Welcome to the Ruby Arc! Enjoy~

"So~?"

Jaune was blushing and sweating at the same time. Having no younger sisters meant that he never had to give the Talk to anyone. Sure, he knew about sex, he masturbated and he had his fair share of Remnet searches -now erased- in his browser history. He also was pretty chill about it, not obsessed like some people he knew were. But nonetheless, that didn't mean he was ready to give someone else the Talk. "W-W-Why s-should I-I-I s-start?" he squeaked out, stumbling on each word. "I-I me-mean, w-w-why do-don't y-you hel-he-help me w-with m-mecha-sh-shift b-before I-I-I tell y-you a-a-about… th-that?"

Ruby tilted her head to the side. "Because I asked first, of course!" she grinned widely. "That's how it works. I asked first, so first you tell me what 'sex' is and then we make a baby for you!"

Jaune choked and coughed at her unfortunate choice of words. He really hoped no one was around to hear of that, especially Yang or her family. Despite apparently being in the family himself, he had no doubts they would not like to hear of the two of them 'making a baby'. He shuddered at the mere thought of it. Beyond all the immediate implications, growing a baby was hard. It was an ungrateful task you could maybe be thanked for after years of it. Sure, Jaune was also pretty certain it would probably be the most amazing task in the whole world… once he was ready for it! And why the hell was he even thinking about that when he needed to find a way out of that conversation!?

He coughed some more, with Ruby's earnest hand patting his back sympathetically, before he could utter another word. Her expression was sincerely worried about what she'd done or said wrong. "Is everything okay?" she asked, concerned.

"It's… I'm fine…" he croaked out, managing to regain his voice. He still needed a few deep intakes of breath before he could speak normally again, but Ruby seemed okay with waiting, satisfied with knowing he was okay. Besides, the rain was still keeping them under the archway, so they couldn't have opted to design his weapon instead of talking about that without getting wet first. He shuddered again. 'Stop the innuendos, Monty Oum, or I might just die of heart attack,' he thought with horror. "I was just… taken off guard by your… choice of words. You know… the 'making a baby' part…"

Ruby tilted her head even more to the side. "Oooh, no I meant a weapon." She laughed. "You can't make a baby. The stork brings them."

Jaune's mind came to a screeching halt and for a second he just stood there, frozen in time, vainly trying to process what the heck Ruby must've been told all her life. Then his brain rebooted and he whimpered, letting his head fall into his hands. "Why me? Oum, why? Did I do something so horrible in my last life to deserve such karma? What did I do?"

"Err… Jaune?" Ruby was back to concerned. "Seriously, are you okay?"

"No, I'm not okay, and I'm going to have a serious talk with your family about the lies they fed you for years!" he exclaimed, pulling at his hair. The shock was still there, as was the embarrassment, but now outrage and annoyance were rising as well. What kind of irresponsible family allowed someone to reach fifteen without knowing anything about sex or 'baby-making'?! He understood that Yang probably never left her side, but Ruby could've easily have been approached by someone willing to 'teach' her sex and taken advantage of! "How can you not know what's basically the reason you were born?!"

Ruby flinched at his loud tone of voice and he groaned, running his hands through his hair. "Just… just how much you don't know? Just how much am I gonna have to explain you?" he asked miserably. "Do you… do you know what males even have in the crotch area?"

"Sure I do!" exclaimed Ruby. "I saw Dad's… thing sometimes when I entered the bathroom and he was in the shower! Plus Yang has lots of magazines with naked people!"

Jaune paled. "Please don't tell Yang you told me this. Plus, I could've really lived without knowing of your sister's porn magazines," he whined as he hid his face into his hands again. "Oum, how could my sisters and my mother do this for every Arc child? How? How am I supposed to do this?"

Ruby patiently waited for him to reappear from behind his hands.

"Fine. Here goes nothing. It's not like you knowing of sex would be any worse than you believing… whatever the hell they told you." He harshly took out his Scroll and opened a few tabs. "Here. Oumpedia. Medicine of Remnant. Alpha Knowledge. These should have all the info without… much… obscene stuff."

