Massive wooden doors towered the group as they took their heavy breaths. Everything that they were training for through the ruthless months of pain and suffering had to end today, given the sudden turn of events. It was either now or never as they all looked at each other, nodding in their silent agreement. With one swift action, the four warriors pushed through, breaking the locks with force.

There was a paladin, wielding his mace and shield. He entered first, covering for his allies while making a swift survey for any prepared traps of preemptive attacks. With nothing flying towards them immediately, the knight with his greatsword came in to support his comrade, if needed. Shortly after, the wizard with his customized staff and the rogue with his dual daggers followed through.

It was quiet within the castle, but it was very dark as well. The wizard was about to prepare a fire spell to help light their way to their objective, but flames began to light themselves up among the burnt torches, causing them to draw their sights all the way to the end of the chamber.

An evil ruler had sat on the throne, glaring at them with a smirk. Their enemy had been clear, but between the two parties had been an absurd number of his royal guards, but a young girl that stood next to the ruler had been the center of their attention. Her eyes had been the same colour as the man.

"She must be the princess!"

However, the king was already prepared, standing up from his throne and pointed straight towards the party of four. As if the room had echoed it, he made a boisterous command.

"Cursed heroes! Coming here was your biggest mistake! Do not think you will leave my domain with your lives intact! My loyal knights! Bring me their heads!"

The knights hesitated at nothing to draw their weapons.

However, the knights were wholly unprepared for the timing of their attack. The [Dramatic Entrance] that the four heroes had made allowed them to act beforehand.

["It's time to roll initiative."]

["Wait, how many were there?"]

["There's way too many to tell at a second's glance. By the time you finish counting even to half, you would already be dead."]

["Then what type of equipment do they have?"]

["As far as you can tell, they were all high-quality armour pieces and weapons. You can't see any of the specific details without wasting time."]

["Whatever, just pass me the dice!"]

["Where did our D20 go? Ah, here it is."]

["C'mon, give me something good! Hah! Natural 20!"]

["20, huh? Let's see what I get… Got 19. Not bad."]

["Only a 14 for me…"]

["And what did I get? Yikes. A 9. Anyways, the order is Motoyasu, Ren, Itsuki, then myself. Your move, Motoyasu."]

The knight took a step forward, grinning in the face of danger. As the enemies began to engage in battle, the knight was able to charge forwards, lighting up his sword in a brilliant flame. Looking towards the area where most of the guards had been spaced out the least, he aimed to cause as much havoc in the frontlines as quickly as possible.

"[Searing Blow]!" he shouted from the bottom of his lungs.

["Roll the D20 for accuracy."]

["Here I go!"]

["Hold on, what!? Another 20!?"]

["Well, pretty obvious that it's a clean hit on the selected area. Now, roll a D6 for the sword damage and D20 for the fire damage."]

[C'mon, give me something good…! It's a 5 and a 16! Hell yeah!"]

The knight leapt up into the air, and threw out his arms, sending a fiery wave into the horde. The ones who were in front tried to take the attack for their allies, raising their shields, but the attack struck the weak points of the shield, breaking it instantly and slicing them in half, separating legs and torso. With a snap of the knight's fingers, the attack exploded, damaging the ones behind them, as he landed gracefully back on the ground.

["Your attack, to be exact, managed to instantly kill the two in front. Also, you managed to splash the attack to the ones behind them, 15 damage a piece."]

["Now that's how it's done!"]

["Alright, Ren. It's your—"]

["I take my time from the back lines to count up all of the enemies in the room and inspect them more thoroughly."]

["Roll D20 for perception."]

["18."]

The rogue briefly glanced at the entire room, keeping a mental counter and passed over every opposing entity. With a small room of error, enough that he would have the ability to rationally make decisions off of that, he had counted 25 bodies which excluded the king, the girl, and the two guards that his ally had recently killed.

As for their equipment, the rogue quickly noticed that despite the fact that they were all made out of reinforced steel, none of the enemy guards had been wearing any enhanced gears. Most of them had swords, a small number of them having a sword made out of a stronger material. Three enemies had positioned themselves in the backline, preparing their crossbows in retaliation.

The rogue scoffed. "Is this really all they have? I expected much more than this."

["I use my illusion magic to make myself invisible, attempting to sneak up behind the king."]

["Okay. Roll a D—"]

["It's a success—rolled an 18."]

["... Alright then."]

The rogue muttered a spell underneath his breath and in the next moment, he disappeared in a gust of smoke. His allies smirked with the successful act, but the rogue realized that they would have to buy some time before he could reach his objective. In his invisibility, he uttered an array of choice words.

"Don't die in the meantime." His allies nodded, thinking to say the same thing towards the rogue.

All in the meantime, the king had still noticed the rogue's tricks. "W-Where did that man in the backline go!?" he shouted, unnerved. "Guards! Make sure he doesn't make it anywhere near me!"

["The distance is pretty far, so it'll take you more than one turn to reach him. Anyways, it's your turn now, Itsuki."]

The wizard knew that the allied knight was going to be an easy target after his opening strike. He raised his staff up high as electricity started to gather up with a bright blue light as its origin. Winds started to kick up around him as he focused his efforts on the direction of his spell—the group of guards that had their crossbows ready.

["I already rolled, Naofumi. Look, see? It's a 15 for the accuracy!"]

["Hmmph. You guys are getting really lucky with your rolls today, unlike the game we played a week ago."]

["Hey, I thought we agreed to not talk about that session."]

["Let's just hope this luck isn't being siphoned from somewhere."]

["Why the fuck would you jinx us like that, Motoyasu?"]

["Never mind that. Itsuki, roll a D20 for your lightning damage."]

["... It's a 9."]

["... Motoyasu?"]

["I didn't do anything!"]

Spinning the staff and guiding the lightning around him, he began his chanting for his spell. Chaining together his words in quick succession, there was a small screw-up in some of the words. Nevertheless, he aimed the staff towards his targets.

"[Lightning Bolt]!" His lightning emerged from the staff and ran right past the frontlines. As it brought itself nearby the backline, it made one more spark and created a small radius, containing the three crossbow-equipped guards. With the sound of a violent crash echoing throughout the throne room, the attack landed onto the guards.

However, despite it being a good hit, the guards were merely knocked down from the damage they took. They were still preparing their crossbows to fire their assault. The wizard cursed himself for messing up those words at the beginning as the full extent of his spell could have killed them instantly, but—

"You fool! Do you think a mere spell like that could hurt my knights!? Men, stand back up immediately and dispatch the—! W-What!? What's going on!?" The king flinched as he took notice of what had truly been going on. The affected enemies from the spell had been struggling to move from the wizard's passive [Shock] ability. The shots on the crossbows won't be firing, at least for now.

They were down for a limited time, but the wizard knew it was still fine if they could successfully seize this opportunity properly.

["In other words, [Shock] allows you to skip those three guards' turns. However, in terms of damage, you only got 18, 9, and 5 points of health off of them which isn't enough to kill them."]

["See? This is why I took the wizard class! [Shock] is stupidly strong!"]

[Alright, I guess it's my turn now. Given that most of the enemies are still alive, I guess we'll need to start defending after our good start. We don't want to lose this momentum, after all. And so, I'll use [Reinforce] on the three of us, Ren excluded since he's invisible right now and that should—Wait, where did the D20 go!? Hey, Motoyasu! Give it back! I haven't gone yet!"]

The paladin raised his shield, playing his positioning around the allied knight who had jumped forwards moments ago. As he ran over, the shield began to shine a somber yellow spark and soon, the radiance had spread over to the bodies of his comrades, hardening their defenses. Their resolve was remastered as every second became important, possibly being their last.

However, the king hadn't shown his hand yet, steadily becoming impatient at his loyal knights.

"What are you all standing around for, useless idiots!? Kill them already!"

["... And the enemy turn starts. Jeez, this is going to take some time."]

