Beta: ShadowMeister234
An: I'm back! Now with two college degrees and a new job.
Jaune suppressed a yawn as he made his way to the kitchen to start his morning shift. Losing three hours of sleep hadn't seemed so bad last night, but waking up so early was hitting him hard. At least he could count himself lucky that what sleep he did get went uninterrupted. Poor Yang had to deal with waking up to take her watch and then trying to go back to sleep when it was over. Yang's disdain for the middle shift was something she made very clear to him when she came to relieve him last night.
Pyrrha had left before that, but it hadn't stopped Jaune from reporting on his unexpected visitor and sharing his new theory about what was going on in Beacon. Yang seemed to agree with him on the attacks being crimes of opportunity and even gave him a little more info about Pyrrha Nikos.
Apparently, she was kind of a huntress celebrity. It explained a lot about her behavior and why she trained so late. She probably just wanted to avoid her fans gawking and had been afraid he was one of them. It didn't explain why she seemed so insistent on befriending him though. In fact, it seemed to go against Yang's opinion of Pyrrha being kind of standoffish with the rest of her classmates.
Other than those two bits of information, Yang could only say that there were rumors of Pyrrha being frequently called to the headmaster's office. Jaune could easily see that being true with how important the four-time Mistral champion was likely to be to the Vytal tournament. It was just a question of if that importance was a key factor in her being chosen as a target.
It was hard to say, and frankly, Jaune didn't have the mental capacity to think about it this early in the morning. The only thing he wanted to do was get through the breakfast rush. He could think about his next course of action when that was over with.
He opened the kitchen door. But instead of walking into a room for food preparation, it felt like he had stumbled into a battlefield. Cooking utensils were scattered everywhere, a small fire had started from the burning food left on the stove, and four of Beacon's cooks were unconscious on the floor. At least, Jaune hoped they were just unconscious. There wasn't much blood, but there were plenty of spots on their skin and clothing that had been turned transparent.
Finally, the cause of all of it, the culprit, or at least their proxy, that had been so elusive, was standing in the middle of the kitchen almost as if it had been waiting for Jaune. The figure, because that's all it really was, was pure white with a humanoid shape but lacked any details or features. Its face was just a flat oval and its arms and legs ended into stumps instead of hands and feet. It was like a seamless mannequin.
There wasn't much more time to admire it as the mannequin rose its arm in Jaune's direction. The stump at the end shot forward breaking in half to form two different stumps then both of those broke in half again to form a total of four, then eight, then sixteen, then thirty-six, and so on until Jaune was staring at a wall of needles branching from the mannequin's arm.
Jaune quickly slid behind one of the kitchen prep tables to avoid the attack and watched the needles hit the door he had just come through. Not all of the needles pierced the door but those that did caused small portions of the door to turn transparent. Once the damage was done the needles retracted in the exact opposite way they had extended, almost like a movie in rewind, until the mannequin was back with its original arm-width stump.
That didn't last long though as the mannequin held out its other arm and use both of them to attack Jaune's cover. The dividing didn't reach nearly the level as it had before, so instead of the prep table having to protect against hundreds of small points, it had to deal with several battering rams. It was a task too great for the table to handle as it was tossed aside.
Jaune vaulted over the table before it pinned him to the wall, and with his summoned sword in hand, he rushed the overextended mannequin. It tried to retract its arms, but by then Jaune was already swinging his blade at the mannequin's neck. Despite its attacks implying the mannequin being stretchy and malleable, Jaune found it anything but. His blade made it a half-inch into the mannequin's neck before getting stuck. It honestly felt like he had just tried to slash a brick wall.
Instead of wasting time trying to pull his weapon free, he let it go and watched it disappear back into the Apeiron. However, the time saved still wasn't enough to let him avoid the mannequin's arm as it swung into his side. The wind was knocked out of him and he was sent crashing into a rack filled with trays of sausages and bacon.
This was not how Jaune wanted to start his day. This thing was fast and hit like a tank. What was it even doing here? This didn't fit with the other two attacks at all. Had the culprit discovered what he was doing and was trying to get him out of the way, but then why not ambush him in his room instead of the kitchen? It could also be that the culprit was growing more confident in their abilities. Something that was easily justifiable as Jaune had to summon his shield to block another wall of needles. His shield couldn't protect all of him, though, and his aura had to take the blows to his legs and shoulders.
