[X] Smashed the floor beneath her feet. She'd taken some hits, so her Semblance should give her just enough to break down the damaged floor and gain distance in the building.
Raising a fist and letting out a cry slip out of her throat, Yang made sure she timed her move perfectly. Her fist struck the weakened steel at her feet, Ember Celica fired, and her Aura exploded out. Each one alone wouldn't have been enough, but all together?
The steel shattered, and shards of steel flew into the air, striking at Yang's Aura in the process. She heard a surprised cry from behind her, and as she felt herself fall, Yang fired her left gauntlet behind her, hearing the rush of smoke that burst out a moment later.
She hit the ground again a moment later, landing feet-first before the force of the impact brought her to her knees. She was quickly to use that momentum to her advantage, as she rolled forward and flipped back up to her feet.
There was less smoke down here, Yang noted. There was still a lot, but a lot less. Yang could actually see, even if details were hard to pick up through the smoke. It helped that the room wasn't on too much fire. There was some burning to the side, but it looked like this hallway hadn't been on fire for long.
Yang noticed a shadow falling from above, and instantly set off into a run.
She needed time to think of a plan to beat Blake, and getting in close range before then would be a mistake. Whatever that damn sickle was, Yang didn't want it anywhere near her. She didn't need anything else telling her what a failure she was. She knew that well enough already, and she'd just be adding another failure to the pile.
The fire crackled behind Yang, and it took her a moment to realise the sound was getting louder. Was it getting closer, or was there just more of it? Either way, it wasn't a good thing.
None of the kids would be this high in the building, right? They'd live near the ground floor, presumably. So there wouldn't be any need for them to be near the roof, and Yang fighting Blake up here wouldn't cause any collateral damage.
There was an explosive sound, and Yang turned back to see a wall of flame bursting towards her, like a starving beast chasing after a dying calf. Eyes wide, Yang pulled her arms over her face, as the flames washed over her. The scent of smoke was all she could smell for a moment, and as it tried to stick to her, Yang let her Aura burst outwards to let lose a mirroring explosion, using the force of the small blast to throw flames away.
The flames parted, and Yang saw Blake stumble, through the momentarily parted smoke. Her raised right arm was buffeted back, and gave Yang enough time to see what she was holding. Firing Ember Celica downwards, Yang threw herself out of the way of the swipe as Blake completed it, and watched the sickle carve through the air right before Yang's eyes.
Hitting the ground and rolling again, Yang kept her momentum until she slammed into a wall. As she got back to her feet, sprinting down the turned path, Yang took a moment to reload Ember Celica, making sure she was stocked up on ammo. There was still a few Dust shells not yet used up, but with a small infusion of Aura, Yang was able to trigger them as she started running, letting the explosion throw her forward and Blake backwards.
Blake was faster than her, Yang realised. Not Ruby fast, but still faster than Yang. To be expected, though. Blake had one of those annoying dodging Semblances, so her being a fast, dodgy, agile fighter was logical, and made her a pain in the ass for a straightforward brawler like Yang.
Usually, Yang could at least rely on being able to take a few more hits, but like hell she was gonna let that fucking sickle hit her again.
As she peered through the smoke around her, Yang noticed that none of the sliding steel doors around her seemed to have any security codes. Rather, they all had buttons next to the door frame, to open or close them.
Mashing two buttons at once, on either side of the corridor, Yang fired Ember Celica to throw her through one, trying to get through before Blake could see which one.
It was an empty bedroom, Yang noted, and she quickly slid next to the open door while cocking back her fist.
Blake was still moving silently, but the smoke wasn't blinding again, just yet. Yang could still see silhouettes, and all she needed was the slightest hint of movement to be able to act.
Yang held her breath, as she tried to listen in to see if Blake would slip u[ and make a sound.
With a moment where she wasn't running, Yang took a moment to think.
So, what was Blake capable of?
She was fast. Had a Semblance that left behind shadow clones. Produced smoke out of her burn wounds. Shadow clones turned into smoke when broken. Had a sickle that brought up bad memories.
So, great situation that created. Couldn't get hit. Couldn't see her well enough to dodge. Couldn't run fast enough to get away. Couldn't try and hit first because she'd just throw more smoke into your face. Said she was going for the kill. Oh, and apparently had some kind of fire power as well, judging by the thing back then.
So, what weaknesses did she have?
She didn't seem too experienced with most of this, Yang mused. She hadn't used the sickle last time Yang had fought her, and she didn't seem experienced with the weapon. Certainly, she wasn't as used to it as Yang was with Ember Celica. The same went with her smoke and fire powers, which also hadn't turned up last fight, and despite how much she was throwing around, it wasn't very controlled.
The smoke didn't spread overly fast, and the only use of fire that she'd shown so far was basically the same thing Yang did with her Aura, which was hardly much. Not that elementally charged Aura's were capable of that much if you weren't the sort of caster-build who mostly used Dust in fights anyway, but there was still a lot of just brute force in that trick that didn't seem to fit with Blake's otherwise subtle dodging ninja fighting style.
Beyond that? Well, the only long distance trick she had was the fire blast thing, and Yang had managed to take that hit well enough.
That didn't leave a lot of room for Yang to work with, but it had to give her something to work with.
As long as Yang could keep some distance, then she should have an advantage. Blake could outrun her, but that just meant that Yang needed to slow her down.
Through the darkening smoke, Yang saw a shadow step forward, and took her opportunity. Her fist flew forward, smashing into the side of Blake's head, and struck flesh hard enough to send her slamming into a wall. A moment before she hit steel, her body was flung away, replacing it with one of her shadow clones, which exploded into more smoke a moment later.
While she could still see through the smoke, Yang barrelled out the door, slamming her hand into the button at the side in the process. The door slammed shut as Yang ran out of it, leaving Blake behind.
