Chapter-22

Thane

"They have returned." Ruler spoke as Onyx sat on his couch in contemplation. He'd received reports that Team RWBY, Port and Tristan had encountered the infiltrators and chased them out of Cysgod. It was good news, but Onyx needed to know what they knew of the page.

The group came in running as Onyx perked up in alarm. What is happening?

"Onyx! I know what they're here for!" Port exclaimed as Onyx's eyes widened. They'd told Port about it?

Oh no. Thane told me not to tell… He thought. Thane had made him keep it a secret mainly because of his students. Thane cared deeply for Maria and Port and did not want them to get involved with what he was doing.

"Ah…you do…" Onyx spoke nervously as Port frowned. "Is there something wrong, Onyx?" She asked as Onyx bit his lip. "Well…"

"…You knew, didn't you?"

Onyx looked away. "…Yes. I knew about the page." He admitted.

"Hold on. What page are you talking about?" Blake asked as Ruby's eyes suddenly widened.

"A page from Thane's diary." Port spoke up. He kept a diary recording all that he did in his life and notes of whatever he came to know. After his death, the diary had been kept by his family, who said that I contained confidential information that no one should ever know about. I haven't read the confidential section, but I have read the ones containing Thane's records of the grimm he encountered. It is the most valuable source of information on the grimm, and even said to have contained the secret to the origin of the Grimm themselves."

Weiss gaped. "That…that would be a revolutionary discovery if made public. Why hadn't Thane's family done that?"

"Because Thane removed all those pages and left only the ones about the types of grimm. I only know because he told me some of it." Port spoke before turning to Onyx. "Are you saying Thane gave you a page from his diary?"

Onyx nodded. "Yes. They are in truth a bunch of pages. I'll go get them." He spoke before going to his office, taking out the pages. "These pages, well, they contain a long story."

The Schnee Manor, Atlas, 30 AGW:

Sophia Schnee sat in her study with a bunch of documents regarding the handover of the dust assets of Axis Industries to her company, the Schnee Dust Company. It had been an exhausting day's work. Her husband Sonne was sick and her son Nicholas was in Mistral to negotiate setting up of SDC mines with the 13 Hanzai.

Sophia let out a yawn and looked out the window, noticing someone hanging there and went back to her work before furrowing her eyebrows and looking out again and rubbing her eyes.

"Oh, you're here." She spoke as Thane, her best friend and the biggest idiot she's ever known, waved at her while hanging out of the window. He gave an innocent smile and gestured for Sophia to open the window.

Sophia groaned and stood up, opening the window and letting the man in. Even at the age of 50, Thane somehow managed to maintain the youthful aura around him. He was dressed in his usual casual clothes, a black coat over a grey shirt and brown trousers along with his signature round shades. His cloak that he protected like his own child was nowhere to be seen.

"Thane, there's something called a door." Sophia spoke yawning before jolting as Thane clapped loudly in front of her and chuckling.

"You think I'm ever going to use your house's doors?" Thane asked playfully as Sophia sighed.

"No…and it's Our house, Thane. I'm completely fine with it if you want to move in. I've got plenty of extra rooms for your family."

"Thanks for the offer, but I'm fine with where I am. It's more peaceful compared to Atlas. Besides, Vidar wants to live with his future wife at my home too."

Sophia smiled softly. "Alright, Thane. If you say so."

"Now, what's the matter? With you being busy with the SDC as well as funding Atlas academy, you usually wouldn't call on me like this."

"Yes, especially with you busy with your students in Beacon."

"Hey, my former students are doing good as the new teachers in Beacon now. I just hop in as a part-time teacher nowadays. With the rate this is going, I think I can retire in 10 more years."

Sophia nodded. "But anyways, I heard you're going to Vale."

"Yep."

"Is there a reason?"

Thane's smile fell. "I found Osmond's successor."

Sophia's eyes widened. It had been 10 years since their leader, King Osmond of Vale, had passed away from the effects of overusing the relic of destruction in the battle of Vacuo. Ever since then, the now scattered members of Ozma's order were searching for Osmond's successor.