With a battle cry in unison, the remaining royal guards charged at the three warriors. Their weapons raised up high, wrath in their eyes, and killing intent was easily felt by their targets. Without any fear or doubt, the three heroes took their battle stances, and readied their own weapons, bracing for the clash that was about to occur.

The royal guard in front jumped at the knight with his sword held in both of his hands, but his attack had been stopped by the paladin who jumped forwards and parried it with his shield. He quickly followed with a counterattack with his mace, knocking the offender back.

However, there were still a lot more of them to take care of…

"... And we died. That really sucks."

A loud slam was made onto the table, knocking over the tabletop game materials and messing around some of the papers. His dirty blonde curls bounced up furiously as he glared profusely at the rolled set of dice in the middle of the table.

"Sucks!? No, this is bullshit! God, this was so stupid!"

The black-haired male had been staring at the recent turn of events blankly before he got a grip onto himself, releasing a great sigh into the room. His left shoulder dropped as the opposing arm went to bring his hand to his back of his head, scratching it in a mild annoyance.

"That was three fails in a row. Four if you count that extra perception check failure for the king's personal equipment. Those rolls were really important too…"

Opposing him had been a blonde male, draping his hair into a ponytail. He leaned back in his chair, stretching back. His red eyes leered over towards each of them, thinking about what he could have done instead in those situations, but he made a conclusion with one big yawn.

"Well, the plan was good. We only got hit with bad RNG really hard."

The dungeon master in the meantime had been scampering to recover the game pieces from the dirty-blonde player's sudden fit of frustration. The player had calmed down already, but he started to roam the room with his attitude in check. The dungeon master could only chuckle meekly in response, then turning to the player with the ponytail.

"Yeah, those dice rolls were really unlucky, Motoyasu. Wouldn't call it RNG though, since it's just real life luck."

"Naofumi, what does RNG stand for?" the black-haired player asked from the side.

"RNG? Well, random number generator."

"And what are you doing with the dice?"

"You're randomly rolling for a…" Naofumi's mind lit up as it came crashing down on his realization. "Oh crap, I guess it is RNG. Never really thought about it like that, Ren."

"You know, I'd like to finish a campaign without anyone dying for once," Ren groaned, tilting his chair back and placing his feet onto the table. If this had been the dining table, Naofumi would have completely gone off on the action, but since it was a table reserved exclusively for their tabletop sessions, Naofumi let it slide.

"That was still a fun session. We almost got close to the good ending," Naofumi added on, beginning to clean up the pieces and papers. "We can return back to the Melromarc Campaign in a few days once I'm finished finalizing the pieces for the endgame of the current arc."

"We're fighting against the Spirit Tortoise in that one now, right?" Motoyasu asked, hearing the familiar campaign. "Though, I feel like it's dragging on for way too long!"

"If you didn't convince us that launching a first attack onto the Spirit Tortoise was a good idea, we could have not wasted any time with escaping the mastermind's grasp! We shouldn't be striking first, ask questions later when our enemy is a giant fucking turtle and a mastermind who stole our life essence to strengthened said turtle!"

"Yep, it's your fault it's been dragging on for way too long."

"W-What!?"

"It was a really bad move. Thank the heavens that Naofumi busted us out and retreated with us before anything terrible happened."

As Naofumi tried to organize everything back to its place in a neat and orderly format through the back-and-forth conversation of his brothers, he felt his stomach rumble and shortly after, it grumbled a loud noise. A small blush strode across his face as he nervously chuckled.

"I-I guess all that junk food we were eating during the campaign wasn't enough." He casually glanced along the floor around their table which had been littered with bags of chips, napkins, empty glasses, and empty bottles of soda.

"When did we even make such a mess?"

Ren scoffed at Itsuki's question. "I wouldn't know. All I remember is playing the campaign."

"Either way," Naofumi continued, "we should probably have a proper meal for dinner. After we finish cleaning, I'll grab a few things from the fridge and cook us something to eat."

Ren rolled his feet off the table, standing back up. "Actually, we'll clean up. Just start cooking now. I'm feeling really hungry too. Though, you should probably look to make something simple."

"O-Oh, alright." Naofumi placed the pieces and papers back onto the table for Ren and the others to collect up. Itsuki came back to the table in a better mood and started to take Naofumi's place. As he left for the kitchen, Motoyasu started to get up and leave as well.

"Motoyasu, where do you think you're going?" Itsuki asked "Help us clean up. Are you trying to ditch?"

"Relax, relax!" Motoyasu smirked. "I'm only going to the washroom! I've been holding it in since we entered the Territory of the Fallen Ruler!"

"That was an hour ago!"

"So I was holding it in for an hour! Just chill! Look, I really need to go now!"

"F-Fine, just go already before you explode all over the room!"

Itsuki couldn't help but chuckle as Motoyasu waddled away from the living room and down the hall to their washroom. Seeing Motoyasu leave like a toddler made him reminisce over the times they were at the orphanage. It felt like it had been ages ago since they were spending their days without any knowledge for their futures, running through the shared halls and getting on the nerves of some of the caretakers.

It's been three years since Ozpin had adopted them, but the feeling of living inside of a proper home was still incredible to Itsuki. The fact that he could even retain the bonds with his friends—though, he should really refer to them as his adoptive brothers at this point—was a higher blessing than he could ever hope for.

That's why throughout their intensive training sessions with Ozpin, they always tried their hardest and constantly pushed themselves to their limits as a way to thank their adoptive father for taking them in with such great conditions. It wasn't as if they were doing it all for him either—they soon learned how to use their semblance through all its usage and technicalities. The strength they gained was something they could actually feel.

Though, they didn't exactly live with Ozpin. Instead, they were provided with an apartment that was within the heart of the Vale. Apparently, Ozpin didn't want them to be living on the school campus, but they were always allowed to sightsee and visit, given they don't make their semblances too obvious to the masses. Since they were coming to the age where they could enter Beacon Academy properly, the apartment only had a short time left in its use.

Itsuki believed that they would still be living in the same room on campus, but he wondered if they were allowed to get all of their things moved in, or at least, as much as they could bring over. Televisions, couches, the tabletop-designed table, their gaming consoles—all of which were gifts from Ozpin that they either accumulated from direct presents or bought using cash that Ozpin gave them.

If they were to be able to bring them over, it would really seem like they were having a special treatment over the other students, so Itsuki had second thoughts about porting everything over.

Though, if they didn't bring something, where else would it go?

"Hey! Stop spacing out!" Itsuki straightened his back with Ren's snapping fingers and loud voice. "You can't help me clean if you only stand there, looking at the papers! Do something to help, at least!"

"A-Ah! S-Sorry, Ren. I'll get to—"

"Ah, crap."

Ren and Itsuki looked over their shoulders, hearing the disdain in Naofumi's voice. Naofumi had been looking inside the fridge, but he closed it without taking a single thing out. He glanced over towards the pair.

"I can't even make anything simple. The fridge is literally empty. We must have forgotten to restock it today, so if you want me to make something, someone will have to bike down to the grocery store." Naofumi took a second to look at their clock, ticking between the living room and the kitchen. "Ah, it's really late already. Are any of the grocery stores nearby even still open?"

"I think FoodMart is still open," Itsuki answered. "Worse case scenario, someone will have to head down to that one nameless grocery store that's nearby that From Dust Till Dawn store. You know, that one?"

"That name still cracks me up," Naofumi smirked. "What a clever pun."

"Either way, that someone is going to be you, Itsuki," Ren followed up. "I think you were supposed to be on restock duty today."

"Wait, was I!?"

"Yeah," Naofumi nodded yet chuckling softly, "but I forgot to give you the list of things that we needed. I didn't even write it down—I was too focused on finishing the final details for this campaign. I can cook up a list right now since I know exactly what we'll need for the week."

Itsuki sighed as a reply. "Ugh, do I have to go this time?"

"If you don't want to go," Motoyasu's voice emerged from the hall, "then I can go!"

"Why the hell do you want to go?"

"Beats staying here and cleaning up."

Itsuki froze, narrowing his eyes onto the man. "Now that you said it, I kinda want to go."

