Rogue Huntsman
Wind
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I brushed my hands down the front of my coat, letting my fingers catch on the several bloody holes torn through it as I made my way from the interior arena. Bullets pushed their way out of my body, clattering to the floor as I walked as traces of blood evaporated from their burning surfaces.
Soon after, the bullets disintegrated into nothing more than flakes and disappeared into the still air above them, the blood riddling my coat having already done the same.
Glowing green strands of light netted together within each hole of my battered attire, stringing progressively more lines together in countless crosshatches before the light faded into black cloth.
People would call bullshit…
They would be right, of course, if they were the kind to refuse all impossibilities in the face of implausibility, especially in their own lives.
No, the art of overcoming the odds has been around since the dawn of existence.
Impossibility in relativity is the only justification for implausibility. Beyond that is up to the one proving the impossible to be possible.
Though, none of that explains the transition from aura to cloth.
I guess that would be confusing, wouldn't it… if my clothes were made of such a delicate material.
My scroll buzzed ever so slightly in my pocket, and I pulled it out to read a message from my partner. She managed to slip away after attendance, disappearing somewhere else on the campus. I didn't bother tracking her with my senses. She'd get a kick out of that.
'Running a few errands off campus. Take care of Kitsuki, will you? I'll be back by morning. Oh! And before I forget, poor girl had nightmares the other night. You might have to sleep with her like I did. Have a good night! 3' No one could blame me if my scroll suddenly crumpled and crushed in on itself in my hand, no… no one could blame me if I'd need a replacement.
The holographic screen flickered before I slammed the thing closed. Crushing the sides of it for only a moment before the whole scroll repaired itself in my hand with a green light.
This… was concerning. What the hell was I supposed to do? Babysit the girl? And what the hell is Anoel thinking, giving me a job she knows I'm incapable of…?
She abuses the right she thinks she has by being the only person I actually consider listening to.
I kicked open the doors exiting the building designed for training and made my way out, letting the doors slam shut behind me as I made my way down the path. I was out early, beating the rush of students between mandatory classes as I crossed the campus and cut through courtyards.
"Take care of her…" I grumbled, denting a nearby pillar as I passed it, "She's sixteen."
I pushed through the rest of the column, letting the stones crumble to the ground as I waited for the ruble to lie still. I guess I'll have to track her down… My thoughts came to a standstill as I lowered into a crouch, picking a broken piece of the pillar from the ground.
The wind quietly sifted through my clothes, drifting beneath the rim of my hat as I looked up and toward the city of Vale past the cliff's edge. Running errands… you say… The stone crumbled to dust in my hand, pressed into spilling fragments as I stood back up and let the pillar rebuild itself.
"The next time you take a job, don't leave me with your self-claimed responsibilities," I muttered, resting a hand on the softly glowing reconstructed pillar and passing aura into it through my glove. The entire campus rendered into my senses, constructing itself in detail within my mind as a green light passed through its worldly connections.
Kitsuki's aura was suppressed in its entirety, her sound completely muted, and her motions were held. She was erasing her presence…
There was only one thing I needed to look for. I pulled more aura and sent another pulse through Beacon. The first sweep failed to locate her, which was impossible with only one specific exception. My aura crashed into the far edges of campus, stopping there after I found what I was looking for. Her tails gave her away.
I dropped my hand from the pillar before me and disappeared, making my way across the expanse of the campus with little effort before passing through the next courtyard and coming up on a large building. Classes were still being held inside, but I knew where she was.
She wasn't inside.
I tore my hand back and out to my side, pulling myself down into a low crouch before flooding my legs with aura, allowing the light to seep into the ground to reinforce the pathway beneath me before I leapt upward. The top edge of the five-story building flashed by in less than a second, letting me catch its ledge and use my momentum to flip over while reinforcing its masonry, repressing the sound of my landing to make it silent.
A small portion of the building protruded up on the back left corner of the roof, displaying a gray door at its center, glimmering clearly in the sun. The tension in its bolts told me it was locked, and its stairwell held no lingering heat… meaning she didn't use the stairs. The rest of the rooftop was clear, only making the several turning ventilation shafts and few skylights all the more apparent.
