On the day of their mission, the first thing Opal noticed when she and her team's Manta took off was how different the airship sounded to their previously pilfered aircraft. Perhaps nobody other than herself could hear the engines as well as she could on account of her extra set of ears, but every part of the aircraft that took them to the abandoned dust mine ran significantly more efficiently than the craft they came into the kingdom on. The airship's engines hummed gently, the flow of dust through fuel lines was muffled, and the sounds of switches being flicked and buttons being pressed came out crisp and clear. Opal assumed that it was simply due to the fact their airship was top-of-the-line in comparison to their stolen ship's comparative age, but it was an impressive feat, nonetheless. It wasn't every day that she was reminded by sound alone about yet another reason Atlas' technological advancements were second to none across the entirety of Remnant.

From her position sat near one of the windows of the airship, she looked out at the environment below. Snowy tundra and various ice-tipped mountains extended as far as the eye could see, save for the occasional sight of some tracks left in the snow by some vehicle or local wildlife. The distinct lack of manmade structures on the way to their destination made Opal wonder somewhat if a road that once led to the mine had simply been buried by snow or if there had never been such a thing to connect the mine to Mantle in the first place. She wouldn't put it past who the mission file reported once owned the mine to have not bothered with the development of such basic infrastructure to save a little more lien.

Opal turned away from the tundra. There was no point in her miring herself down in any unnecessary negativity right before their mission was about to start; thus, she instead looked to the person sat close to her right side. Lux had his weapon in its musket mode and held his weapon close to his face, clearly inspecting the bolt-action mechanism for some reason or another.

"Lux?" Opal started. "Is there anything that I missed or messed up on with your upgrade?"

He quickly lowered his weapon down to his lap. "Oh, no! No, if anything you did better with the integration of the air compression chamber than even I could've probably done, and I made this thing from scratch! I'm just impressed, is all. Not that I'm a gun nut like Ruby was, but when you have eagle eyes like mine… you usually end up staring at things that look nice without really realizing, sometimes."

"Well, that's good to hear," she admitted. "Complex mechanisms like that are sometimes really hard to get done right on your first try."

"Good thing I had the best craftsman in the world to work on Wiz then, huh?" Lux praised.

Opal looked away to hide her blush. "We should probably wait until we're done with the mission to flirt."

Lux shrugged easily. "Fair enough. We'll probably get to the mine soon, so I guess it'd be for the best that we all get in the zone. Don't want to make some stupid mistakes when we're fighting a bunch of Grimm. We've got to make every mission count if the general's plan is going to work."

"Yeah," Tenebris agreed, his arms lounging lazily behind his head. "Which is why you should probably try to avoid ogling your girlfriend's ass after the mission starts."

"Hey, I've neverdone that!" Lux protested.

"Not recently," Tenebris quipped. "But if I'm remembering right, the last time I remember catching you doing something like was when-"

Aurora's hand flew over his mouth. "I'm going to stop you there. Before you say anything else simultaneously mortifying and distracting to our teammates, remember that there is a pilota few feet away who could probably overhear everything we're saying, please?"

As she removed her hand, Tenebris' only response was to let out a satisfied snicker.

"But now that we're getting back to normal conversation…" Lux threw an indignant glare at his brother before he hesitantly looked at his other teammates. "I won't lie, this mission feels like it's gonna be really big for us. I know it's only the first step on a long road ahead, but the fact that we're even here to take this step is honestly pretty cool. At least to me."

Having recovered from the rather clear reminder of the desire Lux possessed for her, Opal once again looked up at him. "You aren't alone, there. I'm sure that since you've all been working hard to understand everything we need to before Ironwood makes us his right-hand team you might all understand the weight of what's going to happen with us more than I do, but all of this still feels big. Like what we're doing will make a change to the world directly because of what we're going to be doing here in Atlas. Even if we're just starting, it feels good."

"Agreed," Tenebris said. "I don't know if this whole 'right-hand team' thing will ever really sink in or inflate any of our egos, but I do know that it's nice to have something that'll maybe be good on the horizon, for once."

"Right." Aurora supplied. "For so long it's felt like no matter what we do, we're only barely able to succeed, but now… we have allies and resources to work with. Amity Tower's launch isn't going to be just around the corner once we're done clearing out the Grimm, but the project will be off a good start, at the very least."

Tenebris stood up and started to stretch. "Yep! And don't forget that we'll be able to test out all our upgrades without too much trouble. Can't cause a lot of collateral damage when there's no city around to worry about in the first place."

"We'll still have to be careful about all the activated dust crystals that'll be everywhere down in the mine, but yeah," Lux agreed. He looked down at his weapon with admiration and proudly swapped it into its quarterstaff mode before he stood. "I can't say I'm not excited to see what Wiz can do now that it's gotten an Atlesian-level upgrade – not that I'm not excited to see what your guys' stuff can do too, of course."

Opal nodded peacefully as her boyfriend wandered over to the opposite sliding door of the airship to look out the window. "Honestly, I'm pretty sure everyone will be surprised at how much better in a fight they'll be, now. Pietro did a great job with the upgrades."

"Yeah, well you did too," Aurora added. "Considering that Ironwood had to ask you to work with him to make sure the upgrades didn't take forever; I like to think that you were almost as important as Pietro when it came to all our upgrades. How else would he have figured out all the details about our gear so quickly without you to help?"

"True." Opal smiled warmly. "Thanks, Aurora."

She returned the gesture. "Considering how much you did for all of us while you were cooped up in that lab, it's the least I could do. In the world we live in, we could all use a little more positive reinforcement every now and again."

"Hey, guys?" Lux spoke up, catching everyone's attention. "It's just a little speck in the distance right now, but I think that we're gonna be in range of the mine soon. Give or take a minute."

Opal finally stood and began securing her quiver and weapon on her person. "Then it's almost time for us to shine. Ruby and Jaune have probably briefed their teams about all the little details of what's about to go down one last time, so I'll do the same and keep it brief." Aurora tapped the base of her naginata against the ground as she was the last to rise, and Iridescence's eyes fell on their leader before she continued. "Once we hit the ground our mission is to infiltrate the mine from our assigned angle of attack and clear the area of Grimm, with the only major threat being an ancient Geist which I'm sure you all remember from the files I shared with you."

"A search and destroy mission," Tenebris commented. "Doesn't get much simpler than that."

"Compared to our first mission shadowing Professor Port, I think that any mission sounds simple," Lux pointed out.

"Well, there is a reason that Greater Cerberus are always marked as some of the highest-priority kill targets on the planet," Aurora commented. "And who knows? Maybe we just so happened to take care of the last one in existence."

Lux chambered a round in his musket as the sliding doors of the aircraft opened. "Yeah, that'd definitely be nice."

"Alright Iridescence, I've taken you as far as I can! From here on out, it's your job to see your assignment through!" The pilot shouted over the wind. "Good luck! Stay alive down there!"

When Opal ran out of their airship near the same time as her teammates, several sensations assaulted her senses all at once. Freezing wind whipped across her skin and billowed through her gi and the scent of crisp snow-filled air mixed with abandoned industry filled her nose. Tenebris and Lux's laughter amid their dangerously swift descent stood out above all else, and she couldn't help but smile at the sound of their boyish excitement and exuberance. The ground raced up to meet them eagerly as the mountain-based mine grew imposingly large, and the time had finally come that they execute their landing strategies. Never before had Opal been more thankful to Ozpin for deciding to throw her and everyone she would grow to love like family off a cliff on their first day of school.

She then moved to unsheathe her blade. As she held her katana as it converted into a bow with one hand, her other angled back into her quiver. In a flash, she'd drawn back and released a fire dust arrow toward where she would be set to land at a pace that far outmatched her own angled descent. The arrow hit the ground, exploding into a shockwave that Opal twisted through the air to catch, successfully slowing herself down enough that she could hit the ground at a run without damaging her Aura. As she slowed to a halt, she looked around as her teammates implemented their miscellaneous strategies.

Aurora's cables sprinted out of her apparatus and easily wrapped around the steel bars of an old CCT support tower, swinging her around until she eventually launched herself out at a much-safer speed from the height of the tower over to meet up with her leader.

Lux simply made the most of his semblance and whipped up a cyclone of snow amidst the whirlwind he created to catch him. He extended the use of his semblance for the short time it took for him to be convinced he'd successfully suspended himself in the air, at which point he simply let himself fall the final few feet.

Tenebris confronted the potentially catastrophic process of a crash-landing into the packed rock of the continent with the simplest strategy of all. He braced himself for impact and landed on his feet before he entered a crouch to further minimize the shock of his impact with the earth. When he finally stopped a few meters ahead of everyone else, he'd left a trail of broken rock and snow in his wake and threw a thumbs-up back everyone else's way.

While her teammates continued their short walks to rejoin her, Opal merely shook her head in amusement at Tenebris' choice of strategy as she pulled out her scroll. The screen expanded, and she pressed a button to create an open channel. "This is Opal. Team Iridescence has successfully landed and we're ready to work our way inside the mine."

"JNPR's all good and ready for action, too! We'll be headed inside soon," Jaune answered.

"Same for RWBY! Uncle Qrow's flying in now. Oh, and Opal! Blake wants to say thanks again for the repairs! Gambol Shroud is better than ever!"

