Author's Notes
I was just told Azure Striker Gunvolt 3 was announced (thanks anon in the reviews! I've been out of touch with the news lately.)
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
I am so there for it. New J-pop song, new intrigues (I see, I see with my little eyes someone who shouldn't be there. Also, GV, what with that logo on your back?). So many questions, so little answered.
The new character, Kirin, seems to be taking Copen's second playable character role. Given ASG's clear Mega Man inspiration, her gameplay screams Zero. Parrying bullets with a sword is objectively cool. Hope it's a main focus of her gameplay rather than a gimmick. Also, is she using GV's abilities? Is she also inheriting Copen's copying schtick?
Either way, as far as this fic goes, she a non-character. But if I ever continue beyond Volume 3 and Rooster Teeth fails to provide me a Summer Maiden, guess who's taking on that role?
Then there's GV. I'm loving GV's new design. He looks older to me. They also seem to have redesigned the Flashfield. Rather than continuous tendrils of lightning, it seems he now sends out discreet bolts that seek the enemy. Kind of like Copen's gun. This could be just an artifact of an early build, though, since we don't see the shield aspect of the attack.
But more important than all of that. More important than the logo on his back. More important than the power of J-pop…
He pulls a Ruby on the trailer. He dashes into an enemy and splits into three wisps of lightning to go around the them. I'm going to have a field day with that. And after Luminous Avenger iX, it just makes SO much sense. It is the natural progression of GV's Azure Striker.
Enjoy this chapter. I'll probably upload the new one this week to celebrate a bit, and with it finally get into the docks.
Chapter 20: Where's Nora?
FWOOOOSH!
Lumen beeped and booped as a flurry of petal dash by her.
'Analyzing physical parameters. Measuring aura emissions. Constructing three-dimensional model… still need more data."
Seeing an aura petal fluttering close by, Lumen scanned the aura construct to squeeze a little bit more information from this iteration before all traces dissipated into the ether.
"How did I do? Did you catch that? Can you now copy it? Can you? Can you? Can you?"
Lumen wondered if Ruby's never-ending excitement would be exhausting if she wasn't an artificial intelligence. Now there was an interesting experiment for another time.
"Results remain inconclusive. Please repeat laps again."
The red blur nodded excitedly, before doing a few more laps around the arena. It was refreshing to have data so accessible. No more cloaks and daggers. Just some good old-fashioned, scientific method compliant data gathering.
That was the theme of the joint training session between KVKC, RWPY, and JNBRY. Figure stuff out. Throw said stuff at the wall and see what sticks. For her part, Lumen was working with Ruby to mimic the reaper's Semblance. Close by, Lola was doing the same with Ren. Though you wouldn't be able to tell by just looking, since both of them were just sitting in lotus position, sipping tea and enjoying the afternoon. Or at least Ren was, with Lola lacking a mouth and legs. Only Ren's slightly washed out colors suggested any Semblance studying occurring.
On the benches, GV was working on the essay he was assigned as punishment for his part on the Forever Fall debacle. Blake was reading a book, providing moral support to her friend by silently sitting next to him.
The rest of the group was working on Jaune, who was suspected of collusion with his Semblance during Forever Fall and Master Copen and Lady Mytyl were grilling him on it, with Weiss and Kohaku providing a fresh perspective, Yang providing muscles, and Pyrrha providing moral support.
Lumen was beginning to suspect 'providing moral support' was a euphemism for being useless.
"Lumen, Lumen! Now?"
"Results still inconclusive. Again!"
-o-
"Ora ora ora ora ora~"
"Yang, please stop!"
Mytyl observed attentively as Yang pummeled Jaune's shield in a flurry of punches, ignoring Jaune's plea. According to Copen, Jaune's potential Semblance revealed itself when he blocked, and she quotes Jaune, 'Cardin's cataclysmic attack'.
"Is what Yang's saying supposed to be a reference to something," Kohaku asked from her place in the peanut gallery.
"How would I know?" Weiss answered.
"Yang, stop," Copen commanded. Jaune fell on his knees, letting his shield clatter to the side while he rubbed his sore forearm. Yang stretched, stretching her arm in circular motions.
"Are you sure I used my Semblance?" Jaune said miserably from the floor.
Mytyl couldn't be sure. She arrived after that part of the fight. But she trusted her brother and if he said Jaune did what he did, Jaune did it. Jaune's own claim to the contrary be damned.
"Jaune," Copen addressed the blond, "I need you to do exactly what you did when Cardin hit your shield dead on the second time."
Jaune groaned. "I already told you I just pushed aura to my arm!"
