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Requested by:
Scrublord Yoda
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They made straight for the mountain settlement at all possible speed, snapping around trees and busting through short, fragile shrubbery. More than a few low hanging branches snapped against his armor and Aura, but he ignored it until he saw the grey of the old wall. As it loomed large, he turned his quad and ground to a halt, wheels hurling dirt as he slid to a stop at the wall's base.
"I don't see the gate." Ren said as he rolled up beside them, engine rumbling.
"Nor do I." Jaune sighed. Looking back and then forward, he frowned. "Looking for it will take time…"
"Time is dead people, Boss." Nora grunted, stepping off her quad and swinging Magnhild around in both hands. Jaune opened his eyes to ask what she was doing, but before he could, she leapt and brought the hammer down on the wall.
"Nora!" Ren shouted as the wall buckled but held, cracked stone tumbling down as she brought her hammer back again and squared her hips for another hit. "What are you-"
Her answer was to bring the hammer around again, screaming her rage and caving in a large section of wall. The old, poorly maintained construction seemed to groan a bit as it sagged in and down. Growling, Nora slammed a foot into the wall's base and, somehow, that was what brought it tumbling down and in, collapsing in a mound.
"Whelp," she laughed brightly, turning and shouldering her massive hammer, "looks like some Grimm knocked in the wall!"
"Nora, what-"
"It doesn't matter now, Ren." As much as she should have asked before acting on her own, Jaune couldn't fault the logic. What was an already ailing wall compared to whoever they could save?
The answer, of course, was nothing.
"Mount up, Nora." He grunted, turning his quad and rumbling over the mounded rubble as fast as he dared risk the wheels on it. "We have work to do."
The fields beyond the wall, here, were fallow and open, resting between harvest and seeding to restore the land for the coming season. Whatever the case, they cut across it at full speed, spraying so much loose, dry soil and rock behind them that Ren and Nora had to pull off to the side so the man could see. The field was massive, and stretched out for several acres to either side. But after a few minutes, a cluster of houses, barns and work buildings came into view. Along with the faint, barely lingering smoke curling up from the houses, vanishing in the humid wind that blew across the fields from behind them.
And then, as they came near, the Grimm - Beowolves, which rounded corners and crawled through holes torn in the walls of the buildings at the roaring sound of their approach.
Pyrrha tapped his shoulder with her spear and stood as they got close, balancing on the back of the seat the way only Pyrrha possibly could, and Jaune smiled. About five yards away Jaune pistoned the wheel to one side and threw all his weight the other, drifting one two wheels as his partner was thrown free of the quad. Or, more aptly, leapt free, using all the speed he'd built up to sail high and coming down like a streaking comet of forged bronze and bright red.
She came down with all the force of a comet, too, slamming into the first Beowolf with her shield and crushing it under her weight. A second leapt and she thrust with her spear as she rose, ripping through its throat and jackknifing its head up and back. As it fell, Nora and Ren cruised past her with Magnhild extended, catching one of the Grimm and sending it through a wall. Ren came to stop beside the hole it made and stood, spraying fire into a pair of Beowolves as they came.
A third Grimm came for his back but Nora just stood and turned, thrusting back and up with the head of her hammer like a pitchfork and smashing the creature back. It didn't die, though. Instead it only staggered away, until a wave of fire rolled across it, burning it away in a flash of black smoke then vanished in the vortex of Jaune's cone of pyromantic fury.
"Clear the hamlet." He ordered as he dismounted and frowned, "And quickly, too."
"The mountain waits, but we can't risk leaving people behind." Ren nodded, "Nora and I will circle around, see if we see anyone on the way and then come in from the other side."
"Good plan." Jaune nodded, "Go."
Jaune watched them vanish around the corner and roar away and then turned to Pyrrha and bobbed his head towards the buildings. He was certain they wouldn't find anyone, the Grimm had obviously earned the run of the place. But they had a duty to check, at least, before they could leave.
A lurking Boarbatusk screamed through a wall as Pyrrha passed it and Jaune watched her bring her shield up and turn, letting the spinning creature glance off her raised barrier. It hit the ground and scrambled onto its feet, turning to try and find the Mistralian again, but Pyrrha's spear caught it in the flank as it did. It sagged to the side and Pyrrha straightened, recalling her weapon with her Semblance and turning back to him.
"Shall we, Lord?"
"Yeah." He nodded, "We shall."
