Disclaimer: I hereby declare that Roosterteeth studios RWBY production crew may freely use any ideas, characters, or events written in this story free of charge and without any threat of lawsuit for any production, though it would be preferable to inform me of the use of the idea if used.

Ch 43

"Come on!" shouted Lan whose wooden knives lashed out at Tenguro, who grunted and batted away the blows with his wooden sword. He missed a few strikes however, which nicked his arms.

The two were currently sparring in a bamboo forest clearing using wooden weapons. They had just finished their morning warmups and had decided to spar.

"That's it" said Lan, who caught a downward swing Tenguro attempted between his two knives "You're finally starting to hit back! You're definitely improving!"

Tenguro gave Lan a wry smile, as both boys knew that Lan was holding back a good deal.

"A few more training sessions and you may be able to help me test out some new weapon prototypes" said Lan, with a gleam in his eye.

Tenguro shivered in response to this and loosened his grip. Taking advantage of that, Lan knocked the sword out of Tenguro's hands with a flick of his wrists, and brought his wooden knives to Tenguro's neck.

"Don't lose focus" said Lan, with a smile on his face as he pulled back.

"Mmmm" grunted Tenguro as he walked over to the tree that his sword had been embedded in and pulled it out.

"I can tell you're trying a lot harder today" said Lan, who sat down and pulled a bento box out of his backpack which was propped up against a large tree. "Something happen last night?"

"N-no, n-nothing" stuttered Tenguro, who was staring intently at the ground. "J-just felt like I wanted to get s-stronger is all."

"Well, that's just wonderful!" said Lan, who sat down on a rock, pried Ignis off the bento box, and began eating his lunch. "In that case, I've got a special treat for you today."

Lan placed his fingers in his mouth and let out a sharp whistle. With a flurry, Edel and George shot out of two pockets of Lan's backpack and assembled in combat position around Ignis who was happily lying on his back while rolling around in something particularly foul. Edel and George stared down at him, stared briefly at each other, and then proceeded to kick and peck Ignis who stopped rolling around, looked at them, and then leapt into his combat position.

"Today you will be sparring with these little ones" said Lan "Be careful, they're tough ones."

In response to this Ignis glowed red and barked, Edel's wings began to glow with the dust that was powdering them, and George lifted himself into the air with his tail while chittering.

"Ok," said Tenguro nervously while he assumed a basic kendo position. "Come at me."

"Alright" said Lan, raising his arm "begi—"

At that moment a loud shriek echoed across the clearing.

Pausing, Lan looked up and then proceeded to climb a tree by leaping from branch to branch. Tenguro soon followed after him by wing. Arriving at the top of the tree, the two began surveying the surrounding area and soon found the source of the shriek. A large Nevermore had perched itself on top of a cliff a little ways away.

"Oh man," said Lan who eyed the creature. "How'd a Grimm of that level get this close to the village?"

He then motioned for Tenguro to descend with him. Arriving back on the ground, Lan thought for a moment, then turned to Tenguro who had just arrived at his side.

"Wait here, I need to go report this to the village." Said Lan

"What? Why don't we take it now? It hasn't noticed us yet so we could ambush it pretty easily." Said Tenguro

"No, that's too risky" said Lan "You're not ready." He then mumbled "besides I left the equipment I'd need to take down a Grimm that size back home."

Tenguro didn't hear the second part though, only fixating on Lan's first words: You're not ready. The words that the village children had said to him the night before began to fill his mind once again.

"I'll be back in a little bit" said Lan, who didn't notice Tenguro's slightly sunken features and turned in the direction of the village "Try not to do anything that would draw its attention."

Lan then dashed into the woods, flitting from tree to tree like an azure shadow and was soon out of sight.

Tenguro stood there for a few moments, his mind racing and his breath shallow. He was afraid again. Afraid that he would lose the first friend that he had ever gained. Afraid of his own lack of ability. Afraid that what the children had said to him the previous night was true. He felt his arms and head go numb for a moment, and then he turned his head in the direction of the Nevermore.

"Got to be better" he thought, taking a step forward and spreading his wings. "Got to prove myself to everyone."

He flew over to Lan's backpack and rummaged through it until he found a katana and a tanto knife. He then began flying in the direction of the nevermore, quietly gliding under the trees for cover. The little ones watched him leave, and looked at each other before diving into Lan's backpack.

