Author's Headnote: Surprised there's no comments on the last chapter, well... to each their own. This is going to be the last chapter for the Volume 4 segment purely because I can't come up with anything else for this segment.
RWBY: Festival of Blood: Taking a Shortcut
Ruby Rose/Roxy Tudor:
- Aura Status: 58%
- Thirst: Very Thirsty
- Semblance: Parasitic Petal Burst
- Weapons: Ruthless Thorn (Formerly known as Crescent Rose and Heartless Rose, she's trying to come up with convincing a convincing cover name), Slice of Life, Penny
- Licensing: None, Illegal Huntress
- Party Relations:
- Raven Branwen: Gonna keep an eye on her...
End of main character status report
Mistral Wilderness, March 27, Tuesday, 12:04 AM, Mistral Hills
Unlike the forests, hills have open view, but they are quite tiresome to climb, hence why Ruby and Raven are in various bird modes. Ruby tries not to use her semblance and keep pace... there's also the factor that she's getting very thirsty. She's going to have to stop and find a white fang mook to drink from.
Unfortunately, there's not a single white fang mook in sight. Looks like she's going to have to power through and fight the beast until she finds a morally acceptable target to feed on. She's not gonna ask Raven because she's half-vampire.
No less... flying to Mistral, seems like a faster way to get there. That is... until Ruby stopped paying attention and rammed herself into a mountain. Causing her to break concentration and started falling. In which she started flapping her wings out of fear... which ended up stopping her fall. Raven just landed down and turned into her human mode. Ruby just casually landed on her shoulder.
"You know, you could just walk as a human." Raven scolded.
Ruby nodded.
"So, why are't you?" Raven asked.
Ruby cried a bird noise. Whatever it is nevermores sound like.
"Oh, I get it... Polly want a cracker?" Raven mocked.
Ruby responded by pecking her neck, in which Raven grabbed Ruby and began to squeeze her.
"Look, I'm told I have a short temper. And you know what it's like to be around women with short tempers. So, cut the bullcrap and start walking like a human and not rest on my shoulder you lazy fuck." Raven threatened. "Your current form is fragile and delicate, and I know your aura hasn't recovered because you didn't drink any blood. So I can just make you pop right now."
Ruby moved her wings towards Raven's hands and toggled into her human form. "At least show some sympathy, I crashed into a mountain!" Ruby retorted.
"And you're a vampire, a crash into a mountain's not gonna do much." Raven retorted.
"Still, it hurts."
"Quit complaining. You drink away the damage from the next peasant we find."
"Peasant?"
"You're a vampire. Don't tell me you're picky with who you drink from..."
"I much prefer to drink from criminals and bad people."
"Of course, I would have figured."
"What?"
"Look, let me tell you this. Drop the optimism. It won't get you far."
"What do you mean?"
"You're a vampire. You need blood. Why would you care about them, if they don't care about the cows that they butcher and milk?"
"Because I don't kill."
"What about Cinder?"
"I'm... not proud of it."
"I can tell. It's why you're here with me, the amoral bounty hunter and not with the huntsmen and your so-called friends."
"They still are my friends."
"You sure?"
"Ya..."
"Are really sure?"
"Uhh... ya.."
"Chances are, they think you're dead. How about you just move on, like they will."
"No. I won't. Even when I have to do this double life mercenary thing, I'm still going to try and do the right thing."
"Persistent, are ya?"
"Yep... otherwise... I would have ended up dying in that cave."
"Just shut up and drink the first mortal you see. If you go Feral, I will kill you." Raven threatened.
Ruby gulped... but she had a point. Maybe she should be more pragmatic in her thinking... think about the long term. If it means less people die... she'd have to bring harm onto others... even if it means to ensure they live in the long run.
No less... Ruby switched back into bird mode, and began to scout for someone to drink. In which she finds wandering members of the Yakuza. Thankfully, she didn't have to give in to pragmatism just yet. Since she changed back into person mode, and began to strike a non-lethal ariel blow from the top. She made sure it's non-lethal by toggling to human form at the right distance, if she was too close, it wouldn't knock them out, if it was too far, she would have killed them due to the laws of physics.
But no less... she managed to grab a hold of the yakuza mook and drank their blood. The feeling of not being thirsty is a good one, she then takes some blood to fill her flask. Guess she'll have to embrace pragmatic heroism later. Determined optimism wins again. Living is not easy. Afterwards, she continued to head to Mistral. No doubt Raven went ahead without her.
Character Change: Ruby Rose - Jaune Arc
Mistral Wilderness, March 27, Tuesday, 9:00 AM, Mountains
Long story short, the van ran out of gas. Yang's elbow has regrown to the point where bending it is not much of a problem. So, that means heading to Mistral on foot.
They're at the mountains, past the hills. They also long past a village called: 'Kuroyuri' which Ren and Nora were very touchy about for some reason. Guess they won't know why. No less, heading to Mistral on foot's going to be a long and perilous journey. Which starts with various complaints. And various means a lot.