Ruby blinked and sat right beside him to read from his Scroll. "Uhm…"

"No, you are not just reading this. I am helping you," stated Jaune, killing his pride and opinion of himself with one stone called shame. "Oum only knows that if I don't, something will inevitably happen and somehow mess everything up. And that's the last thing I need right now. So no alone reading, I'm helping you."

"Okay!" she chirped happily, although she was a bit confused about Jaune's embarrassment. She really didn't know why he was embarrassed. After all, it was just 'sex', right?

"First question, are you comfortable with talking about… I don't know… your genitalia?" He carefully avoided any informal word and stuck to the basics. Besides, he was pretty sure that had Ruby asked, her family would've used words like that.

Ruby turned a bright cherry red and brought her hands to cover said area even though she was fully clothes. "N-No…" she murmured with a mighty blush, looking away. 'Is he going to ask me to strip to show me!? I don't want to learn about sex, then! It's too embarrassing! Why would anyone want anything to do with my… how did Yang call it?… v-vagina?'

"Thank you, Oum blessedmost!" exclaimed Jaune. "At least Yang won't kill me because you went around with no shame to ask and -specifically- do sexual-related stuff! Apparently there is some luck for me in this world!" He sighed deeply. "Okay, now… do you know what its use is?"

Ruby was still very very red, as opposite to Jaune. He was just too resigned and miserable to even be embarrassed. He would probably scream into his pillow later that day, maybe even force Yang to do his homework for a week as payment for having fulfilled her duty as big sis! But the screaming into his pillow was the more attractive option at the moment. "Well, 'genitalia' is a word that comes from an ancient language. The ancient word is 'genitalis'. 'Genitalis' itself comes from the word 'genit' that is the past participle of the verb 'gignere'. 'Gignere' can be translated as 'beget'. Do you know what 'beget' means?"

Ruby thought about it, but eventually nodded.

"In case you don't -no I am not taking any chance- it means to procreate, to conceive a child, to give birth to a child. So, if you have followed my train of thoughts, 'genitalia' is closely related to… 'baby-making'. I'm not explaining that right now." Jaune was pretty sure that, had Ruby blushed any harder, he would need to rush her to the hospital. "The same goes for males, since the word 'genitalia' can be applied to both genders. Now read this paragraphs, don't read more."

He handed her the Scroll. With a little bit of luck, he wouldn't need to explain everything about it. Anatomy could be handled by those sites. Besides, he already checked them and they were safe. Maybe they could give her ideas but apparently she wasn't shameless so it wasn't a problem. Ruby avidly read the whole thing before giving it back. She still didn't appear satisfied, since he still hadn't told her about 'sex', but it was clear she was taking in what he had just given her.

'Please, Oum, I said no more innuendos!'

"S-So… sex is a very general word. I am not going to tell you of the thousands way of having sex. I'm sticking to the basics. Girl on girl, boy on boy, girl on boy slash boy on girl. No threesome." Even Jaune's utter and miserable resignation had a limit, and he could feel a humiliating blush firing up his cheeks. "One of the most common meanings of sex is to stimulate the genitalia until orgasm is achieved. Just… just read this. I am not going to tell you myself."

Ruby nodded and took the Scroll again, this time reading about something much more interesting than anatomy. She had to stop reading twice, allowing the squeaking whines of embarrassment to slip free for a few seconds, before she managed to finish the section. "T-This is s-sex?" she asked hesitantly.

Jaune's face fell as he groaned. "No. No, not at all. But I'm gonna try to speed this up. We only have sex and impregnation to cover before I am finally free of this nightmare."

"It's not like we have anything else to do, right?" asked Ruby, pointing to the heavy rain outside. "It's raining so hard we are probably going to get soaked if we as much as set foot out from under the archway."

Jaune cursed the gods of Remnant for having dropped such a burden on his unprepared shoulders. "Now… sex is basically doing that to your 'partner', and I don't mean like how Weiss and I were partners. Your lover, your better half, your mate, your significant other, whatever. I mean that. Sex is doing that to each other… often in a particular way." He whimpered as Ruby seemed confused. "What you saw earlier was 'masturbation'. When you do it by yourself it's called 'auto masturbation' or 'self masturbation'. Masturbation is often part of sex but they are more used as foreplay… stimulation. Sex is a bit different."

