Proud week of watching Lol Worlds and seeing EU teams do so well.
Anyway, on with the chapter. Fair note, I'll be doing something in this chapter I rarely do – offering some third person PoV. Like last time, it would be really easy for me to write it first person and I'm not doing third because I can't do first, just because I think it will be more impactful in third.
When do I write second person? Never. Just never.
I actually don't even think "choose your own adventure" stories are better in second person. When I'm reading it, I actually feel more immersed if the type says, "I walk into a room" rather than "You walk into a room." I mean, "I" am the one reading it, so "I" feels more in character. Irrelevant point to raise here, just throwing it out there. I used to read a lot of those dice-game books when I was younger.
Beta: College Fool
Cover Art: Dishwasher1910
Book 9: Chapter 18
I screamed as Ruby was swallowed by the attack.
It happened in an instant, Ruby's silver eyes having the briefest second to widen before it struck. Her speed meant nothing with her in the air and all she could do was bring her scythe in front of her as though to parry. And then she was gone, engulfed, swallowed.
My screams continued, reaching a high-pitched croak. Blue flickered in the glass as my eyes lit, trying to push down the rage and grief to no avail. The window smashed under my fist and I had a foot on the brick, ready to jump out and attack her myself.
The black light blinked out. Salem staggered forward.
Ruby's boots struck the cobblestones, scratching across stone as she skidded back, spinning out of control, catching herself with one hand down and coming to a stop twenty feet back from where she'd been hit, eyes wide, mouth open, scythe smoking.
Alive.
Salem pointed a hand. "Kill her!"
Grimm surged forward – a hundred or more. It was an ocean of Beowolves, Canis and other variants we'd never seen before. Given her scythe would crack under a single attack, she had no hope of fighting them.
"Run!" I yelled. "We can try again!"
"You will not," Salem snarled, spinning and throwing a hand in my direction. "Be gone, pest!"
I felt the fear and the panic, but my Resilience saved me. Even as I saw the light flicker in her palm, I didn't freeze but instead threw myself toward the nearby staircase. My shoulder hit the lip and sent me tumbling down.
Cold heat. It made no sense and yet I was bathed in both – a burning so cold it froze my bones. Momentum alone kept me rolling and I bounced down the steps, hitting the floor and rolling away, glimpsing up briefly to see the sky visible at the top of the staircase. The entire second floor of the building had been eradicated. Blue fire licked at the ceiling, along with a small patch on my shoulder that I patted out. I stumbled to my feet, quickly checking myself over and deciding there were no broken bones.
A Beowolf exploded through the door and lunged at me. Gasping, I stepped back and drew Crocea Mors up, getting it between us in time for the monster to hit and impale itself. It slid down the blade, still trying to claw my eyes out. Pushing my free hand against its snout and its mouth and yes up, I pushed it down and used a foot to draw the weapon free.
My senses prickled. I dove and rolled to the side.
Black light scythed through the building, punching into the door and through, carving a path where I'd just killed the Beowolf and incinerating the body. The light dragged up, as if it were a huge intangible sword being wielded by a god. The metaphor was apt. Cursing, I kept moving, stumbling through the house before she could think to try another.
Games were over. Any of those would kill me if they hit dead on.
"Ruby, quick!" Blake's voice came from the other side of the street.
They were alive, then; both of them. That brief spark of hope was enough to push me to movement as well, but not in the same direction. I couldn't cross a street full of Grimm and with Salem there. I had to go the other way. I touched the stone in my pouch, the one given to us so long ago by Ironwood, and whispered Blake's name. Catching on, she touched her own.
"Get Ruby away," I barked. "I'm going the other way."
"Be safe. I love you."
My stomach churned. "Love you too."
It was all I had time for as the back wall of the building I was in disappeared. It wasn't so much blown down as torn asunder. Black light flashed as bricks peeled away from a central point, turning to dust and floating upwards as a shape stepped through.
