Alrighty, so I'm back in busy… for now. As my new semester has started, I'm already surprisingly(?) swamped with readings for my classes. At least on the bright side, 4 of my 6 classes seem pretty easy while the last 2… well, not exactly hard per say, but certainly sound annoying. Only time will tell though, both in how frustrating they may prove to be and how much time it'll take away from working on my fanfic.
Now as said in the ending AN of the last chapter, this chapter will be encompassing the entirety of the village event so this will be a little longer than usual, so I hope you will enjoy that.
And random note: Holy hell, Tokyo Ghoul! I walked into that manga wondering what all the hype was about, now having finished reading it all and moving onto its sequel – Tokyo Ghoul:RE – I can only sing its praise. Talk about an emotional roller coaster! That's definitely one manga that I'd recommend to anyone looking for a good read.
Now onto the chapter!
Chapter 12
Miki sensed it before actually hearing or seeing anything. Same thing went for the members of team RWBY.
Where once things had been quiet enough, the entire area now seemed to tremor under some great and constant pressure.
It only took half a minute for the five women to then learn the cause behind it.
"Grimm!" Ruby shouted as she pulled out Crescent Rose.
Sure enough, as villagers still out and about now rushed for shelter within the nearest buildings, Grimm of all kinds began to pour out from the west side of the village, coming from the forest in droves.
Ruby and Blake, being the most nimble of the four, immediately went on the move. With her semblance, Ruby easily lunged ahead of her Faunus teammate and into the quickly growing swarm of Beowolves that had gathered at the forefront of the literal tidal wave of Grimm. With one swift swipe, the young leader of team RWBY split asunder several of them before spinning around and taking aim with Crescent Rose at an Ursa that was attempting to run past them all and towards the village.
She managed to get only one shot at the larger Grimm before having to hastily retreat as more Beowolves showed up around her, eager to avenge their fallen brethren.
Leaping back with a violent spin that resulted in her weapon decapitating an unlucky Beowolf, Ruby touched ground and took off across the 'borderline' that officially separated the forest from the village.
As she did this, Blake was now into the thick of it as well. Using a clone to take the near hit from a Boarbatusk, she leapt onto its back and started to swing her blades at it, but to no avail; its hide was simply too thick to really cut through. But the huntress in training knew this well from having seen Weiss fight it in class; this was merely to anger it and get it to expose its one true weakpoint: its underbelly. Sure enough, the Grimm attempted to throw her off, rising on its hind-legs to do so. All the beast succeeded in doing was letting Blake effortlessly jump off and land in front of it. Before it could even do anything more, she switched Gambol Shroud into its gun form and opened fire on its soft underbelly.
The Grimm screeched in agony before falling to the ground, dead or at least dying. Blake wasn't sure, but cared little right now as the Beowolves all around her tried to close in. But she twirled about, swinging Gambol Shroud on her ribbons and opened fire before the weakest of the Grimm could get too close.
This had the effect of the Beowolves taking some considerable damage – the ones directly within Blake's field of vision, anyway – and it gave the Faunus enough room to maneuver out of there, rushing past them as she switched her weapons back into their blade forms to cut through the ones that were exposed.
As for both Yang and Weiss, the two of them had taken to more or less serving as a two-women line between the village and any Grimm that managed to get past Ruby and Blake. Given the sheer number of Grimm bum rushing them from the west, that was a lot of Grimm for the blond brawler and heiress to deal with.
"Just how are there this many?!" Weiss all but screamed as she used a glyph to launch herself towards a growing hoard of Grimm, using the extra momentum to skewer a few of them with Myretenaster. With a swift switch of the Dust type, her skewering attack suddenly had a more explosive effect, all but incinerating the Grimm she had just skewered while sending the other ones behind them all but flying back.
"Beats me!" Yang replied as she punched a Beowolf hard in the gut with Ember Celica before grabbing it by the throat and launching it at two other Beowolves. "Just be thankful it's just the grunt ones!"
"Oh I'm sure I'll be thankful for this later!" Weiss replied in a voice that simply oozed sarcasm as an Ursa now made itself known with a loud roar, charging at her with surprising speed.
Pulling away from a few Beowolves that tried to take a swipe at her, Weiss proceeded to switch Dust cartridges yet again, the one being used now being an ice blue in color. She planned to freeze the ground and make the Grimm slip up. Literally.
