Here we are at Chapter 39. Time to keep things going in the tournament. Not much going to happen for Velvet and her team in this chapter. I do not own RWBY or Tales of Berseria. They belong to their respective owners. Here's chapter 39. Enjoy.
Chapter 39: New Challengers…
Team RVWBY watch as their friends in Team JNPR begin their first match in the tournament against Team BRNZ.
"Go kick some butt, Team JNPR!" Ruby yells.
"Um…good luck," Velvet says without as much vigor as Ruby, since she's not used to this.
"3…2…1…" Port counts down over the announcements.
"Come on, guys!" Jaune pumps his team up, raising his sword.
"Begin!" Port says and the match begins.
All four members of Team JNPR run at the three boys of Team BRNZ who run back at them, but the forth member, May Zedong, runs backwards to the forest section of the arena. When they get close, Brawnz knees Pyrrha who blocks it with her shield, and steps back before blocking a strike of his claws with her sword. Pyrrha then takes a swing at him, but he dodges to her right and moves away. This allows Pyrrha to see May using the end of her sniper rifle to hook onto and swing on one tree branch, propelling her to a higher branch, allowing her to act as support for her team. Meanwhile, Nora runs at and takes a swing with her war hammer at Nolan, who ducks under the attack and swings his baton at her rear. May jumps onto one branch, aims, and then fires a shot that goes over Ren, destroying a big chunk of a large boulder behind him. As this happens, Jaune uses his shield to block two strikes from Roy's saws, and then looks up to see a bullet zoom right past his head. He looks at the forest to see May's weapon shining in the forest as she aims it at them.
"R-retreat!" he commands his team.
"That sniper gives the other team an advantage," Velvet notes.
"What do you mean, Velvet?" Ruby asks.
"Think about it. No one on Team JNPR are especially skilled in long range combat. They're at their best in close range. The three members on the other team fight up close while the sniper provides support from a distance. Team JNPR is getting pinned down, leaving them vulnerable," Velvet explains.
"Oh, I didn't think of it that way," Ruby notes.
Velvet raises an eyebrow at her, "Ruby…you do the same thing on our team when you're not fighting up close," she deadpans.
"Oh, right…sorry," Ruby says, scratching her cheek.
Back in the arena, Team JNPR jump behind some rocks and use them as cover while May continues to lay down suppressive fire on them.
"What do we do?" Pyrrha asks.
Jaune looks up to see the rest of Team BRNZ running towards them.
"Spread out! Try to keep moving," he says before he blocks a strike made by Brawnz.
May jumps onto a higher branch and takes aim. Pyrrha blocks another attack from Brawnz's claws with her sword while Nolan causally walks forward to Ren who slides in front of him. Nolan looks back to May and nods his head. May aims at Ren and fires, with one shot hitting the ground in front of him and then another going for his feet, but he side-flips to evade it. As he looks up, Nolan swings his baton at him, hitting his head, making Ren stumble back while Nolan runs at him. Ren spins around and does a spin kick, but Nolan ducks under it and swings his baton at Ren's legs. Ren spins around again from the strike, and then Nolan stabs his baton at his chest, shocking Ren and making him fall to the ground.
"Ren!" Nora yells to her partner, and gets mad.
She takes a swing at Nolan, but he ducks and then stabs his electric baton at Nora's chest. However, the shock has no effect, and Nora just smiles at him while laughing a little bit.
"Ho-ho, looks like one of my favorite students, Nora Valkyrie, is charging up to use her semblance," Port says on the big screen.
"What?" Nolan asks, confused.
"Yes, Miss Valkyrie's semblance lets her produce, as well as channel, electrical energy straight to her muscles. This allows her to jump explosively into the air, wield her mighty hammer, or in this case, absorb Nolan's attacks and send young man flying," Oobleck explains.
"WHAT?!" Nolan shrieks.
Nora then flexes her arms as electrical energy surges on her arms and her torso. Nolan steps back, and then Nora burst forth with pink and white lightning bolts, smiling, before slamming her hammer against him, and sending him bouncing back and crashing into a large boulder, destroying it.
"I have to admit, I was surprised by that being her semblance when we sparred that one time," Velvet notes.
"Guess it was 'shocking' for you, huh?" Yang makes a bad pun, making her teammates groan, and Weiss smack the back of her head. "Ow! Geez, tough crowd," she says.
