The first bi-weekly chapter! Thank you all for your continued support!

Beta-ed by xenosaiyan

Yang groaned, light flickering back into vision as her eyes opened. The roof of a rocky cave came into view.

"Thank goodness," Weiss said. "You're awake."

"Weiss?" Yang moaned. She heaved herself upward into a sitting position, the mattress she was on providing a surprising amount of support despite the fact that it was plopped on a dirt floor. "Where are we?"

"My laboratory," a new, unfamiliar voice informed her.

Yang's head turned towards the speaker and, despite the fact that her chest currently felt like she'd just been mauled by an Ursa, she couldn't help but whistle at the new figure. Tall, flowing blonde hair like starlight, and many other prominent features confirmed their host as another of Earthland's gifts that kept on giving.

"How you doing?" Yang smirked.

Weiss smacked her face into her palm. "Don't start that now. This is Sitara."

Yang's eyes widened, all thoughts of flirting and convincing Natsu and Lucy to add a fourth to their group completely forgotten. "Wait, Sitara? As in—"

"Yes, yes, the one you've been looking for," the woman herself waved off, leaning over Yang and raising her hand. Soft golden light glittered from her palms. "Your sister explained your team's special interest in me."

Yang took in a deep breath. Whatever magic Sitara was using on her, it felt like a rush of cool water was being poured over her aching muscles. "Ruby… where is she?"

"She and Blake went into town to get food a bit after I woke up," Weiss explained. "Apparently our host doesn't keep a well-stocked fridge."

Sitara shrugged. "I don't necessarily need the same things that humans do. Food, water, sleep, I greatly enjoy it all and it helps in some ways, but I don't strictly need it. And it's better to spend as much time as I can working if I'm to have any chance of completing my project."

Yang cocked an eyebrow. That certainly sounded like the same rabid obsession that she'd criticized Blake for before the dance. The same obsession she herself had fallen victim to when she was young and had nearly gotten Ruby killed.

But when she'd intervened with Blake, she'd known the details of the situation, enough to pull her friend back from the edge. She had literally just met Sitara. And though she was immensely grateful that the woman had apparently healed her and Weiss from whatever that Kyouka demon did, she was also the creator of the book that had sent them to Earthland in the first place. Plus, the Devil Slayer part of her that had reacted so strongly to their Tartaros adversaries was just as aggravated to be in their savior's presence. She didn't want to say she was prejudiced against demons… but she hadn't met any that hadn't tried to kill her.

Yet. There was always a first time.

"This project," Weiss said. "It wouldn't happen to be related to the book that brought us here?"

Sitara snorted. "Honestly, it might. I am constructing a mystical book similar to what Ruby described sent you here, but you can rest assured I'd never put Tartaros' symbol on it."

Yang chuckled. "Yeah, they didn't seem the friendliest bunch."

"You have no idea."

Sitara pulled her hands away from Yang and started undoing her bandages. The blonde brawler winced as the woman's nimble fingers pressed into her unmarked flesh.

"Uh, normally I wouldn't have much problem with a beautiful woman poking around on me, but is there any particular reason you're—"

"Astonishing," Sitara murmured. "I'm a competent enough healer but the rate your wounds have closed is phenomenal. Does it have anything to do with this strange energy field pouring out of your soul?"

"Uh… energy field?" Yang replied.

"She means our aura," Weiss said. "It does grant us a passive healing boost, but it can't shield us unless we consciously activate it."

"And yet it was able to block the Enhancement curse," Sitara noted. "Can you grant this aura to me? Or is it something exclusive to those of your dimension?"

Weiss shook her head. "I'm sorry. I don't know if it's exclusive to those from Remnant or not but unlocking another's is a high-level skill. None of us have learned it yet."

Sitara scowled and pulled away from the huntresses. "Unfortunate."

Yang smirked and stretched out her arms over her. "Eh, aura's helpful, but we've gotten our butts handed to us by plenty of wizards. Heck, you roasted Kyouka in two seconds flat, right? Not like her pain ray did anything against you."

"I ambushed her," Sitara pointed out. "I far outstrip her in raw power, but her curse doesn't care about little things like that. I can power through it, but the pain is vexing no matter what."

Yang pressed her hand to her side, recalling how her nerves had flared like they'd been dumped in molten lava. "Seconded."

"Tell me about it," Weiss added. "I could barely even think with all that agony. How do you 'push through it'?"

"Pain's an old friend," Sitara remarked. She sighed and leaned against the wall of the cave. "Given you're a Devil Slayer, I suspect you've already sensed that I'm part Etherious."

"Part what?"

"Etherious. A demon from the Books of Zeref," she explained. "I wasn't born as such. A few centuries ago, I… made a mistake, and Mard Geer, that's Tartaros' guildmaster, turned me into a hybrid. The process was unpleasant to say the least, as was its aftermath."

Yang and Weiss flinched.

"I'm sorry," the Schnee heiress said. "I can't imagine going through something like that."

"A few centuries ago…" Yang mumbled. "Do demons usually live that long?"

"They can, though I'd be surprised if any lived past five hundred. Nothing's truly immortal" Sitara noted, though she frowned a moment later. "Except those the gods enjoy torturing."

Okay, there was clearly a story behind that. Seemed pretty personal though, so it was unlikely that their host would feel like sharing. Then again, she'd already revealed quite a bit about herself to them. Though given she said she was centuries old, and yet they'd never heard hide nor hair of her despite looking for her since they'd arrived on Earthland… she might just have been unused to having company.

Well, whatever. The smoking hot half-demon lady had saved their lives and nursed them back to health. That was well worth pardoning a little oversharing, and doing a little Yang Xiao- 'social butterfly' -Long-ing was easy enough.

She reached out her hand and smiled. "Well, I'm glad you lived long enough for us to meet you. I'm Yang."

"She knows who we are, Yang," Weiss said. "Ruby introduced us while we were unconscious."