"Jaune." Salem's voice dripped with so much rage. "You are a thorn I was bound to let live – no longer. You, I shall take the care of disposing of personally."
She chose me!? With Ruby fast enough to attack her and the only real threat she had here, she chose to hunt me down? I turned and fled, feet stamping against the tiled floor as I launched myself at the closest window.
Fingers wrapped around my ankle.
"Leaving? Let me help."
The world around me blurred as I was swung back by one leg, spun with such force that my body lifted fully off the ground. The grip on me let go suddenly and I was flung away. Pain exploded. Brickwork gave way. Briefly, my view turned from the inside of a house to the world outside, then inside again as I crashed through two walls and an alleyway. I landed in a pile of ruined brick, gasping for breath and with my armour dented and battered. Blood dripped from my lips and hair both. I felt sick in my stomach.
Move. I gripped a brick and used it to pull myself up, stumbling only slightly. My knee gave way, hitting the floor, but rather than try to get back up I kept crawling, dragging myself along with one hand. Got to keep moving.
Behind me, footsteps echoed. Too even and slow to be Blake or Ruby's.
"You really have been a constant frustration."
The ground beneath me exploded up. Rock and dirt skittered off my armour, the sound akin to nails rattling in a metal can. One nicked my cheek and brought more blood, which didn't really matter when I was already hurtling forward, launched from my spot to crash into and break a wooden table. Splinters exploded up as it gave way, not even breaking my fall.
Hurt. It hurt so much. I just wanted to curl up and die.
My eyes glowed. I crawled through the wreckage, stabbing a gauntleted fist through a window, smashing the glass, and gripping the ledge. With flagging strength, I pulled myself up and leaned my body over it, trying to unbalance myself so I fell out.
Salem helped. My graves were left so hot they burned red and started to stick to my hosen underneath. The agony was unbearable. Without thinking, I reached down to touch it, hissing as my skin bubbled. Stoke the Forge activated and the metal glowed hotter still, and yet now it was my heat, my forging, and the pain and burning disappeared.
"At first, you were an amusing distraction." Salem did not climb through the window. She parted the brickwork with a wave of her hand, peeling the wall back like the skin of an orange. "An oddity. You made a wish and time and time again I placed you in a position to die, and yet you did not. Far from a frustration, I found the prospect delightful. A survivor. How interesting!"
A Beowolf hurtled through the street toward me. I got Crocea Mors up in time, but rather than attack, it exploded into black mist. Immediately, it became a hundred tiny Nevermore, which peppered and whipped over me, ten or more dying as they hit my sword but more pecking and cawing around my face and ears. I waved a hand to push them away.
Something coiling and black wrapped around my foot. A tentacle?
The world turned again. My face hit the stone, sword clattering down but somehow gripped onto. I was dragged back, away from Salem and toward a turn in the street, from which a hideous mass of skin and tentacles emerged.
Merlot?
Was that Merlot!?
Its giant maw opened, ready to draw me in and devour me.
"No."
The one word from Salem cut the beast off. With an agonised roar, it launched me like a frisbee. My armour skated and screeched across the stone as I skidded over the street and slammed through two wooden market stalls. I hit a tree and came to a groaning stop.
"I would not put it past you to survive being eaten by him. If I take my eyes off you for but a moment, you'll find some ridiculous and contrived way of making it out. I mean, really, I give you a pendant with a Rune upon it and you use that to forge your Path!" Salem hissed. "What are the chances?"
My Path…? But that was based on how I fought. What I did. I got more combat skills because I was a Blacksmith who put himself in danger. My head flopped back. Silver glinted above me. The tree I'd struck wasn't a tree at all. Or not a normal one. I slapped a hand on its trunk and Stoked the Forge.
"Is this fate?" Salem swept the Ironwood branches that reached out to entangle her aside. More sprung up from the ground, piercing through cobbled stone to grasp for her. Merlot, or maybe a Grimm based on him, was entangled and dragged down by it, not slain but locked in place. She drifted her hand above it, as though she were sprinkling some water on the plants. They shrivelled and died before her, curling and twitching like snakes dying from venom. "Is this providence? I refuse to believe it. No, I've lived so long that it must simply be chance."