Meanwhile, Jaune looks to the top of the mountain behind him to see an artificially created storm cloud forming above the mountain and gets an idea.
"Nora! Get to the mountain!" he shouts to her.
Nora salutes him, "You got it!" she says and races to the mountain top.
"Ren, try and distract the sniper," Jaune tells Ren.
Ren winches as a shot flies right by him and hunches over.
"Sure, why not," he dryly replies and then moves.
Jaune and Pyrrha move forward while Nora keeps jumping up higher and higher as she gets closer to the top. Roy throws his saws at Jaune, to which Jaune blocks with his shield, but the second collision causes his shield to reel back and hit his face. The saws return to Roy, who then swings his arms around, making three swings at Pyrrha who blocks them with her shield. Jaune shakes his head back into focus and runs to join her. Meanwhile, Team RVWBY watches from the stands.
"Yeah! Go get 'em, Jaune!" Ruby cheers him on, pumping her fist into the air.
"Well, he's certainly improved," Weiss notes, complimenting Jaune, which is weird since he usually just annoys her.
'Maybe a little bit," Velvet mutters.
"Yeah, but he ain't got nothing on Pyrrha," Yang adds.
Back in the fight, Pyrrha kicks Brawnz away before blocking Roy's first saw, spinning her body to avoid his second saw, then spinning her body around to kneel and throw her sword at Roy, and then rolling backwards and pushing off her hands as she double kicks Brawnz again. Meanwhile, May aims and fires another shot at Ren, who runs across the center of the arena towards her, side stepping to evade the first four shots before jumping over Roy's saws, hitting and sliding across the ground while Pyrrha jumps and rolls over him. He gets close enough and fires his automatic pistols at Nolan as he runs at him. Ren then swings his pistols' attached blades at him twice before using them to block and lock Nolan's baton, then kicks his chest twice before positioning it behind Nolan's neck as he is forced to turn around and get locked in by Ren. May thinks for a moment before deciding to aim at Nora this time, which Ren notices.
"Nora!" he yells as he holds Nolan.
Jaune blocks an attack from Brawnz with his sword and looks back to see Nora still climbing the mountain. He then looks to Pyrrha.
"Pyrrha, up!" he yells.
Pyrrha runs towards him, flipping in the air to avoid Roy's thrown saws, sliding on the ground right by him, before she gets back on her feet and jumps over Brawnz. She lands on Jaune's shield and he pushes her up into the air just in time for Pyrrha to use her shield to block May's next shot that was meant for Nora. Nora reaches the top of the mountain, raising her hammer into the air to absorb the lightning coming off of it, charging her up. She turns her weapon into its grenade launcher form, and then opens the front section, firing off six rounds that fly through the air in a heart shape. May looks on in disbelief as they fly towards her, but jumps off her tree just in time to avoid the shots. Everyone looks on as May starts coughing from the smoke billowing up and consuming the forest, forcing her to jump down to ground level. The other three members of Team BRNZ look back up to see Nora smash her powered up hammer at the ground in front of them, making a shockwave that sends them flying back to May.
"This is it guys! Let's finish 'em with team attacks. Ren, Nora, flower power!" Jaune declares, but…
"Wait, what?" Nora asks, confused.
"F-flower power," Jaune says again as he looks back at them, but they still don't get it. "That's your team attack name," he explains.
"Since when?" Ren asks.
"Guys, we went over this! Flower power's Ren and Nora. Ren brings the flower, Nora brings the power!" Jaune practically pouts.
"How do I bring a flower?" Ren asks, scratching his head with his pistol.
"No silly, not A FLOWER. Flour, like in baking," Nora says.
"Why would I bring that?" Ren asks again, still confused.
"Eh, uh, no, it's your symbol," Jaune corrects them.
"So, what are we?" Pyrrha asks, gesturing to Jaune and herself.
"Pyrrha!" Jaune pouts again.
"SORRY, I just wanna make sure it's clearly defined," Pyrrha says.
"Pyrrha, you and I are 'Arkos,' it's that thing, where we take our shields, remember?" Jaune clarifies while Team BRNZ looks on in disbelief.
"Arkos?" Pyrrha asks.
"Yeah, it's our names put together," he explains.
"Right, no, I get it," Pyrrha says, not truly getting it.
"What, do you not like it?" he inquires.