"Doesn't mean we shouldn't lend a personal touch," Yang replied, winking at Sitara.

Sitara raised an eyebrow and stared at the offered hand a few moments before breaking out into chuckles. She clasped Yang's arm and shook it. "A pleasure to meet you. Though, while I am flattered, I am uninterested."

Yang sighed and snapped her fingers. "Drat. Oh well. Still nice to meet you."

"Oh my god," Weiss groaned. "Can you not flirt for five minutes?"

"Hey, just because you've got cold feet about taking your shot at the ice prince—"

"And the puns! No puns while we're still injured!"

"Oh, come on, Ice Queen. Don't give me the cold shoulder."

"I hated that nickname long before you incorporated it into your abominations!"

Sitara snorted spittle from her mouth before erupting in giggles. When both members of Team RWBY turned to her, she held up her hand to beg for silence.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It's just… I haven't laughed like that in centuries, not since Oz…" her smile evaporated, replaced with melancholy. "Not since I lost someone."

"No, it's alright," Yang assured her. "I'm sorry for your loss."

Sitara stared at the blonde wizard as if she'd grown another head.

"What?" Yang stuttered. "Did I say something wrong—"

"Oh! No!" Sitara assured her. "No, thank you for your condolences. It's just… well… I'm not really used to getting them."

Weiss raised an eyebrow. "Even back then?"

"Back then I… I had hope for a time that he wouldn't really be gone. And by the time that hope was crushed, most had moved on," Sitara replied, gesturing back to her laboratory, hunks of metal and complex machinery scattered over wooden desks. "I threw myself into my work after that."

"What about your family?" Yang asked. If she lost someone close to her, there was no way her biological relatives or her Fairy Tail family would ever let her hide in the dirt.

"My family…" Sitara murmured. "That's a complicated matter. I haven't seen most of them… since my exile."

Yang and Weiss's eyes widened. "Exile?"

Sitara glanced down at her arms. "A demon has no place in the realm I called home. My father…"

"Cast you aside?" Weiss completed, a scowl marring her face.

"What? No," Sitara corrected. "He didn't want to send me away… he just… he didn't have a choice."

Weiss frowned. "You're his daughter. There shouldn't have been any choice but to keep you safe."

"It was more complicated than that," Sitara argued. "He isn't just my father… he… he has greater responsibilities."

"So that makes it okay for him to turn his back on you for something that wasn't even your fault? You didn't ask to be made into part demon," Yang scowled. "It took my mom dying for her to leave us. Well, my second mom."

Both she and Weiss had experience with parents who'd screwed up big time, with her teammate's dad being pretty much the biggest asshole on Remnant and her mom being… well, her mom. She held out some small hope that Natsu was right, that Raven had loved her and had a good reason for abandoning her, but it was nestled between years and years of abandonment issues. And to both the white and yellow of Team RWBY, 'he didn't have a choice' sounded like an abusive parent making his child blame herself.

Still, Sitara shook her head. "He still loved me, even after I let myself get tricked by Mard. He just… he just…" the blonde woman sighed and slid down the wall. "No one can fight the gods' decrees. We just have to figure out a way to wiggle out of them."

That prompted Yang to tilt her head in confusion. "Gods? Like actual gods? Like the kind Weiss kills?"

Sitara looked to the White Fairy. "You're a God Slayer?"

"Indeed."

"Impressive. Though, if you can't beat Kyouka, you wouldn't stand a chance against a real god," she stated. She stood up and strode over to her workbench, removing a pair of gold and black metal fragments. "I assume these are how you ended up on my trail?"

"The Eclipse Gate pieces?" Yang inquired, recalling them from the dossier Princess Hisui had given them. "We were hired to retrieve them."

"You can have them," Sitara declared. "I needed to analyze the spell structure left in them to finetune my own project. Zeref… his understanding of the nature of magic is incredible. Combining Celestial Spirit Magic and Dark Magic so succinctly… it's honestly mystifying."

Weiss shrugged. "I suppose the most infamous dark wizard of all time must have had some idea what he was doing. What's this project of yours you were working on?"

Sitara frowned. "It's the book I was working on. I was out gathering a crucial ingredient when Tartaros ransacked my old lab and stole it."

"Tartaros has the book?" Yang growled. "Guess that explains how it got their emblem on it."

"Though not who their ally on Remnant is," Weiss noted.

"Or why they've sent it to another world in the first place," Sitara noted. "Mard's smart enough to finish it, maybe, but why would he modify it like that?"

Weiss cocked an eyebrow. "Modify?"

Yang smacked her fist into her palm. "Well, no matter what the answer to that is, our next step is clear. We track down Tartaros, kick their asses, and take the book back!"

Sitara's mouth gaped open. "You… want to work with me?"

"Sure!" Yang grinned. "That okay?"

"Yes!" Sitara exclaimed. "That'd be great! I… I'll get you two more blankets. These mattresses really aren't sanitary for medical purposes anyway, I just don't really have to worry about disease myself because I'm… well…"

Yang waved her off. "Don't worry about it."

"It would be an honor to fight alongside you," Weiss proclaimed. "Though, are you sure you'll be able to repair any modifications they've made to it? You have all the necessary supplies?"

Sitara grinned. "Don't worry. After Quatro Cerberus failed spectacularly to bring back the Hippogremus mucus, I went out myself and got a whole boatload of the stuff. It got the book stolen, but I've got plenty of ingredients."

Yang's eyes froze. "You hired Quatro Cerberus to get you your stuff?"

"Yes. I even requested their ace from the Grand Magic Games, Bacchus Goh. And they still came back empty-handed. If they hadn't given me a refund, I don't know what I would have done."

"Yeah. Customer service is really important to any guild," Yang said, trying to keep the sweat from her brow. "Heh, that monster you mentioned, the… uh…"

"Hippogremus?"

"Yeah, that. It would happen to look like a hippo… ogre… thing?"

