Disclaimer: Tried really hard (not really), still don't own anything. Not even the references, large and small, I have and will continue to sprinkle in for fun.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Chapter 2: A Dream Come True

'What the fuck am I sleeping on? 'Cause it's certainly not a mattress.' Groaning in discomfort, Jaune opened his eyes, and he could barely see the bare patch of rocky ground he was lying upon instead of his bed.

Confused, Jaune slowly stood up, and sees a thick, silver fog that reminded him of the Nightmare Fog when entering a boss room surrounds him. It was so thick that he could barely see the hand he was waving in front of his face. He also felt drowsier than usual when he began the waking up process. It felt like the fog was shrouding his mind as thickly as his surroundings.

'Am I dreaming? If it is, this seems like a weird dream.' As the fog began to clear, so too did the haze in his mind. Jaune began to see that he was in the middle of a sloped field. A field covered by white flowers that somehow tugged at his memory. Walking a bit downhill, he was shocked to see before him a tightly packed group of unmarked gravestones, and the mental haze disappeared entirely.

Slowly looking to his left, the line of gravestones and ivy-covered cast-iron fence, continued up the slope and passing by a large oak tree at the top of the hill. But the large tree was not what caught Jaune unawares, nor was it the large, full, and intact moon partially obscured by the thick branches and leaves, surrounded by swirling red and blue clouds. No… what truly left him speechless was the building on the other side of the fence. A building that he had only seen on a television screen in his room.

'Is this…The Hunter's Dream? This definitely a very weird dream, right up there with the one with the bird chariot.' As if summoned by the thought, he could hear a soft violin solo began playing 'The Hunter's Dream' soundtrack from the game, adding a calming ambience. Jaune could not identify the source, as if it came from all around him.

'Well, as far as dreams go, that's a nice touch. That's one of my favorites to play, but I don't remember hearing any sound in my dreams before. I might have dreamed about various parts of Bloodborne before, but never to this extent of detail. Fuck it, I might as well enjoy it whilst I can.'

Looking down to the hill to his left, he sees an open gate. Going through the gate with minor apprehension and walking up the short dirt path, he kept his gaze focused on the gothic architecture of the workshop building. Looking down, he stops and notices the figure of the 'Plain' Doll sitting down as if she was resting, taking no notice of him yet. She was dressed in the old-style dress and hat exactly like the game.

'Just a plain doll my ass. I guess she's part of this dream too. What a welcome change of pace.' To Jaune's hidden shame, as he played the game he developed a crush on the Doll. With puberty hitting him like a Goliath, her sensual voice filled with devotion, how could he have ever resisted? Not to mention that with his admittedly horrendous social skills in school and the somehow negative labels 'gamer' and 'geek'; no girl, or anyone else, with any desire to be popular talked to him beyond absolute necessity. Continuing to observe her, he noticed something was different around her, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

'If I ever hear the term 'waifu' used on her, I'll fucking stab them. Wait, how do I look?'

Looking at himself for the first time since he arrived in this dream, he was dressed in the same clothes he wore during dinner and the events that followed it. He was wearing a white t-shirt, black and silver plaid-pattern pajama pants, and brown slippers.

Looking back up at the doll, he nearly jumped in shock to see her awake and staring at him with her silver-painted eyes. "Oh shit!" Jaune exclaimed, before calming down and silently reprimanding himself for swearing in front of her.

"Aah, Welcome Good Hunter. Forgive me, I must have drifted off… what is it you desire?" Even her voice is the same, sensual, yet filled with devotion, yet it somehow seemed even more so with it 'really' happening. Hearing it sent pleasant chills down his spine.

Seeing as this was their first 'official' meeting, Jaune decided to go with a more polite approach.

Giving a Hunter's Salutation that he may or may not have practiced privately in his spare time, "Good evening. I am Jaune Arc, and it's a pleasure to meet you. Could I trouble you in asking where I am?"

At his introduction and request, she gave a faint smile and a quick, straight bow in return. 'Wait…the fuck? How can she be able to smile?'

Looking more intently at what little exposed 'skin' she possessed, mostly her hands and face, it seemed like her face was an eerie hybrid of skin and porcelain. Her hands still had visible joints and each part was clearly separated, but not as much as she did in game. Her face was too perfect and pale to be true skin, but there looked to be a small amount of warmth to it.

