now, too. And, there's Blake… Oh, and some of Raven's villages agreed to help us fight. But, that's not what I wanted to talk to you about." Yang fell back into the flowers and put her hands behind her head. She gazed at the clouds.
Salem wondered what shapes she saw in them.
"How did you absorb the Archdemon? Did you also have the Chimaera?" Yang asked.
"The truth of that day has been rewritten many times," Salem told her. "It was an ignoble feat. I didn't possess the Chimaera as you do. When I killed the Archdemon long ago, I sustained a mortal injury. And it, not wanting to leave Remnant, filled the cavity in my body as it decomposed. I doubt it thought I would control it. However, predictably, that control is slowly slipping away. I did not take the Archdemon in out of choice. I simply wanted to eradicate the threat I had brought upon this world."
A breeze blew, stirring the sweet scent in the air.
Yang closed her eyes as well. "Aren't you lonely? Living alone like this…"
"I have never been alone," Salem corrected. "When I enter the Void, all I see are the mists of time. Slowly rolling towards me, drifting away, and dissolving. And yet, the mist is always there."
"I think I know what you mean," Yang mused. "The Void is a strange place. And, so is Remnant. One moment, you think everything's written in stone, and the next, it all goes up in… mist. But then, even that mist feels like it's made of stone."
"Yang," Salem said abruptly. "No matter how many things change, nothing has ever transformed. And so, though you think you cannot do anything, your power is endless. Because all the ends we desire are the same as the beginning, you cannot fail. Do you understand?"
Yang hummed in acknowledgement. After a while, she whispered, "There really isn't that much time left. The next time we see each other will probably be the end. So… can I stay here just a bit longer?"
"You may do as you like," Salem told her. "It's warm here."
/-/-/-/
Raven knew there was merit to what Salem had said about love. There was a strength in Yang not present before she'd met up with Blake and Ruby. Or, maybe it was better described as completeness. She didn't quite understand it, but as she watched Yang kiss the tear in Blake's ear, and as Blake nuzzled into her... As Ruby and Weiss embraced them both in a group hug... Raven got the impression that she herself was missing something.
The impression lingered for a moment, then dissipated completely.
"What are you looking at?" Emerald teased.
"Nothing of importance," Raven concluded, turning away from everyone. "Yang. It's time."
Salem's blue mountain loomed in the distance… and Salem herself stood at its base.
One of her unsteady hands dug into her arm, but even if the pain distracted her for now, the Archdemon consumed the wound underneath the blood. She was struggling to breathe, and her legs shook, but she smiled when she saw them.
"Salem…" Yang breathed.
Salem shook her head. "Yang… I leave the rest… to you."
Remembering herself, Yang's gaze steeled, and she activated the Chimaera. "Right."
Salem closed her eyes.
"Cull. Liberate."
In the instant Salem's soul was released from her body, the Archdemon possessed her corpse. After being trapped in the same container for thousands of years, it had forgotten it could escape. And, being that it was drawn towards familiarity, the Grimm hardly considered exploring its options.
Salem's body grew claws and bone armor. Its eyes opened, glowing a merciless red.
Yang used the power she took from the Oses to grow bone armor of her own down her arm.
Raven stopped her from advancing. She couldn't afford to have Yang deplete her stamina now. "I will separate the two, but you must kill it."
Without waiting for Yang to respond, she reached for a small pouch and removed a tattered piece of an umbrella.
Yang recognized it instantly. "That's-"
Raven stepped into the Archdemon's path. From the orphan who sang so purely in the midst of filth, whose voice and reason were stolen by the Void… From the child whom Raven thought she could save-was it for redemption?-and who wrote the hermit's song… From the memory of that scorched body and twisted soul, Raven would draw power.
Neopolitan…
Raven exhaled. "The terms of this contract are as follows: In exchange for this relic, I will gain the ability to separate the Archdemon from its host. On the condition that my stamina will be used for this feat, it will be successful and final." She opened a portal and threw the fragment into the Void. "I agree to these terms."
The Archdemon, having gotten used to its new body, dashed forwards.
Raven blocked its claws with her sword, forcing it backwards with the power of her swing. She blinked, and her eyes turned white. Two copies of herself appeared behind Salem's corpse to hold it back. One had pink eyes, the other brown. As the Archdemon struggled to free itself, it shattered both of Raven's copies like glass, but they reappeared instantly and apprehended it again.
Raven's blade glowed as if it had been blessed by the northern lights-a perfect replica of Neopolitan's aura. Without wasting a second, she lunged forwards and decapitated the Archdemon's host. Salem's sable head fell to the ground with its red eyes still wide open.