After gliding for around a minute while bobbing and weaving to avoid the trees, Tenguro arrived at the foot of the cliff. Staring up at the Nevermore above him he activated his semblance began forming hand signs and chanting mantras. The Nevermore twitched for a moment and then looked in Tenguro's direction. The boy's heart leapt to his throat in surprise, but he continued to form the mantras. A few seconds later the Grimm turned its head away and the boy let out a relived sigh.

Its vision was clouded by Tenguro's mantra of illusion, hiding him from its sight. The boy then spread his wings and flew upwards towards the creature. Once he reached the top of the cliff he carefully made his way around the creature until he was behind it. The Nevermore began looking around, seemingly confused. It could sense negative emotions nearby but was unable to find its source.

Tenguro flew close to the Nevermore and took note of the back of its neck. He then took a deep breath, and released his mantra to reach for his blades. Released from the illusion Nevermore shuddered as its vision cleared. It was then alerted to the sound of scraping steel behind it. Spreading its wings, it quickly turned its whole body around to face the sound. Tenguro darted forwards to pierce the back of the Nevermore's neck before it turned around, but due to its turning motion the boy ended up stabbing it in the side of the neck.

The Nevermore shrieked and began thrashing about, trying to get Tenguro off. The boy hung onto the tanto and katana embedded in the Grimm's hide, all the while trying to shove them in deeper. To his horror he found that his weapons hadn't pierced very deeply at all, and were slowly coming loose. The boy didn't have the strength necessary to pierce the Grimm's hide, and had only managed to scratch it.

With a violent lurch, the Nevermore flew into the sky while flailing back and forth. And during the low point of one of these motions, Tenguro's blades finally came loose and he was thrown downwards, crashing through tree branches before finally slamming into ground. Tenguro had never trained himself to improve the durability of his aura or how to use it to defend himself more efficiently, so this blow completely depleted what little the young boy had. Moaning in pain Tenguro rolled onto his stomach, wincing from the pain in his wings. They had absorbed a good portion of the shock from falling and as a result had protected his vitals, however this resulted in them getting fractured in quite a few places. He coughed and slowly pushed himself before looking up into the sky…to see the Nevermore diving down towards him.

Alarmed, he attempted to run away, but as he attempted to take a step forward pain exploded in his right foot, causing him to fall to his knees. He looked back to stare at the Nevermore that was rapidly approaching. His mind went blank for a moment as he realized there was nothing more he could do, a single tear trickled down the right side of his face and as he remembered his mother, his father, and Lan, a single word popped into his head: "Sorry", he said and he closed his eyes.

'Boom'

The nearby forest shook as an explosion sounded.

"I'm dead" thought Tenguro, he let out a sigh. Then he paused. "Wait…how can I sigh if I'm dead?"

He opened his eyes and looked up, the Nevermore was gone, however the tops of the trees above him were singed and the trees to the left looked as though something large had just crashed through them. He then heard an enraged screech to his left and he turned to see the Nevermore picking itself up from where it had crashed. Its attention was no longer on him, in part due to the large number of trees that were now between them obscuring its view but mostly due to the fact that it had found a greater threat. It was looking up at the top of a cliff to Tenguro's right. Following its gaze, Tenguro saw at the top of the cliff a red wolf pup with a black monkey sitting on its back and a white eagle circling above them. It was the little ones, and mounted on Ignis's back was a crossbow which had a slingshot pouch instead of the normal bowstring. George pulled back on the pouch and locked it into place, while Edel removed one of Lan's new custom Dust explosives from a pouch around her neck and placed it into the slingshot pouch.

The Nevermore screeched and shot back into the air, however before it cleared the tree line another explosive crashed into its face, causing it to crash down into the ground, its wing frozen to its body. George raised its arms above its head while whooping in victory as Ignis took the opportunity to lower his torso and pee on the grass.

Tenguro looked up in amazement. "Wow" he mumbled "Lan really trained his pets."

A screech snapped him out of his surprised stupor. The Nevermore had taken to the air again and had avoided an explosive that George had fired to intercept it. The Nevermore then positioned itself in the air and fired a barrage of feathers at the little ones. George chittered and slapped Ignis on the butt while firing the newly loaded explosive at the hail of incoming feathers. The explosion diverted enough feathers for Ignis and Edel to begin running and flying in the opposite direction while darting left and right to avoid being impaled.

