Remnant: Angel of Death

Chapter 3: Beasts in the Woods (II)

Azrael knelt to inspect the necklace on the ground.

"So, is this the place?"

Behind him, Yang watched him with her hands on her hips.

After meditating and preparing mentally, Azrael went to get information about the incident that involved Grimm near the settlement known as Lower Cairn. A group of people going for water to the river that was partially deep into the forest was attacked by Grimm, from a group of dozens just four survivors were left. Azrael interrogated them and with patience, was able to learn more about the situation.

The group was attacked by a pack of Beowolves, a few Boarbatusks, and what he believed was a Griffon.

Currently, he was looking for evidence of fighting and presence of the Grimm he believed were there. Monsters were living beings, in most cases, with behaviors that varied from one species to another. Most of them behaved like animals but with murderous hostility towards humanity to the point of seeking its destruction and suffering. Grimm were creatures of negativity, they feed on it and are killing machines seemingly designed to kill humans; they also knew how to make humans feel fear.

Beowolves marked its territory or left their victims limbs near their territory to make humans panic or they left a trail of dismembered corpses to misguide Huntsmen; a Boarbatusk was less intelligent therefore just let its victim go as soon as they ceased moving and a Griffon attacked from the sky snatching people away to crush their heads with their beaks, slammed their prey until turning them into jelly or simply dropped them from a deadly height.

"I can hear the river, we should be pretty close," answered Azrael. "If we find survivors take them to the place we agreed on."

"Roger that, Boss."

Azrael sighed and drew the katana on his back.

"Something that no one tells you about being a Huntsmen is the nasty work."

"What do you mean? Are we going to bathe in a Beowolf blood?" questioned the blonde with her arms raised ready to fight.

"Not exactly. I know how traumatizing a brutally dismembered corpse is. I want to spare you the trauma at least for now."

Yang considered his offer but if she was going to be a Huntress then her stomach couldn't get in the way. She was fully aware of the consequences, just imagining a corpse made her stomach twist and her heart stop; Yang was a hot-headed girl, excellent fighter, someone who looked at the danger and smiled but her experience with death was zero. Azrael knew well what happened to rookies the first time they saw corpses; unless you lack emotions, even watching a dead person in a forensic context was pretty impacting for the inexperienced mind.

Besides, living beings always had an instinctual fear to death.

"I am not backing away. Who's gonna watch your back if I'm not here?"

Azrael sighed at Yang's answer, he was not going to force her into anything, she had taken the choice; all he could do now was trying to not let her get into shock once they get to the bloody scene.

"By the way, do you have more hunting lessons?" she asked with her hands behind her head.

Azrael picked the blood-soaked necklace he spotted on the ground and cleaned it with a handkerchief before putting it inside his vest. Blood was never a good sign when it came to rescue missions, if he didn't find survivors then at least he could give the families a memento from their deceased mothers, fathers and children. He was too late, if only he had a Bullhead then he could have descended as soon as he read the request, maybe if he hadn't checked on Atlas first or preparing his weapons; no, thinking about the past was going to do nothing, had he not prepared then the odds of dying would be bigger.

He had to distract himself or his anger would attract the nearby Grimm.

"I can teach you the basics."

"Great!"

That smile of hers, that was what he fought for. There was something heartwarming when you saw someone so cheerful smile.

"First of all, you must always think about the golden W's of investigation and their sibling the 'H' "

"Okay, what are them?"

"Who, what, where, when, why and how. I recommend you to apply it on every situation. If you had just met a stranger ask yourself those questions, while looking for Grimm ask yourself those questions, while making a plan-"

"Okay, okay, I got it."

Both of them advanced through the forest, she was following Azrael who seemed to be more oriented than her. She was getting bored again but tracking Grimm was part of the Huntsmen experience. Well, it was better start practicing.

"So," she said to attract his attention. "Are you a Huntsman or not?"

"I am not," he answered without taking his eyes off the front. His sword still was in his right hand so Yang had her own weapons ready to shoot.

"Then why do you hunt Grimm?"

"The thrill of the hunt and I cannot stand aside if someone needs my help."

Hmm...What else could she ask? Oh, she had the perfect thing!

"So are you single?"

"Yes, I am."

Yang it. He was focused on the mission her flirt had no effect.

