Heyya everyone! How ya'll doing? I hope you all are doing fine in these trying times, so to make the boredom of quarantine slightly less annoying, here is another chapter! I want to thank everyone once again for the kind words, you people are the best, but here is the next chapter of Lonesome Trail. This chapter is more of how Jaune's daily routine will look like the first two weeks/the first day of training. I decided that I wanted to make this story long and neat and not rush anything. Also, this is a long one, so yay for that!
It was a rather late in the evening in Vale. The moon was out, though barely visible because of some clouds. The forest surrounding Beacon was quiet, unless you were listening very well to the sounds of nocturnal wild life. Most of the students already turned themselves in for the night, but not all.
Inside of the dorm room of team JNPR, there was a singular light on. This singular light was for a singular person. Said person is the leader of the team. Jaune was laying on his bed, reviewing some of the papers he got today. These weren't any kind of papers. No, this was his schedule for the first six weeks. While he asked them why only for six weeks and not eight, they were rather cryptic with their answer.
The most he got out of them was "It depends on your progress." from Port. Well he understood that it would be a rather logical thing to do, he had a feeling that wasn't all. Only time will tell, he thought.
The schedule in itself was very clear on what to do and when to do it. He was required to prove his dedication to the training regime by doing the first two weeks of almost solely strength and stamina training with little to no breaks. Not only that, but after each task on his schedule, he'd have to notify one of the three teachers that he finished his task.
The three teachers would do a quick check on the security cams if he didn't cheat his regime while he would perform the next part of the training regime. If they could confirm that he wasn't cheating his training schedule, then he would get a pass.
Furthermore he would need to meet Dr. Oobleck for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Initially it was needed to get him on the proper diet for a huntsman, but to their pleasant surprise his diet was pretty good to begin with. When they mentioned that, he just shrugged and said that he was somewhat forced to make dinner for everyone when he was younger.
That and that a few of his sisters and his parents are huntsman. So he was somewhat adept to the huntsman diet, though he didn't eat enough food to sustain the muscle mass of a huntsman. They weren't the richest family on Remnant, so most of the food went to the huntsmen in the family and the younger ones.
Jaune, with his twin sister Julie who grew up to be a huntsman from the beginning, were perfectly in the middle. He suspected that he was never trained, because of the lack of resources. That, or favoritism. One does not grow up in a household with eight children without some slight favoritism, though some cases the favoritism wasn't "slight".
Anyway, he didn't want to think about that stuff for now. He has to get to bed soon, since he has to wake up way early before class. Morning exercise + breakfast before first period, it was going to be tough. Luckily he was an early riser, so the getting out of bed thing wasn't going to be an issue. What followed after that would be tough.
"150 push-ups, 150 sit-ups and 150 squads and a 10 kilometer run before my actual breakfast. That and visit the weights for some bench presses etc. Oobleck told me to eat something light and drink something first before I started my morning exercise. Don't wanna get nauseous while doing my new morning routine after all…" He muttered softly to himself. He had to be careful not to make too much noise, since both Ren and Nora were already in bed. Pyrrha was still out, something about going off with Melody to do something, though he was getting worried about her.
'Maybe I should send her a message' He thought to himself. As he was about to grab his scroll, the door opened. In the doorway was a girl with red hair and green eyes. Those same eyes widened in surprise when she saw that Jaune was still awake. He gave her an awkward wave and signaled to be quiet. She smiled in return and nodded.
As Pyrrha went inside, she noticed a few things which she found rather odd. First and foremost that Jaune was still awake. Sure, he could stay awake till late, but he wasn't even in bed or changed into his onesie. Second of all, he was holding something. It looked like a few pieces of paper, but it wasn't a comic book. Much to Pyrrha's dismay, he wasn't the type to review his notes on his bad subjects. He was decent at the more normal subjects, but everything huntsman related (and history) wasn't his strong point.
She watched him putting the papers inside his night case and unbuttoning his shirt. She kept looking at him while he did this, only for his head to turn to her with a questioning gaze. She blushed when she realized that she was staring at him the whole time and looked to the side. She quickly grabbed her pajamas and went inside the bathroom.
