Big Issues

AN: A little later than I expected but life was getting in the way. Hope you all enjoy the chapter!

Vytal Tournament- Begin!

"Welcome everyone to the opening ceremonies of the Vytal Tournament!" Professor Peter Port greets every person within Amity Coliseum, watching on television, and listening over radios. "As many of you have no doubt have noticed, many of the students and staff of the four kingdoms Huntsmen Academies have had to deal with an adversary that could not be beaten by conventional means!"

"That's right Peter! We should congratulate the students for continuing to contend against corpulence to continue our civilizations!" Doctor Bartholomew Oobleck agrees with his shorter and much wider friend and colleague.

"Now! Let's give our contenders a rousing cheer for their perseverance and service! Beginning with Atlas Academy!" Port announces as an Atlesian Knight marches out of the main arena tunnel carrying the flag bearing the symbol of Atlas on a white flag. The Knight was followed by the Huntsmen and Huntresses in training who were here to compete. They marched in sync in their teams, with their leader ahead of their three teammates who were shoulder to shoulder. Everyone was dressed in their chosen combat gear and carrying their weapons of choice. The teams were led to the section of the arena floor that bore the symbol of Atlas where they stood, proudly facing the cheering crowds in the stands.

"Haven Academy!" Oobleck proclaims as another mech marched out bearing the blue banner with the stylized lamp that was the schools' symbol. The students marched out in pairs, keeping their teams together as they were all dressed and ready for combat. The lines stopped on the quarter of the arena with the symbol of Mistral.

Port waited for the crowd to settle a bit before, "Shade Academy!" The swords on the flag were prominent as the Knight carried it. Vacuoan students kept their grouping to their teams but lacked any sense of order otherwise as they were led to their space. Their complete lack of uniform meant little as everyone was battle ready at all times, a Shade Academy standard. Many of the competitors were open with their love of the roar of the crowd.

"And the hosting Kingdom for the 40th Vytal Tournament, Beacon Academy!" Oobleck was almost drowned out by the crowd, understandable as many of them were locals from Vale. Like the other Academies, the students were ready for combat and stuck to their teams, though they simply walked four wide to their quarter. As with the rest of the competitors, they stood facing the crowds, absorbing the positive emotions as the cheers and short songs continued.

"Now if everyone could calm down for a few moments, Professor Ozpin would like to share some words with you all." Peter's voice had changed from his usual bombastic tone to relatively serene, respectful of the Headmaster and the situation.

On the large screens around the arena, Ozpin's face was displayed. For those who knew the man, they could tell he was in his office, the massive coliseum seen floating over his shoulder. "As you all know, this school year has been more, eventful, than in years past. We have faced hardships that none of us could have anticipated, sacrificed small portions of our comforts, and have been forced to constantly adapt to the changes to ourselves and others. While this has happened most drastically within the past few months and while some of the circumstances are different, civilization as we know it grew from and in spite of those hardships and more throughout history.

I have little doubt that many of us will look back on these days with amusement, our current conditions making this festival more unique than others, as we celebrate the end of the last major conflict that ravaged our world and we came out of those times more united than ever.

Conflict will always be a part of our culture, but it has also ensured that our kingdoms have stood the tests of time. We no longer and should never look to engage in conflict with each other over things that are so trivial compared to the threat that the Grimm outside our wall represent.

Yet this tournament is a way for all four kingdoms to engage in conflict in a more civilized fashion, for sport and simple bouts of pride, together as equals. A replacement for wars, a test of skills for our latest generations of defenders to better prepare ourselves for the true threats that test our resolve to live, prosper and survive.

Which is why no matter if you lose your fights here in the arena, here you may learn from your mistakes, recognize your shortcomings, and refine your skills and tactics so that you may do better in the field where it truly matters; where it is no longer your pride at stake but the lives and well-being of others, those you swore to protect when you all signed up for this profession.

Our schools can only do so much to prepare the next generation, which is why it is up to those they defend to show their support and give them a reason to continue to push back the darkness and become a guiding light for others in their times of need. And from what I've seen, these past few months have put us to the test and we have exceeded all expectations. Not only have our communities grown closer to combat our Issue, we appear to have become stronger for it.