But before she could even think to do so, one Beowolf that she thought she had put down suddenly got back up, now lunging at her from behind.
"Yo, Weiss!" Yang called out to her in shock. Being currently caught up with several Ursa flanking her, she was unable to even try to take care of the Beowolf in its mid-lunge.
Weiss could only look over her shoulder a bit in genuine shock as the Beowolf's sharp claws made their way towards her upper back. More specifically, her neck. It was so sudden an attack and now too close to her for her to use a glyph to dodge. This was it for her; the attack would land and end up scoring a direct hit to the side of her neck. It'd be a miracle if she didn't bleed to death within a minute.
But the supposed deathblow never came.
Just as it looked as though the claws would reach their mark, the Beowolf was suddenly split into multiple pieces. Weiss literally saw its outreached arm split into much smaller pieces before her very own eyes.
And as the Beowolf fell to pieces literally, Weiss bore witness to her savior.
"You alright?" Miki asked, Tyrfing firmly in her hands.
"A-Ah… yes," Weiss stuttered out as she looked in the direction she had just been facing in. The Ursa she had been about to attack along with the other Grimm were no longer in one piece anymore. Now, the entire street was littered with pieces of the fallen Grimm.
Weiss and Yang – the latter taking care of the Ursa that had circled her now – could only look on, impressed. Looking at the street, there have had to have been more than twenty five Grimm alone just on this street, with a lot more having been trying to rush through the small openings between the buildings. And yet Miki had slain them all in such a short time span.
"Good." Miki then turned around and looked to the forest. Through the trees, she could see Blake and Ruby still fighting, the two girls now working in unison to hold the other Grimm back. But it wasn't enough as more simply surged passed them and towards the village. "More are coming. Get ready."
"Any plan to deal with this?" Yang asked as she resumed a battle stance. A grin adorned her face, happy to have another person form a line between the village and the forest. And from what she could see, the people of the village felt the same way; though barely visible, many people could be seen looking through the windows at Miki, amazed expressions on their faces.
"Because of the direction the Grimm are coming from and our current spot here in the village," Miki began as she readied her magical weapon. "I'm unable to swing with anything approaching my full strength. And while I'm certainly fast enough to deal with waves of Grimm like this, doing so with the village in danger will only leave it at a greater risk of taking damage. Especially now that Grimm are beginning to come from more than just the west side." The magus grimaced as she motioned with her blade towards the south direction of the village.
It would seem that a number of the Grimm had circled around and could now be seen running towards the village from the south. Looks like the three village defenders would have to spread themselves thin here.
"So what can we do about this?" Weiss now asked as she slowly rotated through her available Dust cartridges.
"This village is only surrounded by forest," Miki spoke, shifting her footing about as she prepared to go on the attack. "And as it's all relatively old forestry, its destruction isn't something that'll matter much. So if we could somehow get all of the Grimm to come at us from just one direction… then I can take care of them."
"Great, so how do we do that?" Weiss asked.
Miki allowed herself a somewhat sheepish chuckle. "For now… let me think on that. Just focus on defending the village!"
And with those words, she and Yang and Weiss sprung into action.
From afar, Surma watched and listened to the battle at hand. Even as the rest of its Grimm army rushed forward, the beast stayed hidden within the shadows, hidings its appearance still. From its spot, its eyes remained focused on the village and the Grimm approaching it.
It knew right away that none of the Grimm would be able to so much as touch Miki, much less successfully do any damage to her.
Surma knew this from watching Miki, its sight great enough to see the magus in action, even from this distance.
Surma watched the practiced ease with which Miki moved about, the way all of her well defined muscles tensed and twitched with every swing of her magical weapon. The level of skill and experience Miki possessed was truly unlike any other magus it's been sent after in the past. Truly, if it came down to an actual battle between it and her, Surma would undoubtedly lose.
But that's only in a direct confrontation.
Indeed, Miki was very powerful. Her muscles weren't for show; even though she was holding back immensely, it didn't take a genius to see that there was no way for any number of Grimm to physically overpower her, much less make her truly strain herself.