When the mannequin retracted its attack, Jaune took the opportunity to hide behind one of the ovens, but instead of readying a counterattack, he took out his scroll and called Emerald. For one, he could really use the help, but secondly, if the person responsible for the mannequin was nearby, Emerald might be able to get the drop on them. Of course, that was only applicable if they were directly controlling their puppet and being obvious about it which was rather unlikely.
That said, the probability didn't end up mattering because Emerald wasn't answering her scroll! Just what was she doing? Had she really gone back to sleep after her training room watch? He tried calling Yang, but she didn't answer either
While Jaune was trying his hardest not to crush his scroll, the mannequin was readying another attack that Jaune couldn't ignore. Peeking out from the side of the oven, he saw that the mannequin had moved closer telling Jaune that it was going to attack with the thicker stumps instead of the many needles. It was easy to tell that the more the mannequin split its arms the more area it covered, the further the attack could travel, and the sharper the ending points became, but not dividing as much made each individual branch much stronger.
It was pretty simple logic, but the fact the mannequin could strategize to the extent of adjusting its position and distance for its desired attack was concerning. Jaune was basically fighting a magical robot, or maybe the better word was golem. Regardless, having a creation with even basic understanding was something that really put a hole in Jaune's out-of-control amateur theory. Creating something like this was certainly outside of Jaune's own abilities. The other options were that the mannequin was more of a summon than a creation, or that it wasn't actually a golem in the first place.
As he evaded another one of the pile driver attacks he paid very close attention to the mannequin looking for any signs that a person might be inside "piloting" it. The small wound he had inflicted on the mannequin's neck was still there, but as far as he could tell, the only thing that seemed to be on the inside was more of what was on the outside.
Not exactly conclusive evidence, but the only way to know for sure was to rip the mannequin apart, something he couldn't really do with his sword although his sword wasn't his only tool. Looking at the silver lines on his arm there were six still fully visible. The other two, the ones he had used last night, were hidden under his sleeve, but he knew from checking them when he woke up that they had each crept about a quarter of the way up his forearm. He had no idea if that meant he could use them and they just wouldn't last as long or if he needed to wait until they were fully "charged". It was something to experiment with later, but for now, he still had six reliable shots.
Bracing for the pain, he fired a spear at the same time the mannequin began dividing its arms. The mannequin's branching appendages were no match for the light spear demonstrating just how powerful it was by blowing the forming wall of needles apart and punching a hole straight through the mannequin's stomach.
There wasn't any blood or gore so that removed the possibility of a person inside, but that created its own problems. Mainly that the hole in the mannequin's body didn't seem to inconvenience it in the slightest. Having witnessed its attack being destroyed, the mannequin saw that its next reasonable course of action was to prepare another one.
Grinding his teeth, Jaune fired another light spear. This time the mannequin's left shoulder was torn open, but beyond that, Jaune controlled the spear to come back around and destroy the mannequin's other shoulder. That should have been enough to detach both of the mannequin's arms and prevent any more attacks, but that wasn't the case. The arms stayed exactly where they were, ignoring gravity and acting like the shoulders were still there. The wall of needles was quick to come, and with no hope of being able to block or evade it, Jaune shot a third spear to blow it away. The pain in his arm was almost unbearable after having to use three light spears in such a quick concession, but as long as they prevented him from being skewered it was worth it.
Unfortunately, that wasn't exactly how it worked out. The light spear destroyed the wall of needles, but right behind, having been hiding behind the original, was another wave of branching points. There were fewer of them, but still more than Jaune could handle. He only had time to use his shield to protect his vitals before his body was assaulted by what felt like hundreds of bee stings. His aura held, but it certainly wasn't a pleasant experience.
As the second wave returned, Jaune was dismayed to see where it had actually come from. The chunks of mannequin he had blown off were scattered around the kitchen, but that did not mean they were no threat. In fact, they only seemed to add to the mannequin's firepower since each chunk was capable of expanding and dividing into branches in the same way the main body was. Thinking of the chunks as separate entities to begin with was probably a mistake because, as Jaune noticed, whenever the mannequin took a step forward the chunks jerked forward the exact same distance.
