I don't own anything from RWBY, that honor belongs to the fine people at Rooster Teeth.
Chapter 5: Lost Friend
Chaos.
Chaos in a battlefield was normally something concerning for any normal huntress. Fortunately, Ruby was no ordinary huntress. At least not yet, but that was beyond the point!
Taking out her sniper, she quickly shot ahead into the group, landing shots against four of them before the first one managed to come out against her. But before she could even try to slash the beast's head off, a fireball came out from over her shoulder and set the beast ablaze. Turning around, she found the vampire from before staring at her with her mismatched eyes of which the crimson was strangely, fading?
"Well what are you staring at?!" the vampire snapped, unaware of the fact that a werewolf was sneaking up on her.
Dashing through her, completely ignoring her whining about running away, Ruby dashed ahead and decapitated the werewolf which finally shut her up.
"Watch your back!" she said, as she rolled and fired out two more shots, connecting to two other werewolves. Luckily, Ruby had long since switched to silver bullets allowing her to maximize her effectiveness against them. The bullets luckily managed to pierce both their hearts.
To her right, she slashed again and swiped off the legs of another eager werewolf. Suddenly however, Ruby felt a huge weight upon her back and sharp claws swiping at her stomach. She tried fruitlessly hoping to elbow the beast off, but it stayed on relentless, until one more came and tackled her to the ground.
Now with two werewolves on her, and her aura fading rapidly as the beast attacked her. She tried using her semblance, but the beasts kept on slashing. Any attempt she would make would keep on getting caught by them.
She then saw the werewolf rear its fangs and go for the killing bite. As she looked up to see the jaws of death approaching, Ruby merely closed her eyes and waited for the teeth to sink into her flesh. To finally snuff out her painfully short life.
But the bite never came, instead she watched as both the werewolves attacking her had been frozen to ice. Before she even got the chance to swing her scythe and break them into splinters, the vampire from before came and turned them to splinters with her rapier.
"If you're done being reckless, I suggest you think about your next move very carefully before attacking." She said to her, her voice still cold as ever, apparently forgetting about the fact that Ruby practically saved her life.
'What does she get off of being such a bit-difficult person? Oh wait, she's a vampire, would she have even been able to feel pain from something trying to bite into her neck?' Ruby thought, as another werewolf attempted to make use her momentary distraction as an opportunity for attack. 'Yikes! Note to self, introspection during combat, BAD IDEA!'
Ducking under the werewolf and getting scratched in the cheek, Ruby sliced off the werewolf's arm before finally guillotining it with Crescent Rose. Landing back on the ground with a soft 'oof!' she again scanned the scenario around her and found her ally, fighting off three werewolves who were casting magic?
'Now they have magic too?! How is that fair?' she thought out as she ducked a stray ball of purple energy that was deflected towards her.
Taking out her sniper, she checked her magazine and found herself with only two more shots left. Quickly aiming at the two almost about to finish casting, she pulled the trigger and sent them both to the floor dead. Now her gun was practically useless without the silver to give it a chance against them. Apparently, the wolves also realized this as now they rushed towards Ruby without any fear of her shooting them down.
Luckily her vampiric ally? Had her back and took out two of the wolves with fireballs, leaving only four for Ruby to deal with on her own. Using her semblance midjump, she effortlessly, maneuvered around a pouncing werewolf and decapitated it with a strong pull. Turning in midair, she brought her scythe's silver hook, down onto another unlucky werewolf's head. Using the momentum, she brought herself down and swung her scythe blade like a hammer, knocking out the other two to the ground.
After removing the wolf's carcass from her scythe blade, Ruby slashed one of the beast's throats and turned quickly, hoping to secure a quick kill on the other. She was instead met with a claw barrage which she managed to slash once in the stomach, making her aura flicker rapidly, before she managed to block its second strike. Seeing its primary source of attack hindered, the wolf opened its mouth and headbutted Ruby, stunning her for the beast to strike her down viciously with four more attacks and then a kick, throwing her against a tree.
Seeing an opportunity to kill, the beast came up to her and after clawing her face once, breaking her aura and then it bit down on her leg. Howling in agony, Ruby looked up to see the sick face of satisfaction on the werewolf, who sneered at her. "All that effort and yet your fate will still be the same. Ironic."
But before it could revel in its handiwork, the werewolf suddenly gasped and howled. It tried to turn and strike behind it, only to find its efforts fail, as glyphs surrounded him and a blizzard of snow surrounded him. When the storm passed, all that was left was ice.
"What did I say?!" the vampire snapped at Ruby.
Right as she was going to respond however, Ruby doubled over in agony, clutching her stomach.
"I told you not to go about recklessly attacking, these creatures are relentless right now! But NO! You just had to go about attacking like a crazed wolf!" The vampire continued, completely unaware of the fact that something was happening to her.