"W-What!?" Motoyasu stomped his foot. "You can't just do that! You said you didn't want to go and I offered, so I should be going instead!"

"W-Well, it's still technically my turn!"

Naofumi sighed from the kitchen, scribing words onto a small piece of paper. After finishing a word with a dot, he looked out and stopped the pointless argument before it would escalate anymore. Hearing anymore of the bickering probably would have driven him insane.

"Look, just go together, alright?"

Ren widened his eyes. "Wait, no! Bullshit! Who the hell will help me clean up this mess!?"

"Don't worry, Ren. I'll help you out." Putting away the pen, Naofumi walked back to the living room and extended his hand to give Motoyasu the paper. "I can't really cook if I don't have any ingredients to cook with. Might as well do something else while I'm waiting."

"Ugh, fine." Ren carried on as usual.

"Alright, it's settled then! Let's grab our bikes and head them quickly!"

Motoyasu dashed towards the front door, grabbing the keys on his way out, leaving Itsuki raising his eyebrows in utter confusion. Naofumi was just as surprised, but Motoyasu did always seem to pull off the impossible sometimes.

Naofumi's hand was still extended, not knowing as to why Motoyasu never took the list from him. There was a heavy sigh from Itsuki, shaking his head. He was glad that Motoyasu hadn't been his brother by genetics, to some degree. Of course, it was great when Itsuki wanted to be somewhat amused.

"... I'll take the list for him, Naofumi. He'll realize it in a bit."

"Yeah. Thanks, Itsuki."

"Shit, I didn't realize it was already this late."

The shattered moon had already been lit in the night sky as Motoyasu and Itsuki were biking down the streets. With a slow rhythm through their legs, they kept petaling, further down than what they originally expected. Through the familiar lights being drafted by the lampposts, arrayed down the streets every so often, the roads had been quite empty. Not even the vehicles had been driving down these streets as people were probably off to the comfort of their homes during this time.

"FoodMart really was closed, wasn't it?"

"At this time, I would be really surprised if they weren't. At least, that one grocery store near From Dust Till Dawn should still be open around this time. All we realistically need is about half an hour to get all the things that Naofumi needs."

"It closes at midnight, right? We have plenty of time left!"

"I suppose so."

As they kept up their pace, they eventually came up near the store they had been using for their point of reference. From what Itsuki remembered, there weren't any bike racks near that grocery store, so they needed to lock up their bikes with the public one provided to the people. They were positioned right in front of the aforementioned store. Pulling out their chains, Motoyasu locked up the bikes, but as he did, he widened his eyes.

"Damn it!" Motoyasu stood back up quickly, growling at himself. "I forgot to pick up the list Naofumi was handing me, didn't I!?"

"Keep it down, Motoyasu. Shouting loudly in the streets is a good way to get into trouble." Itsuki sighed, but he reached inside his pocket to pull out the forgotten paper. "And don't worry, Naofumi handed it off to me. We can buy it without guessing now."

"What a save, Itsuki!" Motoyasu grinned, returning to finish up locking their bikes. "I can't believe I overlook the simplest things sometimes!"

Itsuki started to walk away from the From Dust Till Dawn store, opening up the list and reading them aloud to get the words into his head. He more-or-less knew where the majority of the items were if they were the things that Naofumi usually requested on a weekly basis.

"Let's see… Eggs, milk, butter, potatoes…"

"You know, we always pass by this store everytime we go to this specific grocery store," Motoyasu said, catching up quickly, "but do you think that Father ever buys the dust he provides to us from there?"

"He probably has his own personal supplier, given he's the headmaster of Beacon Academy. I wouldn't be surprised if it's some company that we've never even heard about before."

"Still though, that name is pretty amusing!"

Itsuki groaned as they came closer to the block's end. "It's just a really bad pun in the end. To think that someone would commit to such a pun so much that they make it into a store's name."

"Naofumi is still right! That name is really amusing!"

Itsuki stopped, rolling his eyes over to Motoyasu behind him. "Here's the thing. Naofumi's naming convention is really bad. Him liking a name really doesn't mean much."

"But I like the name. At least it's not FoodMart." Motoyasu pouted, just saying the name. "Like, who the actual hell decided that giving the name FoodMart was okay?

Itsuki shrugged. "It gets the job done, being a market for food items. Not a big fan of the name either, but whatever. Anyways, let's just go buy these groceries and get back home. I'm starving myself too and after a campaign like that one, I think a meal is well deserv—"

The sound of glass shattering fell into their ears, originating from directly behind them.

Motoyasu and Itsuki froze in their place, sharing a quick glance to one another to make sure that they both heard the same thing.

"... You heard that. Right, Itsuki?"

"... Yeah, I did."

The noise wasn't small like accidentally knocking over a glass cup from the table. It was loud enough to have attracted attention among the streets, but from what they noticed, they were pretty much the only people here. However, as that stood, the breaking glass certainly pulled their own attention from where they came from.

A man dressed in a suit had been laying on the streets in front of the broken display window of From Dust Till Dawn store. It didn't take a genius to understand that he was thrown right out of it and if not, groaning from the man had been enough to convince anyone.

However, there was a quick follow-up from the scene. Out from the window, a small figure leapt outside and over the man, gaining a far distance between the shattered window and herself. She had a black dress, matching her short black hair—only divided by the red cloak she had been wearing, long enough to be waving in the subtle breeze.

Of course, someone like that had already been easy to pick out from a crowd, but what sealed her uniqueness had been the weapon she had in her hands. It was a giant scythe that she supported using her shoulder as she looked into the broken window with a smirk. She twirled it around her body before slamming its sharp end into the ground.

"... Okay. What the hell did we just stumble upon?"

"Hey," Motoyasu nudged Itsuki on the arm, "what do you think is going on? This probably isn't some type of acting, right?"

"I'm guessing not, or else this area would have been closed off…"

Motoyasu continued to stare, not being able to break his sight away. "Should we be doing something here?"

"I'm not…" Itsuki took a moment to scan the area around them once again and as he expected, it seemed like they were the only present spectators. "I'm honestly not too sure."

As Motoyasu and him conversed with each other, he started to notice a few other men in similar black suits as the one lying between them and the girl. They were peeking out from the window and as if there was some sort of command to act, the men had moved out and exited through the front door, running towards the girl with machetes in their hands.

Itsuki wanted to move, but the action started happening without their consent. As the men approached the girl, she started to move with her scythe like an expert, kicking away the first man and transitioning that into an attack for the second. She hesitated at nothing to strike the third with her scythe as she started dashing around, almost as if she had been blinking from one place to another.

Needless to say, the girl was pretty much kicking their asses and handing it back to them on a silver plate. However, there had been an odd assortment of petals that kept showing up as she dashed from one place to another.

'Maybe that has to do something with her semblance?'

Itsuki glanced over as Motoyasu's hands started to form a red light between the palms. A physical shape was starting to take form, until Itsuki had interrupted Motoyasu's channelling.

"Motoyasu, stop! Father said that we shouldn't be using our semblances randomly like this!"

His muscles relaxed as the red light died down. However, he replaced the aura with a red flame.

"We should do something, at the very least! If I can't use my spear here, my flames will work just as well!"

"W-Wait! We don't even know who we should fight alongside with yet!"

"Isn't it obvious?" Motoyasu asked with a smirk.

Itsuki had a feeling as to what he was going to answer with and he really didn't want it to be true.

"... Is it the gi—?"

Motoyasu ignited his fists in a flame, punching them together in a battle mentality preparation.

"It's the girl!"

Itsuki dropped his face, falling flat into his held hands. "God, you're retarded. Look, I'm just saying that we shouldn't just act on a whim here! We need to figure out who the villains are in this problem and if it's just an escalated dispute, we should look to break up the fight! It seems about right at this time of the day!"

However, there were a few more men that started to walk out from the store. Most of them were in the same uniform, but there was one in the center that had been holding a cane despite how young he looked. In contrast, his outfit has been a sleek white suit, topped off with a black bowler hat and an orange bang that covered his right eye. He had been smoking a cigar as the rest of the men stood right by him until he threw it on the ground, taking out the end with his cane.