Being distributed to everyone affected by the unusual attack on our Academies are vials containing the nullifier of our current problems. It is not an instant cure, but I have no doubts that should everyone maintain their training, it won't be long before these events over the past months will be nothing but memories to be shared between friends and family."

Rolling tables were brought out of the four entry tunnels, to the participating student's shock. Pushed by Atlesian Knights and flanked by a pair of doctors and/or nurses each, they made their way to each congregation of students where they began matching vials to ID's and distributing them. In the stands, across Beacon, and parts of Vale, drones were delivering vials to appropriate personnel.

Ozpin raises his own vial to be seen on camera once he saw that at least all of the tournament participants had received theirs. On a smaller screen he over saw that most of the deliveries had been made in Vale and even in the other kingdoms.

"Let this be a toast to overcoming hardships, our unity to conquer our fears and face our problems, for it is together that we bore the Issue and it is together that we have beaten it." Ozpin declares before drinking the contents of his dosage.

On the monitors, he watched as everyone who received their dose drank theirs down, some obviously not enjoying the taste. Atlas, Mistral, Vale, and Vacuo all had their doses taken together. In a show of solidarity, he saw that those in the stands had some of their own drinks at the same time.

Somewhere in Vale, a man with a tattered red cape raised his glass before downing the shot with practiced ease. He wasn't alone as the other patrons and the bartender did the same. Lucky for him, that round was on the house in celebration. He did feel bad about the chair one man was sitting in broke, dropping him on his back. His feet kicked the table, which dumped his and his buddies' meals onto the friend along with everything else on it. Thankfully, it rarely occurred to anyone that he might have been the cause, but he left during the laughter anyway for a new place. He'd seen what he wanted.

Ozpin set his vial down on his desk. "Now, with that obstacle out of the way. Let's get the 40th Vytal Tournament underway, shall we?" He gave the camera a warm smile as he held his arms out. Fireworks screamed from all over the floating stadium, providing a sight to remember for everyone who could see them. For those within the Amity Coliseum, they missed out on seeing the true scope of the display in favor of seeing the contenders in person.

Across the continents, Grimm flinched due to the wave of positive emotions racing over the lands. Only the oldest could withstand it as they've become use to it over their long lives. Their youngest kin closest to the kingdom's walls, fled in fear of the unknown force.

The smirk that Cinder wore grew as she clapped her hands at the display, knowing that thanks to her plans, this entire festival would be like the fireworks they were watching. The anticipation of the show, the launching drawing the attention of all around, the beautiful bursting display that everyone would cheer for… and everything falling to ashes afterword. She couldn't wait for that particular show.

Team DAIT stood at the top of the stands watching everything. It wasn't hard for them to pick out their friends, Ruby's red cloak, Weiss' white hair and clothes, and Yang's golden mane stood out among the crowd. The splotch of red from Pyrrha and Nora indicated where JNPR was, if the shorter girls' antics of dancing and shouting her thanks didn't do enough. Even the SSSN boys stood out with yellow, red, green, and blue hair respectively. There were a few others they could pick out but weren't as close to them, like the green hair of Emerald who spoke to Team RWBY often enough to be considered their friend.

So far, the opening ceremony had gone off without a hitch. The Atlesian Knights at every entry ramp in the stands helped to keep people from getting too excited, as did their organic counterparts from Atlas. There were a few members of the Vale Defense Force playing security for the event, but with so many troops from Atlas here and Ironwood in charge of security, the General had given many of the VDF the option of having the week as a vacation. Many took the offer but negotiated for part-time security so they could do their jobs while watching the matches and enjoy the festival with their families.

With no troubles, the team was left to watch the pyrotechnic display before the combatants were escorted back the way they came. The rest of the day and tomorrow were to be dedicated to the qualifiers before the true tournament began. The matches weren't the biggest draw and so much of the festival spent their time getting as many patrons as possible while they could.

The students participating had their own seating area closest to the arena itself, broken up by some seating for VIP's and a few of the audience willing to pay extra to be so close to the action. This also meant that combatants had their own entrance to the arena, which is from where they emerged to relax until their match. Most segregated themselves by school but kept teams together. Teams, RWBY, JNPR, and SSSN managed to group up in the stands to wait for the randomizer to select the matchups.