And, from her neck gushed a sticky blackness that ran down the body's muscles and stuck like a second layer of flesh, only to drip off like water and mesh together again at its feet. The corpse fell, splashing in next to to the dark pool beside its head. As the liquid flooded out of it, the blackness faded from its skin until it looked like just another dead body; devoid of burden.
Raven sheathed her sword, then stumbled away on unsteady legs. After she passed Yang, Emerald helped her into a portal.
As soon as they left, feathers began to grow within the liquid. From the darkness, rose a pair of wings-not those of a dragon, but those of a bird. A human-like back followed it from the liquid, and eventually, a humanoid beast with the head of black ibis rose from the flood. When it stepped out of the flood, the liquid clung to its skin, leaving no traces on the mountain. The Archdemon was mammoth, with a clawed hand large enough to crush twenty people beneath it.
However, instead of lashing out, it observed its form, gazed around, then sat back on the mountain as if it were a throne. Resting its head on its hand, the Archdemon proceeded to close its eyes while it's blood-the black liquid of its creation-fell from its long, curved beak.
As it hit the ground, the blood spawned Dracos.
/-/-/-/
Pyrrha spiked her aura. "Ready!" she yelled.
Three villages' worth of highly-trained warriors aimed their swords and spears at the wave of Dracos flying towards them.
"Fire!"
As the volley of weapons sped towards the Grimm, Pyrrha used her semblance to triple their speed. The Dracos fell like rain, decomposing to leave black clouds on an otherwise clear day.
Ren, Penny, and Nora took out any that were still alive, or those who had approached on the ground. Ren's hair covered his missing eye, and his aura made up for the disadvantage of having only half of his vision. He could sense the Grimm approach, and his bearded axes with energy blades took care of the rest.
Penny would have used Dust to control her sword's movements, but because one group of Raven's warriors was forbidden from being near Dust, she limited herself to simply using her sword as she led a unit of warriors.
Pyrrha launched another round of weapons, then pulled the blades back to their owners with her semblance. Yang, Ruby, Blake, and Weiss weren't making a lot of progress on their end. The Archdemon wasn't waking up or taking damage, and the tide of Dracos was endless. If the tide was going to change, they'd need to take a risk. Based on what she'd observed so far, Pyrrha had a vague plan of action… she just hoped it would be enough. "Penny!"
Penny stabbed a Draco in the chest, then rolled out of the way before it could strike her with lightning. The Grimm spawned from the Archdemon's blood were young and weak by normal standards, but the death toll was climbing. Four of Penny's warriors were killed by the lightning Draco before she could finish it off.
"Yes, Pyrrha?" she shouted above the sounds of battle, falling back with her warriors to rethink their strategy.
"I think it's time to use it!" Pyrrha projected.
Penny put a hand over her eyes and gazed at the Archdemon for a split second, sizing it up. "I think you're right!" She inhaled. "Nora! Ren! We're going to use it!"
"Roger that!" Nora replied, throwing a grenade in the air to signal most of the warriors to fall back.
From the back of their ranks, a cart pulled by boulder hinnies pushed forwards. Six metal rods twice as big as Penny lay in the cart. Unbeknownst to the villagers, they were filled with Dust.
"Nora, let's clear a path!" Ren shouted, slitting a Draco's throat.
"You got it, Ren!" Nora responded.
Under their guidance, the cart advanced for quite some ways until a Draco froze the boulder hinnies, and another one shattered them. Had brave warriors from the villages not sacrificed themselves to move the cart, it would have never made it to the base of the mountain where Yang and the others were trying to damage the Archdemon. Blake was the only one making something reminiscent of progress-Equinox's blade cut through the Grimm's armor as if it weren't even there, but the Archdemon's skin was impenetrable.
Penny activated her semblance. "I'm ready!"
Pyrrha stood in position on the opposite side of the cart and activated her semblance as well. "Then, let's begin."
Each of them lifted three rods into air and manipulated them so that they spun around the Archdemon's beak, with their pointed ends facing it at different angles.
Sweat dripped from Pyrrha's brow. "On two! One!"
"Two!" Penny finished, and both of them impaled the Archdemon's beak with the rods. Each rod went in surprisingly easily-the beak must have been the Grimm's weakness.
Instantaneously infuriated, the Archdemon's eyes flew open. It tried to screech, but it could not manage to open its beak. Blood stopped spilling from its mouth, and its wings unfurled.