'All right, that's enough creeping on her. Focus, and maybe I can get some answers.'

Her expression remained unchanged, "This one is here in this dream to look after you. Honorable hunter, pursue the echoes of blood, and you shall channel them into your strength here. You shall hunt... and I will be here for you, to embolden your spirit."

'That's strange. I know her dialogue verbatim, and that was a bit different. Well at least she didn't call me sickly. Wait a minute, me coming here immediately after announcing my decision to become a Hunter seems far too convenient to be a coincidence. Maybe it's… no, I need more information before jumping to conclusions.'

He asked for clarification. "But I'm training to be a hunter of Grimm, and Grimm don't spill blood. They evaporate into thin air after death."

"These creatures you call Grimm, do they not hunt and kill people?"

"Of course, that's why we hunt them in the fir-"

'Didn't Dad say that Grimm get stronger as they eat more people and live longer? Well, maybe if enemies can pick up my corpse's echoes in game, maybe something in reverse is possible… I think I may regret my next questions.'

"You didn't say Grimm earlier, only echoes of blood… Why?"

Tilting her head again in confusion again, "I did. Why do you ask?"

"Well, where else can I get blood echoes from?"

"From any blood that your prey may spill in combat." She said this in a light tone, and that sent a cold, less pleasant chill down his spine.

"So…ummm…what do I call you?" Jaune was almost desperate to change the subject.

"This one does not have a name." She didn't seem sad, or emotional at all saying that, merely as passive as Bianca.

'Not sure how to respond to that.' Trying to change subject again, "So…is there anyone or anything else here?"

"Anyone…anything…else?" She recited with that damn adorable head tilt.

'I guess that's my answer. If this is real and I'm starting to think that it is, then I absolutely do not want to be a plaything of the so-called Great Ones. Ugly fucks! Oh well, if this is anything like the game, there won't be any answers besides what I find out for myself.'

"Mind if I look around?" He asked, almost referring to her as Doll, but he refuses to do so.

With a breathy tone even more sensual than usual, "Of course not, everything in this Dream is for you to use however you wish."

'Fucking teenage hormones, now is not the time. Besides, she's a doll. She couldn't have meant it that way… probably… NO! Repress, damn it!'

With that, he started to look around, and noticed one major difference in the lack of the gravestones representing chalice dungeons, nor the gravestones marking lantern locations.

He could see the messenger bath, made of pure white marble, but there were no messengers residing in it. 'Shame, I rather liked the little guys… girls… things of unspecified gender…Ah fuck it.'

Opening the doors to the workshop, they gave more resistance than he initially anticipated, and pushed harder as they slowly creaked open. Stepping inside, Jaune looked in the building. Having seen this on a screen so many times, he immediately noticed a big change. It had less stuff piled around, and it was much more organized as a result.

Where books were once in piles all over the workshop, the only books he could see were on the bookshelves to the left and on the dais behind the stone altar. The once creaky wooden floor was one solid piece of carpet, green with a large golden diamond outline pattern. There was a small coffee table placed in the space between the two bookshelves on the left, two chairs, and a silver tea set with two porcelain teacups. He could smell that it was full of Chai tea, one of his favorite blends. Next to the table, propped up against the wall was a violin, identical to the one in his room that he had learned to play form his youngest elder sister, Amethyst.

'How cozy. I wonder if the doll drinks tea? I'll ask her later.' To his right, he saw that the storage chest was gone. Filling in that space were empty weapon racks, and as he looked closer, each stand had a brass, blank plaque.

'So to apply game logic here, no storage chest means no inventory system? Damn, that's inconvenient. It would be so cool to be able to pull things out of thin air and to carry as much as I wanted to without worrying about weight and space. Then again, it would be hard to explain how I could give a bigger than average middle finger to the laws of physics.'

Going to the closest bookshelf, Jaune found that he couldn't read any of the titles on the books' spines. That is until he found one on the middle of five shelves, titled The Creatures Grimm. Opening the book to its table of contents, all but three of the lines were as indecipherable as the other books, and it gave him a brief headache as he tried to read them. As he looked to what he could read, the pain quickly faded. Flipping to the page for Creep, he saw one clear page labeled newborn, a few other blurry pictures, and a few legible lines of a basic description.

'This must be a bestiary. Huh, neat.'

Two of the pictures at the top, and were labeled newborn and decade, indicating that each picture was for their respective age class.