"How so?"

"I am not really knowledgeable on same-gender sex. When the lovers are a male and a female, usually the male puts his… phallus… inside the female's… vagina." He could swear that, had he walked outside in the rain, the water would've boiled and steamed off his cheeks. "Err… read this!"

He hurriedly thrust -'Oum stop!'- the Scroll into her hands. She had to take way more breaks to breath before she finished the section, this time. She returned it very quietly, probably regretting ever asking about 'sex'. To be honest, Jaune knew that explained like that -in theory- was something no one would want to experience, while in practice she would've been no less blushing but way happier.

'No, Oum, don't you dare start with the dirty thoughts!'

"Final argument is impregnation," he wailed miserably. At least it was almost over. He had taken Ruby's innocence already. 'Oum damn it!' "When a male's semen reaches a female's womb, and she is fertile -thus capable of becoming pregnant-, there is the chance for it to impregnate the female, and after around nine months, the baby is born."

He gave her his Scroll for what he fervently hope was going to be the last time. She quickly read the entry, although this time it was much less embarrassing. Humiliated, his pride shattered, his very opinion of himself six feet below the ground, shame and embarrassment having long taken over, resigned to his fate, Jaune Arc just waited for her to finish. 'Oum… you hate me, don't you? You must hate me…'

Finally, the extremely embarrassing subject had ended. Completely ended. Totally ended. It was over, and Jaune had the inkling he wouldn't be able to masturbate for a long time. Now it was time to build some mechashift awesomeness!

"Jaune… I do have a question," Ruby spoked up shyly. "Should I… 'masturbate' too? The site said it's normal…"

Jaune felt his hopes shatter.

/-/

"Okay, now take the higher slashing factor modifier and apply it to the upper half of the second blade section," instructed Ruby, and Jaune stared flatly at her. "Err… take that thing over there and use it on that thing over there."

"Thanks," grumbled the boy, doing what he was told.

"You have to learn how this stuff is called to learn mechashift!" protested the girl, turning back to her own weapon. "How do you think you'll ever be a mechashift smith if you don't even try to remember the components? The names are as important as the designing, the forging of the pieces, and the weapon itself!"

"Remind me who was the one who forged the pieces for your weapon because you wanted it to be forged from the hardest metals and you weren't strong enough to work with them?"

"Hey, it was just a few pieces!" she pouted cutely, crossing her arms. "You are the fullmetal smith who works with raw metals. I just took the chance to make you… to make you practise with creating mechashift pieces so you won't have to go buy them!"

"That's a lie if I've ever heard one," commented Jaune before his 'weapon', still unbuilt, refused to accept the piece he was trying to attach. He frowned and tried again. "You were just being lazy."

"You have no proof of that," she retorted, showing him the tongue. "Besides, I don't see the problem."

"Neither do I, it's just the truth," he quipped back, and they shared a chuckle. His soon turned into a strained growl as he tried to force the piece into the weapon, but vainly. He removed it and examined both the component and the already semi-assembled weapon. "How are you doing over there?"

"Eh, pretty fine, I remember Crescent Rose's design by heart." Ruby giggled sheepishly. "Not like I'm obsessed with it, of course, it's just that… I loved my b-… my weapon!" She blushed as she wisely chose another word. "And what about you? How are you doing?"

Jaune shrugged. "Eh, as amateur I don't really know," he replied nonchalantly, but inwardly he was slightly angry. 'Why won't it damn fit? I am following Ruby's instructions precisely, why can't I just manage something right?!' "This isn't the simplest of weapons, though. Are you sure I need that many modes?"

"Most of them are really solid or good for heavy hits, and I'm pretty sure that's your style. You are not slow but you don't exactly allow the weapon to drag you after it like Nora or I do. You aren't the best in hand-to-hand so it's better not to give you something like Yang. Sword and shield seemed fine…" she trailed off as she noticed his anger, and slowly stood up. "Then I just… added on top of that, I guess?"

