When Jaune and the officer reached the beach, both their stomachs dropped. Each had hoped that the hysterical man who ran past them was just that: hysterical. He had seen a whale or something in the distance and assumed the worst. But that was not the case.

The duo stopped under the shadow of the lighthouse and looked down onto the beach. Nasty creatures sprawled out over the beach: they looked like seals, but with gangly forearms with webbed claws that hauled them across the ground, and their big toothy maws hung open, and their red eyes glared angrily out from their bony Grimm skulls. Their heads looked more like the heads of angler fish than seals, making them grotesque combinations of ocean creatures.

Thankfully, in this chilly climate only the hardiest swam in the cold ocean. So only a few people sprinted away and up the wooden stairs that climbed up the cliffside. All except for two.

A man and a woman. The man's leg was bloody, and he limped badly as the woman, presumably his girlfriend or his wife, tried desperately to support his weight as they stumbled away from the monsters.

The nasty oceanic Grimm, however, smelled the blood and heard their panic. A dozen greedily dragged themselves across the sand, catching up to the pair.

"Ah hell!" The officer said. He drew his gun and ran for the stairs. "Kid," he yelled back at Jaune, "run out and screamy bloody murder for our hunter to get down here!"

"Nope!" Jaune called back.

"What!?" The angry officer turned back and glared bloody murder at Jaune.

But Jaune just focused down on the beach. Omsk had told him not to do anything big, not to draw any attention to himself. Stay in the room and be quiet. Do nothing.

Not for a moment did Jaune consider following those orders.

"I am combat ready!" he shouted. He dug his feet into the ground and launched himself forward, careening into a sprint.

"Kid!" the officer shouted, reaching out a hand to stop the seemingly suicidal brat.

Jaune smashed straight through the wooden fence that blocked off the drop. The last step he took was right at the cliff's edge. Knee bent, he launched into as strong a jump as he could muster.

He flung himself like a rock in a trebuchet. For a moment, he seemed to take flight, curving up and away. Then gravity, temporarily surprised, brought down its big and inevitable hand. He dived entered a dive at terminal velocity.

The twisted seal-Grimm were seconds from their quarry. The couple desperately tried to get away. The man angrily insisted the woman drop him and run, but she stubbornly held on. She looked over her shoulder just in time to see one of the Grimm plant its claws into the sand then launch itself forward in a deadly, sloppy lunge.

"Gerrrrrooooonimoooo!" Jaune shot down like a missile and delivered a meteoric elbow drop to the monster. He smashed it straight down into the sand, which shot up all around them from the force of the impact. The Grimm itself squished and crunched as Jaune's dive broke every last bone in its body and flattened every organ.

"Combat ready!" Jaune shouted as he jumped to feet. The Grimm under him started dissolving instantly, blood fizzing and turning to smoke.

He turned back to the couple who looked slack-jawed at their unexpected savior.

"Combat ready!" he insisted again with a thumbs-up.

The woman, running high on adrenaline and desperate relief, smiled back at him.

"Now run! I can take care of this!" He turned around and brandished his fists. A dozen more of the Grimm hauled themselves across the sand, jiggling their wet bodies and snapping their jaws.

"Ha!" Jaune charged. Each one was barely taller than his waist. Kicks served them well. He jumped at the nearest and smashed its skull in with his foot.

Another came at him from his left, so he hopped and delivered it a nasty spinning kick right to the side of its head.

A third Grimm lunged at him, throwing its fat body up through the air and brandishing its nasty, seaweed-knotted teeth that jaggedly protruded up from rubbery lips.

Jaune shot it an uppercut, sending the thing flipping back in the air and crashing down to the sand. It squirmed there before Jaune leapt high and landed down on it, crushing it underfoot.

One after the other, each of the Grimm he smashed with his bare hands and feet, ending them all. Before long, the beach was littered with quickly dissolving bodies.

"Yeah!" Jaune said, raising his fists in the air. "Mission accomplished!"

He looked and saw the couple being helped up the steps by the officer from earlier, who gave Jaune a thumbs-up to let him know that the injured man would be okay.

Jaune looked back up to the cliff's edge, where he saw several people now waiting by the fencing. They whooped and waved, cheering him on.

He smiled wide. Was this what it meant to be a hero? Just fight things and save people? It felt pretty nice. And hey, it was pretty easy too!

