(A/N) Hello everyone. If there is one author's note that you should read, it's this one.
I've been gone for a while. We all know that. However, it was never my intention to leave this story to rot. If that were the case, I would've let you know ages ago. I just needed some time away from the RWBY fandom.
Last week, I opened my document for this story for the first time in a long time. I was going to write the next chapter, but I needed a little refresher first. And so, I reread the fic.
I couldn't do it. I couldn't make it past chapter 2.
That was when I realized that no matter how much I still love a lot of the stuff in this story, there was too much that needed to be changed for me to move forward.
If editing previous chapters were enough, then we wouldn't have a problem.
Unfortunately, to make this story what I want it to be, a lot of the early stuff needs to be redone. Fanfiction dot net won't let me edit this fic as-is so I basically have to migrate the story and start from scratch.
Long story short, yes: Jaune d'Arc is being given the "rewrite" treatment.
But do not panic! I'm not rewriting it "soon", I'm rewriting it "now". The chapter below is the prologue to the newest iteration of Jaune d'Arc. A few minutes after this chapter is published, a new story titled Luminosité Éternelle will appear on my account.
I won't pretend that it won't take a while for that fic to get back to this point in the story. However, for everything that has to be completely rewritten, there is a near-equal amount that can get by with minor edits. There will be spurts where this story will actually update pretty quickly.
I'd like to apologise to all of you who opened a notification, excited for a new chapter of Jaune d'Arc. On the flip side of that coin, I'd like to extend a big thank you to those in my discord server who made this continuation possible.
On that note, if you'd like to join my server, there is a public link to it on my pa treon account (which you can find in my fanfiction dot net bio). It's not limited to patrons, so if you just want to stop by and talk about stuff (Jaune d'Arc and its successor included) you're more than welcome to do so!
One last time, I thank you all, and I hope to find you again with Luminosité Éternelle.
X
Signal Academy was a preparatory school for huntsmen.
To most, this was simply a matter of fact. If one were to speak with an individual not in the know, to say as much would not raise any eyebrows.
However, the statement was only partly true. In reality, a more accurate phrasing would be "Signal Academy is a preparatory school for huntsmen among other professions".
Where such misconceptions came from was not a mystery. After all, pumping out huntsmen was indeed the goal of the academy; the course load and academic approach reflected that.
With that said, considering the limited enrollment of the post-primary levels, it would be foolish to assume that everyone who went through Signal's program succeeded in coming out the other end a huntsman. It was more necessity than kindness that a robust, holistic education was offered to the many that would inevitably be forced to pursue more mundane employment.
At the heart of it, though, between huntsmen, tradespeople and office workers, it was clear which one had the lifestyle that was aggrandized the most. It was easy to forget about everyone else when so many huntsmen were products of the same academy.
And yet, those who attended Signal Academy knew perfectly well that it was a place for "everyone else" all the same.
It was for this reason that the children of a particular classroom were totally uninterested when a new huntsman hopeful stood at the front of the class on their first day of their second year.
There was an expected silence on their part, but the new kid stood still next to the teacher with his mouth clamped shut. With locks of scraggly blond hair and a posture that made him seem like he was shrinking inward, no part of him suggested that the student body should be any more invested in his presence than they were.
Or at least, that was the shared thought before the blonde took a deep breath and squared his shoulders.
He opened his mouth nice and wide.
He spoke.
X
"Hey, did you hear?"
"About–"
"Yeah."
Yang Xiao Long was only half paying attention to her friends' gossip as she struggled to get her thick locks of hair to fit through an elastic band.
"It caught me off guard."
"Did it? I don't really think it meant all that much."
"But still, that's not something you just come out and say, right?"
She almost had it! Just another twist and–
"Yang. Are you listening?"
The young girl stopped in her tracks, her hands being the only thing keeping her unfinished ponytail in place.
"Hm? You're talking to me?"
A smaller girl frowned.
"Yeah, I'm talking to you. You've been pretty out of it lately, huh? You didn't even come to hang out with us last weekend."
Yang waved her hands in front of her face.
"Sorry, sorry. I'm busy is all. I found this awesome new part for my motorcycle!"