"... You know, those guys really look like the stereotypical mafia that I've been hearing stories about. Are you sure we shouldn't just jump in and help the girl?"

"Maybe we're misunderstanding something. Surely, real mafia would be more effective at dealing with one young girl than this."

There was a small conversation between the orange-haired man and the girl, but it seemed to be more one-sided with the man speaking his thoughts and the girl silently listening. After holding his cane down for a few seconds, he immediately pointed it towards where the girl was, blasting the ground below her as she deftly jumped out of the way and leaving a pothole. There had been more than one shot though, as he began to repeatedly fire the cane at her—

—until she dodged in a certain direction.

"... Wait, Motoyasu. Those are our bikes in the crossfire, right?"

"... Yes. Yes, they are… "

The orange-haired man fired once more without hesitation, annihilating everything that had been in the close distance, which included their bikes, as the girl leapt away. Itsuki could only see the charred remains and broken pieces of their bikes once the smoke had cleared out from the area.

"..."

"..."

The HUD that came with their semblances had a lot more features than they originally expected. For example, one of its many useful functions had been the inventory. It currently held a maximum total of 25 slots with each slot being able to stack up to 99 pieces if the items were the same. For Itsuki, he really only had leeway for 24 slots as one of his slots had been allocated to a maxed stack of rocks he kept for emergencies.

Itsuki summoned 20 of those rocks and used his semblance to keep them afloat, all with emptiness in his eyes. He took a steady and silent deep breath with a new resolve lit up inside of him.

"Motoyasu, you know how I said we should wait because we don't know who to fight with? Yeah, that's not the case anymore. It's time for justice to intervene."

"Now we're talking!"

"Well, you're certainly an interesting one."

The orange-haired man chuckled as he pulled back his cane. However, throughout the midst of the girl's dodging, one of the black-suited men had provided their apparent leader with a briefcase, possibly containing the dust they've stolen. However, the sounds of sirens had been echoing in the distance, signaling the man that their time was of the essence.

"Listen up, little Red. I'm not a big fan of wasting much time, since I am a very busy person. I'm sure you would have much to say, but I'm afraid I have to cut our meeting here. We can reschedule this whenever it's more convenient for me, but for now—"

The leader blasted his cane, not at the girl this time around, but towards the ground in between them. It threw off the girl slightly, but another shot rapidly followed up. She instinctively slashed the shot to intercept the attack, causing a great smoke cloud to cover her senses. She spun around quickly to clear up the visual debris only to see that she had been surrounded by the men in black suits.

Their leader was nowhere to be seen until she noticed him climbing up one of the ladders along a nearby building. The girl glanced around, watching her opponents as they slowly circled around her, guns and machetes waiting to take her down despite her young age. It wasn't as if she was starting to have problems, but she was merely waiting to see how they would strike. She herself knew she was much better in the heat of the moment rather than pre-planning everything and executing it, but before any of them could take their shot—

"[Buster Flame]!"

—one more person had entered the fray, colliding his fiery fist into the face of one of the men. The punch drilled itself into the man's head, immediately exploding into a small burst of fire before the body was sent bouncing all the way down the streets. The man, noticeable from his blonde ponytail, landed on his feet and gave everyone else a smirk.

The girl was just as surprised as the remaining men until the newcomer stood with his back straightened, pointing towards the girl herself.

"I don't get what's going on here, but—"

Before the newcomer had the opportunity to finish his line, one of the black-suited enemies had pulled out their guns, aiming the sights down on him. The girl, realizing that this mysterious man hadn't been with them, had almost dashed in to stop the trigger from going off.

However, rocks suddenly began to pummel the man from the side with enough force to make him stagger, dropping the gun from his hand and holding it down through the pain. Everyone, except the newcomer, looked over to see one more person, one with curly hair, walking down the streets with more rocks floating around him.

"—let us join in, o' fair maiden, and we'll help you fend off against these villains!"

The girl rested her scythe back on her shoulder as Motoyasu and Itsuki came closer to the scene, gaining the attention of their perceived enemies. She ruffled her short hair from the back, nervously chuckling through a pitched voice.

"Uhm, I think I had the situation under control. It's just a robbery. No offense or anything—I really do appreciate the help."

Itsuki slowly crept up, retaining his aim on the enemies and yet, sighing once he realized that Motoyasu chose to enter the battle with those specific words. "Just ignore him. Anyways, it seems like their leader started to escape. We'll take things from here, so go after him."

"Oh, that's a good idea! I guess I should thank you two for the help!"

The girl spun her scythe around and started running after the orange-haired man. There was an attempt for the black-suited men to fire their weapons at her, but Itsuki immediately stopped them, shooting out some of his rocks to disarm their guns or distract them away from the girl.

"Sorry, but your opponent is us now."

However, Motoyasu looked over where the girl was, as she transformed her scythe into a rifle, shooting behind her and using the recoil to launch herself onto the roof quickly. Landing with precision, she began a sprint out of their perspective.

"Huh," Motoyasu mumbled. "The resemblance of that weapon is uncanny like I thought and he did say that he had two nieces. Is it possible that she's..."

"Motoyasu, what are you mumbling to yourself about? Not being sour that I sent her off to prevent you from hitting on her, right? She looks pretty young, so I wouldn't try it if I were you." Itsuki nudged his brother in the arm, beckoning him to prepare for combat. Motoyasu fell back to his usual smile as Itsuki (probably) joked around with his words. "Anyways, get ready. The fight's starting."

"Oh, right."

Motoyasu snapped out of his subtle trance and ignited his fist on fire, dropping to a combat posture that Ozpin had taught him. Keep the fists spaced out with one in front of the other, control them with his chest in mind, keep knees slightly bent and feet always moving—Motoyasu glanced over towards their opponents, keeping the most important rule of watching his enemies in mind.

With my opening move, I was able to take out a single guy and the girl herself took down four. The number of enemies that persisted is about eight, but the number that Itsuki struck is half of that. Their hands are slightly weakened, but they aren't out yet.

Their equipment doesn't look too good either—looks like it's literally only the suit and weapons, considering how easy it was for the girl to take them down. As for weapons, machetes and pistols as it seems. We can easily deal with that and it doesn't look like they have anything big with them either.

Hmmph. How's that for your perception skill check, Ren?

"I'll take on the frontline! You disable the backline for me, Itsuki, and I'll make my way through!"

"Of course! Don't need to tell me twice!"

Two of the black-suited men ran forwards with their blades, slashing down on both of them. They jumped to opposite sides, but Motoyasu rebounded his evasion, jumping immediately into the right man and striking him with a heavy hook in the side. The body flew into his comrade, collapsing both of them down for now. Itsuki was forced to make an extra jump outwards, but his attention had still been locked on the instructed targets.

Before they even took out their pistols, Itsuki shot them with his rocks at a wide angle. Some of them were able to react, slashing the pebbles with their weapons, but others weren't fortunate, dropping from the attack.

A total of four enemies were still standing from Itsuki's spread shot and Motoyasu wasted no opportunity as they were dazed. However, one of the men he took down had still been conscious and raised his pistol towards Motoyasu's back.

"Nope, sorry. You rolled a 1."

Itsuki stepped onto the man's wrist, forcing him to drop the weapon. He could have even sworn on hearing the cracking of a bone, but it wasn't his fault that they decided to cause some chaos within the public domain.

"Let's make sure you stay down," Itsuki said, bringing some extra rocks out from his inventory and dropping them into the man's forehead at a fast-falling speed. He immediately fell unconscious with a red bump showing up as Itsuki glanced upwards to see how Motoyasu was doing.

They tried to stop the flaming assault, but Motoyasu had been too quick. He was striking them in vital areas as Ozpin had thought him, moving back and forth between enemies to keep them at bay until someone dropped. The slashes that they threw out were much too slow in comparison to Motoyasu's agility, ducking underneath and counterattacking all within the motion.

