A/N: The process of writing this chapter was... weird, to say the least. I ended up getting the flu, so I was down for the count for a few days, and then I had homework piling up, and... well, to put it simply, the past few weeks have been a bit of a mess. Either way, it's out now, so I hope you guys enjoy!
Also, Code Vein is out, and it looks pretty fun. Definitely buying it once I have enough. MHA Season 4 comes out tomorrow, and RWBY Volume 7 and Dragon Prince Season 3 come out in early and late November respectively. Words cannot express how happy I am for this stuff! In the meantime, enjoy the chapter!
Disclaimer: I do not own RWBY or My Hero Academia. They belong to Monty Oum, Kohei Horikoshi, and their respective publishing companies. Please support the official releases.
I do not own the cover image
Chapter 59: No Safe Haven
The wail that tore through the quiet, gloomy air was a familiar one to Ren, in all the wrong ways. He had hoped to never hear it again. He had hoped, by some miracle; by some small, tiny sliver of hope, that despite all of the odds, his father had managed to slay the creature. It was a foolish hope. A childish hope. But it gave him comfort nonetheless.
With that wail, all of that had been ripped away. A hole had formed in his heart for but an instant, only to be replaced by something else. Something... primal. It clawed at his stomach, trying to climb its way up his throat and free itself.
Ren didn't feel like this often. Almost never, in fact. He had to be the emotional bastion for both him and Nora, to keep himself in check so that she could follow suit. He couldn't use his semblance rapid-fire. It was why he practiced keeping himself reserved. It was why he always stayed quiet. It was why he always tried to stay calm, no matter the situation.
Now? He felt no need to restrain himself. He welcomed this feeling, this... rage. And in doing so, drew his weapons, with a feral look of anger flashing across his face as the others drew their weapons in turn. His face reverted to its neutral state before long, however. Old habits die hard.
And die it would.
When it came into view, it looked almost like a ghost, as though it wasn't there at all. The sound of its hooves on the remaining pavement told a different story. It was real. And it was right in front of them. Its lower half was horse-like in nature, with its hind legs bearing hooves while its front pair both bore twin-pronged claws, the forward limbs bent lowly with two joints in each leg. It looked like anything but a normal horse. The lower half also had an exposed horse skull in the shape of its mask, only stopping near where its eyes were. Almost as though it was being muzzled.
The upper half, however, was entirely different. Fused to the horse's back was a gangly humanoid body, with large, curved horns that rose from its mask, and a mouth that almost appeared to have been sewn shut. From its shoulders came two long, gangly arms that dragged against the ground, as though there were no bones to support them, with similarly twin-pronged claws emerging from them. From its back poked out bone spikes of varying sizes, but most harrowing of all, were the weapons embedded in it. Spears and swords and axes alike lined its hide and back, as though they were battle-scars or trophies to be boldly shown to anyone willing to challenge them.
And piercing through its left shoulder, after all of these years, were two of the arrows that his father had fired at it. He had meant to fire three.
The rage further built. It was getting harder to stay composed, and Ren didn't care if he could or not. This thing, this Oumdamn Nuckelavee, was going to die. Whatever it took.
Jaune was shouting something to him with Crocea Mors' blade lit ablaze as Ruby sped up to the roof of a ruined building and took the role of covering fire. Nora had rushed on ahead, with Magnhild ready to break the horse's legs as Shoto drew Niohoggr and Veorfolnir to run offense.
Ren ignored it all. All that mattered was the Nucklavee. He would be damned if he let someone else take care of his problems. This thing had haunted him, and Nora, for years. If anyone was going to kill it, it was going to be him.
Ren rushed ahead, before Nora and Shoto both, pelting the Grimm with every bullet in Storm Flower's clips before he reached it. He got within melee range of the monster just as his clips ran dry, jumping onto the horse half's back and aiming several blows at its head.
Unfortunately, the Grimm proved aware of his presence by first snapping around, looking him dead in the eye, and causing him to hesitate, just for a moment. That moment nearly cost Ren his life as he felt its arms crack into his side, sending him flying off its back and straight towards a building.