I caused more rampant growth, both toward her and around me, trying to shield my body.
"Grant enough wishes and surely one must surprise me." Salem let the metal vines touch her wrist and then wrenched it to the side. The root snapped and was dragged up out the ground. Easily half a tonne of metal was thrown aside, and my connection with it was cut. "That's just probability. Chance. Flip a coin enough times and you'll eventually land a thousand heads in a row."
The vines grew under me, pushing me back onto my feet. I made them give me a little push, allowing me to less run away and half-stagger, half-fall, wheeling my legs to keep my upright. Her hand gripped my shoulder, crushing metal beneath her fingers and digging straight through into my skin. My bone cracked.
Salem only sighed.
"I'm talking to you, Jaune. The least you can do is listen. So rude."
She lifted me up. My feet dangled in the air.
Through my pain, I glared at her.
"You really are a marvel, you know?" Her voice conveyed amusement, but her eyes did not. They glinted dangerously. "I mean, look at you. You're almost perfectly designed to annoy me. And I'll admit I'm the one at fault. I've made you what you are today. It would be ironic if it wasn't so darn annoying."
"You… didn't… make me…"
"Did I not?" She chuckled. "Then tell me, Jaune, where do you think your Runecraft came from? It's a dead art. A time of a bygone era. Do you imagine you simply stumbled upon it? You know that's not how it works. Your Paths grant you Skills based on what you do, how you do it and what you interact with. Fight enough Grimm and you gain a Skill to help you slay Grimm. Farm enough vegetables and you will do the same – so tell me, how many Runes did you forge before you earned that Skill?"
None. How could I have if I didn't have the Skill?
But then, how could I unlock such a Skill in the first place? Engraving built off my normal forging. Runesight came from using Runes. All my Skills came from something else first, be that fighting or smithing, but Runes? Those came out of nowhere.
"I see you understand." Salem squeezed my right shoulder harder, making bones snap and me scream out through my Resilience. "The language you call Runes is my own. It was a… gift impaired on your people long ago."
The way she said gift made it clear it was anything but. Another cursed wish.
"The ones I gave it to destroyed themselves, as you humans so often tend to. Since then, it went forgotten. And yet it returns with you – not because you were born of that line or because you are important in some way, but because I granted it to you on a silver platter."
Her smile widened.
"Or was that a silver pendant?"
The Pendant…? No. How? It had a Rune on it, but I'd never interacted with it. Except I had, hadn't I. Every time I wore it and let the magic within change my Class, I was technically using a Rune. I was allowing a Rune to shape me, relying on it. I'd been adapting without ever realising it, and that small interaction over so long and so many levels had warped my Path.
"You should have died so long ago that it wouldn't have been an issue," she said. "You did, in fact. You fulfilled the terms of the wish by dying a Hero at the battle of Vale, in doing so escaping my contract."
He… what? But he hadn't died. The only thing he'd done in that was fight Cinder…
"It still isn't a problem," she went on. "As galling as it is to see my own powers used against me, you're no closer to besting me than you've ever been. You're just an aggravating little pest that won't keel over and die."
"How?" I gasped. "The Seal… doesn't change class…"
"Oh, you mean this Rune?" She tapped my sword with a fingernail. The symbol flared. "Well, I needed some way of making for you an item that would change your Class, did I not? A simple illusionary spell would do." Salem chuckled and waved her free hand toward my face. The words above my head shifted, first to `Knight` and then to `Fool`. "But how to lock that to you? I certainly didn't want to have to follow you around for weeks and months reapplying it, did I? I needed something to do that for me."
"But the Rune doesn't do that…" I'd applied it to our weapons and there'd been no such change.
