Emerald found Jaune, sitting on the front steps of the Wood Mill Inn, after running all over town for him. He had a very intense look as he stared at the dirt road in front of him. "I'm guess you figured it out too," Emerald said taking a seat next to him.
"Hard not to when someone you thought was dead is walking around like nothing ever happened."
"So, Lily is alive. At least something good has come out of this."
"Yeah, I'm relieved. I came on a little strong, though, so I don't think we'll be getting another free night."
"Due to the circumstances, I'll forgive you," Emerald said, putting her elbows on the next stair back in a more relaxed position. "Did we really just go back in time a day?"
"Not just a day," Jaune said. "I checked my scroll and while it still can't make calls the clock still works and it a little more than three hours ahead of what the time is here. I just didn't notice before."
"What does that mean?"
"It means that this isn't the first time we've jumped back."
"When could we have done that?"
"It could have been when we were sleeping but my bet is that it happened right when we first entered town. I remember thinking I saw the sunlight shift, but it happened so quickly that I thought I was just tried after our hike."
"Now that you mention it, I do remember thinking that it got a little hotter when we showed up and the town was a little more active than it should have been for that late in the day."
"I was thinking the same thing. It's because we hit the mid-day rush despite us getting here around 3:00 according to our timeline. Which means this reset isn't just a onetime thing. It's probably been going on for a while, if that term even means anything anymore."
"The merchant I talked to said it was May 12th, so I have to agree."
"Great," Jaune spat, "so we weren't just sent back a day, we were sent back months."
"So, what we're going to be forced to repeat today for the rest of our lives. Can we even age while we're here?"
"About that," Jaune said holding out his arm for Emerald to see, "see those bruises?"
They were barely noticeable and if Jaune hadn't pointed them out Emerald would have missed them completely. She could even see them shrinking slightly as his aura healed him, that part Jaune didn't have to learn, but it would probably go a lot faster if he could direct it. "Yeah, what about them?"
"They're from our spar earlier." Emerald gave him a look that told him that was obvious. "A spar that we haven't technically had yet," Jaune clarified.
Emerald's eyes widened. "Your injuries carried over."
"Exactly, and it's not just that. I used quite a bit of chalk earlier, but when I looked at it just now, the length I used was still gone. On the other hand, the blood on my pajamas," Emerald snorted thinking about that stupid onesies, "was gone, so it's not so much that we went back in time, but the town around us did."
"So, it's only the town that's affected, not us or even the stuff we brought with us."
"Looks like it."
"Don't see how that helps us get out of this situation, though. That just means that not only are we going to have to repeat the same day, but we're going to grow old and wrinkly while we do it."
"But it does help us. It means that we're outside all of this. We can change things."
"Still, it doesn't matter if it just gets reset in the end."
"But does it have to?" Jaune said, smiling. "Every movie I've ever seen about time travel never has the characters reliving a perfectly average day. If we're stuck in a loop then today must be significant, and I don't know about you but I can only think of one event."
"I'm concerned that you're putting your faith in movies. Do you really think that preventing Lily's death with fix it?"
Jaune shrugged his shoulders. "Don't know but I want to save Lily anyways. I failed her once. I'm not failing her again."
"I guess we better go retrieve our weapons, then." Emerald said ready to reunite with her babies.
"What do you mean you don't have them!" Emerald growled at the patrolman, who not too long ago, or never depending on your perception, had questioned her about Lily's murder.
"I'm telling you we haven't confiscated any weapons especially any weapons of huntsmen quality."
"You do have them you just don't remember taking them so go look!"
"I did," the patrolman shouted back. "We did not take your weapons so please leave the premise miss, or I'll have to detain you. Emerald's eyes grew even redder, but she did what she was told and left, slamming the door when she did."
"Looks like that theory is out the window. Apparently, our things are affected." Jaune said, sadden by the loss of his sword but nowhere near the full-blown rage Emerald was in.
"No way, that's bullshit! The guy was probably just too lazy to go and check. Well, I'll show him. I'm going to go get them myself." Applying her semblance, Emerald went back into the patrol center.
She came out around twenty minutes later completely downtrodden. "Didn't find them?" Jaune asked just to make sure Emerald was still able to communicate.
"No, I checked everywhere but they weren't there. Do you know how much those are going to cost to replace?"
"Relax, we both know who you're going to make fit the bill, and you're lucky. My weapon was a family heirloom so it can't be replaced." Jaune didn't even want to think what his dad would say if he found out.
Emerald huffed knowing there was no way Jaune had enough money to buy her another weapon. She knew it had been a bad idea to call the patrol. "Putting aside my monetary loss, we've lost the only way to defend ourselves. That doesn't bode well for hunting down a killer."
"Don't you know hand-to-hand?" Jaune asked sounding hopeful.
"I do, but only the basics."
"Could've fooled me when you were beating me around the forest," Jaune said, feeling his pride take a hit.
"That just because you couldn't put up your aura. If you had, I probably would have had a lot harder time bringing you down. A pickpocket needs to be quick and agile. Getting into a straight forward brawl means I screwed up."
"And I'm only left with my etches, which take too long to use in combat. We've been severely handicapped."
"You're telling me," Emerald huffed. "If this is how it's always going to be then I would like to reconsider our partnership."
"You came out here on your own!" Jaune harshly reminded her. Not that he wasn't grateful. If she hadn't come along, he probably still be in shock from Lily's death, and then died of a heart attack when she revived. "If we can't fight the killer head on then we'll just have to ambush it. We know when and where it's going to strike so it shouldn't be too hard. My etches will be a little more effective then, and your semblance will be a huge help."
