Author's note:
Heyo! Long time no see! I've been busy with work for the past few months or so, and I've been having fun doing it too! This might be the last chapter I'll post for a long while since my writing is so slow with all the work I need to do these days. But don't worry! I'll still be writing, except this time with pencil and paper, then transcribing it to an online document. Anyways, here's a little author's key to what is what:
Bold: psychic things, usually daemonic in nature. Even phrases or names will be put in bold, especially sinister whispers or Her.
Italicized: Thoughts, subconscious things, usually a character thinking something to themselves.
Bold and Italicised: Xenos or non low-gothic languages, usually when characters are conversing in a different language.
Weeks passed by in a blur, Richard teaching his class the intricacies of High Gothic. Eventually, the class spoke almost entirely in the Imperial language, some students still having difficulty with it.
"Alright class, who's ready for a little biology lesson? A common invasive species that lives on many worlds and even dwells within ships are the Pterra Squirrels. We will be dissecting live ones collected from the Imperium's vessels we have at hand." The class unanimously grimaced. They all wanted to ask the same question, but no one dared to raise their hand. Except for Ruby.
"A-are they dangerous?"
"No, not really." Only a few sighed in relief when they heard those words. The rest of the class was silent, well aware of what counted as dangerous to their professor.
"Alright, how about we get started. These will be live dissections, and thankfully the squirrels are sedated. Although, it should be the right time of year…"
Instantly, the class looked at each other nervously. Even Ruby didn't want to ask a question, but Richard noticed their apprehension.
"There is a phenomenon where Pterra squirrels become unusually aggressive. Where once they were docile and like a normal pest animal, they now become dangerous, even to people." He went under his desk and laid out enough cages for the entire class. Richard then put surgical tools on everyone's desk. All of the class could hear groggy snarling and squeaking coming from each cage. Their professor put the cages on their part of the tables, and started walking around, a confident smile on his face.
Ruby eyed her now rattling cage, and heard an almost daemonic squeaking coming from behind the cage door. It was too dark in there to see the thing, but she didn't feel any better knowing what the squirrel looked like. Turning to Weiss, she saw the heiress having the same hesitation as herself. Learning about the entropic Hrud, and the monstrous Ambull, she didn't feel any better about what exactly was out there in the stars.
Richard stood at his own desk, and carefully opened his cage, using his mechanical limb to grab possibly the worst looking rodent Ruby had ever seen. It was large, almost the size of her pet corgi, Zwei, with greyish fur and big beady eyes. It was webbed on the sides of it's body, like a sugar glider or flying squirrel, but it was scarred all over it's body. It's foaming snout was filled with fanged, mismatched teeth, and it violently struggled in the iron grip of the Inquisitor. Then, in a mix of shock and horror, the class watched Richard casually break the thing's neck with but a small movement of his metal digits.
"Alright class, now I want you to open your cages, and I'll be walking around to make sure no one gets too injured by them. We'll be focusing on the adaptable biology of these curious creatures, and how they're able to survive almost anywhere."
Weiss gingerly grabbed the cage door, and slowly opened it. Before she could even react, the squirrel leaped out toward her face, only to be grabbed by Richard. "Careful there, the sedatives seem to be less effective now." He gave a warm smile, in an attempt to inspire some confidence, but it seemed to have no effect on the heiress. He snapped the rodent's neck, and handed back to her the fresh corpse. Weiss could only respond with a few unladylike grunts, out of astonishment and maybe a little embarrassment.
When Richard walked away, Ruby smugly looked at Weiss with mischief in her platinum eyes. "Richard and Weiss, sittin' in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-" As she quietly taunted Weiss, she absent-mindedly opened her cage, not paying attention until the squirrel leaped on her face, much to the heiress' amusement.
Richard slowly pulled the bandages off of Ruby's face, chuckling quietly to himself.
"It's not fair! She hasn't had to deal with even half of what I've been through!"
Richard's face turned from amusement to a sinister shade of melancholy. It reminded her of the faint memories she had after mom died, and how dad had fallen into depression for a few years. It then came to her just how similar the man in front of her was to her father. Richard looked her in the eyes and spoke:
"Everyone has different struggles. You have yours, I have mine, and Weiss has hers. The price of being born into fame and fortune is that you'll either be loved or hated by many, and that people will try to use you for their own financial gain, or influence you to your own end. You'll be broiling in an endless stream of petty politics and the greed of wolves in sheeps' clothing, all the way until your death. I'm envious of your life, growing up in a small town on an island, nothing like that to worry about."
Ruby's face betrayed her new sense of worry. "How do you know that?"
"You have a student file in the records already, and knowing more about my students gives me a better understanding of how best to teach them."
Ruby didn't look convinced, unease settling on her face. "You do some of the worst teaching I've ever had, and Professor Port does better."
Richard flinched, his serious expression gaining a shade of shame. "I'm sorry if I haven't been a good teacher, I just want to prepare you for the rest of the galaxy."