Yang was about to say a flirty line for the sake of getting a reaction out of him but she stopped as soon as he raised his fist. She was not quite sure why they stopped but then she smelled it, a weird scent in the air, sweetish and intense as if a piece of raw steak was soaked with perfume. That aroma was not pleasant at all, it made her stomach shrink.

"What is that smell?" she inquired with a hand covering her face. "Smells like a rotten rat."

"Not a rodent, homonidae."

"Homi-What?"

"Hominidae, it's the taxonomic family of primates."

"So there is a dead monkey?"

"No, a human."

Yang stopped. Her heart raced and her skin got paler, her muscles refused to move despite of her brain telling the body to take a step back; her mouth got dry but drinking would make her vomit. Not just the smell but the sight was horrendous.

Azrael slapped her in the back with force to help her to snap out of the initial shock. If someone inexperienced watched how unfazed Azrael was, that someone would know that something was quite wrong with him but if it was a Huntsman or detective then they would know that Azrael was a professional.

Two bodies, a human and a faunus. Just by looking at them, Azrael knew that they had a gruesome and likely pretty painful death. Breathing in and out, he got into "detective mode" and focused solely on knowing what kill them, finding the cause of death might give him a clue about what was he facing. Extra information was never a nuisance.

He sheathed his katana to inspect.

The human's corpse missed the right arm and his guts were scattered on the soil; the intestines clearly were bitten. The blood was pretty abundant, judging by the severed limb and the open abdominal area; the man died within seconds. The trail of blood and the marks of blood-soaked hands indicated that the man tried to crawl away but gave up and laid on his back. The open belly and the tracks reminded him of a werewolf and there was only one Grimm in Remnant that was just like a werewolf; the man was killed by a Beowolf.

The faunus was harder to investigate. A female, hard to deduce given the sheer amount of physical trauma but he found the corpse's gender once he spotted her pelvis. That body was...unrecognizable. The head and thorax were smashed and turned into a fleshy jelly, the knees were severed through the use of pressure, the same happened to the waist.

He checked on Yang, she was aware of her surroundings again but was trying to not see the bodies. Azrael simply walked around looking for more clues, sets of different tracks, damaged trees, and trails on the ground gave him an idea about what happened there.

"The man was running away from a Beowulf or multiple of them but they were faster, one of them flanked him and sliced off his abdomen. He fell to the ground, a Beowulf jumped on him trying to bite his head off but the man still had fight in him."

"Shut up!"

Azrael turned around, Yang's hair shone and her eyes were red. That was not the first time he watched someone reacting explosively to a crime scene.

"Yang, I am really sorry you had to watch this but as a future Huntress you should be ready for this type of scene."

Damn it, his tone was as neutral as usual and that upset her. There was no time to get taken over by emotions; before she could say something, he grabbed her shoulders and shook her violently just to hug her afterwards; he did the same with a girl whose village was destroyed by a zombie horde.

Given her shock and fear, she returned the hug. Azrael could only caress her head and think how strong she was; there was no tears nor whimpering, all the blonde was doing was using him to calm down enough to think clearly. He felt the need to say something but talking and dealing with people were never among his strengths.

"I-I'm sorry. You warned me about this."

Azrael sighed. "It is not your fault, you were going to see something like this at some point in your career."

"Why?"

"You can say that it was an act of nature. The creatures of Grimm are not natural by any mean but they have spent so many time in the world that they have become part of its nature. The natural position a human has in this world is fighting nature itself but we are heavily outmatched. It's because of the bravery and humanity of special individuals that humans have a chance to enjoy life and show to nature that we are not giving up, Huntresses and Huntsmen are part of those individuals."

"..."

"You, Yang, will be someday the spark that others will need. You will be a fire of hope for a girl who lost her parents to the Grimm, the glimmer of bravery that a faunus will need to get their dreams completed, the flaming sword that will exterminate evil."

"Thanks."

She separated, the lack of light in her eyes made him uncomfortable but there was not time for that.

"Alright, I'm fine now," Yang said faking her usual cheerful tone. Azrael was not going to destroy her attempts to be strong.

"You can see this as some sort of field training on hunts. The bodies have given clues about what we will find."

"I can handle this, teach me."