"Why yes, it does," Sitara nodded. "They're rare beasts attracted to scented oils. Had to spend a fortune to lure one in myself."

"Cool," Yang nodded, a nervous smile plastered over her face.

A series of knocks ran through the cave from seemingly nowhere.

Sitara perked up. "Ah, good, they remembered the secret knock. I'll go help them with the food. You both stay here. I'm relatively sure you're healed, but it is better to be safe than sorry."

"Right," Yang saluted. "Will do!"

Sitara nodded and dashed off down the corridor.

Weiss leaned over to Yang, looking entirely too pleased with herself. "I seem to recall someone telling a story around the guildhall about how she beat Quatro Cerberus's best mage in a one-on-one duel—"

"Not one word."

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"How are you doing?"

Yang glanced towards End as they stepped off Bumblebee, the demon with her friend's face pulling his black cloak over his head. He was as concealed as the day they'd met, only his horns and scaled arms peeking out from his clothes, the rest of his body remaining concealed in shadow.

"About what?" she inquired warily.

End sighed. "Well, anything I suppose. But I guess the most pertinent would be Raven. Your purpose is close at hand. Are you scared it might be snatched away from you?"

Yang shrugged. "This visit is business. Once I'm reunited with Ruby and know she's safe, I can come back later to get Raven's explanation."

"Really? Do you not trust your sister can take care of herself? As I recall, she's quite strong."

"Doesn't matter how strong she is," Yang replied. "Even if she can handle herself, I'm the big sister. At the very least, I need to be there to back her up."

End raised an eyebrow and chuckled. "You're her protector. No matter how strong she is, no matter if she wants it, you look after her. I can understand that."

"You have siblings? Demon siblings?"

"Something like that," End shrugged. The two of them strode through the forest, walking the motorcycle down the final leg of their journey. "But hey, nothing wrong with some good old demon siblings. You might be Ruby's before long."

Yang glanced down at her absent arm, recalling the stump of demonic flesh, the slowly growing stump, that had formed when she first assumed her Full Demon form in training. "Nothing wrong with being a demon."

End scoffed. "The rest of the world won't see it that way."

"My family won't," Yang challenged.

"Maybe they won't think they will," End said. "But the rest of the world tends to view us as lesser. That our lives are expendable, our dreams meaningless compared to others. We're the pawns to be sacrificed."

Yang stopped and whirled on him. "My family won't."

She'd already talked with her dad about it, and he'd promised he'd always love her. He'd… he'd promised. And the rest of Team RWBY wouldn't care either, and certainly not Fairy Tail. If they did put her in a position where she took more hits than everyone else, it was because she could take it. She could push through any pain and literally grow stronger from it. For her friends, she could take it.

Because she knew they'd do the same for her.

End's shadowed eyes held her gaze for a solid few seconds before the demon sighed. "I hope you're right. I really do."

Yang nodded and they kept walking. She wanted to trust her new companion. Not just because he had Natsu's face, but because so far, he had proven himself trustworthy. Not only had he kept his word and not puked in her hair while they were riding Bumblebee, but over the days and nights they'd spent making camp together, he'd both trusted her to keep watch over him while he'd slept, and protected her from Grimm while she slumbered.

He wasn't a bad guy. Bit serious and pessimistic, which was admittedly a bit off-putting when she was expecting Natsu's boisterous excitement every time she looked at him, but a nice guy overall. She'd be lying if she said she still wasn't suspicious about his appearance and what connection he might have to her lost guildmate, but she wanted to believe he was benevolent.

Just like she wanted to believe Raven was. Guess she'd find that out one way or another soon enough.

They arrived at a massive wooden palisade gate. The guards, a bunch of unshaven thugs, with red scarves, raised their ramshackle weapons at the approaching pair. And then promptly lowered them when Yang summoned her flame arm.

"My name is Yang Xiao-Long, daughter of Taiyang Xiao-Long and Raven Branwen," she declared, radiating as much killing intent as she could. "You can either let me in to see my mother, or I can burn you to ash and do it myself."

The bandits paled. Her dad had hidden all the pictures of Team STRQ around the house, but Qrow had shown her his old photos of the group. Yang knew that she had a distinctive resemblance to her biological mother, something her minions could plainly see.

In only a few moments, they were being escorted through the camp.

End grinned. "Nicely done."

Yang shrugged. "The entire guild knew what Erza was capable of, and that kept most of them in line. As long as you make sure everyone knows they can't mess with you without a beating, the small fry won't bother you."

"Rule through fear of force rather than force alone," End mused. "You really are her daughter."

Yang cocked an eyebrow. What did he mean by that? From what he'd said so far, he'd never met Raven.

However, before she could question him about his words, they had arrived at their destination. Half the bandit tribe surrounded them as they stood before the biggest tent in the camp, raised up above the ground by a wooden platform on stilts. She emerged soon after.

Black combat heels, crimson battle kimono and skirt, and a long odachi snug in a massive sheath, Yang would have known the woman before her was dangerous even without the elaborate Grimm mask on her face. She remembered the train under Mountain Glenn, how effortlessly Neo had kicked her ass. And she remembered how when she'd woken up, Torchwick's lackey had been gone, either having been beaten by the figure before her now, or having fled upon seeing her. This was not a warrior to be trifled with.

Once she took off the mask and pinned it to her belt however, she was just Raven Branwen. The woman who'd abandoned her. The woman who had loved her. The woman who had left her. The woman who had wanted her. The woman who had better have a damn good explanation.

The woman who was smiling earnestly at her.

The blonde brawler took a deep breath. Her complicated emotions could wait. She was here on business. "Mom."

"Yang," Raven replied, her eyebrow quirking up. "So, after all this time, you finally decided to visit me."

… Visit… her…

Phantom pain flashed through her lost arm as her rage spiked. In the blink of an eye, her purple flame arm had been brought out once more, a sharp claw protruding out of its end.

Some of the closer bandits took a wary step back. Raven frowned.

