Chapter 28: Festival Time

The sun wasn't even out before Mori had gotten up.

It had been three hours since he had been forced to bed and now, he was up to train again.

"You said I had to sleep but not for how long," Mori evilly chuckled to himself.

After getting dressed and grabbing a banana for a quick bite to eat, Mori tiptoed through the hallways carefully making sure not to wake anyone up, half for fear of them being mad at him waking them up early and half for fear of someone would force him back to sleep.

Now was probably the best time for him to practice before he had to go MC again.

He was looking forward to seeing what other fun fights were going to happen today.

The matches he was looking forward to the most today were RWBY's and CFVY's matches.

JNPR didn't have a very interesting matchup their opponents barely scraped by, and they won more on luck vs actual skills.

That and JNPR were going to be sending out Pyrrha.

Mori could only count on one hand the people in the tournament that could actually give her trouble one on one.

Heck, some teams couldn't even take her on 4 vs 1, like Team CRDL.

That was fun watching Pyrrha take on those guys all at once.

She really outclassed the four of them.

Of course, Mori being himself, he couldn't let Pyrrha upstage him like that, so he demanded to have an 8 vs 1.

After copious amounts of begging Glynda, she finally relented.

Funny enough he ended up facing the two teams RWBY and JNPR fought in the team groups.

It was Team ABRN and BRNZ if he remembered correctly.

Now that was fun a fight, the two teams were pretty in sync as they tried to get a hit on him despite never working together.

It was no wonder they were able to put up good matches against his friends.

Like he told Weiss last night, he was way too hyped from the fights yesterday to go to sleep.

There were so many awesome and fun fights he got to commentate for, and it took all his self-restraint to not jump in there himself.

He had to satisfy himself by imagining what he would do in each of the team battles.

Instead of going to the rooftop like he usually did for training, today, Mori decided to practice somewhere close, that way he could get as much training time in as possible before he had to go back to announcing for the day.

Finding a nice spot near the stadium Mori began practicing.

Starting with basic punches and kicks first, he began to hit his imaginary opponent as he focused on precise form and technique.

Once he was satisfied with his basics he immediately went to his complicated techniques.

Fangs, Axe, Baekdu, Nigawa, Arang, Ground Drawer, Sickle, Scissors, etc.

Each technique he had was given care as he attempted to polish them more and more.

After he had given proper care to each technique Mori then sat down, crossed his legs, put his hands together, and started to meditate.

Taking a deep breath Mori then began to feel the energy both around him and in him.

There was one thing Mori understood as he meditated.

The energy inside him was vast like an ocean.

With this amount, Mori would have no problem facing other Godlike beings.

The problem?

How this energy he had was contained.

His body was still a complete mess, and it hadn't been recovering at all.

Mori wasn't sure if it was because of the grail or because of the rebound effect of multiplying his strength by 250,000.

Whichever it was, it was screwing him over.

Putting the power he had into the current body he had was a nightmare.

It was like he had an engine meant for a supercar but instead of it being put into said supercar it was put in o a rusty old car, one would find in a dump.

No matter how much he wanted to use the engine he had, the limits of his car prevented him from ever using the full capacity.

Most of the energy he had was put into making sure the balance of his incredible power and his terrible body didn't tear him apart and cause him to lose control.

No longer did he have the full might of the Monkey King who waged war against the heavens.

In a way that was good for him.

His Renewal skills had stagnated ever since he had reawakened, instead of relying on perfecting his techniques he had instead relied on what was essentially brute force with sub-optimal technique.

Now that he had no choice but to rely on perfecting his skills, he had grown to have an appreciation for his grandfather's martial arts.

Mori began to appreciate it more and more the deeper he went into perfecting his Renewal.

It really was a beautiful martial arts form.

He was close to perfecting it, he subconsciously could tell.

He could feel himself almost grasp it, but every time he got close it would just miss his hands.

He was still trying to regain that feeling he had when fighting that horde of Grimm with Team CYMS.

That was the closest he had ever felt of reaching his grandfather's level.

Sadly, Mori had been unable to recreate that feeling since then and his strive for perfection had stalled.

Maybe if he found another horde of Grimm, he'd get that feeling again?

He'll maybe have to try that out next time he's on a mission.

For now, though, there wasn't much he could do about it.

It was frustrating but all Mori could do was continue to train and then train some more and after he was finished with that, train even more.