"I don't know how comfortable I am leaving my safety in your hands. Also, my semblance might work on humans and grimm, but who knows if they'll work on these other creatures. There's no telling if their minds work even remotely similar to ours."
"You'll be fine," Jaune said taking joy in ignoring one of Emerald fears for once. "Besides, I'll be there to protect you."
"My hero," She said, rolling her eyes.
The Wood Mill Inn was dark and quiet as Emerald watched Lily clean the reception desk. The illusion Emerald had placed on her would keep her from noticing anything suspicious. A good thing too because without it there would be no way to hid the colorful etches Jaune was crouched over, ready to make the last stroke on any of them at a moment's notice. She really hoped he knew what he was doing because besides him the only thing Emerald could defend herself with was a knife she had stolen from the small kitchen in back.
The time was approaching an hour before midnight and it looked like Lily was about ready to call it a night, so her killer would have to be here soon. The thought that the two of them booking a room had somehow initiated the attack had crossed Emerald's mind, but having more people in the inn should have only deterred the attack. Maybe the killer hadn't known she and Jaune had been there or just didn't care.
Minutes ticked by in the dead silence. In such a small town, there wasn't even any background noise. Emerald didn't know how Lily could put up with it. She would have gone insane—she was going insane. It didn't matter who the killer was at this point she just wanted it to show up.
As if answering her cries, the front door opened. What walked in was not an abnormal creature of impossible description or an unholy beast of destruction, but a normal middle aged man. Granted he looked furious, but if this was their killer than all these perceptions had been completely unnecessary. Emerald was pretty sure Jaune could beat him down with his untrained aura if he had to.
A quick glance to Jaune showed he was just as confused as she was. When Emerald motioned if they should do something, Jaune shook his head, wanting to wait it out just to make sure they weren't missing something. Emerald knew the important of not running in without all the facts so she stayed where she was. They would have to move soon, however, the strain of keeping her illusion up for so long, and now having to add a second person, was getting to her.
It was like watching a scene form a movie. The man, who looked oddly familiar to Emerald, walked to the reception desk in measured steps. "Mr. Tan, hello," Lily said. She sounded nervous. "What brings you out here?"
"Aren't you supposed to say, 'how can I help you?' That's what you say to all you other guests. Why am I getting special treatment?"
"I'm sorry," Lily backpedaled, "how can I help you?"
"You can start by sending a message to that bastard," the man seethed.
"I don't know who you're talking about."
"I'm not here to play games. You can play dumb if you want, it doesn't matter. My life's already over. As long as he gets the message and knows that it's me that sent it, everything will be fine." The chill to his voice and the knowledge of the future caused Emerald to jump into action. The man pull a knife out from the back of his pants, that had been covered by his shirt, and quickly slashed towards Lily neck. Emerald was nearly there about ready to stop the same events from playing out, but just before she made it, Jaune came out of nowhere and tackled the man to the floor. Lily screamed and Emerald quickly picked up the drop knife while Jaune and the would-be assailant struggled on the floor.
Jaune was younger, bigger and stronger so he was quickly able to pin the man's hands behind his head. "What the hell do you think you're doing!" Jaune shouted.
"Get the fuck off me! You don't know anything," the man yelled back.
"I know I'm stopping you from killing a sweet girl."
"Sweet? She ain't nothing but a money grubbing bitch! She'd sell her mother for a couple of bucks. Probably already has."
While Jaune and the mysterious man were arguing, Emerald went over to Lily who was rightfully frightened after her attempted murder and the sudden appearance of two strangers. "Calm down, we're not here to hurt you."
"Who are you people, and why did he just try to kill me?"
"That's exactly what we want to know, and hopefully we'll all get the answers we're looking for."
The man beneath Jaune had run out of breath after his brief struggle and was now panting for air, but before Jaune could interrogate him, the front door to the inn was kicked open as two men appeared, guns raised. "This is the Village patrol! Nobody move!"
Everyone froze, not so much because of the order itself but because of their sudden arrival. The two men scanned the room and Jaune felt a little awkward as they landed on him pinning a man, who was probably more than twice his age. One of the patrolmen stepped forward. "Lily what's going on here? We got an anonymous call that something was going on."
Lily tried to turn her head in every direction at once probably trying to figure it out the same thing. "Mr. Tan came in here and started yelling at me, and then he pulled a knife. He would have tried to kill me if these two haven't come out of nowhere and saved me."
"And why were you two here?" The man said while his partner came to relieve Jaune of Mr. Tan.
"We were hoping to book a room when we walked in on this," Emerald covered, looking a lot paler than normal.
"Didn't the two of you come to the patrol center earlier today talking nonsense about some weapons?"
Sweat trickled down Jaune's face, and Emerald's eye twitched. "We're really sorry about that," Emerald said in her fake childlike tone, "A friend had told us that they were there, but he had lied. Our weapons aren't actually getting here till tomorrow so that's why we need to get a room."
The patrolman looked at her suspiciously, but didn't push as Mr. Tan was brought to him in cuffs. "And you, why'd you attack Lily?" Mr. Tan stood there silently, just glaring at Lily. "Just can't make it easy for us, fine. Lock him up in the patrol center, I'll stay back and ask the questions."
The man's partner took Mr. Tan away while the Patrolman interviewed all three of them. They were pretty basic questions and pretty soon he let too seemingly more concerned with the paperwork this was going to cause than the attempted murder, but Jaune guessed from his point of view nobody got hurt so there wasn't any real danger. If only he knew.
