Chapter 54
It had been about two hours since they had arrived within the nameless saloon. To their dismay, nothing had happened since they entered. The person they were supposed to encounter hadn't returned as Shoopkeep said. Even more unfortunate was that cell service was apparently nonexistent here.
In the meantime, Weiss was able to perform maintenance on her weapon, as well as practicing with her Glyphs. Considering that her Rapier was more or less just a plain weapon, and its lack of complex mechanisms, keeping it in proper shape was rather easy. Unfortunately, Ruby wasn't so lucky. Her beloved Crescent Rose required tools she was wary of bringing out, and an environment she didn't have. As such, she had the resorted to practicing with her electric-generating technique.
Madara was, or at least appeared to be, sleeping. He was still standing upright with his arms crossed, but leaned motionlessly against a pillar. His goggles once again covered his eyes, preventing anyone from being able to tell for certain. He had just recently bested one person that challenged him to a drinking contest, yet afterwards Madara didn't look in the slightest bit intoxicated. If he was sleeping, it would have been impossible to tell, let alone take advantage of. To Ruby and Weiss, it was perfectly fitting.
Suddenly, the front doors were pushed open. A single person, dressed in attire similar to Madara, entered. There was nothing to note about their clothing, save for a short scabbard strapped to their waist containing a sword of some kind. Shopkeep seemed to smile and nod at the intruder who walked straight towards him.
The newcomer removed their mask and goggles at the door, revealing their features. Their hair was black, longer than Madara's but still held in a ponytail, and their eyes were blue like Weiss's. Most perplexing was their facial structure. They appeared feminine, but gave off a masculine feeling.
Weiss looked up from her Elemental Glyph, noticing that Madara was staring directly at the newcomer while they conversed and drank with Shopkeep. "Is that the person he was talking about? Are they a guy or a girl? I think it's a guy.." She thought, thinning her eyes slightly. "Well, people come in all kinds I suppose." She shrugged, waiting and watching.
Madara suddenly moved, removing himself from the wall and walking towards the boy and the Shopkeeper. As he walked, Ruby and Weiss stood up as well and followed, and the boy turned to look at him.
The three stopped about two meters from the desk, where the boy sat. "Who're you?" they asked in a neutral voice.
"This is Andre, a frequent customer of mine. They may be able to help you." Shopkeep explained, leaving through the door behind him.
"..wait, you three were looking for me?" the boy named Andre asked. "Sure you don't have me confused with someone else? I'm not a very popular person."
"Jacqueline Hail. Do you know them?" Madara asked the boy. Andre flinched at the name, but only Madara seemed to notice.
"Who?" Ruby asked, looking at Madara demandingly.
"Oh, I uh, that's one of my teammates at Shade Academy actually." Andre answered, scratching his head seeming embarrassed. "Sorry, i didn't know she was popular. Need her for something?" Madara nodded but stayed quiet as he waited. "Well, I could take you if you want, I just finished my field assignment, so i'm about to head back."
"You did that alone?" Weiss raised a surprised eyebrow. "What about the other two members of your team?"
"They went on their own too." Andre smiled pridefully "Well, we Shade students are pretty different from where you're from. We do both team and solo training."
"Wait, how did you know we weren't from Shade?" Ruby asked, looking down at her dust-covered clothes. "Oh, nevermind."
Andre snickered at the girl, almost pitying her and the suffering she must have been experiencing. "Yeah, not exactly form fitting. Here in Vacuo, observance is your best friend. What's done is done though. So, you three coming with me or not?" he offered again, raising a hand to be shaken.
"We will." Madara answered quickly, accepting the gesture while his companions stared at the exchange.
"You know, I'm surprised that he's becoming even this social." Weiss whispered into Ruby's ear. Ruby nodded, yet continued to stare confusedly at Andre. "What is it?" Weiss asked.
"I… i don't know." Ruby muttered, shaking her head of whatever clouded her mind. "Nevermind, I bet it's nothing.
"If y'all are ready, we can head out now. I'll warn you though, It's going to be a long walk." Andre announced. After he waited for ten seconds with no reply, he nodded, walking past the three and motioning for them to follow. Without another moment's delay, they were gone. Surely nothing could go wrong.
A few hours later
About twenty kilometers from where they resumed their journey. The sun had just begun to descend from the sky, turning part of it orange. The temperature had also declined due to less direct sunlight. Oddly, the blowing sand seemed to settle, meaning that it was fine for Madara and Andre to remove masks and goggles.