Screaming out in pain, Ruby's head started to feel a sharp spike inserted into it. She screamed out, her mind starting to shatter as the pain overwhelmed her. Her vision began to fade as she felt something grow all over her body.
Rushing into the woods to follow Ruby's signal was proving to be quite the difficult task given the amount of foliage that stood between Pyrrha. But slowing down meant spending more time putting Ruby at harm, and also increasing the likelihood that her and Jaune may get ambushed by Grimm, werewolves, vampires or something worse.
So, she hacked and slashed through the dense covering desperately clearing a path forward. Her partner, Jaune was still following her, sword and shield in hand. Looking to him, Pyrrha could very easily discern his disappointment and shame in learning his transformation was now permanent. But she could be nothing but amazed at how quickly Jaune put aside his own troubles for Ruby's.
He hadn't stopped once to tell Pyrrha to slow down like before and this time was rushing forward, trying his hardest to maintain his pace. He had already exhausted another blood bag, leaving only one left, which would hopefully sustain till the end of the night. Strangely, the talk she had with Jaune from earlier seemed to have opened something far more powerful inside him.
As she cut through another clearing, she again looked back to find Jaune and this time found his injuries healing, as was expected of a vampire. But strangely, there was also a white glow coming from the location, which upon further inspection, revealed his aura. The talk Pyrrha had with Jaune managed to unlock it. What possibilities this opened up for Jaune, Pyrrha had no idea but now she was feeling at least a little more relieved with knowing that an active aura would at least be able to keep him safe in the daylight.
"How much further is her signal?" He asked, to which Pyrrha looked down at her scroll, finding Ruby's blip not too far off.
"Not much further, we need to keep going straight." She said, to Jaune who nodded at her as they rushed forward, finally coming to stop as a wall of branches and bushes slowed them down. Seeing the unnatural growth, Pyrrha stopped herself immediately as she recognized a pair of symbols.
But before she could do anything to warn Jaune about them, he came rushing in with his sword and cut right through it. Eyes widening in horror, she looked as she found Jaune fell into a pitfall. Screaming out his name, she looked into the pitfall. It seemed to have been a cavern and the formation was unnatural enough for Pyrrha to understand that this was created through something's interference.
If so, that meant it must have had an exit.
Jumping into the pitfall herself, she slid down the rocky cavern, using Milo as a rifle as she slid down to check for anything that dared to attack her. Aside from the razor-sharp rocks however which grazed her aura, there seemed to be nothing particularly dangerous. Breaking her slide with a jump and slamming the ground, Pyrrha looked around her surroundings hoping to find her partner.
"Jaune! JAUNE! Where are you?!" she screamed out into the dark cavern.
After receiving no answer, she decided to get some insight into the location they were in, so she loaded up a magazine of Burn Dust rounds before firing into the darkness of the cavern, managing to set ablaze a few twigs with her rounds.
With some semblance of sight restored, Pyrrha looked forward into the cave, hoping to find her partner before something went horribly wrong. Walking carefully into the cavern she took in as much information as she possibly could, finding the place littered with webs and acid. Not a good sign.
As she continued deeper into the cavern the webs became more and more common and the rocks at this point had even been colored a sickly green. Moving with caution she found herself at a ledge overlooking a lair. And as she had begun to suspect, it was the lair of a stalker nest. And based on how Jaune was currently trapped, one that had been active for a decent amount of time.
Facing down the four-legged reptilian monsters, Jaune was very quickly starting to wonder how long it would take for him to break down these chains. Perhaps if he used his aura, he could do something but at this point he didn't want to risk doing something that might get him killed. He was fully aware that the tingly white sensation was strongly connected to his soul and given his current predicament, any rash decision might end up doing more harm than good.
Scanning the location, he wondered just how he could use his strengths to his advantage here. He was fully aware that his own physical strength could far exceed every one of these stalkers, but the dust in their bodies and their toxic pincers could hold him in place long enough for them to overwhelm him. To his right he noticed a set of breeding pods, most likely filled with immature stalkers.
To his left, he noticed a massive figure, resting. Trying to make it out, only revealed a faint blue outline, shrouded in mist. But judging off of size, he was pretty sure that this beast was the leader of this group. Which did mean that all he needed to do was break out of his current bindings, avoid getting pincered or overwhelmed or being eaten by one of the many ravenous immature stalkers and then kill it's head which was significantly stronger than all of them.
In hindsight, he realized just how ridiculous his plan actually was, especially given how he wasn't even armed with a proper weapon and if the reports on these creatures were true, their blood was toxic, meaning even attempting to suck out their blood would fail horribly. Looking back at the entrance to the cavern he noticed his sword and shield lying haphazardly right below the ledge and above it was Pyrrha?