"Who is he?"

"A young orphan named Ozpin. Osmond had told me before he died to seek out his next incarnation to receive one final assignment from him."

"Final?"

"Well, he said that he'll release me from his service once I complete this assignment. After that, I can leave the order and no longer participate in the war against Salem."

"So you're slowly leaving?" Sophia asked as Thane nodded. "Yeah, I've been in this mess since I was a little kid. Now, I'm a middle-aged man with a family and a legacy that'll probably last for a long time. The world's changing, Sophie. It's getting more peaceful. More and more huntsmen are popping up, the grimm are being driven back and less settlements are falling every year. I no longer have to keep relentlessly fighting to protect the settlements. So, I'm going start retreat into my own life and enjoy my retirement watching a new Remnant prosper."

Sophia nodded. "I see. Well, I pretty much left this thing after Nicholas was born. So, I'm happy that you're finally finding ways to live your life beyond hunting grimm."

Thane smiled. "I still have 10 years, Sophie. Don't forget about that."

They shared a laugh before Sophia cleared her throat. "Well, I've been trying to buy a dust mine from a village in northern Vale, but because of harassment by grimm, they are unable to progress the negotiations."

Thane nodded. "Ah, so a little extermination mission after I complete the big assignment? Alright then, I'll go take care of this. What's this village?"

It's Cysgod."

Thane was silent. "…Wait a minute. Cysgod, Cysgod…you've got to be kidding me. Are those damned shadows back again?! I thought I took down all of them back in the good old days of the great war?"

"Some must have survived and repopulated. And now they're harassing the village."

Thane sighed. "Alright. I'll go make sure those sneaky bastards are gone for real. I'll bring Port and Maria too. It'll be an excellent opportunity for them to learn how to kill grimm that don't attack straight away."

He wrapped an arm around Sophie's shoulder. "Now that that's out of the way, I want to ask something. What if we try and organize a goodbye party for me with the others?"

"Yeah, I can do that. I'll contact the others."

"Make sure they come. I don't want any of those idiots missing for the great sendoff party."

"Don't worry. They'll come, Thane." Sophie spoke. "Now go. Call me when you're done."

"Gotcha. Bye, Sophie."

"Bye, Thane." She spoke as Thane, in a typical Thane manner, went to jump out of the window.

"Thane!" She called as Thane looked back. "Yeah?"

"What about my birthday gift?"

"Don't worry about that. I haven't forgotten about your birthday, Blizzard queen. I still have some last things to do before it's ready. It's going to be the best thing you've ever seen when I reveal it." He spoke before jumping off.

"Thane to the rescue again…" Sophia spoke in relief. The Cysgod issue had been driving her crazy for the past few weeks. Now that Thane is going to handle it, she can relax a bit, only a bit.

She closed her window and looked back at the papers.

I don't want to do this… She thought in her mind before her eyes fell on her Violin. "Yeah, I'm not doing it now." She spoke before picking up her Violin to take a break.

Nepotain Harbor, Vale, 30 AGW:

Thane felt a little nervous stepping off at Nepotain harbor. This was it. For 10 years the Final assignment had been occupying his mind. He couldn't stop thinking about it as much as he tried. His entire plan for this decade was slowly leaving the huntsman framework, eventually ending it by handing his letter of resignation to Beacon's headmaster and retiring. But all of that would be difficult until he wrapped up his commitments to the Order of Ozma.

"Okay, Thane. Your first step towards retirement begins." He muttered before his scroll rang. He picked up the call as his wife Alpina's voice came in.

"Hey, Alp."

"Hey, Thane. Are you coming to the house?"

"Sorry, Alp. I'm in the middle of something important. It'll take me a bit more time."

"How long?"

"Probably a month." Thane spoke. "Is there something wrong?"

"Oh no, no. Nothing. It's fine. Just wanted to know. Good luck."

"Thanks. Bye, Alp."

"Bye, Thane." Alpina spoke before cutting off the call.

Thane then pulled out the address. "Julius Orphanage." He read out before smiling softly.