The aging wall broke easily with the force Ren had been traveling at, slowing him down enough that he didn't go through to the other side. It knocked the wind straight out of him, causing him to gasp and cough for a few seconds as he gained his bearings.
But he... he knew this home. This place in which he lay, gasping to catch even a hint of good breath. It had been the home of a baker, who'd always treated him kindly, despite his often-quiet demeanor. It may have been one of the reasons he liked Ren so much, since so many other kids in town were rowdy and loud. Even his own. He always gave him Mochi and Sweetbread every odd day he'd come by.
He hadn't survived.
This reminder only pushed Ren further, lifting himself from the rubble as he reloaded Storm Flower with full clips and walked deliberately to the hole he'd made. His rage was greater now, but not so great that his reason couldn't appeal to it. A head-on strategy wasn't going to work. Use the buildings as cover, it suggested. Make it chase you, it said. And when it's trapped...
… make sure it suffers.
Ren allowed himself to form a smile then. One of pure malice and manic fear. It was small, but it was enough. He pointed his guns where the beast fought Nora, Shoto, and Jaune at its front, while Ruby switched buildings and took up another cover fire position. It almost seemed amused, that these hunters would bother going through such pains to kill it.
With no more time to waste, Ren gave an uncharacteristically loud bellow as he fired Storm Flower wildly at the beast, causing his friends to dodge as his bullets found their target in the Nuckelavee's hide. This didn't appear to either hinder or hurt the beast in any way, but that wasn't what Ren was going for. Not yet, at least.
The Grimm cocked its horned upper head at Ren, as if it were amused that he'd try the same thing again. When the raven-haired boy began to reload, the Nuckelavee gave a low growl before the horse half began charging forward. The upper half began to flail its arms about to and fro in rapid succession, preventing any other from firing upon it as it charged with blinding speed.
Ren himself barely had enough time to get out of the building he'd been standing in as the Grimm crashed into it, unaware of its intrusion of a place in Ren's happier memories. And that only served to make him all the more enraged.
From atop an opposing building, Ren fired again, bullet after bullet sinking into the monster's skin with no effect. It simply looked up at his form silently, for what felt like an eternity. And then, it did something that truly unnerved and disturbed him.
It smiled.
It was a mad thing upon lips that shouldn't, and didn't, exist on its face, its semblance of a mouth still bound tight by strands of something unknown to him. And yet, Ren knew it was a smile.
There were no words in all of Remnant's languages to express just how much he hated seeing that thing smile.
It charged again, swinging its arms about as Ren leapt to another building, ready to repeat the process as many times as he had to in order to trap it. Vaguely, he was aware of the presence of his friends, calling out to him desperately to do... something. He couldn't make them out. Whether it was by choice or simply the fact that his ears were recovering from noise, he didn't know. And at the moment, he didn't care. They should get out of there while they could. This was his fight, damnit. They shouldn't have to get involved. They'd only get hurt.
Or worse, they could get in the way.
The dust settled around the site of the crash as Ren waited for the beast to emerge. There was no way that it would take only three small buildings to trap this thing. It was why he was slowly but steadily working it toward the main town hall. Had it been weaker than he'd predicted?
Ren didn't want to believe it; it made no logical sense. But it was possible. So, he took a chance and got closer to the sight of the crash, and saw what was definitely the Nuckelavee held under a particularly heavy beam, trying helplessly to free itself. This was the perfect chance. With Storm Flower's blades at the ready, Ren prepared to pounce on the Nuckelavee, to make it suffer.
But when he launched, it looked straight at him; straight through him, and smiled that unnatural smile. It contorted and twisted itself in ways he thought impossible, and sent one of its claws straight towards him. In his haste, Ren had forgotten to maintain his Aura, muscle memory giving way to the sheer rage he was holding inside of him. Stupid, stupid, stupid. He had no way to change his trajectory. He had no way to get his Aura up fast enough to take the hit and survive.
He was going to die.
Time seemed to slow then. The realization sent adrenaline through Ren's entire system, trying to find some way, any way, that he could get out of this alive. It was futile. He was going to die. And there was nothing he could do about that.