Mytyl hummed in contemplation. Maybe they were going about this in the wrong way. "Jaune, walk me through that part of the fight. How you got there, what you did, how you felt, and the aftermath."
Jaune looked at her, the frustration he felt for her brother not present. "Cardin hit my forearms and sent me flying. I hit the floor, roll to dodge an attack, and then block his next attack with my shield."
"Why did you block instead of dodge?" Pyrrha asked, taking an interest on Jaune's account.
"I… I am not sure," Jaune admitted. "I was kneeling. I think I tried to stand up but couldn't. I panicked."
"But you stood up after Mytyl arrived." Pyrrha pointed out.
'Too easy,' Mytyl thought. "I like to think I have that effect on men."
Pyrrha and Jaune didn't miss the subtext and blushed, while Yang and Kohaku snickered, and Weiss struggled to keep a flat face. Copen didn't miss it either.
"I'm leaving."
"Don't be so stiff, Copen."
"La la la, I'm not listening." Copen walked out of the training room with his hands pressing his headpiece tighter to his ears.
Mytyl laughed. But they still needed Copen. "Kohaku, could you please fetch him?"
"I wouldn't need to if you stopped disturbing him," Kohaku said before jogging after her escaping partner. But not before chuckling some more.
Mytyl switched her attention back to Jaune. "Jaune. You didn't feel the pain of your injuries after using your Semblance, right?"
"If that's what we are calling using Aura? Sure."
It wasn't just Aura. Jaune has a lot of the stuff, but there still was a limit to the recovery rate of it. And with Cardin attacking him, it shouldn't be any faster. So, he didn't just push Aura into his arm. But what did he do? Maybe…
"Hey, Copen, how does self-infusing sound?"
Copen attention was caught immediately upon returning. "Self-infusing? You think Jaune fed Aura into his Aura?" Copen brought a hand to his chin in thought. "That's possible. We had him doing a lot of aura infusing. Maybe he invaded his Aura with his own Aura, effectively using his Semblance on himself."
Kohaku tapped her open palm with a fist, realizing where the twins were going. "And because you didn't allow us to infuse our Aura into other people, we wouldn't have found out about it!"
Mytyl snapped her fingers. "Correct. Jaune, Yang, from the top. Jaune, this time try to infuse Aura into your arm, rather than concentrating it into that area."
"Lola, stop wasting time with Ren and come here," Copen ordered his pod.
"Yes Boss!"
"Wasting time?" Ren was taken aback. "I thought you were copying my Semblance," he told Lola.
"I finished doing that an hour and thirty-eight minutes ago," Lola informed. "Your Semblance is not that complicated. I just enjoyed the peaceful meditation."
-o-
Jaune readied himself for another Yang-patented pummeling. The wild blonde, for her part, threw a few practices punches in preparation.
"Try to keep yourself standing straight and erect, lady killer. No woman likes a limp boy."
Jaune breathed I and out. 'Let it go, Jaune. This is not any worse than Menta's own teasing… except this isn't your sister and therefore not instantly icky. They are similarly blond though…"
"Jaune, don't space out!"
Jaune's musing ended with Mytyl's warning and Yang's relentless rain of punches.
"Ora ora ora~"
'Why does she keep saying that!?'
Remembering what he was doing, Jaune concentrated in pushing Aura to his arm. No, pushing it into his arm. Pushing his Aura out of his arm and back into it? That didn't make sense. Whatever, he would just do what came naturally.
…
What came second naturally, right after cowering and hoping for the end to be quick and painless.
'Ora ora or- OW, son of a…"
Jaune opened his eyes. Once more, he saw a white glow recede from his shield. Risking a look over it, he saw Yang hissing and shaking her hand in pain. To the side Mytyl was positively giddy and Copen was furiously typing into his scroll.
"Lola, report!"
"Definitely looks like a Semblance, Boss."
"You did it Jaune!" Mytyl whooped in victory, dragging him into a hug.
"Yeah, yeah, praise be unto him. What did he do?" Weiss asked.
"I think he broke my knuckles…" Yang said as she approached the group, closing and opening his hand experimentally.
"Jaune, give some of your Aura to Yang,"
Yang took a step back. "Whoa there, Tiger. This isn't some roundabout way of getting rid of me in the next forty-eight hours, right?"
Copen rolled his eyes. "Jaune, if you will."
Reluctantly, Yang offered her hand to Jaune, who did as Copen ordered. Once more the white glow of Jaune's Aura transferring came to life. A few seconds later, Yang was flexing her hand in amazement.
Her wide lilac eyes zeroed in on Jaune. "You have a healing Semblance!?"