Slipping past each one, I made my way to the door and kicked up the bricks beside it. My boot found an easy footing as I gripped the top of the wall and pulled myself over in a quiet flourish of black cloth.
As soon as my feet made contact with the tallest part of the building, my eyes switched to the furthest corner to the right. It was empty, the whole roof was empty, but I made my way forward anyway and sat on the left corner of this smaller, higher portion of the roof below.
I sat there in silence for a few minutes, staring down over the edge my legs dangled from to the cliff below. The building beneath me sat at one of the edges of campus. The eastern mountain range spanned out passed that border of the school, and just beyond the outcrop of the cliffside swayed the stirring green canopy of the Emerald Forest.
I didn't blame her for coming up here. It was windy. A constant gale of wind pushed its way up the rocky outcrop of the cliff's face, rushing up over its edge before crashing into the building we sat upon and flooding up its walls too.
We sat at the tip of an extensive ramp, basking in an ocean of rushing air due to the winds sweeping over the vast mountains in the distance and riding the valleys and forests between them and Beacon.
It was familiar territory… for a kitsune of the wind.
"You don't have to get up on my account," I said evenly, letting my voice carry itself and take precedence over the traveling winds.
It took another few moments, but eventually I turned to see her sitting on the corner of the building, where I looked previously. Her eyes weren't on me anymore, one leg was up on its ledge to help her stand… but she quietly slipped that back down to get comfortable again.
Her eyes were on the mountains in the distance, the trees below, her small boots dangling over the edge beneath her. They weren't ever on me, not since I got here. Her tails waved in soft motion behind her, swaying in the slightest of movements in the waking wind as they fanned out to catch its tide.
One hand rested in her lap, the other, her left, held her long strands of hair delicately behind her human ear, letting me at least see her face. Her white fox ears were up, perked in the wind as each furry appendage fluttered pleasantly before the forceful gale riding up from below.
"How much control do you have?" I asked, watching as her eyes flicked toward me for a moment. Golden-orange in color, each dancing with glimmering light like waking suns, both set beneath white, long flowing hair and detailing an elegantly pale face. No wonder Anoel liked her so much. She gave off the very impression of innocence and endearment.
It was the kind of cuteness you found in a child. A child you wanted to coddle, only with this case… it came in a package. She exuded adorableness like a radiant star, but she also took on the looks of a petite, attractive girl with a gently developed body, more lithe and curvy than exaggerated in any way.
She was a forbidden beauty, something to be protected rather than taken. I didn't think I could ignore her like I'd planned… but I don't need to interact with her beyond the minimum. I'd rather not get tangled in a mess like that.
Her eyes eventually grew guarded, and her look took on a suspicious curiosity. Her fingers still held her hair gently behind her ear, but I knew it wasn't necessary, given what I could sense.
The wind wasn't moving naturally. The wind was fond of her, and her fond of the wind, a mutual relationship of trust and partnership. It was a devotion between element and aura user. It would do anything for her, bend itself to her will, hers alone, and sacrifice itself for her to continue living.
She possessed an Affinity Fragment.
Every simpleton in the world who knows about aura knows it's at least derived from the soul, a manifestation, some would say. Each individual on this planet has the capability to conceive aura, most aren't physically or mentally capable to even attempt to bring it out.
A gene exists in everyone's DNA that allows for the manipulation of energy personalized to each specific user. This gene is a descendant, a deviation, of an original gene that came into existence in the earliest stages of evolution.
The world was harsh, cold, and teeming with Grimm. Life needed to find ways to survive, and with the incorporation of Dust came the necessity to gain control over the crystals and their vast elemental properties.
Aura was the trigger, and humanity pulled it to crawl their hides out of the closing jaws of extinction and overwhelm the Grimm hordes by sheer force.
Those were the earliest stages of this aura gene, and they were the most powerful versions. The originals, they were as raw as the gene got. Every version, every deviation past those original genes, branched out in directions inconceivable by mortal minds.
They all came from two original sources, two opposite ends of the spectrum, Void and Aether, and from there… they granted all descendants the full ability to generate and manipulate aura to varying extents and purposes.
Then the Affinity Fragment was discovered.