"No." she agreed. "It does not." Salem placed her hand on my breastplate, over my heart. "You are the only human whose name and face I might care to remember. If nothing else, take solace in that."
The breastplate gave way with a crack. Metal caved in, shattering as her hand pushed forward. Her eyes remained on mine, always bright, always smiling, as she reached deep inside my body. Something inside me gave way. I heard a deep, metallic, clang, and then saw nothing but darkness. Dimly, I was aware of my body being thrown back to the ground. Of hitting something hard and cold and laying there, of feeling heat seep out of me, and hearing her walk away.
"Goodbye, Jaune Arc."
/-/
"Stay down. Don't make a sound."
Ruby trembled badly as Blake pushed her back behind a wooden barrel, leaning out to peer at the road ahead. The howls of Grimm searching for them echoed all around, and yet there was no mistaking that Salem and most of the Grimm had not chased after them.
"Do you-"
"I said be quiet!" she hissed.
The rage wasn't meant for Ruby, but the Reaper clamped her mouth shut nonetheless. Perhaps in a better world, Blake might have apologised.
"Alright. Go. Across the street, now!"
Ruby darted out and sped over the small distance so fast she was a blur to Blake's eyes – and that was despite how long she'd been the strongest in the Guild. So used to others being slower than her, it was an indignation to suddenly be the slow one. She shook her head, throwing aside such thoughts and taking another glance out before dashing across herself. If nothing else, Ruby's speed made up for her complete lack of stealth.
Not for her lack of caution, however. Blake clamped her hand down over Ruby's mouth the second it opened. She looked back and then ahead, dragging the girl deeper between the buildings and into the shadows like she was about to murder her. She pressed her back into the brickwork. Ruby's, too. Ruby squirmed, not understanding her sudden panic. At least until she heard the footsteps. The click-click of heels. The Reaper went still.
Jaune didn't wear heels and his tread was deeper. Blake's gut clenched even before Salem appeared, walking past the gap between the buildings without a care in the world. Blood dripped from one hand, red droplets falling to splash on the stones. There wasn't a wound on her body, which meant the blood was not her own.
Ruby trembled. The scythe clicked as she turned it in her hand.
Blake shook her head, holding tighter to the Reaper.
Salem continued, unaware and probably unconcerned with them. She'd chosen to hunt Jaune down and that was telling. Her footsteps echoed on until she was a distance away. The Grimm returned to formation with her, surrounding her and forming the same unit they had before. She had to know they were still alive somewhere, but she didn't care.
More than anything, that told her letting Ruby have another go was a bad idea.
"We find Jaune," she whispered into the girl's ears. "Nod if you agree."
Frantically, Ruby nodded. Good. She let go and the younger girl stayed quiet, letting her take the lead to the edge of the alley. The blood trailed in the opposite direction of Salem, as good a trail as any. Blake dashed down the road with the Reaper close behind. If her instincts were right, they were headed to what had once been a market, converted into a healing camp thanks to the relatively large open space and easy access of numerous roads and pathways.
No Grimm challenged them; Salem left none behind. They cut down the middle of the road once that was clear, making good time and arriving on a scene of complete devastation. Broken walls, bricks everywhere, smashed stalls that once contained healing supplies and a silvery root from an Ironwood tree sticking up out the ground, at the base of which lay a figure covered by metallic branches.
"Jaune!" Ruby wailed, rushing forward.
Blake closed her eyes and followed.
"No, no, no." Ruby collapsed upon him, wrapping both her arms around him and sobbing. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, this is all my fault. You came because of me. Why? Whyyy!?"
Because he cared. Because he was brave.
Because they'd both in their own way known that it was better to die on their feet than see everyone collapse around them inside the walls. Blake knelt beside him, numb and cold inside. His face was pale. Just like her mothers had been. His breastplate was carved open, literally buckled inward like he'd taken a point-blank hit from a trebuchet. His blue jerkin and white tunic beneath were stained red.