Mori then took a deep breath, as he moved onto the next part of his meditation.

If he had ever wanted to reach that feeling again, he needed to be able to use as much strength as he could.

Carefully connecting every nerve from the top of his head to the tips of his fingers to the end of his toes, Mori flowed the energy within him so that he would be able to draw the maximum amount of power from his broken body.

Everything was connected.

His mind cleared…

He was a single organism…

A tree…

No, a forest…

Feeling the air around him he could feel people start to pass by him, some even stopping to look at him…

He didn't care, he was serene, one with the area around him…

He wasn't sure how much time had passed but soon he could feel a presence rush towards him…

It held no ill intent, so Mori was perfectly fine with letting it approach him…

The presence wasn't bugging him…

Instead, they seemed to be just outside of his space, not moving…

Like they were waiting for him…

"It'd be rude if I have them wait any longer," Mori thought to himself, "I think I'm done meditating, so let's see what they want."

Opening his eyes, he was greeted with a familiar face.

"Ruby," He smiled as he caught her before she was going to leave, "What's up?"

Ruby took a deep breath as she aimed at the moving practice targets.

"1…2…3…4…5" She calmly said as she fired at each of the targets.

Taking a look at her handiwork she was pleased to see that she was five out of five.

It was early morning on the second day of the Vytal festival and Ruby Rose was spending her morning training.

Part of it was because Mori's training habits had started to affect her.

The other was because she was frustrated.

Today was the doubles matches and she wasn't going to fighting, the participating duo would be Weiss and Yang.

They decided this last night and the entire team agreed that was probably the best pair they could bring to a doubles match.

Yang was an easy answer for one of the spots, she was a powerhouse and in one-on-ones, she was still their best.

The problem came with who'd they choose for the other spot.

Each of them had their own strengths on why they should be the one to go.

Blake because she already had chemistry with Yang as her partner as well as her semblance being able to cause mayhem on the battlefield.

Weiss, because of her dust use and Glyphs made her ideal support to Yang as well as providing good close range.

And then Ruby herself who had range from all distances.

In the long run, any of three of them could work.

Ruby wanted nothing else than to be the one who fought alongside her sister and have the world watch the two of them dominate together.

But as the leader of Team RWBY, her team's needs came before hers and her judgment as a leader decided it'd be best if it was Weiss who would be best for the second spot of the doubles.

Since it was a two vs two Ruby's sniper wouldn't as helpful as it normally would be.

Glyphs was a super versatile semblance and combined with Weiss's own personal combat skills gave them the best chance of moving to the singles.

Still, even though she was the one who made the choice, in the end, it didn't mean ruby couldn't feel frustrated about it.

If she was stronger and a bit more skilled, she'd be able to have the peace of mind to be able to choose herself.

So, in order to work off this frustration, she had decided to spend her morning training.

The first thing she did was set up targets for target practice.

After she was finished with that, she moved to using her scythe.

Cutting up her virtual opponents she made sure her connection with Crescent rose was still strong.

Finally, she set up a training dummy, putting Crescent Rose away, Ruby began kicking at it as she began to practice her Renewal and her close combat.

She had gotten a lot better with her fists and legs, especially since after Mt. Glenn.

She initially only wanted to learn Renewal because it looked cool, but her experience without Crescent Rose had taught her the importance of hand-to-hand fighting.

As a Huntress, she'd be in a lot of situations without her beloved Scythe and she needed to have other tools in her belt so that when those times come again, she'd be more prepared.

Ruby hated to imagine what it would be like in Mt. Glenn if she didn't have Mori teach her Renewal Taekwondo.

While Ruby wouldn't call herself a master at it she'd say she had got most of the techniques down.

While she obviously wasn't as devasting with them as Mori, she could confidently use the moves on live opponents.

There was only one technique that she was still struggling that.

The Triple kick, the one that inspired her to learn Renewal.

Ruby thought it'd be easy once she had gotten the initial kicks down.

But that idea soon went down the drain.

Turns out it was a lot harder than the other techniques.

Ruby still had not been able to perform it correctly.

Staring in front of a practice dummy, Ruby got set as she once more tried the complicated technique.

In a flash Ruby kicked, getting the first hit in she immediately whipped around and used her other leg to get the second hit point, going for the final spot Ruby pivoted as she tried to get it but unfortunately lost her balance just as she tried to finish the technique.

She wasn't sure what she was doing wrong.