"That's… not your semblance."

"No, it's not," Yang growled. "So let's skip past the part where we act like I haven't been searching for you for years, and you've spent that time ignoring me. If you had a good reason, I'm all ears to listen to it. But later. I'm here on business."

"Business?" Raven scowled. "Family. Only coming by when they need something."

Said the woman who never came by at all.

"Dad told me how your semblance works," Yang explained. "Qrow is with Ruby. I need you to give me a portal so I can get to them."

"Well aren't you the doting big sister."

"I do my best," Yang shot back. "Unlike some people."

Raven narrowed her eyes and turned away. "If Ruby is with Qrow, then she's already a lost cause. Trust me, Yang, you don't want to get wrapped up in all this. Ozpin is not the man you think he is."

Yang rolled her eyes. "You mean he's not an immortal reincarnating wizard trying to kill the Queen of the Grimm? Wow, I feel so dumb for believing such an outrageous lie. Please teach me your ways, our wise forest squatter."

Raven's glare gave Professor Goodwitch and Erza stiff competition. "He hasn't bothered trying to kill her for millennia."

How ominous. And uninformative.

"Look, just send me to Ruby and Qrow, and I'll get out of your hair," Yang offered. "I want to help my family."

For a moment, Raven's face grew soft, her crimson eyes tinged with regret. "Family will just get you killed. You may think you know the stakes of Ozpin's war, but he's deceived you. He uses the bonds we form to get us wrapped up in a mess that's too big for anyone. Why throw yourself away like that? When you might already be where you belong?"

Yang snorted. "If you wanted to brainwash me, you should have brought me here when I was a baby. My family won't let me down, and I don't plan on letting them down. Now, send me to Qrow."

All compassion vanished from Raven's face, replaced by a stony stubbornness. "I think not. We're done here. Take them away—"

"Give her a portal, Raven."

With those simple five words, the entire atmosphere of the camp changed. Yang glanced back at End, his cloaked, shadowy figure no longer an afterthought to her bright, bombastic presence. The bandits who had been jockeying for a fight at their leader's command know glanced between each other, unsure and frightened.

And Raven? She had frozen stiff, her face pale and aghast. Slowly, her gaze shifted onto the other intruder.

"End?" Yang whispered. "What are you doing?"

"End?" Raven muttered.

Instantly, her hand dove for her sword hilt. But before she could reach it, the crack of a sniper rifle rang through the air. A round of lightning dust smashed into Omen and its scabbard, the clunky yet elegant weapon sent sprawling across the camp. The bandit leader's eyes widened, her minions frantically scanning their surroundings for the enemy marksman.

"Ah, ah, ah, ah," End scolded. He reached up his hand and pulled back the hood of his cloak, revealing his face to the crowd, pink hair and all. "No running this time, Raven. We still have business to attend to."

Raven's eyes widened. She whirled on Yang, her body trembling. "You're with him? How could you?"

"Wait, you know him?" Yang gasped. She leapt back from End, unfurling her one remaining Ember Celica and falling into a combat stance. All around her, the entire bandit tribe raised their weapons at the demon.

End raised a scaled hand for peace, completely unconcerned by everyone else's response. "I haven't come here to fight anyone. I have come to help one friend fulfill her purpose, and to help advance the goals of another."

Raven bit her lower lip. "Salem sent you… to talk?"

Yang's eyes widened. End worked for Salem? She'd been played! He was just using her to get to Ruby and Wendy!

But then why bring her to the Tribe? He had been the one to offer to lead her to Raven, before she'd ever revealed her plan to exploit the portal semblance. Why would he plan to take her there?

End shrugged in response to Raven's query. "You know the saying. Speak softly, and let the most powerful being on the planet do the talking. The strong live and the weak die, isn't that right, Madam Spring Maiden?"

Ah, there was the reason. He thought Raven was the Spring Maiden and he could capture her. He was wrong of course. The way Ruby and Wendy had described being around Cinder, it'd be pretty noticeable if her mother was—

End flicked his wrist and a bolt of blue fire flashed out. Raven hopped back, her Grimm mask ripped from her hip and turned to ash. The moment it was gone, ethernano flooded the air.

Oh. That could have gone very badly. And still might.

"An impressive bit of forgecraft and time magic, slowing the output of the ethernano creation to a trickle that only one such as I would notice," End remarked. "One wonders where you got it, given it clearly wasn't Ozpin."

Yang stepped in-between the demon and her mother, her eyes narrowed.

End smiled. "Well Yang, ask anything of her you'd like. I can assure you she will not refuse."

"Yeah, I just might," Yang parroted. "After I kick your ass."

"Really?" End sighed. "I'm not your enemy, Yang. Nothing I told you was a lie."

"It sure wasn't the whole truth," she fired back. "You certainly didn't mention the sniper."

End shrugged. "I couldn't risk her running away."

"Because you work for Salem."

"She is my friend. And yours."

"That's enough!"

Both Yang and End turned towards the crowd of bandits surrounding them. A random, unremarkable one had stepped forward, brandishing some sort of hackneyed club. A woman with short hair and a phoenix tattoo on her arm stood behind him sharing a panicked look with Raven.

"You think you can just come in here and talk like that to our leader!?" the brave brigand roared. The crowd, galvanized by his words, began to shout and heckle at the intruders, drawing their hodgepodge of weapons. "You think you can just come in here and threaten the Branwen Tribe?!"

"Yes," End bluntly replied. "Also, Raven, don't think I can't see you trying to form a portal behind your back without your sword."

The black-haired ex-huntress froze, the hand she'd stuck behind her back coming around front, shaking.

"This doesn't have to get ugly, Raven," End assured her. "Open the vault, get us the Relic, and you can go on your way afterward."

"That's it!" the bandit from before yelled. He raised his club and charged, a dozen other tribe members following his path.

"No, don't!" Raven screamed, her eyes wide.

