…- A Place to call Home -…
Jaune Arc was scared.
He remembered, when he was young, that this place was full of bustling life and people trying their best to enjoy their lives even under the threat of the ever-present grimm outside the defended walls. Now, what was once streets filled with constant footstep traffic is now empty and desolate as the broken windows of old vendor stores stares outside lifelessly.
But, amidst the irregular beating of his chest inside his worn-out chest plate, constant looks of fear at the dark alleyways of what was once a proud city, and the utter hopelessness of his faith in his sword mastery against the unnatural threats, he couldn't help but feel a tad bit better.
He was still scared. However-
"Found you." He said, voice shaking, as he stared at the huge silhouette of another lifeless building looming over his haggard form.
A supermarket. An abandoned supermarket over two stories high with its once purple paint turned murky and, in his opinion, look absolutely terrifying to witness even at the light of the afternoon day. Barricaded windows, he noted, of nailed wooden planks at the entrance and cracked windows at the first and second floor yet the people who made them failed to bring sounds of life inside. This does not bring him comfort.
But, worst of all, he knows that - even at its un-life state – if he makes the wrong move, a wrong step, or even a single mistake, he will die in the worst way possible. However, his empty stomach would digress that he would still die by the end of the week if he turned down this opportunity to embark on a risky supply run just because he was scared at the first get go.
"Fuck it." He concluded as he tightened the grip of his forearm metal plate, adjusted the backpack for comfort and easy reach that he 'borrowed' from a dead corpse he found on the woods a few days ago while he was approaching the city of Vale , and whispered prayers to the brother gods as he held Crocea Mors in a tight grip.
…- A Place to call Home -…
Breaking and entering was hard.
It wasn't like the action movies like the legendary Spruce Willis used to portray. There was no window to break in (They were all barred by wooden braces to kingdom come), no ladders to climb the top and start from there, nor door handles where Crocea Mors can cut freely (He tried, the dull vibrating sound still sends shivers down his spine) and, for what seems like an hour of finding, and failing, to get in. Jaune Arc was about to give in and call it a day when, suddenly, he jumped in fright, whirled about, sword drawn, only to berate himself for letting a random critter scare him-
Wait a second, he thought as his tired mind zoomed in from whence the rat-like creature came.
Eventually, after examining the previous location of the unnamed creature, he let out a sigh of relief and took a moment to thank the brother gods for allowing him this small bout of mercy. He then studied one of the barricaded windows that he passed by earlier, dismissing it as another walled off entry point, more closely and, in particularly, the small exit point of a foot wide hole in its far right.
Taking a deep breath and a small 'You got this, Jaune' morale boost, he hefted Crocea mors, then stabbed it straight through the hole, only stopping when it almost reached 2/4 on the way in, then paused, hesitantly looked around then, after a moment of silence, he took another breathe in and pushed his entire weight towards the awaiting hilt - Crack! - then stumbled onto the brick concrete.
Heart beat raising, he grabbed his weaponized family heirloom then listened closely to his surroundings, prepared to bolt at the first sign of trouble, and when danger didn't come to greet him. He sighed in relief, stood, then took a moment into putting a halt to his shaking physique, after he was done calming himself, he looked towards the dark corridors that stared at him inside.
He was scared… so much.
Deep down, he knew that this was a bad idea. A very bad one. However, after the news hit and they came, his family (At least for those who are in Ansel) fled to the wilderness to survive. For the first few months, he was so used to having his father protecting them like a shepherd to his sheep. They always woke up before sunlight came, counted their supplies, wandered the lands of vale, went into the occasional supply runs (properly) and slept together at a makeshift fortress when they've done their chores for the day.
For a while, they've gotten used to it- no, not really, he added quickly, for they've only ever gotten used to having a real huntsman protecting them. They were lucky. The others… weren't. He could still remember the screams of their neighbor, the Ashe family, as monsters, worser (oh so much worser) then grimm, came in to their homes, massacred them, and left the surviving families running away, tails tucked between their legs, from their town, their homes, and forced to wander a new cruel world.
Afterwards, he used to blame his dad for abandoning the others as they, having one of the last huntsmen in remnant looking after them, chose to keep to themselves. Honestly, he still does, but after experiencing so much death and the things people at their worst do… he wasn't sure.
Shaking his head away from the resurfacing bad memories, Jaune arc forced his body to move and as he lifted his legs and felt the cold floor inside touching his right foot, he trudged inwards, face determined, and, for a moment, he felt exactly like Spruce Willis facing uncertain danger with an impassive face…
Well, right until his stomach grumbled away, the unwelcomed sound venturing across the dark corridors while the perpetrator lifted his arms to his head, scratching it awkwardly, and shaking unceremoniously from the shear dread eclipsing his resolves as he went onwards for some semblance of food to last him for a few days.
"I'm going to die…" Jaune whispered, face sweating and heart racing, to himself as he went on and about inside the abandoned supermarket as he hoped to find some semblance of food while he thought of happy thoughts such as a place to call home.
He suddenly stopped, stilled at his core, praying that the sound he heard was just a fragment of his imagination, as he slowly turned his head around, his stolen flashlight beaming the darkness away, and stood face to face with a figure (to call it a figure would be a dishonor to the word figure itself) as a lanky build humanoid entity, infested from downwards to up with blackened rotten skin spewing equally rotten scent to his nostrils, hunching downwards like it was playfully sneaking up to a misfortunate bystander and disturbingly stopping like a clock running out of battery.
Both of them stared at each other, for a few seconds, before one of them screamed, and he was damn sure it wasn't it, as he ran away, tail tucked between his legs, from the corrupted and, after a few seconds of unwelcomed cardio, he comforted himself that maybe the thing that was once human made a lapse of judgement and thought of him as just another critter, like the rat he met just earlier, and left him alone.
But perhaps the brother gods were playing tricks with his hope again, because as he continued to run like the wind, he heard an inhumane laugh behind him and then felt the corridors itself buckled under a monstruous and inhumane charge as he himself slowly felt his life flashing before his very eyes.
Jaune Arc was very scared.