Inside the bathroom she couldn't help but think about him. Did he stay up this late often? This is the first time she noticed, so maybe? The only reason she was back this late was because she was hanging out with Melody. They somewhat lost track of time while watching a romcom. When they noticed it was past 12 am, she quickly returned back to her dorm. Maybe she was looking into it too much.
As she was done changing, she quickly went to bed. She noticed that Jaune was already asleep, though no onesie. Not that she blamed him, since it was getting pretty hot time around. For now, she had to sleep. Tomorrow they had combat class and she did not want to mess up in front of everyone because of the lack of sleep. If they were going to do sparring tomorrow, that is.
The following morning Jaune got woken up by his alarm. He made sure the alarm was rather soft and only made enough sound to wake him up and not the whole team. He grabbed his scroll and the light flashed in his face. He quickly turned the timer off and closed his scroll again.
He lets out a yawn and got up. He quickly grabbed some clothes for meant for sports and went inside the bathroom to change. He put up some deodorant so he wouldn't kill people with his stench and made his way to the kitchen after changing. He grabbed a banana and some coffee and decided that he would do his run first. The gym was closed till 7 am and right now it was only ten past six.
After finishing breakfast, he got his own stuff and everyone else's stuff ready or in place. This was something he always did for the team, since things tend to get trashed quickly here so he made sure to clean the place and made sure that everyone's cups and stuff were in the right place. He didn't think they noticed him doing all of this and more, but it's fine. That's what friends are for after all, right?
He silently made his way out of his dorm and began to head outside. He had a bottle of water with him and his scroll. Not like he needed anything else.
Around and especially behind Beacon was a beautiful garden. Near that garden was the teachers lodging. You see, the teachers got free lodging as a benefit of working at Beacon if they lived there. This way they weren't depended on the Bullheads when it came to coming to work on time or when it came to other business. The teachers could choose to live there, but it wasn't a obligation to do so. They were allowed to live anywhere, but they could choose to live at Beacon if they wished to do so.
The teachers who decided to live here, lived in an apartment building, which was pretty large in itself. From what he heard the apartments themselves were rather luxurious. Teachers often used these apartments as their permanent homes and stay there even during the breaks.
Anyways as he started his run, he noticed a few things. Mostly how beautiful Beacon was around this time. Everyone was still asleep and the only sound that could be heard was that of nature and his footsteps. He almost wanted to stop to admire Beacon's beauty, but he quickly got rid of the thought. He had some exercising to do.
After his 10 km run, which took him around 40 minutes, he was out of breath. He ran four times in total around the gardens of Beacon to get to the 10km. A morning jog is nice, but a morning run is something else entirely. 'And I have to this again this afternoon, but longer. Great…' he thought to himself.
He shook his head though and took of the cap of his bottle of water. He drank some of the water and closed off the bottle again. He went inside the building towards the gym. By the time he got there it still wasn't opened. (The gym opens at 7 am apparently.)
The reason he went here to do his push-ups etc. was so that the teachers could easily check it. He was allowed to do his run outside, since they admitted that Beacon outside was rather nice around these times, though a bit harder to check. They trusted him enough to let him do the running outside in the morning, besides that everything had to be done in the gym, unless he specifically asked for it or under their supervision. (Something about obtaining footage from the outside camera's was harder than ones in a specific location.)
After waiting for a bit the gym was finally opened up by one of Beacon's staff members. He went inside and started to do the rest of his morning workout. For each section of this part of the exercise he has to do 3 reps of 50. During the first two weeks that number will go up to about 120 per rep. Aura can be somewhat of a cheat during exercise, so he has to turn that off as well. There is no point in becoming a warrior without a body to match it.
Jaune felt like his body was burning. Say what you want about this workout, but is only his morning exercise. This wasn't going to stop after two weeks either. No, this would continue with more added on top of it. 'It might be tough now, but it will be worth it.' He thought to himself during the workout. He'll show the world what he's made out of.
After his exercise he noticed that it was around 7:20 am. He was out of breath, but that was a good thing. 'If I wasn't feeling anything, then it either wasn't hard enough or I wasn't trying.' Jaune thinks as he heads over to the weights. 'This will all be worth it.' He kept telling himself. By the time that he went to the changing room it was already 7:40. He went over to his locker and grabbed a spare uniform he always had in his locker and some stuff to take a shower. A quick shower to get all the sweat off before meeting Oobleck and tackling the rest of the day sounded like a good idea on his part.