She had asked Mori for tips on what she was doing wrong and all he told her was that she was rushing it.

How that made sense Ruby did not know.

How could a technique be rushed if the attack was simultaneous?

Once again, she stood up and tried to use the technique.

No luck, her attempt ended in failure and that was the same with her subsequent attempts.

"Aggh," Ruby screamed as she pulled on her hair, "Why can't I get this!"

Deciding she needed to take a break she went back to her room intending to drop her stuff off and check out the festival.

When she got back, she noticed that both Yang and Weiss were gone, with only Blake on her bed reading a book.

"Where are the other two?" she asked as she set her stuff down.

"They're getting ready for the match," Blake absentmindedly replied as she flipped a page in her book.

"So, it's just me and you?"

"Yup"

"Do you want to do something?"

"Nah."

"Aww, how come?" Ruby whined.

"I've been intending on finishing this book and this is as good of a chance as ever."

Ruby gave a slight pout as she left her teammate to her own.

How boring, the Vytal festival was a once-a-year thing and Blake wanted to spend her time reading.

Her loss.

Who could she hang out with now?

Maybe she'll just go by herself.

As she made her way to the fairgrounds, she noticed a curious site of something catching people's sight as they walked to the festival.

Just sitting next to a tree, Mori was meditating all by himself.

Ruby sped over to say hi but as soon as she got close to him, she stopped.

The presence he had right now was…

Ruby wasn't quite sure how to describe it.

She didn't want to interrupt him right now.

Instead, she decided to stand and wait for him to finish.

Ruby watched as he continued to meditate, it was like he was in his own world, and nothing could disturb him.

He was so calm and serene like he was part of the surrounding area.

Ruby wasn't sure when he'd be done so she decided to leave him on his own.

"Ruby," she heard him call out, right as she was about to leave, "What's up?"

"Sorry for interrupting you" Ruby apologized as she turned towards him, "I saw that you were there and wanted to say hi."

"You're fine, I woke up early to train and just wrapped everything up," He said as he got up, "Unless you want to join me?"

"No thank you, you remembered the last time I joined you right?"

Ruby couldn't do meditation, it was too hard for her, she couldn't stand sitting still for that long and her legs fell asleep last time.

"Your loss," he nonchalantly replied, "So where's everyone else?"

"Yang and Weiss are getting ready for their match, and Blake is…"

"Being Blake?"

"Yupp," Ruby affirmed with a pop.

"So, it's just you right now?"

"Yuupp." Ruby confirmed again, "I was planning on checking out the Vytal festival, do you want to join me?"

"Why not," Mori shrugged, "I finished my training, and the matches don't start for another hour or two, lead the way."

"I'm going to go check out the festival, if you need help don't call me," Mercury told his partner Emerald.

"Shouldn't you be getting ready for our match?"

"I'll be fine," Mercury flippantly responded.

"You do realize I'm not bailing you out if you get into trouble, right?"

"So, nothing new."

"Exactly."

"Love you too," Mercury sarcastically replied as he waved Emerald off.

He needed some alone time right now.

He was bored and he needed something to do before Cinder put him back to work.

Wandering through the fairground he looked around to see if there was anything interesting going on like that fight yesterday.

There didn't seem to be much going on, just what you'd mostly expect at festivals.

Long lines, overpriced food, and crying kids.

Happiest Place on Remnant.

"Well, I'm bored already."

Just as he was going to go back and bug Emerald some more, a large commotion burst out near what looked like the animal pen.

Thinking that was looking interesting Mercury began to mosey on over to check what was going on.

As a mercenary Mercury had seen a lot in his life, but what he witnessed was one of the dumbest things he had seen.

All the different animals seem to be in a panic as they were barking, neighing, oinking, and … whatever sheep did whenever they were mad.

The focus of the animal's anger?

The person who his boss Cinder considered a top threat to her plans, Mori Jin.

Who was responding to the animals' aggression with…

Mercury wasn't quite what he was doing, but he seemed to be on all four and was hissing back at the animals.

The only reason a full-blown fight hadn't broken out was the fence separating them.

That and Ruby who he knew as Red was holding the boy back crying "Stop it," and "You're better than this!"

Mercury wished he had some popcorn because this was a great comedy to watch from afar.

Eventually, the keepers rushed over, and they were able to put an end to the tensions by putting the beast in a cage.

They also got the animals to calm down.

It took a while but eventually, Mori was let out after Red made him promise to behave.