Azrael distracted her from the bodies and made her focus on puddles of blood and tracks, in the clues in the environment. He patiently instructed her and taught her the basic. In the end, she went behind a tree in the opposite directions of the corpses but willing to hear Azrael's deductions. She needed time to process the gory image that surely was going to be the protagonist of her nightmares.

"The man who was being chased by the Beowolves ran from them but got his stomach cut by one of them. He fell to the ground and tried to protect himself from them but a powerful bite severed his arm. Somehow, he managed to ran few meters before collapsing, the Beowolves attacked eating his guts but stopped suddenly likely to pursuit another prey. He fought bravely, he gave more than his best."

The man should have been dead after getting feasted upon by the Grimm but he managed to try to crawl away but died shortly. Now, with the faunus.

"It is hard to know what happened with her. The injury of her upper body suggest a big sized Grimm or at least an exceptionally strong one, the footsteps are deformed by many more, impossible to know for certain; my assumption, Goliath or Beringel. Her legs and waist were cut through sheer pressure, a Death Stalker's doing there is no doubt. She was attacked by a Death Stalker and a strong Grimm."

While looking for more clues, he noticed something in the man and faunus' fingers, small golden rings.

The silence made Yang worry, she turned around just to see the cold man crouching and staring at the bodies. She ignored the corpses as much as she could and got closer to touch his shoulder. He was...praying in other language.

"Let's keep moving," he said coldly. "We must exterminate the monsters."

"Are you alright?" she asked unsure.

"I am. Let's go."

.

.

.

Azrael and Yang had kept looking for clues and survivors but there was not success, all they found was dozens of dead people and a container that managed to hover calmly. The poor blonde emptied her stomach on the ground and he could not judge her, if he were a rookie he would have vomited too.

The place was a bloody carnival of death.

People impaled on the trees on the other side of the river, with half of their bodies missing, feasted upon, crushed. The smell was enough to shrink stomachs and lower the pressure; Azrael barely scowled under his helmet due to the nauseating smell, he considered his senses very important but sometimes he hated to resist such odors.

He looked around searching for destroyed trees but nothing suggested the presence of a Goliath and Beringels just lived in the continent of Anima. If there were none of them then what killed the faunus?

No, he could not discard the possibility. Heading back to retrieve equipment in his cabin would take hours and nothing ensured that the Grimm were not going to attack Lower Cairn once they got enough numbers, it was better to thin their forces before they get too bold.

"Where did those things go?" he asked to himself. "The Beowolves surely have a lair near."

"They have lairs?"

"Of course they have, you don't think that Grimm just wander aimlessly, don't you?"

For her first time witnessing such a gory scene, Yang was handling it like a champion. She had recovered from the initial shock and had already assimilated the death that surrounded her.

"You need to focus on the mission, once they Grimm are dead you can allow your emotions free but until then, keep them under control."

Yang remained silent for a couple of seconds before asking.

"Where is the lair?"

"That is hard to say. Do you know anything about hunting?"

"My Uncle Qrow tried to teach me once but there are not many wild animals around my house."

"I will teach you then."

Azrael walked to the container and opened it, there was clean water inside or at least he thought so. The water was really clear, you could see the bottom of the container and there were not any signs of blood; there was no time to boil it and drinking it without doing so could be dangerous.

"Werewolves act just like wolves just that they are bigger and bipedal."

"Beowolves," Yang corrected him.

Azrael noticed his mistake, it was not his fault that those creatures were so similar to werewolves. It was a fortune that they were not werewolves, there was no way to acquire holy energy on Remnant but there were blacksmiths; he should have pure silver ready just in case the necessity arises.

"Yes, Beowolves. Normally, we could follow them but this is not a Beowolf-only territory, many Grimm have come here and deformed the terrain. Finding their tracks will be nearly impossible."

"What do we do then?"

"They are intelligent, they will leave human rests to mark paths to their dens. There should be a bigger and badder one followed by another one that should be even bigger and uglier."

"So all we have to do is following the corpses?"

"You can look for black fur on the bark of the trees, if I had a scum with me I would use them as bait."

"Scum?"

"Rapists, human traffickers, murderers, you know, human scum."

"Oh, a bit extreme if you ask me."

Azrael shrugged, he used a man that poisoned his sister to ascend to the throne once. He had to draw a strzyga out of its lair and it worked perfectly that tactic probably would work again.

"I have an idea," he announced. "They are attracted to negative emotions, right?"