After a quick shower he headed over to the teacher's building. Oobleck's apartment in the complex was on the second floor, so he needed to climb a few stairs before he got to his destination. He looked for the door with the number 204 and knocked on the door.
After waiting for about ten seconds the door was opened by Oobleck. He stood there and greeted the young man in front of him politely. Jaune greeted the man back asked if he could come inside. After getting a nod from the green haired man and an arm motion to go inside, he went in.
"So Mr. Arc, looking at your wet hair I take it you just took a shower?" The man asked, trying to create some small talk to break the ice. "Yeah, I thought it would somewhat more pleasant if I didn't go here all sweaty from the morning exercise." Jaune responded while looking around.
Oobleck's apartment was rather messy and full of books and bookcases. It had your typical old acient research/library aesthetic, with a lot of the furniture being made out of wood. Specifically oak brown or darker. Furthermore were there multiple couches, a television and more. Despite it looks, it had plenty of modern attributes. If Jaune were to guess, then he would guess that Oobleck made the room like this. He always fancied the old things.
"Shall we head to the kitchen for breakfast? Today we have one of my yoghurt specialties that I want to teach you!" He said with way more excitement than Jaune expected. The excitement… wasn't unpleasant however. It was rather infectious if he was being honest. "Yeah, let's." He responded with a smile.
After making the food, the two men sit down and have a lovely morning chat. Oobleck apparently loved cooking in his free time and Jaune was also pretty interested in it, since he had been doing that his whole life. They were just discussing some recipes during their breakfast like they've known each other for ages.
"…And that's how you make my personal favorite Tiramisu." Oobleck finished with a smile. Jaune was listening with great interest to the man's words. Not only was he explaining things a bit slower than in class, but he also sounded way more free and passionate while doing so.
"I'm not going to lie, that recipe is amazing. Using your own strong coffee rather than regular sounds a bit tricky, since it might take over the taste from the parts of the tiramisu, but you make it sound like it's heaven for coffee lovers." Jaune said with a smile.
"Yeah, we can make it some time together if you want. Most of the staff here aren't too big on cooking, for some reason." Oobleck said while rolling his eyes. "I'm down for that, though I would have to do some of my training during the making of the tiramisu." Jaune said.
This answer caused Oobleck to perk up a bit "It seems like you're taking your training seriously. That's good. Though that makes me wonder about something…"
"What's that sir?" the young man asked.
"Well you see, you look like you already know a lot about cooking and huntsman diets. Not all, but it isn't enough to fill in six weeks of training. Sure, some of your grades can do better, though given which subjects and the way you've gotten into Beacon explains the majority of your weaker subjects." He deadpanned.
"But even that won't be enough to make you a better huntsman, so that leaves me to a rather peculiar predicament." The teacher finished.
A moment of silence entered the room. Jaune looked around for a bit and his eyes fell onto the clock. The time on the clock said 8:30. His eyes widen as he had still to grab all his stuff for Port's lesson. "Umm… sir, as much as I hate to admit it, I still need to grab my stuff for school and it's half an hour before the lesson starts." Jaune said.
Oobleck also turned his head to the clock "So it would seem." He looks back at Jaune and says "You can go ahead and grab your stuff. I'll be checking if you actually did your exercises for this morning or not.".
"Alright, thank you sir!" He responds as he stands up and makes his way out. Just before he reaches the door, the green haired man stops him for a small moment. "One more thing Mr. Arc." He says, causing the young man to turn around.
"You can call me Bartholomew, or Bart, behind closed doors. Saying sir continuously sounds a bit too formal for my liking." He says with a small smile. Jaune smiles back and says "I will, Bart, but only if you call me Jaune." Bart smiled at this and nodded. "Very well, Jaune."
After that, Jaune quickly made his way back to his dorm room, to find it empty like usual. 'Nothing new here. At this point I'm doubting if anyone of the team or team RWBY for that matter noticed my absence.' Jaune thought to himself solemnly. He shook his head and decided to grab his stuff. No point getting over something like that now.