"Thank you, for saving me," Lily said, still a little shaken. "I'm sorry for telling you to leave earlier."
"Don't be," Jaune said recalling their pervious interact, in this timeline at least, "I was out of line. I was going through some things at that moment."
"Well, I'm still sorry. You said the two of you needed a room tonight? How about I give you one, free of charge, as a thank you."
"Sold!" Emerald said way too quickly.
"Then let me go get your key," she smiled.
Once she left the table, Emerald leaned over to Jaune. "Clean up you're etches," she hissed. "Keeping that illusion on four people at once nearly killed me."
For the first time Jaune noticed that Emerald was panting slightly. "Is it really that bad?"
"Considering I had already been using it on Lily to cover your sorry ass, and then had to suddenly place it on three extra people, yes, it hurts like hell. Now hurry up." Felling his self-preservation kick in, Jaune moved to get some water and a cloth.
"Where'd Jaune go?" Lily asked when she came back with the room keys.
"He just had to use the bathroom. I'm sure he'll be back soon," Emerald said trying to fight through her massive headache. Unbeknownst to Lily, Jaune was only a few feet away furious scrubbing the chalk lines out of the floor. "Lily, I know it might be tough to talk about, but why do you think that man would attack you."
"I already told the patrolman that I have no idea. I barley know him, the only reason I even know is name is because his wife compla—talks about him so often." The slip of the tongue was obvious. "Listen, I'm sorry I should be here to entrain you, but after everything that's happen, I'm really tried, and I have to work in the morning, so I'm going to bed. Please tell Jaune that I really am thankful." Lily pulled away from Emerald as fast as she could and went into the backroom.
"She's hiding something," Emerald whisper just in case Lily could still hear her.
"Cut her a break," Jaune said getting up from the now spotless floor, "she was almost killed. She's not thinking straight."
"Precisely why it was so damning. She accidently let the truth slip out. If only we could have questioned Mr. Tan."
"I refuse to believe Lily is doing anything wrong. She's so nice and sweet. She's let us stay here for free twice now."
"You know how they saw the quiet ones are always the kinkiest. Well something I've learn is the nice ones are always the likeliest to stab you in the back."
"Now everyone grew up in your environment. Regular people don't try to get a one-up on everyone they meet. They can be nice just for the sake of being nice."
"Believe what you want, what she's hiding isn't what I'm concerned about. That anonymous phone call those patrolmen got."
"What about it?"
"They didn't get one the last time this happen," Emerald said taping her finger on the table.
"Isn't that just because we were here. Someone must have heard the scuffle," Jaune suggested.
"Really? In the brief moment between you pinning Mr. Tan to the ground and the patrolmen showing, someone was able to contact the patrol center, tell them what was going on and the patrolman were able to run over here? I don't think so."
"The call could have happened sooner. They could have seen Mr. Tan acting suspicious and reported it."
"Then it would have happened last time, which we know didn't because you were the one to find her body."
"Then maybe it was something we did. The butterfly effect, you know. Arguing with the patrolman about the weapons could have put them on edge making it more likely they would take an anonymous call more seriously."
"Possibly," Emerald concede, "but I'm not willing to drop my guard so easily."
"So, what do you think?" Jaune said throwing his hands up. "That there's something else out there that is making changes to the loop?"
"You're acting like that's impossible, but we have no idea how this loop works, and there also the fact that three huntsmen came here before us, none of which we've been able to find."
"Are you suggesting that one of them could be screwing with us?"
"I'm just saying that it's not impossible, and it doesn't have to be them. What's to stop one of the otherworld monsters from being able to mess with the loop, or it's the thing doing it in the first place. This might all just be a trap."
Jaune couldn't argue that. There was no telling what the previous visitors had done when they came here. "Let's not jump to conclusions. If there really is something messing with us, we'll deal with it then. For now, all we can do is wait and hope that preventing Lily's murder was the way out."
Jaune and Emerald were out training the next day, which just meant Jaune getting punched over and over aging, waiting for the possible reset. Emerald had told Jaune they should do this every day for him to master his aura as soon as possible, but even Jaune could tell that was only half the truth.
Emerald had gotten pretty wound up last night. Jaune didn't think she caught a moment of sleep with her brain being piled high with endless theories. She was mainly here to calm herself down, beating him down probably gave her a sense of control. Personally, Jaune thought she was getting too paranoid even for this situation. Just because anything could happen didn't mean it would. The unknown world did follow rules, as flimsily and illogical as they might be. Odd how he had broken down over Lily's death and not over the potential lifetime spent repeating the same day.
Still, this wasn't something he could really fight her on. Paranoia might just save their lives. If anything, Jaune should be more cautious, but from the few jobs he had gone on, he had learned that you couldn't really predict what you were going to face, at least not at his level. Worrying about every possible variable would only lead them astray and, eventually, to a dead end.
Emerald landed a particular brutal blow to Jaune's gut and sent him falling to his knees. Aura proficiently was still a distant dream. "We should call it here," Emerald said pulling Jaune up, "isn't it about time for the day to reset?"
Jaune checked his scroll. "About an hour although hopefully there won't be one at all." The two walked back to town, Jaune taking them passed the place where he had made that garden in Lily's honor. Just like their weapons, it was gone. Strange since the flower he picked from it had still been in his hand when the reset occurred. Could what gets reset and what isn't have to do with physical contact to them?
They arrived in town and just loiter the street until a couple second after 11:43 when the town shifted. Jaune hadn't seen this the first time and it really was as strange as Emerald implied. It was like someone had snapped their fingers and everything teleported but the motion continued.