"Right."

"Then all I need to do is to create negativity. I have something that will do the trick."

Yang saw how he walked to the bodies and began to kick them, she was about to question his actions but a shiver made her activate his Aura. It was not something she thought, her soul sensed that something was wrong and shielded the body.

"Their souls are still here, Grimm do not eat them," informed Azrael while drawing the katana on his back.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Angering the spirits."

Given the number of people who died under violent circumstances, Azrael knew that negativity was still present, disrespecting the bodies angered their souls which should attract the Grimm.

Azrael nodded at himself once several howls echoed in the forest, he knew that his plan had proven fruitful. He was not good at measuring distances at all but he knew that the monsters were far away and probably would get to their location in few minutes.

He studied the area, the river was pretty strong and the current would be difficult to fight so crossing it was not a good idea while being chased. The area surrounding the river was free of trees; judging the number of howls, it was a pack and that was an open area, it was better to retreat to the forest and take them out one by one.

"Xiao Long, head back to the forest."

"What?"

"They are too many, we have a better chance in a closed area."

"Fine."

Azrael and Yang ran into the forest but not too far to not draw them to Lower Cairn, they were protecting them after all. It was the blonde who first saw signs of Grimm, the reports were right, they were Beowolves.

It was natural to compare them to werewolves, they were humanoid wolves with black fur and skin covered by bone plates in some areas. Their heads were covered by a bone-like mask with red markings. While standing on their hind legs, they were as big as a human and their musculature was well-developed. The bone plates were small and few letting most vital areas exposed.

Angered by all the death she witnessed, Yang launched herself at the Grimm. Propelling her with shots from Ember Celica, she landed her punch on one of the Beowolves with such a force that it was buried in the ground.

Azrael let her deal with them, the Beowolves paid more attention to her and that was quite useful. That didn't mean that the monsters were not coming to him but compared to the ones that were going to Yang they were nothing.

Azrael moved out of the way of a claw that aimed to his head by stepping to the side at the same time he did a quick downwards slash to the creature's neck. He rolled over his shoulder to avoid a pounce and slashed the belly and neck. Two Beowolves attacked at the same time from the sides, Azrael reacted changing his sword to the left hand and wielding it with a reverse grip; the hunter knelt and stab the Grimm on his left straight into the abdomen and at lightning speed he drew the pistol on his belt and shot the one on his right in the chest twice. More were coming.

Yang threw rapid punches and kicks boosted by shots from Ember Celica. Her punches collapsed thoraxes and her kicks fractured limbs, unlike Azrael who was more defensive and tried to kill with few attacks, Yang was pretty offensive and overkill with her attacks dealing as much damage as possible before delivering the finishing blow. The Beowolves tried to use their numbers to land at least one attack but Yang displaying amazing gymnastic ability and pirouetted out of the way just to propel herself with her...shotgun bracelets and beat the living hell outta them.

A small detonation attracted her attention, were Azrael was standing moments ago now there was a thick curtain of smoke. As soon as a Beowolf got close, it was shot in the neck; the ones who made into the smoke perished with a howl of pain. The smoke got thinner and Azrael got out of it rolling to the front avoiding a stomp and answering with several shots to the torso and one to the head.

"Hey, you are pretty good!" complimented Yang although yelling due to the distance between them and the constant gunshots.

Azrael put the katana back on its sheath on his back and reloaded his pistol really quickly. He answered Yang with a thumbs up before engaging the in-coming Grimm. Besides Beowolves, now Boarbatusks joined the battle, more fun for them.

Boarbatusk were large boars with four red eyes and two sets of tusks; they were, as most Grimm, black with bone plates but unlike the Beowolves, they were pretty armored with just few openings to attack.

The hunter smiled under his helmet and with his hand he made the universal sign of "come on". The boar Grimm bit its own tail and rolled towards Azrael who was forced to roll to the side. He had no idea how did those Grimm could roll so fast, those things didn't obey physical laws. Azrael had little time to think, he dropped to the side to avoid the Boarbatusk again; he quickly shot at the Beowolves that wanted a piece of him.

Azrael rolled on the ground to avoid another charge from the Boarbatusk and stood up with a jump. His bullets simply bounced off its armor.

"No one told me I'd be fighting Sonic today."