He quickly collected all of his stuff and left for Port's lesson. The lesson itself was a complete bore, like usual. The man was rambling about a tale from the past that sounded way too ridiculous to be true. Seeing Grimm from 3 miles ahead of you in the dark and cutting each one down by either bisecting them with his axe, punching/suplexing them into oblivion or shooting them full with extremely precise shot gun shots that somehow always hits a vital spot of the grimm, killing them instantly. There is no way there aren't any exaggerations in that story. (Heheheheh, oh wait no spoilers, bad writer.)
Despite the boring part of the lesson, Jaune did his best to follow it all the way through. Taking notes and everything! Mostly because he really did need to get better at the huntsman subjects and it was one of the requirements of his schedule. He has to show his notes of every lesson (including combat), to show that he's not neglecting his school work because of his training.
After each school day he had to report his work to Oobleck, since he is in charge of his school work and all. Other teachers were also allowed to look if they so wish. Privacy for excellence, it's the trade he made and the trade he will stand by.
Though when writing everything down, he started to notice a pattern in his notes for a bit during Port's class. Mostly that if you leave out the whole boasting, excessive storytelling and more that you actually get some really interesting information. Notes such as these for example:
-Grimm always leave tracks, be it hair, footprints or something else. They don't care about concealing their presents.
-Grimm always have vital spots where they can be hit. Some are obvious and some are not. Furthermore you need to strength and/or specific type of weapon to hit them there, otherwise hitting somewhere else would be the better option. Crushing an armored head can only be done by blunt weaponry, but stabbing through the armor is something done much more easily by pointy weapons.
-If you can't land a vital spot, just hit it hard in neutral spots a few times or make an opening by targeting something else first. If a grimm keeps blocking with its arm, cut off his arm. Easy as that.
-Grimm do not get turned away from positive emotions. Even though they get attracted by negative emotions, positive emotions don't have the opposite effect. They make the grimm more or less neutral, like an actual wild animal. They'll attack you on sight, but don't go hunting for you specifically.
This and a few more notes about certain grimm specifically. It honestly surprised Jaune how much actual information was in the story, but why not tell it straight up? Maybe he didn't give the portly man enough credit.
After the lesson was done and everyone was starting to leave, Port held him up for a bit. "Mr. Arc." He started. "I saw you scribbling hard on your notebook during the lesson, it seems that you're taking your work more seriously, which is a good thing. Now my boy, I would like you to show me your notes for a bit." He said while standing in front of him.
Jaune nodded and got his notebook from his bag. Port took it from his hands and starts looking through the newly added notes. He seemed surprisingly pleased with the notes, even looking a bit impressed. Maybe because most people only write down the bare minimum during his lesson?
"Well, well, well my boy, it seems like you've really done your homework here, so to speak." He says joyfully. "Yes if you keep this up for the future, you'll surely become a huntsman as great as I!" He boasted. Jaune couldn't help but feel a little flustered at the praise, but smiled anyway.
"Thanks sir, but I have to go now. I don't want professor Peach to write me off as late." Jaune says to the huntsman. "Very well my boy, off you go!" He said with a smile and waved him off. As Jaune walked away, the man lets out a small chuckle. "Very well Mr. Arc. It seems like you're going to follow through with this. Now let's see if you can make it to the end." The old man said softly to himself.
Jaune's day went by faster than expected, though it was also far more tiresome. Taking notes all day and actually paying 100% attention to each lesson was way more exhausting than expected. His last class for today was combat class.
Combat class was Jaune's least favorite class. It's not that he hates learning how to be a better fighter, he actually loves that part! No, just like any normal person, he doesn't enjoy getting his ass kicked and the humiliation of getting beaten down every time.
Much to Jaune's dismay, he never changed his losing streak. Sure, he has gotten much better, but so did everyone else. At some point it almost started to seem like a pointless endeavor. The last two months training with Pyrrha became way less, to the point of none at all. Even if it made him somewhat upset, he did think it was fair, since she had her own life and was allowed to do whatever she wanted with it.
Not only that, but he could also always ask Ren, Nora or even someone of team RWBY. He shouldn't be completely reliable on her, he knew that. So he went and asked the others for help. It went about as well as you expected.