It was becoming increasingly apparent that he wasn't going to be able to defeat this foe using normal methods. In one last gamble, he launched another light spear to take both of the mannequin's knees. The pain of launching his fourth spear caused him to clench his fist so hard his palm bled. It wasn't even worth it. As expected, even with both knees missing the mannequin stood firm and upright as if the joints were still there.
This was undeniably a losing position, it was time for Jaune to make his escape. Unfortunately, there wasn't any way he could bring the four unconscious cooks with him to safety. The mannequin had been ignoring them this entire time, so it was a trend he would just have to hope continued. That only left his escape route, but he had dodged around so much that the mannequin was between him and the exit door. He scanned the room for another option and landed on the serving window. The shutter was still closed, but it would be much easier going through that than a wall.
He sprinted for the window just as the mannequin held up both its stumps and started to expand and divide them again. Jaune wished he had enough time to draw an etch that would destroy the shutter, but as it was, he had to send his arm through even more agony as he shot yet another silver spear. The metal shutter blasted outward and Jaune dove through it without looking.
He landed in the dining area where a few students were already lined up to get first pick at the breakfast dishes. They were all shocked by the sudden explosion and flying cook, but they really shouldn't have been. The fight in the kitchen hadn't exactly been quiet, so someone really should have heard it and investigated.
Perhaps more surprising, though, was that Yang was among this group of early risers. She ran up to him already having a good idea of what was going on. "You okay?"
Jaune was on one knee and panting. "I'm fine, but I'm sure happy to see you. I didn't know you got up this early."
"I don't," she complained, "but you kept me up so late last night that I couldn't go back to sleep." A nearby student gasped and Yang's face flushed as she realized the unfortunate insinuation. "Moving on, am I right to assume that in the kitchen right now is who we've been looking for."
"In a way." Jaune got to his feet and with Yang, along with some of the other students, moved back toward the serving window ready for a fight, but when they looked inside the kitchen, the mannequin and all its associated chunks were nowhere to be seen. All that remained was the damage it caused and four unconscious cooks.
The other students were confused, but Yang and Jaune were just angry. "So they can pull a disappearing act too," Yang growled as she dug her ringing scroll out of her skirt pocket.
"Who's calling you at this time?" Jaune asked.
Yang opened her scroll with a scowl but it quickly changed to surprise. "You are."
Jaune rose an eyebrow, but Yang answered it and sure enough he heard her voice coming from his scroll. There hadn't even been an option to answer or decline the call. It had just connected immediately.
Before he could think too much about it, a different girl pushed her way into the conversation. Pyrrha Nikos practically shoved Yang out of the way to get closer to him. "Jaune, are you alright!" She had gotten so close that it was a little awkward, and she was fretting over him like she was his mother.
"Yeah, I'm okay."
"Then why is your arm shaking," she pointed out.
She was right. His arm, specifically the one he had shot five light spears from, was visibly trembling. There wasn't any pain, but that wasn't much comfort since there really should have been. Instead, it just felt numb and distant like it wasn't even his arm anymore.
"I think you should go to the infirmary," Pyrrha suggested.
That was probably a good idea. Emerald would certainly make him when she found out, and he also wanted to know if overusing his spears was going to cause lasting damage.
"I can take him there," Yang stepped back into the conversation after being ejected from it, but for some reason, Pyrrha wasn't willing to let her back in so easily.
She actually stepped between the two of them like she was trying to protect him while giving Yang a smile that was polite enough but didn't quite reach her eyes. "That's okay. I can handle it, and I'm sure you're still tired from whatever you were doing with him last night." A little bit of venom leaked from her voice on those last few words. Clearly, she had heard Yang's little slip-up and wasn't happy about it for some reason.
Yang was so surprised by the passive-aggressive shift that she looked to him for help as if he knew any better. He settled with placing a hand on Pyrrha's shoulder to try and calm her down. "Listen, what Yang said before, it's not what you're thinking. We aren't like that."
She side-eyed him like what he said was the worst lie she had ever heard. "So you're telling me you're not helping each other investigate these attacks."
Oh, that's what she meant. Jaune felt kind of stupid now, but to be fair, he didn't expect her to be so quick on the uptake. "No, you're right about that. We are working together."
"Then all that stuff you told me about not wanting to involve a student in your investigation was a lie?"
Jaune really didn't know how to respond to an accusation like that. Sure, technically he did lie to her, but she should have been able to piece together that they were little white lies to not hurt her feelings. "They weren't really lies. The only reason Yang is helping is because we've worked together before," and she was the one to request this investigation in the first place.