"Yeah, well tell her that I appreciate it. We'll see you guys on the inside."

"You got it! Good luck!"

As she collapsed her scroll back down and put it away, her teammates each arrived at her position at around the same time. Lux was glancing around at the environment with his typical analytical manner, his quarterstaff slung over his shoulder when he shifted his attention to rest more directly on Opal.

"What was that call about?" he asked. "Wasn't paying attention to listening in."

"Oh, just making sure that everyone landed okay," Opal explained with a small shrug. "Blake also wanted to let me know that the repairs turned out great, which is always nice to hear."

"Right." Lux nodded and looked away. "Hey, Tenebris! Real nice landing strategy, there."

Tenebris grinned. "Hey, I've gotta check if this gel bodysuit thing absorbs shock like it's supposed to somehow, right? I figured it'd be safer to check now instead of when we're facing the Grimm on the inside, you know?"

"I was about to say that testing out that shock absorption by jumping out of an Atlesian airship was the most insane way you could test that out, but you have a point," Lux said, pointing a finger over at his brother.

"Hey, Opal," Aurora said. "I overheard the tail end of your call. With Ruby."

"Yeah?" Her brow furrowed. "What about it?"

Aurora's lip scrunched up a little into her cheek. "Well, now that we're away from people who could overhear us, I was wondering if we could talk about her for a second before we went inside. More specifically, about what she said when she took the lead when we were first being introduced to Ironwood."

"Oh!" Opal's eyes widened in realization. "So, her white lies about what we know about Jinn, Salem, and Ozpin, I'm guessing."

She nodded. "Exactly that. Have you had a chance to approach her about it at all?"

"I have." Opal started a slow walk in the direction of the mine entrance, and her three teammates followed. From where they'd landed at the perimeter of the mining complex, it'd be a few minutes' walk before they could enter the mine if they didn't hurry along – fortunately, there wasn't any set time limit for how long they had to complete their mission. "Right when the general left after giving us the run-down of what we're supposed to do here. Jaune and Qrow were a part of the whole conversation, too."

"And what were their opinions on how Ruby handled the situation?" Tenebris asked.

"All of us agreed that the calls she made weren't too immediately harmful, so none of us left the room worried about if she ruined things for us when it comes to the general," Opal explained, looking over her shoulder at him as she meandered along. "We decided that we'd defer to her judgment for the time being, and she knows now that we'll have to fess up everything we know to Ironwood eventually. I trust her to decide when that time will come."

Tenebris hummed thoughtfully. "Makes sense. It was her call to withhold information from Ironwood to begin with, so I guess it's only fair that she gets us out of this situation if it all goes south at some point."

"Let's just hope this situation doesn't go south at some point," Lux stressed. "We can't afford to lose an ally with as much power as Ironwood, even if he's looked shady up until recently."

"Trust me, I made sure everyone was well-aware of what I figure will happen if the situation with Ironwood ever goes wrong." Opal paused before she elaborated. "Maybe not regarding how much trust he has in us, but just the matter of what his endgame with the Amity Tower project looks like it's going to be."

Lux raised a brow. "Already thinking that far ahead, huh?"

Opal turned to face the main entrance again as they continued to approach. "I've spent too much of my life being bogged down in the past. It's about time I truly give my all when it comes to thinking about the future."

"I can't help but feel as though that conclusion you might've reached about Ironwood's end goal wasn't a pleasant one," Aurora hesitantly stated.

"It wasn't," Opal confirmed with a sigh. "To make a long story short, I pointed out to the three of them that Ironwood's plan to unify Remnant isn't just to promote peace. Even if he doesn't plan to keep that unity forever under the iron grip of Atlas' military when they come in and save every other kingdom, he's going to want to make use of it. He's going to want to take the fight to Salem, where we'd all be decimated because we don't know how or if we can even kill her in the first place. Ruby knows the risks if she decides that we shouldn't tell Ironwood everything we know about Salem and the history of the world before Amity Tower is completed."

Tenebris whistled. "So what you're saying is we're putting our faith in Ruby that she'll tell Ironwood 'hey, sorry I kept pivotal details about the biggest threat Remnant has ever known from you' at some point? And not only that, but in such a way that it won't trigger some catastrophic chain of scenarios that jeopardizes all of Remnant? That sounds like a pretty big gamble."

"Maybe," Lux half-agreed. "Ruby's one of the youngest people in our group and the youngest leader of a team from Vale in decades, but she hasn't let us down before. She's not the same weapons-obsessed dork of a kid that she was back at Beacon. Even if the risks are high, I've got faith that she won't ruin things for us here in Atlas when the time comes."

"Hopefully, you're right," Tenebris said. "I'd rather have Ruby prove me wrong when it comes to Ironwood than have us all turned into fugitives because of her decisions."

His brother returned a nod.

"Oh, and on the note of younger people in our group," Opal started. "We also discussed Oscar a little, as well. Ruby told me that she already made sure he didn't feel thrown under the bus, what with how she made that excuse about why Ozpin isn't around anymore."

Aurora appeared beside her. "That's good. I wonder sometimes what it must be like for Oscar to have two souls inside of him. It sounds like something you'd read about in a fantasy novel, but he's living through that kind of situation every day as a reality."

"I've probably said it before, but I will never not find what he has to go through messed up," Tenebris commented. "It'd be one thing if his immortality were like Salem's, but instead his method of surviving for centuries involves robbing people of their bodies every now and again. It's messed up."

"Definitely," Lux agreed. "All of this gets even worse when you think about Ozpin, too. We may have known him as our headmaster, but can any of us ever remember a time where we think we were talking to Ozpin whenever he'd show up? How much of the time were we just talking to Ozma while the guy whose body he owned always sat in the back seat?"

Tenebris shook his head. "There's no way for us to tell. We never knew Ozpin before whenever he was possessed by Ozma, but… I don't like where my mind's heading. If we couldn't tell the difference between Ozpin and Ozma, who's to say that we haven't still been talking to the old knight in not-so-shining armor every time we're face-to-face with Oscar?"

Opal stopped and turned around to face the twins. "I like to think that the grief Ozma showed us when we all learned about the history of our world was real. With any luck, he really has locked himself away in Oscar's mind."

"And if he's been fooling us this entire time?" Tenebris asked.

"Then we cross that bridge if and when we get to it. I'd like to avoid having to do anything rash that'd make us either enemies of or simply distrusted by the second oldest person on the planet, if we can," Opal explained.

"I say that's about as good a plan as we can ask for, really," Lux commented. "When the world's at stake, we can't make decisions that would probably set everyone back in the fight against Salem lightly."

"Oh, I'm on board with what Opal said man, don't worry," Tenebris reassured, placing his hand on Lux's shoulder as they too stopped. "Just wanted to make sure we're aware of all the options we have on the table. Even if they're ones we'll hopefully never have to take, it can't hurt to just think things through."

"Agreed, but enough talk," Opal said, tilting her head to point behind her. "We're here."

Everyone's attention then shifted to the mine entrance and the environment around it. Within the gargantuan indentation of the mountain the mine was carved into, the edge of a rocky cliff blotted out most of the sunlight leading into the entrance itself. Save for the presence of a few small tool shacks within the shaded area leading into the mouth of the abandoned facility and some overturned minecarts, the area felt colder and emptier than even the open tundra that laid just outside the perimeter of the area. Opal didn't know if the chill that ran up her spine was due to the frostbite-inducing cold whipping through her Aura or something far more sinister that laid in wait for her and the rest of Iridescence on the inside. Unfortunately, the only way she'd be able to confirm if her suspicions were true would be to head into the mine.

Whose monolithic open-mouthed entrance was entirely obstructed by a cave-in.

"Welp…" Tenebris walked forward and tapped his armored knuckles against a particularly large boulder. "This is certainly a cave-in. Looks like it's game over. Mother nature itself has turned against us, and we'll have to look for another way inside."

Lux's lips pressed into a line. "Hilarious. So, what's your plan to get us in?"

Tenebris hefted his rocket launcher off his back with one hand. "The same one I've always thought of when dealing with cave-ins. Blow it up and walk on in like it wasn't even there in the first place."

"Wouldn't that alert any Grimm on the inside that we're here, though?" Aurora asked. "And what about any dust crystals that might be near the entrance? We could wind up ruining the entire mission right here if we aren't careful with how we try and get through."

"You see, here's the thing." Tenebris raised one finger in front of him as he spoke. "The Grimm probably could smell us coming a mile away, so making a little noise and bringing them to us on a search and destroy mission isn't a big deal. And about the extra dust crystals…"

"Aurora has a good point," Lux finished. "Brute force might just send us all skyward and cause another cave-in. Considering that the cave entrance has probably been sealed up like this ever since the initial collapse, we should probably avoid any unnecessary risks that'd threaten the stability of the mine as we head inside."

"Which means that it's probably our best choice for me to cut us a clean hole into the mine with a quick boost from my semblance," Opal thought aloud. Her hand found its way to the hilt of her katana and her thumb idly tapped on it as she stared at the obstruction. "Alright. Everyone back up and get behind me. If this all falls anyway, I don't want anyone to get crushed."

Tenebris replaced Boomstick on his back and began a brisk jog back to his brother's position behind her. "You got it, chief!"