Combat class this time around was only more training. Despite what most think, combat class wasn't just mindless sparring. There were also lessons on proper training with your weapon, aura training, dust training, etc. Sure getting stronger was basically homework for this class, but proper training under the teacher's vision and direct comments on how to do things better outside of a spar was just as important as sparring.
It was almost like playing basketball. If you were to train in your free time, you would get better at what you know, but you wouldn't get any advice on how to improve your flaws and what you don't know. By playing matches you get experience and you also get better, but only playing matches isn't going to improve you to where you want to be. You'll find yourself often unprepared or questioning how to handle a situation. To cover up both of the flaws from the previous two, you must train while someone can comment on what you can do better and where to improve. Training with your team, but also alone under the watch of your coach will improve you and cover what the other two couldn't. These lessons are the equivalent of that.
Jaune had gone to the locker room to grab his stuff. Honestly when he looked at his stuff, he felt like it was somewhat bare. Everyone else had at least something fancy or at least better weapons than him. Even his armor feels somewhat bare compared to those who do wear armor. Maybe he should save up some money for future upgrades… 'That's for later. Right now I need to improve my skills with Crocea Mors before I should even think of getting a new/better weapon.
After he grabbed his stuff, Jaune walks to the room where everyone was training. He could see some people doing target practice. Not any normal target practice mind you, no it was far more extreme. It was like target practice, while doing extreme parkour.
The close quarter fighters were sparring with each other or facing the bots. People were working on their techniques and trying out new moves. Honestly, it was an impressive sight all together. 'And now it's my turn to join 'em.' Jaune thought to himself as he walked over towards where the close quarter fighters were training.
He specifically walked over towards the section where the training dummies were. None of JNPR or RWBY were at this section. Ruby was doing parkour with Crescent Rose, shooting all the targets with deadly precision. Ren and Blake were also over there in line, waiting for their turn to use the shooting parkour exercise.
Yang was 1v1ing one of the other students in hand to hand combat. It wasn't a fair fight. Weiss and Nora were fighting another students as well, but with their weapon in hand. Pyrrha was busy fighting a bunch of the robots on the highest setting. Honestly it was ridiculous how strong and skilled she was. Jaune knew that she wasn't just doing skill and strength training, but she also was secretly practicing her semblance with the robot fights, that is at least what she told him a few months ago.
Jaune shook his head and got ready to practice his sword slices. He grabbed his sword and held it like Pyrrha taught him. He started slicing and slashing the training dummy, like Pyrrha learned him. He tried to do what Pyrrha did and what Pyrrha wanted him to do before their training session got to a temporary halt. Though, if Jaune had to be honest, the fighting style wasn't really to his liking.
As he kept on slicing, he didn't notice someone walking up to him. So when he heard her voice, he jumped and almost let go of his sword.
"Mr. Arc, I see that you're practicing your swordplay." Miss Goodwitch said with no hint of emotion behind her voice.
"Uh… Oh h-hi miss Goodwitch. Erm… Yes, I am." He stuttered. No matter how many times he saw the strict woman, she always terrified him.
She stayed silent for a bit, looking at him with an analytic eye, before speaking up. "Would you mind coming with me for a second?" She asked, though Jaune did not experience it as a question. He silently nodded and went with the woman to one of the sides on the training area. They walked over towards one of the benches to the side and began to sit down on them.
"Mr. Arc…" She began. "I want to talk about your fighting style, if you don't mind." She said while looking forward. Jaune gulped, but hinted at her to go on with what she was saying. "Before we start this conversation, did you complete your morning routine?" She asked.
Somewhat more confident in his answer now, Jaune answered "Yes ma'am. Oobleck checked the camera's when we were making breakfast." He said.
Goodwitch seemed pleased with his answer, but continued the conversation about the topic before the question. "First of all, I want to say that you have improved over the year and made a lot of progress. For someone who made his way into Beacon through… underhanded means, you have surprised many of the staff members with how far you have come." She said with a small smile, which disappeared as soon as it came.
"The reason that I want to talk about your fighting style, is because it isn't working out for you. I know you have been training with miss Nikos and it did not escape my eye that you took up her fighting style." She said, now looking at him.
Jaune looked wary, but nodded anyway.
