Chapter 12

It was Sunday at around noon. A few clouds hung in the sky, but the sky mostly clear with the sun shining down below. A small breeze was blowing by cooling down whatever it touched. Ruby, Weiss, and Micheal were out behind the dorms in the small forest nearby. The wolf faunus held Order's sword in his right hand. The heiress told him just to bring that. Weiss had Myrtenaster in its holster on her hip. Blake, Yang, and Hitomi were in town getting the items they missed yesterday. The list of items they missed was provided by the sole male member of the team. Micheal was listening to Weiss talk about aura.

"Okay, so you remember the applications of aura right," Weiss asked.

"Yeah, like increasing the power of my strikes or strengthening the barrier around my body, right," Micheal answered.

"Correct, now today we're going to practice basic applications," Weiss said.

"What kind of basic applications," the wolf faunus asked.

"I wasn't sure where I wanted to start initially, so I decided we're gonna start with offensive applications today and take it one step at a time," Weiss answered. Micheal just nodded. The heiress looked at her partner. "Keep track of his aura levels at all times, I don't want him passing out on us," Weiss said.

"Yes, Weiss," Ruby said. She pulled out her scroll and opened it up. 'Now where is the aura level scanner again,' as she tapped through the options on the screen. She eventually found it and pulled up Micheal's aura. It showed the wolf faunus' portrait on the upper half of the screen with a green bar below it. She returned her attention to her teammates. Weiss was pointing to the tree closest to her. The tree she was pointing at stood about fifteen feet tall and was as wide as a person.

"I want you to hit the tree as hard as you can," she ordered.

"Okay," Micheal said questioningly. He walks over till he stood in front of the tree. He pulled his hand back. Raising the sword until it was next to his head. "Why aren't we doing this in the training room," he asked glancing towards his benefactor.

"I don't want people to figure out we have a teammate who doesn't know how to use aura," Weiss retorted.

"Alright," Micheal sighed. He rolled his eyes at the answer. 'Too worried about appearances Weiss, oh well,' he thought to himself.

"Just hit the tree, don't worry about aura right now," Weiss ordered. Her teammate nodded and concentrated on the tree, his full attention on the tree. He swung at the tree as hard as he could. A thud was heard. Micheal's sword burrowed a few inches into the tree. The wolf faunus grunted as he tried to pull his sword out of the tree. It was stuck in the tree. 'Come on, out of the tree you,' he thought as he struggled to get the sword out of the tree. He placed his foot on the tree and with one final pull he got his sword out. Not prepared for the sudden release of his sword, he fell back on his butt. The mark of his attack embedded in the tree.

"Well, the purpose of that attack was," Micheal asked as he got up.

"To see how far you get into the tree without aura, now similar to how you manifest aura in your hand, manifest your aura then channel it into your sword," Weiss said. Micheal turned his attention to his sword. He took a breath and concentrated. It took a second, but then a light green glow came from his hand. The wolf faunus willed it to his blade. It then made its way onto the sword. The second his sword was glowing the wolf faunus readied himself. As soon as he brought his sword up to the side of his head, the glow dissipated. He looked at the sword confused.

"It requires more concentration to keep the glow on anything other than yourself, when you changed your focus from your aura to your swing, the aura around you sword vanished, be careful as any aura that is expended on anything dissipates even if the thing, like manifesting it into your sword, you were using it for failed," Weiss informed her confused employee. He nodded and got ready again. He took a breath and concentrated again. The next second his aura surrounded his hand then flowed onto his sword. He lifted the armament up to the side of his head again.

"You need to concentrate on holding your aura during the swing or it will dissipate before it hits the tree," Weiss warned. Micheal heard her but still concentrated on the task in front of him. "Also hit in a different spot," Weiss ordered. Her teammate swung at the tree. He swung at a spot a few inches higher than his initial swing. Again, another thud was heard as the blade hit the tree. This time the sword went twice as far into the tree. The glow dissipated on hit. The wolf faunus sighed 'Great, now it's even harder to get out.' He took a few moments to pull his sword out of the tree. It ended n the same result though, he fell on his butt the second the sword came out of the tree. When he pulled his sword out splinters came out of the tree. The mark on the tree was deeper into the tree but was also wider than the sword itself too.