But there was one thing that Surma noticed about Miki: her speed. Compared to fully trained and experiences hunters and huntresses, she was impossibly fast. But by the standards of magi, she was only above average in movement speed, even after all of these centuries.
And what Surma in particular excelled at was speed. Perhaps launching a surprise attack would be more successful than it had originally thought. Even if Miki's reflexes were greater than her speed, Surma, in all of its still bestial intellect, was confident that it could make a break for it before the magus could land a hit on it given the gape in actual speed.
But for now, this was something that it'll worry about if it ever came to that. What truly mattered at the moment… was simply waiting for the Grimm to do their part and make her eventually lower her guard.
And when that happens, it will strike.
Back at the Holy Knights' base, the captain of said combatants was in his room. But outside of his room stood Lugh.
The fifth seat simply stood outside of the room, a quirked eyebrow indicating a certain level of interest. For just having been about to knock on his captain's door, he had paused upon hearing him speaking to someone else.
"A guy from the sounds of it…" Lugh silently commented, taking note of the voice, though admittedly he could barely hear it through the thick door and walls. He had to say that this fellow his captain was talking to seemed quite polite; he never once seemed to consider interrupting the captain whenever he spoke.
"Could this be related to Amaterasu… no, wait she prefers to be called Cinder outside of her Holy Knight duties…" the fifth seat absentmindedly thought.
"Is there something wrong here?"
Lugh nearly pulled out his spear a voice suddenly came from behind him. But he refrained from doing so as he recognized the voice a mere second later.
Turning around, Lugh now bore witness to the final member of the Holy Knights: the third seat, Morgan Le Fay. She made for a tall and even imposing figure, standing at almost an even six foot six and wore an elaborate traditional dress that has been modified slightly to appear more modern and even a little revealing as it showed off her slender shoulders and more than ample bust. Wavy pale blonde hair that stretched almost all the way down to her rear complimented her pale skin and startling rosy colored lips.
Her blue eyes focused heavily on Lugh, who was shorter than her by several inches. "I repeat: something the matter, little Lugh?" Her lips curled up a bit in something akin to a smile.
"Not at all. Just curious as to who the captain is talking to is all," Lugh spoke gruffly. Of all the Holy Knights, he didn't quite along with Morgan. Although he knew it wasn't intentional on her part, there was just this sort of… haughtiness to her actions. Whereas anyone outside of the Holy Knights would've found themselves enraptured by her beauty, the Holy Knights themselves, who interacted with Morgan the most, couldn't help but feel just a tad bit put off by her attitude.
That wasn't to say that she was a bad person though. She really did care for the others. "If you say so. Though I'm kind of curious too…" Morgan cocked her head to the side as she folded her arms under her breasts. "…Seems to me that this person is a friend of his."
"And how would you know that?" Lugh asked of her.
"Personal experience, I suppose." Morgan's reply was immediate and without much emotion. "So? Do you plan to just stand out here or do you plan to ask him something?"
"I can afford to wait for him to finish up his conversation." Lugh replied before walking off, leaving Morgan Le Fay alone before the captain's room.
The third seat stood about in silence, watching Lugh walk away before looking back to her captain's room. She remained standing, listening in on the conversation coming from inside the room. Much like Lugh, she was unable to really make out much other than that the captain and his mysterious friend seemed to be politely letting the other fully finish talking before speaking up themselves.
Finally after what felt like an hour, the talking ceased and Morgan deemed it to fit to now knock lightly on the door.
"Enter," was the reply.
And enter she did, Morgan opening the door and closing it behind her. Taking note of the Spartan room, she locked eyes with her captain, whose face somehow remained hidden from view due to the lack of lighting in the room.
"Morgan…" he greeted cordially, sizing her up as if to guess her intentions.
"My apologies for interrupting your quiet time… but just how did the conversation go?" the third seat asked of her captain as she went and sat down on an extra chair he had in the room. She folded one leg over the other as she patiently waited for his inevitable answer.
"About as well as you'd expect; simply keeping him up to date on the things he didn't catch as he rested, getting his opinion on it all…" The captain did little to hold back the sigh that now escaped his mouth. "Other than that, nothing much."
Morgan simply nodded. "Understandable." She paused for a moment. "So just when will he finally be making a move? I mean, now that we're all fully assembled so to speak… or will be once we move to Cinder's location…" She trailed off as she tried to reorganize her thoughts. "Since we're all ready, just when exactly will you and he finally be confronting the ancient magi for good?"