"Not quite," Mytyl explained. "I believe it's an amplification Semblance. That's why when you hit Jaune, you hurt yourself. Jaune's defenses were amplified."
"Wait, backtrack a bit," Weiss said. "You're telling us that Arc can take any Aura-based technique he's using and just put it on steroids?"
"Jaune, that's a great Semblance," Pyrrha congratulated the blond knight with genuine delight.
"Not only Jaune's," Copen interrupted. "It's also an invasion-type Semblance. As evidenced by how he boosted Yang's healing, he can boost other people's Aura too."
"Jaune, that's an amazing Semblance!" Pyrrha corrected herself.
"Congratulations Jaune. Maybe you can use your Semblance to boost your writing skills."
Everyone turned to see Blake and GV approach the group. Blake looked decidedly unimpressed, while GV sent Jaune a congratulatory nod.
"What do you mean?" Mytyl asked.
"After GV showed me his 'essay', and I'm using that word very loosely here, I decided to take a look at Jaune's."
"You rummaged through my stuff?" Jaune asked with a raised eyebrow. Blake ignored him.
"It's the sentence 'I shall not be a Haven that protects the weak and defenseless' repeated over and over to fill three pages."
Everybody but Ruby, who was still running laps, turned to look at Jaune.
Jaune shrugged. "Cardin's is the sentence 'I shall not be the Atlas to inspire strength in others', filling two pages."
GV chipped in. "Mine is 'I shall not be the Shade that seeks to comfort the weary'. Four pages."
"You are braver than me for turning in that to Miss Goodwitch," Kohaku said.
"Ozpin is grading them," GV explained.
"Oh… in that case you're just smarter than me," Kohaku amended.
"I DID IT!" Ruby tackled Yang as the ballistic missile she was born to be.
"Mytyl, combat module 'Petal Burst' has been added to my repertoire. Do you wish to try it out?"
"Yes, Yes, YES!" Ruby jumped in place. "No, wait. Lola should transform into Ren first. I don't want her stealing my thunder."
Copen relented under Ruby's exuberance. "Lola, activate Tranquility module." Upon command, Lola appearance shifted to black and jade with pink trims, the holograph discs now resembling a pink lotus flower. The P-bits arrangement also resembled a lotus flower, hovering slightly above the floor.
Before being snatched from where she was hovering and shoved unto Ren's face.
"Ren, Ren, Ren, look! It looks like you!" Ruby continued pushing the pod unto Ren's face, who employed all the patience he had learn throughout the years of dealing with Nora. Speaking of, where was Nora?
"Boss, help! I'm being Ruby-handled!" Lola said in distress. "Ahhh!"
Tossing Lola aside, Ruby turned towards Lumen, who retreated a bit in apparent trepidation. Ruby's eyes sparkled with anticipation.
"Just activate the module, Lumen," Mytyl advised." Otherwise she'll just kidnap you during the night."
Bobbing up and down as if nodding, Lumen activated Petal Burst.
And was subsequently snatched by Ruby, who squealed and spun in circles in unrestrained joy.
"This is so cool. Best. Day. Ever!"
Ruby's happiness was contagious and Mytyl found herself smiling at the young reaper. She had to admit, Lumen looked pretty cool. She was now predominantly red with black trims. But what truly sold the Ruby‑ness of the looks was how the holographic wings became a red mini-cloak, with a hood covering Lumen and a short cape fluttering behind.
"How would Ruby's super speed translate to your pod?" Weiss asked.
"Let's try it out," Mytyl said. "Ruby, can you please release Lumen?"
The little pod quickly flew behind Mytyl upon achieving a modicum of freedom. The P-bits settled into the default position for Petal Burst, which turns out is three pods by Mytyl's head; one above and two on each side. The remaining five pods hovered behind her with no discernible pattern… wait…
"Is it me or are the P-Bits arranged as a cloak?"
Kohaku tilted her head at Mytyl's question. "Now that you mention it…"
"Cloaks are cool!" Ruby defended. "Come on, I want to see how fast you go! Will you leave petals? Will they be red or purple? I'm so excited."
Mytyl prepared herself. She was used to fast movements, but Ruby's Semblance still was a few leagues above her boots in that department. If she wasn't careful, she might crash face first into a wall. She manifested some aura, which Lumen quickly collected via the P-bits to power up the Ex-Semblance system. A thin sheet of purplish-blue aura formed from P-Bit to P-Bit. Yep, definitely a cloak.