Weiss walked over to the tree. Her teammate got up and brushed himself off. "This is why I wanted you to hit a different spot," she said pointing to the marks. "I want you to look at the marks, and pay attention to what makes them different," she ordered. Micheal bent down a bit and studied the marks.

'Let's see, the obvious detail is that it's longer, about twice as long, what else, it's wider than my sword, and more jagged than the other, wait what?' He was confused at what he found about the second mark. He looked at his teammate. "That doesn't make sense," he questioned.

"Yes it does, you see even though manifested your aura into your sword, but you didn't refine it," Weiss said.

"Refine it," Micheal said questioningly.

"Yes, now I'm going manifest aura into Myrtenaster, I want you to see if you can see my aura on her," Weiss said. She held her rapier in front of Micheal parallel to the ground. A few seconds passed as the grey-haired boy studied the rapier. He squints his eyes in a last attempt to spot Weiss' aura on the weapon, but still saw nothing.

"I don't see anything," he said.

"That's what I mean by 'refine it,' you shape your aura around your weapon, you essentially cover weapon in a thin barrier, similar to the one around your body, it's invisible to the eye but it exists," Weiss said.

"Yeah, your attack isn't as effective either if you don't refine it, it's stronger sure, but just manifesting aura into your sword without refining it, your sword becomes more of a club with an small edge to it than an actual sword, plus your actually burning more of your aura that way too," Ruby spoke up for the first time in a while. She walks over and shows Micheal his aura level. It had gone down but was still in the green. The brunette tapped on an icon and a percentage appeared under the green bar. It showed "98%," on the screen. "That may not seem like a lot, but you see, you should only lose that much aura after about ten strikes, you also lost one percent for the failed manifest of your aura from before," Ruby said.

"Huh, alright, basically just manifesting aura into my sword isn't enough; I need to concentrate even more to refine it," Micheal said.

"Yes, give me your sword let me show what you should be able to do once you refined it," Weiss said. She put Myrtenaster back in its holster and held out her hand. Micheal flipped his sword around, so the handle faced his teammate and handed it to Weiss. "Now back up," she ordered. The other two hunters-in-training there moved back a few feet. The heiress gave her employee's sword a few practice swings to adjust to the weight. After she felt comfortable with the weight, she turns toward the tree. Then she adopted her usual battle stance readied herself. 'It's off for this kind of sword, but it's only for one strike so I'll manage,' she thought to herself. Concentrating her aura into the blade and refining it in one second. Taking a small breath and then releasing it as she swung the blade. The wolf faunus waited for the thud of the blade hitting the tree, but it never came. All he heard was the sound of the blade cutting through wood.

"Now come take a look," the heiress said. Micheal walked over to inspect the mark. It amazed him once he saw it. The new slash went from one side of the tree to the other. The mark itself was a smooth cut all the way through.

"Wow, that's incredible," Micheal said.

"This is really basic and any hunter should be able to do this," Weiss said handing her teammate his sword.

"So, let me guess it's relatively the same as before, but one extra step," the grey-haired boy asked.

"Yes, manifest your aura, then channel, then refine it, then keep that concentration as you swing," Weiss answered.

"To me, it sounds like it would take more aura to do," the wolf faunus questioned.

"It doesn't, it just take more concentration, so it's more mentally strenuous, but the more you do it, the less strenuous it becomes and the easier it becomes," Weiss assured her teammate.

"Oh one last thing, if you didn't pick up on it, when you hit something all that aura you injected into the blade goes away, when you don't refine it if you refine it you keep most the aura," Ruby said. She showed Weiss aura level. It hasn't dropped at all. "Also, the amount of aura spent depends on the size of the weapon; remember that I said it should take about ten strikes for your aura to drop that one percent," the brunette asked. Her teammate nodded in response. "I should have also it should take ten strikes for a weapon of that size," Ruby said.

"Oh, so that's why you didn't want me to bring my shield, you only wanted my sword as Chaos would have cost more aura," Micheal realized.

