Deep in the forest, Reginald and Persi are wandering aimlessly looking for their objective. Persi is on high alert for any nearby Grimm while Reginald is relaxed with his hands behind his head and his eyes to the sky. As Persi scopes the area for any Grimm activity with his weapon in its shotgun form, Reginald sighs and says, "There aren't any Grimm nearby, so you can relax."
Persi glares at his partner and asks, "How are ya so certain of that?"
Reginald grins and flicks his wrists, causing the area around them to shimmer. "Before I met up with you, I set up a barrier. It's about twenty feet in all directions and catch the slightest of movements, so we're pretty safe.", Reginald explains as Persi sees the wires coming out of his gloves.
"So that's your weapon?", Persi asks as he transforms his weapon back into an axe and places it on his back.
Reginald nods and says, "Silver Lining. Pretty cool, huh?", as he weaves the threads around himself elegantly.
The Faunus simply rolls his eyes before replying with, "Let's just keep moving. We need to find the ruins."
Reginald returns his hands back behind his head before blowing off Persi's worry, saying, "Yeah, yeah. Find the relics at some random ruins in the middle of the forest then head to a random ass location that we'll get when we get our magical moon ruin. Wonderful plan, Captain." Reginald glances over to Persi's axe and asks, "So, what's your weapon? I see it's an axe that shoots shotgun rounds, but what else can it do?"
Persi glances back at him before returning his focus ahead of himself as he says, "It doubles as a baseball bat in a pinch."
Reginald snickers at the idea and says, "A baseball bat? I've gotta see that one!"
Persi smiles at this sudden interest in his weapon before saying, "Let's hope you don't have to." Persi pulls out his scroll and presses an app to show a map of their area, but looks at it in confusion.
Reginald glances over his shoulder and says, "Hey, we're pretty close to the ruins."
Persi gives him a baffled look before asking, "How can you tell that?"
Reginald points to a point to the west of what looks like a landmark at the center of the forest. "We have to be here. The tower just over there is only fifteen feet that way and on my way over to you I saw that clearing to the south.", he explains as he points out the landmarks on the screen.
Persi marks their current location on his scroll and says, "So if we're here, we just have to head east and we'll run straight into the ruins."
Reginald nods and adds, "And then we can get the hell outta this place. There might be a lot of Grimm in this forest, but they're all so booooring!" Reginald starts heading east and Persi follows shortly after.
Persi bumps into Reginald, who suddenly stopped for no apparent reason, causing the bear to look down at him and ask, "Hey, what's with the stopping? Weren't you the one that wanted to get out of here in a hurry?"
Reginald looks at his threads and sees one of them being pulled before saying, "Something's ahead of us, hiding."
"An ambush?", Persi asks himself and Reginald shakes his head no before saying, "Grimm aren't that strategic. Is it a person?" Persi and Reginald both think at the same time, "Don't tell me it's that asshole."
Reginald and Persi stealthily sneak through the terrain before coming upon a rustling bush. They sneak up into a nearby tree to get a better view of the possible threat. They can't quite see them, but hear them saying, "Russel, where the hell are you? I'm not gonna wait all day for your slow ass to get over here!"
Persi grinds his teeth and Reginald only sighs before whispering, "It's this idiot again, great."
"Come on Cardin. Wasn't this your plan? Shouldn't you be taking more directive than just sitting around?", another voice says, sounding as if it were coming out of a speaker.
"Shut up and get over here! Our plan rides on all of us meeting up and getting the same relics! That's how we end up on a team together, trust me.", Cardin continues, seeming more irritated than usual.
"Alright, alright. My scroll says I'm nearby. Poke your hand out so I can see ya.", the voice says to him.
Cardin grumbles to himself before popping out a hand from his hiding spot in his bush and saying, "There, my hands out. Now get over here!"
"Hey! I think I see you!", the voice shouts, coming through the speaker and across the forest all at once. A boy with a shaved head and light-green Mohawk runs up to the hand and pulls Cardin up out of the bush as they smile at each other.
"Russel, what the hell took you so long?", Cardin growls with his mace in his free hand.
