Chapter 2
Tartarus
Pyrrha woke with a start, the image of an Alpha Grimm Drake swooping down to consume her form in a swath of fire and anger seared into her brain. A hand on her shoulder prevented her from lashing out in a circle of fire, activating her latent Aura shield until the biting burn she thought was from her memory dulled, a constant but incredibly nominal drain on her core replacing it. The oxidized taste of air passing through her shields gave off a slight buzz, protecting her from whatever harmful contaminants hovered around her.
She groaned pitifully when she tried to move, every muscle screaming in protest like she just finished a Hunter triathlon, a specially modified version Yang modified especially for S-ranks and left them the equivalent of soft-serve ice cream. Why ice cream? 'Cause Yang had an entirely unhealthy obsession with it after Weiss's passing and she was somehow sucked into picking a favorite to always have in Beacon. Not that she didn't like the cold treat but if they weren't Hunters with already enormous calorie demands, they'd be fat.
And she did not do fat.
The hand on her shoulder retreated away for the moment, leaving her alone with all the time in the world to take in the afterlife. The Drake that ended her wasn't exactly a threat to her, but after Yang passed from old age, she wasn't going to be much further behind. A hundred fifteen wasn't bad for someone born before the turn of the century. An overextension of Aura usage here, an unheard or unseen Grimm finding a weak spot, and even the strongest could fall to the untrained. Sure, getting fried to a crisp wasn't the most dignified death but fate had its plans for everyone in the end.
Though she greatly had to disagree with its plan for her right now.
She and Yang never subscribed to the idea of a concrete afterlife, the many religions on the face of the planet having disappeared millennia before the Great War and leaving behind only trace evidence of humanity's interpretations of the resting places after life ended. And, well, it looked like she ended up in hell.
What she could term as the sky, or rather ceiling, was made of enormous stalactites shrouded in a dark crimson miasma that made up the atmosphere and created clouds, for lack of a better term, that gave off a faint light. Surrounding her, and her unseen companion behind her she trusted for the simple reason they hadn't attacked her yet, was a grey desert of packed ashes, swirling about in some breeze and filling the toxic air around them. Off in the distance, some dozens of klicks away, rose mountains that unbelievably dared to scrape against the ceiling. Along the foot of that mountain snaked a river of lava, disappearing off into the distance beyond her considerable view range.
She rose to a stand, inspecting her reserves and the landscape further. The slight drain on her Aura from the blistering air, whether it be the heat or another substance, was of no concern assuming she could get the energy needed to survive this hellish landscape. The air was breathable enough through her shields as if left to torture the inhabitants rather than grant a merciful death. Further away from the mountain she noticed earlier was the same endless plains and desert, broken by the occasional river of all things. She snorted at that, attempting to apply logic to the afterlife. Her life wasn't evil by any stretch of the word yet she still ended up here, left to suffer after selflessly dedicating herself to the people of Remnant.
The lack of her battle armor did jar her somewhat and she tried to change her casual apparel of hoodie and jeans with a thought, running into the roadblock of physical materiality. She confirmed the weight of Miló and Akoúo̱ on her back, attached to the same formfitting magnetic plate Yang first developed for her team's use.
"Nikos." A familiar voice took her attention away from a mass of shadows moving across the desert. She gulped heavily at the monotone she tried for years to shove into the deepest recesses of her psyche, the half dozen stories Yang told her in confidence painting an incredibly bleak but powerful Hunter behind missions Beacon didn't dare store except on paper copies ready to burn in the Headmaster or Commander's desk. Missions that sometimes decided the continued existence of their country. Yang had her reservations about her, kept close to the chest after learning to manage the peacetime of the new century. The relative abundance of Hunters she had under her control compared to the dwindling supply the Fourth had to manage and personally step into to handle made dealing with the fledgling Council infinitely easier, fewer catastrophes plaguing them after the invasion.
"Commander Ruby." She replied, saluting her with a clenched fist over her heart. Her face twisted into confusion, brows furrowing and lips curling into a frown. The enormous scythe she wielded with impunity rested on her back with none of its weight straining her. The black combat armor she wore during the invasion disappeared in place of reinforced leggings tucked into supporting mid-calf boots and a magnetic plate harness clipped over her tee. "You're looking…"
She couldn't find the word for the circumstance they found themselves in, trailing off into silence. The Commander, Ruby, she mentally corrected as they now shared the same life after death, didn't react to her awkward pause, stomping her foot on the ground and testing the stability of their resurrection site. "Sitrep." The Fourth ordered and she snapped to attention on instinct alone. "Last thing you remember."