"Exactly, we need you to have as much aura as possible to extended practicing it as long as possible, that oversized axe would have detrimental, because of how much aura it would have cost," Weiss assured. She then pulled her rapier out. The revolving chamber spins till it stopped on light blue. The heiress held out her hand and a small glyph appeared. An icicle shot out of the glyph and hit the ground a couple feet from the trio. A cone of ice formed where the icicle hit. The cone of ice was about four feet tall and is smooth on all sides. "I want you to hit that now, like before channel your aura into your sword then strike, also don't worry about refining your aura just yet, I want to do a couple more examples before refining it," Weiss ordered.

Micheal walked over to the block of ice and readied himself, as he before lifting his sword next to his head. Then he manifests his aura and channels it into the blade of his weapon. Doing as he was told, he skips refining it. The grey-haired boy then slashes at the cone of ice. A clink is heard as his sword hits the ice. This time was different, instead of slashing into the ice, the sword reangled itself and just slid down the ice. It was accompanied by a loud annoying scratching noise. The aura still dissipated on hit. Micheal lost his balance a bit form the sudden result. He managed to catch himself before he hit the tips of the cone. 'That was close,' he sighs in relief. The wolf faunus inspects where his sword impacted the block of ice. All he saw a long scratch mark. It didn't even chip away at the ice.

"You see your attack had no effect on it, even though it's stronger, it was just reangled and slid down the side, some species of grimm have this kind of armor, so going for pure power is a waste as it will just glance off it and now…," Weiss said. She held out her hand and a glyph appeared. It was a couple inches off the ground. It appeared to be about five feet in diameter. "I want you to hit this, you should know the drill," Weiss ordered. Her employee nodded and readied himself. He raised his word up and channeled his aura into his sword. Micheal then swung his sword at the glyph. It just bounced off harmlessly with no sound this time. Just like the times before, his aura dissipated on hit.

"Different situation, same result, some defenses are just too strong for pure power to work on," Weiss said. She returned her hand to her side. The glyph disappeared in a second. "Now I want you to practice refining your aura," Weiss said.

"Okay, can I ask a couple things first," the wolf faunus asked.

"What," Weiss said.

"Alright, so how much more effective is refining my aura versus not refining it," Micheal asked.

"As I said before, the amount of aura you lose diminishes, but it increases the power of your attacks even more," the heiress answered.

"Really," the grey-haired boy interrupted in surprise.

"Yes, just injecting aura into your strike, the power of the attack is double, after refining it, it triples and the blade becomes shaper, allowing you to slash into or through objects you couldn't do before," Weiss finished.

"Now my second question, how exactly do you refine aura, I know I need to concentrate more to shape it but is there a specific way to go about it," Micheal asked. His teammate in white closed her eyes in thought. She was remembering how she was taught when she was first learning to use aura.

"Hold your sword in front of you, close your eyes, then visualize your sword in your mind, do as before, manifest, then channel, the sword in your mind should be surrounded by aura, Now I want you to condense your aura into your sword, take it slowly at first, split into multiple sections, then condense each section, if you do it right you should see a thin line around your sword, that is your aura, but once you open your eyes, remember to concentrate on keeping the aura's shape, that line should be invisible, this how I remember it being explained to me on how to practice it," Weiss explained. She opened her eyes to see her teammate nod in confirmation.

Micheal began the practice exercise. He lifts his sword up in front of himself, perpendicular to the ground. Then closed his eyes and drowned out the world. The wolf faunus envision his sword in his mind. It took a second, but it appeared in front of him. A silver single-edge sword, that appeared along with his shield Order on his first day on Remnant. 'Alright, manifest,' he began to speak in his mind as he did his exercise. A light green ball of light appeared next to his sword. 'Channel,' then the ball of light went into the sword. The blade then emitted his aura on all sides. His aura flowed freely around the sword never straying from it. It was trying to shape itself to his sword without his help. It was as Ruby described more of a club with an edge as his aura just simple took a vague shape of the blade. The aura was forming a small jagged wedge-like shape around the blade of the sword but has a small edge trying to mimic the edge of the blade. The wedge is slightly bigger than the blade itself. 'I guess I didn't notice, or never thought of something like that would happen,' the grey-haired commented in his mind.