Taking the form of giant, bipedal lizards with squashed snouts, one is most likely to find them travelling in small groups of a maximum of 5 of similar age, but is known to travel with older Grimm of various species. Commonly attacks with head charges and bites. Newborns charge mindlessly and relentlessly to their closest known foe.

After a decade old, their bone armor forms in hexagonal shapes, starting at the neck and going down their spine, as well as along their legs as they approach the century age-class. Creeps of this age are capable of rudimentary tactics with their group, and can surround their foe. Creeps are more likely to form larger groups of 8-12.

Divided between reading a bit more and inspecting the rest of the workshop, Jaune cursed his lore-seeking curiosity and flipped to the last legible page, which was labeled Ursa.

'Ironically, that curiosity was instilled by the game that inspired this Dream. Isn't that a mindfuck? Oh well, back to reading.' On this page, three pictures were not blurry, and were labeled newborn, decade, and century, in an identical pattern to the other pages.

'That's weird. I've only seen the decade and century class, and Mom killed them. Maybe I only have to see them for this to work.'

Ursa are bear-like Grimm, as their name implies. These are mostly solitary Grimm, and rarely group up to form a sloth. When they do, the sloth numbers between 4 and 24, led by an older Grimm, or more than one depending on the sloth's size. Commonly attack with bites and strong, frontal paw swipes. Newborns charge mindlessly and relentlessly to their closest known foe.

After a decade old, Ursa begin to form armor similar to plate segments on their back, beginning at their spine and growing outward to cover their body as they approach century class. Ursa at this age begin to use their size to their advantage, utilizing quick charges in attempt to catch their prey off-guard.

After a century, armor also forms on their chest and legs; beginning at their paws and work up. Like all century class Grimm, thin red tribal-like markings form on their mask, and glow like their eyes. Ursa of this age class use their armor to tank hits while unleashing their own attacks.

With such a vivid description, Jaune imagined how it would have gone if he had fought that Ursa with Mom. Even as a best-case scenario, not so well.

'Based on what I found in the bestiary, it seems like I have to discover something that will translate the text on these books.'

With no more to read at this time, Jaune put the book back in its place and resumed looking around the workshop. There was only one other door besides the one that he entered in.

'No insight merchant? No outfits popping out of the ether? If my life is becoming like the game, I'm feeling a bit ripped off.' His thoughts might have sounded a bit spoiled, but this was his dream, dammit.

Turning around, Jaune took a closer look at the table next to the fireplace. Instead of a few small paper scrolls, diagrams, and tools, the table was empty. Putting it out of his mind, Jaune approached the stone altar; a waist high solid slab of grey granite, with thick, red wax candles lit at each corner of the altar, and a moderately ornate dagger placed on the left side over a white cloth. Jaune picked it up to get a better look at it.

The pommel was a thick, coin-like shape with the Arc clan symbol, two crescents, inlaid with gold. The form of the handle, wrapped in dark brown leather, fit his hand perfectly. There was no guard, identifying this knife was more specifically an athame, mostly used in ritualistic purposes. The athame blade is about nine inches long, and three inches wide, thinning out to a point to make an isosceles triangle. The blade's metal is steel, and carried a rippling pattern that Jaune had seen before on Ulthane, his father's hammer, only in red and not black.

The top surface of the altar had sixteen basins half the size of his fist ostensibly placed at random upon first glance. Looking in each basin, he could barely see symbols that he recognized as Caryll runes.

'Okay, I recognize some of these, but I don't for a few of them. I mean, I've seen them all before, but I can't remember what some of them do. I see Lake and Deep Sea, but only one of each. I think they were defensive, but there were multiple versions of them. Why only one?'

Taking a step back, Jaune saw that the basins were arranged as a constellation, perhaps the most well known constellation in all of Remnant.

''Gehrman, the First Hunter'. How… appropriate. Gomez named a game character after it, and the founder of Beacon academy held the same name.'

"Good Hunter-"

As he heard the doll after she apparently walked silently up behind, Jaune jumped in surprise. "Shit! Please don't scare me like that."

'So that's what it feels like when I do that to others.'

Bowing deeply in apology, the Doll said, "Forgive me, but I've never been in here before. This one was… curious."

Smiling, Jaune said, "Oh, no worries then. You just startled me, is all."