"My death in the year 178 AGW during an extermination mission into the Sanus Mountain range. My body failed me during the initial engagement and I died in a firestorm from a Drake." She recited with a monotone to match the Fourth's, taking the slightest bit of pleasure in subjecting her to it and receiving absolutely nothing in return, not even a raised eyebrow. She took her silence this time as the end of her report.
"My last living memory is of my exit from the Amity Colosseum and death due to the dematerialization of the plane." She paused and the air audibly hummed with the power exuding from her, the draw of her black eyes rising and forcing her to shut hers to keep them away. "Yet we find ourselves together in a synced time stream in a hostile environment where air blisters and burns the lung." Pyrrha nodded to her initial observation and added in the earlier notes of her survey, the Fourth not bothering to glance about. "I'm lost."
"In what way Commander?" She answered cheekily, not entirely comfortable with the living legend reborn but more than willing to use Yang's tactic of throwing humor at it to chase away the worry. Again it washed over the Fourth with the same effect of water on an otter Grimm. She knelt and grabbed a handful of the grey sand, inspecting and feeling the texture as it fell back to the ground. She did the same, noting the incredibly dry and flaky texture of the sand that resembled ashes. A hot gust of wind scattered the rest of it from her palm, taking it further across the desolate wasteland.
"I'm dead." She replied succinctly as if those words answered everything and Pyrrha resisted the urge to summon Crescent Rose forward and slam her into the sand for her cheek, ultimately deciding to avoid slighting the Commander. It wasn't as if she understood how deadpan and open her two words were for interpretation. "My life after my torture was built to serve my people. There is no Remnant here."
"I'm here." She offered, knowing she was a paltry prize for the billions she kept protected under her wing.
The Fourth chuckled wryly, something she thought impossible for her ravaged psyche. Physically, she outclassed Blake in the ability to laugh but as far as she knew, she never had a cause to chuckle, Yang handing her the sealed medical files after she claimed the coveted S-rank and explained how she literally, and in no way figuratively, couldn't process emotions. She didn't feel love, hate, humor, even agony: her body's ability to feel pain dulled after her torture. That left her as the soulless husk RWBY needed to ingrain duty, loyalty, integrity, and even basic threat recognition of Grimm before they could leave her to her role.
"You are one person who doesn't need my protection, Nikos." She pointed out, tightening her harness. When she tried to ask why and point out she was still a resident of the Remnant despite no longer being there physically, she raised her hand and cut her off. "You were close to Yang." She inspected herself quickly, unable to determine how exactly the blind woman could determine that before looking up again. "Your Aura, while spread out throughout your body in a shield, is more focused around your major joints: a level of control beyond just raising a shield. On your lower back, you keep a small pouch with emergency aid and you keep a perpetual pressure of Aura saturating the immediate area around you. You are an S-rank."
Despite not asking a question, she still nodded in confirmation. "But how did you know of my connection to Yang?"
"You have a tattoo laced with her Aura on your right forearm." She instinctively grasped her arm, confirming the Commander's observation. "And while your core is enormous, several times what mine is, none of it is Yang's. She never split her core with you so the only way for you to have her Aura on you is by proximity. Yang would never have a partner or lover not her equal."
"Lover. Never married." She added, raising her shields higher on the off chance this different Fourth decided that was a slight against her. Much to her chagrin, she softly smiled and forced her to fall back on her favorite strategy of sarcasm. "As if anyone could replace the White Angel of Vacuo."
"Do not make light of your relationship with her for you will find no judgment from me." The extremely formal diction caught her unawares for a bit until she processes her words, shoulders unknowingly slouching at relief. "You've no reason to fear me, Nikos. While Yang has surely used my death to increase my cult of personality to expand and solidify her hold over Vale, you are a Hunter and were mine for my short tenure."
She didn't respond for a long and awkward pause, observing the resurrected woman until her eye started to twitch. Her face and body language brokered no anger, simply tensed due to their presence within this hostile environment. She made no move to draw her weapon or attack her but knowing she could approach the speed of sound within the blink of an eye didn't make her feel any better. Yang didn't make the exams for S-rank easy and for the Fourth to have passed the wartime test at twenty-one was a testament to her skill. It took her until she was 31 to beat the title out of Yang and she still felt she went easy on her. And in the face of a greater danger, she defaulted from the challenge. "My name is Pyrrha, Commander."
