Up high in the air, above the Emerald Forest, soon to be students are falling quickly toward the ground below. As Sapphire starts falling toward the forest below, she draws one of her swords into her right hand and slices through an unkindness of Nevermore. She tucks and rolls as she lands, preserving her momentum as she carries it with her as she runs.
Persi comes crashing down from the sky, he cleaves his way through multiple trees before coming to a dramatic stop as he lands perfectly on one knee, looking like a superhero as he lands. He transforms his axe into its shotgun form as he scans the area for Grimm, and finds the area to be clear for the moment.
As he's scouts out the environment, Reginald is starting to fall from the sky, but he has a plan. He quickly weaves his fingers back and forth to create a parachute made of threads. With that, he gently floats down toward the ground before dispersing the threads, causing the parachute to fall apart.
As Reginald lands on the ground, elsewhere, Ash is leaping from tree to tree as he quickly descends toward the ground. He continues through the forest, keeping an eye out for Grimm along the way, before suddenly stopping almost randomly. As he quickly places his hand on the handle of his sword, three Beowolves leap out of the nearby bushes towards him. In a single motion, he ends up past the Grimm with his sword slightly drawn out of its sheath. As he sheaths his blade, the Beowolves all come to an abrupt stop before quickly falling to pieces. And as their corpses start to disintegrate, he continues through the forest looking for his objective. As he's running, he suddenly stops when he encounters a large river. "A river? Where did this come from? These trees must've blocked more than I anticipated. I'll have to plan my route accordingly.", Ash says as he follows the current down stream.
Back at the top of the cliff, both Ozpin and Glynda are watching the events of the initiation unfold in front of them, or so it seems at first glance. Ozpin sees a boy on his screen walking in Ruby's general direction and presses a button on the screen. Quickly, the terrain around both Ruby and the boy change, causing them to head in opposite directions.
Glynda notices the smile on his face before sighing and asking, "What's the point of using the relics if we manipulate the outcome every time? I really don't understand you sometimes, Professor Ozpin."
"It changes how they see their grouping, Glynda. If we simply place two people together and tell them that we want them together, they will call us selfish and controlling. But if we do it this way, they will see it as fate for the two of them to be partners, thus creating a greater, and deeper bond between partners and in turn, better improving their team as a whole.", Ozpin explains as he focuses on manipulating the forest how he sees fit. He switches his screen and sees Yang fighting multiple Ursai and Blake running nearby. He changes the terrain around Blake, causing her to head right toward Yang and notice the Ursai attacking the blonde.
As the stealthy ninja girl takes down the final Ursa after Yang takes down the other with a rage filled punch, they become a pair. He turns to Glynda, who seems to be watching Ash on her screen and asks, "Is she near him yet?"
"NO! I'm more of a teacher and Huntress than a chess player.", Glynda replies as she tries to make something happen by pressing multiple buttons. This causes Ash to be redirected into a hoard of Boarbatusks, which he quickly dispatches without any real effort. "He keeps going through them. Does he ever stop?", Glynda mutters in frustration, causing Ozpin to let out a slight chuckle before switching his screen over to Ash.
"Then we'll have to up the difficulty then.", he replies before pressing another button on his screen. This causes the terrain ahead of Ash to change into a thicker forest, leaving very little room to move around. Ash suddenly stops and looks around as he enters the thicker part of the forest. Ozpin presses one more button and Ash hears a rumble in the darker part of the forest. He seems to glare into the darkness before retreating up into the trees.
As he does so, he dodges a giant black mass heading straight for him, a large gorilla like Grimm with bones covering its chest and sharp fangs for teeth. Ozpin glances over to Glynda and says, "That should hold him for a minute. Now let's see about getting his partner there before he deals with that Beringel." As he turns away from Glynda, he looks back at his screen before changing the screen to see Persi.
In the forest, Persi is walking at a decent pace, staying on high alert at all times with his shotgun ready to blow a hole in whatever pops out at him. He hears the sound of something stepping on a leaf and quickly turns to see a spider like Grimm, around the size of a soccer ball, and blows it to hell and back. "Great, Aggromantulai are in here too. Why did it have to be spiders?", he says to himself reluctantly before turning back to his path.