Yang dropped back, skittering up the stairs of her mother's tent platform as the bandits attacked End. She doubted they'd do much, but at the very least they might give her an opening to get a more effective attack in.

That did not happen.

End smirked as the bandits charged, smoke rising from beneath his feet, the ground melting to lava. He raised his hand, palm open to the sky. A small sphere of blue flames ignited in his hand, rotating so quickly it appeared completely smooth, a miniature sapphire sun at his fingertips.

"Fire Devil Emperor," he pronounced. "Dante's Tower."

The orb of fire spun even faster, shrinking from the size of a softball to that of a marble, the flames turning from a scorching blue to a luminous, focused, white. End thrust it down into the ground just as the first bandits arrived.

Raven's eyes lit with a crimson glow, a tornado crashing down from the heavens to shelter her and Yang in the eye of the storm. Yet, a blinding light broke through the wall of wind and a wave of fire washed over them both.

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Happy had been watching the proceedings in the camp through his scope third-quarters of a mile away, making sure to snipe Omen out of Raven's grasp before she could draw her sword. Without the weapon, it would take her far longer to create a human-sized portal, a timeframe that could not be feasibly utilized in combat, especially with End right there.

Especially when he'd decided to have some fun.

Happy's fighting style had developed in part so that he'd be able to support his partner from a safe distance. With him out of range, Yang protected by her natural resistance to fire, and Raven perfectly capable of defending herself, End had no reason to be careful clearing out the small fry.

The demon Exceed had already been in his larger from to brace his shots, but he tensed for impact anyway. His preparation bore fruit when a gargantuan pillar of white fire erupted into the sky, at least half the height of the now destroyed Beacon Tower. A shockwave resonated out from the blast, smacking Happy back a few feet. If he hadn't braced, it would have been five times that, and if he'd been in his smaller form, he would have been knocked out of the sky.

The heat was something he was used to by now, the temperature rising a solid ten degrees from the blaze. With a body hot enough to melt dirt and stone into lava even without summoning any fire, partnering with End was always a distinctly warm affair. Despite desiring to avoid Natsu's tendency for overkill, the ultimate Etherious enjoyed being able to use large bursts of his power. After all, he'd been made as a killing machine, the ultimate killing machine. It was an insult to his pride if he lost control of his power and murdered someone he hadn't meant to.

Besides, if there was one thing the human and demon personas had in common, it was that they loved a good slugfest. Though there were a few more psychological layers to the matter, End's eagerness to find Erza was ultimately to get a one on one slugfest with the Titania.

Happy could admit that he'd grown into the Fairy Tail propensity for a good scrap. Being able to hold his own contributed to that. He could even say, to his shame, that he'd enjoyed some of the killings he'd carried out, when Salem had demanded the heads of some particularly nasty individuals.

The rest, he'd still done. For fifty years, he'd done it, for the same reason he now aimed his rifle at the smoke rising up from the former Branwen camp, his ethernano sight scope waiting for Raven to flee or be defeated and his shot at Yang, his friend, to be cleared. He could only hope she'd forgive him one day.

He'd waited fifty years for the Fairy Spheres to break and start returning his friends. Now, he just needed to wait for the chaos that was sure to erupt at Haven to make a move.

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Yang groaned as she staggered to her feet, her entire body aching as if she'd been rammed headfirst by a Goliath. Beside her, Raven remained on her hands and knees, staring blankly at their surroundings. Or rather, lack thereof.

"Gone," she murmured. "They're all gone…"

Yang gulped, unable to argue with the statement.

The bandit camp, the bustling base filled with lowlifes and murderous crooks, was just gone. The tents, the crates of supplies, palisade, even the very ground upon which it had stood had been scorched to ash. A wall of smoke and soot rose up from the ruin and plumed into the sky, the trees bordering the site either on fire or burnt black.

She… she'd tried to stop this. Yang had opened her mouth, called the flames inward to devour them whole. But the moment the blaze touched her lips, she'd recoiled. They were hot, too hot. Hotter than her flames, even hotter than Natsu's. Her natural resistance to fire had been working full stop along with her aura and it still felt like she had stood on the surface of the sun when the blast washed over her.

"You… you brought him here?" Raven muttered. "You brought him here for me. Do you really hate me that much? That you'd side with Salem just to destroy me?"

"I am not on Salem's side!" Yang shouted. "He had your location anyway, he just brought me because… I don't know why! Who is he anyway?"

A shadow began to emerge from the smoke. The air temperature shot up ten degrees as he approached.

Sweat poured down Raven's forehead, and only a fraction of it was from the heat. "Salem's mightiest servant."

End emerged from the smog; a wide grin plastered on his face. His black cloak caught fire from the sheer heat and dissolved into cinders, revealing his form in full. His clothes were black and orange vestments, probably enchanted somehow not to have burned up already. His arms and legs were covered in blood-red scales, his devil horns flickering with sparks as blue fire spread over his body.

"I am the Lord Ophiuchus, protector of the Queen's Gates. Human, faunus, Grimm, demon, or even god, it does not matter. Before me, all things are equally ash," he boasted. He raised his hand, as if offering for them to take it. "Now please ladies, there's no more need for violence. You cannot win, so let us talk."

Yang's eyes narrowed. He'd just wiped out the entire bandit tribe in one move. For some reason, she couldn't eat his fire, and if he was anything like Natsu, his confidence was far from empty bluster.

But no matter how strong he was, he was still a demon. And she was a Devil Slayer. She hadn't forgotten how little that had meant against Kyouka, but she was stronger now then she'd been then. Even if she couldn't match End's power, she could at least hold him off. She'd listened to Ruby raving about Crescent Rose enough to know that no matter how good her enemy's sniper cover was, they couldn't see through the massive plume of smoke floating over the campsite. So this fight would just be between them.

She glanced to Raven. "Can you make a portal without your sword?"

Raven staggered to her feet, her wide eyes pinned to their enemy. "I can, but a human-sized one will take time."