"But I'm willing to help too. There's nothing Yang can do that I can't and if you're worried about me getting hurt, don't. I can take care of myself." She looked like she was about to cry as she pleaded her case. Why couldn't she just realize that he didn't want to partner up with someone he barely knew, and quite honestly, was starting to creep him out. He couldn't say that to her though, so he had to come up with a different excuse.
"It's not that I don't believe in you." That got a real smile from her. "It's just that this investigation requires a lot of subtlety," not including blowing open the kitchen serving window and jumping through it, "and Pyrrha the Invincible Girl is just too famous to be sneaking around with us."
There, Jaune thought that was pretty good reasoning, but when he saw the color drain from Pyrrha's face, he realized he must have said something very wrong.
"How did you know—" Whatever she was about to say was interrupted as the door to the dining hall was slammed open and Emerald came running through. Literally, it looked like she had sprinted just to get here and when she found Jaune she ran towards him just as fast.
"What happened?" Then her eyes narrowed in on the red-haired girl standing close enough to him that he could feel her breath on his lips. "And who is this?"
Before Jaune could explain anything the dining room doors slammed open again and this time Ironwood, Winter, and half a dozen soldiers all came through with Headmaster Ozpin close behind. "Nobody move!" the General shouted. "This is an active crime scene so to ensure all of your safety you will all need to follow my orders."
Things were a mess after General Ironwood took over. Everyone in the dining hall was questioned, and Jaune was a huge point of interest. The General also seemed to instantly distrust him for some reason especially once he saw Emerald and Yang by his side. Once that happened the questioning very quickly turned into a light interrogation.
He gave Ironwood a mostly accurate version of what happened in the kitchen with the major exception of the mannequin being replaced with a person in a white catsuit. Of course, that led to suspicion about why Jaune, a cook, was strong enough to fight off someone that had taken down a Beacon student. Jaune answered by saying he had originally been training to be a Huntsman and even applied to Beacon, but while that had been good enough of a reason for the Headmaster to hire him, Ironwood seemed a bit more skeptical. The questioning might have gone on even longer, but thankfully, Ozpin stepped in and prevented Ironwood from digging into Jaune's entire life history.
After that Jaune was taken to the infirmary where the other cooks had woken up and were mostly collaborating his story about a figure in all white attacking them. Hopefully, that would keep Ironwood from looking at him as the prime suspect in these attacks. The fact Ren was attacked before Jaune took the job as Beacon's cook should have been enough to exonerate him, but if the real culprit couldn't be caught then Jaune might make a pretty good scapegoat. By now, there probably wasn't a person in Beacon who didn't know what had happened this morning and his involvement in it. Rumors were sure to spread like wildfire. Any of that subtly he had claimed was so important to Pyrrha was certainly gone now.
In slightly better news, the doctor told Jaune that there wasn't anything wrong with his arm and the trembling was probably just stress from being placed in such a dangerous situation. Obviously, Jaune knew that wasn't the case, but he thanked the doctor anyway and eventually the shaking calmed down on its own.
With all that over with, and classes canceled for the day, he, Emerald, and Yang huddled in his room to go over everything they knew. The first order of business was piecing together why Jaune didn't get any help. Yang was insistent she hadn't heard a thing coming from the kitchen until Jaune had blown the serving window open. Then there were his scroll calls. Both of the girls had their scrolls on them, but both of them failed to get his call. Except that wasn't exactly right because they had received them just not when he had made them.
Having all their scrolls laid out in front of him made it clear. His scroll recorded him making a call to Emerald at 6:32 and then a call to Yang a minute later at 6:33, yet Yang's and Emerald's scrolls didn't record them getting a call until 6:39 which was the exact time Jaune broke out of the kitchen. That was the reason Yang was able to connect a call to him and why Emerald had rushed to the dining hall once she got a call from Jaune with a busy line.
"It was the same way with the security cameras," Emerald pointed out. "Somehow this thing is messing up time or at the very least how technology perceives it."
"I think it's closer to your first guess," Jaune said. "My theory is that the culprit, or the mannequin itself, creates a sort of enclosed space where no one on the outside can perceive or interfere with it unless they physically move into it or out of it like I did. That would explain why Yang couldn't hear anything and why no one noticed Ren being attacked in the middle of Beacon."