He suddenly sees three more tiny spider Grimm crawling toward him, which he quickly shoots, sending their tiny legs flying into the air. A shiver goes up his spine as he looks at the limbs, disgusted. He goes to continue on his path, but stops when he hears a loud screech. He glances around with a confused look on his face before feeling the ground start to shake under his feet like an earthquake.
He turns his head to the right and his eyes widen in horror as he sees a fully grown Aggromantulai running toward him. "SHI-", he begins to shout before the Grimm shoots webbing out of its four arms. Persi manages to transform his weapon just in time to slice through the webbing, saving himself from the monster's trap. He isn't quick enough, however, to dodge the beast's powerful punch that it threw while he was cutting down the webbing. The punch is strong enough to send him flying back first through multiple trees before he finally stops himself by planting the blade of his axe into the ground.
Persi quickly gets to his feet, both rage and disgust filling his eyes, as he stares down the Aggromantulai. As it starts charging at him again, he transforms his axe back into its shotgun form and starts firing at the giant arachnid. After three shots however, he runs out of ammunition and needs to reload. "Damn it! I knew I should've used the barrel mag!", he thinks to himself as he quickly transforms his shotgun back into its axe form. He lets out a loud roar as he charges at the beast, but right as the melee is about to start, the beast suddenly stops in its tracks. It starts to flail violently, and Persi mutters to himself, "W-what the hell is it doing."
He sees a shimmer in the air and thinks, "Is that..Dust?", and as he squints his eyes he sees what it actually is. "Wires?", he asks himself before something leaps from one of the nearby trees and on top of the Aggromantulai.
He suddenly looks up to see Reginald standing on the Grimm's thorax, weaving thread around its large body. "I didn't expect to catch anything in this trap other than some lowly Beowolves! To think I'd catch an Aggromantulai of all things!", Reginald says as he finishes weaving his threads around. He leaps up into the branches of a nearby tree and pushes a small button on the inside of his gloves. The cylinders on the inside of each of his gloves turn and the red Dust crystals inside them start to glow as the wires start to glow a similar shade of red. In an instant, the giant spider is engulfed in flames!
The Grimm turns its attention to Reginald and launches itself at him with its four massive legs. Reginald presses another button on his right glove and he's sent zipping toward another tree, dodging the attack. The beast lands on the side of the tree and launches itself again, chasing Reginald. As Reginald lands in his new tree, he sees the beast hot on his trail. He goes to throw out more wires to stop the creature, but stops when he sees something falling from the sky.
Reginald smiles and waves goodbye to the burning Grimm right before Persi falls from the sky and slices right through the Aggromantulai's neck, severing its head from its body.
As Persi rests his axe over his shoulder, Reginald smiles down at him. Persi glances up at Reginald, who's still standing up in his tree as he makes eye contact with him. "I could've handled her, you know.", Reginald says confidently as he jumps down from his branch to Persi.
Reginald extends a hand out to Persi and says, "Reginald Wolfe."
Persi rolls his eyes before reluctantly shaking his hand and saying, "Persi Pumpkin."
Across the forest, Sapphire is running with only one of her swords drawn. She suddenly finds herself in the thicker part of the forest and glances around as she stops. "This forest is just filled with a bit of everything. Swamps, caves, now forest forests.", she says to herself in a slightly annoyed tone. In the distance, she hears a Grimm let out a loud howl. Her eye widens and she quickly places her sword in her mouth before drawing two more swords and rushing toward the sound of battle. "If a Beringel is really in this forest, then we have to kill it quick. If we don't, it'll only bring more Grimm with it!", she thinks to herself as she rushes in the direction of the howling.
When she gets there, she sees Ash dodging the Grimm's giant fists before going to slice through the beast's throat. The beast manages to block the attack with its boney armor on its right forearm before swatting at Ash. Ash manages to dodge back just in time to avoid its counter attack and retreats to a nearby tree to calculate his next move. "It keeps using its armor to block my attacks. I'll have to get around it somehow.", he thinks to himself before seeing the beast rip a smaller tree out of the ground with its bare hands. The gorilla like monster chucks the tree like a spear, aiming straight for Ash.