Sorry, mom. Sorry, dad. Guess I couldn't keep my promise after all.
That was when the world shifted. Faster than even this frenzied state could process, Ren suddenly found Nora in front of him, a determined look in her eye as she pulled him close and protected him for the Nucklavee. The impact the blow had on her Aura cleared his once dulled hearing as she grit her teeth so hard he thought they might crack from the sheer strain. She was trying, desperately, not to whimper, not to show weakness.
In a similarly desperate state, he summoned as much of his Aura as he damn well could, even as Nora shifted in mid-air to take most of the landing. He'd lost too many loved ones. His mother, his father, his uncle, and his grandfather. He'd rather die himself than lose Nora too.
(Shoto's POV)
They were running short on options. The Nuckelavee wasn't just exceedingly strong and fast, it also had something that few Grimm possessed. It was exceedingly clever. And it was learning. It had used Ren's own tactic against him when it pretended to have been trapped by rubble. And if it could do that, it meant that they couldn't use the same tactic twice. It would be ready for that.
So what could they do? At this point, Shoto was barely managing to hold it off himself with all of his ice walls. Ruby was still holding cover fire, and Jaune's strikes, even when enhanced with Dust, still weren't enough to get it down for long, not without recovering within seconds.
He had been debating using his weapon's other form this entire battle, ever since Ren had seemingly gone berserk. Shoto didn't have a whole lot of experience with it, and the last time he'd tried to use it in combat, he'd nearly burnt out a rather large swath of trees. He didn't want to risk hurting any of his friends.
But the longer the fight dragged on, the more and more appealing that option became.
(Ren's POV)
Nora was alright. Somehow. Barely. By the skin of their teeth, they'd somehow survived the impact with their Aura's mostly intact. It was definitely lucky, but he had no time to dwell on that. Once Ren made sure she was alright, he was throwing himself back into the fray, back into the bloodbath. It wouldn't matter what became of him in the end, but he'd rather die a thousand different ways than let Nora get dragged down with him.
"Ren..." Nora said, clutching to his hand as he tried to leave. She didn't want to be left alone. And it was almost enough to get him to stay.
"Nora, I need to get back out there," Ren explained as he tried to pull away, despite every other part of his body and mind telling him to do the exact opposite. To stay. Even though he felt he didn't deserve it. Especially because of that.
"No, Ren," Nora said, gripping his hand even tighter than before. Strength of ten Ursa, five Beowolves, and half a Bakugo, she'd once boasted. Ren doubted she needed even half of that to crush someone's arm. And needed no effort at all to look beautiful, no matter the situation.
But those thoughts, while comforting, were also fleeting. Ren couldn't afford to dwell on them. Not now. Even if he desperately wanted to.
Even though I don't deserve it.
Ren sighed to himself. He hated that he had to do this. Explaining something like this... wasn't his strong suit. But he was going to try. "Nora, I... I need to be the one to kill that thing. I need to know that, when all is said and done, I won't have to keep myself up at night, just thinking and hoping that someday, someone else will kill it. I have to do it. It can't-"
CRACK!
.
..
…
… she... slapped him... right across his left cheek. Backhanded. No hard enough to bruise, but more than enough to sting. To get his attention.
"You want to be the one to kill it? Fine. We'll let you kill it. But... damnit, Ren, that doesn't mean you need to go up against this thing alone! Let us help you... please... let me help you... because this is personal for me, too," she said, her voice shaking as tears fell from her eyes. Real tears. Not the crocodile ones she'd used for pranks. And he'd just...
Ren had never seen Nora cry since that night. Not once. Not ever. Even after they'd gotten away, even after all of the hard days, even after they'd lost Pyrrha... she had never cried. Even when it seemed like she was about to burst.
And I destroyed that.
Ren adjusted his hand, so that he was holding Nora's hand in his own. She was right. He'd been a damn idiot, letting himself get overwhelmed by his anger. It was still there, and it still burned with all the fire of the sun, but he was not about to let it overtake him again. Not if it cost him his friend. Not if it cost him Nora.