Yang immediately ran ahead, until she pushed herself out of the thick cloud of smoke into a thinner, less obscuring cloud of smoke. There was an explosion somewhere behind Yang, as Blake released another fireball to escape the room that much quicker. Opening some more doors as she passed them, Yang turned into another corner, and saw what she was looking for.
A window. Perfect. Protected glass without a doubt, yeah, but the fires were spreading faster and faster with what Blake was doing, and if she hit it enough-
There was the sound of something whistling through the air for a moment, and Yang turned just in time for the Grimm growled as they prowled forward, and the girl stumbled back. Her heel hit the wheel of the cart and she fell back, slamming into the ground as Ruby shook in her sleep-
The blast of fire threw Yang out of her relived memory, and threw her against the wall. She bounced off of it and into the ground, and as she pushed her self back up, she saw Blake slid across the ground, picking up the sickle that she had thrown, and replace herself with a shadow. She reappeared by Yang's head, and before the girl in yellow could do anything, Nora slammed her into the wall, stopping her from going after the terrorist, stopping herself from destroying herself like a fucking idiot, how did she never think about what Ruby would feel? Why didn't she ever see how badly she was hurting the people around her by pushing herself so hard? Maybe her mother had the right idea, there clearly wasn't any point expecting anything from Yang-
Being slammed into the wall again, Yang felt more of the flames building up as Blake put a hand around her throat, heat flowing from the burnt hand like the burning sun. The wall behind her was melting, and Yang could feel the liquid metal dripping down her jacket, burning away at her Aura. She tried to struggle free, come up with a plan of escape, and Blake brought her other hand up to stab in the sickle.
Yang let her Aura explode outwards again, as she kicked up on instinct, hitting Blake's elbow as her burning Aura slammed into Blake in general. The twin impacts threw the weapon out of Blake's hands, and Yang reached to grab Blake by the throat.
Blake let go at the last second and disappeared into an exploding cloud of smoke, reappearing in the air next to the sickle as Yang fired Ember Celica upwards. The smoke was growing too thick for Yang to see now, but if she kept running, then she wouldn't be able to get out the window. Who knew where the next one would be?
Fortunately, Blake had made a mistake. The wall had melted from her efforts to wear down Yang's Aura, and the heat was enough to sustain the flames, which was making it burn away faster. Considering that the wall had been right next to a window?
It was easy enough to reach out, smashing through some melted steel, to grab the side of the window. The frame holding it in place had been damaged enough that, when pulled to the side with the force of Ember Celica firing, Yang was able to pull enough of it away to shatter the window.
Broken glass scattered through the corridor, as Blake hit the ground next to Yang, spinning around and driving her sickle up at her. Yang twisted, throwing a shard of glass into Blake's face to surprise her, while her other arm slipped out of her jacket.
Blake disappeared with another shadow-to-smoke clone, and Yang finished pulling her jacket out as she stepped out of the window, slamming her side into the side of the remaining glass and cutting her Aura again in the process. At the last second, she threw her jacket back, and sure enough, she heard the pained cry as it slammed into Blake, the various sections of molten steel stuck to it weighing the jacket down enough to make it an effective weapon.
And as Blake struggled to pull Yang's jacket off of her, Yang jumped.
Ember Celica fired back at Blake in case she tried to pursue, and a moment passed, before Yang slammed into the ground. Her Aura took the brunt of the impact, but Yang could feel is straining. She couldn't take too much more of a fight, she realised.
"Yang?"
Turning towards the voice, the girl realised she had been too distracted. She had completely missed what was going on outside, as she fell.
Winter Schnee was looking at her, standing in front of a crowd of Two's orphans. A dozen children, some with some small burns on them, some huddled on the ground, most of them crying, and all of them looking over at her.
"White Fang." Yang declared bluntly. "Right where I jumped. Produces smoke, makes fire, has some sort of magic weapon."
Winter's gaze, if possible, hardened, as she looked up towards the window. A glyph appeared under her feet, and a ghostly figure of some sort of humanoid figure with a lion's mane appeared next to her. She gestured upwards, and the phantom stood, before running up to the building.
"Where's Two?" Yang asked.
It'd been months since she had seen Winter, but now wasn't the time to catch up. Not with what was going on, right now.
"Still in there." Winter replied. "She's been out a few times to carry people out, but she never stays long enough to talk."
Examining Yang for a moment and noting the Aura strain, Winter came to a decision.
"I've called in some workers." She decided. "And help should be here soon regardless. As soon as someone brings a van over, go with the kids back to the main manor. Find the head maid and tell her everything about whoever you were fighting. I'll try and deal with this here."
Turning back towards the burning mansion, Winter created a pathway of glyphs up to the window, and ran back in.
Watching her disappear, Yang took a shuddering breath, and turned towards the kids.
One of them stepped forward, and Yang took a moment to recognise her. It was the girl again, the fox Faunus that Yang had saved from the burning village several months ago. Carmine, her name was.
She looked up to Yang, with miserable, empty eyes. This was the second time now, that a home of hers had been burnt down. The second time Yang had been there. Cent had said a week ago, that Carmine had looked up to her, didn't he?
Maybe she should get better role models, Yang thought bitterly. At least ones who can actually be worth a damn.
"Yang..." The girl croaked, as she tried to hold back a sob. "Why... Why does this keep happening?"
"...I don't know." Yang admitted. "I... Everything's gonna be alright, okay? It's all going to be fine."
Carmine looked down, clearly not convinced. Yang didn't blame her. She didn't even know if she believed herself, right now.
While Mis Xiao Long waits, perhaps we should take a moment to observe another important player?
[X] Ruby Rose
[X] Nora Valkyrie
[X] Sun Wukong