Russel scratches the back of his head nervously before saying, "I ran into a few Grimm, but I was able to get out of it all unharmed."
Cardin just rolls his eyes before saying, "I thought I told you to AVOID the Grimm. It doesn't matter now. Let's go meet up with Dove and L. They're just north-east of here. Come on, don't slow me down."
As the two boys walk off together, Persi and Reginald both look to each other for the other's reaction. Persi seems irritated by this while Reginald is only bored. "A bunch of half brained idiots working together might just make a whole brain.", Reginald says to himself before leaping down from the tree.
"Those two...!", Persi growls under his breath, just loud enough for Reginald to hear.
"What are you on about now?", Reginald asks with a confused glance over his shoulder at his angered companion.
"You heard them! They're rigging the system so they end up on a team together! Doesn't that defeat the whole purpose of this exercise!?", Persi replies in a frustrated tone as he points in the direction the two boys ran off in.
Reginald smiles at his frustration and replies with, "Just ignore them. They aren't worth worrying over. We have a job to do, right? Then let's get moving."
Persi grits his teeth, but follows Reginald's lead as he heads for the ruins. As he hears the sound of rustling bushes behind them, his bear ears twitch. "Wait, did you hear that?", he asks as he glances over his shoulder. They both look back to see twenty large, glowing eyes and their eyes widen in disbelief as the beast's giant shadow casts over them.
Across the forest, Ash and Sapphire are walking through the forest toward the ruins. "We're close, I can feel it.", Sapphire says as continues trekking through the forest. As she lets go of a nearby branch, it flings back at Ash and she shouts, "Heads up!" Instead of dodging the branch, he quickly slices through the threat before sheathing his blade and continuing onward. Sapphire lets out a chuckle before saying, "You know, I never expected to run into another swordsman. Well, not somebody at my level at least."
Ash doesn't seem phased by her complement and continues onward as she tries to talk to him. "So, you're from Anima, right? What made you want to come to Vale and attend Beacon?", she continues to ask, but all she gets is a glance from the mummy like swordsman before he turns back to his path and ignores her question.
As he continues on his path, he tells her, "We need to head north to find the forest's center. If we want to avoid anymore battles with the creatures of Grimm, we should keep moving." He passes her and starts leading them in a slightly different direction and she follows, walking slightly behind him and to his right.
As they walk, neither one of the swordsmen say a word, causing Sapphire to think, "Not very talkative, is he?" "Hey, you're a swordsman too, right? Did you make your sword yourself? It looks well crafted.", Sapphire says as she tries to break the ice with Ash.
"Yes and yes.", he bluntly replies as he continues walking, not even looking over his shoulder to communicate with her.
She looks closer at his sheath and notes, "It's a bit bland though. How do you shoot things with it?"
He glances back at her for a moment before turning his sight forward and saying, "I don't."
"T-then how do you-", she begins to ask before they hear a hissing noise. She turns to see a young Aggromantulai crawling toward them. She goes to draw her sword, but stops when she sees the Grimm pierced by a glowing grey sword. As the Grimm starts to disintegrate, the sword begins to fade away into nothing. "Another sword made out of your aura?", she asks in disbelief as she looks to her partner, who's ignoring the aftermath of the battle and continuing on his path. She picks up the pace to catch up and ends up walking right next to him as she says, "So that's your semblance? It's pretty cool."
They both hear a loud rumble coming from their left and they both turn to see what it might be. Sapphire says, "What the hell could be-", before activating her semblance to see what'll be coming their way.
In her vision, she sees Persi and Reginald rushing past them as Persi shouts, "Retreat!" Reginald is only laughing as he swings from tree to tree with his wires and Persi runs as fast as he can, easily keeping up with his partner. Ash and Sapphire look to where the two came from to see something huge heading straight for them. As it gets closer, they see it's a gigantic Grimm, a fusion of five King Taijitu to form a Hydra like Grimm.
As Sapphire's vision ends she grabs Ash by the back of his shirt and pulls him along as she starts rushing in the direction Persi and Reginald would be heading in. "We need to go this way! If we're lucky, we can set up a trap for it!", Sapphire shouts to him, leaving Ash confused.