Two of the attempting men tried to flank Motoyasu from both sides, but Motoyasu reacted just the same. Both arms were thrown out as the men came close and he touched their chests before they could begin their swings. A small flame lit itself and exploded between them, blasting both of them into the wall and into a trash can.

Motoyasu converged the explosion into the center of his chest, holding both flames in front. The two remaining men had been directly in front of him from their attempts to follow up their comrades, but they knew what was about to come. They could only react with their voices, but their bodies wouldn't budge in time.

Motoyasu made a smug expression.

"Eat this! [Hellfire II]!"

A beam of fire exploded from his combining hands and was sent flying towards the two enemies. Usually, his normal Hellfire spells would consume everything it came across, but this adaption of the spell made an explosion upon the first thing it touched, meaning—

—the men tried to block the attack, a fruitless endeavor, as the flames reached them, sending them flying down further than ever before. The street was pretty long, but their bodies were still able to slide up right to the end.

Motoyasu looked around, seeing that everyone had been dealt with. He dusted off his hands and rolled his shoulders before he started to run towards the aforementioned ladder.

"W-Wait, Motoyasu! Where are you going!?"

"Huh? What does it look like? I'm going to see if that girl needs our help or not!" Motoyasu spun around, keeping his velocity constant. "We're finished up here, so we might as well give our support!"

Motoyasu had already been climbing the ladder, as Itsuki groaned behind him. Clicking his tongue and surveying the damaged surroundings alongside the unconscious bodies, he decided to follow suit.

"Damn it, Motoyasu! Wait up!"

The impact between the leader and the girl sent both parties backwards, and yet, still standing. The girl had to admit that for someone that probably hasn't used their semblance yet, he was doing a good job without it—more so that his goons who all were taken down rather easily. Her slashes were proficiently parried by his cane whenever he could and those that could not were evaded, almost with ease. Not to mention that he was doing this all with the briefcase of stolen goods in his other hand.

However, it wasn't as if he was giving back a good offensive. With the girl's sheer speed, it was rather difficult for the man to escape his defensive shell. Even the space that they just made could be closed easily with the girl's semblance, and the man knew that, ever keeping up his guard against her.

However, he kept looking at his watch. Once he saw what he liked, he took up a posture as if he was a real gentleman and started backing off. The girl didn't think much about it, but she realized that they were still on a roof. Behind the man had been a long fall to the concrete streets.

"Hmm." The man shook his head, sighing longingly. "You're such a persistent person, little Red. I'd say that it's a good trait of yours, but you should really know to not stick your nose into other people's business. Oh, and by the way—"

Suddenly, an aircraft vehicle had risen up from the streets, hovering just behind the man and opened up its hatch for his escape. He made a small snap of his fingers as he turned around. The girl flinched and had been prepared to run right over to stop his departure, but she caught a glowing spark before her feet.

"—it's the end of the line, little Red!"

A red dust gem!? When did he drop it!?

An explosion roared on the rooftops, covering the entire girl in smoke.

The man promptly retreated into the aircraft, chuckling as the vehicle started to rise into the skies. He took the last moment from the open hatch to see his handiwork. He had a smug grin to his expression, but it was soon wiped out the moment in which the smoke cleared away.

Instead of an injured girl that took the full extent of the attack, a blond man with a ponytail had blocked it. In his hand had been a spear with a reddened blade, with edges in shapes of flames. From the way he defended against the attack, there should have been some levels of damage on the man, but there wasn't even a scratch.

"What the hell?"

[Spear Equipped]

[Fire Dust Spear]
- increased fire resistance (medium)
- increased explosion resistance (low)
- deals additional fire damage (medium)

"Damn, it still stings, but at least I got here in time. If Naofumi was here, he could have taken this attack with no problem. Still though, Father would be so disappointed with the way I handled that attack..."

Motoyasu shook off the attack and held his spear readily towards the retreating leader. He wasn't intending to infringe on Itsuki's warning, but sometimes, things just happen and his instincts start to move out of anyone's presetted rules. Though, he never really understood the logic that Ozpin told them to restrict usage of their true semblances as much as possible. He also mentioned that it was so rare that people didn't even know what they were.

To the average person, Motoyasu's weapon of choice had been a spear, just as the girl's was a scythe-rifle hybrid. No one would have to bat an eye simply because of his weapon and he was intending on using it to its full potential now that he had it out.

However, the man, who had been clicking his tongue, had already reached a tall enough height where Motoyasu couldn't reach him with ease. It wasn't something that a mere jump could cover. Luckily, he didn't have to do it himself.

[Bow Equipped]

[Fire Dust Bow]
- deals additional fire damage (medium)
- deals additional explosive damage (low)

An arrow flew into the aircraft vehicle, exploding along its surface. The entire thing started to shake within the air, almost swinging the leader out of the open hatch. That was only the first arrow, since Itsuki was getting ready to fire more, walking slowly towards his brother's side. Despite saying that they shouldn't be freely using the weapons, Itsuki seemed to be more into this exchange than Motoyasu himself.

He wondered if it was for the bikes. Motoyasu didn't really mind it that much, but Itsuki did get his own bike custom made with his own pocket money, so seeing it be blown up probably tipped him off the edge.

With a grit in the man's teeth, he retreated into the aircraft. However, the hatch had been opened still. In his place, a woman in red and black hair walked up, glancing at the two boys. It looked as if she had been surprised by their situation, but Motoyasu couldn't see the woman all too well from this distance.

Itsuki released his arrow, aiming for the insides of the vehicle. It looked as if it was going to be a clean hit, but the woman raised her palm, almost to catch it before the arrow landed in her hand. Much to Itsuki's surprise, it didn't impale the target, but instead, it acted as if it melted away into ashes upon the sheer contact with the woman.

"What!? Did she just nullify it!? Damn it, you're not getting away!"

Itsuki started firing his arrows in quick succession, but the woman on board had been effectively countering the shots with her own fire balls. He clicked his tongue, not knowing what else he could do. There was no way that Itsuki could let them get away and Motoyasu could see that in his eyes.

"Why are you boys always getting into trouble like this?"

The familiar sounding voice drew as footsteps echoed behind them. Motoyasu and Itsuki, as well as the girl, drew their attention backwards. It was surprising to see her out of all people to arrive at the crime scene, but Motoyasu supposed that she herself was still a huntress.

"Miss Glynda! You're here!"

"Mother!"

"Please stop calling me that, Itsuki." Glynda sighed as she glanced over towards the escaping aircraft. Itsuki covered his mouth, blushing from his instinctive calling. Glynda had been a part of their lives ever since Ozpin took them in and sometimes, that little title just slipped out from time to time.

"Anyways, it doesn't seem like we should be letting them retreat, should we? You already have your weapons out, much opposed to what you were told to do." She pushed up her glasses glancing over to Itsuki from the corner of her eyes. "You might as well lend me some assistance here."

As Glynda swung her crop towards the fleeing ship in a horizontal arc, purple streaks appeared along the stroke, dancing between each other as they flung themselves into the aircraft. The airship maneuvered in such a way that the damage would become minimal, as Motoyasu noticed that the leader of the goons had now been in the cockpit. He had descended the vehicle to evade some of the attacks.

Itsuki, on the other hand, focused on his own weapon. The red frame of his bow started to shapeshift, transforming itself into a jagged and frozen display, iced with a crystal colour.

[Bow Equipped]

[Ice Dust Bow]
- deals additional ice damage (medium)
- chance to freeze the target (low)

Glynda pointed her crop, aiming above the vehicle as a giant magic circle appeared above it. Quickly transforming, the circle emitted a dark and stormy cloud that was exclusive only to the area directly above the enemies and with one flick of her weapon, icicles started to rain down from the cloud, penetrating the target.

Itsuki took a knee down to the rooftop, getting a better aim on the vehicle which had been making its attempt to not lose control of itself. With the woman inside looking to be disoriented from the shift in weather, he took the opportunity to fire off his own barrage of icy arrows from the ground.