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It took another hour and a half to get back la Montagne Minee, stopping to slay whatever Grimm they came across and sending the tragically few survivors they found back the way Jaune and his team had come. It wasn't ideal, but he could hear gunfire in every other direction, so it was their best hope. The mountain settlement would doubtless be under assault, too, so taking them there would only be taking them into even worse danger. And doing so knowingly, too.
Rock or hard place, then.
That decision turned out to be even better than he'd thought, though. Because by the time they made it back…
The 'Goliath' was a towering construct of broken stone and bent wood, warped into the shape of a great elephant almost as tall as the walls of the settlement. It bellowed and backed away before ramming its stone head into the wall again and again, each time sending tremors and dust scattering along the wall, and shaking the soldiers standing at its apex trying to fight it off. Lesser Grimm thronged around it, wading through the ruined slums that had been built outside and pounding against the towering wall.
"I don't see the Gheist-mask." Jaune murmured, watching the creature from far enough away the Grimm didn't notice them, too taken with the anxiety of the soldiers on the wall and the panic of those beyond it. "Ren? Pyr?"
"Nothing."
"It's too far, Lord." Pyrrha agreed, "And moving too much. Perhaps if we get closer…"
"It's not on either of the sides, or its rear, and I doubt it's on the big elephant's front, either." Nora rattled out quietly, kneeling in front of them with Magnhild standing tall beside her and a hand wrapped loosely around its hilt. "And puttin' it on top would be dumer 'n a senate of rocks."
"Any lucky rifle could kill it that way, yes." Pyrrha nodded, "It's stomach, then?"
"Wouldn't be able to see…"
"Only while it's controllin' everything." Nora pointed out, "All it'd need to do is check which way the mountain is and walk that way."
"She's right." Mort rasped quietly, the first words they'd said ever since they'd left the forest - and not even about Nora's chest. "But it's stomach is twenty feet up and surrounded by armored legs. Or, well, legs made of rock, but it's all the same. And I won't be much good against a rock, Jaune."
Neither would Mort's fire… It was hard to work up enough heat to melt literal stone, and even if Jaune pushed the heat hot enough, it could just replace it with waste from the wall and the slums both.
It would just be a waste...
"Nora, go for its legs." He ordered as he straightened and drew Mort Noire, "Ren, back her up. Pyr, you and I are going to draw them off the walls and kill them. I go left, you go right. We'll be on our own. Everyone got it?"
"Yes."
"As you will, Lord."
"On it, Big Boss."
Jaune lingered only a moment, watching their backs as they strode away to fulfill his orders. Then, slowly, he brought his sword up in both hands and rested the flat of the blade against his shoulder. To it, he said, "Ready for this, partner?"
"Is that a real question?"
"This is a battle." Jaune pointed out, "Not a Hunt."
"I have been through both, boy." Mort rasped darkly, "I'm more than ready. I am eager."
The shanty towns that clung to the outsides of the walls had been annihilated whole-sale and quickly. Collapsed walls made of sheet metal, stacked rock and salvaged wood fared poorly against Grimm claws and gave way. Few had escaped, he could tell from the blood smeared along the great wall that towered over the slaughter-grounds by Grimm who cared little for those in their way once they had been gored and mauled.
And their victims had been forgotten, by the Grimm now and by their own people before the monsters came. There weren't so much 'bodies' left behind as fragments of them. Arms, legs, heads, torso. Poking out from under collapsed, burning walls or scattered across the paths they'd made in between their shanties. A tragedy years, maybe even decades, in the making, that had ripped apart and ended an incalculable number of families. The sheer loss of it all…
Jaune felt his blood boil and race for it, rage building to a dull roar in the back of his mind. He reached out to Mort and their connection and felt the trapped spirit echo it as he stepped forward and into the open, at the base of the gentle hill made by the foundations of the wall and the shanty ruins heaped around it.
He didn't try to contain his anger, instead letting it build until his teeth ground together and his stomach churned.
The Grimm ripping and tearing at the concrete of the wall were maybe thirty feet away and he watched them slow and turn, sniffing the air. Smelling his rage and hate - which were far closer and more potent than the distant thrum of those beyond a ten foot thick concrete wall. Beowolves had the sharpest noses for that, he knew, and were one of the more reckless races, so he wasn't surprised when they turned first.
He felt Mort thrum in his hands as his - their - rage coalesced along its length, fire burning white hot and so fiercely even Jaune feared it would scorch him. As the Grimm came he slid a foot back and brought his sword down, resting the base against his hip as he breathed and pushed his own power into the ancient, black sword. The first Beowolf leapt and came down and Jaune stepped back, only far enough to get out of the way of the claws as they came down. Bone white claws bit into soil and red, bestial eyes met blue as Jaune turned and brought his sword around.