"Yeah, Julius would have loved to get an orphanage named after him." He spoke before putting his scroll in his pocket and heading to the Orphanage.

He went to the reception. "Good morning." He greeted before showing his card to the receptionist. "Ah, you have arrived. I shall take you to the Directress." She spoke as she took Thane to the Directress' office. The Directress was an old woman wearing glasses, who smiled at him as he entered. There sat a young boy with unruly hair in a black shirt and blue trousers. His eyes were coffee brown. "Welcome to Julius Orphanage. This is Ozpin." She spoke as Ozpin looked at Thane with a little nervousness.

"I'll leave you both to talk." The directress spoke before leaving and closing the door.

Alright, no turning back… Thane thought before sitting down in front of him. "So, you're Ozpin?"

"Y-Yes, sir." Ozpin spoke meekly.

Thane could simply tap his forehead and use what little thaumaturgy Osmond taught him to put him to sleep, but he first wanted to know the kid.

"I'm Thane." Thane spoke holding out his hand, which Ozpin hesitated before shaking it, seeing Thane didn't seem to be a cold person.

Thane then pulled out some gum. "Here, have some." He spoke as Ozpin stared at it. "Sir…"

"Oh don't think I'm doing this because 'I'm supposed to'. Chew some gum and take your mind off the stress. This is just a normal conversation between you and me." He spoke as Ozpin was silent before taking the gum and chewing it.

"So, I heard you don't like this orphanage."

Ozpin looked away. "No, I don't."

"Do the teachers harass you?"

Ozpin's eyes widened. "Oh, no! The teachers are nice! But…"

Here it comes… Thane thought. The whole part about dragging someone into the mess with Salem. He didn't like that it was a kid, but he had no choice. Ozpin had been chosen as the next host of Ozma, and that meant any chances of leading a normal life being 0%.

"But they think I'm insane." Ozpin spoke looking down. Thane could see his hesitation and fear, as if Thane wasn't going to believe him.

"Because you say someone is speaking when there is nobody else?" Thane asked as Ozpin's head shot up to look at him in shock. "How…"

"Let me guess, one day you just heard someone speaking?"

"Y-Yes, but how…"

"Yeah, let's just say I know why this is happening."

For the first time, Ozpin brightened up. "Really? Please tell me sir, please!" He exclaimed as he went to get up, only for Thane to push him back down.

"Woah, woah! Hold on, kid! I said I know why this is happening, but I can't tell you. It's a lot of responsibility that right now a kid like you can't take on right now."

Ozpin's smile fell. "What…?"

"Look, Ozpin." Thane spoke. "I'm not saying you shouldn't know. But remember that the moment you know why there is someone speaking to you, then you will be given one of the most difficult jobs on Remnant."

"It's difficult?"

"Yeah, difficult to the point that even with a bunch of people helping you, you can make little progress in years." Thane spoke. "I'm just one of those people who's supposed to be helping you."

"You'll help me?"

Thane nodded. "Yeah. But all that's later. Right now, I have a really important assignment that I can't ignore. Once I finish it, I'll be back for you, kid. Then, we can get started on your mysterious inner voice."

"O-Okay, so what do I do?"

"First, close your eyes." Thane spoke as Ozpin did so before he pressed his finger against Ozpin's head and uttered a spell. Ozpin slumped as the boy fell asleep.

Thane pulled away his fingers before sitting back. "Alright, Oz. I think you've had your fun. Get out and lay it on me."

Ozpin's eyes opened and he sat up, his face now calm as he looked at Thane.

Thane, meanwhile, inwardly groaned looking at Ozpin's position.

Even as a little orphan, Osmond still manages to look like royalty… Thane thought. "Hey, Oz."

"Hello, Thane." Osmond replied with a smile. "I see the years have weighed down on you."

Thane laughed. "Since when have they not? In the tragedy that is the life of yours truly, every second feels like a bus on my spine. Why else do you think I scrambled over when I found your next host?"

"I thought you wanted to see me again."

"That too." Thane spoke before hugging Osmond. "Good to see you again, Oz. It was pretty difficult for us without you."