"No, no, it's…good," she tries to be nice about it.
"Hm, I sensed hesitation," Nora notes at Pyrrha's response.
By this point, Team BRNZ was getting impatient.
"HEY!" Brawnz yells to them, getting their attention.
"Huh?" Team JNPR inquires as they look back at them.
"What do you think you're doing?" he yells to them.
"Trying to have a team meeting, thank you very little!" Jaune retorts.
"Yeah, team ears only," Nora adds, pointing to her ears.
Brawnz looks at his team, then back at them, "We're in the middle of a FIGHT!" he shouts.
"AND WE'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF A CONVERSATION! WHAT DON'T YOU GET ABOUT THAT?!" Jaune shouts back.
"Um, Jaune…" Pyrrha begins.
"Yes, Pyrrha?" Jaune replies as he calms down.
"I think he means that we're ALL in the middle of a fight," Pyrrha points out.
The group look around the coliseum to see the crowd booing at them for their lack of action in the middle of the battle.
Velvet hunches over with a look of confusion mixed with irritation, "I can't believe they're having a conversation about stupid team combo names in the middle of a tournament fight. Either they're really confident, really lax, or just plain idiotic," she says dryly, making Ruby laugh nervously.
Back in the arena, Team JNPR look on at the commotion around them.
Jaune then sighs, "Nora, just…hit them with the hammer," he says.
"Got it," she replies, getting a maniacal smile.
"Wait, what?" Brawnz says.
Nora jumps into the air, landing next to them, and swings her hammer around, hitting all four members of Team BRNZ out of the arena, colliding with the force field at the edge. This ends the match with all four of them getting eliminated by knockout.
"And with that, it appears Team JNPR wins by knockout. Literally. Can someone go make sure they're okay?" Port announces.
"Leave it to Nora to knock everyone out of the park," Velvet notes, but then Yang smirks at her. "What?"
"You just made a pun! I'm so proud of you!" she cheers.
"Oh, great…" Velvet groans, and Ruby pats her on the shoulder to comfort her.
A few minutes later, the arena resets and the next match gets set to begin.
"Aw well, Vacuo fans are sure to be hurting after that one, but this next round will have them on the edge of their seats," Oobleck says, showing a picture of Team BRNZ's defeat.
Port then steps in, "Team NDGO (Indigo) of Shade is certainly a crowd favorite, but these lovely ladies are going against some of the toughest, testosterone-filled teammates we've seen so far. I'm of course talking about…Team SSSN (Sun)!" Port exclaims. "Sun Wukong and his team are certainly a force to be reckoned with," Port says as Sun's team walks into the arena while waving to the crowd. "And although he'll be representing the Mistral academy of Haven, I'm sure his friends and family back in Vacuo will be cheering him along," Port says.
Sun and Neptune wave to the crowd along with the other two members of their team, Scarlet David and Sage Ayana. Neptune looks up at Team RVWBY and winks at Velvet and Weiss. Ruby and Yang notice this and instinctively wrap their arms around their girlfriends while narrowing their eyes at them.
"I guess he hasn't learned his lesson yet," Weiss flatly says to Velvet.
"Nope," Velvet replies, popping the 'p'.
Neptune chuckles nervously as he looks away and then his team meet their opponents, the four cute girls of Team NDGO. Neptune then quickly changes his objective.
"Ladies," he tries to act suave with them, moving on from Velvet and Weiss.
Seeing this, Ruby and Yang flip, "KILL HIM, NDGO!" the sisters yell out.
"Alright girls, try and remember; hands…above the waist," he continues flirting with them.
Sun puts a hand on his shoulder, "Ignore him, for he…Yeah, he's dumb," Sun says.
Neptune winks at them, much to their disgust, as the arena begins to set up for the next match. Behind Team NDGO, the arena opens up as a desert section with tall rock formations rises up. Above the rocks, an artificial sun appears, with some of the crowd putting their shades on.
"Ha-alright, home-field advantage," Nebula says as they look at the field.
"Don't get too cocky. That's my turf, too!" Sun says.
"I hope I don't get sand in my shoes," Scarlet worries.
Neptune leans in close, "Be cool, man," he whispers as the roulette behind him stops.
"Hey, the ocean," Dew joyfully says.
"Huh?" Neptune says as he turns around to see the symbol for the ocean…and gets engulfed in fear at the symbol, to which Velvet notices.