"Looks like stopping Lily's murder didn't do anything," Emerald observed.
"Admittedly, it was long shot, but I didn't have any other ideas," Jaune said.
"What we going to do now? We're back a square one."
Jaune scanned the town taking in the familiar sight and the familiar actions. "We do the same thing we did last time, investigate and look for clues." Jaune turned to look towards the edge of the village and saw the path that he and Emerald used to originally get here. "Wait here for a second, I'm going to go look at something."
"Look at what exactly?" Emerald asked, following him as he made his way to the town walls.
"I want to see how far this effect goes."
"The effect of what?"
"The time loop. It only just occurred to me, but this loop can't cover the entire world. We never would have been able to get here if we kept repeating May 12th. I would still be a home and you'd still be Vale. Time has to be moving forward somewhere."
"But what if coming to Bury did this? We could have been shoved into our own little timeline where we're forced to repeat the same day, but time for anyone who didn't come here moves normally."
"It might be, but my book said that alternate dimensions don't exist, something about gods not needed to fight if they did, and I'm pretty sure timelines separate from the main one would count. If you right, though, then we can just head over to Vale and I'll ask three-month younger Roman for help. If I explain how I'm his appreciate from the future and show him the book he gave me, I'm sure he'll help me out."
Emerald stopped in her tracks and stared at Jaune. "Roman? Do you mean Roman Torchwick?" Her hands balled into fist and her eyes seemed to glow red. "The man whose crime spree has made the police force double their efforts over these last few months, and nearly forced me into starvation because of it. Are you saying he's your boss?"
"Have I not mentioned that…" Jaune didn't even think of explaining how none of that was his fault or how Roman wasn't technicality his boss. Jaune had seven sisters, he could see where this was going, so instead of subjected himself to Emerald's unjustified rage, he ran as fast as he could.
In speed Emerald was far superior to him, but with the adrenaline pumping through him, and the suddenness at which he took off he had probably had gotten large lead. He didn't dare look back to confirm that, however.
Jaune only ran until his body forced him to stop, which wasn't that far. He really need to work on his cardio. Emerald had said aura would help with that, but that didn't help him now. Luckily a quick glace backwards showed that he had managed to escape Emerald although it was very possible she just hadn't crested that mound. Jaune would just have to take her fury if that was the case, but she probably hadn't bothered wasting the energy. She could just wait for him to come back.
Taking a few more moment to catch his breath, Jaune removed his hands from his knees and stood up to look just how far he ran. It came as a big surprise when the saw the town of Bury not behind him but in front of him. It would only be short jog to enter the village.
There was no way he had backtracked. He had been following the road in a straight line this whole time. He rubbed his eyes just to make sure he was hallucinating from exhaustion, but the village was still there.
There was a long moment of utter confusion, Jaune trying to reconcile just how bad at directions he was, but soon enough his rational, or maybe irrational in this case, mind kicked in. If whatever was doing this was messing with time then it could probably mess with space, too. Jaune walked away from the village once again, making sure to not make a single turn. About three minutes in the Bury disappeared from behind him and two minutes later he could see it in front of him. He walked over the same terrain as he had to leave and pretty soon he was at the town.
At least he had gotten his answer. The world outside Bury was probably working as intended, but that didn't matter if he couldn't get there. It was hard to tell at exactly what point he was turned around like he had walked into a mirror, but it couldn't be too far from the village. Good news, whatever was doing this was definitely inside the town. Bad news, he and Emerald were trapped until they could figure it out which was pretty bad, but it explained why the huntsmen had never come back. They had been trapped too although where they were now was anyone's guess.
Jaune walked back into the town ready to discuss his findings with Emerald bracing himself if she was still angry, which was likely, but surprising she wasn't there. That wasn't a good sign. He hadn't been gone that long. Had she really chased him down and gotten caught in the same spatial reflection he had. It was possible they could have missed each other because of that. Jaune waited at the town entrance, expecting Emerald to come racing into sight. Minutes passed but no green-haired thief appeared.
It was panic time. Had crossing that barrier done something to Emerald? Could she have disappeared like the garden and their weapons when he crossed? Had something gotten to her in the few minutes she was out of sight?
Jaune ran around town without any real destination. It was all coming back, Lily's corpse, the blood-soaked floor of the inn, the red hands that couldn't save her. Why was he such an idiot? He had gotten complacent after seeing his mistakes reversed. Emerald had been right to be worried. There was no telling what else this place held. He was the caretaker here, damn it! He should have been the one stressing over all the unnatural occurrences, taken the lead instead of waiting for things to happen. Now it was happing all over again, but this time there wouldn't be a do over.
Jaune was barley paying attention to where he was going, so it was inevitable he would run into someone. Thankfully, he was able to catch the women before she fell. "I'm so sorry!" Jaune apologized.
"Please don't worry about it, dear." The women Jaune had run into radiate that mature kind of beauty and power that had his heart racing. "I know how you younger folks always need to be running around or they don't feel like they're getting anywhere. Why are you in such a rush if I might ask?"
"I'm looking for someone—a girl, green hair, dark skin. Have you seen her?"
"You mean like the one behind you?"
"Huh," Jaune said spinning around. Emerald was there alright looking just as pissed as he remembered, but something was a little off. There was some sadness mixed in with it. Before he could even process what that meant, Emerald was in front of him and slapped him hard enough to make his head spin.
"Oh my," the women said bringing a hand to her mouth, "I think I should get going. I hope you two can work whatever has come between you out."