"... alright. I'm sorry for screwing up," Ren said. It was the easiest sentence he'd ever uttered, sincerity practically dripping from every word.
"You'd better be," Nora replied, a small but confident smile back on her face. That was good. She'd always looked better when she smiled. "Now let's go kick that thing's ass!"
(Shoto's POV)
Shoto once more crossed his blades to make a steam-screen for cover ad Jaune once more tried for its legs, only for its hide to once more prove far too thick. Damnit, they couldn't keep this up! If they didn't get Ren and Nora back into the fray-
SHING!
At least, that's what he'd thought, until Qrow suddenly swooped in and cut clean through that thing's arm, Harbinger's blade covered in gore.
"Okay, you guys need to start wrapping this up! I don't know how much longer I can-"
Before he could finish his sentence, however, Tyrian came flying in at speeds Shoto thought only Ruby could reach, and slammed himself into Harbinger's edge, a mad cackle escaping his mouth as the force both of them deeper into the city with a loud, echoing impact of steel against steel.
"Where are Ren and Nora?!" Shoto yelled to the other two. If they were going to pull this off, they'd need both of them.
"Right here!" Nora said with a swing of her hammer, launching Ren into the air. Now above his target, and significantly calmer, the black-maned boy fired precise shots into the Nuckelavee's body, aimed frequently at the mask.
Once Ren landed, and Nora quickly joined him, Shoto allowed a smile to cross his face. He didn't know what Nora had done to get Shoto back in the game, but she was definitely due some thanks later. All you can eat pancakes here we come.
"Okay! Tactical retreat!" Shoto ordered. Jaune and Ruby nodded to each other and quickly started moving, the former grabbing a large shard of Ice Dust and lobbing it straight at the beast while the latter took quick aim with a blame bullet and fired just as it bounced against the Nuckeavee's skin, exploding in a burst of steam that would give them plenty of cover for at least ninety seconds.
Everyone quickly gathered on one of the remaining rooftops as Shoto explained his thought process. "If we're going to get anywhere near that thing, we need to immobilize it. So, first priority will be taking out its arms. Jaune, Ruby, I'll need you guys to pins those things to the ground. I'd normally be all for cutting them off entirely, but we need to keep it still.
"Nora, you and I will be going straight for the legs. If you can take the back, I can take care of the front. Ren, you've got the cleanest cuts out of everyone here with blades, so I need you to go straight for its head."
Ren simply nodded as his hand went to his boot, brandishing a hidden knife in the same style as the ones on his guns. From the way he held it, almost like it was a reverent object, it was obviously very precious and very personal to him. The fact that he was deigning to use it said all Shoto needed to know.
"It's a good plan, but how're we going to get it to stand still? Every time we try to get close, it just starts flailing its arms around like crazy," Jaune pointed out. Shoto was about to get to that, but it did involve him being the vanguard. That was never something Jaune was crazy about, since it was usually him and Lancelot who did a majority of the tanking because of their sheer durability.
"Well, I'd have suggested doing something like that steam screen we just pulled off, but I don't think it'll fall for the same thing twice in a row," Ruby pointed out as the screen began to clear. Their ninety seconds were nearly up.
"... how about hitting it in the eyes with a blaze shot to blind it, and then getting it off balance with my grenades?" Nora said as she pulled out a few of the 'special concoction' pill grenades, each of which was emblazoned with a large pink heart at the tip.
"That'd work perfectly. A lot better than what I was thinking of. Are you sure about using them, though? I thought you were saving them for a particularly rainy day," Shoto asked, knowing just how long it had taken Nora to whip up ever a full barrel of those grenades.
"Shoto, I don't know if you've noticed, but it's kinda raining buckets right now," Nora said as she started loading to pills into Maginhild's launcher. "If there was ever a rainy day to use these, this is it."
Shoto nodded and lifted himself from the ground without another word. The others quickly did the same as the Nuckelavee dragged itself from the cloud and truly opened its maw, letting out a horrific shriek that bellowed through the open space.