And that was Mytyl's last thought before being violently shot forward at dizzying speeds. A second later, she came to a stop on her knees at the other side of the room. That was one of the drawbacks of the Ex-Semblance system. Most of the times, Semblances were very good at providing the safety mechanisms required to make them usable. It was the reason GV didn't electrocute himself every time he used Azure Striker. Why Yang didn't immolate herself. Or why Copen didn't end up flinging his body into anything with his sigil. After all, anything with his aura was attracted to the mark and what has the most amount of his aura if not himself?
And in this case, it was the reason the world was spinning. She was not Ruby and as such this speed was not made for her. At least her own aura and the copied aura cloak made sure her insides were not scrambled. It wasn't much of a problem. It would just take Lumen some more time to analyze it further and modify it into usability.
"Wow, so pretty!" Ruby's voice sound from some distance behind. Mytyl rolled so that she was sitting and looking at where everyone was.
She was met with a flurry of blue butterflies that were left on her wake. Aura constructs, by-product of Ruby's Semblance. The result of her using the Semblance rather than Ruby. And just as Ruby's rose petals, the ephemeral butterflies soon dissipated into nothingness.
"That. Was. AWESOME!" Ruby gave her final verdict.
"You ok over there, sis?"
Mytyl gave out thumbs up as she slowly got on her feet and made her way back.
"I needs some fine tuning, but I think we can call it a success," Mytyl said as she regrouped. "Though I suppose the name Petal Burst is not quite accurate anymore. Maybe Aura Burst?"
"I'm going to call you Mini-me and we're going to be besties!"
Mytyl blinked at where Ruby was Ruby-handling Lumen. When did she snatched Lumen?
The door to the training room slammed open. A livid Nora promised pain and suffering to someone inside.
"You!" Her word dripped with vitriol.
She pointed at that someone. At face value, it was hard to tell at whom, since everyone was close enough to each other and she was far enough to everyone to make the pointing uninformative.
With previous knowledge, it was clear GV was the target of her anger. "Hello Nora. Who are you referring to?"
"I repeat my previous statement," Kohaku said, "you are a braver person than I will ever be, GV. Or stupider. It's a fine line, really."
"Nora, Nora, look! Mini-me- HEY!"
"Yeah, yeah, Ruby, that's nice," Nora pushed Ruby to the side – the little Huntress squawking at the action – as she stalked towards GV. "How did you do it?"
"Do what?" GV played innocent.
"THIS!"
She shoved her scroll on GV's face. Error 404: Page not Found.
"…I don't get it." GV continued selling his innocence. In his defense, nobody else got it.
"That's the webpage for the brand of haircare products I use. And this," she swiped to another tab, same error, "the brand of soap." She swiped again. "The brand of lotions, toothpaste, cosmetics, EVEN MY FAVORITE BRAND OF PANCAKES!"
"…I still don't get it." GV insisted.
"My entire stockpile of EVERYTHING was gone, GV. From my own bathroom."
"Are you sure, Nora" Ren asked, "they were there when I got ready this morning."
"I know, Ren," she turned back to GV. "Couldn't find them anywhere in the room. So, I went to get more and deal with you later. But when I get to the store. Nothing. Nada. Those products? Never existed. Asked the employees, they swore those products were NEVER a thing."
"Sounds to me like you're crazy," GV metaphorically stood on the hill he was supposed to be dying on. The dying part was not sticking.
"So, I went to Vale. Surely you couldn't have bribed every store in Vale, right?" Nora narrowed her eyes. "How you did it, Volt? How did you convince an entire country that my products do not exist?"
"Sound to me like you're crazy," GV reiterated.
Nora pointed two fingers at her eyes, then at GV's. "I'm watching you, buzz boy." And with that, Nora stalked out of the training room.
Everyone turned to look at GV.
"Surely Nora is misremembering, right?" Yang gave the most sensible explanation.
"I don't know, sis, you wouldn't just forget what your hair conditioner is called." Ruby provided Nora with a sensible defense.
"I can confirm the products Nora mentioned exist. Or perhaps 'existed' is the correct verb tense?" Ren said, eyebrow raised and eyes on GV.
"Nah, she's just crazy." GV dismissed Ren's accusations. "On an unrelated note, did I ever told you guys about that one time my roommate and a friend pranked me and convinced the entirety of Vacuo that what I saw as green was red, yellow was purple, blue was orange, and the other way around?"
"Didn't you mention your roommate was like a sister to you?" Jaune asked.
"Eh. More or less. More less than more. And while we're on the subject, my friend was like a big sister."
"That explains so much." Jaune decided.
"Mhm" Ruby nodded.
"Yep," Yang popped
"I suppose it does," Weiss added.
"Affirmative," Lumen and Lola confirmed in unison.