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you about Roman," Jaune said holding out his arm in a poor attempted to keep his partner away. "I wasn't trying to keep it a secret. I just didn't think it mattered."
Emerald looked confused. "You think this is about him! Where have you been?" she screamed.
Now it was Jaune's turn to be confused. "Where have I been? I've been running around the town worried that you were in danger or dead!" Jaune yelled. 'Where have you been."
"Everywhere trying to solve this problem since you abandon me."
"Abandon you? I wasn't gone that long."
"You been missing for two days!" The utter shock must have shown on Jaune's face because Emerald seemed to calm down considerably grabbing his wrist and pulling him forward. "We'll talk about this as we walk. I can't lose that woman."
"Who is she?"
"Mr. Tan's wife."
"Why are we following her?"
"Because I haven't just been sitting around doing noting these last few days. It wasn't easy but I think I've found the root to this problem."
"Emerald I don't understand, we've only been separated for maybe an hour." Jaune went on to explain how he how they couldn't actually leave the town and what he had done when he came back to find her not there.
"That's not at all what happened from my perspective. To me it looked like you vanished the second you got too far for Bury. I thought you were dead." She sounded the closest to crying Jaune had heard her. Granted that was much, but it made Jaune flush at the thought of Emerald having even the slightest of care for him.
"I'm sorry I worried you," Jaune said as he thought about why there was such a discrepancy of time between them. "You know I didn't really think of this, but don't you think it's odd that we were only sent back a few hours the first time we entered the town."
"I haven't really giving it much though. Isn't it just because that's when the loop starts and ends."
"That's part of it, but why did entering Bury cause the loop to start over. Maybe when I went through that barrier the same thing happened. What if I was kicked into the next run of the loop, instantly, while you had to experience the whole thing, and since I went through the barrier twice, that would explain how you were able to go through two entire loops while I only felt a couple of minutes go by.
"I guess that makes senses. You wouldn't have noticed any change since you enter the barrier pretty much the same time the loop reset anyways, but why did it have to wait to send you back out. Surly it could have spit you back out immediately. Who cares if you appear right as the loop resets."
"Obviously, whatever is causing this does, but why didn't you just follow me when you saw me disappear? We would have both come back at the same time if you did, and neither of would have realized that an entire loop had passed."
Emerald rolled her eyes. "Survival rule number one, if someone appears to get disengaged into nothing, don't go to the spot where it happened."
"I feel so cared for." Jaune said. "So, what were you up to the entire time I was, apparently, nonexistent."
"A lot," Emerald replied, "in fact, I'm hoping Miss. Tan here will lead us to the end game."
"How'd you figure that?"
"Do I have a story for you."
Emerald was shaking. She had just watch her partner be wiped from existence. Looks like whatever was causing this loop also didn't want them to leave. Things couldn't be any worse. She was stuck in and unknown town without a weapon and without a plan. Whatever information Jaune had was lost with him. Emerald might just have to get used to living the same day for the rest of her life.
She loitered around the town entrance hoping that Jaune would somehow just walk back into existence and announce that he had found a way out. It didn't happen, of course, and Emerald was left to fend for herself. It was nothing unusual, but this situation was far outside her expertise. Also, she had kind of like having the dumb knight around. Everything he was thinking was plastered on his face, and in a world filled with betrayal that was a comforting characteristic.
It was while she was thinking of a way to escape she noticed a Mr. Tan walking down the street. When he attacked Lily, Emerald had thought she recognized him, but now she could remember. He had been that guy who she had nearly pickpocketed the pervious loop. He had the same pissed off look as last time.
Not having any other real lead, Emerald decide to follow the future killer. Nothing came out of stopping Lily's murder, but that didn't change the original theory. If there was anyone in this town that would be at the center of this loop it would be him.
Mr. Tan lead them to the lumber mill which was surprisingly quiet. All the workers must have been on lunch break or something and from the way Mr. Tan was nervously looking around that was planned. He was obviously not supposed to be here as he darted around the place as fast as a man in his fifties could. Their journey took them to the foreman's office that she had broken into the first day here. Emerald found it strange that Mr. Tan would come here, and found it even more strange when he produced a key from his pocket that opened the foreman's door. He seemed to get angry when it worked.
They both enter the familiar space and Emerald put an illusion on him. She had been able to tail him without one so far, but this cluttered room was too small and tight for him not to notice someone coming in after him. He went behind the foreman's desk and used the same key to try to open the desk drawers. It didn't work, so Mr. Tan switched to a more physical approach.
At this point, Emerald had no idea what to think. Mr. Tan had been the one to break into the foreman's office only a little bit before she had done the same but why? What could possibly be here that he would want?
It took an agonizingly long time, but Mt. Tan finally forced his way into the bottom drawer and pulled out the leger. Emerald didn't think she had ever seen anyone as angry as him when he looked inside. "I knew it," he growled, knuckles turning white from how hard he was griping the book.
Emerald didn't have any time to think about why Mr. Tan cared about misappropriated money because at that moment a chuck of wood, that could be found everywhere around here, was thrown through the only window the office had. It was so sudden that Emerald jumped at the sound, bumping into a stack of paper and knocking it over.
This caught the attention of Mr. Tan who turned away from the property destruction. "Who's there!" He yelled staring directly at Emerald. She was still inviable to him so there was a chance that Mr. Tan would just assume the paper had somehow been knocked over by the wood chuck, but any chance Emerald had of escaping was quickly killed when the foreman barged into his office after hearing the window being smashed.