Miss Goodwitch lets out a small sigh. "I'm going to do you a favor here and be blunt about it. It isn't working for you. You are not Pyrrha Nikos. Miss Nikos has a fighting style of her own. Created and developed specifically to her own wishes and abilities. So, despite this part of the training not coming up yet, I want you to think about changing your battle style completely." She said to the young man, who now was deep in thought.
Jaune wanted to protest, he honestly did, but seeing his results over the year and the fact that it never felt right to begin with, gave him something to think about. He was improving, but he was always missing something.
Though that doesn't mean he likes her statement. Jaune has been trying a whole year and to hear that he should just give up, isn't fun. He thought a bit more. He could make a choice here, either be stubborn or give up. Or rather give up on Pyrrha's fighting style. He does admit that Pyrrha's fighting style is designed for her alone, so pursuing would be a fools errant.
On the other hand, he was still improving. He actually learned some nice tricks and things that actually work, even without him having her semblance and other stuff.
It stayed silent for a good minute between the two, before Jaune speaks up. "Then what would you suggest? Drop it completely and work it from the ground up, or try and deviate from Pyrrha's fighting style to make it my own?" He asked, no emotion showing whatsoever. He figured that he would hear her out completely before making a choice. Goodwitch was trying to help him after all.
Goodwitch took a second to look at him before answering "I would suggest working it from the ground up, but that doesn't mean you should disregard everything you have learned so far. Again, I stand by my words that you have been improving steadily, but you'll soon find out that pursuing miss Nikos's fighting style would be useless."
Glynda took a deep breath before coming to her conclusion. "So trying to create a fighting style that works for you would be your optimal choice. If some of the techniques you learned from miss Nikos's fighting style do work for you, then you can develop those into your fighting style. After all, it's about what works for you."
Another moment of silence entered between the two. It was again the young man who broke the silence. "Why not tell me this earlier? I mean if I was heading down a road that would only get me so far, why not stop me from the beginning? It seems kinda counterintuitive to stop me now then stop me from the beginning onwards." Jaune said to the older woman.
"Well you are right about the fact that it would seem counterintuitive to what I'm doing now, but allow me to answer your question with a multitude of questions." Glynda spoke.
"Did you improve over the year? Did you get the basics of swordsmanship? Did you get the point of advanced swordsmanship? Did you get a taste of it? Did you develop a taste for it? Did you figure out what felt comfortable? Answer these for yourself and you'll have your answer." She finished while looking the boy straight in the eyes.
Jaune turned his head away from the woman and looked down for a bit. 'Hm… I suppose I did improve over the year, and I did get some better insight on swordsmanship as a whole. That, along with some experience in it. Though that makes me wonder, did I really get a taste for it? I know the basics now and what more advanced techniques are like, but that doesn't mean I got a feel for it. Hell, I don't know what feels comfortable and what doesn't. All I know is that some of Pyrrha's techniques never felt truly mine.'
Jaune let's out a sigh. Maybe she was right, but before Jaune could respond Goodwitch already began to speak. "I think you are starting to see my point here, but there is still some internal conflict. I know letting go and starting over isn't the easiest thing, nor am I telling you to let go of your previous training completely. I'm only telling you this to help you, please remember that." She said with a softer look in her eye.
Jaune took a moment to take in the words "Hmm I suppose that there is some merit to your advice, though just letting go feels a bit wrong on my end. It feels like betrayal to my efforts and especially to Pyrrha." He admitted.
The woman wore a small smile on her face after seeing the young man nod. "Just think about it some more, when you're ready for that step, come to me and I'll help you take it. I am your combat instructor after all." She said with little bit more smugness than Jaune ever heard from the woman, though it was certainly not an unpleasant experience.
"Now, off you go. We still have an hour or more of class and I don't want any slackers amongst my students." She said, changing back into her strict dean role.
The rest of class passed by in a blur. Jaune tried doing some more training against the dummy and even tried some hand to hand combat. He got taught some hand to hand combat techniques over the year by team RWBY and team JNPR, or Yang, Ren and Pyrrha to be specific. He did get better at it, but again never truly won a spar, but at least he can hold himself in a hand to hand combat situation now. Which was something given the population of Beacon and those who actually tried hand to hand sparring. Aka almost only people who were adapt at unarmed combat.