Water exploded up from the ocean in a great torrent. A deep and angry roar bellowed out from the foaming sea. Red eyes peered out from over a gaping maw that now grinned hideously from the waves. The massive Grimm pulled itself out the water and onto the beach.

It was another twisted seal-monster, the same as the earlier creatures but huge. It loomed as large as a house, and it could easily devour Jaune whole in a single chomp; it could probably swallow a car whole. Its blubbery and swollen body promised an odious and awful end to anything that was sucked into its dark bowels.

It roared a deep and gravelly howl as its skeletal arms pulled it onto the beach. The chalky teeth were each almost as long as Jaune was tall, and each could certainly skewer him like a marshmallow on a stick. Jammed between them were seaweed, driftwood and what looked like a sheet of metal, the remains of a ship.

"That…" Jaune said, "is not a nice-looking fish."

The Fish scanned the beach and saw the dissolving bodies of its kin that had just gotten smashed and bashed. Its big, bulbous eyes locked onto Jaune. Its jaw quivered with angry anticipation.

The Fish roared again, and this time the bellow truly washed over Jaune. It whipped his hair back, made him stumble and almost blinded him even as it completely deafened him as well. The awful smell of the monster's breath—like rotting fish and mud—made him gag.

When the Fish's long roar ended, it looked with hate at its little foe.

"This is not very good," Jaune remarked.

The Fish threw both of its huge, clawed paws down into the wet sand, which spurted up under the force. It dragged itself up further onto the beach, predator eyes locked onto Jaune.

Jaune, himself, kept his cool. He was combat ready, after all. All his subroutines and programming and training had readied him for this.

"Wait, training?" he asked himself. What training had he done? He had done some, he knew that. How he knew that, he had no idea, but he had certainly done—

The Fish lunged forward and swept out a paw for him. He managed to dodge back just in time for the razor-sharp claws to avoid him—the tips of those claws scraped against his aura, promising a deadly demise if he didn't start focusing.

He spared one last glance for the civilians. The people on the cliffside who had been celebrating his victory now followed their good senses and ran away as quickly as possible. The officer and the pair had also just gotten up to the top.

"Alright pal," he said to the Fish, fists raised, "let's see what you got."

As if to answer the challenge, the Fish snarled and roared again with its acrid deep-sea breath. It raised a great paw into the air and brought it crashing down straight onto Jaune. He did not move.

Instead, he raised both hands above his head and braced his legs. The Grimm's paw collided with him, but his arms held, even if they shook. The sand under his feet sunk and threatened to make him lose his balance, but he did not fold.

"Rah!" He shoved the Fish's paw up and away from him, giving him the opening he wanted to rush forward as the confused monster wondered how it hadn't flatted the puny prey.

Jaune jumped directly up to the thing's mouth. He planted a foot right on the tip of one spear-like tooth jutting up from the bottom jaw. He leapt from that up onto the thing's face.

He slipped immediately, for the rough bone was still covered in sea water. Before he skidded off, he droved his hands finger-first into the Fish's rock-hard skull. He had barely moments however, before the claws that it had raised came down to crush him.

Jaune threw himself up to the Fish's right eye, his arm reared back. This close, the glowing red eye illuminated him in a bath of scarlet light. And this close, the emotion held in that eye really hit him; it hit him like a physical force, like a wave from a hurricane. It was hate, a primal and ultimate hate, that drove the Fish. A desire to do nothing but destroy.

"Take this!" Jaune shouted as he drove his fist right into that big, bulbous eye. He mustered his strong aura to empower the blow, so his knuckles cracked straight through the eye's tough outer layer and into the mushy interior. He buried his arm in shoulder deep.

The Fish howled again. But this was not the menacing and mean roar of a monster on the attack, not again. This was the pained screech of a creature suddenly thrown into a pool of utter and excruciating pain.

It slammed its paws down onto the beach again and again, throwing up mounds of sand in its agony. It rocked its blubbery body to and fro and gnashed its huge teeth together, chomping on nothing.

When the Fish raked a claw across its face to slash the menace that had blinded it, Jaune had already jumped off again. He landed, stumbled and ingloriously fell face-first into the sand. Whenever he had been taught, he had evidently not been taught the proper landing techniques for this situation.