"A trap? For what?", the boy asks as he follows Sapphire, no longer being pulled along by his shirt.
She points back to the source of the noise from earlier and shouts, "There's a large Grimm coming! I haven't seen anything like it before! We need to do something or those guys behind us are done for!"
As Ash looks back, he sees Persi and Reginald starting to catch up to them along with the Grimm chasing them. "We need a plan. Based on that Grimm's size and speed, it'll eventually catch us. King Taijitu are nearly impossible to cut due to their scales being too slippery, so we'd be at a massive disadvantage.", Ash suggests as he turns back to focus on where they're going.
As they continue running forward, they see to their left is a cliff leading down to the ruins that houses their objects: the relics. "The ruins? So they were this way after all.", Sapphire thinks to herself as she notices the ruins.
Ash suddenly stops, causing Sapphire to come to a screeching halt before rushing back to see what he's doing. As she does that, Persi and Reginald finally catch up to them and Ash grabs Sapphire by her jacket before leaping up onto the side of a tree. He then uses that tree as a springboard at just the right time to leap through the air and grab both Persi and Reginald at the same time, sending them all over the cliff.
As they all go flying off the cliff, the Hydra Grimm follows them, falling down to its demise. As they're falling however, Persi shouts, "What the hell!? Are you trying to kill us all!?"
Ash looks to Reginald with an aloof glance and says, "You made a parachute before. Do it again."
Reginald, noticing they're starting to fall faster and faster, gets a large grin on his face! He quickly weaves a large parachute to hold all of them, but they're still falling too fast.
"We're still falling too fast!", Persi shouts in his rage as they continue to fall.
Sapphire suddenly gets an idea and draws two of her Azure Drakes. The Dust crystal cylinders rotate to the green crystal and she says, "I'll use some wind Dust to slow us down!"
As she does so, Persi shouts, "We're still falling too fast! We need to slow it down a little more!"
Reginald turns to Persi and shouts, "You wanna stop shouting and start shooting!? I'd rather not die being held by two guys and a cyclops!"
"What the hell did you just call me!?", Sapphire exclaims as she continues to trying to slow them all down.
Persi draws his axe and as soon as it finishes transforming into its shotgun form, he starts slowly shooting. "Yes! Like that Persi! We're starting to slow down!", Reginald notes as they start to slow down enough for it to be safe to land.
They slowly land near the ruins and as Reginald reels in his wires from the giant parachute, Persi shouts, "What the hell was that!? Were you trying to kill us!?"
Sapphire puts away her weapons before Ash replies with, "It would've caught up with all of us no matter what we did. A Grimm of that size isn't as easy as some of the other threats in this forest. This was our best way to avoid the Grimm."
"We could've died!", Persi exclaims in response as he gets in Ash's face.
Their one sided argument is suddenly interrupted by the sound of someone coughing behind them. The four turn to see Cardin and Russel with two other boys, each pairing holding something. Cardin and one of the other boys are both holding relics that resemble the black bishop from a chess set. "Are you two done? Because we got places to be.", Cardin says smugly as he crosses his arms and waits for them to move out of his way.
"Ah, so you managed to find all your friends, huh? Were they hiding in bushes like you were?", Reginald mockingly asks, causing Cardin to growl at the boy. Cardin lifts his mace up into the air and aims to hit Reginald, but before Reginald can setup a barrier to block the attack, Ash draws his sword and places the blade against Cardin's throat.
Cardin simply grins before saying, "You think a small razor like that'll get through my aura? You'll need more than just one cut to get through to me."
"Who said I was only going to cut you only once?", Ash coldly replies before Cardin glances around.
He notices Sapphire's grinning as she has her arms crossed and he shouts, "What're ya so smug about?" Russel taps Cardin's shoulder before pointing up at something. They all look up to see twenty grey aura blades floating above them.
"Do you still believe your aura can save you from my attack?", Ash asks with a cold glare as the blades seem to start moving in, preparing to pierce Cardin's body.
Cardin reluctantly lowers his weapon before replies with, "I don't have time for you punks anyways. Let's go guys." As Cardin and his team start to leave, Ash sheaths his blade and the floating daggers above them fade away.