"She killed him!" Ruby hissed. "She killed Jaune. I… I was the one who attacked her, but she hunted him down and killed him! I hate her. I hate her, I hate her, I hate her!" Ruby surged up, scythe in hand. "I'll kill her!"
Blake caught her wrist. "We shall kill her, but not before we see to Jaune."
"See to him? He's dead! DEAD!"
It was grief. Ruby didn't mean to sound like she did. Blake's was just as raw, yet she'd skipped anger and gone straight for numbness. Or disbelief. It hadn't sunk in yet that she was going to be alone again. Something golden sparkled in the depths of his armour and she reached in, touching the pendant he'd forged for each of them. Her own hung from her chest. His was misshapen with little silver metal nuggets clinging to it. Even so, she opened it to see the tiny painted image of the two of them inside. They looked so happy.
We were happy, she thought, refusing to accept otherwise. It was the happiest I'd ever felt.
She laid the locket back down on his chest, over his wound.
Metal clinked against metal.
The locked rattled.
Ruby heard it, turning back to look with confusion. Blake was the same, scanning the area. She hadn't felt the floor shake and though the battle was still raging in the distance, it was far enough away to not cause any vibrations.
The locket rattled again and slid to the side of the open wound. Blake reached in and placed it back in the centre, eyes wide and breath held. The locket sat there for a second, then vibrated and slid to the side, rattling over metal.
With no regard for her fingers, she pushed into the open cavity of Jaune's armour and his chest, peeling back the blood-soaked clothing and skin. Muscle and ribs poked through, blood pooling, but as she forced the blood away, she gasped.
Her own face stared back at her, reflected in glimmering metal.
"What is… I… I don't…" Ruby's voice trailed off.
There was no faulting her. Shining metal twisted its way through the inside of Jaune's left breast, sticking to parts of his ribs like a spider's web. It coalesced in a singular spot, coiled and wrapped around what could only be his heart. Or what remained of it. There were bits of flesh that peeked through, but the metal was worked into it, moulding to the organ and filling in blanks and gaps, forming a clumsy and outright hideous approximation of a human heart. Small symbols flickered and glowed upon it. It didn't move but the metal of the locket had rattled against it. Why?
Blake touched two fingers to the smooth and hard surface. It was warm.
Vibrating.
"Is that…? Is he…?"
"I don't know." Her own heart was racing. "I have no idea. The metal is burnt but it's all forward facing. It took the brunt of Salem's spell. How did it last when his armour folded like paper?"
"It's like a shield over his heart…"
It wasn't. A shield was something you held in front to protect you. From her angle, she could see that the metal made up a portion of his heart. It was twisted and melded into it. Forged into it? By whom? When?
"This is a healer's camp," Blake whispered. "They had to evacuate in a hurry. Ruby, search it. Find me something. Anything!"
The reaper tore into the nearby tents and stalls.
"Don't you dare, Jaune," she begged him, pulling his armour off and placed two hands, one crossed over the other, on his metallic chest. "Don't you dare."
/-/
Everything was dark. Cold. My body felt heavy and although my eyes were open, it felt like I was still asleep. Was I breathing? Did I need to? I tried to stand but felt myself drift instead, more sliding up into a sitting position. I tried to look around but couldn't. My head didn't work. Nothing did. Was I in water? Was I swimming?
Was I… dead…?
Something warm pressed against my back. Someone else's. I felt and heard them sit, back to mine, knees drawn up and feet on the floor. For as much as there was a floor. It was all just an inky world of off-black that spanned on forever.
"W-Where am I…?"
"The abyss?" a feminine voice replied. "The void between life and death? The afterlife? Your mind?" The woman chuckled warmly. "Who can say, Jaune? Who can say?"
It was familiar. So familiar. I wracked my mind, but every thought was heavy and slow, like I had to drag it out of a deep ocean. It wasn't anyone from the guild and that narrowed it down. It still took me a few seconds, and when I did recognise it, I gasped and tried to look at her. My body wouldn't obey but my mouth was still my own.