'Okay, now let's split it into segments and then condense it, let's condense it starting from the top and work my way down,' Micheal reminded himself of and planned ahead for the procedure. He split his aura into three segments trying to make them as even as possible. He started with the first segment of his weapon, which up the upper half of the blade. He noticed the aura slowly began to shrink in size and mold itself around his weapon. A strange sensation is going on in his head as he worked on his aura. It was a like a tingling sensation and was coming from a small spot from the front of his brain and it was distracting. It was a spectacle to behold to see his aura shaping itself around the sword. Even if was a simple trick for a regular hunter and not that impressive to a regular hunter, it was impressive to him. After a long minute, the first segment was done. He tried to continue to the next section, the middle of the blade, in his mind, but the first segment burst free and returned to the wedge shape before it was condensed.

"Concentrate," Weiss said.

"I was," Micheal shouted losing concentration for a second. His aura dissipated from the sword. The tingling sensation disappeared along with his aura.

"You obviously weren't concentrating enough seeing as your aura just dissipated," Weiss retorted. She saw her teammate letting loose a frustrated sigh and rubbing the front of his head. Knowing of the tingling sensation was bugging him as well as she dealt with it when she first started using aura. It was his brain just wasn't used to this much exertion. She sighed "Look I don't care how long you take right now, just concentrate on getting it down and then we'll go for a few strikes afterward."

"How long did I take anyways," Micheal asked.

"Don't worry about it, just concentrate, I don't care how long you take right now, just work on refining your aura," the heiress said in a softer voice. Her faunus teammate nodded. He took a deep breath then started again. A few minutes passed before it broke shape again. Micheal released a frustrated sigh again but kept at it. The same result repeated again and again for about five tries till he managed to finally work on the second segment. Ruby checks her teammate's aura. It was now in the mid-eighties and was still slowly dropping. After another few minutes had passed and the wolf faunus completed the second segment was finished. The tingling sensation had spread across the entire front of his brain. It started to hurt at the spot where it started. The pain was slightly visible on his face as he scrunched his face a bit.

'Okay…, concentrate…, almost… done, ugh brain hurts,' Micheal assures himself of the situation. He slows the condensing of the last so as not to start all over. He managed to figure out when the other segments were going to burst by a certain signal, a subtle tick. This tick sounded like glass breaking. If he heard the tick, he would stop and repair the other segments. Once, he felt he was in the clear, he would continue on his current section. He began the last bit of his sword, the handle. It was still part of the overall weapon, so he needs to refine his aura around it as well. It took eight minutes, due to hearing the ticking a couple times. In the end, he managed to condense the entire sword. He sighed in relief and this his aura burst free of its shape then dissipated. The wolf faunus groaned as he stared at his sword. He is a little happy that the pain and tingling sensation is gone. A clap got his attention.

"Good, at least you got the entire sword refined," Weiss said. She glanced towards her partner. The white-haired girl saw that her employee's aura was still in the low eighties on the scroll. Though she is sure he's mentally tired. "Think you can do it again and at least strike the tree one time," she asked. The wolf faunus gave an exasperated sigh but nodded. He walked over to the tree and stood in front of it. He held his sword in front of him then began channeling his aura again. It took almost ten minutes to refine it, but he accomplished it with no problems. He raised his sword up to ready his strike. His entire brain tingled with the front segment of it was in pain, a burning pain. Micheal held his concentration and swung at the tree. He expected a thud and his sword getting stuck in the tree, but it never happened. Instead, the grey-haired boy saw was a clean cut through the tree. He stopped concentration after completing the slash. The aura around his sword dissipated.

"Good," Weiss said as she walked over to inspect the mark.

"How do you feel," Ruby asked.

"Brain's fried," Micheal groaned.

"Yeah, I bet it is, you don't mind if he takes a short break, Weiss," the brunette asked her partner.

"No, but only for a few minutes," Weiss said. Micheal sat against the tree he's been slashing at. "Not bad, as I said, the more you do this the easier it becomes, meaning you can do it faster and the less strenuous on your brain it is," Weiss said. A minute had passed and Micheal felt his brain wasn't hurting anymore.

"How useful is this technique," he asked.

"Overall it's useful, but it also depends on the hunter," Weiss answered.

"What do you mean," her employee asked.

