The world of Remnant wasn't a friendly world for its inhabitants. Vicious creatures called Grimm roamed the lands, killing anything human in their path. To face these monsters, schools were built and a part of the new generation was raised with weapons in hand to protect the innocent. But not everyone who enrolled at these academies lived long enough to make it to the end. And no one would know that better then the headmaster of Beacon Academy, Ozpin.
The grey-haired man sat in his office high above the ground and listened, once again, to the arguing of two of his most trusted people, the strict Glynda Goodwitch and the rough Qrow Branwen.
"If you would have done your job, then we wouldn't have that situation to begin with!" the black-haired man shot the same accusation he had used for the last week at the teacher.
"And if you had actually taught your niece to listen to her superior, she and her team wouldn't have left in the middle of the night to hunt a Grimm outside of their capabilities." the blond woman shot back.
Ozpin's eyes wandered to the four folders on his desk, all baring the names of the most likely newest names on the long list of people he had failed: Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna and Yang Xiao Long.
It all happened a month ago. To train for the Vytal Festival the school had organized a Grimm hunt. A nearby village had requested helped to deal with a terrifyingly large Deathstalker, so the plan had been to let the students hunt the target together and to kill it. With Glynda as their supervisor Ozpin had seen no risk agreeing to this idea, knowing full well that the woman could deal with such a threat mostly on her own accord. But one team hadn't followed the rules.
In the night before the event four students had sneaked out of their lodgings, the four girls whose folders were lying before him. After being found missing the next morning Glynda changed the objective from "killing Grimm" to "find the missing students". Given their track record, it was easy to deduce for the woman that the girls had already entered the territory of the Grimm, wanting to kill it on their own.
But they were to slow. In a clearing in front of a giant cliff they found evidence of a fierce battle, but no sign of either huntresses or Grimm. Even after expanding the search radius and looking for a total of three days, both parties were still missing. In the end, the students and the teacher returned to Beacon, empty handed.
There was one person who didn't give up though, Qrow Branwen. He had been striving through the wood for three weeks now, killing each and any Grimm he came across, hoping to find his niece and her team. But there was nothing. And when he finally returned, his drinking habit became stronger than ever. And each and every day he approached Ozpin and Glynda, blaming them for the death of the girls. Which lead to the situation Ozpin was witnessing now.
Turning his back towards the bickering man and woman he observed the night sky.
"Miss Goodwitch? How was the weather report for this evening?" The other living beings in his office turned towards him.
"It should be a fine evening, nothing out of…" Glynda started, but her eyes widened when she saw a dark cloud developing quickly over the academy. "What in…"
The headmaster stood up. "Call the students. No one is leaving the building." he ordered, his demeanour changing from a nice teacher to the seasoned huntsman he was. "Then we will check out what is going on."
"And how do you plan on doing this?" the black-haired man asked.
"The centre of the clouds seems to be around the Main Avenue. If something is going to happen, it will be there." Without looking back, Ozpin went towards the elevator. He knew that Glynda would follow his orders. And Qrow would come, too. His pride as a huntsman would prevent him from staying behind.
When the three people left the protecting halls of the academy, the wind had already begun to howl with a high tone and began to tore at their clothes.
"What's going on here?" Qrow had to raise his voice to overtone the wind. "Oz, do you have any idea?"
But the headmaster was still. He had seen many things, but nothing except one person came close of being able to create such a phenomenon. And if she was here, then he prayed to the God Brothers, that they would be able to get as many people out of here as possible. "Something's coming." He didn't raise his voice, but the power of the wind was still unable to extinguish the words he spoke. Qrow raised his sword, Glynda her riding crop and Ozpin's hand grabbed his staff harder.
Then from one moment to the next a giant door of light appeared in front of them.
"What the…?" and from the light four figures appeared, all walking towards them. At the same moment, the strong wind currencies subsided.
"Halt." Ozpin spoke. "My name is Professor Ozpin from Beacon Academy. Whoever you are, state your name and your business with my school."
The shadows stopped for a moment, before the voice of a girl was heard "Professor Ozpin?"
Qrow's reaction was immediate. "Ruby?" He stepped forwards, just to be blocked by the headmaster.
"Uncle Qrow?" the same voice answered, before one of the shadows turned into a drill and rushed towards the group.
But the male huntsman only opened his arms and the drill turned into a black-haired girl with silver eyes, who fell into the arms of her uncle.
"We're back. We are really back." Now the rest of the three figures walk onto the street, following their leader Ruby Rose.
"No way." Glynda couldn't find any other words. They had looked for the girls everywhere and now they appeared in a door of light directly in Beacon Academy.
"So Luciferia really kept his promise." a girl with black-hair wearing a bowtie spoke. This was Blake Belladonna.
"Was the last thing he could do. At least he wasn't that empty in this regard." The blond girl besides her, Yang Xiao Long, continued. The two apparently finished a conversation they just had. "Hey, Qrow." she waved at her uncle.
Ozpin mustered the girls. All of them were wearing similar clothes, a red top with a white stripe in the middle of it, followed by a dark coloured skirt and stockings. It was clear that it was some kind of uniform, but he couldn't remember any school having such a dress code. But that wasn't the only changes he noticed. At Weiss side rested two rapiers, one he recognized as Myrtenaster, the other one a black steel mystery for him. And Yang's hair seemed shorter than before. Not much, but still enough to stand out in his eyes.
"Where have you been?" Glynda's strict voice teared him from his observation. "Do you have any idea what chaos your disappearance created? We thought you were dead! We thought…"
Ruby let go of her uncle and turned towards her enraged teacher. "I'm sorry." she apologized and bowed her head. "We wanted to help the people and that got us into a pretty big mess."
Glynda's gaze didn't soften.
"No really. It is a big tale full of friendship, betrayal, war…"
"Miss Rose, I don't think that anything you can tell us will explain how you ended up in the middle of Beacon Academy at night through a door of light after being gone without a trace for a whole month."
Suddenly Yang started laughing. "A… door… of… light?" she spoke between the laughter.
"And what is so funny, Miss Xiao Long?"
"Knowing her, it has to do with what one of our friends once said." Weiss answered in place of the blond girl.
She pulled Myrtenaster from her side, holding the blade forwards like facing an enemy. "We stand before a great darkness, but remember, darkness can't exist where light is. Let's be that light!" she intoned with a deep voice.
"But I didn't think that he meant literally opening doors of light." Yang interjected, before laughing again.
"Professor?" Glynda turned towards the headmaster, who had a small smile on his lips.
"I feel, that this night has turned out to be really good. Let's enjoy it and talk more about what happened tomorrow."
With an overjoyed Qrow and four returned students, the next day would become pretty interesting none the less.
xXx
Welcome to my first story. I hope you enjoyed the read and leave a comment, be it a critic or a supportive one. This story was inspired by "Fairies of the Shattered Moon" by TheMaster4444 (Link: s/13022667/1/Fairies-of-the-Shattered-Moon). I hope to see you when chapter 2 comes around.