These original genes bore the highest of powers, exuded the greatest of immeasurable auras, and cycled with the greatest of efficiency between itself and the user it was contained within. But, above all else, the original genes were conceived for one purpose… and one purpose only…
Dominion and control over the elements of Remnant's bounty.
Dust was the main reason aura was conceived, and through the elements of Dust were these genes evolved and developed. This direct link created a vast tree of original genes, each with a single, powerful connection to a specific element among the several colorful Dust crystals spanning throughout the depths of Remnant's earth.
These were known as Affinity Fragments, deemed by an ancient culture to be harbingers of Remnant's guidance as if the planet was a benevolent deity gifting them with the powers of nature. These fragments were the only genes to remain unchanged as the centuries passed and civilization prospered.
You were lucky to be born with a direct ancestor, let alone a gene of the exact same makeup of its original bearer.
I was looking at the only wind user in the world, and due to that fact, subsequently the most powerful as well.
Affinities were elemental based and held immeasurable power, granting the user a direct connection to every aspect of its related field of power. Kitsuki was likely capable of generating her own wind with her aura, absorbing the force of external air to increase her own aura capacity, bend external currents to her liking, and cast her senses through its reaches.
No, these affinities don't stop there, they never stop there, nor are they the same as semblances derived from aura. Controversies arose and continue to rise in the scientific community over which was stronger, an Affinity or a Semblance. Studies were rarely conducted given the rarity of ever finding more than one affinity user in one place, so the answer was never found to be believably accurate.
They were only capable of ever discovering one affinity user, and that was out of sheer luck. Affinity Fragments lay dormant until invoked into action through an evolutionary trigger of absolute necessity and a very real, highly fatal danger to the life of the user.
It was no wonder she woke her affinity… with a past like hers.
"You're capable of more than you lead most on to believe," I continued, letting her confusion settle as her gaze slowly took me in again. Her eyes met mine for a brief moment before reading my image, trying to get some bearing on who, or what, I was, "Your semblance is strong, I'll start with that. But you need to learn to control its field to encompass more than your direct surroundings. Your affinity, on the other hand, that's a closed book."
Insulting her was a bad call here, anyone would know that.
I slowly shifted, raising one leg up to the corner of the edge beneath me as I leaned back, lying down on the surface of the roof just behind me with one leg dangling over its edge.
"A book most would be too curious not to open," I continued.
Her gaze grew defensive again before she finally decided to sign something, letting loose some of her strands of hair. But as soon as she released them, I felt a shift in the wind and watched as they remained behind her ear, despite the rampant winds around us.
"What are you talking about?" She gave me a look, something I interpreted easily. This wasn't the first time someone's asked her about something like this, and in most cases, that usually led to outcomes unfavorable for her.
Especially in a world of developing science and breakthroughs in the study of aura.
"I'm talking about this," I held up my right hand, Ahrulian's fabric already sparking with my aura as I sent a cluster of green light her direction. The emission of aura fluctuated for a moment before growing bigger, a threat she couldn't ignore, as it passed through the air between us with a burst of speed.
The wind tore it to shreds, letting small streaks of light drift away in fading wisps as she tucked a few strands of hair behind her ear again.
"How did you know about it? I never used it… not even during initiation. Why were you able to sense it?" Kitsuki's gaze remained guarded, something I've come to expect from people who weren't Anoel. It was a natural response… to someone like me.
"I sensed it the same way I sensed the discrepancy in the wind on the east side of campus, alongside the unmistakable displacement of the air in the form of your tails," I explained, touching on the tactic I used in picking her presence out of the non-existence she used to blanket the school. I was hoping she'd learn how to fix that, now that she was aware of it, "Aura is a tricky concept to understand, so don't expect clear answers to questions like that."
"You can sense something like that?" she slowly signed out, eyes adverting down the outcrop of masonry before returning to me, "I hardly changed it."
"You don't need to change the currents much. Nature has a stubborn way of being predictable. The smallest shift in normality is an immediate anomaly in the system," I returned, letting my hand catch the passing wind as the current slipped through my fingers, "Don't assume no one can sense you, it just makes you more vulnerable."
"Usually no one can sense a change that small, let alone any change at all," she signed back, eyeing me with more of a curious look now rather than the guarded one she was using before.