He hauled himself up to his feet and looked down with disgust and the red gloop that covered his arm. Then he looked back to the creature, thinking fast about how to end this. He could possibly go for the second eye, but getting through the defense of a huge, livid and spasming monster was not exactly the greatest plan.

What else? He didn't even have a weapon, let alone one big enough to use on the creature. He looked around desperately to see if perhaps some clumsy hunter had left their bazooka behind during their beach picnic, or maybe there was a buildings-sized spear he could use to impale the—

Jaune looked up at the lighthouse. Its roof was sturdy steel and stretched up into an imposing point.

He sprinted for the cliff, jumped and climbed. He thrusted his hands into the tough, rocky dirt along the cliffside, gouging out precarious grips for himself as he scrambled up.

The Fish, meanwhile, calmed down slightly from its pain. Just slightly enough to seek out its vicious little opponent. Its big blubbery abdomen heaved deeply as it looked for its quarry. Then it saw Jaune, barely halfway up the cliffside but climbing quickly.

Just how he would make the lighthouse a weapon was a difficult question that he intended to answer when he got up there. For now, however, he would focus on climbing as the huge Grimm screamed at him, dug its claws in the beach and dragged itself towards him while also bucking its whole blubbery body forward.

Jaune didn't look behind him. That would be a bad idea, like looking down when you're crossing a rickety bridge over a deep chasm.

He focused on climbing; he dug a hand into the dirt, threw himself up a yard, dug another hand in, threw himself up, so and so forth. He reached the top of the cliff after what seemed like an eternity.

The Fish crashed its huge claws into the cliff, knocking down a spew of rocks, clumps of dirt and almost Jaune himself. He teetered back on one foot, waving his hands to precariously keep his balance.

He looked back. He saw the massive Grimm with its huge maw wide open; its gullet was a black and bottomless pit. It screeched up at him, demanding to gulp him down like a sardine.

"No, no, no," Jaune muttered to himself as he leaned forward. He planted his other foot down onto the grass, reached out and grabbed the fence. He threw himself over it and sprinted for the lighthouse just a stone's throw away.

The Fish reached a claw up and gouged out a huge chunk of earth from the cliff. It buried its great paws into the cliff and reared up, pulling itself up the side of the cliff, which was only twice as tall as it was long.

Jaune leapt up onto the lighthouse wall. A bold red paint covered its steel panels, which now Jaune drove his hands into. He treated his hands like spears and drove them into the steel, making a handhold for himself by which he could throw himself further up the lighthouse.

A huge paw reached up and over the cliff's edge. The Fish roared triumphantly as it dragged itself up over the ledge. Its blubbery body rippled from the effort, and it breathed heavily from pain and anger and exertion.

Red goop oozed out from its right eye, which no longer shone as brightly as it had before. Its left eye, however, contained a hate of even more pure intensity now. It was personal.

"Over here!" Jaune called at it. "Come on you big stupid fish!"

The Fish roared at him, locking on with its one good eye. It smashed both its claws down into the ground and threw itself forward, stampeding for the light house.

"Oh I hope this works," Jaune said, still not knowing exactly what his own plan was but going with the flow. He stopped thinking about the future (i.e. about sixty seconds or so from then) and chucked himself higher up along the lighthouse. He had scaled it so quickly, in fact, that he managed to jump up the rest of the way and grip onto the railing surrounding the great big light. He hauled himself up and set his feet down on the catwalk.

And then he was face-to-face with none other than the officer who had so recently been suspicious of his squirrel-befriending activity.

"Oh this was a bad idea," Jaune admitted.

"How'd you get up here?" the officer asked, face red and panting.

"How'd you get up here?"

"I ran up to get a vantage point!"

"I wish you hadn't."

The entire lighthouse shook as the sea-Grimm smashed headfirst into the tower with a mean grunt.

The officer's eyes shot wide open, and he wobbled on his feet. "What was that?"

"The Fish."

"The Fish?"

"The big Fish."

The Fish reared back its head with a mighty roar and chomped down into the steel lighthouse, gouging out big red panels. It raised its mighty claws up and crashed them against the tower, seeking to bring it all down to get a chance at its prey.

"Did you lead that thing here!?"

"It seemed like a good idea at the time."

The lighthouse shook.