"Soon enough. Once my experiments yield favorable results, that is; to go against Fenrir now would only result in the death of us all if he so chose to kill us. It'll take the results I so desperately want to stand much more of a chance against that all-powerful wolf," the captain explained, leaning back in his own seat. "That said, I should much rather be asking you that question: are you ready for what's to come? Fighting the ancient magi could no doubt result in casualties on both their side and ours."
At that, Morgan huffed. "For the dream that you have given us all? I'm more than ready," she replied, an almost feral grin on her otherwise beautiful face.
"Then until all of my own preparations are set, you're going to have to wait." It was rather subtle, but Morgan could've sworn that her captain just sounded a tad bit amused.
"Very well then… I'll leave you it, my captain…" Now standing up, Morgan bowed deeply to the man before exiting the room.
The captain watched her leave before letting out another sigh. "Soon enough, my friend… soon enough…"
Back at the village, the fighting still raged and even more fiercely than before.
Although the Grimm have thinned noticeably in numbers, there were still far too many of them still trying to rush the village.
In the forest, both Ruby and Blake still remained there trying to hold back as many Grimm as was possible. To this end, Ruby used her semblance and the recoil of every round fired from Crescent Rose to all but catapult from place to another, swinging her weapon around wildly at every Grimm she could lay her eyes on.
As for Blake, who was now on the opposite end of the village, she used several clones to serve as a brief distraction for the Boarbatusk that showed up while she focused on an Ursa that was trying to clumsily sneak past her. A barrage of sword slashes and a swift kick to its neck stopped the Grimm cold.
Now using a clone yet again to avoid taking a hit, Blake somersaulted back several times to put some distance in between her and the Grimm that had decided to focus on her rather than going after the village.
"Just when will this end?" she muttered in growing frustration and exhaustion. Although these Grimm were little more than cannon fodder, their numbers were finally beginning to get to her and the others. If this kept up, it'd only be a matter of time before one of them really slipped up.
Her cat ears twitched violently as she heard something coming from behind her. Instinctively, she leapt forward, keeping her head low just in time to avoid a wild swipe from a Beowolf. Halfway through her leap, she changed one of her swords into its gun form and opened fire on the Grimm before switching back to her sword in time to deftly block a vicious blow from yet another Ursa.
Blake grunted, her arm straining from the force of the hit. As she took several steps back to once again put some distance between them, she tried not to sigh. This wasn't the time to worry about falling. Not yet.
As for Yang and Weiss, the two girls remained as close to one another as possible as they kept on running from one end of the village to another.
The line they had formed had ultimately been broken as more and more Grimm simply slipped past the borderline that Ruby and Blake were so desperately trying to defend still.
"Eat… this!" Yang roared, her eyes glowing red as she reared back her fist and punched a charging Boarbatusk right in its massive jaw. Thanks to a combination of pure brute strength and the firepower that Ember Celica had, the charging Grimm ended up being halted in its advancement and was even launched upwards into the air.
But Yang wasn't done just yet. Kicking a nearby Beowolf in the back of the legs, she grabbed a hold of it and proceeded to spin and throw it into the airborne Boarbatusk, sending them both flying back a fair distance.
Meanwhile, Weiss deftly kept at bay a small number of Beowolves. She gritted her teeth in mounting frustration. She was running low on Dust and using her glyphs anymore would drain her of whatever aura she had left. She was going to have to do this the hard way.
"Good thing I'm always prepared for times like this!" she thought as she deftly flicked her wrist several times, said repeated movement resulting in her stabbing the Grimm in either the throat or another vital spot. The ones stabbed in the throat would collapse on the spot, but the ones who weren't stabbed there tried to press onwards. A repeat of stabs from Weiss ensured they would fall this time around.
"So what now?!" the heiress then asked almost frantically as more Grimm showed up at the end of the street and began to rush towards her and Yang.
"Just keep running until we reach the forest!" Yang shot back, figuratively and then literally, as she took aim with one of her gauntlets and let loose a blast at one unlucky Ursa, striking it right in its left shoulder.
While they did this, Miki was in the thick of it all, doing her best to reroute the Grimm.