"That sounds pretty impressive," Yang said. "Wouldn't creating something that dangerous take a lot of effort and skill."
"I don't think so. One of the very first things Jaune did was create a pocket dimension for his journal and weapons, so it must not be that difficult," Emerald said.
Jaune shook his head. "While you're right most of what I did is just piggybacking off the Apeiron which already exists I wouldn't even know how to begin cutting off one space from another."
Yang looked worried. "So what you're saying is that we aren't dealing with an amateur after all."
Jaune scratched his head. "I don't know. Magic isn't like math where you need to know how to add before you can multiply. Whoever is doing this likely just discovered a different "route" than me. The only question is how far along on that "route" are they?" Jaune looked at his arm where only one of the silver lines climbed all the way to his wrist. It was possible the culprit was worrying about the same thing. They might be wondering how strong Jaune was to be able to use such destructive magic when the truth was Jaune barely knew himself. That was the thing about the unknown world, what seemed impossible to you might be a common skill for someone, or something else.
"Let's move on," Emerald suggested. "Do we know why the mannequin, as Jaune called it, attacked the kitchen?"
"Isn't that obvious? It was after Jaune," Yang said.
"Do we know that for certain, or could it just be a coincidence? Don't forget the mannequin was already there before Jaune arrived."
Both girls turned to him for his opinion, and it was something he had given a lot of thought. "I don't know for sure, but I'm going to say that I was the target. It doesn't line up with the other attacks otherwise. Ren and Pyrrha were targeted when the culprit knew they'd be alone. Also, they were both students. I doubt the culprit suddenly switched to attack the Beacon cooks. They also all woke up with only minor injuries where Ren did not."
"That would mean they know about our investigation, though," Emerald said. "There's no reason to attack you otherwise."
"It also means they know your work schedule," Yang added. "Who knew you were going to be working today?"
Jaune sighed. "Anyone on Beacon's staff and although the students wouldn't know for sure it wouldn't be hard to guess. I've been working every morning since I got here."
Emerald huffed. "So it could basically be anyone. Alright, then who knows about our investigation."
The group was silent for a while as they considered it. "I think Ozpin might suspect something's up. He did seem a little too accommodating for me during Ironwood's questioning." It was a lame answer since it was pretty hard to imagine that Ozpin would be attacking his own students, but it was all Jaune had.
"What about Pyrrha? Doesn't she know?" Yang said.
Emerald's eyes flashed dangerously. "That girl." Since Jaune hadn't had a chance to meet with Emerald last night, she hadn't been filled in on his late-night visitor until a little bit ago. To put it generously, Jaune would say she hadn't been thrilled with that information. "What's her damn problem anyway?"
"I have no idea," Yang replied. "I've never seen Pyrrha act like that. She usually just keeps to herself. Doesn't even talk much with her team from what I've heard, and she definitely hasn't shown any interest in anyone before. Trust me, I've dealt with girls keeping their boyfriends away from me a lot and that was classic back-off-bitch attitude."
"I don't understand why she would see me like that, though. We shared one conversation and that was it."
Yang shrugged. "Who knows maybe she's just into the tall, blond and mysterious type."
"Or she might really be that interested in helping and is just a little extreme about it." Yang didn't even try to hide her laughter, and he really wished she would. He could see Emerald getting agitated and she had already moved to stand closer to him. "Let's get back on track. It's true Pyrrha knows about the investigation. Do you think she's the culprit?"
Yang forced herself to calm down. "I'm not saying I know it's her. I'm just thinking that she fits the bill and if she really is the culprit then she's trying to get so close to you and the investigation makes a lot more sense."
Yang had a point, and it was something he had considered at first too, but after talking with her, even if she was a bit intense, she just seemed so nice and sincere. He'd freely admit he was biased, but if Pyrrha was the culprit then the attack on the training room was completely pointless. Even if it was meant to be a false flag attacking the training room you're known to associate with would only draw unwanted attention. It would also mean that besides himself Ren would be the only targeted victim and Jaune didn't know of any reason why Pyrrha would want to hurt him. That wasn't to say there wasn't one, but they didn't have any proof just as they didn't have much proof on anything in this investigation. It was all just speculation.