"I'm not like anyone else," I replied with an even voice, pushing honesty on her that was impossible to brush aside or doubt, "besides, I'm not up here to prove anything to you. Unlike most of the world, showing off isn't my forte."
"What was that during initiation then?" She asked, eyeing me skeptically now, "Wasn't that showing off?"
I let my hand fall to my side as I turned my gaze toward her, "Those launch pads were hardly worth the time wasted waiting to go off. I'd rather just walk at that point." Besides, I needed to catch Ozpin's mild interest. If I managed that, which I did, then it was worth the bad reputation it spawned.
"Mine worked pretty well, I guess," she signed.
"That's because you're basically lighter than air when you want to be, and even when you don't want to be. You force an envy down so many women's throats you might as well accept it." My response was quick, something that caught her off guard considering the blush reddening her pale cheeks.
"Nobody's envious of me," came her small response, having the ability to look meek as she signed that out and turned her gaze slightly away from me.
Like hell nobody's envious of her…
Not many, at least. Cardin on the other hand, he can't see past her ears. And not in a good way, either. He's blinded by family ideals and a hateful past. Either that or it was just the way he was raised. And even then, it's hardly worth noting considering his parents most likely weren't around.
Who'd be proud of a kid like that? They probably left him with a sizable allowance, the freedom to do anything, and the skills to beat those weaker than him. He was a Winchester, heir to a noble family known throughout most of Vale.
They didn't have the best reputation.
"That's your own problem to decide, and whether or not you deal with it is up to you," I said, pulling the tip of my cowboy hat down slightly to rest my head on the stone roof, "Anoel and I don't solve people's problems unless we're paid to do it or it's on a personal level with either of us."
The message was clear. This bullying issue, if it kept up, which it undoubtedly would due to the target Cardin's painted on her tails, was going to be her problem to bear. Until either of those conditions were met, Ano and I would do nothing to stop it.
If she couldn't handle something like this, then being a huntress doing her duty on the wrong side of town isn't for her.
The world idolizes huntsmen. That's a given fact proven by the four kingdoms and the villages in between. But, not everyone shares that ideal. A poor experience in the past, an unsavory encounter with an arrogant hunter, a hunter who couldn't do their job well enough to make a difference, the expectations were high in this occupation.
Not everyone embellished this job in such a praiseworthy light.
If she couldn't handle that, then she needed to drop out of school and find something else to do. She can freelance, but no one likes freelancers.
I plan to do my own thing, be a freelancer, but with a… specific skillset. I'll be able to re-open my father's bar on the side, raise its reputation through the roof, and build a network of contacts like the old man did in his younger years.
He was known as the person who knew everyone and everything at one point or another. Nothing happened in Vale without him hearing about it. And, because of that, he was on most criminal's info-broker lists for high-end information. Most importantly, it was live information, meaning it was always recent.
That's where Anoel came in. She traded info at our bar. Unfortunately, for some reason or another, she started sticking around more often than not. And she admitted it wasn't for the business, either, despite her young age.
It was for something else I'd rather not think about right now since she admitted to something else too.
"I didn't want either of you getting involved anyway. It pulls you into the spotlight, I'd rather not let that happen," Kitsuki replied. I tried to find any disappointment in her voice, in her eyes, but was mildly impressed to find none.
She wasn't as fragile as I thought.
Ozpin assigned this kitsune to my team. I'd rather not worry about her more than I have to. But, given the situation, Ozpin's decision may have ruined her chances of becoming whatever she dreamed of being.
Once I got my hands on the information I came here for, I had no other reason to stick around in an institution built for breeding tools with weapons.
She's already without a partner, imagine what would happen if her team dropped out as well.
It was a problem, but it didn't warrant an immediate solution. Once we dropped out, given the year, she'd just transfer into a new team or run solo. Some students were forced to do that before, especially if members of their team died before graduation.
It wouldn't be the first time it happened… and it wouldn't be the last.
She'll just have to deal with it. Until then, I won't make this any harder than it has to be.
"Anoel makes other people's business her business," I responded, sitting up now as I turned toward her, "It's what she's good at. If she finds you interesting enough, that is. But you caught her interest with an incredible amount of ease," I pulled myself closer to her and got a predictably confused reaction out of her, "something very few people can do."