The cone of fire they summoned bloomed white hot and seared all the way up to the wall, annihilating the Grimm coming for him and those that had only just noticed him alike. Those of their kin too close to the fire scrambled away, roaring as their pelts burned. Jaune backed away as more Grimm came for him and smiled.
Jaune heard Mort rasp, "Six o'clock."
Jaune didn't even hesitate, turning on a heel and bringing his searing blade across in a horizontal cut that ripped through the oh-so-clever Creep. Mort rasped another warning and Jaune inverted the blade and thrust back and up, into the chest of a leaping Beowolf as it came down on him. It ignited and vanished in a shower of smoke as Jaune turned and backed away, sword flashing up to catch a spinning Boarbatusk that fell in two halves to either side of the young knight.
He backed away more and then leapt to the side, rolling as an Alpha Beowolf came down. He turned to it and the monster roared, ripping a clawful of soil and earth free and hurling it in his face. He took it on the side of his head, Aura shattering the force, and lunged, burying the tip of Mort Noire in its throat. As it fell he turned and swing, ripping through the chest of another Beowolf and pumping power through the thrumming sword.
A fireball soared over a Beowolf's head as it ducked but detonated just behind it, swallowing it in flame along with half a dozen of its fellows.
But as soon as it fell and the fire faded, more Beowolves came, and Jaune sighed, ducking back as a claw swung for his face. Mort Noire came up to disarm the monster and then came down to behead it and Jaune turned, bringing the sword up to catch a snarling Ursa's claws as the monster tried to fall on him. Snarling, he pushed his rage and willpower into the sword and the monster vanished in a flash of red fury.
It collapsed back and crushed the Creep behind it as Jaune turned again, decapitating another Beowolf as it came for him and then slammed a boot into a Creep's throat. It staggered back, choking, and Jaune followed, thrusting down into the side of its skull to end it. Another Ursa came for him and he ripped his sword free of the dead Grimm to catch the stupid thing in its throat. It swiped for him as it fell, but Jaune ignored it, stepping by and looking for the next enemy.
But all he saw around him was fire and inky black Grimm smoke, billowing into the air.
Then, over the quiet crackle of the dying fire and the distant gunfire, he heard a sound that chilled him to his bones. A scream, piercing and loud, that cut off suddenly with a bestial roar that dragged his eyes over to where the towering stone pachyderm had been trying its best to breach the walls. It was gone, though. And in its place stood a writhing mass of wood, contorted steel, and shattered chunks of rock that flowed together into a more human shape.
It turned and its arm snapped out, hurling a limp form high through the air over Jaune.
Magnhild slammed into the dirt beside him, though, its handle stained a bloody red.
Jaune stared at it and felt his blood turn to ice, and then he screamed, pumping power into his sword as he rushed towards the Grimm. Screaming, he leapt as he got close to it and brought the sword down, carving through wood and sparking off stone. Roaring, he bellowed, "Mort, give me everything you have!"
"Everything?" Mort demanded, "Because I have a lot to give this fucker!"
"Everything!" He bellowed, "Damn the risks!"
Mort Noire shook in his hands, vibrating with such an intensity it set his teeth shaking against each other and his vision swam. Fire burst along its sharp length, white hot and roaring in rage. It crawled up Jaune's arm, searing even through his Aura and Mort's own protections, but Jaune ignored the pain and pushed more of his will into the weapon. He roared again as the Grimm construct stepped back and turned to face him.
Then, the fire burned black, and Jaune heard thunder roar around him, deafening him and blinding him.
As Jaune's vision returned, swimming and foggy though it was, he found himself on his back, staring up at Pyrrha kneeling beside him. She was shouting something, but Jaune couldn't hear it. He ignored it, turning to look to his other side. The construct lay in a thousand shattered, burnt pieces, scattered across the ground as far as he could see and embedded in the towering stone wall.
Between him and the wall lay Mort Noire, black as always but… Edged in a strange, faint silver.
"That's new…" He murmured before he let his head sag back against the ground, sighed, and felt sleep drag him away from consciousness.
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Sebine :
XD
Screaming Stuka :
Such chaos must be contained and prevented, lest the world fall to ruin…
Cj Robbins :
To be fair, I'm making Nora much more teasing in this than canon. But I could see Nora being in the mood to mess with people.
Death Trooper :
It's a good question! We shall see eventually, lol~