"Ha!" With a swift swing of Tyrfing, she sliced open the ground to an extent where a number of Beowolves fell into the opening and remained trapped there, forcing the rest of the Grimm to try and go around the large opening.
The magus then went on the move, skipping back with an almost inhuman grace as she constantly baited the Grimm. As she expected, they simply grew enraged and continued to try and get to her, ignoring the village now.
Not even a full minute later, Miki almost ended up literally bumping into Ruby. "How're things?" Miki asked.
"They just keep coming from that direction now!" Ruby exclaimed, pointing with the hilt of Crescent Rose towards her right, outwards to the forest.
Miki brought her sword down on one Boarbatusk that had finally been able to reach her, her attack slicing the large creature clean in two. With that little distraction dealt with, Miki focused keenly on the forest. It was very faint due to the sheer number of trees, but now she could see the rest of the Grimm running past everything else to head for where Ruby had been pointing to.
Miki's eyes widened slightly; all of the remaining Grimm were intending to come barreling all at once now from Ruby's direction, trampling everything underfoot.
Despite this worrisome turn of events, the magus slowly walked past the young leader. "…Out there, there's nothing but forest, right?" she asked Ruby.
"U-Uh…." Ruby nearly let go of Crescent Rose just to try and scratch her head. "I don't…"
"That whole area is just forest, you dolt!" Weiss exclaimed as she and Yang finally reached them, taking down more of the Grimm that had been chasing them. "Study the maps more often!"
"Where's Blake?" Miki then asked, ignoring Ruby's surprised sputter when Weiss had yelled at her just now.
"I'm here now!" All eyes turned in time to see Blake now appear, using her semblance to feint an attack towards a lone Ursa, before circling around it, slashing at its sides until it finally fell.
With the Ursa quickly finished off, Blake now ran over to the rest of the team, her entire body all but drenched in sweat and her clothes looking more than a little dirty now. The rest of team RWBY could hardly find fault with her disheveled appearance; they too were sweating and covered in dirt too. Such was the effect that this ridiculous number of Grimm had upon the girls, who simply weren't used to fighting anything approaching this number.
"Oh good, now we can all get trampled together!" Yang commented dryly, showing that even she, the ever lively one, could be worn down too. She then looked to Miki. "Then again, they're all pretty much lined up like you wanted, right?"
"Yeah…" Miki took several steps forward, her hands tightly gripping the hilt to Tyrfing. She paused for a brief second as the Grimm continued to approach and took that time to smile softly at the girls. "You all did very well. Not many people at all could hold their own this long. And without any injuries too."
Then Miki focused back on the Grimm, her smile gone. "And now it's about time I really do put an end to this… before the Grimm could change their minds about what to do." She raised her sword horizontally, preparing to swing it as she took up a left handed stance.
"Watch carefully…" Blake whispered to her teammates, much to their sudden surprise. "You didn't really get to see Mr. Sumeragi fight, so now you'll really get to see for yourself just what a magus could possibly do… and what we'll probably be going up against with these Holy Knights…"
Digesting what Blake said, Ruby, Weiss, and Yang turned back to watch Miki, taking in how every sinew in her body was now poised for a 'true' attack.
Miki remained perfectly still, her gaze locked onto the Grimm that continually grew closer. And closer. And closer. Even when the ones at the very front of the final wave were little more than twenty meters away and rapidly closing in, Miki still didn't budge a single inch. The girls and the villagers, who now poked their heads hesitantly out to watch from afar, were beginning to worry.
But their worries ceased immediately.
With little more than a grunt, Miki swung Tyrfing with every ounce of strength she possessed.
And the result was something that everyone there would remember to their dying day.
The Grimm hadn't even been within Miki's swinging range. But even then, that had been a trivial matter, for the sheer strength Miki possessed and unleashed generated such air pressure that all of the Grimm were obliterated. Not simply crushed or sliced or blown back, but obliterated. With a speed that couldn't be tracked by anyone's eyes save for Miki's own, the Grimm were simply destroyed, one cell at a time until nothing remained.