Emerald quickly put an illusion on him too, and luckily the foreman was too focused on the other intruder to notice a tint of green disappear from his vision. "Geoff!" The foreman yelled. "What are you doing here? I told you never to step foot in here again."
"Of course, you didn't! You didn't want me to find out you've been sleeping with my wife!"
"For the last time, I've haven't been doing anything with her. You're delusional."
"Really because I just found the proof right her!" Geoff said slapping the leger on the desk.
"I don't see how the company records prove anything," the foreman said although he looked considerably more worried than he did a second ago. "I've had enough of this. I've put up with your accusations and death threats long enough. I'm calling the village patrol."
"I won't let you!" Geoff screamed, hitting the desk so hard that he actually punched a hole through it. It must have hurt but Geoff didn't seem to think about it as his eyes widen and he pulled his hand back out. It was only when the shiny piece of metal came with it that Emerald realized that he had punched right into top drawer, where she knew the foreman kept his gun. "What do you know looks like my threat did get to you."
"Now Geoff, calm down. We can talk about this. There's no reason to for things to get out of hand." The foreman's words wouldn't do a thing. Emerald could see it in Geoff's eyes. That man wasn't going to stop for anything, and as if things couldn't get any worse, Emerald was trapped between the two.
Mr. Tan leveled the gun and fired, aiming for the foreman stomach. It hit Emerald in the arm and while it didn't break her aura it stung enough that her illusion shattered. Understandably, the two men were shocked at the sudden appearance of a teenage girl between them, and Emerald used that moment to push past the foreman and run away.
She had to spent the rest of her time in hiding after that since the town descended into chaos after the news spread. Rumors and misinformation spread like wildfire so Emerald could never be sure what exactly happened after she ran, but the hunt for a green-haired girl that had run away from the crime was enough to keep her in hiding until the next reset.
Along with having to avoid the village patrol another, unexpected, problem became known. Emerald was hungry and thirsty. Not a new feeling to be sure, but whenever it had happened before the solution was always to eat or drink something. Apparently, Bury made even the most common knowledge unreliable. Emerald could eat and drink all she wanted. She could taste and her appetite would be satisfied, but no matter what she did she couldn't get rid of the gnawing sensation and she never gained any energy. Emerald couldn't even begin to come up with an answer as to why this was happing, but the consequences were easy to see. If she couldn't get out of here soon, she would die of dehydration.
Suddenly that lifetime she could spend trying to get out of here was cut down significantly. It hadn't been an issue before since most of what she had eaten so far came from what Jaune brought, which apparently acted like it was supposed to, but that had been lost along with him.
Emerald was really starting to regret getting involved with him. If he wasn't already dead she would have killed him. Should have just stay on street. At least that life was simple.
One thing she did gain from having to hide was a lot of time to think which ended up just making more questions, like who had broken the foreman's window and alerted him? That certainly hadn't happened the first time through. Emerald had almost been taken in by Jaune's insistence that the phone call was just a slight change due to something they did, but now it was clear. Someone else was here, and they weren't happy with their interference. More precisely the two incidents were trying to keep her away from Geoff Tan. Whatever was going on he was involved somehow.
When the reset happened, Emerald got to work. She went around and asked everyone she saw about Mr. Tan. Most of the people she talked though thought she was weird at best and dangerous at worst but Emerald couldn't find it ins herself to care about their opinions. If things didn't work out, they would forget about it anyways. Over the day, the information she got wasn't much but it was enough. Geoff had been married for the past twenty-four year, him and his wife were on rocky terms at the moment, and he owned a clock and watch shop, but nobody would give her the location of his shop or house, probably because they thought she might hurt him, but Bury wasn't that big. She could find it on her own, which she would have to do given how suspicious owing a clock shop was given the time loop, but first she wanted to talk to the man himself.
Searching the entire town would be a pain and would only make her interest more obvious to whatever was trying to stop her, so she settled with stalking out where she knew he would be.
Back in the Wood Mill Inn, Emerald waited for Mr. Tan so show up and murder Lily. Why he was going after this girl when his beef was with the lumber mill foreman was something Emerald still didn't understand, but it was just another question she could ask him.
The time of Lily's murder approached, then came, then passed. Mr. Tan never appeared. Another play by that mysterious someone, or a result of him hearing about someone investigating him? It didn't matter the fact was Emerald wasn't going to be able to ask him anything, but he wasn't the only one who might have answers.
Emerald eyes landed on the girl whose murder brought this whole mess to their attention in the first place as she walked into backroom for the night.
Emerald waited until morning to start questioning Lily, knowing she would be more on guard if someone just should up in the middle of the night. Emerald posed as a normal customer and asked for a room. Lily was so excited for a customer that she sat down with Emerald to talk and served her an unfulfilling breakfast. How Emerald wished her stomach would be stratified by this food, but alas it wasn't meant to be.
"By the way is it just you? We only have the standard two bedroom rooms so I hope that'll be okay."
"Yeah, that's fine," Emerald replied. Jaune was gone after all. "I'm here on a business meeting with Geoff Tan. Do you know him?"
Lily got very quiet. "Not really, he likes to keep to himself."
Emerald sighed. Looks like she would need to push a little harder. "I've heard he's having trouble with his wife. Do you know anything about that?"
"I wouldn't," Lily said getting a little defensive.
Someone kicked the front door and the man himself came walking in, looking just as crazed as he had against the foreman. "You little bitch! I know what you've done. I'm going to kill you!"
Lily fell out of her chair, panicked. "Mr. Tan wh-what do you mean?"
