Author's Notes: Hey everyone! If you're actually taking time to even read this I thank you! I'm not an experienced writer, but I've always wanted to give it a shot. I'm constantly writing up first drafts and ideas for ideas for stories I have. Sometimes even going as far as doing a full first chapter, but I never post them... I get nervous... But hey! Here's to my first story! Hope everyone enjoys it! Please leave your thoughts, comments, and questions! I promise to try and address a few!
First Chapter is a bit short, sorry. I do want to try and make them longer and more reading material later.
A bit about the world I have here, it's an alternate Remnant I came up with. There's still Humans, and Faunus. But they're also extra monsters, and other monstrous races I'd like to bring up from more traditional fantasy settings and stories. I got the inspiration for this story from a few different things I'm probably not gonna bother to list off right now. I do promise to try and be as original as I can be here, but I make no full guarantees though, cause I'm sure just about everything I can come up with has been done somewhere... But back on track, I am going to bring up more straight up magic, and dust is going to be crystalized magic, though not naturally, through artificial means for the Schools and Inquisitors to use on their jobs.
Oh! And if anyone finds a grammar or spelling error let me know please! I'll try to fix it and do better! Thank you!
Chapter 1:
A clear cloudless sky hangs over the city of Vale, the waning half moon poorly illuminating the city where the street lamps and lights of buildings failed to light themselves. All the same the city was still a standing bright beacon in the darkness, one of few cities left in the world mostly untouched by the forces of darkness, and not from the lack of them trying to mind you. Alongside the high walls of the city, and the many defenses modern technology has engineered to assist the constantly pressuring tide of the dark, stands the Inquisitors Academy of Beacon. A school that took the best and brightest volunteers to train and make them elite fighters to defend the people of the world in the dark times they live in, giving hope that tomorrow will always be there for them so long as they have them fighting.
The sounds of gunfire, and spells being cast rattles the docks warehouse district. Several squads of lightly armed and armored guards, some wielding handguns while others are equipped with sub-machine guns.
A few stood behind some crates outside of a warehouse, taking cover from gunfire from some people in street clothes, though all of them wearing masks resembling snarling dragons. Each wielding similar weapons to the guards, though the masked individuals greatly outnumber the squads of guards trying in vain to protect the warehouse.
One of the guards, possibly the one in charge based on the slightly more decorative armor he wore, was shouting orders to his men "Target the casters in the back! They're tearing our cover apart!"
As if on cue, several of the masked men not wielding firearms, instead had faint glowing glyphs and symbols floating in the air wrapped around their arms, shooting and launching a rapid stream of bolts of flaming magical energy slamming into and in already burnt or damaged sections, blowing off pieces of the crates the guardsmen were using for cover.
"Damnit!" The officer shouted, slightly peaking out in an attempt to blind fire in the direction of the castors, his SMG simply spraying around the casters, although winging one of his enemy gunmen. "Fall back into the warehouse! We'll use the automated defenses!"
After shouting the order, with an attempt to cover fire from most of the guards outside while two of them ran to open the doors. But the doors explode open in a massive ball of fire and heat bending and melting the edges of the warehouse doors.
Walking through the ruins of the door, holding a small metal crate under one arm is a figure, sections of his shirtless torso covered in bright crimson scales, two horns growing from his head and weaving into the dirty gold hair, a tail twitching and shifting behind him. His face is hidden behind a dragon mask as well.
After a brief moment of shock, a few of the guards opened fire on the imposing figure, he simply raised his free arm to shield his face as the bullets impacted his body. Though... rather than hitting him directly, a reddish-orange flash of energy where the bullets manage to him.
"He's a caster as well?!" One of the guards shouts in panic as he ejects the magazine from his weapon, and reaches for a fresh one. But as he goes to slide the new mag into his weapon there's a sudden flash of bright blue energy, and the smell of ozone. A sudden pain in his right arm as it's now missing form the forearm down, and standing between a few of the guards, holding the hand and the weapon in one hand, and a short curved blade in the other is a second figure, a faint trail of remaining cackling magical energy and smoke leading from behind the red scales figure.
The new arrival stands just a bit shorter than her red counterpart, along with a simple tank top covering her torso along with electric blue scales lining parts of her torso and arms, a similar mask donning her face although this one blue, matching the scales revealed on her skin. The tail trailing behind her is more slender and longer than the red scaled male in the doorways.
The guard with the missing arm let out a scream of pain and terror, falling to his knees and clutching his arm. The other guards quickly, turning to aim their weapons at her.
She drops the arm and weapon she's holding in her right hand, electrical magical energy arcing the palm of her hand as a long curved sword appears in her now open hand, a katana with a strangely jagged edge.
It was at this point when the Officer realized that he and his men weren't gonna be around for the next shift change in a few hours.
The flashing lights of police cars, and yellow tape blocking off a section of the warehouse district, along with the now gathering group of onlookers, ranging from typical pedestrians to excited news reporters standing in front of cameras talking erratically.