"This wouldn't be all that useful for me as my weapon requires precise strikes and not power, I also have dust and my semblance to increase the effectiveness of my strikes and have more offensive options that don't require me to get in close; I need use most of my aura for dust and my semblance," Weiss said.

"I can get more out of it than Weiss, but my sweetheart has more weight to swing around and cut through most grimm fine, so I don't need to increase the power of my strikes, also I'm also using my aura on my semblance most of the time to stay moving," Ruby said.

"Some hunter have a semblance that increases the power of their strikes, so they don't need it, some hunter prefer not to waste aura on this as they don't have a lot of it, again it just depends on the hunter's methods, but in the end it's not about how much power you have in a strike, but how effectively you can utilize your aura," Weiss explained.

"So basically, while its useful can be overshadowed by other means, I also have to find a style of combat that suits me and see if this technique, or other aura applications, fits me," Micheal asked.

"Yes exactly, alright that's enough resting, let's continue, we're gonna keep going till we say stop this time," Weiss said. Micheal sighed and picked himself off the ground. He brushed himself off and stood in front of the tree. He took a breath and prepared himself for the rest of the session. The wolf faunus continued to practice on refining his aura and holding concentration, which he continued to lose until his aura fell into the red. His final aura level when they stopped was ten percent. A couple hours have passed after his last break. The tree he was swinging at, was missing a large wedge-shaped segment out of it. The sound of the tree groaning could be heard. It sounded like it could fall over soon.

"Alright, that enough," Weiss said.

"Okay," Micheal said exhausted. He dropped his sword. Then he walked over and leaned against a tree nearby. He was breathing heavy and sweating. His ears twitched at the sound of footsteps could be heard approaching him from behind. A bottle of water appears to the left side of his vision.

"Here you go," Ruby said. Her teammate took a deep breath before speaking.

"Thank you, Ruby," Micheal said taking the bottle from her. He took a quick drink.

"No problem," the brunette said with a smile.

"Alright, we made progress today, you got it down, albeit slowly," Weiss said walking over to the duo.

"How do you feel," Ruby asked.

"Tired, brain hurts and it's also fried, I don't want to think about anything right now," Micheal groaned.

"That's to be expected," Weiss said. She stood next to Ruby.

"Really," Micheal said turning around. He leaned against the tree for support.

"Yeah, I wasn't much different when I was first practicing aura, but like Weiss said, just keep doing it and it's easier on your mind and easier to do," Ruby said.

"Okay," Micheal sighed. After a few minutes, the trio began their way back to the dorms. "Hey Weiss," the wolf faunus tried to get his employer's attention. Weiss turned towards him. "I'm curious, how long are planning on this taking, training me that is," he asked.

"I want to cover the basics this month and then we can move onto more advanced applications next month and work on combat experience along the way, at the earliest two months, at the latest two and a half months," Weiss answered.

"So you want me to train on my own to speed things up," Micheal asked.

"That would be nice, but I want someone observing you so you don't overdo it and injure yourself, if you keep hurting yourself through training then it isn't helpful," the heiress said. Her employee nodded, but still planned for his own training.

'Okay, I get what she's saying, but feels like a waste of a Friday, I mean I should be able to check my own aura levels with my scroll right, so what can a little solo practice, after some studying, do,' the grey-haired boy thought to himself. "So what are we gonna rest for a bit then go at it again," he asked.

"No, this is a good way to practice aura regeneration techniques, also I want to see if the others have returned and got what they missed," the white-haired girl answered.

"Is that more work for my brain, I don't think I can take any more of that," Micheal groaned.

"No, it's like meditating; you just relax and let your body do the work," Weiss said.

"Good, I can do that," Micheal smiled.

That night, a warehouse in the industrial district of Vale

In an office room, sitting around a table was the woman in red, Roman Torchwick, a young man with grey hair, and a young woman with green hair. "Roman, where are those reports I asked for," the woman in red said in an annoyed tone, her glowing gold eyes glaring at the wanted criminal. "It has been two weeks and you have yet to get any information on those three from that night."