Ruby continued to watch Madara with her heterochromatic eyes. She watched as he periodically expelled Chakra as he had on the water. There was no noticeable gesture from Madara to suggest he used hand signs two or single-handed. It simply moved out from his body and into the ground as if it was natural. Curiously, Ruby looked down at her own hands. She was far from skilled enough to replicate the act as she had seen it, but perhaps through manipulating it with her hands.
"Hey, Ruby." Andre called out, catching Ruby's attention. "What kind of weapon do you use? Look a little empty handed."
"O-oh, I use my own custom scythe. I call her Crescent Rose." Ruby answered, taking out her paper scroll and retrieving her rose-colored weapon. "It's also a high-impact sniper rifle, though I'm thinking about making a few modifications."
"A scythe huh, pretty rare to see those here. They're not exactly easy to handle, let alone use effectively." Andre remarked, "what about you Weiss? Is that a rapier?"
"it is, in fact." Weiss answered, smiling surprised.
"Well, I'm excited to see how good you two are with those things. Hopefully better than they were during the tournament." Andre said as he drew his own sword.
Ruby and Weiss quickly armed themselves, thinking that the boy was preparing to fight them. However, he had yet to point his blade at either them or even Madara. Instead, the tip hovered a centimeter above the ground. Suddenly, they could feel the presence of what the boy held his sword out for. The sand no longer moved from the ground, and therefore no longer served to distract their senses. They could feel movement from beneath their feet, an indeterminate distance away was something large, something approaching at high speeds.
"Ever seen a Grimworm before?" he asked nonchalauntly. Neither Ruby or Weiss had ever come across one personally. The only time the specific type was ever brought up was in Professor Port's lectures, most of which Ruby slept through anyways. All they knew was that they were worm-like grimm on a massive scale.
Soon enough, they would no longer be unacquainted with this particular species, as the tremors reached their peak. The ground a short distance ahead of the four suddenly crumbled, and out appeared a large pillar.
It had thick black skin and was at least ten meters in diameter. Its full length, or at least the part that was visible, was over forty meters long. As it loomed over the four, it brandished several rows of white teeth, large, serrated, and spinning as if made of separate segments. Without a moment's wait, the lamprey-like behemoth thrusted its head towards the four.
"Move!" Madara commanded as the beast neared. The four instantly moved, scattering in separate directions. Divided, they watched the creature burrow back into the ground, preparing for another strike.
"Where's it coming from?" Weiss asked, staring directly at her feet warily.
"They follow movement as well as negativity. Feel for the shaking." Andre explained, closing his eyes as he put a hand on the ground beneath the sand.
Weiss created numerous Glyphs, all floating off of the ground at different elevations for which she and Ruby could both stand on. At the very least, it would prevent the Grimworm from sensing their movement. Madara used these moments to infuse nature energy with his chakra, entering Sage Mode to use its sensory abilities.
Seconds past as they waited for the monster to resurface. Eventually, it chose Madara as its target, and tunnelled straight for him. Madara easily evaded its charging attack, before hurling a ball of fire at its side as it breached the surface. However, the creature continued to attack him, completely unaffected by the flames.
"Fire doesn't work on these things! Gotta cut it to bits" Andre warned, receiving nods of acknowledgement from the others. The Grimworm once again dove into the ground and burrowed, preparing its next attack.
"Hm, maybe I shouldn't have ignored those lectures." Madara thought, mentally facepalming at himself. "What about others?"
"Not sure, I've never tried. Best thing to do is hit it until it dies."
"Weiss, Ruby!" Madara called for the girls' attention. "On my signal, restrain it and strike with lightning."
Weiss hesitates for a moment, but proceeds nonetheless. A dozen Elemental Glyphs appeared around the four, each prepared to expel an element of her desire. Simultaneously, Ruby began to generate a current in between her hands, increasing its voltage rapidly. Madara and Andre managed to keep the monster's attention on them, as well as avoiding every attempt it made to swallow them.
"R-ready! Please hurry! I can't hold this for long." Ruby stuttered, feeling the paralyzing effects of her own creation. Rather than causing her to spasm uncontrollably, her joints felt uncomfortably stiff, and it wouldn't be long before she couldn't maintain the charge.
"Wait wait wait! Sure that is even going to work?!" Andre asked, staring at Madara in disbelief. The Uchiha didn't respond, simply waiting in place for the emergence of the Grimworm.