"Don't play dumb with me," He said walking closer. "I'm going to make you pay for what you did."
Lily was nearly crying at this point and tried to back away but Mr. Tan was coming in fast. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Lily repeated. Her pleas didn't do anything to stop and when he got close enough he pulled out a knife ready to start stabbing.
Lily screamed and put her arms over her face. "Alright, I think that's enough," Emerald said. Mr. Tan disappeared as she stopped the illusion. "Now, are you ready to tell me the truth?" Emerald asked the very shaken girl.
"I already told you—" Lily stopped when Emerald glared out her making it clear she wouldn't accept any lies. "Mrs. Tan and the foreman of the lumber mill are having an affair," She admitted. "You have to understand we weren't doing anything wrong."
"And what was it that wasn't wrong?"
Lily titled her head to the ground like she was about to tell about her most embarrassing secret. "This inn isn't doing too well. We hardly have and guest and even with the lack of staff we're having trouble staying afloat. My mom's actually in Vale right now trying to negotiate with a bank. When the affair stated, Mrs. Tan and the foreman needed a place where they could…you know, so we made an agreement. My mom and I would provide a room and kept everything a secret as long as they paid for it."
Everything was starting to make senses. Well, not in the sense that it should've driven Mr. Tan to killing her just for her participation, but that guy was obviously already very unstable. "Okay, I have two more question and then I promise I'll leave you alone and you'll never have to see me again. What does Mr. Tan wife look like and what's the price to rent a room for the night?"
If it was even possible Lily managed to look even more guilty. "I have a picture. I thought I could use it as blackmail if things ever got really bad and a room here costs 83.79 lien."
Bingo.
"Emerald! That was cruel."
"Stop being a wuss. I needed to get that information and Lily wasn't going to give it unless I scared her a little."
The two of them had followed Mrs. Tan to her husband's store. A sign that read "Time keeps on ticking" was hung outside. Emerald and Jaune waited around a few minutes before going inside. When enough time passed for them not to appear suspicious, they walked inside to see the couple chatting. When Mrs. Tan saw them enter, being the only customers in the store, she put her and on her husband's shoulder and whispered, "we'll talk about this later. You're worried about nothing." She kissed him on the cheek and left.
"What can I do you for?" Mr. Tan asked trying to sound polite, but even a child could tell he was furious." The store itself had clocks covering every wall in every style imaginable. Every single one of them was running.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.
Emerald wondered if it was listening to this noise every day that made Mr. Tan go crazy. "My friend and I are here looking for a very unique piece. Possible one that can do a little more than tell time."
"I don't know where you think you are, but this is a clock store. They do one thing and one thing only. If you want something more go buy a scroll or a computer."
"That's a shame."
"If you're not here to buy anything then I'm going to have to ask you to leave. I have an errand to run and I really need to do it soon." Mr. Tan practically pushed them out of the store, closed it, and walked off in what was probably to go raid the foreman's office. At least, he thought he did all of those things.
"Your semblance is just too good," Jaune said to Emerald as they stood in the store not having moved and inch.
"That along with everything else about me. Now, let's get going whatever is causing this loop must be somewhere in here."
"If it is than this is going to feel really anticlimactic," Jaune commented as they spotted some stairs in the back.
"For you maybe, but I've been working two entire days for this."
"But, I'm supposed to be the one solving these problems. You're my assistant."
"Then you shouldn't have disappeared for two days."
Jaune could only mutter about life being unfair as they walked down to the basement of the store. It was a workshop of some kind with metal and spring tossed round on two different tables, but all that came second to what was in the center of the room.
"I'll told you it would be here," Emerald gloated.
"We don't know if that's it!" Jaune said trying his best to act like he had contributed.
"Seriously?" Emerald said rolling her eyes.
In the center of the room was a pocket watch suspended from the ceiling with a long chain. It was swinging side to side like the pendulum to some bigger clock. The clock itself was bright gold with a black and silver clock face. Instead of the normal set of hands this clock had four hands in total. One pair was stuck firmly at 11:43 while the other pair was keeping track of the regular time.
Jaune had to admit defeat. "Fine, this is it, but how are we going to stop it?" Jaune pulled out his notebook to see if he could find anything similar to this, but Emerald, not one for subtly, walked up and smashed.
Suddenly it was as if the room had turned into a wind tunnel. Nothing was actually being thrown around or moved but it sure felt like it should. Jaune had to clutch his note to his face just to stop the feeling of his eyes being pressed back into his skull. All the while a voice could be heard throughout the room.
"It's not enough. It's not enough. They haven't paid nearly enough. Ruined my life. They need to pay more. I want a repeat. Do it again and again and again and again and again. I won't let them get away with this! Daisy why? I loved you! How could you do this to me. Again and again and again and again. I will make this work I promise."
Then as quickly as everything began it stopped. Jaune pulled the notebook away from his face to see the new state of the workshop. Most things hadn't changed, but there was now a thick layer of dust and a badly decomposed body in the corner, making Jaune jump when he saw it. It was more bone than flesh but from the tattered cloths it was wearing it had clearly been Mr. Tan. The swinging pocket watch was gone. Not even the smashed bits remained.
"Emerald! What is wrong with you? Going up and breaking the magical item is not the default strategy. We could have died, or gotten caught in a time paradox, or been force to relive the loop forever with no way out, or—I don't even know what could have happened to us!"
"Listen, I am sick, tired and hungry! I wasn't just going to stand around and wait for you to calculate the speed of its swing."
"I still have a few granola bars if you want them," Jaune said reaching into his backpack. He nearly lost his hand for that.