The qualifying matches were fought in the basic arena, the clear hard-light barriers active to protect those watching them from the weapons being used. Given that there were eight people in the ring at the start of every fight, mobility could be something of an issue in the limited space. Keeping track of your team, opponents, the various weapons and what they could do along with the use of semblances, combined with the stress on the teens being put in the spotlight for the world to see. More often than not, falling off the arena was how fighters were eliminated rather than their aura gauges.

It also meant that the matches were fairly quick. The next round was chosen before the current one was finished, if they lasted past three minutes. That gave the chosen teams time to prep their weapons and any pre-fight rituals they wanted to do. Any damages and debris were quickly fixed and cleaned so that even the longest matches with the most damage had the next round starting within ten minutes of the last.

One by one, teams were eliminated. Most of the victors returned to the stands to study any of their potential opponents in action. Those who lost often left to partake in the festival activities as a distraction or they returned to the stands to cheer for their school. There were a few who managed to take injuries once their aura was exhausted, so they spent their time in medical beds being taken care of.

Finally came the time for Team RWBY to fight. After a round of good lucks from their friends, the girls made their way to the Beacon locker room where they collected their weapons and ammunition. It was nice to know that they weren't going to be fighting anyone from Beacon as they were the only ones in the room.

Emerging from their tunnel, they found that their first round was a team from Atlas. The eight fighters made their way onto the slightly raised ring and the teams stood a few paces apart.

"Now we have Beacon's Team RWBY facing off against Team BRON of Atlas!" Port announced for the whole world to hear.

"Hey Bluto, they look familiar to you?" The tallest one asks his apparent leader.

"Yeah, the yellow cow has really been stuffing her face. Must hit that grease pit often. Same with the piglet in red." Bruto sneers.

"Nice catch Rick. I thought that guy and the trash were part of their team, apparently I guessed wrong." The shortest one laughs.

"Should have guessed that the rest of their team were some real fat asses, Orson." The fourth boy points at the black and white duo.

"Ha! Good one Nero!" Bruto laughs with the rest of his team. They either didn't care or were ignorant of the four tubby young women who were seething at the insults lobbed at them and their friends. Blake was particularly incensed at Orson for calling Faunus trash.

"Ah, look. They're turning as red as our mouths were from that grease pit that dared to call itself a restaurant." Orson cackles.

"The walk here must have been too much for them! No wonder Atlas was needed to protect their kingdom from the Grimm!" Nero jeers. A large majority of the crowd were getting disgusted at the insults to their opponents and the hosting kingdom.

"Um… Begin!" Port calls out, not wanting to hear any more of the insults.

Immediately, Yang burst forward with a boost from her gauntlets and punched at Orson, her fist impacting a hard light shield that materialized between them thanks to a quartet of drones. Ruby's opening shot was blocked by the massive gauntlets that Bruto wore as he surged at her. Blake leapt at Rick, their swords clashing. Nero jumped away from Weiss' thrust as he placed a flute to his lips and began to play, a trio of mechs unfolding themselves from his 'backpack' and placing themselves in front of him.

The mechs flexed their arms as Nero played a tune that was light but also had dark undertones. From the mechs, blades extended from the wrists of one, gun barrels from the second, and the third had larger barrels that seemed to match too well with the tank on its back. Weiss was taken aback by the strange tactic, that pause gave the gun mech the time to fire at the girl. She managed to block the bullets with her sword but that was a distraction for the bladed one to get in close and start slashing at her. Weiss had to shift her attention to the close combat mech as it attacked her with reckless abandon, any time she made some distance the gun mech would fire again and repeating the cycle. She lost track of the third as she struck back when she could at the skeletal machines.

Blake and Rick were engaged in a dance of blades, their swords meeting between them many times over. Blake's cleaver/sheath served her well as he only had one blade but he was quick to deflect her attacks. But there was something that was off that made her wary of the taller boy that kept her from fully committing to her attacks, almost like he was trying to lead her into a trap. Still, she worked to whittle his aura down as best she could.