"Well it wasn't!"

Jaune looked back over the edge and down at his giant foe. It tore a chunk out of the lighthouse with another bite. The entire tower now listed precariously; its big steel beams creaked and bent.

"Alright, changing the plan to make it a better plan!"

"What?"

"Let's hope I can land on my feet!" He grabbed the officer by the shoulder and hauled him close, then picked him bridal style. The man started hollering and squirming.

"Just what the hell are you—"

"Think of it as landing and not falling," Jaune said. "And hang on tight."

"What the—"

Jaune jumped up onto the lighthouse roof. Here the polished steel gleamed under the cloudy sky. Its pointy peak held a promise that Jaune really hoped it would keep.

"You ready?"

"No!"

"Great!"

The lighthouse trembled again and creaked dangerously, becoming the Leaning Tower of Boggindorf as the Fish smashed his forehead against its ruined foundation.

"Here we go!" Jaune shouted as he jumped up off the lighthouse. He flipped back through the air, holding on tight to the screaming sheriff, whose pure terror and yelling attracted the Fish's attention as they sored back over it.

Jaune twirled as they cleared the cliffside and rocketed back down to the beach. He twisted and managed to angle himself to land feet-first.

And feet-first he did land. He smashed down into the sand, with the officer in his arms no worse for wear.

"Oh great!" Jaune said. "That actually worked!"

"What the…" The officer was shell-shocked, jittered and frankly not having a good time.

Jaune, meanwhile, was waist-deep in the sand. "You should run," he said as he let the officer roll out of his arms and onto the beach. "It's me it wants."

"I, wuh—"

The Fish roared from above, and the ground shuddered as it thumped its big bulky body around.

"Oh gods—"

"Get going!" Jaune said as he pulled himself out of the sand. "I'll lead it away."

The officer didn't need any more convincing. He ran as fast as his legs could carry him along the cliffside and away. Jaune, meanwhile, ran further out the beach toward the water, waving his arms and shouting.

The Fish glared down over the cliff. Its one good eye glowed with wroth and hate. The monster dragged itself over the ledge, flopping down to the beach again with a heavy slam! Sand spewed up in a cloud as the huge thing landed. It roared and rolled over, searching for Jaune.

The lighthouse creaked and swayed.

"Come on…" Jaune muttered. His admittedly kinda stupid plan was now put to the test.

The Fish stopped writhing and glared at its prey. It bucked forward, hauling itself along with its big nasty claws.

"Come on…"

The lighthouse leaned toward the beach.

The Fish advanced as Jaune backpedaled.

"Come on…"

The lighthouse shuddered and screeched as its steel beams and rivets finally collapsed and broke.

The Fish roared as Jaune's feet sank into wet sand and water lapped at his ankles.

"Come on!"

The lighthouse suddenly began to fall completely.

The Fish opened its maw and prepared to leap toward Jaune. It was so close again that its noxious breath buffeted him.

"Come on already!"

The lighthouse smashed down on the ground with a tremendous thwoom! Much of the tower careened down from the cliff and slid point-first for the Fish.

The Grimm spasmed as an entire building acted like a multi-ton spear and pierced its tough, blubbery hide. The lighthouse impaled the Fish and plunged deep into its flesh, giving it barely enough time to let out one last angry, pained roar.

The echoes of that roar rumbled from its gullet as the whole creature shuddered. Its muscles were taut, and for just a moment, it was unclear if Jaune's plan had been a complete success.

Then the creature's muscles lapsed. The hate in its eyes dissipated along with its life. The thing let out one last breath and went limp. Just like that, different spots around the body began to sizzle and smoke, getting blown away in the salty breeze.

Jaune sighed. His knees suddenly felt weaker than the mental resolve of a five-year-old in a haunted house. He stumbled forward and welcomed the silly laziness of falling face-first down into the sand.

He sighed again. "Oh man…" He looked up at the Fish. It smoked and dissolved at a faster and faster rate. A part of him recognized that this was a pretty big accomplishment, and maybe he should be proud of himself? But all that he could really register at the moment was pure relief.

He laid his face right into the sand, appreciating how the coarse grains felt against his face. He laid there for a little bit like that. Time passed, and he enjoyed the moment.