But that hadn't been the full extent of Miki's strength either. For it was not just the Grimm that virtually ceased to be, but the trees as well. Whereas before, many trees in varying degrees of health or decay stood, surrounded by a lot of dead grass or uneven and rocky ground, there was now nothing more than a plain landscape. All of the trees and grass and anything else in the direction Miki had swung were gone as if they had never been there and even the ground had now been rendered perfectly flat, any hills that had once been in the area destroyed along with the Grimm.
And it was this now plain landscape that anyone there was capable of seeing. Where it ended and where whatever remained of the forest began was simply beyond even Miki's ability to see with the naked eye now.
And so with the threat of the Grimm eliminated for good from this area, Miki lowered Tyring and turned around, feeling just a tad bit uneasy as the eyes of team RWBY and the villagers were all but glued to her now.
"So… I guess that's that?" she asked sheepishly.
From afar, Surma had watched as its army of Grimm had been annihilated. Whatever fear it had felt of Miki had now increased dramatically. Never would it have imagined the magus to possess such immense brute strength. Surma considered itself lucky that it had been hiding towards the west rather than where Miki had swung, otherwise it would have been caught up in the attack as well. And while it would've survived the attack, the sentient Relic knew for a fact that it wouldn't have emerged unscathed from it.
But alas, thinking any more on this what-if was irrelevant; Miki had lowered her magical weapon and turned her back towards the plain landscape, her guard finally down.
Every muscle in Surma's body bristled, preparing to go on the move. The chance it had been waiting for had finally come.
A fraction of a second later, the beast pounced out of its hiding spot and headed for the village.
Back in said village, Miki slowly walked back towards it, looking uneasy as everyone still remained all but mute.
"T-T-That was just…" Weiss tried to speak up. Normally a young woman with great composure, the heiress was now little more than a shaky kid in demeanor, trying to find words to properly describe what she just saw. And so far, she was failing at that.
"I… I knew you'd be powerful…" Blake now began to speak. "But to see something like this…" She too was at a loss. In a way, this attack had even outdone the sort of collateral damage Heracles had wrought upon the city and the port with one of his punches. And considering the level of brute strength he had seemed to possess, the cat Faunus knew that that was really saying something about Miki's own level of strength.
"Eheh… I guess I went a bit too-," Miki began, about to scratch her cheek in embarrassment when she suddenly stopped speaking.
An attack was coming. She could sense it.
After all of these centuries of battle and training, one of her magical abilities, Hlidskjalf which allowed her to see a few seconds into the future still very much remained an active ability. It wasn't some passive thing, but rather she had to actively use mana in order to use Hlidskjalf in any capacity. But after all these centuries, using it so much had resulted in what could perhaps be called a more developed 'sixth sense,' a passive one that is capable of indicating to her when a magical attack or an object imbued with mana is coming towards her. In addition to this, it also informs her of the direction of the attack and when it will happen so long as it was within a second and a half of actually happening at all.
Thanks to this 'sixth sense' of hers, Miki was able to spin and bring up Tyrfing in time to parry the massive set of claws that would've sliced open her back.
Miki grunted, her arms straining under the sheer strength of the near hit. The amount of mana she had sensed had been great, but not to the extent that would suggest this level of might. Although she was certainly stronger than this attacker, she hadn't been mentally prepared for this sort of thing just yet and as such she was knocked slightly off balance.
But as quick as this happened, Miki regained her sense of balance and shoved the attacker aside…. Only for the attacker, still little more than a blur to even her eyes, to suddenly go into something of a frenzy, launching one blow after another at her. Miki scarcely had time to respond with an attack of her own, simply having to block or parry the blows instead.
What felt like minutes to her though had only been an instant to team RWBY and the villagers watching. And so wasn't until Miki found enough of an opening to take a light swing at the attacker's legs that the attacker relented and leapt back.
"W-What's that?!" Ruby exclaimed as she readied her weapon, her teammates doing the same thing.
Miki took up a careful stance as well, her failed attack having allowed her some breathing room to finally get a good look at who or what had tried to ambush her. And she found herself earnestly shocked to see just what it was.
The beast was quite large, at least by human/Faunus standards, standing at roughly eleven feet in height. It appeared to be some sort of humanoid wolf, like a werewolf some would later say upon seeing this beast. Its fur was as black as the night and was just thin enough for all to clearly see its incredibly sleekly muscled body, showing it was built for both speed and power. But what really caught everyone's attention were its tail and its eyes.