Orson's drones' circles Yang, firing small lasers at the blonde that burned the floor where they hit. The girl in question had managed to punch one that flew to close only to find that it had its own personal shield around it. Still managed to send it flying past the irritating boys head which was rather cathartic. But she had to keep dancing to avoid being shot, the one that hit her left shoulder stung and she was sure her jacket was singed but hadn't time to look. The fourth one flew back, controlled by a fancy bracer on Orson's left arm. Ember Celica barked twice and hit two of the drones away with the fire Dust laced buck shot. That sent them reeling back and left her able to focus on the last one in front of her before the others could really recover.

Ruby was glad that she was used to sparring with her sister, though her fists weren't anywhere as large as Bluto's were with his weapons of choice. But he was all about power in his strikes and his bulky gauntlets left little in the way of finesse that she was used to from the blonde brawler. Not that she should say anything about having a large weapon when her blade was nearly as long as she was tall, let alone the length of the shaft. But she was still light on her feet and collapsed Crescent Rose into its rifle form for more mobility. A shot fired and he blocked it, but the size of the arm blocked his view of the girl for a moment but that was all she needed.

"What a spectacular battle we have in the qualifiers! Imagine how the fights will be once we get to the true tournament rounds!" Oobleck says through the speakers.

Weiss was being pushed and guided by the blade and bullet combo bots that Nero controlled. Losing track of the third was an error on her part even as she could see that the one controlling them hadn't moved since he began playing his flute. A few more deflections of bullets and parries of blades, her counter strikes to the robot did little when she had to pull back due to the gun bot firing at her whenever she tried to go on the offensive.

Then she was reminded about the third in a bad way… There was a click behind her, her only warning. A glance back and she saw the barrels on its arms beginning to glow brightly before the cannons fired and causing a massive explosion where she stood. Nero stopped playing to admire his handywork as the smoke and dust began to clear.

Rick pushed Blake back with a kick to the gut, sending the girl rolling back to her feet as soon as she could with her blades raised. To her surprise, Rick stood back and reversed his grip on his sword to raise the round pommel to his face with a grin. His blocky backpack unfolded from behind to have speakers facing her from either side of him.

"You're gonna wish you stayed sitting on your fat ass." He taunts before taking a deep breath.

"YOU'RE GONNA GIVE UP NOW!

YOU'RE GONNA BE TAKEN DOWN!

TIME TO STOP FIGHTING AND RUN!

GO AHEAD AND CRY!

IT'S TIME TO SAY GOODBYE!

GO AHEAD AND LIE AND HURT!"

The speakers blasted the girl with decibels far higher than they should be capable of, given their size. The blast of sound threw her back and making her ears ring. Blake landed on her back near Weiss, trying to stand through the disorientation and she was almost sure her cat ears were bleeding from the auditory assault. Then she found an explosion far too close for comfort, especially with what she just went through.

Yang grabbed the fourth drone with both hands, unable to properly hold it thanks to the shield around it making it seem more like a large ball. But she was able to pull it down from the air, her weight keeping it from lifting her and she had the strength to fight its thrust to use it as a shield as the first one started firing its laser at her. Apparently, the shield was in a fixed orientation to the drone, otherwise it would have turned around in her hands and shot her point blank.

Realizing that she had a good opportunity, Yang charged at Orson just as the other two drones began to return, the first still firing at her but the shield held strong, though weakening.

"What? Stay back you cow!" Orson yells at her as she closed in far faster than he expected she could move. He tapped some commands to his drones and the free ones blasted their way over to his defense just before Yang could reach him. That didn't stop her from smashing the drone in her hands into the triangular shield between the organic fighters. While the shield held, the one on the drone flickered and faded after a second hit, allowing her to grip it directly and free up a hand.

Orson's eyes went wide as his larger opponent spun and threw the captured drone at one of the intact ones that were focused on maintain the shield between them. The resulting crash broke their energy cores and they exploded, showering the two fighters with their shrapnel and the barrier faded away.

Bluto raised his massive fists just in time to take the hit from Ruby's scythe as she came down on him. He swatted her away with his other hand, ignoring the damage done to his armored limb. Ruby landed on her feet and shot at him, the bullets bouncing off the gauntlets' surface as he charged at her. An overhead attack shattered the floor where she had been standing but she spun herself away, the blade sweeping out in the process and taking his feet out from under him before slamming the backside of her weapon into his chest, driving the air from his lungs.