"Need to help" thought Tenguro, who put his shaking hands together and began to form hand signs while muttering mantras. The Nevermore, who was flying after the trio of little ones, suddenly found its vision clouded with little ones disappearing and reappearing from its eyesight. Shrieking in rage, it shot into the air, turned in Tenguro's direction, and began dive bombing down towards the boy. Seeing this George chittered and kicked Ignis's side, in response the little wolf spun around in mid run to allow George to point his crossbow at the Nevermore and fire. However, at that moment the Nevermore tucked in its wings and accelerated its descent, causing the explosive to miss its mark.

Alarmed, Tenguro released his Semblance and began to limp out of the Nevermore's crash zone. He had barely gone a few feet when then Nevermore crashed into the ground behind him. The shockwave slammed into him and sent him flying along with the rocks and debris. He smashed into the slide of a tree and felt his ribs crack as the air was knocked out of his lungs. He then fell to the ground, gasping for breath as his vision blurred and his ears filled with a dull ringing. With his fading vision he saw a large dark shape rise out of the ground and begin to grow larger as the ground shook beneath him. Eventually it completely obscured his view. Somewhere behind the ringing in his ears he detected a screech. Suddenly the dark shaped stopped moving, the top part of it fell to the ground, followed by the bottom. Tenguro felt the ground shake and noticed that in the place of the dark shape, a humanoid form with wings had taken its place. He felt his vision fade as it began moving towards him, and as soon as it arrived, Tenguro passed out.

Tenguro awoke to the smell of rice porridge. His whole body ached, and when he tried to move he found that his whole body had been bandaged and his wings and right leg casted.

"Hey, morning sleepyhead" came an older man's voice.

Tenguro turned his head to see a man wearing a casual kimono and hakama.

"D-dad?" said Tenguro, who rubbed his eyes.

"Yeah" said Daitenguro, "Hey son."

The two sat there is awkward silence for a few moments, the smell of the straw tatami and the warmth of sunlight filling the room.

"You're back" said Tenguro, who smiled awkwardly "I'm glad"

"Yeah" said Daitenguro, who gave a clumsy smile "My squad finished our last mission a few days ago, I'd just arrived back at the village yesterday when I saw you…uh…being reckless."

"Yeah, I…was, wasn't I?" said Tenguro.

Daitenguro felt as though he should scold his son for being so reckless, however he knew that he had never been home long enough to teach his son these things and that the fault was greatly his own. And any anger he may have had towards his son was dashed as he saw the boy's eyes filled with tears.

"I'm sorry" choked Tenguro, who began crying "I'm sorry."

"No no no, don't apologize" said Daitenguro with reserved panic. "It's just-, I don't know why you did that in the first place. Can you at least explain to me what happened?"

But Tenguro continued to cry. Daitenguro looked left and right, not knowing what to do, until he finally reached out and placed both his hands on Tenguro's chest. The two stayed like that for a good 10 minutes, until Tenguro finally stopped crying, after which Daitenguro removed the lid off a bowl of rice porridge and spoon fed his son. Once the bowl was empty, Tenguro finally spoke again.

"Where's Lan?"

"Off to the medical store" said Daitenguro "He's using master Muteki's privileges to get a jar of temples mystic dragon salve."

"What!?" said Tenguro, alarmed "But that's super expensive!"

The salve was a special medicine produced only at the dragon temple, under the guidance of Byakko's sworn brother Meng Zhang. When applied to a wounded body, it greatly accelerated the body's natural healing processes, allowing one to recover in one day what would normally take many months. Naturally such a medicine was greatly valued, and was worth more than its weight in gold. Lan had frequently had this applied to him whenever Byakko went overboard on training, so the boy was well aware of its properties.

"Yes, well the boy felt guilty that he didn't supervise you well enough as your trainer" said Daitenguro. "I guess he feels like he's failed you."

"What?! No!" said Tenguro, who tried to get up, but was forced back down by the pain and his casts. "That was all my fault, it wasn't his, I did it cause I was afraid, I didn't want to be alo—"

He stopped in alarm, and turned to look up at his father.