"HMM! MFHMHFM!" He tried to speak, having his voice muffled by the webs covering his face. However, it seems his struggle was picked up by her. Gesturing to his sword and shield using his legs, he hoped Pyrrha could find some solution as to how to get out of this situation.
And luckily for him, she did. Using her semblance, Pyrrha grabbed the shield and sword and thrust it towards him, cutting through the webs holding him in place before outfitting him with his shield as he fell, which he promptly used to smash a very confused stalker's face in.
The jig was up now, it was time to fight. Taking out his sword, he blocked a pounce from one of the other stalkers before attempting to stab its soft underbelly, which wasn't covered with scales protecting it. But the beast was too fast and quickly it brought down it's pincer on Jaune. Reeling from the pain, he gasped as he fell to his knees, clutching his shoulder. The wound stung as the venom inside burned his insides like acid and while that wouldn't do much to a vampire whose aura was often disabled, it certainly left him helpless to the mercy of the stalkers.
Looking up, he was able to see Pyrrha once again, this time, seeing her battle against the stalkers that attempted to imprison Jaune. She moved with blinding speed and vigor in her heart as she lashed out against the beasts, cutting off their pincers, blocking their claws and pounces and masterfully dodging and weaving in and out of their attacks and responding with her own.
But out of the corner of his eye, he noticed one pincer had gone unnoticed by Pyrrha, and given from where it was pointed, it was going to strike her dead in the spine. Fighting his pain, Jaune forced the tingling sensation of his aura into his wound, and allowed it to burn his shoulder, making him scream in agony as the wound painfully healed and his aura restored his shoulder.
The stalker from before, still confused had no time to react as Jaune blindly slashed it into ribbons. Getting up slowly, Jaune quickly gathered his sword and upon seeing that same pincer begin to coil up in anticipation of hitting his partner, Jaune mustered all his might and threw his sword.
Right into Pyrrha's shield which she deflected and sent towards the pincer, cutting it right off and making the stalker threaten her scream, revealing its location to the two of them. Rushing in to meet the stalkers, he grabbed his shield again and slammed it into one of its frilled mouths before also using the edges to cut into the scales of the beast.
But before he could even follow it up, he was suddenly pounced by another stalker and was left lying on his back as it opened its mouth revealing a set of razor sharp teeth designed to rip through cloth and went in for Jaune's neck. The strike connected but his vampiric nature meant the only pain he felt was towards the acidic saliva that was now burning his soul.
His scream managed to attract Pyrrha's attention however, as suddenly Jaune saw the beast take a shield to its face and found his sword by his side, allowing him to strike the beast's soft underbelly and kill it. Taking back his shield he successfully blocked another pincer from the previous stalker. But before he could even do anything to respond, he noticed a familiar orange and gold javelin sticking out of it's back.
"Are you okay?" she asked, pulling him up with her hand.
"Stinger's roughed me up, but I think I'll be fine." He replied, pulling himself up. "Ah!"
"Jaune, you just unlocked your aura, you need to take it easy." Pyrrha warned, making Jaune's shoulder's slump.
"We still need to get out of here and we're nowhere near doing that, in fact we still have to get past that monstrosity! And even then, we don't even know where Ruby is!" Jaune said, pointing to the huge stalker, whose pincer had been cut off.
"Ruby's signal is directly ahead of this cavern, there must be an entrance at the other side."
"So what do you suggest Pyrrha? I don't think we can take it on with just the two of us."
"Maybe but, if we can send it out of its cave, we can weaken it massively. If I use my gravity rounds, I might be able to push this beast out of this lair and grant us a straight shot to Ruby."
"Is there anything you want me to do?"
"Just hold on tight."
"What's the matter with you? Are you so emotionally unstable that even a few harsh words turn you into a self-deprecating pile of- "Weiss snapped angrily, as she turned the screaming girl to face her and found her clutching her head? What was wrong with this girl? First, she ends up rushing into the forest during a blood moon to apparently have a heart to heart with her dead mother then she ends up becoming a target for an entire pack of werewolves and then gets bitten by one!
Eventually however, the girl stopped screaming which should've comforted Weiss, as she would no longer have to worry about this girl's incessant whining. But seeing as how fur was starting to grow all over her body and her screams of pain were turning into howling, she would have no choice but to finish this right here right now.
Plunging her rapier into the ground, she willed ice to grow all around the werewolf, locking it in place and also forming the first part of a teleport glyph. Simultaneously a wall of rock grew, covering Weiss as she finished casting her ice, protecting her from the shadow wolves' attacks.
However, Weiss knew all too well that the wolves would eventually be able to break it down, meaning her protection was only temporary to say the least. As more and more Shadow Energy accumulated in the wall, the number of cracks grew in the rock wall. After seeing one of those cracks almost reach the ground, she shattered the wall and using her glyphs sent them towards the wolves, impaling all the wolves that were casting.