He goes to cut through the tree in one slice, but Sapphire beats him to it as she slice it into tiny pieces with her Azure Drakes. As she passes him in the air, the two swordsmen make direct eye contact before she manages to spin around in the air and land on her feet, facing the Beringel. Through her sword, she's able to tell Ash, "We need to distract it! It's only armored on the front of its body! It's back is defenseless!"
Ash nods before saying, "Then I'll leave the execution to you then.", and rushing toward the beast. As he gets close to the Beringel, he draws his sword and unleashes a wave of slashes down upon it. It blocks his onslaught however and sees Sapphire moving in for the kill. As it quickly turns, it tries to backhand her and send her flying, but she manages to block the attack with her Azure Drakes, crossing the three blades to block his attack. Ash takes advantage of this slight opening and slices the beast down the length of its spine.
The Beringel lets out a terrifying cry, but manages to stay standing as it lives through Ash's deadly blade. Sapphire growls and says, "We're too late, its backup just showed up." Ash glances over to see several Elite Ursai, Ursai covered in a thick boney armor that protects them from weapon damage, walking out from the thicker parts of the forest. As one of the Elite Ursai rushes the two huntsmen-in-training, Sapphire dodges to her right as Ash just stands there, waiting.
Sapphire's eye widens and she shouts, "Are you crazy, you can't pierce that thing's armor! We need to fall back, now!" The Ursa swipes at Ash with its paw, going from left to right, but Ash dodges under the attack as he takes a step in while drawing his sword. With one good stab, his blade goes up in a small opening in between the Ursa's jaw and its armor along its neck, killing the beast.
"You shouldn't be so quick to give in. Every enemy has a weakness.", Ash notes as he pulls out his sword and the Ursa evaporates instantly, leaving only its armor behind. "Between the shoulder blades and disks, below the jaw, and the eyes and mouth are the main weak points for these monsters.", Ash explains as he sheaths his blade.
"He found out all their weak points so easily..! Is that his semblance?", Sapphire thinks to herself as Ash moves to her side.
"We need to deal with the Beringel first then eliminate the remaining Grimm.", Ash calmly suggests as the Ursai start to surround them.
"It doesn't look like we have that option right now.", Sapphire replies as the two stand back to back, waiting for the right moment to strike.
"Can you fend off the Ursai while I deal with the Beringel?", Ash asks as he focuses on the wounded Beringel on the other side of the wall of Ursai.
Sapphire chuckles at his plan before saying, "Some little teddy bears like these guys? Now that I know where their weak spots are, they should be a piece of cake!"
Ash nods once and finishes with, "Then I'll finish off the Beringel.", before disappearing without a trace.
In the blink of an eye, Ash manages to maneuver between the Ursai and get past their defenses, catching the Beringel off guard. The Ursai all see this moment as their time to strike and charge at Sapphire all at once. She smirks at their effort and swiftly dispatches three of them in a single motion, stabbing them through the weak points that Ash explained to her just moments ago. As she pulls her blades out from the now disintegrating Grimm, she presses a button near the guard of her Azure Drakes and the Dust cylinder rotates over to the green colored gems. As soon as the cylinder stops, the blades all glow with a green light and pressurized air begins to flow around the blades, making it easier for them to pierce through her enemies.
"You think you can beat me with shear numbers? It'll take more than that to beat me!", Sapphire exclaims as she seems to stab wildly at the Grimm, hitting their weak points with every strike. She glances over to Ash for just a moment to see him dodging the Beringel's giant fists with ease. As he dodge's the behemoth's giant punch, he manages to get past its guard and slice its head clean off of its shoulders with one slice. Sapphire lets out a sigh of relief as the final Grimm begins to disintegrate.
"It seems we are victorious.", Ash says as he sheathes his sword into its sheath.
Sapphire does the same with her three Azure Drakes before turning to him and saying, "Yeah, but now we have a bigger problem." Ash seems to raise an eyebrow under his bandages and Sapphire explains, saying, "Now we need to find the ruins."