She heard the groans that followed, but she ignored them. They just didn't understand! Once she got that thing working, they'd be begging her to take them for rides around town.
"Putting all that aside, I figured that you'd wanna hear about this sort of thing," a taller one chimed over the sounds of disapproval.
That threw Yang for a loop. All they ever talked about was pointless stuff like who was dating who or what new trend was popular. She was twelve. Why should she care about any of that?
"There's a new kid in my class," another girl explained. "He was talking pretty big, saying stuff like 'I'm gonna be a better huntsman than anyone else in our graduating year!' or something like that."
Oh?
Yang smiled. She rocked back and forth on the balls of her feet excitedly.
"That's a good thing, right? Sounds like someone who wouldn't pansy out of a fight for once."
Her optimism died a painful death upon seeing the unsure looks on her friends' faces.
"Yeah, that's not happening," one of them droned.
"He's definitely full of hot air. He'd fold instantly for sure!" chirped another.
A hand was placed on the blonde's shoulder comfortingly.
"No one's ever going to fight you on purpose, Yang."
The blonde crossed her arms.
"You don't know that!" she shouted. "Maybe he's for real."
As the discussion went on, Yang could feel her counterarguments losing gas. She knew that she was just arguing for the sake of it at this point; it was wishful thinking on her part. It wasn't like she actually had any reason to refute anything that her friends were saying.
Heck, she didn't even know who they were talking about in the first place. They'd know better than she would.
But still, the idea was nice. The main characters on those Saturday morning cartoons always seemed to have, like, a rival or something. Someone who pushed the main character to get better, and then they eventually formed a super manly bromance, and then they had an argument about fighting the villains which led to the rival character sacrificing their life for the sake of the main character's goals, and then the main character finds the rival's headband and–
But anyway.
She didn't have either one of those things. Signal was supposed to be a school for huntsmen and huntresses, right? It didn't feel like it most of the time.
Her classmates knew that it was hard to become a huntsman, right? They knew that they wouldn't get into an actual Huntsman Academy unless they tried, right?
Yang wanted to be a huntress and so she acted like it, but how was she supposed to get better if no one here bothered to do the same?
Her thoughts were interrupted once she noticed how the school hallway's near-constant hum of chatter started quieting. Even her friends, who always seemed to be talking about something, had regressed from borderline outdoor voices to unintelligible mutterings.
The crowd started to part around an individual who she hadn't seen around Signal before. All eyes were on him.
At first, all that was visible was a face that stood above a sea of heads.
He was tall.
Blond l strands similar to hers fluttered back and forth with every step he took. If one paid close attention, they could catch the piercing blue eyes that would occasionally peer through them.
…Was this him? The new kid?
If so, maybe her friends were wrong. Maybe he wasn't full of hot air. Maybe she finally found–
All the students quickly stepped out of the way as the new kid lost his footing and planted his face into the ground.
He was given a wide berth as he clumsily tried to get his feet back under him, but the effort wasn't going too great. He kept slipping over his ridiculously baggy pants and– was that the Pumpkin Pete's Cereal mascot on his hoodie?
The silence and sideward glances from the crowd turned into full-blown laughter just as her hopes died a smouldering death. This wasn't the rival character. This guy was comic relief at best.
"Come on, Yang, let's go! We don't have that much longer before the next class!"
Her friend's s urgings snapper her back to her senses. Without even a parting look, they left to enjoy what little time for recess they had left.
X
As usual, dressed in a plain white t-shirt and a pair of orange mesh pants, Yang stood under the shade of a large tree and started her stretches. As usual, the sun of a hot summer afternoon beat heavily against the wide, barren field behind Signal Academy's main building.
As usual, her father, a licensed huntsman and the teacher for combat class, was wheeling weapon racks to the side of a large circle drawn in chalk. He answered students' questions as he lined up the metal carts.
As usual, no one wanted to stand anywhere near her. Right now, she was alone.
She understood, though. It wasn't anything personal.
Yang Xiao Long was a popular kid. She wasn't pretentious enough to pretend that she didn't realize that. She had a lot of friends, a lot of people wanted to be her friend, and no matter what she did, most people liked her; being pretty and a social butterfly was really all it took.
Here in combat class though, her classmates wanted to be as far from her as possible.
