And here is yet another chapter of Trail of Blood! Enjoy Yang's turn and, of course, a little piece of Hektor's adventure with the Wraiths.
Yang growled.
In front of her, the training bot kept trying to put her on the defensive, but Yang Xiao Long was not a fighter who could be put on the defensive. The droid's attacks were swatted aside or simply tanked before responding with a counterattack.
She knew that Headmaster Timber had interrogated both Weiss and Blake, but she was thankful the man had decided not to show up during her spar. She didn't know if she would've been able to stop herself from punching him if he had.
Yang Xiao Long wasn't, despite her normal behaviour, someone who didn't think. She knew Timber was searching for information about Jaune, and she also knew that he had authorized that soldier, Captain Hektor something, to shoot both Jaune and the Wraiths on sight. She could've cared less about the Wraiths, but hurting them could result in them taking it out on Jaune. And the fact that Hektor had tried to shoot Jaune himself had made her angry like very few other times.
After all the trouble they had gone through to follow the Trail, and not piss off the Wraiths, to try and find him, Timber had allowed his little soldier to try and shoot him. It wasn't just endangering Jaune's life and spitting over their efforts. It was also the utter lack of attention he had shown when they had explained to him why he should've allowed them to continue the Trail. But most of all, it had been a message still saved on her Scroll the catalyst for Yang's rage.
The man had ignored their warnings, their words and their pleas. She wasn't in the mood to obey him at the moment, nor she would be in the foreseeable future.
She wasn't wasting any time, dismembering the training bot with quick and powerful punches, tearing its limbs apart with the mere strength of her attacks. Her weapons were now different, not more just bracelets. The entirety of her hands was covered, and the gauntlets went up to her elbow. Burn Dust could be seen on the inside of her forearms, attached to the weapon. Two small barrels were also visible on outside of her forearms, barrels she used time and again to fire a flow of flames at the droid. Larger barrels could also be seen on the back of her wrists, keeping the design of the shotguns Ember Celica had been equipped with.
The idea of her weapon itself was simple. It was similar to her previous gauntlets, but it covered her hands like gloves instead of covering just the back of them and the wrists. They were much slender than Ember Celica, and the gauntlets had a shotgun and a small flamethrower each, both connected to the Burn Dust generator inside the weapon. The shotgun's calibre was slightly smaller than her previous ones, but that was because Ember Celica was massively built, and thus allowed for greater calibre. The barrels were black against the golden metal of the gauntlets, and a single black wire connected the flamethrowers to the Burn Dust generator.
She had called them Inferno Celica.
Her arms moved on their own as she smashed the last piece of the droid, its torso, and stood over its destroyed scraps, panting for the exertion. With a flick of her hands, her weapons returned to its compact mode. The metal around her hands clicked and retracted into the bracers, even if her forearms were still covered by the metal. Even in compact mode she could fire her shotguns, even if using the flamethrowers was a bit risky due to the closeness between the Burn Dust generator and the actual barrel in its compact state. It allowed her to free her hands, but to remove the weapon she would still need to detach the bracers by hand.
Sighing, she tiredly rubbed her eyes. It was getting late. She looked up to the camera in the training arena. Since she had been training in the arena usually reserved for the matches in Combat Class, her whole fight had been under the steady gaze of the camera. Yang would've liked to train without anyone spying on her, but Ozpin had begged her and her friends to train where he could see them, at least after hours. A quick glance to the window confirmed that yes, it was very much after hours. Maybe one or so in the morning. She shook her head and mockingly waved at the camera befoe walking away.
/- from the notes of Jaune Arc -/
Yang Xiao Long
6'. Blonde hair. Lilac eyes, turn red when active Rage. Colour theme: yellow. Lively. Bright. Teasing. Party-girl. Sisterly. Caring. Sarcastic. Weapon: Inferno Celica (shotgun/flamethrower gauntlets: 1' 8'' per 4'' per 4'', Fire Dust and gold alloy, 33 calibre, automatic Burn Dust rounds. Flamethrowers' range: 20'). Fighting style: CQC, boxing, little to no use of legs, predictable but unstoppable. Semblance: Power Rage.
