Hi, so it's been a while. I haven't abandoned this fic, I just lost the motivation to write during portions of this chapter. Apologies for the wait, apparently it was so long that Lobotomy Corporation actually has a place here on .
On a different note, I mentioned in the last chapter that I had some ideas concerning the Grimm, but that I hadn't landed on anything concrete. That's now been resolved, so I'll just mention the changes here before the chapter starts. Mainly, it's just dividing Grimm into 1 of 2 categories, Horde Grimm and Arbiter Grimm. Horde Grimm aren't really any different from canon Grimm, while Arbiter Grimm are Grimm that sap certain emotions from people around them. Arbiter Grimm are basically the Apathy, which is an Arbiter Grimm in this fic, but not just focused on sapping energy.
Also unrelated, but I'm changing minor things about some characters' weapons, since quite a few RWBY weapons are the victim of what I call the "Magic box of Bullshit", where they work without any regard to physical limitations or designs. Some characters also have minorly different semblances, since some of their semblances aren't well defined, or I thought it would be cool to give it a more limited power.
Jaune wasn't sure which way was up as he flew through the air. He was so close to getting some advice from the headmaster as well.
Regardless, he now had to deal with the gravity of his current situation, namely that he had no experience whatsoever in maneuvering himself in the air, especially with his weapons in hand.
After a few moments of slight panicking, he found himself righted, by which he meant facing the direction he was moving. He was still spinning slightly, which he was actually very surprised wasn't triggering any kind of motion sickness. He didn't have time to actually ponder on that, as the ground was quickly approaching. It wasn't like someone was going to pluck him out of the air and to safety though, so he needed to think of something quick.
As soon as the thought passed through his mind, he felt a sharp tug on his neck, which he silently thanked his aura for tanking, as something pierced the hood of his jacket. He instinctively pushed his aura to his jacket to prevent further damage to it, though whatever had pierced it seemed intent on dragging him along, seeing as his course of flight had sharply changed. He reckoned that it probably wasn't some kind of Grimm, seeing as it was dragging him straight towards that rather thick tree-
The impact with the tree was heavy, the tree not budging or giving an inch. After Jaune gathered his bearings for several seconds, he realized that he wasn't actually falling and was instead hanging by his hood. He quickly glanced upwards, faintly registering someone yelling something in the distance, perhaps someone else had as rough of a landing as he had. He appeared to have been pinned by a silver sword… Pyrrha's silver sword.
"Of course." He wouldn't exactly say he was surprised by this turn of events, given how… clingy he's noticed Pyrrha has been. He had been hoping to make some friends at Beacon, but it seemed that he had simply traded a set of overprotective sisters for just one, but who was somehow more protective of him than his sisters combined.
Shaking himself out of those thoughts, he still had the situation of being pinned to a tree. Simple solution, he thought to himself as he gripped the sword's hilt with both hands, braced his legs, and pulled. It was only as he tilted forwards did he realize that hadn't actually looked down to see that he was a good 20 ft above the ground.
He was lucky to not land on any roots, though the ground wasn't too much better. Jaune found himself thanking his aura for taking the blow as he slowly stood up, pulling himself up with the silver sword that was still in his hands. Once standing, he gave the sword a once over, giving it some cursory swings as well. It was clearly well cared for, though it was a bit more top-heavy than he was used to.
A low growl shook him out of his investigation. Running on instinct, he reached for the sword at his hip, only to find nothing. A quick glance told him that he indeed did not have Crocea Mors in its place on his belt. There was no damage, so it must have fallen out during his fall, perhaps when he was violently torn away from his original path.
He had more pressing matters to attend to, however, such as the beowolf standing in front of him. It wasn't approaching him yet, instead opting to slowly circle him, likely waiting for the rest of its pack to arrive. He had read about this before, though this was the first time he had actually seen it in action. Horde grimm without an Arbiter had stronger pack instincts, causing them to only engage people when a significant portion of their pack is around. Given this information, Jaune realized that he needed to deal with this beowolf before more came and overran him.
He charged towards the grimm, shifting his grip on the silver sword so that he was holding it in both hands at his waist. As he neared, he swung the sword in a wide, diagonal arc, catching the beowolf's snout as it tried to back away. This only really had the effect of pissing it off, causing it to pounce at him as soon as it landed.
Jaune wasn't entirely prepared for the sudden shift in behavior, his swing had put him off-balance from the extra weight. In an attempt to compensate, he took a step back as he swung the other way, the blade even with the beowolf's torso. This had the intended effect of bisecting the grimm, the blade cleanly cutting through.