"It's alright son." Said Daitenguro, who gave a sad smirk "I know I haven't been the best father, hell, I was a terrible husband too. That's why your mother is always out traveling." He then bent forward and began massaging his eyes "I'm never around when either of you two need me."

The Karasu village had very strict guidelines on how its members would live. For someone of Daitenguro's status, they were expected to train in combat and espionage and regularly perform missions for the village, if not they would have all of their holdings revoked and be exiled from the village, possibly even be imprisoned or executed if they were privy to classified information.

"I was really lucky your mother was so understanding" said Daitenguro "at least I can see her now and again whenever we both happen to be in the same place or come in to check on you…But I can see that this arrangement has been the hardest on you most of all."

"…Yes" said Tenguro with a slight nod, his voice slightly choked with sadness "I really miss you both."

"Yeah…well, I'll be here for the next week at least" said Daitenguro with a smile "And hey! I heard you finally found something you want to do! Training to be a Night Raven so you can go out and see the world! That's great! That's…really really great."

"You can see how that's going" said Tenguro, who motioned to his injuries.

"You just bit off more than you could handle!" said Daitenguro, who waived his hands in a panic "Just make sure to take things at the proper pace and I'm sure you'll get there. Tell you what, during this week I'll help train you, and I'll try to make openings in my mission schedules for other training sessions… What do you say?"

Tenguro looked at his father, his silly nervous father who was renowned as one of the village's greatest warriors but at the same time looked down upon for violating some of the village's key tenants. The man who was forced to take on missions almost the entire year to pay for the fact that he had married a woman that the former family head had not approved of, but continued to produce excellent results on almost every mission he took part in. The man who had never had time for him or his mother, acquiesced to the demands of the village, but loved them both more than his own life.

"Okay" said Tenguro, smiling at his father "I…I think I'd like that."

The two stared at each other silently for a few moments, a cool wind blew through the open window, tickling the foreheads of the clumsy father and son. And then:

'Tump Tump Tump Tump Tump'

The sound of footfalls suddenly appeared starting out quiet and slowing growing into a thunderous stampede. Suddenly the door flew open and standing there out of breath was Lan who was hold several large steel paintbrushes, Trey who was holding a large jar above his head, and the little ones who were circling around the two.

"Don't worry Tenguro! I got the stuff!" shouted Lan, who quickly turned to Trey and the little ones. "Quick! Get his clothes off!"

""What?!"" shouted Tenguro and Daitenguro simultaneously.

"Got it!" shouted Trey who put down the jar and pulled out a chisel to remove casts as the little ones barked, chirped, and whooped in acknowledgment.

Daitenguro watched in shock as 4 shapes darted past him and began stripping his son who began screaming and protesting at the top of his lungs.

"Ah-Ow-No! Not the fundoshi please!"

"Don't worry bud, we got this!" said Trey, who put his chisel against on of Tenguro's wing casts and swung a hammer down on it.

"ARRRGGHHHH!" screamed Tenguro.

"Don't worry buddy!" shouted Lan, who dipped a very large and bristly looking paintbrush into the medicinal ooze. "This will fix you right up!"

"Wait." Said Daitenguro as he finally collected himself, "I'm not sure you're supposed to apply it like tha—"

"Don't worry, this is how grandpa does it with me!" shouted Lan, who raised the paintbrush into the air. "The bristles make sure the salve gets under the skin. THAT SPEEDS UP THE PROCESS!"

"Wait-" shouted Tenguro.

Before he could finish, Lan's paintbrush fell and for the next 10 minutes the house was filled with Tenguro's screams.

Hey, I know it's been a long time since I've written. But I've finally graduated college, so there's some more free time there. Although I did just sign up for a community service program that will take around 10 months to complete, but when you're almost dead inside and want to find something to do with your life, you tend not to be bothered by those kinds of things.

Anyways, there is still a small hope in my heart that this tale will be read by the RWBY development team and possibly incorporated into the story. But I know how small of a hope that really is. In fact, most of that hope died with…he who is the god-creator of the RWBY world. But hopefully those embers will be relit in the future.

I hope my writings good, but I only spend 2-3 days writing a chapter and 1 day to revise it, so I can't really say it's something I put my heart and soul into. In fact I'd say what you are reading is spiritual vomit compared to the main story.

But still, Thank you, and I hope you'll spread this story to as many people as you can.