"Well Cinder, one of them has been a pain in the ass to get any information on," Roman said. He threw three folders on the table. On each of the folder's tabs is a name, from top to bottom, Glynda Goodwitch, Ruby Rose, and Micheal Canus Law. Cinder grabbed the top folder and worked her way down. The first two folders contained the information she wanted like a birth certificate, a picture of the person, current occupation, etc. The last one, Micheal's folder, annoyed her. All it contained was the wolf faunus' picture and a sheet of paper giving a physical description with some questioning details, like height and exact species of faunus. The height said, "Between 5'3 to 5'6." The race stated "Rumored wolf faunus? More than likely just a dog faunus." That did catch Cinder's attention. She wants to first question what there such little information on him.

"Roman, why is there so little information on this one," Cinder questioned as she threw the folder onto the table. The other two people there looked at the folder. "There is nothing, no birth certificate, no dental records, nothing," the black-haired woman said.

"Yeah I know, frustrating isn't it, I pulled as many strings as I could, but I couldn't find any information on Grey, even with that picture, no one recognizes him, it's like he just came into existence," Roman sighed. He pulled out a cigar and lit it. He inhaled and let exhaled a small puff of smoke.

"It says here he's speculated to be a wolf faunus," Cinder asked picking up the picture. She studied the picture to see if he was actually a wolf faunus.

"I mean obviously he's just a dog faunus, the wolf faunus became extinct years ago, also he has a blue eye, the wolves never had blue eyes from what I heard," the grey-haired man said leaning back in his chair. He is a well-built young man, somewhere in his early twenties. His eyes and hair are the exact same shade of grey, a silvery-grey. His hair is slicked back while partially unkempt in the front. He wears a black and grey jacket two-tone jacket that is partial zipped up. His pants are mostly black with a grey stripe down the sides. He also wears a notched belt with what appeared to be a sash draped over it on his right side. On the sash is a winged boot. He wears fingerless gloves with vambraces over them. On his shoulders are rerebraces. On his feet are black shoes with a metal plate on the front. Above those shoes are dark grey greaves.

"Though it would be interesting if he was, after all this time, it's revealed that a wolf faunus has survived," the green haired woman said. She appeared to be around the grey haired man in age. She is a thin woman with medium brown skin with red eyes. Her hair is mint green haircut with straight fringe with two bangs, as well two long locks on each side, in the back. She wears an intricate, exotic white top with an olive undershirt. The undershirt is a shallow-cut revealing a good amount of cleavage. On the back of the top is a cut gem. She also wears white pants and brown caps that end at her calves, plus an overlong belt, twice-wrapped, where her weapons are hooked onto as well as a single pouch. She wears a metal three-ring armband on her left arm and beads around the same wrist.

"Not really, he would just be any other faunus, nothing special about them," the grey-haired man said in a bored tone. He glanced towards his superior, her eyes trained on the photo. "He can't be that interesting, he's just a dog that looks like a wolf," he said questioningly.

"No, he is a wolf faunus, and one with grey hair at that," Cinder said. She placed the picture on the table.

"I have grey hair does that make me special," the grey-haired man asked.

"On a human, no, on a wolf faunus, yes," Cinder answered.

"How so," the man asked.

"First, let me ask you a question Mercury, when a person thinks of a wolf, what species of wolf they usually refer to or is often depicted in media," Cinder asked. Mercury was about to answer before the green haired woman spoke up.

"Oh, a grey wolf right," she said earning a slight glare from her associate.

"Correct Emerald, but I was asking Mercury, anyways, as you should know faunus generally have lower amount of aura than humans, but tend to have traits that make up for it, night vision, superior hearing and smell, some species like bear faunus are naturally stronger than human and can build muscle faster, or cat faunus are more agile, but some faunus break those rules," the black-haired woman said.

"Like Grey here," Roman said gesturing to the picture.

"Yes, it a strange aspect of faunus, but it seems that faunus that take after recognized species of animals are stronger than usual, increased aura reserves, unique and powerful semblances," Cinder explained.

"So, some species of faunus are naturally stronger than others because their animal counterparts are more recognized," Emerald asked.

"Yes, even among the same species of faunus there are those are more powerful than others, like a black cat faunus or dog faunus that take after beagles or golden retrievers," Cinder answered.

"Even just hair color among the same species means one is stronger than the other; there is a trade-off right," Mercury said ending in a question.