"And mine is Ruby." She didn't have to explain why she dropped the title when they were both alone and stuck in the pits of hell with no obvious escape. She instead stepped forward and extended an arm in greeting, crossing the distance between them first. For the nightmare without any preconceptions about society, she just marked Pyrrha as her equal. She shook away that thought. Hell might've made them equal and brought them together, but she was nowhere on her level of combat. She grasped her forearm and gripped tight, sealing the exchange and wryly replying, "Nice to see you again."
Ruby wasn't about to waste time, instantly moving past into mission mode. "What're the nearest points of interest?"
"A large blob of dark creatures moving off in the distance, the ruins of an ancient temple, and a mountain range with a river of lava next to it. There are other rivers even further away that flow with normal water, at least, normal looking water from this distance. I wouldn't trust drinking from it." She recited her immediate observations, already deciding on where to go on sentimentality alone. The temple was where her journey as a Hunter started and she wanted to start this confusing one on the same track.
"Mountain range first." She ordered and Pyrrha couldn't challenge that. "It's our best shot at some form of shelter on these flatlands. We'll go after these dark creatures for information on this land after." An Aura pressure blanketed her and she accepted this as part of how Team RWBY used to travel in the height of their power. "My Semblance will aid us forward but you will lead." She waved her hand in front of her face mockingly, eyes wide and mouth open stupidly. She poked her on the forehead to display her irritation, keeping the much shorter Commander locked in place.
She clicked her tongue and ran towards the mountains, immediately creating a furrow into the sand as she vastly underestimated the assistance Ruby gave. Ruby hoisted her back to her feet, giving her a piece of advice before she could decide to take point again. "Only I can run normally under augmentation. Your mind can't react to your body moving at such speeds so my team learned to leap forward to run instead of moving their legs. I will match your bounds with adjustments."
She tried again, taking a running leap and practically soaring through the air before slamming into the ground, her Aura taking the brunt of the impact with ease. She looked back to see if Ruby was following her, jumping slightly when she already stood behind her. "Don't do that." Ruby chose not to respond, only tilting her head to indicate for her to continue. She did just that, leaping forward again and transferring her momentum forward and up again upon impact instead of coming to a stop, chaining together movements with Ruby increasing their pace.
"Woooooo!" She didn't get to see the smile on Ruby's face, clearly pleased with her reaction to her Semblance as the plains below them blurred with each leap. The hot air became a distant problem with Ruby not raising the shield to cut through the atmosphere in front of them. They made good time across the cracked and scarred land, crossing clear over enormous cracks that sometimes broke the monotonous dry plains.
Closer to the lava river, the desert plains turned into coarse dirt yet still they encountered not one other creature. With how filled she expected a punishment plane of an afterlife, and even knowing the Grimm existed on an entirely different one, this one was remarkably empty. Or maybe she was severely underestimating the size in the first place. The earlier heat from their awakening abated despite Ruby slowing them to a walk near the banks of the enormous river. Maybe the ambient heat from around them from before made everything a bit of a mirage until she remembered to forget about logic, voicing her observation for Ruby's benefit, unsure if she could visualize the confounding sight. "It's a river of freezing orange liquid fire."
She had to look away from the cursed liquid, a headache slowly forming from trying to comprehend what was both a liquid and fire at the same time. At least Ruby's cursed eyes didn't try to be two states of matter at the same time. The freezing chill emanating from the fire wasn't even the biggest conundrum. She had to sit down on the bank to massage the headache away, grateful the differing temperatures clashing together made it at least a comfortable break. Ruby, not caring the slightest about the mental gymnastics keeping her companion occupied, wrapped her arm in layer upon layer of virulent yellow Aura until the low whine caught Pyrrha's attention. Her cry advising patience went unheard, Ruby plunging her arm up to the elbow.
Pyrrha waited a good ten seconds before repeating her request, Ruby lifting her arm and taking with it a small pool of the fire cupped in her palm. She held it out to her, letting her inspect the remarkably similar qualities it had to just plain liquid water before tossing it back into the river. Neither of them dared take a sip, still mesmerized by the rather underwhelming properties of it. She even grabbed Ruby's arm and made sure there wasn't anything hiding away from her sight, poking at the skin and finding the layers of Yang's Aura still wrapped protectively around the limb.
Ruby's reaction time eclipsed hers when she noticed a figure materialize from the fires and burn into reality a short distance away from them. More than a century of life let her frankly admit the middle-aged man had a rogue charm to him from the well-trimmed beard and close-cut hair… made of fire. Everything else about him followed the same pattern with his skin approaching a perfect black just a shade off to look burnt to a crisp. The clothing, however, did not agree with the visage, a long piece of fabric draped from one shoulder to the opposite hip and leaving his chest half bare. His non-threatening and unarmed stance didn't stop Ruby from slamming her closed scythe into the ground and creating a barricade to cover them.