Osmond nodded. "How is the Order by the way?"

"Well, me and Morrigan are pretty much the only ones who see actions. With the intel Jackdaw Branwen and his merry group of war criminals provide us, Morrigan and I go around hunting acolytes, the usual stuff. The rest have been busy in their own work. Sophie's been revitalizing Atlas' economy with the SDC, Julius has been going around rebuilding the fortifications of Vale's villages, Nikos has been busy ensuring no one tried to bring down Mistral's council and attempt to bring back the monarchy and so much more. As for the other side, they've gone quiet. Probably because I've been cutting down acolytes before they can establish some influence."

"Good. Do talk to Norman and get the poor boy to Beacon. I'll be training him until he's ready to take the mantle."

"Alright. I'll anyways need to leave for northern Vale after this."

"Another mission?"

"Yeah, turns out all the shadows didn't die when I burnt down the old mansion near Cysgod's woods. They repopulated and are causing trouble again. So, I'm going with Port and Maria to finish the job. Now, what's the final assignment?"

Osmond sighed. "Do you remember when you had a massive headache when you were in Mount Glenn?"

Oh, boy. Thane did remember that. When he'd come to Mount Glenn for the first time, the headache he'd got made him feel like his skull was cracking open.

"I can see from your face that you remember. Well, the reason for that is that there is a 500-year-old grimm over there."

Thane's eyes widened. "Hold on, a 500-year-old grimm?" He asked. That was bad.

"And you want me to kill it?"

"Yes. It doesn't serve Salem. But it is still a massive threat if released. It is a loose end that needs to be tied up. I trust you can do it?"

Thane thought about the briefing. This was going to be like on the level of his fight with the Elder Wyrm in Shamal desert. But if he played his cards right, he could take down the grimm quickly without much difficulty.

"Alright."

"Good. Do this, and I will consider your service to the Order fulfilled. Do you need help?"

Thane thought about it, before shaking his head.

"No, I'd rather not get anyone else involved. This will be a secret."

"Very well. Good luck, Thane. We shall talk after you've completed this." Osmond spoke before laying back as Ozpin jolted up. "Wha…I fell asleep?!" He exclaimed before looking at Thane. "I'm so sorry!"

"Nah, it's fine. It was nice talking to you, kid. I'll talk to someone and they'll handle it."

Ozpin tilted his head in confusion. "It means you're getting adopted. Congratulations." Thane spoke before leaving the office, leaving Ozpin alone as a wide smile formed on his face.

Mount Glenn, South-east of Vale, 30 AGW:

"Is this the point?" The aurorus aircraft's pilot asked, flying through the cloudy skies above Mount Glenn as Thane nodded, clad in full Sylfirian armor made by himself. He put his war scythe Hela on his back under his cloak and his shotgun on his hip before checking his armor for anything loose before his headgear snapped shut into a mask over his face. He picked up necessary supplies for this mission in pouches at his waist.

The aurorus' backdoor opened as Thane stared down at a forest before giving a thumbs up to the pilot and jumping off the aurorus.

Here we go, ladies and gentlemen. A 50-year-old fart like myself doing shit he should be doing in his 20s. Thane thought as he flew through the air.

As he got close to a tree, Thane pulled out his shotgun and fire the gravity dust round loaded into it, cancelling his momentum as he fell slower and swung Hela at one of the tree trunks, using to slide down slowly and land softly on the ground.

Thane immediately scanned his surroundings for any grimm. When he noticed there were none, he began running towards his destination, a cave near the mountain's peak. He kept an eye out for any grimm, but otherwise the journey was relatively peaceful up until he got close to the entrance.

He was in a grassy part below the cave before noticing a lot of grimm and hiding behind a rock. He slowly peeked over the rock and brought out his binoculars to see what he was up against.

There was the classic beowolf, about two packs along with two Ursas, a common group of grimm found in Vale. But the abnormal things he noticed were the two-headed canine grimm with no ears and snake-like heads with eyes covered by bone plating called Orthrus, a troupe of Imps and to top it off, a freaking King Taijitu. There were no aerial grimm, so that was a relief.