Lux placed his hand on her shoulder. "Did you want me to help clear away any debris if there's any left when you're done? Don't want to breathe in any more airborne dust particles than we have to, after all."

Opal nodded. "Yeah. Sounds like a plan."

"I'll leave you to the excavation work, then."

He lifted his hand, and she started in the direction of the collapse. Upon her arrival, the same boulder that Tenebris touched in his mock-inspection of the situation proved to be an extra head and shoulders taller than her. Other smaller boulders and other rocks pressed into the obstruction varied in size and shape, but the one she now stood in front of looked like it might very well be the cornerstone of the collapse's formation.

'Okay… so that's my target. Turn this one big boulder into gravel with enough cuts and the rest of the formation will cave inward. The entire collapse will turn into a steep slope and there'll be a big enough hole at the top of it that we can get inside, no problem.'

Opal took in a deep breath, and her stance widened as she leaned forward slightly. Her arms tensed with anticipation – every time she flooded her muscle fibers with the power of her soul via her semblance, the sudden release of energy that would always follow that short surge was always nothing short of cathartic. She pulled Emerald from its sheath slightly and closed her eyes, envisioning the exact angles and number of precise slashes she would need to execute if she wanted to avoid another cave-in. One final exhale, and her semblance amplified her body and empowered her blade.

Her arms moved in a blur along her premeditated path and each strike with her katana into the boulder cleaved through it like a hot knife through butter. Only when she opened her eyes did the boulder seem ready to accept its defeat, and the innumerable slashes powderized her inanimate opponent almost instantly. The entire obstruction started to groan, and another quick use of her semblance let her leap back to safety back with the rest of her team.

And then the collection of stone caved in on itself to create a neat slope for the awaiting team of fighters with a conveniently person-sized hole at the top of the new formation. Opal looked over her shoulder with a smirk at her teammates as the dust started to settle.

"You know Opal, sometimes I forget just how precise you've trained yourself to be when you use your semblance," Aurora said admiringly. "You cut us a way in and didn't even ruin the support the rest of the collapse gives the rest of the cave mouth. That takes skill."

Opal's smirk warmed. "Thanks."

"Which means that once I clear away all this dust, we can head inside and finally test out our new gear on some Grimm." Lux shoved forward with his palm and a powerful use of his semblance blew the airborne particles away to either side of the mine entrance. "I would say that this all sounds like a pretty good time if it weren't for the reason this mine was shut down in the first place."

Tenebris sighed through his nose. "Right. Dust mine. Probably had the most dangerous sections of the entire place manned by faunus workers exclusively."

Aurora eyed the new entrance into the mine warily. "Do we know if the workers' bodies were ever, you know… recovered?"

"Ironwood didn't think that it was necessary to tell us exactly how many people died when the first big collapse happened. Or if the bodies of the people who ended up dead or trapped inside were ever found," Opal explained. "He only gave us statistics about the estimated Grimm count on the inside, the layout of the mine – mission-relevant stuff like that."

"You'd think that with the reason we're gonna become his right-hand team in the first place that he'd at least say something about how many faunus died in there," Tenebris commented.

"I think I might've figured out a reason why. Look." Lux pointed in the direction of an overturned minecart. The paint was marred by exposure to the elements, but the snowflake emblem and the accompanying three letters remained legible.

The Schnee Dust Company once owned the mine, which meant that they were also the same people who left the people trapped inside to die and swept the entire crisis under the rug in the years that followed. Jacque Schnee's hands were stained with the blood of an untold number of lost lives, and the world never even punished him for his negligence.

Another chill ran up Opal's spine, though this time she was uncomfortably aware as to its source.

"Why am I not surprised that this is something that Weiss' dad would want no one to remember happening?" Tenebris shook his head.

Lux huffed shortly. "Because the only commitment the richest man on Remnant has is to himself and his money. Honestly, I'm kind of relieved now that I know who's responsible for all this."

"Why…?" Aurora asked.

"Because now I have another good reason to hate Jacque with every fiber of my being," he said simply. "That, and the fact that what we're doing here today will technically turn this entire area into a military-owned space. If that sick bastard ever had any plans of opening up the mine again one day, too bad for him. Ironwood will be able to decide exactly goes on here moving forward after we're done."

"Spite is a very dangerous form of motivation when it comes to situations like these," Opal said, looking at the new entryway again, "but it would probably be for the best that we made sure that no more people will lose their lives in this place again. Yet another good reason for us to clear out the Grimm in there today."

"Well, there's no time like the present," Tenebris commented. "We already gave RWBY and JNPR some good head starts on us with all our chatter. I don't want to have to tell Ironwood we had the lowest kill count because we took forever to even get inside the mine in the first place."

"Then it looks like you guys will finally get the chance to see what your new gear can do out in the field." Opal started in the direction of the newly made entrance. "Let's get going."

For a place that had been abandoned for probably as many years as anyone on her team had been alive, Opal was surprised to find that the inside of the mine was rather well-lit. Some old mining lamps fueled by easily wasted fuels such as oil had long since died out, but there was an equal abundance of dust-fueled blue lamps that lined the walls of the facility from the moment she and her team stepped inside. Given the abundance of dust-related hustle and bustle that must have taken place within the mine, Opal reflected that she probably should've expected there to be a few lingering echoes of human – or in this case, faunus-based – activity here. The presence of some lamps and unrefined dust wasn't what made the sight of the first few dozen feet the group traveled further into the mine all that disturbing, though.

It was the complete absence of any bodies.

"I know that Ironwood never mentioned if the bodies of the people trapped inside here were ever recovered, but…" Tenebris' brow furrowed as they continued along. "We all saw what the only way in and out of this place looked like. The entryways that RWBY and JNPR used didn't even exist until Ironwood's scouts carved them into the mountain for them to use for this mission. All that said – and forgive me if I sound blunt – where did the bodies go?"

"Right… this place was essentially turned into a lot of peoples' tomb. There should be at least some mummified skeletons around here somewhere, but there's just nothing," Aurora said. "It doesn't make any sense."

"But there is evidence that there were bodies here once." Lux stopped, which caused everyone else to do the same, and he lightly planted his weapon into the packed dirt below. He knelt close to the ground and, with an almost tender degree of care, brushed aside some of the dirt before him with one hand. Through his work, a suspicious white fragment that had only barely poked out of the soil beforehand was revealed. "Here's all the proof you need."

Aurora's face fell. "That's-"

"Bone," Lux finished solemnly. He didn't move to pick up the shard or remove his hand away from it, but instead simply stared at it. "And before anyone suggests that it might just be a piece of a Grimm's skull or armor, don't. We all know that not a single part of a Grimm's body would keep its form long enough to get buried by all this dirt before it turned into ash."

Opal crouched down next to him. "Then you don't have to stare at it any longer. I think we have our answer about what happened to the bodies now."

Lux followed her lead as she hooked an arm underneath his and rose back up to her feet, though his eyes lingered on the unrecognizable piece of bone for a little longer before he tore his gaze away from it. "Right."

"Wait, but what you implied doesn't make any sense," Tenebris contested. "It sucks, but people get killed by the Grimm all the time, and sometimes their bodies are recovered more-or-less intact. Why would the bodies of the people who got trapped here get eaten and not everyone else's on the planet?"

"Because although the Grimm don't have to eat to live, they can," Lux explained. "Usually a Grimm won't bother eating someone they just killed because they're always on the hunt or, if they're old enough to act smart, on the run from Huntsmen. Look at things this way – if you were a Grimm that found an abandoned mine you could age and grow stronger inside, basically had nothing to do in the meantime, and there were just a bunch of dead bodies lying around…"

"Shit," Tenebris hissed. "This mission just got a ton darker."

"You think?" Lux quipped. "Just be thankful you aren't cursed with my eyes right about now. I can't help but notice all the shards here and there as we go along."

Opal squeezed his shoulder. "Well, keep those eyes anywhere other than the floor and you should be alright. I can't believe I'm saying this, but with any luck, we'll hopefully run into a bunch of Grimm soon. It'll be easier to ignore all the messed-up stuff we could probably spot around here when we're in the middle of a fight and busy getting a better feel for what our gear can do now."

He took a deep breath. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Got carried away with the staring there and made us lose time. We should probably keep going."

"You don't have to think that you wasted our time, Lux," Aurora mentioned, appearing at his other side as she gave him a concerned look. "All you did was look around to give us a clearer picture of what happened here. Even if you get carried away sometimes, your sight's probably one of the most valuable assets we have on our team."

"Besides, with how crazy everything's been the past few months, we all get carried away now and again," Tenebris commented. "I'd honestly probably be more surprised if you weren't a little put-off by the fact we're essentially cleaning up the SDC's mess today."

Lux gave a nod. "You guys make good points. I appreciate it."

"Then I guess it's time to get back to the 'search' part of our mission," Tenebris said. "Here's to hoping we won't go too much longer without any Grimm deciding to show up. I can only deal with this whole 'ominous abandoned mine' atmosphere for so long before I go nuts."

Opal gripped the hilt of her weapon. "Well, you won't have to wait much longer. Look."