However, even in the midst of the two-sided assault, the woman managed to fire off an attack through the storm, causing Glynda to cease her own pressure and defend, putting up an energy shield before her and the others.

Nevertheless, there was a follow-up as the energy merely splattered around them.

The woman made a gesture, causing Glynda to immediately take notice of the sparkling embers. She motioned her crop towards the others, forcing them to slide out of the way. Motoyasu was taken surprised by the sudden use of her semblance, but immediately after, the area they had been standing within exploded into a pillar of flames.

Using the time they bought, the woman expunged the icicles out from the aircraft, melting them to mere water vapour in the air. Itsuki flinched, realizing that their enemy had some type of fire-oriented semblance. His ice shots weren't going to be much help anymore, so he switched back to the Fire Dust Bow, with intent to shoot at the vehicle, rather than at the woman.

With everything out of the way, the aircraft was about to make its getaway, but Motoyasu started to run towards it. The act of Glynda pushing him out of the way gave him an idea.

"Miss Glynda, send me up!"

"I'll keep providing support!" Itsuki exclaimed, reaiming his arrows. Even the girl transformed her scythe into her rifle and started taking shots at the aircraft. "Focus on taking them down!"

"You can't be serious, Motoyasu," she responded. "There's no need to irrationally engage like that!"

However, Motoyasu didn't want to simply let them leave. He thus gave Glynda an ultimatum, by tossing himself off the building with a high jump. If she didn't send him up, then he would definitely fall down into the streets.

"Motoyasu! Ugh, you've always been the most stubborn one out of your brothers!"

She flicked her wand once again towards Motoyasu's direction, and flung him upwards. The height gained had been considerable, much more than what Motoyasu could have achieved by himself. He used his spear as a ram to force the mysterious woman to evade the incoming puncture and once she ducked out of the way, Motoyasu gained access into the aircraft.

The spearhead got slightly stuck in the roof of the vehicle, but Motoyasu ignited it in flames and was able to easily rip it out of the top, dropping down onto the same level as the woman. He brushed his hair aside, messed up from the crazy maneuver he pulled off and caught a glance at the enemy clearly for the first time.

Black hair draped over that fair-toned shoulder, beautiful amber eyes that look fierce, red dress is a bit simple though it really brings out the colour in her natural appearance...

"... Hey, you're pretty cute. I'd say you're a solid 8. Could have been a 9, but with this whole operation going, I have to unfortunately drag it down one notch."

Before the woman had the chance to respond, not seeming to be distracted by the fact that her enemy had just complimented her, Motoyasu spun his spear around his body, dropping into a battle posture with his hand sliding down the weapon arm. The shape of the spear went from the reddened colour to a black figure, having something akin to tusks at its end.

"Anyways, sorry that I have to do this. If this was any other situation, I'd ask for your number. However, it looks like I'll have to ask you to surrender instead."

[Spear Equipped]

[Boarbatusk Spear]
- increased agility (medium)
- increased thrust damage (medium)

"That spear…"

"Hey, I hear an unfamiliar voice on board!" The voice of the goon's leader had shouted from the cockpit. "How the hell did one of them get on!?"

"... I have it under control," she responded softly and sternly. "Just focus on making our escape."

"I'll focus on trying not to get shot down first!"

The aircraft had been moving quite a bit, both from the man's controls and the pressured assault from the three ranged fighters on the rooftop. However, Motoyasu kept his calm emotions, trying to keep his feet as parallel to the surface as possible. If his allies were doing their best from keeping them from flying, Motoyasu should be doing his best as well.

I guess it's time to roll for accuracy.

Motoyasu dashed forwards, thrusting his spear at the woman's shoulders as she deftly dodged each strike. He started cycloning his spear with no trouble while moving his fingers along it, swinging it around like some sort of disk. The woman sparked a flame through her evasion, suddenly jamming her palm into the forearm of the spear, stopping its momentum.

Motoyasu didn't let a single second let up, as he pulled the spear back and bought his foot forward. It was aimed for her stomach, but she managed to catch that attack as well, flinging him backwards to the end of the aircraft. If he hadn't stabbed the spear into the ground, he would have likely fallen off.

Still, I think both of us need to be careful. We both use an element of danger in our semblances and if we're not careful, we might send this ship right to the ground. I don't think either of us would want that. But still...

"Cute and feisty. What a real shame."

Motoyasu spun his spear from the planted position and held it like a javelin. With one fluid motion, he threw the spear directly at the woman. She extended her hand as if she wanted to block it, just as Itsuki's arrows were broken apart, but a second before it reached her, she widened her eyes and aborted the method. She swerved her body to let the spear land right by the cockpit's door.

However, Motoyasu had been running straight behind it, dragging a flaming fist behind him with her name attached to it, whatever it had been. The woman threw up her arms to defend against it, crashing the impact and sending her a skid.

She must have heard the spear wiggling around, as she immediately dodged the returning spear when Motoyasu called for it. It flew back to him and he grabbed its end, twirling back to a few thrusts. He was able to scratch her cheek as she backed off from the one-sided exchange. She was practically against the wall, frustrated at Motoyasu's forward assault.

He wasn't usually this quick, but the agility buff that the Boarbatusk Spear gave him made these motions possible. If it weren't for the edge, he would have been placed on the defensive by now.

She glanced out towards the firing squad, noticing that there were a few arrows coming close towards the hatch, but not exactly due to the fact that Motoyasu was in a clear view of it. She extended her hand towards them and burned them to ashes, only to transform them back into blades. She pulled a few of them back into Motoyasu who noticed in time, turning around and slicing the blades back into pieces.

The pieces flew past him, but they reformed into blades again. They flew back into Motoyasu. The sound of the air being pierced was something that was hard-wired into his brain by Ren's own water blades. Motoyasu smirked, realizing that these attacks were much slower than Ren's blades at his best condition during their training.

Motoyasu used both ends of the spear to begin shattering the blades with ease as the woman kept remaking them. Some of the pieces dropped when the aircraft started to violently move around, shifting the woman's focus. Of course, Motoyasu's attention was slightly driven by those movements, but he still managed to fend them off.

If she kept attempting this, she was going to exhaust her semblance, but suddenly, Motoyasu noticed a cane poking out from the cockpit's door.

"Move!"

The woman pushed herself out of the way as the cane brought its reticle upwards and fired into the storm of blades and ashes. Motoyasu had no real choice, except to take the attack from the speed it was coming from. With the memory of the cane's effect fresh in his mind, he swapped his spears accordingly.

[Spear Equipped]

[Fire Dust Spear]
- increased fire resistance (medium)
- increased explosion resistance (low)
- deals additional fire damage (low)

He took the attack which launched him out from the open hatch, sending him flying down into the streets below. The explosion didn't seem to be that wide, but it must have caused some level of deterioration to the aircraft. Though, it wasn't enough to bring it down, so the person who fired it off must have known the limits of damage that it could take.

Not that it should be mattering to Motoyasu, as the breeze violently flew past his body. His head turned over to see how far he had until he hit the ground and it wasn't that far off.

"... Right, landing technique."

Since his body dropped down near a building, Motoyasu stabbed the surface and allowed the innated friction of a spearhead inside concrete to slow him down before he kicked off the wall and landed on the ground safety, rolling into a crouch.

His head turned upwards into the sky to see the escaping aircraft retreat into the distance. It seemed like the outside assault hadn't had much luck in stopping it, but from what he had seen, it was considerably slower than the normal ones. Though, it wasn't a speed that they could catch on feet nor a height they could reach with a boost.

The hatch started to close with the woman glaring back. It might have been his imagination, but he was fairly certain that she had been glaring at him specifically. Motoyasu could feel the chills out from his spine, but decided to play them off for now as the aircraft flew away into the night sky.

"... Wait, was she interested in me?" Motoyasu made the small joke to himself as he wryly sighed, standing back up. "Just my luck. I meet someone that can't stop looking at me and she's a criminal. Eh, there are plenty of other fish in the sea, I guess. I should probably meet back up with Miss Glynda, Itsuki, and that girl again."