"Woah, that was... that was cool.", Reginald notes as he watches the blades disappear.
Sapphire looks over to Reginald and says, "Come on, let's scout out the ruins. You two keep an eye out for Grimm."
Reginald and Sapphire walk into the ruins, leaving Persi and Ash behind to talk. Ash and Persi turn to see there aren't any other real threats in the area except for the downed Hydra Grimm and the now retreating team of bullies. Without any real threat in sight, Ash glances over at Persi to see him glaring at him. "You know, it's impolite to stare.", Ash notes, causing Persi to growl in frustration.
In the ruins, Reginald and Sapphire are looking around for the relics that they were asked to find. "There's nothing here that really looks like a relic.", Reginald notes as he looks at the chess pieces all sitting on pedestal.
Sapphire glances over her left shoulder at him and asks, "You think he wanted us to get these chess pieces?"
Reginald nods and replies with, "Figures our headmaster would send his students into a war zone to find his missing chess pieces. It's definitely more fun here already than it is back home."
Sapphire turns back to the pieces on her side and notices the only ones missing are the black bishop pieces that Cardin and his group took with them. "If all students are broken up into teams of two and all pairs are told to retrieve only one of these chess pieces, then-", Sapphire starts saying as she begins to figure out the way Ozpin is planning on assigning teams.
Reginald finishes her sentence by saying, "Then whichever two pairs have matching pieces become a team then." He quickly picks up the black knight piece sitting in front of him. He shows her the piece and asks, "You thinking what I'm thinking?"
She lets out a laugh before saying, "You two don't seem too bad. I guess it's better than ending up with some other random people." She grabs the matching black knight piece and asks, "Well, now what?" Before they can make a plan or leave the ruins, they both suddenly hear their scrolls vibrating, and when they check, they see they both received a message containing coordinates to an unknown location.
"I guess we have a new objective.", Reginald notes as he puts away his scroll. He motions for Sapphire to go in front of him as he says, "After you. I think it'd be best if you head into the battlefield first."
She accepts his offer and replies with, "Getting scared already?"
Reginald only laughs to himself as he watches Sapphire's hips as she walks ahead of him, while saying, "Nah, I think it'd just be better for both of us this way, heh."
Little did he know that Sapphire was glancing back at him over her shoulder, before she growling, "Stop looking at my ass and get your ass moving."
He places his hands behind his head as he follows her out of the ruins, replying only with, "You're no fun."
As they're about to walk out, they hear Persi shout, "What the hell did you just say to me!?"
They rush out into the open to see Ash glancing over at Persi, who's shouting at Cardin and his group, who've returned for whatever reason. "What's going on?", Sapphire asks as she puts her right hand on the grip of her top left sword.
"I'm gonna beat these guys into a bloody pulp, that's what's going on!", Persi exclaims as he pulls his axe off his back and prepares for battle.
"Heh, like I'd lose to some furball like you.", Cardin mocks the Faunus with a grin on his face.
Ash and Reginald both look at the group and Ash comments, saying, "Something's not right here." Sapphire and Persi both look to Ash and see his attention shift to the cliff side. They look to it as well and see the Hydra turning it's attention from the nearby forest to the eight of them. Reginald, Persi, and Sapphire all figure it out and their eyes widen.
"You're trying to draw that Grimm over here!? Are you insane!?", Sapphire shouts in a panic as Cardin simply waves goodbye to the four of them.
As they prepare to attack Cardin and his comrades, the four bullies all disappear with a gust of wind, surprising all four of them.
"They were...an illusion?", Persi asks in confusion before hearing a rumble in the distance.
"We have a bigger problem on our hands.", Ash says as he points to the Hydra heading right for them.
In the distance, Cardin and his friends watch as Sapphire and everyone else at the ruins start rushing to the north, trying to escape the Hydra. He turns to the boy dressed in mostly brown and says, "Good job Dove."
Dove nods and replies with, "It was all your idea to use my semblance to get the Grimm to move out of our way."
Cardin grins and says, "That's one of the things I wanted to happen. Enjoy your first mission here at Beacon, you furball." Cardin turns around and starts walking into the forest before motioning for his team to follow.