The rest of her teammates looked forward and saw signs of disturbance only a few feet in front of them. A once unperturbed patch earth with only a few other flecks of bone strewn about it shuddered and cracked as something to indicate some creature burrowing its way to the surface from below. Several more such disturbances followed the first, and the faint sound of inhuman clicks and chitters struck faintly into Opal's ears before the source of the activity emerged.

Centinels. Easily comparable to the centipedes from which they derived their name, the creature was composed of a long, segmented body colored with the typical pitch black one would expect to see from a Grimm. Each segment came with a pair of clawed legs and possessed a protective bony shell that only left the underbelly of the beast exposed. Despite an evident lack of eyes, each Centinel made its way through the world easily enough via echolocation to better target their prey with their fearsome four-clawed jaws. No fewer than ten emerged from below at various angles, spinning around like drills as they burrowed out of the ground, chittering like insects all the while.

"Oh, cool! Last time we ever even heard about these things we were back at Beacon. Good times." Tenebris stepped forward, cracking his knuckles. "So, am I headed in first, or are we moving in as a team? Your call, Opal."

She gave her teammates a confident look and tensed, ready to spring into action as the Centinels began an ominous series of clicks. "We head on in together. Let's make them regret the day they moved into this mine."

"My kind of plan." Tenebris smiled. "Here we go!"

"Attack!" Opal commanded.

All members of Team Iridescence sprung into motion. Tenebris charged headlong into the first few Centinels with a brief burst of acceleration with his weapon's thruster while Lux instead opted to run forward and back his brother up. Aurora punched her cables out like bullets into the tunnels' wall and threw herself into an elegant dance over their opponents' heads while Opal ran ahead of everyone in an instant with a short boost from her semblance.

Having closed the gap between herself and a pair of Centinels that had only recently emerged from the earth, Opal prepared to strike. She unsheathed her blade and delivered a devastating strike along one's exposed stomach in one fluid motion and then turned to face her other quarry. It lunged forward as its ally turned into ash on the ground to try and tear off her face, only for Opal to deftly duck beneath the attack and cut the lower third of the creature's body clean off at the gap between some of its segments. The creature let out an insectoid squeal as it was suddenly shortened and thrown to the ground, at which point a quick semblance-boosted stomp from Opal crushed its skull, killing it.

Aurora flew by overhead as another three new Centinels burrowed out of the ground, her naginata extended in front of her to cover her friend from behind. She landed on one knee and immediately jabbed her blade into the exposed portion of one Centinel's head before it had a chance to react. Another attempted to skitter toward her along the ground to try and nip through her armored heel, only to find itself suddenly ensnared and thrown into the air by one of her cables in an instant.

It attempted to bite through its binds to escape, but by the time its mouth even opened, Aurora had already swapped Sapphire into its assault rifle configuration. A quick succession of rounds pummeled through the upper half of its body and Aurora turned her target into forgotten ash on the ground. As she quickly began to reel in the cable with her semblance, she turned her attention to the last of the three as it leaned back and made a guttural retching noise.

"This can't be a good sign…" Aurora mumbled.

The Centinel whipped itself forward with one final retch, and a gooey green substance flew from its maw. Aurora leaned to the left to avoid the ranged attack and glanced over her shoulder to see the substance smoke and hiss as it started eating through the wall of the tunnel.

"Okay, I don't remember Professor Port ever saying that they had acid spit… good to know that now rather than later…" she noted.

She returned her focus to her present opponent just in time as it launched another glob of acidic spit toward her. Aurora jumped to the left to avoid it impacting her center of mass and surged forward on foot to interrupt the Centinel before it could produce another round. Right as it was about to make another use of its acid at point-blank range, she smashed the Grimm in the side of its head with the butt of her rifle. Her leg then reached high in the air and whipped back down like a hammer into the center of its armored back, pinning it to the ground and offering her an opening to deliver a few shots clean through its skull.

"Yeah, this armor was just upgraded. I won't allow all of Pietro's hard work go to waste because of some random bug, thank you very much." Aurora looked back at the rest of her team. "Guys! Be careful with these Sentinels! If they start sounding like they're about to hurl, they're aiming acid spit at you!"

Lux used his semblance to blow some acid aimed at his face off-course and jabbed his weapon into the head of a Centinel so hard that it left a series of cracks in the rock wall it smashed into before finally fading away. "Thanks! Already noticed that, but it's the thought that counts! These things might be some kind of evolved strain of the same Centinels that Professor Port told us he fought when we were back in Vale."

"Oh, cool!" Tenebris shouted. "Be sure to tell him all about these new Centinels when we see him again someday. For now…"

He turned his attention back around the direction they came, to what looked to be another bulky group of Centinels that arrived late to the party. A pair of the insectoid Grimm intertwined and started to spin unnaturally through the air as they charged straight for him. With a smirk on his face, Tenebris strolled up to the pair of Centinels and threw his hands into the fray to shut their attack down early. Even combined, the Centinels' efforts didn't even scratch the outer layer of his armor in the time it took Tenebris to find a grip on their heads. Their spin was stopped with minimal effort on his part, and the pair of Grimm seemed to squirm in fear before Tenebris promptly killed them by bashing their armored skulls together.

"We've got a fight to win," Tenebris finally finished. He then retrieved Boomstick from his back and widened his stance to aim further down the tunnel at what appeared to be the final five Centinels left in their encounter. "And I'm sure that one shot from Boomstick here should put an end to our battle against the bugs in three… two…"

Both Aurora and Opal leaped into the fray before he had a chance to fire.

Opal had already transitioned her weapon into its bow form before she even completely passed him. She nocked two arrows as she threw herself down onto her knees and loosed them one after the other into two Centinels' heads. Fluidly rising back onto her feet and transforming Emerald back into its katana form, Opal's eyes flared with spiritual flame as she diced a third Grimm into as many pieces as it had segments before it turned into ash.

Aurora cleaned up the rest from there. Her feet slammed into the chest of one Centinel and made it bend backward before she plunged Sapphire, once again in its naginata form, into its exposed throat. The last Centinel chittered at her warningly to try and prevent her from doing the same to it as she did with its partner, but another swap of her weapon's configuration and three shots into its torso killed it just the same.

"Steal my thunder a little harder why don't you…" Tenebris said exasperatedly as he replaced his weapon on his back again.

Lux patted him on the shoulder. "They probably made the right call. Dunno if rocket fire inside of a dust-filled mine would be a wise decision if we wanted to get out of here alive."

"Pfft! It was just gonna be a low-power rocket!" Tenebris protested.

"In a tight space like this tunnel here? Even if there isn't any dust hidden behind the walls where those Grimm were at, you might as well set off a bomb. Remember, Boomstick does use dust as ammo," Lux reminded. "Not all that great an idea to use any kind of explosive dust when we're in an enclosed area."

His brother sighed. "At this rate, I'm gonna forget how to aim with my own rocket launcher…"

Lux smirked and rolled his eyes. "You'll get your chance someday, man."

"I hope so." Tenebris straightened as their teammates rejoined them. "So, I guess this means that we cleared out this part of the mine of Centinels. Good riddance. Can't say I'll really miss the sensation of grabbing and punching a bunch of people-sized bugs all that much."

"Same here," Aurora agreed. "I'd almost prefer to fight a bunch of Manticores and Ursai than so many insectoid Grimm. Bugs have always creeped me out, most of the time."

Lux shrugged. "I'll be honest, I don't think anyone here is all that big a fan of bugs, but hey! We killed all the ones around this part of the mine, so at least we probably won't have to worry about any more Centinels showing up while we're here."

For a moment, Opal simply stood and stared at her team as a sensation of satisfaction bloomed in her chest at the sight. It may have been bizarre on paper, that their troubles with Salem and Atlas and so many other things could be forgotten in the middle of a mission, but it was a reprieve she would readily welcome if she could see her friends at their best. Before she could open her mouth to tell everyone they should keep going though, one of her feline ears swiveled in the direction of an ominous noise far behind them, another followed from the tunnels ahead. Both sources of the respective disturbances seemed to be closing in on their location.

"Eyes up," she said. "It looks like those Centinels might've had friends."

"How many?" Tenebris asked.

Opal's eyes shut as she trained her ears on either noise. "It sounds like there's only two coming at us from ahead and behind us right now, but they don't sound like low-level Grimm if the weight of their steps is any indicator."

A feral roar echoed through the tunnels from further inside the mine, while the other Grimm that was on the approach from behind let out a distant groan that would've sounded human had its unnatural depth not given it away as a monster. Opal opened her eyes to find her teammates' orbs widened as they caught wind of the disturbances.

Lux held his quarterstaff at the ready. "Now I know you guys said that my eyes are really useful, but I'd like to take the final three seconds we have before the Grimm get here to mention how quite frankly awesome Opal's hearing is all the time."

Tenebris walked up beside him, his focus fixed on the tunnels ahead. "It does pretty much act like an early warning system a lot of the time…"

"I appreciate the compliments, but we can talk more about how great it is that there's two faunus on this team after we're done with the Grimm," Opal said. "They're almost here."

The new arrivals then revealed themselves in all their glory.