She understood why, but she couldn't respect it. Just because they couldn't win against her –and maybe because she was a little rough sometimes– they decided that fighting her in combat class wasn't worth the trouble. Weren't they just wasting their time here? Wasn't she just wasting her time here?
With a knee raised and held to her chest, her eye caught sight of a familiar-yet-new face in her class.
The new kid.
He looked totally lost, sort-of-not-really doing his stretches as he tried to replicate what everyone else around him was doing. It looked like he had half a mind to walk up to someone and ask them what he was supposed to do, but for whatever reason, he pretty much refused to move. What, was he shy?
"A better huntsman than anyone else in our graduating year", huh? What a joke.
She didn't know what made her do it. Maybe she was sick of sticking to herself during combat class. Maybe she wanted this kid who she'd never met before to grow a pair instead of acting like a headless chicken.
"Hey there!" she shouted happily, waving her hands in the air as she ran towards him. "Need a hand, buddy?"
"Wh-huh?"
His face went beet-red. Nothing new there.
"I'm asking if you need help," she repeated. "You kinda… don't look like you know what you're doing."
He scratched the back of his head and chuckled wimpishly.
"Is it that obvious? Hehe…"
She clicked her tongue but enunciated little else.
Ignoring his squawk, she lifted his arm and pulled it across his chest.
"What are you–!"
"Hm? You actually got a bit of muscle on you. I'm surprised."
The blond-haired boy's face lit up again, but maybe this time his embarrassment stemmed from something else.
"Of course I do!" he squealed out through a failed yell. "I train with my old man all the time, so…"
She picked up right where he trailed off.
"Your dad? Is he a huntsman?"
"Hm? Oh, yeah! He's– hng! Easy! I can do that myself!" He pulled himself away from the girl before she could absentmindedly push his shoulder farther than it was supposed to go. "He's a great huntsman! I'd love to be like him someday."
Yang's eyes were lidded.
"And you two don't stretch?"
"Ah! Well actually–"
"Attention everyone!" her father shouted from the center of the chalk circle. He cupped his mouth with his hands in order to be heard more clearly. "Sparring starts now! Gather around the arena."
The pair looked to each other before coming to an unspoken agreement to cut the conversation short.
All the second-years present crowded around Taiyang Xiao Long as the older man thumbed through a stack of papers on his clipboard. He glanced up from the papers occasionally to mumble out a name before bringing his eyes back down.
"Ah!" he exclaimed. "Jaune Arc."
Once more, all eyes fell on the new kid. He raised his hand unsurely. "Yes?"
Her father nodded.
"Welcome to signal. I hear you've been homeschooled up 'till now, is that right?"
The new kid tried his best to ignore the chuckles from his peers.
"That's right, Sir."
"You can call me Mister Tai," her dad answered with a smile.
"Right. Mister Tai."
The teacher nodded and continued.
"You've never attended a combat class before, so all of this might be new to you. Your aura is unlocked, right?"
The boy nodded.
"Great!" Taiyang exclaimed. "I'll explain how things work around here, then. It's nothing too complicated: just a bunch of one-on-one spars. I'll evaluate the performances and give each one of you feedback afterward. Makes sense so far?"
Another nod.
"Awesome. Since this is new to you, why don't you sit out the first day? You can watch the others and see what–"
"Hey, Jaune. Wanna fight?"
Yang didn't know what possessed her to say it. Judging by the scathing glare that her father was giving her, she knew that she wouldn't hear the end of it when they got home that evening.
And yet, she said it anyway. She waited for the new kid's response with bated breath.
Her father tried to defuse the situation.
"Jaune, you don't have to–"
"Sure! Sounds good to me."
Everyone was quiet. The students were quiet. Taiyang was quiet.
She was quiet.
That he didn't know what he was getting into wasn't the point. No one had expected anyone to agree to fight Yang.
She wordlessly stepped into the middle of the arena and beckoned him to follow.
He did.
The dead crowd suddenly came to life.
"Wait, is he actually gonna…?"
"Think so."
"He's dead meat."
"Yang on the first go? He seemed a little too full of himself, but I kind of feel bad for him."
"He brought it upon himself, I guess."