"Cinder?"
Another laugh, soft and warm. "It's good to see you again, Jaune."
"Cinder, I…" My voice cracked. "Is that really you? You're not just a figment of my imagination?"
"What do you want me to say? I think I'm her, but then if I am naught but a part of your imagination, then I would still think this way. Is this the crossroad between our world and the next? Did I wait here to guide you on and have a chance to exchange final words, or are you simply dreaming it as your – our – body fades from this world?"
"Why can't you have an easy answer for me?"
"When has life ever been easy, Jaune? Yours or mine. Or hers, if I'm not even real."
It sounded just like her. That philosophical way of speech, the way she phrased those difficult questions that had caught my imagination even then. We couldn't have been further apart, her a Prestige Hero bound to be Queen, and me, the lying Blacksmith. She'd known, too. She was the first to figure it out, long before Ruby ever could. And yet she never told. I knew deep inside it was because there'd been a respect between us. Of course, since I remembered her speaking like this, it would be possible for me to imagine her this way, wouldn't it?
"I've no idea," I said, laughing bitterly. "The only thing I know is that I'm dying."
"Hmm." Cinder didn't deny it. "Duty will kill us both in the end. Destiny."
"I don't believe in destiny. Or duty. I… I chose to be there. I chose to fight not for my King or Kingdom, but because I wanted to protect them. I wanted to keep the people I love safe. Or die beside them." I sighed. "Maybe it's better I die first. Less painful."
"How selfish of you."
Yeah. She wasn't wrong.
"Duty is not so different to love," she said. "I had a duty to my people that I could not escape. You cannot imagine a world in which you abandon your friends, and so you have a duty to stand beside them. I must say, I think I would have preferred your way more than my own."
"I wish you could have, Cinder. I… I killed you."
She chuckled. "Not before I killed you."
Killed…? I frowned, staring ahead and leaning back into her. The support kept me from falling over from exhaustion, but my thoughts kept churning. Salem had said that as well, how I'd died in the battle for Vale. At the end of the war between our Kingdoms. Yet I couldn't have. I was still alive. My waning life now notwithstanding.
"How did you kill me?" I asked.
"Do you not recall it? The sword you presented to the King, which I used to run you through."
My chest hurt. I brought a hand up toward it and it came away bloody. Looking down, I saw a whole split through me – and more than that, the top half of a sword was sticking from my left breast, the cross guard and hilt visible but the rest buried deep inside. I felt Cinder sag against my back, impaled on the same weapon. There was no pain, but I suddenly couldn't breathe. I wrapped a hand around the blade but couldn't shift it.
"C-Cinder…"
"You died then. Or maybe we both died – it's still hard to know what's real right now. The real me died soon after, slain by your hand. I don't think she – or I – blamed you, however. We were both just fighting for what we believed in." Cinder chuckled. "You stole my sword, you know. Or his sword."
The weapon implanted in my chest began to glow. Red light radiated out from my hand, turning the steel orange and then white, slowly melting it down until it drew into my body. I gasped, watching it sink into my chest with wide and frightened eyes. This… I remembered this. The refusal to die. The agony. The desperate grip of my hand around the blade, of drifting away but having the time to whisper.
"Stoke the Forge…"
"You forged your destiny, and in doing so forged so much more." Cinder laughed. "I'm jealous of you. Or she is. We are. I don't know. What I do know is that we both would hate you now if you didn't finish what you started. What I, we, died to prevent." Her voice had become dizzying, like two people speaking at once, overlapping one another. "You're not dead until the last moment when all hope fades. There's no bright light here, only darkness. Take that as a good sign."
"Cinder?"
"I think we are in your head. I think we're not real. That's a shame, but also a blessing." The weight behind me shifted and stood, leaving me cold and alone.
"Cinder, wait!"