With a great gust of wind, it propelled itself skyward and beat its wings. The resulting wind current was so strong that the warriors not already claimed by the tide of Grimm were washed away with it. The squalls threw both them and the Dracos far from the mountain, and even uprooted patches of the blue flowers that clung tightly to the ground.
Pyrrha, Penny, and the others dug their weapons into the rocks to stay put. The wind wasn't as strong where they were, but that didn't make it easy. Once the Archdemon had determined enough of its aggressors were where it wanted them, it lifted a single finger.
A bright, violet column consumed the warriors-Salem's semblance.
When the beam faded, almost nothing remained.
Almost.
The flowers killed in it had turned to Dust.
At the sight of that, all the remaining warriors from the village Raven forbade from possessing Dust dropped dead, along with their families at home.
Upon seeing the sheer amount of Dust the flowers had made, Penny immediately rushed over to Ruby and Weiss. They spoke in as low of tones as their situation would allow, then nodded and stood.
Ruby used her semblance to speed Penny to the Dust, and Weiss set about creating large glyphs to the side of the Archdemon.
But, the Grimm wasn't about to be outmaneuvered. It trailed Ruby with vapor beams, ravaging the mountainside in a trail so close to her, it tattered her cloak. Eventually, however, the Archdemon ran out of stamina, and returned to creating wind gusts with its wings.
Weiss' glyphs changed colors, signaling that they were complete.
Ruby dug Crescent Rose into the ground. "Penny! Whatever you were going to do, do it now before it vaporizes us!"
"Don't worry, Ruby!" Penny said. "I'm combat ready!" At that, her eyes glowed an iridescent green, and the Dust crystals began to float. Penny steeled herself, then shouted, "Beam!"
The crystals fueled an energy beam that raged through the air, ricocheting off of Weiss' glyphs and severing the Archdemon's left wing. It would have taken off the right wing as well had the Archdemon not recovered enough stamina to lift its another finger as it fell from the sky.
"Penny, look out!" Ruby cried, tackling her out of the way of the vapor column.
In that moment, Penny lost control of her energy beam, and it veered off towards Yang and the others.
Ruby's eyes widened in horror. She and Penny didn't have enough time to react. There was no stopping it.
However, as the light cleared, both of them exhaled in relief. Weiss had created a line of glyphs to compact the beam, which Blake nullified with Equinox's sheath. Both of them were completely worn out from that… Pyrrha and Yang scooped them up and ran them to safety.
At that moment, the Archdemon crashed into the mountain, rupturing the layer of earth surrounding the main vent to what a volcano thousands of years old. Molten lava leaked out from around the Archdemon, spilling down the mountain and burning the flowers in its path. The Archdemon itself wasn't affected.
Yang narrowed her eyes, then activated the Chimaera. "Pyrrha," she called. "I need you to open its mouth. Ren, Nora, make sure Weiss and Blake are safe."
Before they could move, the Archdemon summoned a vapor beam from the palm of its hand. Yang conjured a yellow light field to negate it. Lava dripped from her nose.
Pyrrha took a deep breath, then used her semblance to remove the six rods from the Archdemon's mouth. At that point, however, her aura deactivated from the exertion. "Yang, that's as much as I can handle," she said, gasping for breath.
Yang nodded, though she could barely hear her. After thanking Pyrrha, she walked into the lava, then knelt down in it, completely unfazed. "I can almost remember…" she whispered, but her voice was lost in the deafening roar of the remaining Dracos and approaching magma. Yang inhaled, head tilting towards the sky. It looked like she mouthed something - Cinder? Pyrrha found it hard to tell. Then, Yang shuddered and coughed out lava.
Pyrrha took an unstable step towards her, but there wasn't anything she could do to help.
However, it didn't look like Yang needed any help. Now, lava streamed from her mouth, not her nose. She stood. Turning, she shot out bursts of black flame to kill and absorb what Dracos were left. Then, she returned her attention to the mountain, slowing down the flow of the magma.
Yang smirked. "This is going to be loud…"
At that, she raised her hands, and the lava began to float. She closed her eyes and focused for a moment, then opened them abruptly.
On command, Yang made the volcano erupt.
And, she funneled the hot blood of the earth into the holes in the Archdemon's beak. It screeched and thrashed and protested, but she could hardly sympathize. Vapor beams shot outwards here and there, but not anywhere worth concern. One extended dangerously close to the faint outline of the broken moon, just narrowly missing it.
Eventually, the volcano quelled, and the Archdemon began to decompose.
Yang collapsed, falling into the ash about her. Her Grimm scar devoured the black mist spewing from the Archdemon's remains. Pyrrha picked her up and staggered down the mountain with her to reunite with the others.