From up front, a genuine Beringel lumbered into view. Despite being all fours, the gorilla-esque creature still towered an intimidating foot taller than even Tenebris. Its muscles bulged like tree trunks and its skin was largely unmarred – given how few Beringels would ever dare to attempt travel to Solitas due to their inherent disadvantage at swimming, the fact that it was largely unharmed meant that it was old. That, and it had been in the mine for long enough for any of its wounds to heal completely. Not a threat to be taken lightly.

From behind, an equal threat skidded to a halt in the form of an Alpha Beowolf. Ice clung to its thick black hide, sharp canine jaws, and even coated a solid portion of the spikes on its back, but it was still ready to rumble. Although its Beringel counterpart had it beat with brute strength, the Alpha Beowolf had intelligence, ferocity, and speed on its side by default. If it was around the same age as the Beringel, it was an arguably even more dangerous opponent if its fight dragged on and it was given the chance to catch on to its adversaries' moves.

"Hey, Lux." Tenebris tilted his head in his brother's direction. "Want to see if we can take down this grumpy son of a bitch together? Could be fun."

"Absolutely," Lux said confidently. "Aurora. Opal. We've got the Beringel covered if you can handle that Alpha Beowolf in the meantime."

Opal shrugged. "So long as you guys are fine with a divide and conquer kind of strategy in this fight, that works for me. Aurora, so long as we have each other's backs, this thing won't stand a chance."

She smiled. "Took the words right out of my mouth."

Both Grimm bellowed furiously at their quarries and started to charge. In return, all members of Iridescence shared in a unanimous series of confident smirks as their opponents made their jobs that much easier. Opal felt her blade yearn to be unsheathed once more.

"Now!"

As per usual, she sprang forth first, her semblance amplifying the speed in her every step. The same instant the Alpha Beowolf recognized that she would have her sights set on its side, it dug its claws into the ground and turned to face her as it stopped. Still in possession of the initiative though, Opal successfully delivered a deep slash across the creature's boney snout. It reeled back in pain and unintentionally exposed its torso, at which point she speedily took advantage of the opportunity and cut off each of its six armored ribs with only a slight amount of effort before the Alpha's vengeful claws aimed at her chest forced her to leap out of melee range.

It turned to follow her as she isolated herself further away from both the twins and her partner on their end of the battle. With only a brief second of hesitation as it contemplated potential risk, the Grimm roared and fell back onto all fours in what would probably become an attempt to close the gap between them. Aurora's cables latched onto the spikes of its back and she pulled herself forward, successfully thwarting the creature's upstart charge while she closed in herself.

"You'll have to fight smarter than that!" Aurora taunted, and her attacks echoed through the tunnel as several bullets buried themselves deep in the back of the Beowolf's hide.

Despite its age and wisdom, the pain proved to be too much for it to ignore as it let out an infuriated snarl. It whirled around with inhuman haste with its arm outstretched to sever the cables Aurora connected to its back before she could reel them in or leverage them any longer, but the Grimm was interrupted once again as a trio of arrows from Opal nailed it in the side. Sapphire switched modes back into a naginata, thus enabling Aurora to cleave the spikes on their adversary's back clean off before she finally decided to fling herself ahead to rejoin her partner.

"In all honesty, I think this is going rather well for us at the moment," Aurora said, smiling. "Is it just me or are Alpha Beowolves' tempers the part of them that almost always overshadows their intelligence in a fight?"

Opal shook her head. "No, you're right. Alpha Beowolves are at their deadliest when they have a pack that can whittle away at their enemies while they stand back to watch and figure out how to take them off-guard. That's why most of the time you want to end one of these things quickly before they get a chance to think things through."

"Then how about we give this monster everything we've got and end its miserable existence here and now?" Aurora proposed.

"Hey, when did you decide you wanted to have fun in a fight?" Opal asked with a grin.

She shrugged. "Even I can only spend so long with Lux and Tenebris before they start to rub off on me. It had to happen eventually. I wouldn't bet on me acting like this all the time, though."

"You won't hear any complaints from me about that," Opal returned. "I'll see if I can't cleave this thing apart with my semblance and some quick hits. If I can't and it manages to put me on the back foot, all the glory goes to you."

"Sounds like a plan the twins would be able to get behind," Aurora commented. "I'm in."

'My gods, they did get through to her!'

"Okay then…" Opal returned her attention to their canine opponent as it shuttered with bestial rage that finally overshadowed its pain. "Time to rid the world of another monster."

Opal then amplified her speed with no further warning and zoned in entirely on her opponent. It snarled and tried to nip at her head as she came in close, but she ducked beneath its attack and raked her katana across the underside of its jaw. A vertical slash with its claws tore through the ground before it tried to tear open her stomach, but Opal's amplification let her leap to the side of the beast in a blur. In the second that followed, she committed her semblance to help her pepper the beast from all angles with a series of slashes, and its black blood spewed from each wound like mist before she finally decided to conserve her Aura and back away.

Yet the beast still didn't fall, and as it fell onto all fours in preparation to enter what would likely be its last-ditch offensive, Opal remained as tense as ever as she re-sheathed her blade.

'I've probably burned through fifteen to twenty percent of my Aura already… but it looks like I might have to bust out my ascended state to take this thing down after all. Unless…'

Right as the Alpha Beowolf entered a pounce that would act to initiate its desperate assault, one of Aurora's cableswrapped around one of its front paws. She pulled back shortly thereafter to thwart its advance and caused it to crash unceremoniously on its back before it twisted around and glared at her. It prepared to unleash its anger on her instead.

"Sorry, but you aren't hitting either of us," Aurora said, smiling. "Let's see what these upgrades can do."

The cable storage device on her back let out a distinct click, and a second cable shot out like a bullet not a moment later, its tip coated in ice dust. As the cable jabbed clean through the beast's other front paw, its arm was frozen to the ground with a sudden growth of ice. The two cables that followed glowed green with earth dust and spawned sharp shards from the ground that further cemented the Grimm onto all fours as they dug into its hind legs. The Alpha Beowolf strained against its sudden binds, but the combined cage born of dust and Aurora's cables both held firm.

Aurora's smirk grew ever more confident as a final pair of cables shot out and surged forth like snakes while she simultaneously transitioned her weapon from its naginata form back to its rifle configuration one last time. Her pair fire dust-coated cables and a hail of bullets raced one another on a perfectly aimed warpath headed for the Grimm's skull.

It didn't have a chance to let its jaw drop in disbelief before its head was blown clean off. Her cables then returned to their apparatus with a metallic clink, she reloaded her rifle with practiced grace, and Aurora held her weapon proudly against her chest as the Grimm's corpse faded away in the nonexistent breeze.

"And good riddance," she quipped.

Opal looked at her in awe. "I'm going to go ahead and assume that the upgrades Pietro made to your cables are to your liking."

"They're that and somuch more," Aurora reassured. "I think that I could get really used to being able to coat my cables in dust whenever we're in a fight in the future. Remind me to thank him again in person when this is all over."

"Will do," Opal said with a nod. "But for now…"

The pair focused their attention deeper into the tunnels. Tenebris and Lux were still in the midst of a fierce melee with their opponent. The Beringel's skin was marred with bullet wounds and some of its once-untarnished bony plates had been cracked or broken off, but it still seemed to be fighting at peak form, nonetheless. Its opponents still wore their typically confident looks when they fought alongside one another but remained on the defensive as their quarry continued beating at the earth in front of itself and stalked forward, clearly intent on the idea that it would pound them into pieces underneath its fists.

"Should we help them...?" Aurora asked as she rejoined her partner.

She rolled her head from side to side. "Probably not. We already stole Tenebris' thunder once. I say we should probably let the guys have the glory with this one."

"They would get to test out their new gear in the process…" Aurora paused. "Okay then, we'll leave them to it, but we should still be ready to help out if they need it."

"Of course," Opal said with a brief nod. "For now, though, we can watch our teammates duke it out together against an ancient Beringel. Not exactly something you'd be able to see every day."

"True."

It was then that the Beringel's seemingly tireless attacks against the ground came to an end. It raised its thick arms proudly into the air and beat against its chest, bellowing a roar before it fell back onto all fours again. Smoke seemed to fume from its hollow nose as it simply stared the twins down with enough intensity in its unholy eyes to melt steel. In return, Lux and Tenebris merely shared a look and an almost nonchalant shrug.

"You know Lux, I think that he's finally getting kinda-sorta pissed that he hasn't been able to even land a hit on us yet," Tenebris commented. "I almost feel bad for the thing."

"Yeah, if it wasn't a creature hellbent on the destruction of every trace of humanity on the planet, it'd almost be funny how bad it is with its aim," Lux returned. "Then again, I'm pretty sure one solid hit on a normal person from that thing would probably send their ribs flying out their back, so we should probably finish this guy off before he figures us out."

"Probably." Tenebris looked back at the Grimm. "What do you think? Wanna accept that you're still somehow miraculously garbage in a fight after a few hundred years around Remnant or do you want to keep trying to take us down?"

Almost immediately, it lowered itself to face-level with the twins and bellowed at the pair in such a way that almost made it sound annoyed with their banter before it jumped at them. Its arms tensed above its head in preparation for an overhead smash, and its adversaries doubled back a few feet in response. The Beringel's attack created a crater where they once stood, and it huffed in annoyance before it started charging toward them.

"It looks like we have our answer!" Tenebris shouted. "I've got a plan though!"