"Are we there yet?" Nora complained.
"That question is pointless." Jaune responded.
"But we're taking sooo long." Neptune complained.
"Then we should have taken the boat to the nearest port to Mistral."
"You're taking this quite well." Violet commented.
"I've spent months in the same dorm as Nora." Jaune replied.
"I would have figured."
"We're supposed to be huntsmen, if we're complaining that our legs hurt during a long walk, then we shouldn't have pursued this path."
There were groans from everyone save from Jaune, Ren, and Violet.
Other than that, it was daytime. So, no vampire raids or Yakuza grimm attacks. They just have to be careful of the conventional stuff. Bandits, criminals, grimm. All that normal stuff. They have to limit their sleeping time to get to Mistral at key time. And no doubt there's no cars coming this way. Jaune is annoyed, but he knows this is the truth that he has to deal with.
Still, he wonders what Weiss is up to... likely still in a comatose. He feels bad about leaving her behind, not that he had much of a choice, it was either bring along an unconscious body without treatment or let her heal on her own. She'll understand the decision Jaune made in time... after she wakes up.
Weiss aside... he has a journey to attend. No doubt Qrow has already beat them there. If only there was some sort of shortcut... Jaune looks down, and sees an array of train tracks... no, that's too stupid, catching a train-mid travel? That's suicide.
Jaune has to come up with a way to get to Mistral, fast... because no doubt these mountain ranges, and the roads between them aren't going to be reliable way to get to Mistral in record time. It's best to arrive before whatever it is planned for that place.
Hmmm...
"Jaune, are you thinking of a plan?" Sun asked.
"He's thinking, alright." Ren commented.
"Does it involve getting on the train?" Nora asked. "I think I got an idea."
"Oh boy..."
"We find a goliath and place it on the tracks. I can get it to stay on the tracks, and we can break on the train whilst killing the goliath at the right time. And then hop on the said train. And boom! Free ticket to Mistral!"
"What if the train is going the wrong way?" Neptune asked.
"Then the next one won't." Nora replied.
"Jaune?" Violet asked.
"It's worth a shot..." Jaune retorted.
"We're gonna die." Scarlet retorted.
"Wait... what about Yang?" Sun asked.
"Ya... what about me? Pretty sure I can't go jumping on trains given this." Yang said, lifting her thinning stump.
"Atleast you have an elbow now..." Jaune said... trying to lighten the mood.
"Don't worry, you'll be fine, Yang. Just land on your feet." Nora said, likely being ignorant.
Jaune sighed. And listened to Nora's plan outright.
Mistral Wilderness, March 27, Tuesday, 3:40 PM, Mountainous Train Route
After scaling down to the train tracks... they're about to do something that's incredibly illegal. There seems to be two sets of tracks... in a short distance of 20 feet between one another. Guess the train would be coming from a port-town or something. Not from Argus, Jaune knows... these tracks are coming from south of Mistral, and Argus is up north. No less, there's a plan to get to the capital city of the kingdom.
The entire crew went and gathered at the train tracks. And went to intercept it. Nora managed to get the goliath to stand on the tracks. So, they're on the goliath, not the tracks nor next to the tracks.
The land's mostly a dark grey or brown. With mountains surrounding it. Which, is obvious because they are in the mountainy part of land, that is full of mountains. As for the tracks, they are visible, since there isn't much to cover it up. Sun and Neptune are holding Yang just in case she messes up and scratches her healing arm.
After waiting a couple of hours... the train had finally arrived. At the right moment the bunch of them had jumped onto the train. And had killed the goliath after it was slowly dying from Jaune's blade stabbing it in a precise location which Violet points out would paralyze the goliath if it had been damaged there.
Mistral Train, March 27, Tuesday, 5:40 PM, Exterior
A red and black train. Modern and passenger model. Designed to transport a wide array of civilians. And they are on the outside of it... thankfully, there's no grimm. All they have to do is sneak onto the train without anyone noticing that they're trespassing. Which is a bit harder. That means, they need to head into the back. Jaune and the group start running towards the back of the train, keep running and jumping and stuff.
However, it seems their efforts are mistaken for a grimm attack, as per the obvious goliath in front of the train. They've locked down the train and activated turrets. That, and that they could be taken for raiders or bandits being outside of the line of sight of the driver when they plan on getting on the train.
Which means, that they're gonna have to deal with the automated defense. They consist of gun-turrets. Though, designed to deal with grimm, not huntsmen. The turrets started to open fire on Jaune and his friends. In which Jaune uses his shield to block the gunfire. In which he still feels the backlash from his arm. Which hurts a lot. He slowly approaches the turret and takes all of the attention from it as the rest of the party run past him and the turret. Eventually, he got in front of the turret and stabbed the front of the gun, causing it to explode. He eventually jumped to the next car... only to find that Ren and Sun managed to take out the rest of the guns for Jaune.
No less... he managed to jump to the next car. They're trying to get to the very back car. Where most of the cargo would be. And like re-capped, that's where Jaune will be going. He's managed to jump down to the porch of the final car. Hopefully they've managed to sneak by before the guards manage to investigate what's going on.