"They're rarer, for example, wolf faunus were known to have four hair colors, all of them except for one came in different shades, wolves came in red, black, white, and grey, grey never showing any other shade of its color, out of every fifteen wolf faunus, only one would be born with grey hair," Cinder said.

"What about humans, since we don't have multiple species," Emerald asked.

"Every human has an equal chance to gain a unique and powerful semblance and high levels of aura, just an extremely low chance, but it equal for all for all humans, anyways this is rare chance to gain a potentially powerful ally," Cinder answered.

"So, you want us to capture him," Mercury asked.

"No, I want to know what his aura rank is first, if it's high, then capture him and we'll see if we can persuade him to our side, can I trust you to get his aura rank," Cinder said ending in an order to Roman.

"Yes, the required equipment isn't a problem, getting close is," Roman said. He puffed a small cloud of smoke. "Ozpin is probably keeping a close eye on him, being the last wolf faunus and all, he would try to keep him safe, he would probably recognize a spy," he commented.

"I can do it, he doesn't know about me," Emerald said.

"He doesn't, but one of his associated does," Cinder said.

"Who, Qrow," Mercury asked.

"Maybe him, but there is another," Cinder said.

"Okay who," the grey-haired man asked.

"The X-rank hunter," Cinder snarled.

"How the hell does that old man know and isn't he in Atlas right now on a hunt," Mercury asked.

"I don't know, the only reason why Ozpin doesn't know about you is must be because he probably can't describe or draw anything to save his life," Cinder said. 'He has spies somewhere, but where,' she thought.

"Or he keeps forgetting, his age must be catching up to him, poor memory and all," Roman said.

"Regardless, every year he makes a trip to Beacon and stays there for a few months to help train the students, he always does it towards the beginning of the year, about a month or two after classes start," the black-haired woman sighed. "We need someone he won't recognize…," she said going into thought. She stared at Roman.

"What," the orange-haired man retorted.

"That right hand of yours, she rarely shows herself, there's a chance that he doesn't know about her," Cinder said,

"She is also my bodyguard and you're asking me to send her away just to get an aura ranking," Roman snarled.

"Yes, but also, this is a good way to know more about this person, any information would be useful, so she also has to pretend to be his friend, it would make it easier to convince him to join us, besides we have a different task for you and who will be working with, you'll have plenty of guards," Cinder answered.

"Okay, who am I working with," Roman asked.

"The White Fang," Cinder answered.

"What why the hell would I ever work…," Roman yelled.

"Roman, you will do as I say," Cinder interrupted glaring at her pawn. A flame appeared in her hand.

"Fine," he scoffed.

"I suggest you tell that girl of yours her new mission, and then go convince the White Fang to work with you," the black-haired woman said. Roman grumbled and walked off. Cinder looked at her two associates. "You two, he'll show up sooner or later, If he spots you, run, don't attempt to fight him, he has far more experienced and is far more powerful than you, he will either kill or capture you," Cinder warned.

"If we do get captured, what then," Mercury asked.

"You're on your own, no one is going to come to rescue you, and as far as I'm concerned you're dead," the black-haired woman said. Her two associates nervously nodded getting the message. 'I rather not lose these two, though if this wolf faunus has a high aura rank, then he'll potentially be more powerful and more useful than these two, Micheal Canus Law, hmm,' she thought looking at photo near the end of her thoughts.

"Oh, almost forgot," Roman said walking back. The trio at the table turned towards him. "It's not in the folder, but there are couple other things about Grey there," the criminal said.

"Like what," Cinder asked.

"First, during his initiation, he managed to slay a Gigas by himself, not exactly a mature Gigas, but not a young one either," Roman said.

"Not bad," Mercury commented.

"The other thing is," Cinder asked.

"He appears to have an odd relationship with a grimm," Roman answered. He saw Cinder raise an eyebrow. Knowing what question she's going to ask. He answered it before she could ask. "This grimm had him pinned and should have killed him, but didn't instead all it did was talk to him, we couldn't record the conversation, so we don't know what exactly these two relationships have, but it could be that the grimm has marked him as its prey so it could be dangerous to have him around," Roman remarked.