Motoyasu spun around and started his return walk.

Motoyasu swung his feet back and forth, simply waiting for everything to wrap itself back up. He and Itsuki found themselves waiting within the local police department after they gave their witness reports, but they weren't dismissed yet. Glynda still had a few choice words for them after the whole ordeal was over, but she was taking her time talking to—rather, she might have been even interrogating—the black-haired, red-cloaked, silver-eyed girl.

He noticed that Itsuki's leg had been moving up-and-down nervously for some time now. He sensed some frustration in his brother's movements and tapped his shoulder, trying to calm him down from whatever he was thinking about.

"Hey, are you okay? No injuries or anything, right?" Motoyasu asked in concern.

There was a pause followed by a deep sigh as Itsuki shook his head. "As a matter of matter, no. I'm not okay. That motherfucker destroyed the bike I worked hard on for months! And he escaped without letting me get a good punch or even a good shot at him! The next time we meet, I swear I'm going to kill him!"

Motoyasu flinched from the sudden burst of aggression. "W-Whoa. Let's calm down here, Itsuki. It's just a bike here—I'll even help you buy a new custom one. There's really no need to kill for a bike."

Itsuki rolled his head back, exhaling a deep breath. "Sorry, I didn't mean it like that. But at this point, the bike is only an extra reason to go after him. You saw how their leader had access to a bullhead aircraft. They aren't normal criminals."

"Normal criminals…" Motoyasu swirled himself in his thoughts as the image of the orange-haired man showed itself. He could have sworn that he'd seen that man before, but it definitely hadn't been in real life. Perhaps it was on the television or something…

"They had to have some reputation in the underground world! If we had dealt with them tonight, then it would have been a good deed spread across the world. We would have been heroes before we'd even entered Beacon if we had killed the bastard!"

Hearing Itsuki use the term so loosely, Motoyasu had doubts on the weight of those words.

"... How do you decide when it's okay to kill and when it isn't?"

Itsuki hung his head back and glanced over toward Motoyasu's direction. A blank stare had taken him as he thought about the phrasing he should take before saying it out loud. He was trying to find the answer out for himself, but couldn't exactly place his finger on it.

"I just… I guess you just feel it."

Motoyasu raised his eyebrows at the response, feeling it was somewhat inadequate. However, he didn't say anything else about it. There hadn't been much he could say since he was sure that their future as huntsmen would give them that dilemma once again. The job of a huntsman will come to a time where he will need to take one's life, sooner or later.

Could I do it? Probably.

The question asked to himself echoed as the answer came almost immediately after.

But how would I feel afterwards?

His hands felt calm, yet he knew it shouldn't have had. A life wasn't something to be taken away at a whim. Surely, Naofumi would have felt uneasy about it, but he had a shield, not a weapon meant to kill.

I don't know. I really don't know how to feel about it.

In the end, he released himself from the mindless wandering. There wasn't much point about thinking about it yet, especially when entering Beacon should be their primary concerns at this time. He glanced over the doors where Glynda and the girl should have been in, noticing that the clock had been going for quite some time ever since they walked in.

"Hey, Itsuki? What do you think Miss Glynda is doing in there?"

Itsuki pulled his head back up to see the doors for himself, but still shrugged. "Not sure. Though, this kinda feels like the first time we met mot—" Itsuki bit on his own tongue on purpose, stammering for a bit. "I meant, Miss Glynda!"

Motoyasu chuckled. "You really can't stop calling her by 'mother', could you?"

Itsuki's face reddened, turning away as he pouted. "W-Well, could you blame me? She's been taking care of us ever since father took us in those years ago. Actually, I would say that she looks after us more than father himself. Sometimes she cooks for us, makes sure that we don't live in a pigsty, and scolds us when we do stupid things. If that's not being motherly, I don't know what is."

"But you know, Miss Glynda and father aren't actually married, much less a couple."

Itsuki sighed, holding his head back with his hands. "Yeah. I know." There was a sense of disappointment in his voice. "It's only wishful thinking, but it would be nice if they were together. Then I wouldn't have to feel bad about calling her mother all the time, since she would be our mother."

"It would," Motoyasu softly agreed. "It really would."

As their words trinkled off, a clear clacking of footsteps came down the hall. Motoyasu and Itsuki drew their attention over to whoever had been coming down, only to notice a familiar grey hairstyle and outfit. It was none other than Ozpin himself.

"Hello there, boys. I've heard that it was quite an eventful evening for you two."

"O-Oh, father," Motoyasu stammered, surprised to see his appearance here. "It's nice to see you."

"Hello, father," Itsuki greeted as well.

"I see that you two are doing fine. I trust that there are no injuries or anything of the like," Ozpin inquired. "It would be quite problematic if you weren't able to come to your first day at Beacon."

"I feel fine, even when falling from the aircraft." Motoyasu rolled his arm to prove the point, standing up in tandem. Itsuki merely grinned as Motoyasu cheerfully showed himself off. "See? Great condition!"

"Excellent. Now I'll get down to business," Ozpin said, sitting down next to Itsuki. "I would like to hear what happened tonight. That would be appreciated."

Itsuki glanced over to Ozpin in slight confusion as Motoyasu sat back down. "Wait, but we've already given our witness accounts to the police. Shouldn't you have access to those files for this incident?"

"Yes, but is there anything wrong with… a father wanting an excuse to speak with his children?"

Motoyasu and Itsuki glanced at each other before breaking out into a smirk. After a silent gesture from Motoyasu, Itsuki had started talking. They talked about how Glynda had been motherly towards them, but if Ozpin had spent more time with them outside of their training hours, perhaps there wouldn't have been a need for Glynda to step in. However, it wasn't as if the boys hadn't understood.

He was the headmaster of a prestigious academy for huntsmen. That alone would have been time-consuming, considering how he seemingly did much more than manage the campus grounds. Sometimes, it was almost as if the academy had been his actual home—now that Motoyasu thought about it, they weren't actually living in anything that Ozpin owned, it was just an apartment that was being rented out. Barely did Ozpin actually come by and have dinner with them like a real family due to constant business that had to be attended to.

Really, what could be so important that it takes up so much of his time?

"For background information," Itsuki began, "we ran out of food in the fridge and forgot to restock earlier today, so Naofumi sent Motoyasu and I to buy some groceries. The nearby grocery store had been closed, so we decided to head over to the one near From Dust Till Dawn. We locked up our bikes and headed towards the store when suddenly—"

Itsuki suddenly stopped himself, widening his eyes. "Ah, shit! Naofumi and Ren must be wondering where we are now! Crap, where's my scroll!?" Itsuki started to quickly pat his body down until the memory struck him. "Oh, I remember! I thought we were going to be gone for a few minutes, so I left it at home!"

"I'd advise you to watch your language, Itsuki."

"S-Sorry, but they must be confused on why we aren't back yet!" Itsuki stood up immediately from his seat. "Let's see, the police's reception desk is over there. I could probably ask for a quick call from them and—"

"That won't be necessary," Ozpin interrupted, holding Itsuki back from his seat. "I've already called ahead and told them the basic situation already. They wouldn't be coming out here, but I'm certain that they won't be expecting food from you when you return. In addition, I've already sent some groceries to extra express delivery."

"O-Oh…" Itsuki collapsed back onto the seat softly. "T-Thank you, father."

"Returning to the topic at hand, you mentioned that we were heading to the store. What happened afterwards?"

Itsuki nodded. "Right. When we were about to take a turn away from the street, we both heard the sound of glass shattering behind us. All within a few moments, there was a girl with black hair and silver eyes that had been fighting a few mobster-wannabes—though, if their leader had a bullhead aircraft, they probably were mobsters of some kind. Anyways, that girl had been swinging some type of transforming scythe, beating up these guys who were apparently robbing the store."

"In the end," Motoyasu jumped in, "I guess you can say we sorta joined in on the fun!"

"Shut up, Motoyasu. You only wanted to fight because you thought the girl was cute."