The sheer force of it hit their eardrums like a truck, causing a few of them to stumble due to being unprepared for the attack on their senses. Through the haze, Shoto could see that the bone spikes on its back had grown even larger than they had been before, almost to the length of sword blades. But they didn't have time to adjust their plan. What they had right now would have to do.
Nodding to Ruby, the girl quickly sped up a building with the help of a quick shot from Crescent Rose while Nora did the same with a quick assist from Lancelot. Jaune and Ren then quickly spread out, while Shoto remained in the center of its vision. It cocked its head at him as it continued to slowly trot over to him with all the confidence of a hawk spotting a rabbit.
Team RNJRS were anything but rabbits.
Searing across his vision in a single blazing shot, Ruby quickly took its vision away as it screamed with pure, unfiltered agony. Nora wasted no time in following up with a volley of her special grenades, bursting into small clouds of pink smoke at the Nuckelavee's feet. All they had to do was wait another two seconds, and...
BOOM!
Delayed Instantaneous Ignition Reaction Grenades, also called DIIRGs, also called Pink Puff Boom Pills. Nora had been working on the effect alone for weeks. Shoto still didn't know how she got the smoke to be pink in the first place, but he wasn't about to question something that was giving them an advantage. At least, not in the middle of a fight.
Without missing a beat, Jaune and Ruby sped from their respective positions and got ahold of their respective appendages. The red-themed reaper got to hers first and quickly planted her scythe's blade straight into its palm with a shot-assisted swing of her weapon.
It roared in pain as Jaune quickly clambered onto his own appendage, coating his blade in ice as he suddenly stabbed it downwards, trapping it with a sudden cover of ice that hardened and crystalized as quickly as it had appeared.
Realizing too late that it had been brought into a trap, the Nuckelavee tried to spring forward with all the force its legs could grant. Ruby and Jaune strained their legs against the ground in order to keep their holds on the beast, their teeth grit with effort as their bonds dug deeper, almost ripping through the monstrous black flesh.
Luckily, they would not have to hold on much longer, as Nora twirled down with so many spins Shoto was almost certain she was experiencing vertigo, and sent all of that momentum into the horse half's hind legs, causing them to give way with a loud crack and a dull thud as they hit the ground.
Far less successfully, the front half tried to pull itself away from the chaos if had found itself in, only for the half and half leader himself to step forward and freeze its front half as well. It was now well and truly out of movement options.
Then, Ren silently descended from the rooftops, giving the Nuckelavee a determined but still controlled glare. Brandishing his knife in his right hand, he prepared to cut its head clean off its shoulders, at the neck, when its sporadic movement suddenly came back, and it gave the unprepared ninja a quick and solid headbutt, and giving his magenta Aura an audible crack as it dispersed around him.
Swinging his head back around as his anger burned further in his eyes, Ren grabbed its head by the horn and steadied himself. With a quick twirl of the knife and a single moment of silence, a fast, silent cut was made through the neck, from one section to the other.
The main body of the Nuckelavee fell limp, its head quickly disappearing as its mask remained, lingering. For how long, Shoto could not say. But Ren wasn't about to keep it, evidenced by his throwing of the object down the street as it shattered into millions of shards.
The collective sigh of relief that swept through the group was welcomed with open arms, leaning on their weapons as they suddenly felt safer than they had for the first time in months. They'd done it. They had killed the Nuckelavee. It was over.
It was supposed to be over. But irony had a different plan.
With a screaming leap, Tyrian leapt over the battlefield with a mad gleam in his now violet eyes, his tail ready to pierce and poison the target he had set his sights on. Ren. The only one out of the entire group who had no access to an Aura. Qrow was rocketing in close behind, just out of reach, violet streaks of venom running down his side. He wasn't fast enough. Nora was still readying her hammer, and Jaune and Ruby's weapons were still lodged in the Nuckelavee's dissipating corpse, their semblances too slow to save Ren.
That left him. As memories of scarlet red hair and a choked final gasp filled his ears, the glowing yet cold amber eyes of his enemy practically laughing at his struggle... this time, Shoto didn't hesitate for even a moment. With barely a moment to spare, Shoto's free hand found itself on the hilt of Niohoggr, sparks flying everywhere as a pillar of flame was aimed directly at Tyrian's chest, the impact sending him flying through the air and tumbling across the ground, his Aura too audibly breaking as Shoto quickly followed him.