Yang jumped over a Boarbatusk and got ready to destroy it. Ember Celica propelled her downwards like a shooting star and her punch absolutely impacted like one; the Grimm literally tore apart, its body was unable to handle all of that kinetic energy. She took that short moment of peace to breathe and scan her surroundings, more Grimm were coming out of the forest. She aimed mentally and punched the air making her bracelets shoot and kill the ones that were trying to get closer. The coast was clear.

Azrael rushed to the Boarbatusk as soon as it stopped rolling around and faked taking aim, the Grimm was no fool and lowered its head to avoid getting shot at the eyes but that was what the hunter wanted. Azrael dropped to the ground once again but parallel to the beast, on its sides there was little armor and that was what killed it. Five bullets pierced its flesh and went straight into its lungs.

Yang ran to Azrael and helped him to get up.

"We are good and all but they're still coming."

"Yang," he called with his neutral tone.

"Yes?"

"Before dying I would like to say that you are so edgy that you are cutting me by just touching me."

"Well-"

"And I love you."

"What?" Yang showed her surprise on her face and that made Azrael chuckle.

"Gotcha."

"Did you just...laugh?"

"Focus."

Azrael reloaded his pistol once again, when his left hand went to the left side of his combat belt he found no magazines. That was quite a grimm situation, he thought.

Yang was getting tired and was normal considering that she took care of fifteen Beowolves in quick succession without rest. Azrael was getting tired as well but he was used to force his body beyond what he should and the adrenaline rush was helping him to not feel it too much.

"After this, that village will pay us so much that they will get bankrupted," he commented annoyed by the in-coming enemies. "Next time I will bring my assault rifle and Dust."

"What do we do?" she asked while reloading Ember Celica.

"We could flee, wait for them to disperse and take them out in small groups."

"Or...?"

"Kill as many as possible right now and call Huntsmen to clean the forest. I think that the Grimm were preparing an attack hence their numbers, they even had ways to deal with the defenses."

"That sounds too smart for Grimm to do."

"Not at all. Boarbatusk are hard and fast enough to take down the barricades, once there was a breach on the barricades the Beowulves would have get in to kill everyone. Such level of administration and thinking. Is someone commanding them?"

Yang crossed her arms and shook her head. "No, Grimm cannot be controlled."

"You are right, then another Grimm is leading them?"

"I heard that they get smarter the older they get."

"Right, I forgot that. An Alpha Beowolf or an Ulfhednar "

"What is that?"

"Remember that I said that there had to be a baddest and biggest in the Beowolves den? Well, that is what the beast is. You can just keep calling it Alpha Beowolf but I think that the distinction is necessary."

"And there's a difference?"

Both of them were just killing time while waiting for more Grimm to appear but they were taking too long maybe they were done there.

"Ulfhednar are oldest and stronger than an Alpha Beowolf, bigger and tougher. They have their bone armors all over their bodies, like a knight. I named them like that because in the place I came from there were we-people that could change into a Beowolf-like creature."

"They could turn into Beowolves? That is gross and awesome."

"I agree."

"By the way, don't you think that the forest is too silent?"

"I do. I was expecting them to arrive by now."

Azrael and Yang looked around not finding anything strange but a glowing orb on top of a pile of rocks covered by moss. Wait, what was doing a yellow orb up there?

"Rachel, thermal vision."

Azrael commanded the artificial intelligence in his helmet, the lenses changed colors and glowed. Just as Azrael said, his helmet now allowed him to see infrared light.

"Oh, that is not good," he said holstering his pistol and drawing the high-caliber revolver on the back of his combat belt.

Yang got into a fighting stance and readied to shoot. "What is it?"

"Death Stalker."

The blonde threw a punch shooting a shotgun shell towards the glowing orb. The explosion shook off the moss of the Grimm who raised its pincers threatening the humans but it trembled a little due to the dizziness caused by the force of the explosion.

Death Stalker was a scorpion-like Grimm, with the usual red eyes. Its skeleton was jet-black and covered under many layers of bone-like plates wit red markings; its pincers were really large and the size of the stinger of its tail was more than enough to make holes in human chests and Azrael knew that the bastards had venom. This Death Stalker was not a giant one but was the size of a small car.

Yang shot again with a brief war cry that he found kind of cute.

The Death Stalker jumped off the pile of ro...