Ruby jumped back, ready to help her teammates when Bluto lifted one of his arms, a barrel revealing itself within the palm of his gauntlet. The small cannon fired at the chubby cloaked girl, only for the shell to pass through a small cloud of rose petals and strike the wall by the stands with a large explosion that tested the strength of the barrier protecting the audience.

A red streak weaved around the heavy hitter of the Atlesian team before reforming behind him into his opponents, her scythe already in mid swing. The blade bit into his back, tearing through the shoulder components of his weapon, his arms dropping as dead weights thanks to the support that connected them being severed.

Bluto growled in frustration as he was forced to withdraw his arms from his weapons in order to move. Now free, he rushed at the shorter girl far faster than she expected him to, though it made sense given that he was no longer carrying around the very heavy weapons. The didn't stop her from planting her blade into the floor and acrobatically spinning herself on the shaft of her weapon. Bluto threw a powerful punch at her but she kicked his arm to the side before twisting around again and driving her boots into his chest as she flew off and as the boy hit the ground, she landed on him and bounced off.

"Oh ho! It looks like Bluto has been taken out by Miss Rose!" Port announces. It was hard not to hear the satisfaction in his voice, though it was hard to tell if it was favoritism for the Beacon student or because of what the boy had said earlier rubbing the valiant teacher the wrong way. Likely both.

Yang rushed at Orson now that the shield was gone. She dive-rolled through the lasers shot at her by the surviving drones and kicked at the controller, keeping the boy from inputting further commands. Orson punched at the girl as she stood up with his free hand, but she didn't budge as his fist impacted her forehead.

"Uh…" He says stupidly at her complete lack of reaction to his attack. Then she smiled… and his confusion turned to fear.

Fear that was justly deserved as she uppercut him in the jaw hard enough for his feet to leave the ground before grabbing his arm and spinning twice and throwing him at his drones. One was brought down under him as the other managed to swerve away in time. Yang smirks as she uses her gauntlets for a boost as she jumps at the drone and punches it into the back of Orson's head, depleting his aura and knocking him out.

Blake found herself carried in the air, held by a familiar hand under her arm with a white sleeve. "We need to switch!" Weiss calls to the cat girl who could barely hear her over the ringing in her own four ears but managed to get the point. They landed gently on one of Weiss' glyphs within the dust cloud and separated, with Blake staggering for a step or two.

Nero raised his flute to his lips as he saw movement and began to play, his three robots moving into position at his commands. A figure burst from the dust and Blades attacked only to be parried by a duo of black blades, the larger of the two cutting the left arm off at the elbow. Guns tried to cover for the weakened Blades as the girl outran the first mech but was able to deflect the bullets fired at her. Blades leapt and tried to stab her in the back with its remaining arm, only to find that the girl was gone, her image fading like a shadow and it was now in the path of several bullets that crippled the melee bot.

Nero frowned at the loss of his bot but stayed where he was with Cannon by his side. The dark themed girl with the big ass rushed at him from where she had landed after using her semblance. Cannon raised its arm and fired at the girl while there was distance between them.

The Dust shell passed through the clone of Blake and exploded at the edge of the arena. The series of gunshots into Cannon from above allowed Nero to track her and had Guns return the fire before Cannon took too much damage. Blake managed to use her semblance again to avoid the bullets and rocket herself down onto Cannon, crushing it underfoot with her weight. That position also meant that Nero was between her and Guns meaning that he couldn't use the mech to attack her.

Yet Nero smiled as he concentrated as he played his flute, the air between the fighters rippling. Those ripples hit Blake without any noticeable effect beyond a flinch, causing the boys smile to widen. Gambol Shroud whipped up and cut his flute in half between his hands, shocking the boy for more than enough time for Blake to punch him in the jaw and finish the fight with a kick to the chest.

"Nero's down! Apparently, his semblance of Auditory Hallucination didn't work on Miss Belladonna after she was hit with two loud sound blasts so recently. She must be hard of hearing right now, otherwise his semblance would have worked." Oobleck analyzes from the announcer's booth.