/-/
Unbeknownst to Yang, someone replied to her wave.
Standing tall in Ozpin's new office, right under Goodwitch's, was a Wraith. Her mask showed no expression as her hand lazily responded to the unaware girl's salute, the gesture almost invisible in the darkness that enveloped the office, the only sound of it coming from the rustling of her bloodied cloak.
Standing not five yards away from the Wraith was Ozpin, his cane in his right hand and eyes looking like brown agates behind the glasses. His face was cut from stone, but his mouth was slightly twitching as it held a displeased frown.
After replying to the mock wave, the Wraith turned back to the former Headmaster. "Everything I said is true, Medeis Ozpin," said the figure, her weapon nowhere to be seen but obviously close at hand. "You will find what I told you to search for. Emerald Sustrai's Semblance is quite the useful one, though, so I recommend special care to avoid falling in a trick. But Cinder Fall is the most dangerous of the three. Roman Torchwick and Neopolitan Torchwick agreed to aid you in this quest. Is there anything else you need to know?"
Ozpin's stance, if possible became even stiffer. "How do you know all this?" he asked for the second time. The Wraith tilted her head sideways. "What tells me you're not lying to me just to remove Ms Fall and her teammates from the school?"
"I have this," replied Death, drawing a Scroll from her cloak and slipping it on the Professor's table. "This is Jaune Arc's former Scroll. I recorded my conversation with Roman Torchwick. I have his son, Medeis Ozpin: he wouldn't lie to me."
"We already went over this," murmured Ozpin, his left hand crawling on the table and snatching the Scroll from it. "What tells me you didn't force Torchwick to confess something like this just to have Ms Fall captured?"
"Nothing tells you," was Death's slow reply. There was a moment of silence during which the two powerful entities simply appeared to stare each other down while lost in thought. "But... there would be a way to prove to you that Cinder Fall has stolen the Fall Maiden's powers."
Ozpin gritted his teeth. "I'm still not sure telling you of all people... beings... entities... about the Maidens has been a good idea," he noted with an edge in his voice.
Death merely laughed mercilessly. "I am not interested in four girls burdened with the responsibility of the world," she chuckled cruelly, almost making him wince. He knew that the Maidens had to bear unfair burdens, but it was for the sake of Remnant. Death's next words tore him from that line of thought. "I will fight Cinder Fall. If she uses her powers, then you and your Professors will intervene and either capture or kill her. I will disappear as soon as her powers will be revealed. And if she does not reveal her powers until the very end, you will blame the assault to me. Either case, you win."
"I can recognize a trick when I see one," retorted Ozpin. "What tells me you will let her live if she doesn't reveal her supposed powers?"
Death growled, growing annoyed, even if it was understandable for the Professor not to trust her. "Then you will step in and stop me," she spat out. "Do you want to save the Fall Maiden, or do you want to let Cinder Fall continue with her plan?"
Ozpin remained silent as the two engaged in a tense gaze challenge, but eventually he was the one to look away and at the Scroll in his left hand. "I will consider your words, Wraith," he said with an edge in his tone. "Now get out of my office."
Death seemed amused. "What? You're not going to try and capture me?" she laughed.
"Doing so would simply result in Mr Arc's suffering or even worse, death," the man gritted out, his grip on his cane increasing. The Wraith gave one last dry chuckle before slipping through a wall and disappearing from sight.
Ozpin remained tense for one more second before sighing and slumping back on his chair. "Why did it have to get so much more complicated?" he asked to no one. "I don't have time for the Trail and for the Queen's pawns at the same time. But choosing to take care of the pawn..."
He didn't say it.
It meant leaving the students on their own against the Wraiths.
/-/
Hektor Troy didn't like being helpless.