The rest of the party is there, they were waiting for Jaune to show up.
"Okay... now we just have to open up the metal sheet." Nora stated.
"Neptune, shock Nora." Jaune stated.
"What? No!" Neptune objected.
"Don't worry, she won't hurt you. She just needs to get strong enough to lift open the metal sheet blocking the door to open."
"It's not that, it's that we're all clustered together. All of us would get shocked."
"Oh."
Then all of the sudden, the metal sheets lifted up on their own. The party then entered the car.
Mistral Train, March 27, Tuesday, 5:47 PM, Caboose Car
Like, Mentioned. This contains mostly cargo. It's mostly dark with little light, and Sun is the only faunas here. However, it appears that even then there's nothing here that's interesting. May as well ask him where to hide for the time being.
"Hey, Sun? Can you lead us to somewhere to have us hide?" Jaune asked.
"Okay, su-" Sun said, before getting interrupted.
"You guys really are stupid, aren't ya?" Qrow interrupted, appearing out of nowhere.
"GAH!" Everyone else screamed.
"Shut your mouths." Qrow retorted.
"It was Nora's Idea." Jaune excused.
"That's not an excuse, and Violet... disappointed in ya."
"I'm not defending anything. Though, I should have considered finding more fuel dust before heading out." Violet stated.
"Ya, ya, hindsight's 20-20. Point is. You were reckless, you could have easily gotten people in danger and caused this whole train of people to die." Qrow stated. "And I'll be keeping an eye on you to make sure you don't pull a stunt like that again, just be lucky you weren't caught." He added, holding the controls in hand.
"How did you?" Jaune asked.
"I know my way." Qrow stated. "Now if you excuse me, I'm needed in a different car." He added, leaving the train.
Now, Sun managed to escort everyone to parts of the caboose where they can be kept hidden in case anyone would be searching for them. They were all hiding behind some non-precious, and heavy cargo. That was conveniently placed for them to move and hide under them.
Now they have to wait for the train to stop. The downside is... Jaune has motion sickness. And which means he's not gonna last quite long on this train until he vomits. No less, the path to Mistral is secure, and they'll be on their way quite soon. All and all, it's a good victory for Jaune.
Character Change: Jaune Arc - Ruby Rose
Mistral Wilderness, March 27, Tuesday, 10:00 PM, Mistral Hills
Ruby and Raven had to stop at some nearby cave. Near an abandoned town... named Kuroyuri. It was abandoned for sure... though, why it was abandoned. It appears to be from a grimm attack.
And it appears they're about to meet the grimm responsible. A Nuckaleeve, an older one. Much older than 'Dave'. And she has to fight it by herself. Given that Raven's quite useless in a fight without a weapon, unlike her biological daughter.
They're around the cave that Ruby slept in during the daytime, she made sure it wasn't anywhere near the sun's rays would touch. And now they're outside of the cave, with Raven having to sit back and watch Ruby trying to fight an old grimm by herself.
The Nuckaleeve made the first attack with its stretchy limbs, however. Ruby grabbed her scythe and sliced the limbs, which immediately grew back. In which the Nuckaleeve started to charge at Ruby. What's weird about this situation is that a wild grimm is attacking her, despite being a vampire, but apon looking closer, she notices the Nuckaleeve has purple eyes. Which means it's a vampire-made grimm.
She had tried to go under, however. Those legs are quite persistent in keeping Ruby held back. And no doubt those arms are gonna intercept her if she tries to attack from above. Thankfully, she has an alternative. due to her holoblades conjured from her friend's AI core, Penny. In life and death, Penny's been nothing but good to Ruby. And it's time to get her to use. She conjured up a holoblade, and waited for the Nuckaleeve to attack, in which she dodged and used the holoblade to stab and trap the arm there.
She then got Crescent Rose (or Ruthless Thorn depending on if she's near others) and started to run alongside the arm and reached to the base where it's connected, and then sliced it off. It did not grow back. Which leaves for the other arm, speaking of... the other arm started to reach for Ruby, in which she parried with Crescent Rose and then proceeded to hop towards the arm and latch onto it, and dismember it at the base. The nuckaleeve then started charging at Ruby, she turned off Penny for now... and then dived under the Nuckaleeve with her scycthe, sliding through it whilst sliding under it. The end result is the grimm sliced in half.
Ruby sighed. They'll just have to continue moving forward. They'll get to Mistral in time. And hopefully stop whatever plot is going at hand. She's determined to do the right thing, though she'll try to make sure the means are as good as the end. That, and she has to repair Raven's sword. No matter, it's a long journey ahead of Ruby... and she has all the time on the planet.
Author's Footnote: Sorry for lack of Quality, I'm suffering from some Writer's Block, and I may have to take a break from writing for now. Mostly because my interpretation for the future of this story has come to a blank here. However, this will not be abandoned, I will update it after this chapter. I'll just take a small break from this story to figure out what I want to write next.