Yang smiled weakly at the bottom of the mountain. "Well… glad that's over," she said to everyone.
Looking back at it, the mountain was more of a mangled, black mess, now.
"We did it!" Ruby cheered. Then, she became more serious. "How do you feel, Yang…?"
"Great," Yang joked. "I made a volcano erupt."
"I can't even pretend to be surprised," Weiss said.
"What about the Archdemon?" Blake questioned.
Yang shrugged. "I'm still taking it all in." The black mist was still funneling into her scar. "We'll know soon, though. It's almost done." She shivered. "Pyrrha, would you mind putting me down? I'm a little cold."
Pyrrha set her down on a boulder.
They waited for some time for the decomposition process to finish.
At the end of it, Nora was about to ask if Yang's scar was spreading at all when Raven reappeared from the Void. Emerald wasn't with her.
"I take it the deed is done," she concluded.
Yang nodded.
"I'm pleased." Raven walked towards her, taking a Dust slip from her pocket. "This is the end… Goodbye, Yang." And, before anyone could stop her, she uttered, "Absolute."
/-/-/-/
When Yang turned white, Blake thought she heard the sound of something tearing. Her aura spiked. As far as she was concerned, Raven had just signed a contract for her own death.
Raven eyed the group for a split second, then blinked behind Ren and Nora. She wasn't the only one with speed anymore, though. Ruby blocked her sword, and Blake electrocuted her.
Raven's muscles locked up for a moment, but she increased the intensity of her aura to null the effect, and leapt away.
"I thought we were on the same side!" Ruby shouted. "Yang didn't deserve to be frozen!"
"This isn't about what Yang deserves, it's about what Remnant needs," Raven answered simply. "And for that, I'm willing to go to any length." She exhaled, then brought out a necklace with the holy symbol on it.
Ruby froze. "Wh… Why do you have Uncle Qrow's necklace?"
"The terms of this contract are as follows," Raven began. "In exchange for this relic-"
"Why do you have it?" Ruby screamed. Her aura's intensity skyrocketed. Her rose petals multiplied, then began to congregate. "Tell me why!"
Raven paused the dictation of her contract. "It's common for a family member to reclaim an heirloom from someone who has been estranged…"
"What do you mean?"
"It seems Qrow felt a certain responsibility towards Yang when she was born, which drove him to become involved with you two. After your parents were killed by the Archdemon, however-"
"The Archdemon?"
Raven raised an eyebrow. "Did you think it was an ordinary Draco? We were too late to save Summer and Taiyang… Qrow vowed to care for you two, but his guilt pushed him to alcoholism. Since he became defective in more ways than one, I terminated him discreetly."
Ruby gasped. "Defective? That's… You killed Qrow…? He's dead… because of you?" Her eyes glassed over in rage. Her rose petals became razor-sharp. They pulled themselves together to form a budding rose. "Full Bloom," she said quietly, morbidly. The rose blossomed, and the petals dispersed.
Ruby herself was no longer visible… until she reappeared in front of Raven with hundreds of bladed petals following in her wake.
/-/-/-/
Yang had felt this "nothing" somewhere before… What seemed like lifetimes ago when she'd been Culled by the Reaper. Except, now, she knew where she was. Her body was completely overtaken by the Dust spell-she couldn't even feel the cold.
Fury seethed within her when she realized that Raven had betrayed her… but, another presence caught her attention.
The Chimaera.
It whispered to her sweetly and without words, asking her to submit to it since her body and soul were confined. Yang ordered it to shut up.
Sure, she was confined, but she wasn't trapped… There was somewhere else she could go. The Void.
But, if she left her body now, wouldn't the Chimaera be able to possess her all the same?
Maybe not. She could sense that the Chimaera was bound to her. She was the one who called it into Remnant. Therefore, she could be the one to take it back.
Along that line, if she forced the Chimaera, which had absorbed the Archdemon, back into the Void, maybe she could keep the Archdemon there for good.
Yang entered the Void.
The paradoxical ocean stretched out before her… Her golden soul floated above the waves. In the distance, she could see two, distinct, glowing lights. A yellow light blessed by the ocean's flames, and a violet light blessed by the ocean's wind. Sun and Salem… had they been waiting for her? There was no way for her to ask.
From the side of the ocean without waves came a certain presence. The Chimaera, which had no form on Remnant, had taken her form here. Yang watched a colorless version of herself don the mask of a lion. Here in the Void, black was a color reserved only for souls.