"The shield is fine, but the sword? Sword, katar, spear, scythe and bow. Nothing else? It's kind of overkill, don't you think?" He growled under his breath as he examined the components again, and tried once more. "But anyway having more modes never hurts. As long as no one steals my weapon, that is – will you connect, you damn-"

"Problems?" asked Ruby from over his shoulder. He jumped, startled, and the pieces fell. With a heavy sigh full of anger and strain, he picked them up again. "What's wrong?"

Jaune gestured to the component. "I can't manage to attach it," he explained, irritated. "It's like the central gun barrel is too big to fit between the side ones. But I followed your instructions down to the last detail…"

Ruby examined the barrel and hummed as she scrutinized the rest of the components. "You are right, this barrel is slightly too large. Not enough to be immediately visible but enough not to fit," she nodded. "It'll have to be reforged. Thankfully you didn't force it in or it could've ruined the whole central gun mechanism."

Jaune wanted to growl in anger. He wanted to grumble in irritation. In the end, he just sighed deeply and took back the component without a word.

Ruby glanced at him and immediately recognized his mood. She had been in similar fits of moodiness when she had first begun to practise mechashift, fits due to the false belief that she had messed up once again and that she could never do something right and that she sucked at it. That had usually been her train of thoughts, and now it was time for her to be the one to drag him out of it. "Good job at spotting the mistake, that takes a keen eye," she complimented, although it wasn't completely true. Even an idiot would realize that something was wrong when the component just didn't fit. "You're on a good path to become a mechashift smith."

Jaune didn't reply, instead standing up and going over to the forge to create a new gun barrel. Ruby grabbed his arm to stop him, and made him turn. "Hey. Your only mistake was putting too much trust in me. You didn't think I could do something wrong in this and so you discarded the idea of it being my mistake," she stressed the word. "If anything, I should be honoured. You think so highly of me that you don't even think I can make mistakes. Although that's not right, I make mistakes every time. This is your first time building a mechashift weapon, and as you said it's not the simplest. I guess I went way overboard with it, but you're doing it. There's nothing to be ashamed of in not doing everything perfect immediately."

Jaune looked at her, blue and silver into silver and blue, and then sighed again, but this time irritation was leaving his body. Not all of it, but at least some of it faded. "Thanks Ruby. You're good at this," he nodded at her before turning again and going to the forge. He took off his shirt as he neared the fire, and threw it on the table.

Unbeknownst to him. Ruby's gaze remained fixed onto his bare back, and the girl sported a prominent blush on her cheeks as she tried not to let her mind wander to what he had taught her about.

/-/

"I'm bored…" lamented Yang as her new team, Arboreal, wandered aimlessly in the halls. "I'm so so so bored… I am so bored. I-"

"We got the message, Yang," Blake interrupted, glaring at her. "Now could you please stop being so loud?"

"It's not like I am distracting you from something," rebutted the blonde, showing her the tongue. "Who wants to go to Vale for the rest of the afternoon? Ruby's and Jaune's Scrolls' ASS locate them both in the forge."

The ASS, or Academy Status System, was a very useful -if poorly named- app of their Scrolls. With it, they could see their friends' status such as position within the school, Aura levels, health condition -whose only levels were Healthy, Injured, Critical, Dead- and a few more details. Unfortunately, the locating system could not work outside the school, so if they were to go to Vale, they would be able to see Ruby's and Jaune's position in the forge, but they wouldn't be able to see their own.

Blake sighed at the name -she had the inkling Goodwitch had chosen it- and shrugged. "I might use that chance to visit the library," she stated plainly. "Beacon seems not to have… my favourite literary genre. I shall search in Vale's public library."

"If you want to go search for your smut, I'm not gonna stop you," grinned Yang, making her blush deeply. "What about you, Sky? You wanna follow Blake to read of pervert ninjas doing the do upside down hanging from the ceiling with very creative uses of katanas, wires and limbs? Or do you wanna have fun in a club or something?"

Sky coughed in embarrassment at the mental image Yang brought up. "I guess I'm coming with you to a club. I'm not overly fond of reading, if I have to be honest."

"Mind if we join you?" They all turned to see Team ARTR walking up to them. "We overheard your offer. We could all use some carefree relax in Vale, so if you don't mind we'd like to tag along."