"Still, that's harsh."
After snapping back to reality, the teacher shoved his hands into his pockets and pulled out a scroll.
"Right! Uhm… I'll give you a rundown of the rules. Don't step outside the circle or you'll be out of bounds. Official competition rules are that the match is called after one fighter's aura drops below fifteen percent, but we'll play it safe since it's your first time, Jaune. Let's say twenty-five. Understood?"
Yang nodded, and the new kid did the same. She knew what her old man was getting at: he wanted to make sure that Jaune didn't get hurt in case she went overboard.
Whatever.
She got into a fighting stance and her opponent mirrored her. They waited for a good few seconds before realizing that they weren't being told to start.
"Ah. Weapons," Yang muttered.
Jaune blinked.
"Weapons?"
Taiyang slapped his cheek lightly. The teacher wheeled the racks towards the young fighters.
"Right! Sorry. You'll be crafting your own weapons as a fourth-year capstone project. Until then, the school lends out training weapons for the students to practice with. Feel free to try out something new. Get a feel for as many different weapons as you can."
Yang sauntered up to a rack and took a pair of plain metal gauntlets.
Taiyang sighed.
"Or just use the same thing all the time, I guess."
The class laughed, but they were, for the most part, ignored.
Jaune took a little longer to pick what he was going to use.
The blond-haired girl watched him curiously. What was taking him so long?
The boy's fingers traced the pommels of swords and the faces of hammers. Eventually, he settled on what seemed to be a fairly long metal staff.
Yang was blank-faced.
"I hope you know how to use that thing."
If he didn't, then he would have a rough time. If the new kid took the metal pole because he didn't know how to use anything else and thought its reach would give him an advantage, then he was wrong. It was what, almost twice his size? Something like that was hard to swing.
Jaune didn't answer.
Their teacher-turned-proctor pulled the weapons out from the field and stood between them.
"Are you two ready?"
Yang slammed her metal-covered fists together. Her opponent held the staff under his armpit.
"Begin!"
She didn't waste a single moment. The moment she knew that she was good to go, she sprinted forward and got inside of the boy's guard.
It would be impossible for him to reach her with that weapon of his now that she was so close. Her gauntlet came racing forward; she fully intended to knock him out with a single punch to the stomach.
Ah… what am I doing?
She wanted to fight the new kid, right? Then why was she ending things so quickly?
What was I thinking?
Maybe it really didn't make much of a difference if things ended now or later. A waste of time was a waste of time.
What–
The side of a metal pole slapped her shoulder so hard that she was taken off her feet and sent cartwheeling back three meters. She was forced to let herself tumble to the ground and dig her feet into the dirt to avoid a ring out.
For a moment, she sat wide-eyed on all fours. The arena boundary wasn't a hand's width away from where she landed.
Yang could hear her friends muttering among themselves.
"Did that just…"
"Yeah…"
She laughed.
She laughed and laughed. To others, she must've seemed like a crazy person.
"Good one, champ! Don't think you'll get another–"
She jumped out of the way of another downward strike from the metal pole. She almost did a double-take mid-leap when she saw the earth shatter where the weapon hit the ground.
This guy's strong.
Like, really, really strong. She had never been pushed by a classmate like this before.
"Hey!" she yelled.
His guard lowered for a moment. He looked like he was trying and failing to hide the fact that he was panicking.
"Are we, uh… allowed to talk during the fight? My dad always says–"
"You're my rival now!"
"Huh?"
Jaune found a fist planted in his face. He was sent stumbling back.
His sparring partner was slack-jawed.
"Wha– I hit you really hard!"
"Yeah, and it hurt!"
She tried again. With speed that belied her age and frame, the pugilist bull-rushed him.
The stupidly long staff was in no position to get in her way– she made sure of it this time. With a smirk, she wound back her fist once more.
In what felt like slow motion, she noticed him lifting his leg from the corner of her eye. She only had enough time to bring both arms back to protect her ribs before the back of a foot made impact.
She was ready for it this time, so she was able to steady herself immediately.
Her breathing was laboured. Jaune must've thought that he was close to victory because he took a chance and overextended with his weapon.
That was a mistake.