"Uh, what's wrong with Neptune?" Velvet asks as the team looks at Blake.
"Oh no," she says, shaking her head in her right hand.
Behind Team SSSN, arena opens up, allowing a crashed pirate ship with several small islands and ocean water to rise up. Neptune's whole body freezes up with fear as Sun pushes him a little bit.
"Neptune's…afraid of the water," Blake confesses, much to their shock.
"He's afraid of water…Well that's gonna screw up their team strategy.
"3, 2, 1…BEGIN!" Oobleck signals the start of the match.
Neptune immediately, and very quickly, races past Team NDGO, and gets up near the top of the rock formation behind them, doing everything her can to avoid the water. This confuses both teams.
"Neptune! What are you doing?!" Sage yells.
"Oh, you know, just uh, gaining higher ground!" He yells back an excuse.
"On the enemies' side?!" Sun yells out.
"They would never expect it!" Neptune replies.
"He's not wrong," Dew points out.
"Open fire!" Nebula commands and they run towards Neptune.
Sun's group run after them, with him jumping into the air ahead of Scarlet and Sage. As Scarlet gets close, Octavia jumps up in front of him. Scarlet takes a swing at her, but she ducks under him while sliding across the sandy floor. She slides in between Sage and Dew. Sage reels his large sword back and makes a heavy swing at Dew while she spins her spear around and the two attacks collide, pushing both fighters back. Dew starts slowly moving her spear over the sand, and creates sand tornados. Three tall sand tornados surround Sage and fuse together. The tornado sends him flying out of the battlefield, landing on the ground with his sword impaling the ground next to him as he is eliminated by ring-out.
"And NDGO gains the advantage," Oobleck says.
Octavia lands near Sun and Scarlet, who watch Sage get knocked out before focusing on her. Octavia spins her sword around, sending out a crescent wave of fire energy, hits the sand, causing a small sand storm to blind Sun and Scarlet. Scarlet gets blinded, but Sun jumps away and starts running by the rock formation. He then looks up to Neptune.
"Neptune!' he calls out as he keeps running.
Neptune looks down before jumping and landing on the ground level. Octavia flips in the air before swinging her kris again, shooting out another fire wave that hits the sand towards Neptune. However, Neptune pulls down his goggles to protect his eyes from the sand, and then fires his rifle back at her. Octavia blocks the shot, but looks up and gets blinded by the sun, allowing Sun to jump up and kick her in the face. Sun smiles as Octavia stumbles back before running at him to attack. Sun pulls out his weapon in staff form, and twirls it around him as he deflects a swing from Octavia's kris. He twirls it around him again before hitting her several times on her body before the last attack knocks her to the ground. Her aura drops to the red and eliminates her from the match.
"Ooooh, and we're down to three-on-three!" Port says.
"Well at least now they've evened things up now. Though with Neptune too scared to fight on one half of the arena, I can't really call it a fair fight," Velvet notes, making Ruby and Yang snicker at the mentioning of Neptune's fear of water.
Meanwhile, Dew makes another tornado that sends Scarlet flying into the air. Luckily, Scarlet flies near the mast of the pirate ship, and grabs it, swinging around to land on his feet on one end. Down below, Nebula fires an arrow at the mast of the ship, as Gwen uses the arrow as a stepping stone to jump onto the arm of the mast that Scarlet is on. When she lands, her crossbow folds and extends into a sword. She then swings her sword at Scarlet, but he blocks with his cutlass. She then makes a right swing, which he ducks under, and then swings her sword again, only for him to deflect it with his cutlass again. Scarlet counters with a right swing of his sword, but she ducks and then hits his face with the butt end of her sword. Scarlet does a spinning kick that hits Nebula, sending her around the mast and onto the other arm. Scarlet quickly spins around the mast in pursuit, swinging his cutlass as he gets near her, but she blocks the strike. Nebula then makes a downward swing at him, colliding with his cutlass, and pushing him back. However, Scarlet grabs her sword and swings his cutlass at her feet, to which she jumps over, before spinning around and elbowing her in the face. This causes Nebula to fall off the mast and hit the ground. Scarlet looks down to see Sun evading Dew's and Gwen's combined attacks, focusing on Gwen as she spins around like a ballerina while throwing her knives at him.