"Then get started," Yang declared, taking a deep breath of wonderfully thick ethernano. She marched forward. "I'll get you your time."

Raven nodded and placed her hands together in midair. Slowly, but surely, a small dot of red and black energy appeared before her, growing every few seconds.

End smirked at Yang. "You're approaching me?"

"I can't beat the shit out of you if I don't get closer."

"Oh, my friend," End chuckled. "You can't do that no matter how close you get."

Yang snarled and launched herself forward with a blast from Ember Celica. With momentum on her side, she turned the fire of her right arm from purple to pink and launched it at her enemy.

End raised both hands, but only one towards Yang, his palm rising to catch her strike, his feet not even flinching from the blow. His other hand formed a finger gun and aimed past Yang, a small marble of blue flame forming at the tip.

"Bang," he said.

The fire bullet cracked through the air and streaked for Raven. The Spring Maiden's eyes widened, and she leapt to the side, all progress on her portal completely lost. A good forty meters behind her, an explosion echoed through the air, smoke billowing away from the shockwave.

Raven froze the ground, her breathing maddeningly panicked.

Internally, Yang wretched. This was Raven Branwen? This was Summer's partner, the sister Qrow wasn't sure he could take in a fight? This was the Spring Maiden, the infamous bandit queen who lived by 'the strong live and the weak die'? She'd expected the possibility that her birth mother was a monster, a jerk who'd abandoned her and her dad because she felt like slaughtering civilians, but this? This was just pathetic.

Or was End truly that terrifying for her?

Whatever. She didn't live by the tribe's ridiculous philosophy, she lived by Fairy Tail's. And that meant the strong had a responsibility to protect the weak so that they could have the chance to become strong themselves. She'd keep End off Raven's back long enough for her birth mother to make them a portal to safety that they could both flee through and then figure out their next move with Ruby and the others—ah!

With his shot at Raven fired, End had lit his free hand ablaze and brought it crashing into Yang's side, pulling the huntress forward by her caught fist to optimize the strike and smash her into the ground.

Once again, Yang found having been stomped by a Goliath to be the aptest comparison to the pain running through her muscles, a hefty chunk of her aura shaved off by the blow. Fortunately, she sucked in a breath as she rose to her knees, preparing her counterattack.

"Fire Devil's Rage!"

She opened her mouth and unleashed a torrent of pink flames up at her foe. With a point-blank attack like that, even Erza would be forced to duck back to avoid being scorched. But End didn't even flinch, merely raising a hand and letting its sapphire blaze stalemate her breath attack. If it had just been her normal go-to move, it might have even worked.

But after the first exchange, Yang was not dumb enough to believe that her normal level of strength would be enough. Raven's presence provided plenty of ethernano, but she needed a greater magical output, more power. And she knew where she could get it. She'd fight a demon with a demon. The demon within.

When Wendy had told her of the power Gray had discovered when he'd become a Devil Slayer, his Full Demon form, an equivalent state to Dragonforce, she'd known she would need it to prove her strength to the others. All the months she'd trained on Patch had been spent perfecting her Purple Flare arm but more importantly, learning to access her full power.

Anger. Hate. Wrath. Most might shirk away from such emotions, but Yang had always embraced her rage. Whenever her eyes had blazed crimson and she'd unleashed her fury, that was when she was at her best.

And when the riving black tattoo sprouted across the side of her face and the stump of thick demonic flesh appeared at the tip of her flame arm, she was at her most powerful.

Her pink flames tripled in size, turning from a stream of fire to a hellish inferno. End's hand was pushed back, his blaze struggling enough that the man himself puffed his cheeks—

"Fire Devil Emperor's Howl!"

Oh shit!

End opened his mouth and a sapphire flood rushed out. His flames washed over hers. An outsider might have thought he was actually using water to quench her assault, but that would have only made a brief rush of steam before she evaporated the liquid. This? Her attack was completely overwhelmed by his, his inferno hotter than hers by several orders of magnitude.

It was almost as if he was burning her very magic away.

Yang rolled away, the blue flames licking at her heels as they burnt a molten trench into the ground. She whipped around to face End again.

The demon's opposite hand launched another fire bullet at Raven, this one clipping the Spring Maiden's side and causing her aura to crackle with strain. But his other one, the one he'd used to block her attack, he brought in front of his face and clenched with a smirk.

"That actually hurt," he remarked. "It seems that even if my curse burns away your magic like everything else, it's still able to affect my body. How intriguing."

Yang roared and charged, her flame arm streaking forward and her flesh arm rushing forward wreathed in flames. Jabs, uppercuts, crosses, kicks, every move she knew, she unleashed on the demon with a barrage of relentless blazing attacks.

And each one End deflected. If it was fire, he projected his own to block. If it was physical, he deflected the strike and brushed it aside. All the while, he kept finding openings to keep strafing Raven, preventing her from creating a large enough portal for a human to fit through. And he never once moved from his spot.

"You fight like him," End sneered, for once truly dismissive. He brushed her flame arm aside and delivered a crushing elbow under her armpit, throwing off her balance "All wild instinct and relentless power. It's predictable. And disappointing. You could be so much more."

Yang spat out a glob of saliva and blood, stabilizing her stance. "Natsu managed well enough."

End growled, a deep thing crawling out from the depths of hell. "Salamander had me to draw upon me for his strongest techniques, his 'Flames of Emotion'. And when he couldn't do that, he had to bet everything on eating whatever random thing happened to be around. Etherion, God Slayer flames, lightning, it truly amazes me how lucky he was. He should have been dead a dozen times over."

Yang smirked at his obvious disgruntlement. "He could kick your ass. Just like I will."

"Not fighting like this you won't," End snorted. "Power is one factor of combat, the only factor that applies if possessed in sufficient quantities, but it is not impossible for the weak to close the gap with skill. It is admirable, impressive, something he never bothered to do. You emulate him like that, relying on raw strength, trying to force your way through every obstacle. It is… unimaginative. And eventually, it might be fatal. Really, you can conjure limbs of fire capable of physical interaction… and yet you stopped at one?"