I should conserve as much energy as I can for the big boy. So I shouldn't directly engage them. Thane thought as he looked at his surroundings. He spotted a big rock which seemed like it could be pushed over. However, for that, he would need to lure the grimm away, get to the rock, and then push it to take them out, all without being seen.

Thane pulled out a firebomb and threw it away from him. The explosion alerted the grimm, but Thane knew it wouldn't be enough. Knowing this horde formation, first the imps will investigate the site. If they feel there is no danger, then they'll back off. He needed more to come.

He slowly shuffled around the rock to hide himself from the imps as they bounded over, their long hands stretching out to grab pieces of the dust crystal that had exploded in the firebomb.

I need them to get closer Thane thought before chucking a rock. The Imps noticed it and their arms shortened before they moved forward.

As soon as they got to the rock, Thane pulled out another firebomb. "Got you." He muttered before throwing the firebomb at the imps, getting all of them with the explosion. Thane heard the growls and howling of grimm as now the beowolves, the Ursai and the Orthruses ran forward, while the King Taijitu remained in its spot.

Thane exhaled. Good that the King Taijitu stayed behind. It's sense of smell was keen enough to sniff out his aura even after Thane put on some suppressing liquids to muffle his scent. It's eyesight was poor so it shouldn't be able to see him run.

As the group of grimm passed him, Thane made a dash for the next rock, checking if the grimm were looking his way before making his way to the bigger rock. Just as he reached the last rock, He heard the dual barking of an Orthrus.

"Shit!" Thane cursed and quickly hid behind the last rock as he heard the sound of the Orthrus running towards him.

Fuck, I hope it didn't see me… Thane thought as he could now hear the Orthrus on the other side of the rock. He held his breath and controlled his aura to muffle his body's sound so that the Orthrus' sharp senses of hearing couldn't pick up the sound of his heartbeat.

Come on, go away…don't make me fight you guys right now. Thane thought in frustration. He noticed the two heads of Orthrus peek out from either side of the rock. He laid down on his back as the Orthrus' two heads stretched out over him, taking advantage of the Orthrus' poor eyesight to hide himself. For several seconds, all was silent as the Orthrus growled and sniffed just above Thane as he slowly raised his shotgun to fire in case it found him.

But then, The Orthrus' heads retracted as Thane lay there, not letting go of his breath until the Orthrus had returned to the other grimm.

Thane took a deep breath as he sat up. "That was close." He muttered before moving to the big rock. He checked one last time to see if all the grimm were there before drawing back his fist.

"Here we go!" Thane spoke before punching the rock with his full strength as the rock's surface collapsed inward into a small crater made by his fist. The rock rolled down very quickly, not giving the grimm time to dodge before it slammed into them, crushing their bodies. Thane confirmed that all the grimm were dead before looking towards the king Taijitu. That was simple enough.

He went to the Taijitu and this time pulled out a bunch of fire dust crystals before tossing them just outside of the range of the Taijitu's smell. The Taijitu picked up the mana within those dust crystals and moved towards them. As it's heads moved to sniff the crystals, Thane shot them and jumped back as the explosion blew off both of the Taijitu's heads.

"And that's 556,782 for Thane, 0 for the grimm." Thane spoke. He silently chuckled remembering when his students said that even taking out a horde of grimm consisting of only Ursa and Beowolves was impossible without semblances.

"They're still young." Thane told himself. "As they get older, they'll pick up these tricks." He spoke before entering the cave.

Thane picked up a branch and set it alight to illuminate the cave and pulled out his knife. As he walked through the tunnel, he checked small burrows for any imp nests. Those were breeding grounds made by Imps for new grimm. Whenever he found some, he would drop a fire dust crystal and set the nest alight, burning all the small grimm inside.

Eventually, he found a massive pit that seemed to go down into a void.

"Yeah, this looks like a massive grimm burrowed in here." Thane spoke. He had nothing to hook onto, so he was going to have to use Hela.

And so, he began his descent. For hours, Thane carefully climbed down the pit, noting more holes on the pit's surface that seemed like the work of the grimm.