"Quite right, Barty!" Port agrees.

Weiss had leapt from the dust cloud to engage Rick in a fierce fencing competition, the two being almost equal in skill at the art. Where he was top heavy due to the speakers on his back, she was bottom heavy around her hips from her gains. But where he needed to have a set up to use his semblance to enhance sound around him, Weiss just needed a moment to concentrate and flick her hand.

A black glyph manifested under Rick's feet and gravity intensified, slowing his movements. To his surprise, the girl had backed off to create more glyphs around him, ones that glowed a bright, light blue before chunks of ice were launched at him from various angles, whittling down his aura as he couldn't block them all with his blade. Then came the bright flash of red just as the gravity regained normality around him. That flash happened to be a fireball that Weiss had discharged from her rapier and stuck him in the chest.

Rick landed on his back from the blast but managed to flip up to his feet and turn his blade around as he prepared to use his speakers once more. He took a deep breath as he felt them moving on his back.

"TIME TO - AUGH!"

The speakers exploded thanks to a shard of ice embedded within the armored housing preventing it from opening normally and the use in that state directed the soundwaves against itself and damaging the systems until they erupted in a shower of sparks.

"Ah, get it off! Get it off!" Rick yells as he fumbles for the straps holding his weapon to himself. He manages to get it off just as the internal wiring and batteries began to smoke and burn from inside.

"Are you finished?" A cold voice asks. Rick turns in time to see Weiss propelling herself from a glyph straight at him with her blade at the ready. He managed to parry her sword with his own but could do nothing to stop the thick leg from impacting his chest, driving the air from his lungs, and his remaining aura plummeted to disqualifying levels.

"Team RWBY wins by knockout and aura levels!" Oobleck proclaims and the crowd goes wild.

Emergency medical crews come out to take the boys away with a few Atlas soldiers to take their weapons to be stored until they can be returned to their owners. Then the clean up crews came out to repair the damages as RWBY left for their tunnel.

"That was great guys!" Jaune was quick to greet the four girls as they returned to their seats.

"Thanks, Jaune!" Ruby flops down and starts to drink her juice.

"Oh! Fresh popcorn!" Yang sat next to her sister, accepting the hot snack from Pyrrha.

"You're welcome!" The champion says with a smile.

"Thirsty Blake?" Sun offers the girl a cup as she sits in the chair that was close to being a tight fit for her.

"Huh? Did you say something?" Blake looked the wrong way at first until a drop of condensation landed on her bare shoulder. "Oh." She takes the offered cup but misses what he was saying.

"She's really out of it, isn't she?" Sun relents and asks Weiss who was likewise having some issues with the width of her seat compared to herself.

"She did get blasted pretty hard." Weiss admits, knowing that the pressure waves hit her teammate the hardest and she'd be the most sensitive to the auditory assaults. She saw the worried look on his face. "We'll take her to the nurses soon if she doesn't start to get better."

"Thanks." He says with some relief before his scroll goes off indicating his teams fight was after the one about to start, thus he led team SSSN off to the locker room to prepare. Blake saw them leaving and waved goodbye, smiling as the blonde did the same before vanishing down the ramp.

"Is this the best time to talk behind Blake's back?" Yang asks Weiss just loud enough to be heard over the crowd, leaning back to see the heiress. Weiss' eyes widened at the implications before the joke set in.

"You want me to call you Darbie for the rest of the year?" Weiss threatens. She knew how much the blonde hates the dolls and the stereotype that the franchise had created. Sure, the taller girl may play the part on occasion but it was always just an act to lower a victims' guard, usually right before her fist was introduced to their face.

As expected, Yang scowled at the threat before smirking at Weiss, giving her a nod for playing along with the game. Through it all, Blake was unaware of the conversation and Ruby was happily munching on the fluffy kernels as she watched the next fight… or more accurately, watching their weapons.

JNPR sat behind them, watching everything and smiled at the friends' interactions. Though a blonde was nervous about the upcoming fight that would either be today or the next.

Team SSSN had to fight a team from Mistral, which meant it was no surprise that the school was divided on which team to cheer for. There did seem to be a bit of a fan club in the stands for the boys, a few of which holding up large pictures of their faces… or abs in Sun's case. The latter part caused Blake's eyes to narrow; just because she couldn't hear what they were saying right now didn't mean she was blind.