Ruby slammed slammed her fists on the table, cracking the sturdy wood and sending an echo in the empty classroom. "WHAT ARE YOU EVEN PREPARING US FOR? YOU JUST TEACH US THIS STUPID LANGUAGE AND TALK ABOUT ALL THESE AWFUL THINGS! WHAT USE DO THEY EVEN HAVE? I ONLY JOINED THIS CLASS BECAUSE OF THE WEAPONS!" Her words rang out, and the light from the windows created a shadow on the Inquisitor's face, obscuring his scarred features.
Moments passed in silence. Then Richard spoke calmly and with intent:
"That's fine… I want to teach you these things because… because…"
"Because?!"
"I… have ruined many things in my long career. Countless lives, my own family's loyalty to humanity, even my own damn sanity at times. I swore to myself that I wouldn't ruin innocence; rather, I would prepare them for any threat to come. I do this because, sooner or later, worse things than what I teach you now will eventually find you when you least expect them to. They will find Remnant, and unless I teach you, you will be woefully unprepared."
Fear coiled itself into Ruby's heart. She thought of herself if those 'Things' ever did find Remnant, what would she even be able to do against them? The serpent of fear slithered down to her gut, making her queasy. What about dad and Yang? Could she, armed with Richard's vast experience and knowledge, beat back whatever came their way? Tears filled her eyes, as she started to cry.
Richard knew what he was doing, no matter how wrong it was. He knew that by manipulating Ruby to his own ends, he could eventually control Beacon from the sidelines. This worthless ball of dirt will be mine and the Imperium's in the end… all I need to do is to control the hearts and minds of the next generation. I will survive this new trial, and I will kill any who get in my way. He knew if he played his cards right, he will win in the end. And so, he knelt down, and, in a slow and tentative motion, hugged the crying teenager tight.
Ozpin sat, watching the one thing he needed most to defeat The Queen drifting away from him, to the man he had begun to despise with all his undying heart. The coffee mug in his hand began to crack, before shattering in a shower of black liquid and white porcelain, covering the monitor in the caffeinated stuff.
"You alright Oz?"
"I'm fine, Qrow."
"Doesn't seem like it."
Ozpin's neutral expression twitched violently. The headmaster of Beacon sat up abruptly, startling the tipsy black haired hunter leaning on one of the room's pillars. Ozpin walked over to the window, staring out into the city he once founded.
"We have to have him on our side, Qrow, no matter how much I may hate him."
"Oz, you've never hated anything this much other than-"
"THIS IS DIFFERENT, QROW!" Ozpin turned around, his usual calm facade broken, replaced with frightening rage.
"H-How is it different?"
"Richard rules the skies, and from the info I have scraped together, he can wipe us all out with the push of a fucking button! The Queen may control the grimm, but she can't ever go past the atmosphere, and neither can we! We are fucked if Richard decides to use force to control us!" Ozpin's glasses had fallen, revealing bloodshot eyes and darkened circles. Qrow stared in horror at an Ozpin he had never seen before.
The haggard headmaster sighed, putting back on his glasses with a shaking hand, slowly regaining his composure. "We can easily beat The Queen with his help, which is why I intend to bring him up to speed on some of our plans."
Qrow opened his flask, gulping down a large portion. He then looked into the flask, before having another sip. To him, he needed to forget the terror he felt when Ozpin had shown him a side he never thought existed. "Sssooo… When do we, uurp, bring him in?"
Ozpin sat back into his seat, resting his chin on his right hand. "Soon. First, we need to prepare for the Vytal Festival."
Qrow nodded, before stumbling into the elevator, leaving the aged man alone. The sun was setting, turning the sky into reds, oranges, and pinks. Now, more than ever, everything must go smoothly.
The mechanical skull watched the headmaster, its mechanical eyes quietly clicking and whirring, before crawling down the ventilation shaft and out the tower, then retracting it's metal tendrils and soaring into the stratosphere.
A large, marine sized figure watched the servo skull's progress on it's return trip. His deep black and red robes concealed many wiggling mechadendrites and sanitized mechanical components. The being chuckled, his raspy and mechanical voice echoing throughout the extended R&D labs of the ship.
"Ahh, Ozpin, you do not even know how outplayed you are in this game of Regicide!" He continued to chuckle, before turning to the elongated azure and gunmetal rifle, glowing with ancient and baleful energy.
"Richard's new toy is almost ready, isn't that right Nietzsche?" A mechanized ferret purred estatically, curling itself around the techpreist's neck. The figure then turned to the brutalised corpse of a faunus dressed in black and white, his mechadendrites beginning the dissection, the whirring of sawblades and vibro scalpels echoing throughout the Gloriana-Class Vessel known as The Void's Gambit.
HAHAHAHAHA I FINALLY UPDATED THIS SERIES AFTER LIKE SEVEN MONTHS!
Sigh… Damn. Sorry for holding you guys up, I've been busy living in Wyoming, also known as the world's loading chunk error. Anyways… I'm sorry to say you'll be waiting for longer for chapter 11, and I haven't even gotten a good idea of what to do next. Oh well!
More and more characters are being introduced, and Ozpin's having trouble keeping up with the amount of enemies he's discovering. We'll see how that affects things in the future.
Thanks a bunch to those who were patient (or not!) for the latest chapter!
The Emperor Protects,
Lord Inquisitor Richard