Scarlet pulls out his pistol, firing the grappling hook on the butt end of the gun. The hook grabs Gwen's left ankle.
"Gotcha," Scarlet says as he pulls Gwen up while he comes down.
However, when Gwen gets pulled up, her skirt and tassets open up. She holds up her skirt, but can't stop her throwing knives from falling out of her tassets. Scarlet looks up in horror and holds his body still as the knives fall, just barely avoiding him, to the ground. He then hunches over and sighs in relief. Meanwhile, Dew jumps onto one of the small islands in front of Sun. Sun looks at her before looking up at the palm tree next to him to see a few coconuts hanging above him. He smiles and hits the tree, causing two coconuts to ceremoniously fall into his hands. Sun throws the two coconuts at Dew, but she hits them right back at him with her spear. The two coconuts, now on fire, fly at Sun, but he just barely avoids them. Unfortunately, the two fire coconuts fly towards Scarlet, with one hitting him in the face, making him spin around just in time for the second one to hit him in the nuts. The painful shot takes his aura down to the red zone, eliminating him as he falls to the ground in sheer pain.
"Oooh, that's gotta hurt," Yang notes, laughing at Scarlet's expense.
"Oh well. Better him than me being humiliated," Velvet says.
"…Nuts," Sun comically says.
Sun then looks back to Dew, who smiles and then swings her spear around, creating a water spout that moves towards Sun.
"Uh, Neptune, could use some help buddy," Sun says as he flips out of the way of the tornados coming at him.
"Uh, you know uh, it probably would better if YOU came over HERE. Yeah, I can guard this…sector…We're in lockdown mode," Neptune replies, still trying to avoid the water.
"What are talking about? There's nothing to lockdown!" Sun exclaims while Nebula shoots an arrow at Gwen's hooked foot, freeing her.
"Lockdown, right, you got it," Neptune replies.
Nebula and Gwen jump after Sun, and then Sun looks back before jumping away as Dew impales her spear into the ground where he was standing.
"Dude, I know you're afraid of water, but you gotta-!" Sun begins, but stops when Neptune shoots Dew out of the air as she attacks Sun again.
"There, I helped! Are you happy now?!...Also I am not afraid of water, and I have no idea what YOU are talking about!" Neptune yells back as he points at Sun.
Behind Sun, Dew gets back up as Nebula and Gwen land next to her in the water and take their combat stances.
"NEPTUNE!" Sun screams, pointing at the three girls.
"Okay, fine! Just get out of the water," Neptune says and jumps to the beach edge.
Sun then jumps onto the beach next to Neptune. Neptune spins his gun into its glaive form, and quickly tiptoes to the water, much to Sun's annoyance. Neptune then stabs the electric blade into the water, shocking the three members of Team NDGO. The attack depletes the rest of their auras, eliminating all three and ending the match as the buzzer goes off.
"And with that, Team SSSN moves onto the doubles round," Port announces while Sun and Neptune chest bump then start dancing in celebration of their victory. "You know what I call that victory?" Port asks Oobleck.
"Shocking?" Oobleck tries to make a joke.
"No, well earned. What you said is stupid," Port replies.
"Aw, that was so close," Ruby says, breathing a sigh of relief.
"Close? They won that match because they got lucky if you ask me. They were a mess for most of it," Velvet voices her opinion.
"Looks like the dorks made it to the next round," Yang adds.
Blake looks down to the arena at Sun and Neptune dancing. Sun then looks back at her and winks at her, making Blake blush.
"Emphasis on dork," Blake says as she looks away, smiling and still blushing.
"That concludes the matches for today. Please leave the coliseum in A CALM AND ORDERLY FASHION!" Oobleck screams, making Team RVWBY wince at his loud voice.
"Come on, let's go congratulate them," Yang says as they get up to leave.
As the team leaves, Weiss notices the airship from before flying by the coliseum, and stops, making Ruby walk into her, and Velvet walk into Ruby.
"Uh, what are you doing?" Ruby asks as she backs away from Weiss, who doesn't look back to her.
Seeing the airship makes Weiss show a big smile, "…She's here," she happily says.
Velvet also looks at the airship, "Now what?" she thinks.
And that's the chapter. Just trying to get through some stuff before I can get to the next chapters that will involve more of Team RVWBY. How will Velvet's meeting with this new arrival go? Until then, please Read and Review?