Jaune told the girls as much, and they agreed although Jaune could tell they were going to be watching Pyrrha a lot closer from now on. Instead Emerald shifted the flow of the conversation. "It's great to look at the bigger picture, but shouldn't we be focusing on our more immediate problem."
"And what is that?" Yang asked.
"That the culprit failed to kill Jaune so they're going to try again."
With Emerald's words a depressing mood set over them. Any of them being attacked in the near future was almost certain and it wasn't like they could always stick together with their varying schedules. Yang would still have to go to class and Emerald would still have to clean classrooms. To make matters worse, he had already confirmed it was impossible to contact each other during an encounter, so whoever got attacked would be completely on their own.
"Even if we could all gang up on it, would it even matter?" Yang asked. "From what Jaune said that mannequin thing is basically invincible."
"We could use Ruby. Silver eyes are supposed to be able to erase all magic so no matter how strong this thing is it shouldn't be able to stand up to her." Emerald's suggestion was not taken lightly by Yang. Her eyes shifted red and was about one step away from grabbing Emerald's throat.
"We are not using my sister," she growled.
"Why not? With her power she'd be in less danger than us."
"Because I brought you two here specifically so Ruby wouldn't get involved. The last time she used her powers she almost ripped her eyes out! Who knows what will happen if she does it again?"
Emerald argued back. "I don't know if you remember but the three of us nearly got killed getting a cure for her!"
Jaune quickly stood between them before an actual fight broke out. "I agree with Yang. Ruby isn't involved so we shouldn't force her into this. Besides, even if we did use her silver eyes to destroy the mannequin it wouldn't help us find the actual culprit." He also didn't want to use Ruby simply because it would create a bad precedent of relying on her silver eyes when they didn't know what to do. That was a path that only led to disaster.
Thankfully, his reason was enough for Emerald to back down even if it was begrudgingly. "Then what are we going to do because I'm not a fan of sitting around waiting to be attacked again."
"I'll look through my journal to see if there's anything I can find out about the also still have that lead with the library books. If we find out who checked them out, I'm sure we'll have our culprit, and your semblance is perfect for convincing the librarian to give us that information," he told Emerald. "I'll come with you since we should partner up as much as possible. Yang, you should talk to your team about having someone be with you. I hate to say it but with your injured arm you're the most tempting target."
"It would be a lot easier to partner up if my partner was here," Yang cursed.
"Do you want us to walk you to your dorm room?" Jaune asked.
"No, I'll be fine on my own. It's not that far of a walk and I doubt the culprit would try anything with their last attack still so fresh."
"Alright, just make sure you're careful."
"Will do." Yang walked out of Jaune's room and made her way back to her own thinking about whether Russel or Sky would be more likely to mistake her request as a date proposal. Maybe it'd be best to just ask both of them so neither of them would get the wrong idea.
Was it hypocrisy to put her teammates in danger but not willing to get Ruby involved? Probably but Yang didn't care. Ruby was her sister and she wouldn't let her be used as some kind of anti-magic weapon. Her skin bristled just thinking about it. She couldn't believe Emerald had the nerve to suggest it.
Yang tried to let it go as she walked back to her dorm knowing it wouldn't do her any good to stay angry, but it was hard. It was even harder when she found a very unexpected guest waiting outside her door.
Pyrrha pushed herself off the wall she was leaning on and eyed Yang. The tension was thick and Yang found herself turning to the side to make herself smaller just in case Pyrrha was here for a fight, something very possible if she really was the culprit. Damn it, now she really wished she had taken Jaune's offer. "Do you need something?"
Pyrrha didn't hesitate. "You told Jaune who I was, didn't you." she accused.
Out of all the things Yang had expected to hear this was low on the list. "Um, I'm pretty sure you told him yourself last night. He doesn't just forget everything when he sleeps."
"Not that. You told him that I'm Pyrrha Nikos, the Invincible Girl, that I'm a champion."
"He could have looked it up himself."
"I didn't ask what he could have done. I asked what you told him."
Yang didn't know why she seemed so angry about this. Everyone at the school already knew, and it had been genuinely shocking that Jaune hadn't known already. "Fine, you caught me. Jaune asked me about you and I told him what I knew, but it would have been the same if he asked literally anybody else. It's not like I gave away some big secret."