"Oh gods! Oh no, it got him!" It was none other than the officer himself who sounded full of panic. "Not him! He saved us all!" The man's heavy boots thumped against the sand as he neared. "Oh poor kid…"

Jaune pulled his head up. "Hey there!"

"Gah!" The officer kicked him right in the face.

"Ow."

"Oh no kid I'm so sorry!"

"Why'd you kick me?"

"Why'd you scare me?"

"I didn't scare you."

"You were laying here like a corpse!"

"How else am I supposed to lay here?"

"Sheesh…" the officer shook his head. "What are you even doing?"

"I was just resting."

"Guess I can't knock you for that," the officer said with a long sigh, running a hand down his beard. "That was the scariest damn thing I been through since, well… ever. I think."

"That was the scariest thing ever for me, too," Jaune said.

"Yeah, in all of the forty years that I can remember."

"Yeah, in all of the four days that I can remember."

"What?"

"Hm?"

"Four days?"

"Nothing."

"Well… you want to get up off the ground now?"

"Sure!"

Jaune grabbed the officer's hand and pulled himself up.

"The name's Chad, Chad Mulligan," the officer told him. "Normally, I'd ask you to call me sheriff, but you can call me Mulligan."

"Hello Mulligan!" Jaune said as he shook the man's hand. Mulligan liked to shake tightly, so Jaune squeezed in return.

Mulligan grit his teeth and stopped himself from wincing.

"My name is Streetlamp Salad!" Jaune said.

"Yeah? Well… guess hunters come up with all sorts of weird names these days. And hey, my half-sister named her daughter Khaleesi, after that girl from the show."

"What show?"

"Anyway," Mulligan continued, "let's get you up to the town." He pointed at the Fish, quickly dissolving and falling apart. "I'm sure everybody will want to meet the hero who saved our bacon."

"Hero?" Jaune said the word, and it left a pleasant aftertaste in his mouth. It made him smile. He liked it.

It was a clear and crisp Atlas night. So far from any major cities, the black sky was full of a smattering of stars that glowed fiercely along with the broken moon.

Through a vast forest a dark river flowed, cutting through the rocky soil. At a clearing beside its bank, an old man had set down a rickety wooden chair that had to be at least as old as he was. He held a fishing rod and relaxed, looking up at the stars and dozing off, not caring much if anything bit. He never really came out here to catch fish anyhow. He just liked to sit there, bundled up in his cozy wool jacket.

He tugged off his comfy old orange fisher's hat and scratched at his balding head.

Suddenly, his fishing line tugged. "Ohhhh…" The old man smiled and gripped the rod, pleasantly surprised that he might get something big.

The fishing line snapped instantly, for whatever it had gotten snagged on was too big for the little line to put up with for even a second.

"Ah darn…" he muttered, reeling back the line and figuring that he would call it a night.

Bubbles floated up and popped at the top of the slow-moving water. The old man squinted. Something poked out the water. For a second, he thought it was a piece of driftwood or a fish. Something kept rising. He though it might be a beaver. It kept coming. It was big.

The old man stood up warily as what looked like a big, dark, humanoid figure stepped up from the freezing water. Its "skin" looked slick and metallic under the dim light of the shattered moon and the scattered stars.

It turned its red eyes to look at the old man. It had no discernible face.

He yelped and hopped out of his chair, filled with a primal fear that a humanoid Grimm had just marched out from the river.

But then the figure's eyes flashed and became white. "Clothes," it said in a dark and rumbly voice. "I require clothes." It didn't sound like a normal person, but a person calling through a phone from some faraway place with not-so-great reception.

"Clothes?" the old man asked. He puffed up his chest. "A hundred lien and I'll give you a full outfit."

"No."

"Fifty lien!"

"No."

"Twenty lien!"

"No."

"Ten lien!"

"No."

"A stick of gum!"

"No."

"A coupon for MartWal!"

"No."

"Give me a piggyback ride up to my cabin and help me move some firewood!"

"Agreed."

"Oh yeah?" The old man's eyes lit up. "I didn't really expect you to say yes! I've been meaning to move those old logs for days but my darn nephew went to the next town over for a job installing new pipes around and—"

The Pursuer picked the old man up and slung him over his shoulder.

"—he said he'd be back by today but he hasn't yet! Anyway, you gotta take that road there and we'll be back to my place in no time!"

"Understood."

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