Jaune paused for a moment, surprised at how easily the blade had cut through the grimm. "... I should probably return this." He decided to go find Pyrrha so that she knew her sword was fine, and hey, maybe he'd find Crocea Mors on the way.
Ruby loved the thrill of the wind whistling by her. Thanks to her semblance, she was easily able to extend her flight. All it took was a gesture in the direction she wanted to go, a little bit of aura, and she'd find that limb dragging the rest of her with it.
Everyone else had likely already landed by then, including Yang. The blessing of Der Freishutz was helpful, but they both knew it did nothing to affect her actual velocity. Yang probably had used it to land earlier so that her landing wouldn't be at as high of speeds. Ruby was instead taking full advantage of her semblance, "Acceleration", in order to bypass the forest entirely.
A quick glance towards the ground told her that she was probably approaching the destination, though she wasn't sure if the principal was being honest with his description of the building. He had called it an "abandoned temple", but from this distance it appeared much more like a "decrepit shell of a building". Regardless, it would be a good place to at least touch down and gather her bearings.
The sound of a distant foghorn brought an immediate change in her plans. In retrospect, gathering this many of the blessed in one place and testing them with trial by fire was bound to trigger an Ordeal of Doubt. Unfortunately, there was no way to actually know if this was Dawn or if it was worse. If it was Dawn, she could safely ignore it, the challengers would only have blades for hands. Noon and Dusk were where she would encounter problems, mainly because they have guns which, while normally not a large issue for her, could deal some real damage to her while she was flying.
So, instead of potentially being shot out of the sky, Ruby decided to safely end her flight with a quick kick down instead.
...
The first indication that she wasn't completely aware of her situation came from a yelp from behind her. It didn't sound loud, but that was much higher than the forest floor.
The second indication was her impact with what was definitely a person, and the subsequent trajectory shift said collision caused. In an attempt to slow down her and whoever she crashed into, Ruby threw her hands to the sky, drawing on her semblance to increase what little acceleration her arms had. She wasn't exactly sure how effective that was, but her impact with the floor was softer than she anticipated, so… success? But there was still the person who landed on top of her to deal with.
"You know, you could have warned me that you were going to land, I would have moved out of your way." … Why? Actually, how? She didn't have anything against Weiss, but she was seriously worried about why Weiss had followed her. Did she not just 30 minutes ago talk about how they should keep an eye on Pyrrha because of her seeming to be overly clingy and/or protective?
She supposed Weiss was waiting for an answer, and Ruby was not one who hides how she's feeling. "I was more concerned with not getting shot out of the air." She started sitting up, regardless of Weiss still being on top of her. "Besides, I didn't realize you were there. I thought I was the only one who could get this far in the air."
Weiss was kind enough to realize that she was still on top of Ruby and darted off of her. "I… um… why would people shoot us down?"
Ruby just stared at her, unbelieving of what she was hearing. "Have… have you never gone through an Ordeal before?"
Weiss's eyes lit up. "Oh! No, I have, just… I didn't realize that one had started here… Is that what the horn was?"
Ruby pushed herself up, rolling her eyes in the meantime. "Yes, the Ordeal of Doubt, started by a foghorn and consists of robot automatons. Since it's impossible to tell the severity of the Ordeal by the alarm, I opted to assume the worst."
Weiss had a look on her face that was something in between pensive and concerned. "Right. I… feel I may not be as helpful as I had anticipated."
Ruby wasn't sure why that was the first thing to come to her mind, and didn't have time to try and decipher the meaning behind it, so she just shrugged. "I'm sure you have your areas of expertise that you can help me out with, but whatever the case is, we're partners now."
Ruby watched as Weiss slowly smiled, even if it was weaker than her previous smiles. "Right. And right now, we have a mission to fulfill!"
Weiss sprung up with energy, her temporary melancholy seemingly forgotten as she grabbed Ruby's wrist and started dragging her towards the temple.
Nora wasn't having fun.
Sure, she'd run into a few beowolves earlier and had enjoyed turning them into floor pancakes with Magnhild, but all of the emotions she could feel around her were negative. Some people were scared for various reasons, others were trying to overcome their panic of the launch. There were enough people here doubting themselves that they'd managed to trigger an Ordeal of Doubt in what must be a record time. None of those emotions were fun, and it is hard to have a good time when no one around is having a good time themselves.
The arbiter grimm in the area that were suppressing various positive emotions weren't helping either, though that was a problem that could be solved with excessive force from Magnhild, so she wasn't as concerned about it.
But those problems could be solved later! First, she needed to find Ren. She hadn't been joking about using animal calls to find each other, she just had no idea what call to actually use. Ren must have assumed she was joking around in order to calm him down, which is half-true as well, he was somewhat stressed about the initiation, moreso when it was mentioned that they don't really choose their partners.