"Does it involve our upgrades?" Lux quickly asked.

"Yep! I'll test out my shit and make an opening for you to take advantage of yours," he explained. "With all the Manticores I had to manhandle on the way to Argus, I'm fairly sure that me and my gear can handle an angry ape."

"Yeah, sure. You do that!" Lux blew himself backward. "Have fun!"

He raised his fists. "Will do!"

At that moment, the Beringel completed its charge. It swung its left arm like a club with the intent to hammer Tenebris like a nail, only for him to send the attack backward with a strong right hook of a counter. The sound of his attack reverberated off the walls with a muffled boom, and his left fist flew and caused another repetition of the sound mixed with the crush of bone as an uppercut jerked the Beringel's head backward.

"There's a start…" Tenebris muttered.

The Beringel spat out several teeth and whipped its head back into place to stare down his foe again, but Tenebris was already in the middle of another jab that suddenly introduced a new crack in the beast's bony armor where its nose should've been. As the Grimm reeled back with a huff, Tenebris started a series of hooks and jabs with a frenzied yell that almost overshadowed the guttural grunts and growls the Beringel let out as each attack landed. Over a dozen completed strikes in, and Tenebris was finally forced to duck underneath a clumsy yet powerful uppercut of the Beringel's own.

It was as Tenebris was about to continue his barrage of blows when the beast thrust its other arm forward with an angry grunt to deliver a punch that would put anyone's Aura through hell if it landed. Tenebris wasn't one to fear physical blows, though. Confident in the defense both his armor and his strong Aura provided him, he planted his feet firmly on the ground and crossed his arms in preparation to guard against the beast's attack. The impact of the Beringel's punch reverberated through the tunnels and Tenebris' feet tore tracks through the stone floor beneath him as his foe's strike pushed him back.

Even so, he remained upright, both his defenses and his will unbroken.

"So. Is that all you've got? My armor and semblance have always made me pretty durable in the past, but with these upgrades, I've become a tank! I hardly felt that punch! You want to try and kill me? Fine, but you're gonna have to try a lot harder than that!" Tenebris taunted.

The Beringel snarled. Its muscles bulged, and it ran forth with enough weight and savagery in each step that it created cracks everywhere its massive limbs landed.

Tenebris grinned. "That a boy!"

As he tensed, each of the lights atop his armor thrummed brighter. The gaps between every one of the protective plates suddenly glowed the same purple as its wearer's Aura, and it appeared as though he was suddenly ensnared in a web born from the power of his soul as the kinetic amplifiers in his armor came to life. Tenebris took in a deep breath, and as his quarry threw its forelimbs forward to try and cave in his skull from both sides…

He caught the behemoth's hands with almost minimal effort. Reality ground to a halt, and only when Tenebris finally looked the Beringel in the eye did the effect of their clash show.

Fractures. Cracks and gaping wounds in the earth opened from the floor to the upper reaches of the walls of the main tunnel of the mine for well over a dozen feet in all directions, as if the earth all around them suddenly transmuted into glass as an effect of two heavy-duty fighters colliding. Not a single member of Iridescence spoke a word as they watched, while the Beringel grunted softly as it realized the evident strength of its foe. The Grimm started to push forward with all of its might to try and push its armored opponent off-balance, but Tenebris didn't budge an inch.

"Oh…" he chuckled darkly. "I could get used to this kind of boost."

Tenebris ripped one of his hands out of his contest of strength with the Beringel and turned it into a fist, the kinetic amplifiers all around his arm whirring as they prepared to fulfill their function to the letter. The Grimm followed his hand with a horrified realization on its face as his hand balled into a fist and flew like a cannonball toward its torso.

Suddenly, the Beringel was launched to the other end of the tunnel like a stone and created a crater where it impacted the solid rock of the mountain itself.

"Hey, Lux!" Tenebris called. "Threw him halfway to kingdom come with that hit! Think you can take him down from this far away?"

Lux raised his weapon in its musket form. "Dunno. With the upgrade Wiz just got thrown into the mix, though, well… I guess we're about to find out."

His brother stepped aside. "Be my guest."

"Gladly."

As the twins' target remained stunned against the mountainside, Lux pulled back the bolt of his musket's reloading mechanism. He paused before his readied round would be ejected from its chamber and instead freed a few fingers to direct a steady stream of air into an innocuous device hidden behind the bullet. Upon the device being filled with the extra force of Lux's semblance, it automatically sealed itself shut, and he cocked the bolt back into place.

He then took aim. "Lucky me. There's no dust near where it landed, so I can see what damage this thing can do now when I've made it hit capacity. Sayonara, Beringel."

The shot that he fired left a trail of compressed air in its wake.

It also so happened to make the crater that the Beringel created expand ten times over as the single bullet Lux sent its way exploded like it came out of a railgun the second it hit the poor creature in the chest. By the time the dust settled, and the deafening echo of all the compressed air's being released in such a tight space subsided, the Grimm had already disintegrated.

Lux blinked twice before silently lowering his weapon. "Okay yeah, I think that might have killed it."

"Lux. Buddy." Tenebris pressed his hands together. "I think you deleted it."

"You know, I think you're right." He then turned around. "Opal?"

Her ears pricked up. "Yeah?"

"Remind me to never forget that you made this upgrade happen," he stated.

Opal nodded. "Will do."

"Remind me never to get on his bad side…" Aurora muttered as the twins started to walk toward them. "Or anyone's on this team, for that matter. I know that Ironwood told us that our gear would be brought up to an 'Atlesian standard' but our firepower's gotten almost absurd with these upgrades. Not that I'm complaining."

"Oh, I get what you mean," Lux said. "One second Wiz can make mildly irritate Hazel when we were on your guys' home turf and the next its wiping ancient Beringels off the map. Tenebris used to be able to tackle Ursai, now he's throwing Grimm that're probably four times heavier than him around like paperweights. Your cables are now lethal weapons, and Opal's sword makes her semblance and ascended state even more busted than before."

Tenebris planted his hands on his hips and shrugged. "I'm beginning to think that Ironwood might've made the right decision when he said he'd make us his right-hand team."

"I wouldn't say that yet. Until we've all seen what RWBY and JNPR can do with their new gear too, we might still be on the same level as them," Opal calmly argued. "Remember, we haven't sparred with them in a full team-versus-team scenario since before we left Vale. We'll need some solid proof that we're in any way stronger than them before we inflate our egos."

"If we can take down that Geist before anyone else, that'd probably be a good start," Tenebris thought aloud.

"Then we should get a move on," Opal mentioned. "The sooner we keep headed further into the mine, the sooner we might come across our main target."

"Something tells me that this Geist might try extra hard to hide when it realizes that we're all trying to corner it," Aurora observed as they resumed their journey. "It'll be pretty hard to find an old Grimm that can hide in rocks to avoid being spotted."

Opal's scroll buzzed, and she fetched it from her pocket.

"Guys! We ran into the Geist! It tried to get the jump on us but escaped before we could get any good hits on it," Jaune declared. "We double-checked the maps and it should be headed for the central mining cavern now!"

Aurora's mouth fell agape. "Or it can make our lives a lot easier and corner itself for us."

"But we can't count on it staying there for sure," Opal pointed out. "Which means that we should get a move on while we still have an idea where it'll be. Let's go!"

Her teammates responded with unanimous agreement, and they were on the move.

Upon Iridescence's arrival at the central mining cavern, the space quickly revealed itself to be rather aptly named. Bridges that supported miscellaneous minecart tracks like a web of transportation throughout the mine's levels were illuminated by a massive dust-powered orb from above that served as the area's only artificial light source. All the others were the various unharvested dust crystals that glowed softly with their respective colors, though none were clustered all that close; rather, several artificial cliffs and levels within the cavern itself separated the majority of the untapped resources. At the center of the cavern floor were various abandoned tools, fragments of bone, and a pile of icy boulders that presumably never had the chance to be removed from the mine before the initial accident.

But there was no sign of their target, and Opal knew that with Lux on their side and the cavern's state of illumination, their inability to spot the Geist could only mean one thing. She kept her hand firm on the sheath of her weapon as she strained her ears for any sign of activity.

"I can't hear anything," she stated. "Either the Geist still hasn't made its way through the tunnels back here yet or it's already gone. For now, we should probably hope that the latter isn't true."

"Right there with you," Tenebris agreed, glancing around the cavern. "No wonder Ironwood wanted to secure this mine. It's almost as much of a treasure trove of resources as Vacuo was back before the Great War. Doesn't explain why it's so warm in here, though."

"Activated dust crystals are usually the more sought-after kind of dust in the world since the energy stored inside them reduces the time it takes for them to be processed a lot shorter. It just so happens though that, before they're processed, that same energy usually radiates off the dust crystals themselves in the form of faint light and moderate heat," Lux explained. His finger remained ready to pull the trigger of his musket at a moment's notice.

"Unless you're trying to mine the gravity dust that keeps the floating islands over Lake Matsu airborne, that's also one of the only ways prospectors can find underground dust deposits in the first place," Aurora elaborated, and they all stopped in front of a guard rail overlooking the bottom level of the area. "They use thermal devices to scan for heat signatures and then bring in specialized tools that respond to the latent energies of unprocessed dust to confirm if the heat originates from geothermal activity or dust crystals."