The man made no move to step forward, raising his hands in the universally understood gesture of peace. "Καλώς ήρθατε στο ποτάμι μου."
"I don't understand," Ruby asked, stepping from her cover and letting her voice travel uninterrupted.
The man looked confused before answering, "Welcome to my river. It has been some time since humans have graced my banks." Pyrrha pegged the man's voice as worn but incredibly filled with life, almost as if he embodied strength and will to live. She looked over to Ruby and found her face blank again, unable to betray her thoughts.
"Implying there are more than humans in this place?"
"Yes. So rarely are humans thrown in Tartarus and none have survived long enough to make conversation." So they managed to get a man who claimed ownership of the river while not exactly fishing for that information. "Many make use of my river yet you two are... curiosities." She didn't like the inflection he placed on that word, reinforcing her shields without meaning to.
"You are an emissary of Tartarus?" Ruby asked, doing the fishing for them without any regard for what her line of questioning might bring and marching forward.
"No, but your questions raise another as to your lack of knowledge of Tartarus. I would be willing to answer your questions for the chance of intelligent conversation." Ruby spared a second to think and then abruptly yanked her scythe from the dirt, stowing it back onto her back with no indication of effort. The man took that as an acceptance of their offer, though the warm smile on his face faded slightly when his golden eyes fell upon Ruby's own, a silent war waged between the pair until he averted his eyes to greet her companion. "Thank you. To answer your question: I'm not an emissary of Tartarus. Tartarus, for lack of a better word in your language, is a prison for immortals under the domain of the Primordial by the same name."
"And Primordials are?" Ruby asked without bothering to wait for him to ask a question first, Pyrrha facepalming at her lack of decorum. She didn't dare however contradict her, remembering the beasts that laid siege to the Amity Colosseum a century ago. He didn't take issue against her though, giving Pyrrha a warm smile and answering it anyway.
"The Primordials were the first gods created by the progenitor of the universe, Chaos. Most of them have faded into obscurity and those that remain are imprisoned either within Tartarus or elsewhere." Much like Ruby, she couldn't repress the shudder that ran through her at the name of the progenitor. Something within her hindbrain detected that entity as a threat, however insignificant it may find them as little specks on a planet somewhere in the vast universe. The one time Yang convinced her to try a hallucinogenic did not end up going well, to say the least. "May I have your names?"
"Pyrrha Nikos and Ruby Rose." She offered, overriding Ruby's seeming reluctance to part with information when she had technically agreed to a trade when she dropped her barricade. "All we know is that we both died and found ourselves here." Ruby did not react to the nugget she handed over, revealing nothing to the man who called this place a prison for immortals. "And yours?"
"I am the god of this river, Phlegethon." He regained his smile as if they had presented a new facet or gem for him to poke at. "Most curious. No immortal, save for those created from mortals by the current pantheon of gods, have a given and house names. You must be the first of a new line of them." He sounded extremely chuffed at this conclusion.
"No. I may not agree with the existence of those that wear the title of gods but I was not created or granted immortality. I am aware of my death and that is all." Pyrrha noted the roundabout way she referred to gods, preferring to keep them at a theological distance after her clash with the gods of her world. Ozpin and Salem were not gods in the sense of omnipotence or omniscience but they could affect the world around them to a terrifying degree. The more fervent sects of Beacon held Ruby as a fallen god but they kept that mostly to themselves.
"But surely the ichor that flows in your veins is gold?" He asked and Ruby spared no moment in pulling a knife and dragging it across her forearm, the man falling into stunned silence when her crimson lifeblood dripped down to the dirt. "That's impossible."
"I've heard that many times before." She took it in stride, searing her wound shut with a faint sizzle and sheathing her knife. The stare she gave him would've leveled Atlas and he again looked away. "We are not privy to this world or its gods. We know not of its people or its beliefs. Even you, as the spirit of this river, are a mystery for our world." Pyrrha had to take a deep breath to stop herself from screaming with Ruby giving up so many potentially expensive pieces of information. Her initial cagey attitude wasn't so cagey after all: she just didn't care about the niceties that came with meeting someone new and she overreacted with paranoia.
But then again, what chance did she have at guessing a psychopath's thoughts? Even Monty, decades down the line when using her as a case study, never fully understood her, going as far as to claim their original diagnosis was a pigeonhole they placed her in because they didn't have a better catchall term. Sure, she fit some of the parameters but she also really, really, really cared for people. A little too much with her perchance for combat but no one was perfect.