"Well... this was unexpected. But not unwelcome," Tyrian said as he quickly dusted off the singed piece of his outfit. "Were it not for the protection of my goddess, I'd likely have a massive hole in my chest. Now that we've-"
Shoto the flipped both of his Dao blades into backhanded grips, holding his hands rigidly in front of him as he called out to his friends, "Stay back! This'll be big!"
Any movement towards them was suddenly cut off as Tyrian's eyes suddenly lit up with realization. Then, as quickly as he could, Shoto brought the pommel-ends of his blades together, causing them to stick to each other and the hilts to further extend into shaft-length as the twin swords melded into a single weapon. He felt himself brim with power as frost covered the right side of his body, with searing flames roaring up from his left. Letting himself smile just the slightest bit, he recited one of his partner's more excited suggestions for the name.
"Arise and bloom eternal... Yggdrasil."
Now, he needed to act fast. He could only use this form for a total of five seconds at full blast, and every one of them was going to count. Let's start it off then, shall we?
1.
A quick overhead flourish, causing the area surrounding them to suddenly become encased in ice.
2.
A single step forward, the steam hissing off of the ice unnaturally as Tyrian tried desperately to free himself of that same ice.
3.
Another step, followed by the lifting of Yggdrasil as Tyrian again began to mutter something, desperately, to get Shoto to spare him.
4.
A step and a strike, arced deliberately over Tyrian's head to perfectly cut off his tail at the root, the red blade burning with power as an explosion go flame accompanied the strike. He barely felt the weapon go through the appendage.
5.
And that was it. Shoto collapsed to the ground, his coat splaying out around him as he suddenly heaved and gasped for breath, Yggdrasil coming apart and forming two weapons once again. He felt the frost numbing the pain on his right while the fire sputtered out and steamed on his left.
But as consciousness left him, Shoto let himself give a satisfied smile. Tyrian wouldn't be poisoning anyone else. Not on his watch.
(a few minutes later, on the outskirts of Kuroyuri, Giyu's POV)
Giyu had seen several things in his time. Despite his young age of twenty-one, he had been through some harrowing battles that would've broken most other people. He certainly wasn't the strongest Hashira.
But that fight... honestly, Giyu had been tempted to intervene. He knew that it was against their code of conduct to become involved with hunters, but they had looked so... so desperate. And when that man had tried to actually kill one of them, he'd nearly broken code.
But that was for another time. The Border Force was there now, called by the massive pillar of smoke that had emerged at the end of the fight, and he was needed elsewhere. So, with a single sigh and the sheathing of his blue blade, he walked into the forest, a serious look across his face as he disappeared once more.
A/N: And that's a wrap for this one! Okay, I'm typing this all out the-day-of, so I'm sorry if this isn't quite living up to its usual quality. Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed regardless! And now:
Review Responses:
Gojifreak (1): Not quite. The villains still have to get through their sheer tenacity.
Kaiser Dragon (1): We'll just have to wait and see about that.
Kaiser Dragon (2): Indeed, she does. Ruby's still got her own stuff to deal with, and hopefully, Jaune and the others can support her while she recovers.
Thunder Dragon: It might be a few chapters, but I'll be sure to keep including this kind of stuff!
Black Fang (1): Thank you! I hope I can continue to keep this up in the future.
Midgardsormr Jr: I mean, they do deserve a break, and it is coming. Just be patient.
Gojifreak (2): She does. Unfortunately, the Nuckelavee interrupted the possibility.
Black Fang (2): And now the team has killed it in response!
Pheonix Wizard: That's a very touching sentiment. I've gone through the process of grief before, and I can say from experience that it isn't and shouldn't be easy. Losing someone is hard, but that never means that you should be alone in your grief. There are other people who understand. It can just be a bit jarring to reach out to them.
Mecha Manda: That she does.
DD Lore Nerd: That's what I was going for. Glad you liked it!
Next Chapter: Oct 25th
Seeya in the next one!