Soon, Thane reached the top of a particularly hole on the pit. At that moment, Hela lost grip and Thane slid off. Thane's right hand stretched out and grabbed onto the hole's ledge before he pulled himself up.

"Careful, Thane, You've got a lot of work to do after this. Dying would be a really bad thing right now." Thane grumbled before he sensed the presence of a massive grimm as six massive red eyes lit up in the darkness of the hole.

Thane's eyes widened. "Mother-!" He propped his feet to the ledge and jumped, firing off a gravity dust round to propel himself to the other side as a beam of lightning struck where he just was.

"Looks like big boy's up." Thane spoke before looking at the red eyes staring straight at him. "Hey there, big boy. Were you having your beauty sleep?" He asked before the grimm let out a roar shaking the cavern and bounded out of its resting place, lunging with its jaws wide open to bite into where Thane was.

Time for my special attack! Thane thought as his mask unfolded, Thane's silver eyes staring at the maw of the grimm before his eyes shone with a white light.

"Eat this, sucker." Thane spoke before unleashing the power of his silver eyes.

Thane immediately closed his eyes as they stung from using so much of his power. He could hear the sound of the grimm's petrified body falling down. He had his eyes closed for a few minutes before they opened.

Thane looked down at the darkness, his mask snapping back into place before he let out a tired breath of exhaustion. He'd done it. He'd completed the Final assignment. 10 years of wait was over.

"Alrighty." Thane looked up at the faint light coming down, showing just how deep he was in the pit.

"Well, let's go back up." Thane spoke. But as he went to climb back up, a roar sounded and Thane smelt Ozone.

His eyes widened as he immediately jumped off the wall, another beam of lightning hitting where he was as Thane fell down into the abyss.

Thane's silver eyes glowed again as he noticed the ground coming up fast. Thane frantically loaded a gravity dust round and shot, slowing his fall and Thane landed into a tumble.

As Thane got up, his silver eyes shone upon the form of the grimm. A massive reptilian body with bone plating all over its back, six eyes staring down at Thane screaming murder as two curved horns sat atop its bony head. Two massive wings with red leather unfolded.

Thane's eyes widened as the clearly non-petrified grimm let out an ear-splitting roar.

"Oh…Fuck."

A/N: So I uploaded this chapter just a few hours after Chapter-21 before remembering the last time I did that, my chapter didn't show. So I removed and am now uploading after a much longer time. But still, writing two chapters in a single day was no joke. Even after having written some part of Chapter-21 I spent 9 hours doing nothing but furiously typing out the chapters on my laptop. Maybe it's the fact that this was the first chapter completely focused on Thane and I was really pumped to write my OC's arc. It's not going to be too long, since we still have some distance to cover before the Cysgod arc is over, so Thane's mission will end the next chapter and we'll return to Team RWBY.

Now, Thane, as you can see, is a silver-eyed warrior. At this point, I'll start slowly dropping hints as to who Thane is (I almost dropped a massive hint in the process, but I deleted it before I could forget about it). He's pretty much the top dog among huntsman and I wanted to show why he's considered a legend among the huntsmen community, being able to take down a horde of grimm with just careful planning and tactics instead of charging in and using his weapon and semblance like younger and more inexperienced huntsmen. It's pretty obvious what grimm Thane is going to face, considering we saw Ruby freeze it in canon.

There are some new grimm, namely the Orthrus, which basically can't see very well but makes up for it with super sharp hearing, to the point that it can hear heartbeats. Only really experienced huntsmen like Thane know how to counter the Orthrus' hearing.

Now, I think I've compensated for missing out on Saturday.

Hope you guys enjoyed and constructive criticism is appreciated! I'll be responding to reviews after some time.

Response to Reviews:

Longbowchris50: Thank you.

Maglad: Good to hear you liked the previous chapter. And this is the first time I'm hearing about Oh! Great. I had to google him to understand what you were talking about. But I'm not much of a manga reader, I just read Berserk because that checks out with my tastes, so I can't fully connect with the Oh! Great comment.