Once again, the creature attacked from directly below. However, Madara seemingly chose not to evade, and was engulfed by the enormous worm. It roared with an unnatural noise. However, before Andre could even gasp or let out a word, he watched speechlessly as the Grimworm was suddenly bombarded. Twelve large white spikes suddenly impaled the beast from all sides, preventing it from escaping or retreating back underground. Andre traced the source of the ice-like constructs, finding that their origins were the Glyphs that Weiss had conjured.
"Wh-that was the signal?!" Andre exclaimed, wide eyed and open-mouthed.
"Yep!" Ruby said, dropping down from her Glyph platform and running towards the monster. "Eat this!" she shouted as she dashed forward with her arms stretched out.
Her hands slammed into the side of the beast, channelling a large amount of electricity into its body. The worm screamed even louder, but Ruby continued to push. A few seconds after contact, her hands began to sink into its flesh, cutting through its skin with incredible ease while also paralyzing the rest of its body.
"Woah!" Ruby thought, in awe of her accomplishment. "So that's what that does to Grimm. If I make this even stronger, and practice a few more techniques, I might be able to cut a Grimm in half with a chop! That would be so cool!" she smiled, nearly drooling at the thought.
Suddenly, the upper half of the beast's body exploded, releasing a cloud of black smoke and flame. The force was enough to push Ruby and Andre back, both managing to instantly recover. The smoke was quickly blown away by a large gust of wind, wind that originated from Madara and his transformed Gunbai. He stepped down from the disintegrating beast's body, collapsing his weapon and walking towards the three nonchalauntly.
"I… have never seen someone do that before." Andre told Ruby, blinking constantly.
"What, killing them from the inside?" She asked, tilting her head slightly.
"Being inside of a Grimm and surviving. It's never been heard of, let alone tested." Andre responded, putting a hand under his chin. "Those things have really tough hides, so they're a pain to take down without really heavy weaponry. He must've used that fan-thing to get a hold inside of its throat… i think that if you two didn't distract it, he may have died."
"What?" Ruby asked, laughing halfheartedly at his remark. "There's no way that would happen. He's practically invincible and always has a plan to get out of anything. Besides, i don't think he trusts us like that. We're pretty clumsy sometimes. This was probably just a test or a brag."
"Well… if I were to say anything, he trusts you more than you think." he whispered to Ruby. "but what's between you and that guy is none of my business. There's probably no more Grimm nearby. We should start setting up a campsite. " Andre shrugged with an indifferent look.
"But, we don't have a tent, and this probably isn't a good place for sleeping bags." Weiss reminded.
Madara walked a short distance away, before putting his hands to the ground. Using earth-release, he had created a dome-like formation out of the dry dirt and rock, one big enough to fit the four of them as well as protect them from the sand. A small feat for Ruby and Weiss, as they had seen much more impressive creations, but not for their new jaw-hanging party member.
"Wait… he can… so he can just do that? That was without dust right?" Andre asked, weakly pointing at the impossible shelter. The girls stared at him, both wearing desensitized expressions as if it was a mundane occurrence. "A guy should-I mean, I didn't even see any dust. To do something like that is like-"
"Like magic? You'll get used to it." Ruby chuckled lightly as she walked towards the shelter.
Watching the sixteen year old walk away, Andre turned to Weiss."What else can he do?
"Hm," Weiss hummed, "I've seen him breath fire, spit jets of water, and blast people with miniature tornadoes. Basically, anything you can think of with Dust, but a thousand times stronger. Don't worry, I've thought about the possibilities too, but also don't bother talking to him about it, he doesn't talk about them." Weiss smiled hollowly, as if disappointed by her own declaration.
"I… i see… so, then is that what your Glyphs are based off of?" Andre asked. "Your family's known for your semblance and its wide range of abilities, but you use the elements without dust like he does."
Weiss smiled, looking at Madara in the distance. "Well, that's flattering, but i can't do nearly as much as what he can. I would say he's the strongest person in the world."
Andre looked off to the side, as if contemplating Weiss's remark "Hmm… you two admire him a lot, but I think i get why. But I wonder how annoying it can be with his personality."
"You have no idea, but sometimes you can get him to listen." Weiss replied, chuckling self deprecatingly. "Anyways, there's something i noticed. Well, Ruby did first actually. Your skin is more pale than I thought it would be."
"W-well, i'm always wearing long sleeves and masks and such. If i didn't, i'd probably have sunburn everywhere." Andre answered calmly.
"I see.." Weiss said, looking at the boy as she contemplated his response. "Nevermind then, I guess it was Ruby's and my imagination. Sorry for asking."
END