In the case of the tail, it was not that of some 'normal' wolf, but rather it was a snake and one that was clearly quite alive as it hissed darkly at Miki, its stark white scales contrasting immensely with the beast's fur. As for the beast's eyes, they were completely devoid of pupils and even irises, leaving the shining red sclera entirely visible as it focused its gaze on Miki as well.
"Just what are you?" Miki muttered as she raised Tyrfing at it, getting ready to charge and attack.
"Well whatever it is," Yang began, loading more rounds into Ember Celica. "It can't take us all on! So-."
"No! Stop back for now!" Miki ordered, not taking her eyes off of the beast. "This is definitely not some kind of Grimm…" The sheer amount of mana it was radiating certainly saw to that. Miki's eyes narrowed as she sized up the beast.
The beast, none other than Surma, did so as well, but no longer with the intention of attacking. It let loose a low growl at its own failure. It had moved as quickly as it could and yet somehow Miki had still been able to react in time. Not even one of its follow up attacks had gotten through her guard. And now that it has Miki's full attention, this was no longer was a situation where it could afford to fight, especially when the four girls, as weak as they are compared to it, could serve to distract it from Miki in the midst of a battle.
No, this entire situation had been shot to hell. The army of Grimm it had assembled had failed, its surprise attack had failed and now here it was, exposed to the magus and the rest of the village. The advantage of surprise had been lost and all because it hadn't backed off soon enough since it was Miki's failed attack that had ultimately forced it to jump back and pause momentarily like this.
Surma eyed Miki warily now, taking note of every single little movement she made. Earlier in the day, it had felt confident that it could move faster than she could possibly react to, but now its confidence had been shot down considerably. And this magus was far from a fool; if she sensed any movement on its part, she'd go in for the kill in an instant.
Therefore, the only option it had left was one it had considered taking back when it had first become aware of Miki's presence.
Moving so suddenly that Miki ended up actually gaping at the sight, Surma turned its back on Miki and made a run for it.
"Hey, wait!" Miki prepared to swing her blade at the beast. Although she knew right away that catching up with it would be impossible for her, the air pressure generated from a swing of her magical weapon will surely knock it down before it could get far.
As if sensing her intent, Surma shifted direction, jumping high into the air and over the village before rushing off yet again.
At that, Miki could only let out a 'tsk' of frustration. She couldn't do anything now, not without wiping out the village if she really did swing her blade.
Having now lost the one slight chance she had to halt the creature, she quietly dismissed Tyrfing as she now proceeded to walk towards team RWBY, who now all stared off in the distance that Surma had taken off in.
"…What in the world just happened?" Blake asked.
In response to this, Miki could only sigh heavily. "Honestly, I don't know… but something tells me that somehow, someway… that thing is involved with the Holy Knights."
That got the attention of team RWBY very quickly. "So then-," Weiss began.
The magus nodded grimly. "Yeah. Sooner or later, we'll be seeing that beast again. And I don't think he'll be running away the second time around."
Back at the base of the Holy Knights, Kalma awoke from her evening sleep with a sudden start.
Although her connection with her sentient Relic Surma was only strong enough for them to be aware of the general location of each other, if one of them was feeling particularly strong emotions, the mental link between them would be become a bit clearer.
And in this case, she had been rudely awakened from her sleep by the sudden images that flashed through her mind, courtesy of a scared and somewhat miffed Surma.
The sentient Relic had tried to attack one of the ancient magus. It had failed in its attempt. And not only that, but now the ancient magus had gotten a very good look at the beast.
Kalma's mouth went dry in an instant as the young Holy Knight tried to process this turn of events. Finally, she was able to work her own voice enough to summarize her thoughts on this.
"O-Oh dear…."
And that's that. Expect some of the scenes in this chapter to herald a few things to come in future chapters. That's all I can really say lest I potentially slip up and say something too revealing. It's my hope to really take you all completely off guard with some of the plot twists I have planned out for the future, especially near the climax of the story.
Well, not much more I think has to be said about this other than that as usual, thank you all very much for the continued increase in favorites/follows for this fic. I hope you're all enjoying this so far and if not, then it's my intention to do even better with every passing chapter.
Until next time everyone! Take care.