The four of Team ARTR hadn't talked much with them in the previous week, but they had been kind of supportive with Ruby and Jaune, and they had tried to deal with some of the morons who insulted the two. Tried being the keyword, as it's hard to deal with such behaviours. Every time they turned their backs, it would only continue.

"Sup," Sky greeted them.

"Hey," Arthur replied back, speaking on the team's behalf. "So? It's not like our team has anything to do. Plus Ruby and Jaune aren't around so we aren't even needed as substitute bodyguards." He grinned cheekily at the three students of Team ARBYL at that jab. "Richard here knows a couple of clubs, so why not?"

"I'd rather go somewhere quiet," sighed Trayor Mordree, third member of their team.

"Oh, you can go with Blakey," offered Yang. "She's going to the library. But sure, why not? You can all join. It's not like you can't tag along because 'we are superior' or some bullshit like what other teams say."

"Like main characters and side characters?" asked Blake, always the bookworm.

Yang burst out laughing. "Yeah, sure!"

/-/

"Aaand done!" chirped Ruby, lifting her massive scythe once again. "What do you think?"

Jaune looked at her and at the weapon with shock. "I know I saw it already, but now it looks huge when compared to you. Are you sure you didn't get the measurements wrong? 'Cause that thing is taller than you are… basically twice as tall."

It was true. The oversized weapon was probably twice as tall as the petite redhead who wielded it. As opposite to his own weapon, Crescent Rose's design fully showed off the amount of mechashift needed to create it. Although he did notice that where the original Crescent Rose had been red and black, the new one was dark red and silver. His eyes widened when Ruby turned it around. Instead of red and silver, the other side was golden and blue. He glanced at the girl, who was smirking smugly, and took in her dichromatic hair and eyes. It made sense… kinda. Its colours also kinda clashed, but he wasn't going to tell her that.

"It's… wow… it's…" He racked his brain, trying to find an appropriate word. "I'd say it's definitely your weapon, despite the size. It's awesome."

She beamed at him. "I know! I'm not sure about the colouration but I can change that later on, I wanted to keep it in theme with… you know…" she gestured at her hair and eyes to emphasize the meaning. "But if I don't like it I'll change it back to red."

"Are you still going to name it Crescent Rose?" asked Jaune, returning to work on his own weapon.

"Yep," she popped the p like she always did. "Although now that I think of it, Crescent Rose seems like the name of our emblems mixed, right? Double crescent and red rose. Crescent – Rose. Odd… but cool!"

Jaune chuckled. "I hadn't thought of that. Maybe you should be team leader."

"Ugh", she blerghed immediately. "No thanks. Before coming to Beacon I thought that being a leader would've been cool, but it's just boring and hard. You can keep the position, Mr Fearless Leader."

"One can always try…"

"Speaking of trying, how are you doing with your weapon?" she asked as she sauntered over to his table. The pieces laid scattered around, but the central part of it was mostly complete. He still needed to connect and attack the blades, insert a few support bolts, make the pommel mechanism and close the whole mechashift with armoured plates. Thankfully most of it was in the central piece, and the central piece never had to shift, so he could just make it a massively solid thing, as opposite to Ruby's scythe's fine machinery. Even after she had explained it to him, he still couldn't understand how that thing resisted hitting anything. It should've been barely solider than an origami. It was basically a metal origami. "You're almost done! Wanna some help?"

Jaune shrugged and allowed her to drag a chair beside him. "You know, I'm pretty sure Yang would've had a pun about this," he noted, gesturing to the many pieces that were his weapons disassembled. "Something about you feeling like you're falling apart, or you being all over the place."

Ruby groaned. "Please don't try to imitate Yang's puns, they are horrible," she pleaded him. "I already have her and Sky with their mock flirting and sense of humour. It's horrible. Don't get added to the list, please."

Jaune laughed. "Right, sorry," he commented before looking back at the components. "Although… speaking of feeling bad, how are you feeling? Everything okay?"