That was something interesting to note in Mercury's head as he watched the two walk off.

He seemed really close to Red.

That was probably something he should probably tell Cinder.

After all, she had assigned Mercury to find out more information about Mori Jin.

Just from the outside talk, there wasn't much to glean he randomly appeared and the only trace of him was his time at Beacon.

He had tried to befriend him to get some more info but there wasn't much luck there.

Even though their conversations were pleasant the guy was guarded around Mercury.

Mercury couldn't help but respect that, in his profession, one couldn't be too careful.

Actually, Mercury held a lot of respect for the guy.

Mercury didn't have a semblance because his bastard of a father stole it from him, so he had to work twice as hard to reach his level.

That dude was able to be at that level without even aura, so he got Merc beat there.

Then there was the fact that they both used their legs in a battle.

Mercury was curious how he'd fare against him if he was a target.

Obviously one-on-one was a no-go especially after he took out the White Fang's enforcer.

And the way he had wrecked that idiot Torchwick's forces.

And how he was able to manhandle two trained huntsmen.

Mercury couldn't help but feel jealous about his natural talent.

But if there was one thing he had learned from that bastard was there was more than one way someone could cut down a tree.

And based on how Cinder talked about him he was a giant tree in their way.

Ruby sighed as she dragged Mori off from the animal farm.

All she wanted to do was visit and pet, cute, adorable animals!

So why did that end up in such a disaster!

"What's up with you and animals," Ruby asked as she looked at the source of the incident.

"I don't know," Mori muttered as he walked next to her with his arms folded, "They started it."

"Seriously," Ruby whined, "First Zwei, now this? Is your semblance related to pissing off animals?"

"Haha, very funny."

Just as Ruby was about to complain more a whiff of something delicious tickled her nose.

It was super sweet, like…

Ruby's eyes turned into stars as she realized what it was.

Grabbing Mori's hand, she used her semblance to speed over to the stall.

It was full of caramel candy apples!

"Ruby what was—"

"I'll have two candy apples please!" Ruby shouted as she handed part of her allowance to the shopkeeper.

It seemed like Mori wanted to ask something, but Ruby didn't care, all she wanted was to get her hand on one of those delicious apples.

"Here you go!" Ruby smiled happily as she handed one of the apples to Mori.

"You know Yang is going to throw a fit about this not being good for your teeth, right?"

"Do you want your apple or not?"

"No, I will take it."

Blissfully enjoying her apple, Ruby walked around looking at the different stalls to see if there was anything interesting to do.

There were a lot of carnival games!

Oh, there was a rife shooting game!

Rushing over to the stall Ruby went to try it out.

The game was she had a minute to hit as many targets as possible.

Of course, being an amazing sniper she got the new high score.

The people around her clapped as she took a bow to her adoring fans.

"Beat that!" Ruby proudly said as she turned to Mori.

"Oh, I will!" Mori grinned.

Ruby was excited to see how'd he do she was used to seeing amazing things from her friend.

She could see Mori concentrate as he took a deep breath.

With bated breath Ruby watched.

A minute later and all Ruby could think of was what she saw was certainly amazing.

"Zero!" The shopkeeper exclaimed.

He had missed every single target!

"There, there buddy," The shopkeeper said as he attempted to console a downcast Mori, "It's a lot harder than it looks."

"Really?"

"Yeah!" Ruby said as she went to cheer him up, "I only did so well because I use Crescent Rose, I'm sure you'll do fine with something else."

Mori nodded as they moved to another game stalls, this one where they had to throw rings onto a pin.

…That one didn't go so well for Mori as well.

"I-I'm sure that was just bad luck." Ruby nervously said as she looked at Mori who had a dejected look on the ground.

"…"

The silence from Mori made her nervous.

"That looks like something that could be interesting!" Ruby pointed out another stand as she attempted to distract him from his recent atrocious showing.

Going around from carnival game to carnival game Ruby attempted to cheer him up.

Ruby discovered something new about her friend today…

He was absolutely terrible at carnival games.

From not hitting a single target, to coming into the last place in others, his carnival game abilities were like the inverse of his combat ability.

Maybe that's what his semblance was, being terrible at carnival games.

"Zero!" Another stall owner announced as Mori once again failed at another game.

"Ma-maybe we should find something else to do," Ruby asked as she looked away.