"But it was a secret to him!" Pyrrha's voice cracked. "For the first time since I can remember, I was able to have a normal conversation with someone without them treating me like a celebrity or awkwardly avoiding that fact, but Jaune was different. He didn't know who I was and talked to me like a normal person. No expectations, no pressure, no fake smiles. It was perfect, yet you took him away from me."
Damn, this girl was possessive. Just what did she think was going to happen if Yang hadn't told him? Did she really believe she could just keep talking to him, maybe even hook up with him, and he'd just never find out? Was that the kind of relationship she wanted? It was hard to feel sympathetic for her supposed problems when he wouldn't care one bit about Pyrrha's celebrity status with everything he's been through. Pyrrha was just assuming he would act differently and blaming Yang for it. It was probably that lack of effort in actually getting to know people, ironic since she was claiming that's exactly what people did to her, that was causing her to have these issues in the first place. They had been at Beacon for more than half a year and Yang couldn't once recall Pyrrha trying to strike up a conversation with anyone. It had led everyone, Yang included, to think that Pyrrha believed she was above it all. Funny that it was the other way around.
"So why did you come here?" Yang asked. "Was it just to yell at me?"
Pyrrha straightened her back and made direct eye contact. "I want to help with the investigation. Let me join."
"No."
Pyrrha stepped forward. "Why not!"
Because in Yang's opinion, Pyrrha was prime suspect number one. "We don't need anyone else. We have it handled."
"Really?" Pyrrha accused. "Because Jaune was nearly killed, while you were standing around waiting for him to serve you food."
As if Pyrrha had been doing anything different. "The answer is still no." Yang forced her way past the champion and brought her scroll out to open her door."
Pyrrha made one last attempt. "You owe it to me."
"I don't owe you anything." If Yang had any proof that Pyrrha was the culprit, she'd tackle her to the ground right now. Actually, with Pyrrha so worked up, maybe there was a way to get some proof. "In fact, Jaune and I are having a training match in two hours and you're keeping me from getting ready."
Pyrrha's eyes drifted down to the arm Yang had in a sling with an accusatory expression. "You're going to spar like that?"
Yang decided to really lay it on. "Yes, it's a light one to get me back into the swing of things. Jaune offered and he can be so considerate like that." Pyrrha stiffened. "Oh, and just in case you didn't know, Jaune already has a girlfriend." The implication that it was Yang herself worked wonders. Pyrrha went from shocked to angry to downright furious in a matter of seconds, and that was how Yang left her as she shut the door in Pyrrha's face.
Emerald was about ready to kill someone as the stubborn librarian still refused to give her the name of the person that checked out those journals.
"Listen Ozpin if you want those journals so bad then use your own computer to look up the student. Don't come all the way down here and ask me to do it."
"I can't because my computer is having some technical issues."
"Then go log your credentials into one of the library computers. You should be able to access the database the same way you would from your computer."
"I haven't used the library database in years. I'll get confused."
"Then this is the perfect chance to refamiliarize yourself with it."
Emerald's fingers twitched with images of them wrapped around the old hag's neck. Right now she was her boss, so why was she being so unaccommodating? "Please, I really need those books."
The librarian just pointed towards the public computers. Emerald groaned. The longer this conversation went on the more suspicious the librarian would become and the more people would take notice of the strange conversation between the librarian and the young girl that the librarian kept calling Ozpin. "Fine, I'll do it myself, but don't expect to be getting a raise anytime soon."
The librarian scoffed. "As if I'd ever get a raise. I doubt you even know my name."
Emerald retreated before the librarian could confirm that statement was correct. She dropped her semblance when she was alone between two bookcases and went to the back of the library where Jaune was sitting at a table intently looking through his journal.
"I didn't find out who got the books." Emerald slumped down in her seat.
"I heard," Jaune responded. "Guess even the librarians are a lot tougher when surrounded by teenagers with superpowers all day long. Probably more cautious about giving out information too. I doubt you're the only one with an illusionary semblance that's walked these halls."
"Feels more like she just wanted to give Ozpin a hard time for some reason. I should have gone with Goodwitch instead."
"You still could."
"No, using someone else to ask for the same books would be way too suspicious. We were already pushing it with you having asked for them yesterday. Best case scenario is that the librarian thinks you and Goodwitch were sent on Ozpin's behalf and still gives me the runaround."
"That's not ideal." Jaune mused. "You might just have to try again tomorrow and hope a different librarian is on duty."