With no more wolves left to stop her from finishing her escape. Walking over to her target, who had graciously not moved, she continued to cast her portal to her safe haven. Closing her eyes and again plunging Myrtenaster into the ground, the glyph on the ground began to glow as a portal began to form in front of her.
Sweat beading on her face, as she fought to keep the portal open, Weiss was able to keep the portal active in a stable state. All she needed to do now was push her rapier into the rift. But as she was about to plunge it into the rift, her ears perked as she felt a soft thud from behind her.
Ducking immediately, Weiss turned and rapidly stabbed out, attempting to strike her attacker's knees only to find her efforts stopped by the furry hands of a werewolf who punched her back into the ice. Aura flickering as she recovered from the impact, Weiss dodged the claws of the werewolf and struck out against the werewolf. Unfortunately, her efforts were met with by the werewolf simply dodging her rapier strike and punching her in the chest and face, before grabbing her by the throat.
Luckily for Weiss, it had forgotten that vampires don't need oxygen. Using her glyphs to form a pattern under the werewolf, she created ice on its legs forcing it to drop her. With an annoyed snarl, the beast threw her into a tree, knocking her out briefly and leaving her weapon on the floor.
As she fluttered her eyes open, dazed. What happened to her? Why was she in this forest instead of her home? She looked up to the beast in front of her who sneered. "A Schnee? I thought all your bastard scum were killed off. Oh well, I guess I may as well do what the others couldn't all those years ago."
Breaking off a branch from a nearby tree, Weiss watched in horror as the beast clawed Weiss up to her feet before holding her back with its hand. Her shoulders slumped as she stopped struggling and waited for the stake to pierce her body and snuff out her long yet painful life. A shame that this was how she would go, stuck under the chains of something far more powerful than herself and forced into a role she had no interest in partaking.
But the impact never came. All she heard was a guttural howl, followed by sounds of grunting. Opening her eyes, she found that her former target had come back, now fully a werewolf and tore into the previous werewolf's neck. Howling in pain, the werewolf tried to shake off her target, but to no avail. Weiss's former foe had no intent of leaving the beast alive, and she sunk her teeth deeper into the beast's neck.
Finally managing to latch onto the beast attacking it, the werewolf threw her off and attempted to claw it. But instead of connecting with flesh, it only found petals, as it was met with claws to it's back and sides. The red blur from before, this time surrounding the werewolf and slashing it mercilessly.
In desperation the werewolf summoned energy into its hands and slammed it down on the ground. With a flash of purple and black energy, Weiss watched as her ally was thrown back towards her, crushing her with her weight. Laughing wildly, the werewolf boasted "The pack's sacrifice was not in vain! Today I shall feast in the honor of my clan!"
The person she was ordered to kidnap, came back to her and tried to save her life. And for that, she was now lying on the ground, unconscious as her aura slowly began to fade into Shadows. Letting out a guttural scream, Weiss surrounded the werewolf with glyphs and rushed forward, striking the werewolf brutally across its entire body. With each strike a piece of ice growing on it.
In a matter of seconds, the beast was surrounded in ice everywhere but it's head. The werewolf howled as each strike turned more and more of its body into ice but there was no place left for mercy anymore. Summoning her Arma Gigas's sword, she brought it down in a vertical cleave allowing it to cut clean through the werewolf leaving her aura flickering as she prided herself on her handiwork.
Looking back to the werewolf, she had no longer any doubts about what she had to do with it. Picking it up over her shoulders she went back to the glyph she placed. And finally set down her dying ally and opened the portal that would take them both to their salvation.
Suddenly a shot rang out in the distance and struck Weiss in the stomach leaving her aura at the barest minimum. Staggered, she looked in front of her, finding Jaune and his hunter friend, who's rifle was now aimed squarely at Weiss.
"Don't make another move. Both of you are coming with us." The hunter said, completely unaware as to the fact that Weiss had made her mind that she wasn't leaving the werewolf to suffer at their hands. Focusing all her magic into her rapier, she let it drop from her hands and into the floor, letting out dry smirk as the rapier's impact brought a spike towards the hunter,
Reclaiming her weapon, Weiss immediately expanded the spike into a wall and picked up the werewolf and escaped into the portal.
To the one place where she knew, she could keep her and her 'acquaintance' safe. Ewiger Gletscher.
A/N: And with this chapter the first arc of Bonded Through Blood comes to a close and in good time as the next few chapters are filled with a lot more of a slowdown and improvement. But seriously this chapter, almost killed me. Writing it got extremely difficult and as such I'll probably not be working on it for a couple of days to quell my Fantasy Burnout. But hopefully you all enjoyed this chapter in this story!
Keep moving forward!