She had to turn away, she couldn't look Mori in the eyes right now, for fear of him seeing the look of pity she had for him right now.

"GAhhhh!" He screamed, "I WILL FIND SOMETHING I AM GOOD AT!"

Oops looks like he finally broke.

She then watched him run around more as he continued to try to not suck at these games.

Was there anything he could do that wasn't going to end with looks of pity?

Wait Ruby knew something that could work!

"Mori," she shouted, "Over here!"

It was one of those strength test games where you have to hit a target as hard as possible.

"Huntsmen or regular?" The owner asked.

"Huntsmen," Ruby replied as she took a hammer.

"That one over there," the man pointed as he directed Ruby to a reinforced contraption.

"So what do you do?" Mori asked as Ruby approached the target.

"This!" Ruby replied as she raised her hammer and smashed it.

She watched the reinforced target go up but sadly it wasn't even close to a higher score.

Biscuits, curse her small arms.

"Your turn," Ruby smiled as she gave the hammer to him.

"Ok," He calmly said as he took it, "I can do this."

"You can do this," Ruby repeated.

"It's not that hard, I just need to hit this, I have hit stuff before…right?"

"You have hit stuff before," Ruby reaffirmed, "A lot of stuff even."

Raising the object, he let the hammer down.

It took a few minutes for Ruby to wash the debris out of her hair.

It was silent between them as Ruby and Mori walked away from the carnival games.

Ruby broke the silence by laughing once they were far enough away.

"Don't laugh!" Mori whined, "It's not funny."

"Sorry," Ruby apologized as she wiped the tears from her eyes, "Just the look on everyone's faces after you destroyed the ground and everyone's stalls!"

"That way worth my entire paycheck for announcing," Mori complained, "I'm never doing that again."

"Come on, Mori," Ruby said as she tried to cheer him up, "That was fun!"

"…You're right that was fun," Mori admitted as he let a small smile out.

Ruby was glad he felt the same way.

She had been to festivals before but this one was one of the funnest in her life.

There was something about today that made her wish it could last forever.

Ruby always enjoyed spending time alone with Mori.

Every time she did it felt like she was learning new stuff about him that she didn't know before.

Like the stuff he was bad at.

"You know seeing you struggle really reminds me of something," Ruby exclaimed as they continued to walk away.

"Oh, and what's that?"

"You aren't a God who's amazing at everything."

"Hrrrk."

"Mori are you ok?"

It looked like he choked on something as he turned away from her.

"Yeah I'm fine," He said as he turned back to her, "It's just you caught me off guard with that."

Ruby wasn't sure what it was, but he had a melancholic look on his face.

"What's up is something wrong?"

"I'm fine don't worry," Mori replied back, "Oh, look at the time I need to get going!" Mori exclaimed as he ran off, "I'll see you at the stadium."

Ruby waved goodbye to him as he ran to the stadium.

She sadly watched him go.

That was another thing she learned as she spent time alone with him.

She knew his tells whenever he had something he wanted to hide.

And he had a lot that he hid.

Despite Ruby getting to know him better, there was still a lot she didn't know about him.

She wished that one day he'd trust her enough to tell her.

Hey, Another Chapter down, Just a shorter sweet one, I hope you guys liked it!

Andielgranrayo: I'm glad you liked the chapter, those are always fun to me whenever I read crossover fanfics, the reaction to the power a character has.

Khonkyawza: Thank you! I'm glad you consider this a good story!

Entetheslayer: No it does not lol.

Wizardwolf1020: You know that would be fun to have him have a Mori Dan appearance. It'd be like superman hiding his appearance as Clark Kent. There actually is a story I'm working on that does have him use that appearance.

Akira-of-Ashton: Hopefully it's not Hui, as for his partner they will be from Remnant.

Luke: He literally clapped Rabbit and Bunny out of existence lol.

xXWolfsterXx644: Hope you enjoyed this one.

Chickenhell: I guess you enjoyed this chapter huh!

Pop: Thank you!

.fox37: Hopefully you are satisfied with the speed of my updates.

UdaySra: Thank you!

DaDragon562: Op characters are hard to write but they can be fun as well, the key really is not to focus on the battle side of their opness.

dragonfighter11: I've planned the pairing for a while and it hasn't really deviated from it, I hope that you enjoy whatever I do in the end if you continue to follow the story.

Guest: I'm glad you've enjoyed the story a lot!

Beta(s):

Eliad91

Patrician Lurker