"Is that really okay? This is our best lead and waiting only gives the culprit more of a chance to get ahead of us."
"I know, but if you can't convince the librarian today then we don't really have another option."
Emerald knew he didn't mean it in a disparaging way, but she couldn't help but feel like she had disappointed him. It should have been a simple task for her to accomplish, and yet she had completely failed. "I'm sorry."
Jaune placed a finger under her chin and tilted her head up to force her to look him in the eyes. "Don't be. You didn't do anything wrong. We can't expect everything to go right for us on the first try."
Jaune was being too kind. Whether he wanted to admit it or not this was a setback, a potentially disastrous one. "I know that, but it doesn't feel like anything's gone our way."
"I wouldn't be so sure about that." Jaune tapped his journal with the tip of his finger.
Emerald's eyes widened. "You found something?"
"Possibly. While the culprit might have been able to keep their own identity a secret with that mannequin they had to reveal a pretty distinctive card and I think I found a match."
Jaune pushed his journal to the center of the table so Emerald could read it if she wanted, but he explained it out loud to her so she didn't have to. "They're called imaginary friends. They're kind of similar to the echoes we faced at Mt. Glenn in that they can be created with intense emotions. The difference is that the person who creates an imaginary friend has a lot more control over their creation. They basically gain a servant and the description of what those servants are supposed to look like matches what I saw almost exactly."
"Then why are you unsure about this match when it fits so well?"
"Because there is a difference between what I copied into my journal and what I saw, and it's a big one. Imaginary friends are created from and represent the insecurity and doubts of their creators. Apparently, they're mostly created by lonely children, hence the name, but because of that creation method, imaginary friends are supposed to be incredibly weak. Not at all what I encountered."
Emerald didn't have enough knowledge to comment on that discrepancy, but she had been listening enough to find a different flaw. "If imaginary friends are only created from intense anxiety, that doesn't seem like something someone could do intentionally. In fact, it seems like something you would force onto someone else."
"I know which is why I don't think it's an exact match."
Emerald leaned on the table knowing Jaune's mind was already working overtime with ideas. "So what do you think is happening?"
"I think the imaginary friend is only a base that the culprit has modified. I think that might explain a lot like why this is all happening now and why it feels like the culprit is experimenting. What if the culprit accidentally created their imaginary friend, maybe as a kid or maybe more recently. That would have introduced them to the unknown world. Then at some point, they come to Beacon and find the two library books while trying to research their mysterious creation. From there it wouldn't be a stretch for them to learn how to modify their imaginary friend to better suit their purposes."
"It's a compelling story," Emerald admitted. "But I'm more interested in how we beat this imaginary friend."
Jaune, who had been on such a roll, immediately deflated. "About that. Apparently, imaginary friends just disappear on their own when their creators move past whatever they were going through and feel they don't need them anymore. They simply outgrow them."
"Suggesting that whoever this person is never managed to do that."
Jaune sighed. "Exactly."
Emerald didn't want to think about what a person like that would be like, but there was a more pressing issue. "So this doesn't really help us unless we know who the culprit is. In other world, things aren't going our way and we still need to find out who got those library books "
Jaune tried to hide his embarrassment by looking away, but Emerald could still see the hint of red on his cheeks. He really didn't need to be ashamed. This all still came down to her failure, but just before she could beat herself too much over it, Jaune's scroll began to ring.
Seeing that it was Yang, Jaune put it on speaker so they could both hear. They were met with a very loud declaration. "I know how to prove Pyrrha is the culprit!"
Excerpt from the book
Why is it that emotions and thoughts alone are so persistently capable of producing magic and access to the unknown world? They are simply part of one person's perception of the world, so why should they have external effects? Is our species simply blessed with such a power, or is our own internal being and the external world not as separate as we are led to believe. What would the ramifications of such a state actually be? I don't subscribe myself to the notion that the world behind my back ceases to exist until I look around but follow this line of thinking to its logical conclusion and that must be the case.
Perhaps a better explanation is that emotions aren't the direct cause. Maybe they are only a signal. For as far back as human history goes there has always been worship to Gods and Goddesses (some more real than others) and through it all there has been one thing in common: prayer. The idea that one can speak to these divine entities. However, it seems a bit silly that these Gods could only hear these prayers if spoken aloud, so maybe as we think, feel, and hope there is a listener, and that listener is gracious enough to answer.