"Well, she was!" Motoyasu smirked. "She's cheerful, quirky, and bursting with energy! And if that wasn't enough, she was completely nerding over our weapons afterwards! If that wasn't cute, then I guess you could sue me for defamation!"

"So you've already somewhat met," Ozpin said. "Excellent, but I suppose proper introductions should wait for now. In its place, I should introduce a bit about her before I leave to do my work."

"Introduce her?" Itsuki furrowed his eyebrows. "Why would you need to do that? She's a random stranger to us."

"First of all, she may be a stranger to you, but she is certainly not random. Her name is Ruby Rose and she's—"

"Let me take a guess," Motoyasu interrupted, kicking his leg over the other. "She's Qrow's niece, right? He's the only other person that has a transforming scythe that I know of and her fighting style is somewhat similar to his own."

"Hold up. Qrow has a niece!?" Itsuki asked in complete surprise. "I've never heard about this!"

"Yeah, two of them," Motoyasu answered, holding up the same amount of fingers. "He never actually said it out loud, but I asked him in private one day if he had children and he told me that he didn't, only two nieces. As far as he knew, he added at the end."

Itsuki blinked at the sudden intellectual moment that Motoyasu had, not really expecting this much perception from the skirt-chaser of the household, but he started to wrap things back around. "You asked because you were curious if he had any female children that were our age, weren't you?"

"Guilty as charged," Motoyasu smugly grinned as he leaned back, winking towards his brother. "And hey, I think the other niece is about our age, unlike this one that's a few years younger!"

Itsuki collapsed his face into his hands. "Goddammit, Motoyasu."

Ozpin stayed silently, taking a slight amusement to their conversation and ended up releasing a soft chuckle between the both of them. It brought over the attention of the two brothers, as it appeared that Ozpin was about to speak.

"Yes, yes. Miss Rose is indeed one of Qrow's nieces and she's rather… interesting." Ozpin's words held a delicate air around them, as Motoyasu felt it started to become very ambiguous all so suddenly. Ozpin moved on before Motoyasu had a chance to even think about it. "Yes, let's leave it at that. She's a very interesting person and I see that you fought to help her out. That is why I shall overlook this incident and forgive you."

Itsuki tilted his head. "Forgive us… for what?"

"I remember telling you four that you were not to use your holy weapons outside of the training periods until you enrolled into Beacon Academy."

Both of their expressions stricken with fear that moment those words were laid down in front of them, causing them to practically jump from their seats. Motoyasu knew that Itsuki tried to warn him about it, but things just happened and they simply acted without the rule in mind, as if it vanished. He spun around onto their feet, facing Ozpin in a fluster.

"I-It was to help out Ruby, wasn't it!?" Motoyasu stammered, placing his hand on his chest. "That had to count as an emergency that falls under some category! Right!?"

"R-Right!" Itsuki nodded accordingly, trying to find excuses to turn the tables back to normal. "We were holding back a good amount of enemies for her! We… uh, had no choice! Really! There was no way that we were taking on an aircraft with our elements!"

"Both of you, calm down." Ozpin sighed, pushing up his glasses. "I've already mentioned that I would forgive you—that you would be excused to some degree. Meaning, you do not need to fret so much about this."

As they shrunk back with relief, they sat themselves back down as their worry was replaced with self exasperation.

They started to hear another person's footsteps down the hall, causing Motoyasu to glance over to see a police department receptionist bringing down some items. However, if he didn't know any better, he could have said that the woman was a waitress, with a mug of coffee in one hand and a plate of cookies in the other.

"Mister Ozpin. Here are the things you requested," the receptionist said, wryly gazing at the plate. "You did say a plate of cookies, correct?"

"Indeed, I did say that."

Motoyasu watched as Ozpin stood and took the two items off from the receptionist, holding each in his hands. He noticed that they were all chocolate chip cookies and an abundance of them too. Motoyasu couldn't stop looking at them.

"Cookies?" Itsuki asked.

"One of the reasons why I came here was the intention to speak with Miss Rose. If you remember, I did this back when I first approached you four with the notion of adoption. It was simply on a whim, but I see that it was rather effective in helping children and adolescents to open their mouths." Ozpin glanced over to the brothers as there was a subtle sparkle to their eyes. An amused smirk came upon his face. "Go ahead. Take one. I don't anticipate Miss Rose to eat the entire batch."

Itsuki stood up to get one for himself, but by the time he was able to pick one up, Motoyasu already had one in his mouth. Itsuki raised his eyebrow to the brother, thinking as to why he was so quick on things that relatively didn't matter.

"Thank you, father!"

"Thanks."

"I should probably head in now. Glynda should be expecting me around now. You two should head back to the apartment. I've already asked for special permission from the department for you two to leave."

The boys walked down the hall, cookies stuffed in their mouths, but they heard a throat being cleared up from Ozpin. They both turned to see if their father had been beckoning them, meeting Ozpin's cold glance that could have been described as going from zero to one hundred real quick.

"However, we will speak about your ban of the holy weapons another time. Simply because I've forgiven you, it does not mean you shall go unpunished."

The way that Ozpin talked made them drip sweat from their foreheads as the unsettling feeling came to reach the back of their necks in a cold embrace. Luckily, Ozpin had decided to reset himself, walking into the interrogation room and leaving the two to their fates. The pressure suddenly dropped from the atmosphere, letting them drop their shoulders.

"Father can be rather scary when he wants to, I guess…"

"Yeah," Motoyasu nodded in agreement, "tell me about it."

Author's Note:

What's up gamers? Long time no see, huh?

I could write an entire essay on reasons why i haven't updated this story in so long, but ain't nobody got time for that. In short, quite a lot of things happened in my life, and a certain virus didn't really help. I am still alive and well though.

I wanted to write the entire first volume first before posting, but after making two and a half chapters i got hit with some real writing block, unable to write anything for the last half a year. Before I even realised, an entire year passed since the first prologue was released, and the first volume still isn't even halfway done. I apologise for that, that's pretty cringe. I released this chapter to compensate for the wait, and I guess to show that the story isn't dead.

Obviously, I have some real-life responsibilities that are more important than just writing stories, but still, I really care for this fic, and want it to be something more than just an abandoned prologue. I believe I've recently gotten my inspirations back, so I'll try to get back into writing, and hopefully, next time I upload, the entire volume 1 will be finished.

As always, massive thanks to Pretty Lazy for editing and enhancing my story, he is just as much of a creator of this story as me. Guy's a real bro.

And with all of this said, hop aboard the fanfiction train, it's time to put an end to this hiatus!

Cya next time!

BONUS:

As Ren and Naofumi were slowly finishing cleaning the mess, Ren glanced over the clock, realising that enough time had passed for the other two to already come back, and yet, they were nowhere to be seen.

"What's taking them so long?"

Naofumi raised his head, and seeing that Ren was staring at the clock, he also turned his head towards it.

"It's been almost an hour since they left, they should be back already, and I heavily doubt there were long lines in the shop at this hour."

Naofumi opened his mouth, but before he could speak any words, he got interrupted by the sound of his scroll's ringtone. Someone was calling him.

He pulled it out of his pocket, and glanced at it in order to see who it was.

"Is it them?"

"...No, it's Mr. Ozpin…"

Ren raised his eyebrow at that, Ozpin called them from time to time, but mostly in matters such as setting up training sessions.

Naofumi accepted the call, and put his scroll next to his ear.

"Hello, father… Yes, me and Ren are at our apartment, why do you ask?"

Ren silently stared at Naofumi with a questioning look on his face, being able to hear only half of the conversation.

"Oh, I see… Are they okay?..."

At that point Ren rolled his eyes and sighed, already having a couple theories on what could have happened.

"O-okay, that's good… When will they come back? A-alright… What about… yeah, that… Really? That would be great. Thank you, father. Yes, see you too."

As Naofumi put his scroll back in his pocket, he glanced over Ren with a tired expression.

"Let me guess… We won't be having our groceries, will we?"

Naofumi sighed and lowered his head, causing Ren to weakly chuckle.