All of this caught the attention of a young Inquisitor in training. Trying to look over the heads of the crowds in vain, she sighs and starts to elbow, and squeeze her way through the crowd. Letting out the occasional "Excuse me." or "Pardon me." This young trainee eventually managed to force her way to the front of the mass of people, her silver eyes scanning the scene in front of her. From the blasted and damaged crates to the multiple warehouses with doors blown open. About to take out her scroll to record this, someone in the crowd shoves forward, causing her to yelp and stumble, dropping her scroll sending it skidding under and through the tape and barricades into the scene. Not thinking it through, and getting on her hands and knees, wanting to crawl and quickly grab her dropped device before someone steps on it, or thinks it to be evidence. Crawling as fast as she can, not to draw attention to herself she scoots over to her scroll and places her hand on it only to have another come down and meet hers. Snatching her scroll and quickly standing up and brushing off her black and red skirt.
"What are you doing here Ruby?" The person in front of her asks.
Ruby looks up, straightening her red-highlighted hair. "Yang? What are you doing here?!" She asks, quickly trying to shift the focus onto her sister. "And why are you in school uniform?" gesturing to the outfit her sister was wearing, which consisted of a black blazer jacket with white lining that contrasted the bright blonde hair of her sister, along with a matching skirt for the female version of the outfit. Yang's jacket was open, revealing the standard white dress shirt they wore under their school jacket.
"I'm here on extra credit, me and a few of my classmates are helping Professor Oobleck investigate the scene with the police." Yang responded. "Now what are you doing here? Especially on this side of the tape."
"Well..." Ruby slowly started "I was on my way to the store when I saw the lights and people and got curious. As for why i'm on this side, I dropped my scroll." She said, holding her scroll up for her sister to see. "What happened here?"
"You know I'm not allowed to say, this is an ongoing investigation."
"Ah c'mon Yang! You can tell me! I'm your sister!" Ruby whined at her sister pleadingly.
Looking around and leaning in, Yang whispered "I'll tell you what I know later." Then more out loud "Now go! You shouldn't be on this side of the tape. go enjoy your weekend." Yang led her sister back to the tape and lifted for her sister to duck through.
Ruby stepped back into the crowd, and waved goodbye to her sister. Reversing the process of "Excuse me" and "Pardon me" to get out the opposite side of the crowd, and turning to head back down the street to head to the store to meet up with her friends before she heard someone call out behind her.
"Excuse me, Young Lady?!" Turning to come face to face with a reporter with light blue hair that shifted more to lavender as it got to the edges, and a black business dress. "I saw you talking with one of the Inquisitor students inside the tape, would you mind answering a few questions? I'm Lisa Lavender with the Vale News Network."
"Uh..." Ruby stammered for a second "I-I really don't know much about what's going on..."
"Are you a student yourself?" The reporter pressured on.
"Uh yeah, I'm a first year student at Beacon."
"Does the presence of the inquisitors mean that this was a rogue monster attack or one of the Grimm cults?"
"W-what?! N-No! It doesn't mean a monster did this. It's just standard procedure to investigate with the police, in case magic was used or... a monster... did do this... But that doesn't mean it was one!" Ruby quickly tried to answer and defend her answer.
The reporter nodded "Thank you for your time." She then turns to her camera man and motions for him to follow her, and walks off.
"Well... Bye I guess." Ruby said, a bit confused and flustered. Shakinging herself out after a second she turns and heads back down the street, the way she was going.
Ruby jogged up to a small game store called 'Nerded Out'. Entering the store she smiled and waved to the old man behind the counter. "Hi! Have the others shown up yet?" She asked as walks by the counter, heading for the back.
The oldman behind the counter nodded pointed towards the back right of the store.
Ruby happily thanked the man, and walked into the back of the store through a door, into a room with a table and a few of her friends sitting around it, paper, pencils, and dice already out. "Hey guys! You're not gonna believe what I saw on the way here!" She then quickly started on explaining what all she saw at the warehouses.
One of her friends, the one sitting at the far end of the table behind the GM screen, and a school friend. Kallen, his short red hair currently brushed back, his canine ear popping out above them pointed towards her, but his eyes looking down behind the screen, perhaps at the games notes.
But it was her friend Ashley who spoke up first, it was her grandfather who owned the store "Really? Was the damage that bad?"
Ruby Nodded "Looked like a lot of burn marks around. So I think there was definitely magic involved."
Another friend from school, Jaune, a second year student like her sister with messy blonde hair, and black hoodie spoke up as well "Do you know if they'll need any extra hands down there? I could use the extra credit this term..."
"I dunno, you can check after the game maybe." Ruby kinda shrugged at her friend, a little sorry she didn't have the answer he wanted.
"Sense you're here, why don't we go ahead and get started then?" Kallen finally spoke up from the head of the table. "You can tell me more about it later when you go snooping around tonight."
Ruby let out a light chuckle. "You know me so well... But yes! Let's game!"