"My condolences," Copen sympathized.
"Hear, hear," Kohaku preached.
"All of you are crazy," Blake voiced.
Author's Notes
Guess we're not getting the ****ing Monkey King just yet. Stay strong, Goku. Stay strong for mother. No, wait, wrong Monkey King.
Rundown!
Jaune's Semblance: Given that it's implied Jaune used his Semblance for the first time in Forever Fall, I'm assuming he can amplify his own aura, even though we haven't seen him do so.
Menta: Until we get a proper name for Jaune's sisters that are not Saphron, I have to name them myself. I could take the names Coeur created for his fics. But no, BECAUSE of the photo reveal. There's another writer, DemAN3000, who took Coeur's interpretation of the sister,paired them to each of the canon sisters, then changed the names to fit their color schemes. It was in his fic "Knightshade Between the Scenes". I could make an inappropriate comment here, but instead I'll just say it's a fun read.
All of that said, I am picking some of the personality quirks from Coeur's fics.
Anyways, names. The Arcs don't have a naming convention. Jaune is French for yellow. Saphron is either an orange spice or, if you're wrong, a purple flower from which the aforementioned spice is made of. Yes, I'm camp "Saphron the spice". I'll fight you on this. My point is I can't just go "oh, all Arcs are named after spices/flowers", so that's out of the picture. On one hand, it gives me freedom to name the Arcs anything. On the other, choice paralysis. And it doesn't help blue-green is not exactly the most common of colors in nature. I ultimately settled for the name Menta.
If you look at the photo, Menta would be the minty colored sister with the glasses. Menta is Spanish for "Mint". I considered "Mennica", Polish for Mint, but ultimately Menta is just shorter and roll off the tongue better.
I also toyed with calling her Aqua, but when I say Aqua I think of Kingdom Hearts and she does not look like an Aqua to me. The other option was Turquoise, which had the advantage of being an actual thing that exists in a world that doesn't believe that color is kind of cool. However, I didn't like any of the translations for turquoise. Either they were too off from either Spanish or English for me to pronounce them or they sounded pretentious (like they do in Spanish and English). So, in the end, I went back to square one and opted for Menta.
The only other sister I have an idea of what to name would be the little not-Saphron one. I'm thinking of keeping it simple and call her either Violet or Lavender. Alternatively, I can go more cutesy sounding with Teazle (or Teasel or Teazel) or more outlandish with Wisteria.
Actually, now that I'm typing it out, I love the name Teazle. It's adorable and refers to a prickly plant with purple flowers. It fits her wild, anime-esque hair! Teazle Arc it is!
This is also the reason I'm not considering Teal for Menta.
GV, Master Prankster: Expect GV's pranks to become increasingly more ridiculous. He learned from the best.
Ren!Lola and Ruby!Lumen: A look at what those variations of the pods look like. You can assume the pods can share these modules with each other. I think their looks are fairly self-explanatory. Cloak for Ruby, Ren's lotus motif for Ren. Tranquility works like an area of effect that suppresses emotions, hence why the P-Bits hover close to the ground, demarcating the area of effect. For Petal Burst…
Hear hear: In case you missed it, in that last exchange participated everyone with a sister. Not a sibling, a sister. Hence Mytyl's absence.
Aura Burst: This will be the name of the Semblance the pods copied from Ruby. After the adjustment Mytyl mentioned, it will provide a burst of speed in one direction. More of a blink than Ruby's actual Semblance. That's a recurring element for these copied Semblances: they are not as strong and/or versatile as the originals. With that said, since there is no plan for each character to use this, here's a list of the aura constructs each of the main characters would leave if they used Aura Burst:
NOTE: Kohaku's aura construct hints at her Semblance.
- Ruby: Rose Petals (duh)
- Weiss: Snowflakes
- Pyrrha: Flakes of iron (i.e. ferromagnetism)
- Yang: Fire
- Jaune: Golden crescent shapes
- Nora: Electric sparks
- Blake: Hard to describe but think as if someone took a brush and smeared a painting of Blake. Similar to how sometimes her Semblance has been animated.
- Ren: Lotus Petals
- Mytyl: Stylized Morpho Butterflies
- GV: White feathers
- Kohaku: Gears
- Copen: His X sigil
Reviews
Anon: Again, thanks for bringing attention to ASG3. I literally had to leave the room to watch trailer and silently celebrate without interrupting. Glad you are liking the characters' interaction. Seeing new interactions is one of my favorite aspects of fanfiction, so it is one of my main focus when writing.
Blue Bragon: Thanks again for the encouraging words! I'll keep at it, then.