The moss was destroyed by the explosion and revealed what was underneath. A Grimm elephant, that thing was a Goliath.

"Rachel. Normal vision."

With the thermal vision off he could say clearer and didn't like what he saw.

"I think that we should run," he suggested. "Really fast."

"That's a great idea," seconded Yang. She might be the kind of warrior that threw herself into the battle aggressively but even she knew that those Grimm were no joke.

And with those words, the blonde and the hunter ran for their lives.

.

.

.

Yang carried Azrael and jumped onto the branch of a tree. The branch was really high and Azrael could have never made that jump.

"Any ideas?" she asked.

"I would say 'wait for the reinforcements' but we will be dead by the time they arrive."

"We are on our own then."

"Basically, yes."

"Can you at least act scared or something?"

The blonde was a little upset at his lack of reaction, he was not scared nor excited, there was nothing and his voice also was neutral, not emotionless, just neutral.

"I am so scared! Please, save me my golden maiden, take me away from these filthy beaaaasts."

Azrael's exaggerated and sarcastic whining made her laugh aloud. "Alright, you don't get scared easily. How should we take them out?"

"The Death Stalker is problematic, its venom could destroy your Aura. We need to take it out first, its undersides are weak so we need to flip it over."

"I can do that."

"The Goliath is harder, if you can shoot through the eyes you might be able to kill it."

Azrael stood on the branch and stretched his body as if he were not on a branch at ten meters from the ground.

Yang stretched her shoulders and with a smile she declared. "Let's finish this mission with a yang."

"Cheers to that, battle maiden. Booyah!"

Yang grabbed Azrael and jumped off the tree. She used the tree to support her feet to jump towards the Death Stalker that had passed just by the tree.

The Death Stalker didn't see coming the man that tackled its tail and stabbed the its body. With Azrael embracing its tail and his katana deep into its body, the Death Stalker barely saw the blonde before she landed on its face and take hold of one of its pincers.

The beast made strange sounds and shook violently but that was not enough. Yang proceeded to shoot the pincer right into the "arm" that was thinner and weaker. The repeated shots from Ember Celica severed the limb making it hiss in agony. Azrael drew his revolver and shot the stinger, the bullets impacted at the point where the stinger joined the tail.

With its deadliest weapon disabled, Yang jumped off to the front of the monster and grabbing it by the pincer, she executed a classic judo throw that flipped the arachnid over. Azrael who had jumped off right in time, rushed and stabbed its exposed underside and mercilessly made the blade move upwards; at the same time, Yang shot twice to its face.

The creature died but they could not celebrate their victory. The rampaging Goliath from earlier had finally found them and charged at them with enormous fury.

Yang propelled herself with Ember Celica to dash to the side, Azrael simply rolled aside and jumped to avoid it.

The Goliath was basically an elephant Grimm with bone-like armor covering its face and red eyes, the rest of its body had small bone plates but was mostly uncovered but that was not a problem since its skin was strong and thick enough to the point of shrugging off a bullet from a .50 caliber sniper rifle. This beast had flattened every tree while looking for them.

"It's really fast for its size," Azrael commented.

Once, again, both of them were forced to run. Yang had already tried to use Ember Celica on the Goliath but she noticed how useless it was.

"Any ideas?!" asked she after using Ember Celica to push away the Goliath's trunk.

"If you can climb onto its face ma-"

The trunk hit Azrael's side, the impact had enough force to make him fly and crash against the nearest tree. The air was knocked out of his lungs, and he could swear that his ribs vibrated; even with his vest that was made to avoid bullet penetration and to cushion impacts, the damage was high. Ignoring his loss of air, he rolled over his shoulder to avoid getting crushed by the Grimm. The beast reduced the tree to splinters and kept advancing a few meters giving the same fate to any tree that was on its way.

Yang propelled herself with Ember Celica and got away from the Goliath after picking Azrael up.

"Are you alright?"

Azrael raised his thumb and got up as he could. He was careless and deserved getting his ass whooped.

His resources had been used to fight Grimm, getting equipment, and keeping an eye on the criminal world; gotta be prepared next time.

The hunter had never fought an elephant before but he guessed that he could apply the same logic while facing cyclops or leshei.

"Our best bet is destroying one of its legs and then the skull, focus your fire on a single knee."