The staff was backhanded so hard that one of his hands lost its grip. His only means of defense against her was sent swinging away from his body.
She slammed her fist into his gut.
Again.
Again. Again. Again. Again.
It was a flurry that must've felt like it would never end. Or at least, that's what Yang assumed it'd be like. This was the first time that she'd been able to do something like this against a real person.
He threw a clumsy hook at her head. The girl didn't want to take any risks, so she ended her barrage and put a fair amount of distance between them once more.
She wasn't even given a second to think. He threw the staff at her like a javelin. She jerked her head to the side, knowing that taking a hit like that would lead to her defeat.
As it whistled past her –and decidedly away from where Jaune could reach it– she suddenly felt a lot better about her odds.
That was until she realized that the projectile was merely a distraction. She was grabbed by the collar of her t-shirt.
She panicked.
"No!"
The line was right behind her. She needed to escape, or else–
A whistle blew.
"That's enough! Yang wings by ring-out!"
Eh?
Both kids froze in a tangled mess. Slowly, they both looked down to their feet.
Or more specifically, Jaune's foot.
Which was over the line.
Jaune dipped his head.
"Man… That's disappointing. I'll get you next time though!"
"…"
"…"
"Hey, you okay?"
Yang was in a daze.
He waved a hand in front of her face once, and she immediately snapped.
"I reject this outcome! This is a load of crap! I demand a redo!"
X
Qrow Branwen was having a strange day. The fact that he'd been left alone in the teacher's lounge for the past twenty or so minutes and wasn't even a little tipsy was a testament to that.
He pressed his cheek against the cool surface of the communal table, closed his eyes and let out a long sigh. An eyelid peeled open to see how much time he had left before he needed to go back to being a productive adult.
Hm? He only had a minute and a half to get back to his classroom.
"No," he muttered. The eyelid snapped shut.
He heard the creaking of a door.
Normally Qrow would try to hide his inebriation when another colleague entered the teacher's lounge, but unfortunately for everyone involved, he didn't have anything to hide for once. His neck struggled to lift his head to see who had shown up.
"Taiyang? You're looking a little thin in the face. Something happen in combat class?"
The blonde stood at the entranceway blank-faced.
"Charles' kid happened. You had him this morning, didn't you?"
"Charles?"
"Arc."
"Ah. The brat who just transferred in." Qrow mustered the energy to sit upright. "Yeah, I had him. Jaune, right? How'd he seem to you?"
Taiyang furrowed his brow and took a seat across from the brunette.
"He's strong for his age."
Qrow scoffed.
"He's an Arc. If Charles sent him here, then that was never in question."
"Then why did you ask?"
"Did he seem all right in the head to you?" Qrow reiterated.
Silence reigned between them. Taiyang opened his mouth, but it took him a moment to think about his answer.
"He seemed…" a pause. "He seemed a little awkward."
"Yeah, that sounds about right."
Qrow got out of his chair and started pacing around the room.
"I could tell right away," he added. "He introduced himself to his new classmates this morning. Wanna know what he opened with?"
The blonde hummed.
"I overheard some girls mention something about him wanting to be better than everyone."
The caped man chuckled.
"That's one way to paraphrase it, I guess. His words were, 'I'll be number one overall'. Pretty bold, right?"
Taiyang's eyes shot open.
"But that's–"
"Something that would fly right over the heads of second-years. Rankings, overalls, drafts… that's all tournament talk. The kid knows what he's here for… even if he turned into a blubbering mess right after once the other brats started getting on his ass."
The combat class teacher lowered his head and stared at his lap.
That didn't make sense.
"So why–"
"Does he have the social awareness of a two-year-old?"
"Stop interrupting me."
"Well," Qrow began, assuming that his interruption was correct regardless. "You know why he's here, right?"
"Here?"
"At Signal."
Taiyang lifted his head back up and narrowed his eyes at his friend. "I only know what any other teacher would know about a new student. Why would you of all people know anything more than that?"
"Ozpin told me."
Ozpin? What did he have to do with this?
If that man was getting involved, then…
"You mind filling me in?"
Qrow stole one last glance at the clock before shrugging. He circled back and sat once more at his previous spot at the table.
"Sure. I can take a moment for Story Time, I suppose."