The match was comparatively short to most as it appeared that SSSN's opponents were poorly suited to taking the team on. Sage's strength battered their defenses, Neptune shocked them, while Sun and Scarlet made short work of what was left.

Blake had visited the nurses during the night at her teams' insistence. The conclusion was that the damage was temporary and was healing on its own, though some eardrops were given to help relieve the pain and assist in the recovery process.

JNPR fought first thing the next day against a team from Atlas. The Atlesian team put up a good fight, only taking Ren out by aura and Jaune by ring out. But between Nora's raw strength and Pyrrha's skills, the match was theirs soon after.

Somehow, Team CRDL had made it through their qualifiers. The male team weren't exactly known for their skills as a team, Russel and Dove had that aspect while Cardin provided the muscle which left Sky as the odd one out but apparently could hold his own.

Ruby was glad to see that Penny's team passed with ease but the girl was constantly surrounded by guards so she couldn't talk to her friend. That didn't mean that their group of friends didn't gather and enjoy the festival when they could.

They found Talon and Anya sampling the wide variety of foods, their culinary backgrounds giving them plenty to compare things to. Itazura was often checking her scroll for updates on a 'project' she was doing. Which left…

"C'mon big guy!" Denko had been pounced on by Yang again, forced to give her a ride on his back as they walked though the fair. Atlesian Knights patrolled the grounds in pairs on occasion, something that was almost as amusing as it was worrying.

"Do you really need to ride him?" Weiss asks as she walks next to the blondes as they looked for a stand with something interesting.

Nora and Pyrrha shared a look at the comment while Blake was close enough to hear clear enough and her mind immediately turned to her books and her face turned red. Ren saw the look that Nora was giving him, "No Nora. I'm not carrying you."

"Why not? We could say its part of training." The short girl offers. Beside her, another redhead looked at an armored blonde and considering the notion.

"You want a ride?" Sun asks Blake jokingly, receiving a smile and a punch to the shoulder for it.

"Oh! A shooting game!" Ruby squeals before zipping off to a stand down the lane.

"We better keep her in check." Weiss shakes her head as she picks up her pace. Next to her Yang pointed ahead and bumped her heels into her 'horses' hips.

Not too far away, Emerald and Mercury watched them having fun. As far as they could tell, that Team DAIT was still a bunch of unknowns. No matter how much they watched them fight in the sparring classes, the one match that Mercury had with Anya, and what Cinder had said about Talon… there was still very little they had to gauge their strength.

But Anya was able to hold her own against the assassin, even if he wasn't trying that hard. Yet it was obvious that she wasn't either. Then there was that exchange in the CCT with Talon that caught Cinder's attention, how she was able to stop her attacks, throw them back at her, and punch her across a room without ever touching anything.

Yet from their observations, the sisters were obsessed with trying food, the fox was playing games on her scroll, and their leader had the bimbo all over him. Even the 'Invincible Girl' wasn't looking to be at the top of her game with how much she had grown, though some of that could be due to the few people capable of standing up to her worthy enough of a full display of her strength.

Further observation would be needed but nothing that would draw attention to themselves.

Back on Patch, Taiyang was celebrating in his own way with Zwei when he saw his girls win their qualifier match. How? They howled to the ceiling for a little before going back to watching.

In a dingy looking bar, another man had seen the fight and won a handful of Lien from an off-duty soldier who just happened to be from Atlas… and a few of his buddies. He raised his glass to them in salute before downing the shot and leaving the place, paying with some of his winnings.

AN: I hope you all enjoyed the original content about the Vytal Tournament. Opening ceremonies shouldn't have been skipped over in canon but I made sure that they are here... kinda needed. Plus canon only mentioned qualifiers in a single line in V4... another thing that was kinda skipped over but corrected here.

The speech by Ozpin was something I had worried about writing as I planned the chapter but when I started writing it to see what I came up with, it kinda just flowed. Some of you may be able to notice a big reference to another series I enjoyed over the years. Cookies if you can spot it. Speaking of references, anyone wanna take a crack at the sources of the Atlas team that RWBY fought?