Yang nodded and began shooting while Azrael checked his equipment and moved to flank the beast. Its big size and quadrupedal position made it slow while turning around, not something exaggerated but was enough to have an opening. Bad day to not have any Dust with him.

The Goliath had charged against Yang but the latter could evade without a problem. Improvising, she propelled herself to the head of the Grimm and began to unload her shotgun bracelets on its head. She then jumped off and landed next to Azrael.

"Tell me you got a plan," she said trying to find a way to kill the monster. "You got one, right?"

"It is baking. Take me to the trees."

Azrael grabbed a grenade from his vest and threw it at their feet. They both were covered by a curtain of thick smoke that was followed by a gunshot, the Goliath charged but hit nothing; confused, it looked around for its preys.

Hanging on the branch of a tree, Yang and Azrael discussed about the strategy to follow. She was holding the branch with one hand and Azrael's hand with the another one. Azrael unwillingly looked upwards to look at her face but got a nice peek at her butt; those minishorts were a little tight, not like he was complaining though.

"This the plan. I will use my last smoke bomb, you use all of your strength to break its knees, once it is on the ground I will finish it off."

"Let's do it."

Yang landed with Azrael on her arms.

Suddenly, all got quiet. The Goliath was nowhere to be seen, there was no sound of its feet touching the ground nor the vibration. Such a big creature should have not gone too far.

Something that was overlooked by Aura users was the extrasensory perception it gave when it came to fighting Grimm, it sensed their unnatural presence and turned on the alarms to act. Even normal people could feel when someone or something watched them, that was just really developed by Aura and training.

Yang's alarms alerted her with noisy sirens. She turned around just to see the beast about to hit Azrael, out of reflex, she pushed him away to receive the attack instead of him. The hit sent her flying but maneuvered on the ground to stand quickly, however, she received a tackle from the Grimm; the acceleration was minimal but was enough to make her lose her balance; the blonde instinctively took a few steps backwards to stabilize herself but the monster tackled her again but this time using all of its strength.

Azrael drew his katana, the smoke grenade was in his left hand. Watching the badass blonde turned into a missile kind of lowered his moral, without Yang his possibilities to win were scarce to not say zero. What was saving him was the relatively short distance between him and the Goliath, as soon as that thing caught speed he was dead.

"This is going to hurt."

The hunter jumped aside and rolled over his shoulder dodging its trunk by a hair breath. He pushed himself up as soon as he finished the roll and charged at the Grimm who had braked to turn around. Azrael put the grenade back in his vest, he jumped and spun to deliver a descent slash which cut through thanks to the sharpness of the katana and the extra force that the spin gave it.

Azrael rolled backwards and changed his sword of hand to draw his pistol; he aimed at the right eye but the Grimm was smart enough to tilt its head to the front and charge forward. A normal human would have not had time to dodge but Azrael had trained specifically to fight against monsters, his body was not special at all but it was at the limit of human capabilities normally, the adrenaline rush helped him to push his limits a little more.

Grimm used to get bigger and smarter the more time it survived, a Goliath usually lived for hundreds of years which gave it enough intelligence to not attack like a mindless animal but an intelligent one. It knew that Azrael was going to dodge and took countermeasures.

In the middle of rolling, Azrael was hit by a medium sized rock that knocked him over. By reflex built into his muscle memory due to several hours of training, he spun his body and pushed himself up with one hand just to roll to the side again, all of this was done without even looking at the Goliath; Azrael had just anticipated the direction of the next attack.

He holstered his pistol and changed his katana to his right hand.

Again, he rushed to the Goliath and slashed it with a spinning slash to try to do real harm but his strength was not enough for the blade to get too deep, if it weren't for the holy properties possessed by blade he doubted that he would have even done a scratch. Rolling backwards again, he created some distance between them.

"If only I had my demonic weapons or Dust."

Without Yang his best chance to win was climbing onto the Goliath's face and try to jam his katana into its brain but he was likely to be stomped if he got closer. If the beast were a Beowolf or Ursa he would stood a chance but the sheer size of the elephant-like Grimm was problematic; dodging was harder since he had to cover more distance, his blade could only cut superficially and stabbing was not an option. To make things harder, he was getting really tired and his side were the rock hit was hurting badly, the pain was not going to let him think clearer and got in the way of the pirouettes he had to do to move around faster.