Ruby nodded energetically. "I have no idea how, but even dismantling your weapon is not harming me in any way," she stated confidently. "At this point, I don't even know if you can harm me by changing your weapon. And that's odd since this is completely different from Rubis Solaire and you had to dismantle it all and reforge it… I guess our hypothesis was wrong, reforging it doesn't harm me…"

"Well, that's good to hear," Jaune sighed in relief. "It would've been kinda late to go back, wouldn't it?"

The two shared a chuckle while the worked. With Ruby's swift hands and helpful knowledge, it didn't take much before his new weapon was ready. Jaune ruffled her hair as thanks and picked up the weapon, standing up to examine it better. The colour theme had been suggested by Ruby herself, night sky blue.

The shield itself was a beautiful but simple matter, with an eight-point-star pattern that repeated itself multiple times. Jaune had wanted to make it flat so to copy Crocea Mors's shield, but Ruby had insisted for each star to protrude from the previous one so to give it more resistance. It made it heavier, but Jaune didn't mind the added weight. Then he looked at the sword and put the shield on the table to wield it two-handedly.

The sword was a bastard sword, or one-and-a-half sword, with fanged edges and two points. There was no proper hilt, as a hilt would've hindered the mechashift, but the blade itself guarded the hand. With a nod of satisfaction, he tried swinging it a few times, testing its balance as if it were a fullmetal sword. It was still good, despite all the machinery. Then he activated the first shift, and the blade split apart by the middle, revealing three barrels. The two to the sides were shotguns, but he had chosen to honour Ruby by using a high-impact sniper rifle for the middle gun. He nodded again and activated another shift.

The blades retracted and partially folded, while the pommel travelled up the handle to secure itself on the guard. The handle itself turned ninety degrees, lodging itself between the two blades, still acting as a handle. A single lock encircled his forehead for stability, and the three barrels almost double in length. Testing the new katar mode, Jaune frowned at the thought of how much training he would need to put into practising with all the modes.

Another switch activated, and the blades extended again, only to turn one-eighty degrees and bent backwards. He had gotten the idea when Ruby had told him of her uncle's sword-scythe shift. The barrels shortened again, and a string of white Aura connected the tips of the two blades. Lifting the metal bow, he summoned three Aura arrows, one for each barrel, and tried to take aim. Not bad, he had to admit it. Ruby was a genius when it came to weapons.

Only three left to try out. He activated a shift, and the bow collapsed back into sword, but then the handle lengthened into a pike's shaft, and he was holding a polearm. Again, he swung it a bit to test its balance. It was far from the first weapon he forged, but damn if it didn't feel good to try it out.

Thwack!

Ouch. Okay, no more playing. Another shift split the blades apart, much like the first shift he had used, to reveal the barrels. Nothing fancy. 'Time to honour Crescent Rose,' he told himself. The final shift activated. A blade rotated and curved, much like in bow shape. The other folded like in katar mode, and rotated vertically, letting the blade run parallel to he shaft. The barrels were still visible, and he was holding a badass scythe. The scythe's blade was maybe a little thin, but he couldn't make it thicker without modifying the whole weapon.

Ruby was basically jumping up and down at that. "Oh my gosh try it! It's so cool!"

With a smile, Jaune flourishingly swung the scythe and took aim at a practice dummy. He pressed the trigger, and immediately two holes formed in the walls. One was due to the bullets going completely through the practice dummy and through the wall.

The other was Jaune Soleil Arc Rose Xiao Long being flung back by the recoil and flying through the opposite wall.

This was damn fun to write! Also, there's my brother looking from over my shoulder and... guess what... talking. -_-

SO! I have no time. Sorry if I won't reply to PMs today but my WiFi is going to be nil for a few days. WiFi problems... Argh...

This is the link to the new weapon. It's Cauchemar, still suggested by lordrednight. Check out my deviantart profile for the incomplete, but shadowed version. This has no shadows but has all modes. I didn't have time. As usual, remove the spaces

ht tps: (slash slash) www (d0t) deviantart (d0t) com (slash) khorevis/art/Cauchemar-Unshaded-771902463

Romance status: STILL! NOT! BEGUN! Wait until I tell you.

Next chapter: New Life, New Feelings. No, no romance, just friendship, please.

Until my brother stop talking,

Khor Evik Vlakhavlakh