If she could help it, she'd be Ren's partner. He was a great guy, but he gets incredibly stressed about crowds, or other people in general. That's why he needed her to be around, because she could calm him down.
A deafening roar from behind her brought her attention away from the other applicants for a moment. That moment was long enough for someone to rush past her, grabbing her by her wrist and dragging her behind them. Now, if she really wanted to, she could have pulled back and thrown them to the ground, but considering the test and that they were dragging her away from whatever arbiter had caused such an ungodly noise, she decided to give them the benefit of the doubt.
She brought her attention back to the person in front of her, and took note of the familiar green attire. She gently pulled back, just enough to signal to Ren that he could let go of her, which he promptly did. "So, did you get to see it?"
He briefly looked over his shoulder, pushing through the discomfort to make eye contact with her. "Yes, and I'd rather not try to fight an Angelion alone."
Nora winced, mentally agreeing with him. Angelions were somewhat unique among arbiter grimm in that they are never formed directly. They always developed from beowolves, which led to them usually leading their old packs. Their innate age compared to other arbiters also made them much smarter than most grimm. Couple that with wings and opposable thumbs, and you've got a six-year old with a body that rivaled some of the top huntsmen and a taste for human blood.
...
Why was one of these so close to Beacon? Moreover, why was it in their initiation? Angelions, like other arbiters, sapped certain emotions from people around them, and their tendency to sap pride would certainly hinder any huntsman-in-training who wasn't already suicidal.
Nora nodded to herself. "So, we're grouping up with the others and fighting it as a group?"
She couldn't see Ren's face, but she could tell he was mildly entertained by her suggestion. "Well, I suppose that would be a reasonable follow up to my initial plan of just running."
Yang was having a blast.
She'd managed to propel herself further than most of the other students with some well-timed blasts from Ember Celica, though she wasn't surprised that Ruby was quite literally flying past everyone else. Her new friend was seemingly trampolining after her on those dark-purple glyph looking things, so they'd probably be partnering up, which is nice.
Shortly after landing, she'd found a few beowolves and an ursa to punch around. She didn't find too much difficulty in dispatching them. Some of the beowolves started running, which Yang took as as good of a reason as any to try some target practice with Medeis Arcus, her collapsible rifle. She was aware that it wasn't really her style, but being Der Freishutz's incarnate had its quirks. He really liked rifles, and she wasn't going to complain about the intuition he provided her.
Two shots later left two beowolves with smoking holes through their torsos. With a smirk, she collapsed her rifle into its more compact form and stowed it behind her lower back. She was, like, 90% sure that Ruby had made Crescent Rose as a combination of Medeis Arcus, and Uncle Qrow's scythe Harbinger, but considering her other weapons, Ruby may have just come up with that on her own. Ruby's spirit, Little Red Riding Hooded Mercenary, had its own preferences for weapons. Crimson Scar was the spirit's preference, and Crescent Rose had always seemed to Yang to just be an upscaled Crimson Scar, so there may have been something there as well.
"Your name is Yang, right?" A feminine voice asked, somewhere behind her. It seemed familiar, but not enough for her to put a name or a face to it.
She decided against turning around for the moment. "Yeah, what's your name?"
A pause, which honestly could have meant a lot of things. "Blake."
With that name, the memory came rushing back. Ruby had talked about a faunus girl who had been reading about incarnates last night. That meant she was at least aware that being an incarnate could have its… difficulties. She spun around to face her. "Right, Ruby had mentioned you last night!"
Blake, whom Yang was now vividly remembering, considering that she was still wearing only black and white, seemed to be surprised, but they had already made eye contact, so they're partners now. "I… she mentioned me?"
Yang shrugged. "I mean, yeah, you're at least aware of the difficulties us incarnates go through, since you were reading 'On Two Souls'."
This only seemed to confuse her more. "What do you mean 'us incarnates'?"
Yang smiled as she gently beckoned Der Freishutz to her. Gradually, her hair began to burn with black flames. "Well, I am an incarnate, specifically of Der Freishutz."
Blake had a pensive look on her face, her mouth in a slight frown. "You seem close."
Yang chuckled a bit at that. "Yeah, she's my sister, why wouldn't we be close?"
Blake shook her head, smiling slightly now. "I meant with your spirit. You must be close to it if you're willing to merge so casually with it."
That… was actually a fair point. A lot of incarnates had… collisions of personality, for lack of a better term. Yang was lucky that she matched her spirit's personality fairly closely, so they were generally on the same page with each other. "We've got similar personalities, so-" She let the black flames die down, "-we generally agree with what to do."