Despite herself, his words pricked something in Yang's mind. She glanced down her flame arm, felt the distinct lack of weight that would come from a real limb, something that had taken time to adjust to, but which she had handled in time.

So, if there would be no weight increase, what was stopping her from making more than one?

"Allow me to demonstrate. Purple Flare – Giant's Grip."

Yang's eyes widened, but the swaths of blue fire surrounding the demon suddenly turned violet. It formed into the vague shape of a central limb and reached out for the huntress like a giant's hand. Caught off-guard, she was trapped in its thick fingers and tugged back to End, who grabbed her throat with his physical claw.

"Fire is a simple magic at heart," he confessed. "Blazing ever brighter and burning everything in its path. Yet even simplicity can be mastered."

A pair of lightning bolts cracked through the smoke, shredding the giant flame arm apart and smashing into End. The demon yelped, the first sound of pain he'd made the entire fight, and dropped Yang from his grip. He even took a step back, though it was only one step.

"Yang!" Raven shouted, the light of the maiden powers surrounding her eyes. Her latest attempt at a portal glimmered before her, barely the size of a baseball. "Come on!"

The blonde leapt to her feet and dashed for the portal, the distortion slowly growing larger every second. If she timed it right, it would be just big enough for her to leap through when she arrived.

Unfortunately, she never would.

A clawed hand reached out and yanked her back by her hair. Yang's eyes barely had time to widen before she was thrown in the opposite direction, smashing into the tree line at the edge of the crater.

End turned back to Raven and took in a deep breath. A moment later, he unleashed a massive Fire Devil Emperor's Howl, a mouth of sapphire flame hurdling for the bandit queen.

Raven's eyes widened. She glanced at Yang, face full of terror.

And even across the field, Yang's heart dropped. "No. Please don't. Not again."

Her prayers went unanswered.

Raven transformed into a bird and dove through the tiny portal just as the wave of fire washed over them, the gate collapsing a second later.

Yang's one remaining hand closed into a fist. For a moment, she tried to rationalize it. Raven had been trying to create the portal several times and that was after getting hit by End's opening attack and some of the later potshots. She couldn't have had too much aura left, and it wouldn't have done either of them any good if she'd been incinerated. In a few seconds, she'd be back, with Qrow, and Ruby, and Wendy, and everyone else, ready to back her up.

She waited. End even turned around and watched her, the smoke clearing even further from the crater. She waited for what seemed like forever, just standing there, waiting for the mother that had once wanted her to return to help.

You'd think she would have learned by now, would have gotten used to being abandoned.

"I'm sorry," End said.

Yang's eyes locked onto him, burning a furious scarlet. The black tattoo of her Full Demon form rived across her face, the stump of her right side growing ever larger, a protrusion resembling an elbow forming at its end. Her hair, the hair he'd dared to touch, ignited with pink flames.

She let out a guttural roar and launched towards him like a rocket. He pointed a finger gun at her and fired a blue flame bullet downrange. But if he expected it to hit, he shouldn't have spent so much time critiquing her before.

Her flame arm erupted from her side, but this time larger, wild, no longer conforming to the idea that it had to act like the arm she'd lost. Its claw sank into the ground to the side and tugged shifting Yang's course and whipping her around the flame bullet.

And with even more momentum behind her, she rammed her semblance supercharged fist right into End's gut. The demon spat out a cough, and was sent skidding at least three dozen yards across the ground, trenches of pink fire trailing behind him.

Yang landed on the ground, panting hard, her flame arm balancing her on her legs as she forced her tears to evaporate from her skin. She'd finally made the bastard move and quite a bit at that.

But that was her best shot. With Raven gone, the ethernano in the air was getting thinner by the second, and she'd just blown her semblance's stockpile of damage. Not to mention since she'd still taken all that damage, her aura wasn't exactly in pristine condition.

End took a deep breath, the trails of pink fire she'd left behind streaming into his mouth.

Yang frowned. "Great. So I can't eat your fire but you can eat mine?"

The demon swallowed, a plume of smoke rising from his lips. "If it makes you feel any better, I don't get any benefit from it. And that actually hurt a decent bit. But I suppose that's to be expected. I do pack quite a punch."

"Heh, cocky son of a bitch, aren't you," Yang panted, raising her fists once more. "All that posturing, trying to play teacher with me. You call Natsu reckless, but you just let me hit you with all the ammo you've been firing at me this entire fight. What if you'd been wrong?"

"Your semblance was irrelevant. None of the attacks I've used this fight were meant to kill you," End sighed. "I am the most powerful being on this planet, Yang. That is not arrogance or posturing, it is fact. I was designed to destroy the curse of gods. If something isn't strong enough to kill you, it doesn't have a chance in hell at harming me. Still, I've greatly enjoyed our time together. But my interest in teaching has allowed the Spring Maiden to escape for the moment, a vexing obstacle, if far from insurmountable. Nevertheless, I believe it is time for our fun little spar to come to a close."

He extended an arm up to the sky, a ball of blue fire appearing in his hand just like it had before he'd wiped out the camp. Except instead of shrinking and speeding up its rotation, the sphere grew in size, quickly. In the space of sparse moments, the orb the size of a softball had swelled to gigantic size, a shining sapphire star at End's command.

Yang snarled. "Tell me one thing. Why did you bother bringing me to the Tribe at all?"

"I wanted to help you achieve your purpose, to meet your mother, and ask her why she abandoned you," the demon replied. "I suppose this encounter has answered that question, whether you asked it aloud or not."

Fear. If this fight had done anything apart from showing Yang how outmatched she was against Salem's ace, it was reveal her birth mother's true nature. A coward who abandoned her out of desperation to hide from Salem's eye.