After class was over, Jaune got changed, put on some deodorant and went back to his dorm room. He was the first of the four to arrive there, though he wouldn't stay there for long. He looked at the clock and it said 14:30. As much as Jaune wanted to rest and read comic books, he still had some studying and working out to do. So he grabbed some of his books that he didn't have on him and left the stuff he didn't need.
It took him about two minutes to grab all his stuff and to leave. After all, there is no better place to study than in the library, or that is what Weiss and Blake usually say. Though he expects that Blake is not always there to study when she says she's going to study in the library.
As Jaune headed to library, he passed Ren and Nora, who were talking to Lucian and Whitney. "Hey!" Jaune said, but he didn't think they caught it. Sadly enough, they didn't react to it whatsoever. Though to be fair, they were pretty intensely discussing something.
A tired sigh escaped from his mouth, but he decided that he would just move along. No point in stalling his studying, since Oobleck would discuss some topics after having dinner with him.
When he came into the library, he was surprised to see that it was almost empty. Though most classes were coming to an end and all grades were already handed in, so it was somewhat to be expected to see almost nobody studying.
The only students he saw were people whom he barely recognized. Honestly, it was like he was sometimes walking amongst shadows instead of actual people.
Welp, time to study up some more on some of the huntsman-type subjects. Not the most interesting thing, but he had to do it anyway. 'Sigh, guess I'll start with grimm studies.' He thought to himself. Jaune made sure to set a timer, so he wouldn't be late to his dinner with Oobleck. 'That sounds so wrong.' Jaune thought to himself. Anyways he still needed to some pretty intense cardio routine before getting to Oobleck.
Honestly, as much as Jaune wanted to be a huntsman, some of these subjects are extremely boring. He knew the merit of following these classes, but when you have to read fifty pages of reading about different types of surfaces grimm like to sleep on for each common grimm in Vale, then it doesn't matter how much you want to be a huntsman, you're just gonna die of boredom.
Anyways, after two and half hours worth of studying, Jaune felt like he was brain fried. Or sat through one of Weiss's complaining sessions. Same thing really.
Anyway, after his study session, Jaune went back to the dorm. The dorm of course was just as empty as he left it. "Nothing new here…" he muttered to himself. He dropped off his stuff and went for his locker where his gym cloths were that he used this morning.
Jaune figured that he could use that set again, since he didn't want to waste an outfit for each workout, since he had to do those three times per day. 'I'll just remember to take that set with me after tonight's session.' He thought to himself.
For this round, Jaune was doing pure cardio. Tonight he was going to do some weights, or that's what the schedule said. Right now, he had to run for about an hour and twenty minutes, while mixing up between running and sprinting. Though, before he started that ordeal, he did a warming up first. This warming up consisted of some stretching and a light jog on the treadmill before doing the full blown run.
After each ten minutes worth of running, Jaune had to follow up with five minutes of sprinting, this until the seventy-five minute mark. After that Jaune was allowed to stop, but had to perform a cooldown, which consisted of slowly decreasing the speed tempo so that he would decrease the change of injuries during the sports routine.
The first twenty-five minutes were easy, especially for someone who had aura. Even with the first time sprinting! After that though it became harder and harder as time went on.
At the forty minute mark he was really feeling the exhaustion from working hard all day, but that didn't mean he was going to stop.
At the fifty minute mark he felt like his legs were giving out.
At the sixty minute mark, he felt like giving up, but he wouldn't allow himself to do so. He was determined to do so, he was too far in now.
And after the final sprint, he finally did it. Jaune felt like he was going to die, but happy at the same time. A feeling of accomplishment if you will. He still had to do his cooldown, so he wasn't completely done, but he might as well be. His legs were burning though, something which he would probably feel for the rest of the day.
After the cooldown Jaune went over to the showers and took a quick shower. Something about showing up sweaty to meet a teacher just didn't feel right. After showering he put his uniform back on and headed once again to Oobleck.
They had a high protein dinner that consisted off cayenne chicken skewers with black bean salsa. It was a pretty good meal all in all.