"I can't. I'm not even here. You're not either, you just think you are. Rise up, Blacksmith. Rise up, Swordmaster." Her misty figure walked beside me, away, ignoring my attempts to reach out and stop her. "There's work to be done."
The darkness rushed in.
/-/
My eyes snapped open.
"Uwahhh!" I dragged in breath, choking and gasping. Hands supported me, drawing me up, breaking thin silver branches and making their leaves flutter down onto my body. I was dragged up and pressed into something warm and wet. My throat was raw and scratchy. "Ahhh. Hahhh…"
"You stupid bastard," a girl whispered, crying on my head, making my hair damp. "I hate you just as much as I love you."
"Jaune!" Ruby was on my legs, face buried in my stomach and covered in blood. "Jaunnnneeee!"
Cinder-?
No. Blake. I was alive…? So it hadn't been real. Or had it? I laid there in their arms, choking and struggling to breathe. My chest felt so tight, like I was wearing armour several sizes too small. "What… Salem…"
"Killed you," Blake said. "Or tried. How you survived. I don't believe it. Your heart is literally made of metal. How? Did you forge yourself from steel just to withstand her?"
"My heart…?"
"You don't know." Blake helped me up, pulling me back off the Ironwood root. "Your chest was carved open by Salem and she left you for dead. You should have been, but your heart – it's like its half flesh, half metal. It withstood her attack, though I don't know. Your armour didn't stand a chance."
The armour was just steel. It wasn't any stronger than any other material, just thicker and sloped to deflect or redirect force. My heart, though? I brought a hand up to try and touch my chest, but Ruby pulled it away. Blearily, I noticed stitches and felt the tightness as they pulled. They'd sewn me back together. Medical instruments were strewn across the floor, including some empty bottles of what I could only assume were healing supplies.
The sword, I realised. Watts' sword. Or Cinder's. The one we gave to the King, which Cinder used to run me through. It's inside my chest. I… Did I melt it into my body? Like the dream. Or the memory. I winced. Did I, in my dying moments, use the sword run through my chest to patch the damage and rebuild my heart? How…? It didn't make sense. It wasn't the only thing.
"How did Ruby survive?" I asked. "Your Constitution wouldn't take a blast like that…"
"I didn't take it. I… I think I swung through it. I hit it with my scythe, and it disappeared."
No. It hadn't. Everything clicked into place.
"Jaune." Blake shook me. "We can't stay here. We need to move."
"Salem. Where is she?"
"On her way to Beacon. She'll be at the walls in under an hour – and through them just as quickly. It's going to be a last stand."
"Good."
"Good?" Ruby almost shrieked. "How is that good?"
"Because she'll be distracted." I tried to push myself up and had to be helped by Blake. I leaned on her, wrapping an arm around her shoulder for support. I looked back to Beacon, where spellfire and arrows could already be seen raining down on the encircling army. "We're going to strike from behind."
"And do what?" Blake asked. "Die?"
"No. Win." I swallowed and looked to Ruby. Thank you, Cinder. The ghost of you, or just the memory. "I know what the Rune does. I know why Salem went for me instead of you, and why she did her best to kill me."
Their eyes grew wide.
I laughed.
"I know how to end this."
Well, Jaune. I'm glad someone does! Ha, no, I have my plan in place as always, but that's always an inner joke when I'm writing. Even if I have an ending planned, it's in bullet points and main plot points, and sometimes that leads to moments of complete brain death.
"Jaune and Co beat Tyrian" for instance.
And when I got there, I was like "Shit… how do they beat Tyrian…?"
The sword in his chest is, for those who may have missed it, the same one Cinder ran him through with, and which he absorbed into himself moments before he gained the ability to switch Class between Blacksmith and Swordmaster. I know people were still asking whatever happened to that and why it never got brought up, and this was the reason. Also the fact Jaune was unconscious and dying when it happened, so he never really thought about it until now. The only witness (other than the reader) was Cinder and the King of Mistral, both dead.
Next Chapter: 28th October
P a treon . com (slash) Coeur