In a vertically aligned ring above the Chimaera's head floated the masks of all the Grimm she'd absorbed. The ring rotated, and it picked the Archdemon's mask from the selection, switching it out with the lion's mask.
So, even now it loved the taste of power…
Yang, Salem, and Sun's souls circled it, then went in for the attack. All three of them had been hosts of the Archdemon. All three of them felt like they were fighting an old nemesis-a nemesis with no secrets left to hide.
The color from their souls pushed back the colorlessness of the Chimaera, submerging it into the waves of the ocean, drowning it. Eventually, Yang knew they'd reached a turning point. The mask of the Archdemon was about to go under… and forcing something that had been on Remnant since it came into existence back into the Void could not happen without consequence. Something would need to give.
Salem's soul hesitated. Yang wondered if she knew what the consequence was, but there was no way to ask.
In the end, they forced the Chimaera completely into the nothingness of the Void. Yang watched as it, Sun, and Salem all faded into the sea. Once she saw them all disappear, she knew she was severed from the Chimaera completely… and that it, the Archdemon, and her friends had ceased to exist.
Something else had gone, too, she just didn't know what.
/-/-/-/
Emerald rushed out of the portal. She'd felt the change in the Void, and despite not having opened a portal before, she managed to pump enough power from her blood to do so. "Raven!"
Raven was dead.
A few feet away, Equinox and Crescent Rose dripped with blood.
Emerald couldn't say she was surprised, but that didn't make coming to terms with reality any easier.
Yang, now scarless, had just woken up. She and her friends paused in their bittersweet reunion to stare Emerald down.
Emerald took a step back, then stopped and shook her head. "I'm not your enemy," she said.
After a few seconds, the tension in the air defused.
Refocusing on Raven's corpse, Emerald pulled out a Dust slip to Burn the body with.
Except…
There was no Dust.
~~AAAND END!~~
AN: Wow, that's the end of the story! Woo! What a run! With that, the series comes to an end. Thoughts about part two? If you still haven't read part one, check it out! It's called The Witch of Vale.
This was so much harder to write than part one, tbh. But, I enjoyed the torture, haha. I'm quite proud of what I've done… I can only hope you all have enjoyed the story as much as I have.
A few things before I go... I've spent some time gathering accounts of what everyone went on to do in the future. This is what I've heard:
First, it should be known that because Dust has gone from Remnant, Aura is now humanity's sole hope of survival. Thus, they are forced to turn to Menageran Faunus for guidance and diplomacy. The Hunter's League, and international group dedicated to training Hunters and controlling Grimm is formed at this time. The survivors of Mountain Glenn were some of the key players in founding the orgainzation.
Yang remains a Keeper. She has become a clan leader and is intent on ensuring that Dust and the Archdemon do not return to Remnant. She donated much of the Branwen's land and money to the Hunter's League (HL), including the SDC's money. She returned Weiss' personal funds to her. Most notably, Raven's temple is used as the grounds for Haven Academy, where young Hunters are trained. Yang also spends a lot of time with Blake in Menagerie. The Faunus respect her for bringing Harmony back to Remnant, and regard her as a hero that has ushered in a new era of progress between humans and Faunus. Rumor has it, she and Ghira get along quite well.
Emerald is a librarian/historian at Haven Academy, and is certified through the HL.
Blake is a Menageran HL representative who advocates strongly for Faunus rights on both a global and regional scale. She is held in high regard by her people. She is also a formidable Hunter.
Weiss is a HL representative that deals directly with the four kingdoms. She is feared by all business people because she knows dirt on everyone, though no one knows about her because her family has been forgotten due to Raven's contract.
Ruby is a HL field researcher working with Penny to analyze the correlation between old keywords and aura abilities. She is interested in seeing if people can learn to cast old Dust spells with their aura alone.
Penny is a HL Professor at Beacon Academy in Vale. She is researching aura, including dead zones and the link between personalities and aura elements. Unlike Ruby, she enjoys teaching. Like Ruby, she enjoys Hunting.
Nora is part of the HL global relief team, and gives food to villages ravaged by the Grimm.
Ren is a medic traveling with Nora as part of the HL global relief team. He is researching the healing effects/capabilities of aura.
Pyrrha is a world-renown combat instructor at Beacon Academy, strategist, and Hunter with the HL.
Neptune is the HL's biggest supporter, and is now recognized as a good, far-sighted king. He funded the construction of Beacon Academy, using the land where his father's old home was to build it. This was all on the condition that the recreation center be named the Wukong Recreation Center.
Again, thank you to all my supporters. Cloy especially. Really. It means a lot to me.
Okay… That should do it. Farewell!