Phlegethon scratched his beard for a bit, toying with the impossibility placed in front of him. "That certainly explains your lack of understanding when I spoke Greek. Setting aside your rebirth into this prison, you seem to be what our world refers to as clear-sighted mortals. To any other mortal, I wouldn't appear as myself, but as a figure in the beholder's beliefs such as an angel for the Abrahamic religions or a nature spirit for the Pagans."
Pyrrha groaned and wearily massaged her forehead, trying to come to terms with that groundbreaking revelation but Ruby plowed right in as if nothing had happened, more after answers than assimilation. "How does reality make sense if it's subjective to each person? The universe would tear itself apart with infinite perspectives as it tries to shift to accommodate each one."
He looked positively ecstatic to share conversation with someone who dared question reality around them instead of accepting everything around them. "No. Reality is that this place is part of what mortals refer to as the Greek pantheon. I am only one god within it and hundreds of others govern many physical aspects such as the Underworld, the earth, and water, along with metaphysical aspects such as darkness, terror, and night. This river is my domain and I know everything that happens in it and around it from its source deep within Tartarus to its end underneath it where Chaos rests, yet I cannot leave."
"That doesn't explain how everyone can perceive something different." Pyrrha prodded this time, taking in the information and coming to several conclusions. This… afterlife… wasn't their own since neither of them prescribed to this Greek pantheon, and Remnant had no major or even minor religions, removing the idea that their subjective beliefs could drive the reality they saw now. Along with that, this world they were in was governed by beings known as gods with power over a certain domain. How much power they held within which and each domain varied from one river to large swathes such as darkness itself, much like how the Hunters had classifications.
"With different belief systems came the introduction of magic called the Mist created by the goddess Hecate to shroud the world and obscure it from the supernatural elements to prevent panic within the mortal realm. To those with the clear sight, such as you and your friend, it has no effect, yet for almost all other mortals, they see what they want to see based on their preconceived notions of the world around them."
She felt more than saw Ruby stiffen next to her and she agreed with her reaction. To have an illusion shroud the entire world to the point it could hide any oddities from notice spoke of power that brokered belief but to them have that illusion tailor itself to every single sapient being and based itself around their beliefs pushed the envelope. One being, god or not, could not actively control it so to create a sentient to do it must've been exceptionally powerful and not someone they wanted to cross.
"And what about yourself?" He smiled genially at her question. "A river spirit with knowledge of the world vastly outside your domain and not only of what happens within or near its shores?"
"Yes!" Phlegethon cheered, his wider more enthusiastic smile returning despite looking at Ruby directly. "You don't know how much of a relief it is to converse with another. The other river spirits know only what occurs within them, and the other inhabitants of Tartarus cannot either converse, dismiss me as a simple river god, or are actively hostile."
He sure did like to talk but she couldn't fault him if he truly did have no one else to speak within this hell. He paused and swept an arm over his river, drawing their attention.
"My river, to the denizens of the Underworld, is known as the River of Unending Agony, not because it causes immense pain to any who drink or swim within but because it passes through the Fields of Punishments where Hades, the Lord of the Underworld, uses it to prolong the torture of evil souls. To those within Tartarus, my river is the River That Sustains for it can cure hunger, thirst, and injury."
"That's awfully convenient we came to near a river that could keep us alive in this place," Ruby remarked and they both resolved to at least attempt murder on the pink ice-cream devouring hellion for interfering with their afterlife. At the moment, Pyrrha was ambivalent about being ripped from her concept of an afterlife and dumped here with Ruby, a Hunter that still probably could overpower her. Whatever rest waited for her after her life was over couldn't be better than spending her time kicking ass in some prison designed to hold immortals.
"Perhaps," Phlegethon remarked neutrally. "Or perhaps the Moirai, the Goddesses of Fate, brought you here for a reason. And when I said that I'm aware of everything in my river, consider all the tortured souls Hades restores to prolong their punishment." His smile turned into a sinister smirk for a second and she instinctively released Miló into her grip. "Many souls accept respite from their tortures in exchange for information or conversation."
She did not like the terrifying return smile Ruby gave and she suddenly felt increasingly left out of the process and exchange between the two of them. "Remind me to get Neo a few buckets of ice cream."
"Okay…" She couldn't exactly follow along with why they needed to get the demon more of her favorite icy treat, or where they would get any in this realm, or even how they would locate her, but she noted it down for later. "But what if this wasn't Neo?"
She turned slowly to face her with a wide grin and repeated the same words of wisdom Yang gave her a long time ago. "It's always Neo, even if it's not."