With his left hand, he reached for the thigh bag and pulled out one of the syringes in it. The Goliath was studying him trying to find a strategy to finally kill him, as both of them interlocked gazes, Azrael retired the plastic that covered the needle with his thumb and spun the syringe and injected its contents into his thigh.

The intramuscular injection was going to take some minutes to have effect but his increased blood pressure due to the combat was going to help with that. He put the syringe back into its place and lamented not being able to pick up the plastic from the soil; he didn't like to contaminate the environment.

The Goliath...roared? Azrael had no idea what kind of sound elephants do but that thing just did it. That was an intimidation attempt but was ineffective against him who had faced Eldritch creatures in the past.

"How long are you going to keep me waiting?"

As if it had understood what Azrael said, the Goliath grabbed a tree with its trunk and lift it over its head.

"Damn!"

Azrael ran and quickly took cover behind another tree. His cover was reduced to splinters and he was going to get turned into a bloody jelly by the Goliath; the hunter managed to roll to his left side and use a nearby tree as a trampoline to jump with one leg and repeat the action with another tree. He turned around with his sword ready but the Goliath was not attacking. Cursing under his breath, he turned around to see whatever was behind him.

"Not good."

The hunter ducked to dodged the claw that was aiming to his head and ran away. That was not the time to face an Alpha Beowolf.

A loud gunshot and a war cry announced the presence of a a certain hot-headed brawler.

With her golden hair as blinding as the sun and her eyes as red as those of a Grimm, Yang came out from the trees and landed a punch on the Alpha Beowolf. She rolled over her shoulder to absorb the impact of her acceleration and shot Ember Celica again to impulse herself towards the Alpha Beowolf; if she was as fast and strong as a train, now she was a damn shooting star.

Her uppercut sank into the Grimm's stomach and was followed by a shot from Ember Celica, the werewolf could only beg for mercy as its mid section was relentlessly assaulted cracking every bone and turning every organ into liquid. A particularly strong uppercut blew its head off.

The Goliath had used Yang's assault on the Alpha Beowolf to take a big tree and chuck it at the blonde.

Taking advantage of her adrenaline rush and her semblance, she launched herself into the air and straight into the trajectory of the tree. Her punch broke the tree apart; before getting too close to the Grimm, she used Ember Celica to go upwards and unload a maelstrom of explosives at the Goliath.

Azrael moved aside and took cover behind a tree as that zone of the beautiful forest was transformed into a war zone.

Yang unloaded the empty shells and reloaded mid-air as she fell at high-speed. As soon as Ember Celica were reloaded, she shot to propel herself downwards adding even more speed and force to her fall. The Goliath was not fast enough to evade but it could support is weight on its hind legs and try to knock the blonde over but that didn't end well.

With a war cry, she threw a punch with all of her might.

The impact caused a powerful shockwave that tore the remnants of the trees that were not reduced to splinters or ashes. The bone-like mask covering the Goliath's shattered like glass and it slid backwards. The Grimm let out an...elephant sound of pain and fell to its knees, stunned and injured.

Yang landed on her knees and leaned on her hands, her breathing became heavy and her hair returned to normal as well as her eyes.

Azrael stumbled while trying to stand up, with his sword sheathed, he decided to draw his pistol and aim at the already damage head of the Grimm. Yang was too tired so a confrontation was out of the picture.

The Goliath surprisingly turned around and disappeared between the trees after getting away from the bombarding zone made by Yang.

"Good job, young lady," praised he while helping her to stand up.

"We didn't kill it though."

"Let it be, it now acknowledges the danger that humanity poses. It will not be around, at least not for now."

Azrael put one of her arms on his shoulder and his hand on her waist. She took a minute to recover the breath.

"Sorry for being late. More Grimm entertained me," she apologized.

"Don't worry. We must return to the village and inform about what happened here. They will take care of the corpses."

"..."

"Calm down, we have likely avenged their deaths already."

"Maybe."

"I know what you are passing through, if you want to talk about it I will listen."

"Thank you."


Hello, readers, how are you all?

In this chapter I use the world 'propel' too much. Anyone who has watched RWBY knows how Yang and other characters use their weapons to impulse by shooting (a show defying physics as always) and I simply didn't know how to describe it. I'm sorry if 'propel' was not the right word to use.

Enjoy the chapter.