Bartholomew did do a good amount of the preparation, since he knew that Jaune had to work out and had to study, so by the time he arrived it would be pretty late. So when he came there, he only had to the finishing touches and had to cook the chicken. While he was doing this, Bart took the liberty to check if Jaune did his work out and made sure to send Glynda a message to say that Jaune completed the second part of the daily routine.
During dinner however, Oobleck had some news for the Beacon student. "Say Jaune, I've been thinking about something today." He started.
Jaune paused his eating for a moment and looked at the older man.
"You see, I've been thinking about something. Like I said this morning, I don't think I've got enough materials to last six weeks of hard training, since I'm the only teacher that will do actual six weeks of training. The others of course will start to add to that list once the initial strength and stamina training face is over, so I took the liberty to check all the papers again to find something missing just so I would have enough materials for the full six weeks." The teacher explained.
The young man sat there in silence, grateful for how far the man was actually going.
"In my little search, I noticed one thing missing on the list. Aura training! Out of all things to miss, I was surprised this was the one. Aura is one of the most essential things to a huntsman after all." The man said wisely.
Bartholomew showed Jaune the schedule and indeed found it missing. "Huh, how did we miss that?" He asked in response to the paper.
"Well, perhaps because we thought we were dealing with the average Beacon student, no offense. Most people who enter Beacon already have a pretty good grip on their aura. Even then, it would normally be considered standard practice to write that one down, but I suppose we skipped past that. We're all only human I suppose." Oobleck answered.
"So in conclusion, I'll be your aura instructor, alongside the other things." He finished.
Jaune looked grateful at the man and thanked him, which caused the other man to smile. They decided that they would finish the rest of dinner and that they would start aura practice tomorrow. Jaune cleaned his dishes and left the man's apartment.
He returned to his dorm and was allowed to relax for about half an hour, letting the food set in before his final work-out was going to start. This time, he was going to use the weights. His legs were still a bit tired, but less tired than before, so that was good. After all, the schedule said he was going to do the machines that trained your leg strength and the machines that trained his arms. 'No pain, no gain.' He thought to himself.
He left the dorm again and did the same starting routine as he did for the other two training routines. This time though, he was going to do the machines. Today he was going to do every machine that had to do with his leg muscles and every machine that had to with his arms. If any of these machines trained more than just his arms and legs, then that was a bonus.
'Nobody said this was going to be easy.' He thought as he walked into the gym. The gym would close at 23:00 and right now it was around 21:00. So two hours of pure muscle training. 'Thank god I have aura, because I think I would have collapsed today otherwise.'
He went to work and started doing his weight training. Jaune could lift some pretty heavy weights after a year of training, on par with some of his peers even. Though even those weights would increase over the coming days.
He could lift with his legs 140kg, because of intense training and a little bit of aura. His arms were a bit weaker, which was logical considering the muscle mass difference and all. With his arms he could do 80kg. Though on some machines the weights had to be bit lighter, since doing an exercise well is much more important and effective than doing it with the most heavy weight you can.
After about two hours of training, when it was closing time, Jaune felt like he was officially dead. Like a zombie he stumbled his way back to his dorm. Inside of the dorm, he found all the remaining members of team JNPR awake.
When they asked where he had been, he just told them that he was working out. Normally he would be happy to get some attention again from his team, but right now he was just too tired to bother. Nora was quick to accept his answer and went back to what she was doing, but Ren and Pyrrha's eyes lingered a bit longer on their leader, especially his partner's.
Jaune took a quick shower before bed to get the sweat of his body. The process of it all was almost completely done while his mind was on automatic. The shower was completely thoughtless and he almost wasn't even bothered to put on the sleeping wear, but he decided that he would rather keep his modesty.
He slumped his way to bed and noticed that the others had gone to bed when he went into the shower. He set his timer for around the same time tomorrow and moved his body under the sheets. 'I hope to god this will be all worth it.' The leader of team JNPR thought before falling asleep.
Thank god this chapter is finally done. It took so long! I'm sorry you guys had to wait for so long, but at least it was a long chapter. I was rather busy these weeks, so making this took a lot of time. I'm glad I manage to finish it though and I hope you guys like it as well. Also, extra work for Oobleck hype! Anyways, I'm tired.
Cya!
~MT