And as justified as End's power had proved that fear to be, she couldn't find it within herself to view that terror as a good reason for leaving, for all the pain she'd caused her and dad and Uncle Qrow, for all the innocent people she'd slaughtered across the Anima wilds. Natsu had been right about Igneel having a good reason for leaving him behind, but he had been wrong about Raven. Ironic, one mom had left her out of a fear of death, while the other had run off to face it without fear.

And if she had to choose between following one of them, she'd choose Summer every time. She'd been hurt, and abandoned, and made to suffer more pain than anyone should have, but she would never give up. This endless adventure belonged to her and her friends, and she would weather whatever pain came her way to keep them safe.

With a wordless roar, she charged, packing every last ounce of magic she had into the pink flames around her fist.

End thrust down his hand. "Fire Devil Emperor – Cruel Sun!"

The burning blue star fell like a hammer from the sky cast in judgment from the heavens. It meant Yang mid-charge, her aura shattering to pieces.

The heat consumed her, and after a brief flash of all-encompassing sapphire, she saw only darkness.

RWBYRWBYRWBYRWBYFTFTFTFT

As far as good news went, the fires were finally out. The Nikos' rented house would not burn down! Though, they might have to pay for damages. Half the living room had been scorched black.

Ruby had spent the hour since coordinating the effort and then overlooking their new arrival. Raven had been put in Scarlet's bed, still unconscious despite Wendy's continued healing of her burns. The Sky Dragon Slayer made no secret of how lucky the bandit queen was to have gotten medical attention so quickly. For some reason, her wounds had resisted the healing magic, and if the Maiden of the Sky had gotten to her much later, there would have been permanent nerve damage.

Perhaps a hospital would have been better at that point, but they could hardly bring the infamous Raven Branwen to such a place. The tide of ethernano pouring out of her indicated that she was the Spring Maiden, and even beyond that strategic fact, she recognized those blue flames that had chased her from Oniyuri. Whatever had happened at the Branwen Tribe, the Ophiuchus was behind it.

And since Cinder and Mercury had said the Ophiuchus had captured Yang…

Ruby's feelings for Raven Branwen weren't something she thought about often. She'd never met the woman who might have been godmother in another life, but she'd seen the effects of her absence torment her sister, father, and uncle. Plus, the whole 'killing innocent people as a bandit' didn't win her any points. But no one ever talked about her, so for the most part the silver-eyed girl never had much reason to bother thinking about why such a prestigious huntress had suddenly abandoned everything she'd valued. But, if she could tell them any information on where Yang was, and what had happened to her, then Ruby wouldn't let her escape.

Besides, there was a person other than Wendy who hadn't left her side since her arrival. And if Uncle Qrow still cared about his sister enough for that, whatever bond they'd once shared must have been worth it.

Suddenly, Ruby's scroll rang and roused her from her thoughts. Both Qrow and Wendy turned towards her as she pulled it out, her eyes widening at the caller ID. She shoved the device against her ear and answered it.

"Yang?" she desperately said.

"Hello, Ruby."

The huntress did a double-take at the voice that answered. The very familiar voice.

"Natsu?"

A snarl simmering with fury indicated she was incorrect. Wendy, her hearing enabling her to hear every word, paled.

"I will forgive your… understandable error," the voice on the other end of the call replied. "Rest assured, I am not Natsu Dragneel. My name is End. You passed my test with flying colors as Oniyuri."

Ruby's blood froze, her suspicions confirmed. "You're the Ophiuchus. You have Yang's scroll. Cinder was telling the truth. You have her."

"You know that Cinder is in the city… that's interesting," End remarked. "I'll be blunt, my friend. There are two people that Raven Branwen could have fled to from our battle and a coward like her would flee to those who could defend her, meaning Qrow and your lot that she knows are with him."

"We don't have her," Ruby lied. "She must have gone to the other person."

"Your father? Her husband that she's avoided like the plague for nearly twenty years? Unlikely," End declared. "I currently have Yang and Professor Lionheart as my guests here at Haven. At eight-fifteen tonight, I will be shipping out to bring your sister to the Queen. Though if you were to bring the Spring Maiden here ten minutes before that, I might have reason to delay."

Ruby frowned. "You can't possibly think we're going to just bring you the key to the Relic of Knowledge."

"My friend, let's not play games. You're a Fairy Tail wizard. Futile attempts at outmaneuvering me aside, that's exactly what you're going to do. But, if you'd rather take your chances coming for Yang in the Grimmlands, that's your prerogative. I don't really have a reason to keep Professor Lionheart alive then, but if that's your final choice—"

"No!" Ruby shouted. "Don't kill him. We'll… we'll be there. We'll bring Raven."

"Good. Don't worry, Ruby. As long as you don't try anything, no one will get hurt tonight. And you'll be reunited with the Queen so very soon."

The call ended with a click.

Ruby lowered her scroll and shared a terrified look with Wendy and Qrow. Somehow, despite their best efforts, their enemies had learned that the Spring Maiden was with the Branwen Tribe and beaten them to the punch. Now, they could either hand the Relic of Knowledge over to Salem… or risk Yang being taken away.

Neither option was permissible. But whatever their plan to get around their opposition was, they had only a few hours to figure it out.

When night fell, Haven would be a warzone.

Ah. Been waiting a while for that fight. One thing I really wanted this chapter to do is something I hope the remainder of the canon RWBY Atlas Arc does: justify the older cast's pants-shitting terror of Salem. She is just as strong as End, and the only reason Yang survives here is that he does not want to kill her, and the only reasons that Raven escapes are that 1) he's having so much fun trying to teach Yang/actually trying to befriend her that he slips up just that tiny bit to give her an opening, and 2) she gives in to her fear and abandons Yang again. To quote Starscream from Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (never thought I'd quote that movie) - "Not to call you a coward, master, but sometimes cowards do survive."

Thank you for Reading! I hope you enjoy what comes next!

Go Forth and Conquer!