After Jaune reprimanded Emerald for nearly using his hand as emergency food, the two of them went back upstairs to see the town. It wasn't good. Bury was desolate. Everything was overgrown with plants and the bodies of residents were laying in the street. "What's going on?" Jaune asked as he looked at the horrid scene. "We fixed it."
"We did, but not for them."
"Lily!" Jaune remembered. He ran to the Wood Mill Inn as fast as his legs would carry him. The door literally fell over when he opened in it, and inside was a cold dark place. Plants had started to grow through the floorboard, dust covered every inch of the place and Lily body was behind the reception desk. Like all the others she was more of a skeleton than anything else, but Jaune could still make out where Geoff Tan had slit her neck. Jaune couldn't find it in himself to cry. He just stood there looking at the person he couldn't save, and never would have been able to.
"Looks like we found our missing huntsmen," Emerald sighed having come in some time after him. Jaune looked to the common area and saw two more corpses one was bent over a table and the other was leaned against a wall. They weren't as decomposed as the other bodies, which made Jaune want to vomit, but the complex weapon by each of them made it clear who they were.
"They weren't able to break the loop," Emerald said walking right up to one of them and examining the weapon. "I'm guessing the third one is somewhere else. Poor guys they walked in here without a clue. They must have been terrified when they were faced with something that wasn't grimm."
"Did they starve to death like what was happing to you?"
"Possibly but whatever was trying to stop me could have gotten to them." Emerald reached into the huntsmen's pocket and pulled out a stack of lien.
"You're going to steal from them?"
"We need the money."
Jaune didn't like it but he had to admit Emerald was right. "Fine, but only the lien. I don't want to take anything that might be personal."
"Deal." Emerald and Jaune spent a couple more hours in the town. Emerald was the only one who looted anything, Jaune couldn't bring himself to do it. It was only when they searched the patrol center and found their weapons there that Jaune could feel ever the slightest bit happy that they chose to stay. He just wanted to go back to Vale and forget this ever happened.
There was some small talk between them about what they thought they should do but they eventually settled on doing nothing. Vale or Mistral would send someone eventually and they could discover it for themselves. Whatever had tried to hurt Emerald hadn't done anything since they broke the watch, so it probably wasn't around anymore or died when the watch broke.
As they prepared to leave Jaune went over to where he had made a garden in Lily's honor. Just like their weapons the garden was now back, growing steadily. Feeling like he needed to do one last thing Jaune got a small log from the lumber mill and placed it in front of the garden writing "Rest and peace, Bury" in white chalk. In the end, they hadn't saved anyone probably had never been able to in the first place. Bury was dead long before they got here.
Jaune would never forget what happen here. It was sad but perhaps this was a lesson best learned early. Not even heroes can do the impossible, but you still had to keep moving on, and that's just want he planned to do. The world wasn't going to stand still because of this. The next incident was just around the corner, and this time he'd be prepared to face it.
A mysterious figure watched the pair of outsiders leave his town. The figure sat on a nearly collapsed balcony eating a can of fruit. "Jaune and Emerald," the figure said to himself, "they sure were an interesting pair. Sucks that they ended the loop, but no harm no foul. It was an amazing experience, and I was running out of food anyways. But what to do now? From how those two were talking it seems like the old man isn't the only one who stumbled onto something like this. I wonder how far is goes." The figure toss the can of fruit and stood up catching the backsides of the travelers right before they were out of sight. "I hope we see each other again. I'd love to compare notes."
Excerpt from the book (Jaune's notes)
The Bury Clock didn't so much as send us back in time but put a filter over the current time. We might have been repeating the same day but it wasn't technically real. Whatever happed the first time around is the one that stuck. It's why that even when we prevented Geoff Tan from activing the Bury Clock the loop still repeated. It would seem once activated the clock has to be physically destroyed to stop its effect. It was also the reason that you could starve to death despite eating. It's because you weren't really eating anything. Imagine this, a person eats and apple and then the day resets. They eat the same apple, and their mind tells them they have eaten the apple, but in the "real" time the apple has already been eaten, so it doesn't actually exist, only the illusion of it.
The other thing of note about the Bury Clock is how it resets things. It appears to remove anything that wasn't part of the original cycle and sticks it in the "real" timeline, but it doesn't do this to anything that could cause change in the time loop, people or anything in their immediate possession. How it can determine this is unknown. Corpses and items outside the changer possession are removed and can't be recovered until the loop is broken at which point anything that was changed inside the loop will appear in the "real" timeline. For example, if you build something, with martial that you brought in from outside the loop, it would disappear on the next reset, but when the Bury Clock is destroyed the structure would still exist where you had built it as if it had been made outside the loop.
An: I thought about breaking this chapter into two, and looking back I probably should have just so I could have gotten it out at a more reasonable time, but I didn't think it would be a good idea to have Jaune and Emerald wander around Bury for another two chapters.
Honestly because of it being basically two chapters in one I'm not overly happy with it. Especially with how I handled all of the effects of the time loop, like the barrier that kept Jaune from leaving. I definitely should have introduced a lot of this stuff earlier, and I thought about cutting some of it out just to keep from rambling, but I ended up decided that it was better to have it in and it be a little rough than not having it explained at all. It got a little cluttered and confusing because of that, but maybe that's to the stories benefit since not everything is supposed to be super clear.
Anyways, let me know what you think with the completion of the Bury arc. New chapter isn't really part of an arc and it more of a transition chapter but we're going to be moving into more familiar territory so I hope everyone's excited.