Blake was looking towards the ground now. "I'm new to being an incarnate. I only discovered my status as an incarnate a year ago, so I'm still learning."
Yang threw her arm around Blake's shoulders. "I may not be the best teacher, but I'll make sure you know what I know!" And with that, she started dragging Blake along towards the temple.
Pyrrha was glad that she had found Jaune quickly, she felt bad that he had no weapon because of her assistance, but he had managed to make do with her sword Vlépo. She hadn't intended for her assistance to be as violent as it turned out, but to be fair his flailing around in the air didn't inspire her with any confidence in his ability to land.
And now…
"Remind me again, why are you being chased by a young deathstalker?" She yelled over the crashing of trees.
"I don't know! Grimm always seem to know where I am, like they're hunting me!" That answer… didn't fill her with much hope either. "I kind of got side tracked on returning your sword to you and walked past a cave with some weird paintings around the entrance. I stopped for a moment, and suddenly that scorpion busted out and started chasing me."
"Well, we really need to take it out. It's an arbiter, so its existence is draining people." Pyrrha reasoned. "We're lucky it's young, otherwise we might have an actual problem on our hands." She turned to face it, stopping in her tracks. With a flourish, she shifted Milo into its spear form, raised and ready to meet the charge of the-
A foghorn bellowed.
A rusted arm shot out of the dirt, stock-stiff and unyielding.
Unfortunately for the deathstalker, it appeared right in front of its face. The deathstalker had no time to react before it crumpled, partially skewering itself on the outstretched hand. The grimm laid there motionless, while the arm pushed itself up off of the dirt, revealing more of the thing's mechanical body.
Apart from the head, the whole thing looked skeletal, with cogs jutting out at seemingly random intervals. The head itself was solid looking, the rusted metal surrounding a singular glowing red "eye". The arm that had pulled the rest of the body out, its left arm, ended in a stump around what would be its wrist on a human. Its right arm became a blade at the elbow, the chipped blade nearly reaching the floor in its limp stance. It balanced itself on digitigrade legs, once again ending before any major details would occur.
It didn't look too imposing, but Pyrrha knew not to underestimate the challengers. Even the weaker ones can be surprisingly resilient and deadly.
"HAAAAH!" Given his warcry and charge, it appears that her partner didn't. She released Vlépo from its sheath, the sword rising on its own accord in response to her mental command. This was a Dawn challenger, so Jaune would be safe for the first few attacks. She could then step in once he was out of the way, since she'd rather not lose Jaune.
The automaton stiffly walked towards them, its right blade-arm raised to meet Jaune's charge. Jaune swung wildly over his head, aiming his sword straight at the automaton's own head. Unfortunately, the automaton was faster to react than its stiff walk would imply, the outstretched blade arm deflecting Jaune's swing to his right, pushing him off balance. The automaton then spun its torso 180 degrees to the left, bending what was previously its left forearm back beyond what would be natural for a human and thrust it forward towards Jaune's chest. Luckily for Jaune, he had his shield in the path, so he simply got shoved backwards to the ground.
Pyrrha chose to strike, since Jaune would not be caught in the crossfire. She launched Vlépo towards the automaton, skewering it and pushing it so that its back was to a tree that Vlépo was now impaled into. She loosened her grip on her shield, spun around, and threw it straight at the automaton's neck, decapitating it as her shield embedded itself into the tree.
Releasing a breath she didn't realize she was holding, she strode over to the still prone form of Jaune and silently offered him a hand.
Jaune accepted the help and hoisted himself up onto his feet. "Thanks for that, I didn't expect it to react so quickly." His voice was strained, yet still communicated his gratitude.
Pyrrha just frowned slightly. "Have you never encountered a challenger before?"
Jaune's face lit up. "Oh, that was a challenger?" He glanced over to the headless body pinned to the tree. "I didn't realize that, I don't exactly trigger Ordeals, with the whole spiritless thing and all."
Pyrrha sighed. "Well, now that we're together, you'll have to be prepared for them in the future." A distant sound of explosions roused them from their conversation. "We should start moving again, we still have a goal to accomplish."
Those who succeed in the hunt are granted with one of the very feathers that countless hunters once yearned for. -The Firebird(O-02-101)
Yes, I have given people weapons related to their Spirit. In case people are curious, Medeis Arcus is supposed to mean "Magic Bow", though that is through google translate shenanigans, since it lists "Medeis" as a word for magic and "Arcus" as meaning bow. Vlépo is supposed to mean "see" in greek, but once again, google translate.