Opal's gaze scanned along the cavern floor. "That same heat also makes abandoned dust mines great shelters for the Grimm. They can warm up, get stronger over time, and they wouldn't even have to worry about food in the meantime since it isn't a necessity for them. That alone makes our mission here today probably one of the more important ones out there, even if we take the Amity Tower project out of the picture."

"Right," Lux agreed, his brow furrowing as his attention landed on the pile of icy boulders below. "Wait a second. I've spotted something suspicious."

"What is it?" Opal asked.

Lux pointed to the boulders. "Down there. It isn't just a pile of boulders that were never shipped out of the mine. There are unrefined dust crystals there too. Standard dust mining procedure is to separate dust from excess stone to make everyone's lives easier when it comes time to ship out their crystals – so why are a bunch of good dust crystals mixed in with a pile of rocks?"

An ominous noise that sounded like inhuman gasps echoed through the cavern.

"Everyone get ready for a fight," Opal ordered. "I think that we might've beat the Geist here after all, and our job's about to get a lot harder if we let it get armored up."

It was as she finished speaking that the Geist emerged from one of the many mineshafts on the bottom level of the mine. Unlike most Grimm, whose bodies were all more than capable of a one-on-one fight, the Geist's base form resembled that of a ghost whose body below the waist had been torn to shreds. The only other distinguishing features of the thing were the smoke trail it left in its wake as it hovered along and the single-eyed bone plate that served as its face.

The Grimm only paused for a second before it noticed Iridescence and made a beeline for the suspicious pile of rock and dust nearby.

"Lux! Aurora! Open fire!" Opal shouted.

"On it!" Lux said.

"Will do!" Aurora responded.

A hail of bullets peppered the area around the Geist the second that Opal gave the order, but the ghastly creature ducked and wove its way through the storm with relative ease. Centuries of experience and survival against previous Huntsmen had taught it well how to make the most out of its already-wispy form to keep itself from being damaged.

It swiftly disappeared into its targeted pile of material.

'Well, shit.'

Every boulder and dust crystal shuttered for a few seconds before it started to move. From within the inorganic matter, the Geist's arms quickly stretched out and its body released unfathomable energies, breathing life into its makeshift armor. The newfound Petra Gigas rose like a groggy titan and towered above the bottom level of the mine like a colossus – leaving the only exposed part of the Geist the comparatively minuscule bone-white plate of its face. The goliath made another gasping noise unbefitting of its size and started to swing one of its gargantuan arms in an arc overhead.

"Everyone, scatter!" Opal commanded.

No one hesitated to heed that advice. Tenebris' weapon activated its thruster utility to propel him away, Aurora latched onto the underside of a nearby bridge to pull herself to safety while Lux used his semblance to follow her lead, and Opal used her own to dash just to the side of the Grimm's smash as it created a ditch in the earth.

She then leaped atop the Petra Gigas' arm and ran up the rocky limb before it had a chance to shake her off. Emerald was unsheathed and re-sheathed a dozen times over in a series of experimental slashes along the Grimm's stony armor, only for her to notice that her katana's blade only managed a few deep nicks into the boulders that made up its arm. Opal then backflipped to the same ground level as the Petra Gigas as it brought its other arm around to try and squash her.

'Emerald's one of the best blades I've ever seen on the face of Remnant. If it couldn't cut through the same boulders that I turned into gravel with such little difficulty back at the entrance when used against this Petra Gigas, that means that the Geist is somehow boosting the defensive stats of the matter it possesses. Not good.'

The Petra Gigas swung its arm like a club toward her as she finished her line of thought, and another backflip brought her out of the creature's effective range. While the Geist within tried to arrest control of its titanic body's momentum, Tenebris jumped from the higher level of the cavern that Iridescence started at and landed next to his leader.

"I know that you didn't expect those dinky little slashes to do any real damage, Opal, so that can only mean that you're trying to come up with a plan," Tenebris pointed out. "I think I speak for all of us when I say we're all ears."

"I'm working on one," Opal quickly muttered.

He snorted to suppress a laugh. "Oh, that's good."

"Trust me, if it were as simple as busting out my ascended state and hacking this Petra Gigas to bits, I'd do it in a heartbeat," Opal explained, tilting her head toward their target. "But it isn't as simple as that. Its armor is too durable for me to risk running through all of my Aura with my semblance without knowing we'll be able to take it down around the time I run out of energy to keep it up. The fact that it has dust crystals incorporated into its armor also means that we can't just shoot at its armor recklessly with your dust rockets to blow it apart."

As the Geist regained control over its possessed colossus, Lux and Aurora opened fire and drew its attention over to them. The pair ran to the other end of their bridge as it sluggishly smashed through the half they originally landed on in retribution. The same arm it used to do so formed another ditch in the ground as the Geist failed to slow itself down, and the cavern shook under the weight of its unintended attack.

Lux waved with one hand to grab their attention. "And this Geist might be even more of a brute in its Petra Gigas than that Beringel was, but it's still too unwieldy for me to get a clean shot in on its mask! I've got my upgrade all stocked up again but I'm not even sure if another one-hundred-percent power shot from it would be enough to destroy its armor!"

"But we've still been able to dodge all of its attacks…" Opal thought aloud, ears flat against her skull as her mind raced to come up with a battle plan. "It's also unable to keep up its offense nonstop because of its size. We're faster than it. Guys! I have a plan!"

Heaving its arm from the ground and into an uppercut that destroyed the only other segment of the bridge they were perched on, the Petra Gigas finally forced Lux and Aurora to abandon their refuge. They both used their semblances to land safely after they jumped off the bridge to avoid the attack and landed around the same tunnel they all emerged from into the cavern in the first place. Once more, the Geist sent itself into another struggle before it could readily defend against its team of tiny adversaries as its unwieldy armor's momentum got the better of it.

"Aurora!" Opal shouted. "I need you to put everything you've got into your semblance! Use your cables to try and remove the dust crystals in the Geist's armor as quickly as you can!"

She nodded. "Will do!"

"Lux, you'll be back up!" Opal continued. "Take potshots at the Petra Gigas whenever you think we need a distraction and wait to unleash a strong shot with your upgrade against the Geist inside when the time comes!"

"If you can get it out of that armor, I'll blow it into the next century!" Lux affirmed.

She then looked to Tenebris. "You and I will stay on the ground and keep it occupied as much as we can. If you think that your kinetic amplifiers will be enough to help you blow apart its knees and deal some major damage to the Petra Gigas as a whole, look for an opportunity to do that as soon as you can."

"Compared to some of the crazy shit we've done before, that sounds like a cakewalk," Tenebris said confidently. "I'll grab its attention first, but what'll you be doing in all this?"

Opal pulled her katana slightly out of its sheath. "Pissing it off, but mostly helping Aurora cut out the dust crystals inside it."

"That sounds like a really reckless plan, since that means you'll have to be running all along its body the entire time," Tenebris pointed out. "I like it."

"I've learned from some close friends that sometimes you need to throw caution to the wind," Opal said with a shrug, and the Petra Gigas finally recovered enough control over itself to stare down at them again. "Can't wait to see what you have in store to taunt this thing, though."

"Oh, that part's easy. Watch this."

Tenebris proceeded to throw up two middle fingers at their opponent.

The Geist's single eye flared in fury, and it then brought one of its arms around to begin a sweeping strike all along the floor of the cavern, though Tenebris only smiled.

"How about that?" he asked.

"It was great," Opal said, mock amusement in her tone. "Just focus on not getting crushed by this next attack."

"You say that as if that's a possibility for me."

With an internal roll of her eyes, Opal jumped just in time to avoid the Petra Gigas' sweeping blow. As she landed on its arm she threw a glance to her left to see Tenebris' palms pressed against the colossal arm as he was pushed back, but his armor mitigated the impact of the attack enough to keep him upright without issue. At ease with the knowledge of her teammates' temporary safety, Opal started up the creature's unnatural arm.

'Alright. First order of business is to remove one or two of these dust crystals from its body.'

She stopped and crouched low to the Petra Gigas' shoulder to assure she wouldn't be thrown off as the creature finished its sweep and started a stomp aimed at Tenebris instead. Situated on top of the Petra Gigas' hunched back were a few dust crystals only precariously connected its own body by a few black tendrils. Opal jumped again as the Geist finished the stomp and started hacking away at the crystals' misty bindings almost before she landed. At the same time, Aurora managed to use many of the dust crystals jutting out of the creature's lower back, stomach, and limbs as anchorage for her cables as she entered a delicate dance swinging all around the Petra Gigas' body.

Once she successfully cut all of the crystals out of their binds, Opal sheathed her weapon and swiftly scooped them all up into her arms while Aurora managed to wretch free five of the largest crystals free from its stomach and arms with the force of her momentum. She used her sixth and final cable to pull herself to safety while Opal followed after her with a semblance-boosted leap away from the Petra Gigas' hunched back.

Both of them skidded to a halt alongside one another and delicately deposited their respective crystals on the ground. One careless drop and any one of them could detonate, and the entire mission would be over for everybody.

"I see you went for the ones you wouldn't have to cut through stone to get," Aurora observed as she stood back up. "Smart."