He had been grown as a solid, logical man from his father, a grape cultivator in Northern Vale. He had learned how to obey to orders during his time in the military. But eventually, when it came to facts, he had joined the Army because he hated the feeling of being helpless. Not to protect the lands of Vale. Not for some sense of justice. He was just a normal man searching for something that would've kept him safe from Life. The military offered him that, and he accepted it.
And yet, even in his career first as soldier, private, lieutenant, sergeant and then captain, Hektor Troy had found himself helpless more than once. During a White Fang rally, he had found himself captured by a tall man with brown-red hair and a red katana as weapon. The man's cruelty had become clear when he had gutted one of Hektor's men. Another time had been during a fire in a building. Crouched in the smoke with a small boy in his arms, he had been helpless as he watched the flames burn the lower floors. Fortunately some Huntress with a water-based Semblance had arrived in time, or both the soldier and the child would've died.
But never in his life he would've thought that he would end up searching an empty basement, trying to find some psychopaths and their just as psychopathic prisoner. His training had covered what to do in many a situation, ranging from hostage situations to Grimm attacks, but it hadn't prepared him for whatever the Wraiths were. His best bet would've been to kill Jaune Arc, since it appeared they were somehow linked to him, but he suspected that such an action would just earn him their ire, especially Death's.
The man kicked a stray pebble out of his way in irritation.
It wasn't a wise choice.
Almost immediately, the echoes of the noise filled his ears, remembering him that the basement wasn't the best place where to make any kind of noise. The echo wasn't actually strong, but in the silence it sounded deafening. He stilled for a second before sighing. Nothing had moved, nothing had appeared, nothing had attacked.
He was just alone in a damn empty basement.
'Not like I want it to be haunted,' he thought as he moved further into the dark recesses of the dungeon under Beacon, a residuum of the ancient past of the school. His torchlight shined as the light ray cut through the darkness, wavering slightly and trembling every time he took a step.
He had been searching the basement for more than an hour now, his CABAAR6 strapped on his back, when he finally got fed up. It was four in the morning, if not five, and he was tired and irritated. His fear was now gone, lost in the tide of sleepiness and annoyance, and he began stomping through the chambers with a clearly displeased frown on his face.
He still had more than half the Beacon basement to check out.
One after the other, several more rooms revealed themselves to be empty, and he checked them out on his electronic map. Seventy down, so many more to go. His irritation flared then and there, making him kick another pebble and send it flying. Most of the times it would hit a wall. Sometimes it would land on something, be it old cloth or ancient wood, abandoned there ages before during the construction of Vale's castle. The school, after all, had been built over the ruins and remains of an ancient castle, the optimal position of the academy making it near-impossible to siege and storm.
Room after room, his composure began to crack a little. He began slamming the few doors that were still functioning much harder, sometimes cracking the old and rotten wood, and overall beginning to check the rooms less and less thoroughly.
Ding.
He stopped. The sound of something hitting metal echoed for a second in the room before he pointed his torch towards the source. There, a metallic plaque had been propped on a table in the middle of the room. The light shone brightly on the metal while the rest of the room was shrouded in darkness. He took a single step closer to read what was written in elegant red letters on the plaque.
Captain Hektor Troy
Dead on February 8th, 83 years after the Great War
Killed by the Supreme Wraith of Death
Something moved in the shadows.
Hektor ran.
Not my longest chapter, but it was important. For the date I just made the year up from scratch. It should be more or less 80 years after the War so I put 83. Correct me if I'm wrong. February the eighth because that's my birthday.
Anyway, I am on DeviantArt, under the name of Khorevis (who would've guessed, eh?). Here are the links for Eclipsim Mark III, Eiszapfen (will probably be re-drawn), Malasorte and Inferno Celica:
www. deviantart khorevis/art/Eclipsim-Transformations-760788969
www. deviantartkhorevis/art/Eiszapfen-761409075
www. deviantartkhorevis/art/Malasorte-761432717
www. deviantartkhorevis/art/Inferno-Celica-761502956
(remove the spaces, obviously)
And with this, I'm off!
Until next time,
Khor Evik Vlakhavlakh