My voice had lowered now and I watched her bite her lip, hand pressing into the corner of the building just behind her as she leaned against it. I was right against her now.
Her tails made a move to slip between us, but I brushed them aside and flicked my hat up, clearing the obstruction by only half a margin.
"What piques her interest is no business of mine," I continued, trailing off before humming for a moment, keeping my eyes on her golden-orange irises. Her face was getting redder my the second, and I knew she was likely getting the wrong idea.
That was the point.
"On an ordinary day, that would be the case, but," I kept talking as I trapped her in her corner, "when an affinity user appears before me like this," I grazed my hand up her arm, slipping over the cloth of her light sweater and glancing my fingers across her milky shoulder, before applying pressure and easing her onto her back, "I can't help but take advantage of the situation."
I leaned down, pressing my arm over her side and trapping her against the roof now with my elbow supporting me on the small edge to her left. Her eyes didn't know where to look, mostly keeping track of my own lime green irises, before they snapped closed and I watched her tremble slightly with a burning blush.
Helpless, no response, acceptance, and a disconnection from reality.
No retaliation, not counter play.
I frowned at that, pulling my hat to situate it back into its normal position and pushed away from her, "You should value yourself more than you currently do, it'll save your life, and all the pieces of it that make you whole," I spoke up over the wind, her eyes squinted slightly after a small startled flinch came over her.
More confusion nestled into her gaze as her bright eyes opened again, her body shaking minutely as she looked up to me.
I didn't need to look at her anymore, so I made my way to the edge of the building and let the wind whip against the cloth of my trench coat, nearly ripping my hat from my head as I did so.
"The next time someone pushes themselves on you, if they try to take advantage of you in any way," I continued, holding out my gloved hand and letting the wind mold around my arm, "don't hesitate to blow them away. The wind is strong, but a strong enough hurricane can rip through the side of a mountain."
I turned my eyes back to her and leaned into the wind, letting gravity slowly take hold as I reached up and tipped my hat toward her in a farewell gesture.
"Defend yourself, or you'll force me to break the instigator for you."
I dropped and leveled the ground below by a solid four feet, sinking into it by half that. It didn't mean anything, matter was easy to reconstruct given its simplistic atomic structure. Stones, dirt, and grass shattered before pulling back together as I stood up, the ground fixing itself flawlessly as I suppressed my aura and disappeared from sight.
Aura could do a lot of things, I wasn't lying about that. But not all aura was the same, and not all aura was different, each signature customized itself to the person it stemmed from. Anything less or anything more than that was up to the user and the laws of relativity.
My aura just happened to surpass that realm of understanding.
I wasn't looking forward to my next destination, even after I started making my way toward it. I've heard the rumors, I've heard them all, mostly through Anoel. Everyone wanted to show up for something like this… someone like this… hell, even the slackers show up early for this class…
For a professor like that, even though she's late half the time.
I hear she wears a hat, like mine, and her class 'assistant' was a sight to see alongside her.
I could almost guarantee one thing, though…
Anoel probably looks better in a cowboy hat than she does.
Hmm, does anyone else think Niro's opinions are pretty subjective? He has a rather solid opinion on the world, which could blind him from certain other 'truths' that could be happening right in front of him.
It's in his perspective, after all. Of course, his comments about his own power hold a lot of merits. His comments on the actions of others, though, can be argued.
Affinity Fragments are my version of how aura users can bend the elements. It creates a connection between Dust, Remnant, and why something like Aura can ACTUALLY affect something mined from the depths of Remnant. I'll expand more on it when I can justify actually doing so.
It's already a huge part of my main story, anyway.
What a surprise, I'm bringing in yet another person wearing a cowboy hat. Because, well, why not? I swear this isn't what it looks like. She's actually an OC belonging to someone I'll mention in the A/N of the next chapter. And there's a reason why Niro wears his hat too. It relates to Anoel.
Speaking of which, I wonder if Niro will actually consider the second half of Anoel's request. Heh, I guess we'll see.
For now, Favorite and Follow.
I look forward to seeing REVIEWS for this. You'll be introduced to a LOT of concepts of mine. Feel free to give me your thoughts.
Cya XP