"And you went for the ones you could use your cables and mobility style to retrieve without too much difficulty," Opal added. "We played to our strengths, though I'll admit I didn't get a clear look at how many more crystals we need to retrieve before we can hope to pump some damage into this thing."

Aurora nodded. "Don't worry about that. When I was swinging outside of the Petra Gigas' range I got a good look at how many major crystals it has inside of its body. Seeing as we've already retrieved most of the big ones, all we have to do now is pry a few out from its legs and we'll be home clear."

Both of them merely watched Tenebris' thruster assist him in avoiding an overhead punch from their target and Lux shot another quick succession of boosted rounds into its back, nearly causing it to stumble over. The crystals in the Petra Gigas' legs possessed no decent perch for Opal to take advantage of and cut another crystal or two loose, and its comparatively short legs to the rest of its body were too low to the ground for Aurora to implement the same momentum-assisted technique she used before to pull the crystals free safely. The Geist guided its body to enter another attempted stomp against Tenebris and a reckless swing at Lux simultaneously to ward them both off.

Opal sighed. "Easier said than done. It looks like the Geist is slowly gaining more control over its armor as this fight goes on. Even if we ignore how hard it'll be to remove the crystals in its legs, it doesn't look like it'll be giving us any openings to do our job safely any time soon."

"Then how about we make one?" Lux shouted from above. "Tenebris!"

Tenebris finished running through the creature's legs as it smashed both of its arms into the ground where he used to be. "Yeah? What's up?"

"You game to see if you can hold up over seven tons of living boulder for a few seconds with your new gear?" Lux asked casually. "Opal and Aurora need this thing to stand still long enough for them to get the dust crystals in its legs out."

"Oh, sure!" he responded easily. "That'll be a good time."

"Please don't tell me that he's going to use another one of his 'great' insults against the Geist to bait it into stomping on him…" Aurora complained.

Opal held back a snicker. "He will. You've got to admit, they might be dumb the majority of the time since he doesn't have to try to anger Grimm, but they still have their charm."

"At least one of us finds them amusing…"

The Geist finally raised its arms from the shattered earth beneath it and turned around, its single eye fixed firmly on Aurora and Opal's pilfered pile of dust crystals. Before it could make a move to try and regain that which it had lost, Tenebris cupped his hands around his mouth and made his gambit.

"Hey, you!" Tenebris shouted, and its focus fell to him. "I know you lost that punk rock hairdo you had going on with the dust crystals, but I think this bald look works better for you! Not like you had much of a sense of fashion in the first place, eh?"

The Geist's gasping howl threw a chill into the air, but it took the bait and lifted one of its legs to try and turn Tenebris into a fine red paste on the ground. Tenebris merely smiled and re-engaged his kinetic amplifiers one more time as he raised his hands to meet the Petra Gigas' foot.

"Get ready Aurora," Opal whispered, mentally preparing herself to spring into action. "The second he catches that leg, we need to get those crystals out as soon as possible."

"Right," Aurora agreed. "I'll get the leg he grabs. You get the one that's still on the ground."

As the Petra Gigas' gargantuan foot collided with Tenebris' outstretched hands, the earth beneath him cracked like glass. The veins on his neck and around his temples bulged under the strain despite his semblance and armor upgrade combined, but he held firm. His fingers dug deep into the boulder that acted as the creature's foot, and the Petra Gigas was effectively rooted in place.

"Alright… here we go! Maximum effort!" Tenebris grunted. "Guys! I've got him, go in!"

His teammates simultaneously flew by him in a blur.

Opal's eyes flared as she poured her heart and soul into her series of attacks that followed. With a constant boost of speed and power from a more liberal use semblance, she ran up the leg of the Petra Gigas that kept it upright and cleaved crevices all around where the three large dust crystals therein were embedded. In one smooth motion, she sheathed her katana and kicked off the start of the colossal creature's torso to send herself flying on a path to catch the crystals she cut free before they hit the ground.

Aurora accomplished a similar feat at the same time. Upon her landing a short distance away from where Tenebris held their opponent's leg still, she wasted no time before she sent three of her six cables out to anchor her to miscellaneous heavy machinery nearby. Her remaining three cables then slithered through the air and coiled around the three crystals on the Pete Gigas' other leg without delay. Aurora let out a grunt of exertion as she pulled with all the might of her body and semblance to wretch the crystals free and used her anchored cables to send herself back to a safe distance once she did so.

'No more crystals on the Petra Gigas' body to worry about!'

"Tenebris! We're in the clear!" Opal shouted. "Make your shots count and mind the rest of the dust crystals around the cavern and we can destroy this Geist's armor no problem!"

"Oh, that's music to my ears!" Tenebris grunted eagerly.

With a groan of exertion and a fiery shout, a herculean shove from him sent the colossus into a precarious balancing act to keep itself from falling backward. Tenebris whipped Boomstick off his back and kept himself rooted in place as he activated a timed device that would turn his weapon itself into a makeshift missile.

"This is where the fun begins."

He heaved his weapon on a path headed for the Petra Gigas' leg. Boomstick's thruster flared to life only a moment later and added even more speed to the throw. At the same time that it connected with the living armor's knee, the timed missile launch Tenebris had prepared earlier released its payload. The combined brute force of his weapon and the ensuing explosion combined turned the colossus' knee into dust and brought the Petra Gigas down in a heap onto its side.

The kinetic amplifiers in Tenebris' armor shut down, but the lights in the top layer of his armor thrummed, and the gravity dust upgrade within his weapon from their time in Mistral brought it right back into his hand. As the Petra Gigas tried to use one of its arms to push it back up from the ground, Opal was already on the move to intercept.

'This will probably burn through the rest of my Aura, but we need to force that Geist out of its armor!'

Spiritual flame flared up around her eyes and upper back once again as she pushed her powers into overdrive. Whereas before it seemed that her semblance would only ever be enough to have her cleave deep cuts into the Petra Gigas' rocky body, her ascended state would let her demolish that paradigm with ease. Her grip on the hilt of her katana tightened like a vice as she planned her series of slashes far ahead of time and committed to her actions thereafter faster than any of her teammates could follow.

All they'd see in the aftermath of her assault was her sheathing her blade, and the Petra Gigas' arm as it turned into rubble.

"Now's our chance!" Opal declared, turning on her heel. "Aurora! Force this thing out of its armor before it can try to reform!"

To her surprise, Aurora had already slingshotted herself toward the Geist's exposed face before its suddenly destroyed arm brought it back down to the ground. Her expression was one of cold determination, her weapon in its naginata form held out in front of her like a spear that would gore her opponent if it didn't try to escape in time. The Geist's eye widened as it recognized the incoming threat, and it made its choice.

Aurora's naginata sank to the base inside the boulder where the Geist's mask used to be. At the last second, it released its grip on its inorganic armor and flew skyward in a last-ditch effort to flee the battlefield and live to fight another day.

But it forgot about one final threat against its life.

"Where do you think you're going?" Lux grinned. "Nice try with the escape, but this is the end of the road for you. See ya!"

One pull of the trigger, and the Geist was destroyed in another awe-inspiring maximum power explosion that rippled throughout the cavern. When the dust settled and the breeze created by that last shot subsided, and silence fell over the area as Iridescence quickly regrouped by the now-inanimate pile of wounded stone.

Tenebris was the first to break it. "So… correct me if I'm wrong, Lux, but I've got the feeling that you like that upgrade of yours almost as much as I like mine."

"Something like that," Lux chuckled.

"I almost can't believe that we took down that Geist so quickly…" Aurora mentioned.

Opal smiled softly. "Well, once we didn't have to worry about triggering any of the dust crystals all over its armor, we were finally able to go all-out. It'd probably take something on the highest tiers of Grimm out there to deal with a coordinated and powerful team like ours."

"Aw, you're proud of us…" Tenebris said. "Thanks."

"How could I not be?" she asked. "We took down the number one target in this entire mine by ourselves after fighting a whole ton of Centinels, an ancient Beringel, and an Alpha Beowolf that have all been here for who know how long. It'd be weirder if I weren't happy with what we did here together."

"Very true." Lux placed his hand on her shoulder. "But I think we have guests again. Look."

He used his other hand to point at another pair of entrances at different levels off in the distance, and the slight tension Opal felt at his choice of words evaporated as her eyes followed the angle he directed her to look. RWBY, JNPR, and Qrow all just emerged from those entrances, and even from a distance, she didn't need eagle eyes to tell that their expressions were a mix of awe and surprise as they took in the aftermath of their battle. Opal would be a liar if she ever said she didn't feel some form of satisfaction at their reactions. She then waved to grab the two team leaders' attention.

"Mission accomplished!"

Authors Note: HOOOOOOOoooooo boy! Didn't expect this chapter to turn into such a big one after the comparatively tiny chapter before it, but hey, it got the job done! Team Iridescence gets to show off their upgrades while RWBY and JNPR probably futzed around with their own battles in the meantime and show off the power of their team coordination to take down the MacDaddy of all the Grimm in the mine. Oh, and the faunus subplot continues to exist as opposed to being unceremoniously ditched/exposition dumped by Marrow this chapter like canon essentially did. Time shall tell what will become of that situation as it evolves, as well as the state of affairs with Amity Tower (and many other things), but until next time… stay cool.