"It let him live," Mercury said questioningly. All he got was a nod from the orange haired man.

"Hmm, we'll just need to be wary, but I doubt it can keep an eye on him at all times, if it does become a threat to us, we'll just kill, it's still a grimm, an intelligent grimm, but still a grimm," Cinder said.

"I highly doubt you could kill it unless you're stronger than an entire school full of hunters combined," Roman said.

"Why would you say that," Emerald asked.

"Because it attacked Beacon to get to Grey, and defeated a majority of the students and staff there, it killed about thirty students and staff alike," Roman said. That got a shocked expression from the others.

"Well, for the time being we're safe as it's more than likely massively injured and won't be fighting for a while, but I guess…, we'll just have to avoid fighting it as long as possible and if it does attack, we retreat without the faunus, no point in fighting an adversary we can't kill," Cinder said. Her two associates nodded. 'Another thing to worry about, but we just need to be cautious and it'll be fine,' she thought. "What kind of grimm is it and do you have a picture of it?"

"Unknown, unfortunately, my scout couldn't get a picture, although he says that it's a dragon," Roman said.

"Like a Scourge," Emerald asked.

"No, this is a true dragon, four legs plus wings, that breathe purple fire and smoke," Roman answered.

"Purple fire," Mercury said questioningly

"Yes, purple fire, probably just for show, sadly we the scout couldn't get much more," Roman remarked. "That's all I have," he said and walked off.

"As I said already, we just need to be wary, we got some time before it recuperates, but how much I'm not sure, let's use what time we got and make sure everything goes well," Cinder ordered.

"Yes ma'am," her associates said in unison.

Author's Notes: As always, criticism is good.

I have said this before at some point, can't remember when though, this was going to be a slower paced story focusing more on Micheal growing as a hunter and as a person. I went looking through my older chapters trying to find when I said that and I couldn't find it. I have said that before though, I probably deleted it by accident when I was shortening and fixing chapters. I have different ideas for chapters, from classroom lessons, more training chapters, some character based chapters like backstory or character development, and some pure bonding chapters. I mean I'm also going to combine a few of them into one chapter as well if it fits with the chapter, some chapters will be short and some will long. I did say this story is mainly told through Micheal's perspective, but I will do chapters where he's not the main focus.

I've wanted to get to this chapter, which is the first of the training chapters, for a while. So, this one was faster for me to write. Do you think I overdid the side effect of first his usage of aura? I mean it would be natural for him to be tried at the end of it. Also, I would imagine training in any magic-like force would be strenuous on your mind. While aura is a natural force of your body it's magical in nature and still requires the use of your mind to manifest.

The idea of faunus being strong based on their animal being more recognized was originally based on a different idea. You see the original idea was for wolf and fox faunus. It was that wolf faunus have four different hair colors white, black, red, and grey. Depending on which one you're born with defines your capabilities with grey being the strongest hair color. The reason is that I remember reading somewhere the most recognized species of wolf is the grey wolf, though as I looked up recently the red wolf is just as recognized. I chose the grey wolf because that's what I think of when I think of a wolf. I decided to generalize it amongst all faunus kind, in the end, to balance it out. So, for example, a cat faunus with black hair, like Blake, would be stronger than the average faunus because when I think of cats the first color that pops into my head is a black cat. Even if it just because of the black cat superstition. I like the idea in the end, even if it could be flawed. Oh well, that where you readers come in and criticize me on aspects like that, so I can fix it, change it, or just remove it.

A little bit on a side note. I actually read the Color Naming Rule recently. I was just curious at how it works, provided by the list of every character name in the show. It seems at least some part of the name has to be in some way related to color, either being a given, middle, or surname, Even though the cast of characters in the show don't seem to have middle names. Micheal is fine as far as this rule goes. Canus is Latin for grey. Hitomi is not following the rule though. I'm I've been pretty lax as far as this rule goes, but I want to stay as true as possible to the rules of the world while making as little amount of changes as possible, either minor or major. So, Hitomi's middle name is now Viola. It's Latin for violet, even though Hitomi's main color is magenta. It's still a shade of violet. I choose the middle name for the rule because I choose to and also I like the names I've chosen for the given name and surname I've chosen.