Turning back to the altar, Jaune saw writing clearly carved into the side near the edge of the top.

'That's weird. That was definitely not there before. Might as well read it if it's anything like the scrawled notes that were scattered in Yharnam.'

Most of the writing was illegible, but the format that it was written in implied that was a list. There were sixteen sections of writing, and only a single line at the top was legible.

Pay the old price, and your reward shall be inscribed.

'The old price? Well, ain't that cryptic?'

Looking back at the athame, he recalled something he had heard in a guest lecture in school. This really hyperactive, green-haired dude was speaking about, according to his teacher, evidence of a 'barbaric cult' that existed in a pre-Dust civilization. Jaune barely paid attention to it, until he heard the key-word blood. They had practiced blood sacrifice, and had invented the medical technique of blood transfusion.

'Ministration sounds much better than transfusion, but I might be… scratch that, I definitely am biased.'

Putting the lecture out of his mind, Jaune picked up the athame.

'Maybe I need to drop some blood into a basin? That might be what they are for. But which one should I try?'

The runes were so faintly etched into the basins that most people wouldn't even know that there were any, but luckily for Jaune he had better eyesight than most people. He saw the slanted, squiggly X and dot of Guidance, the two S-crosses of Clockwise and Counterclockwise, the star of Eye, and even his favorite covenant runes Corruption and Hunter, until he saw the perfect choice. A rune formed of a bisected, incomplete circle forming an abstract eye in the center.

'Aah… Moon, my grinding assistant… fucking bullshit Ludwig fight.'

Finally deciding on which rune to try first, he made a small incision on his right palm, and moved his hand to squeeze a bit of blood into the basin. The cut turned black, and a few drops of black blood dripped right onto the rune.

'Why is my blood black? Dreams are weird.' He thought with an outward sigh.

As the cut quickly healed, the basin turned red and the blood was absorbed into the stone. With three large drips/splashes echoing in the room, the Moon rune etched deeper into the stone, and gained a full red tint, with a small golden glow in the center. The basin had filled in like water and was as flat as the rest of the altar.

'Wait…why were there three drip noises?'

As he looked at the altar again, Jaune realized he had made a careless error. Instead of cutting his hand directly over the Moon basin, he had cut before placing his hand over it. As a result two drops of black had landed perfectly into two other basins, and they were so close that they were almost touching, and were very similar in shape.

The smaller rune were six black, crooked, intersecting lines forming the image of a crude beast's claw stretching away. The thicker rune also displayed a beast's claw, but shown from the side and positioned as if trying to grab something, and a spiral meant to be its wrist.

Aside from the shape, the thicker claw-like rune differed for the other claw by also turning to the color of blood like Moon had. Jaune felt the two runes on the altar, and despite their appearance of being crudely carved; it was as smooth as the rest of the altar like an impeccable inlay.

'Shit, this might be a problem. I never used either of these runes in the game. I have no fucking idea what they're supposed to do. Fuck all kinds of duck!'

On a whim, Jaune re-checked the inscriptions on the side, and found that three of the sections had been fully deciphered.

Moon: Echoes from fallen prey embolden Hunters. A sign of Oedon's Blessing.

Beast: A true Hunter can be a beast in mind.

Beast's Embrace: A true Hunter can be a beast in flesh. Only those with Oedon's Blessing may retain their humanity.

'Well those last two aren't ominous or morbid at all. Noire and Gomez would love it though.'

He reacquired the athame he had placed back on the cloth, desiring to try again for more runes, but as soon as he touched the leather handle his head felt like it was about to burst. As he let go of the athame, the pain dissipated as quickly as it had arrived.

'If that's not a warning to stop, then I don't know what is.'

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Suddenly, three new sensations made themselves known on Jaune's chest, right above his heart. Groaning and gritting his teeth in pain, Jaune took off his shirt and walked up to the mirror on the dais behind the altar. Looking at his mirror image, he saw the three runes identical to those that he had activated were now tattooed on his chest where he felt the brief sensation of being branded. Moon and Beast's Embrace were over his heart, the latter encircling the former; while Beast was on his sternum, claw side up.

'So that's what the altar meant by [inscribed]. Man if these were real, Mom would lose her shit. I think that she hates tattoos for some reason, even though she has one. Dad was on the couch for a week after he got his big one.'

Putting his shirt back on after admiring the 'new tattoos' for a bit longer, Jaune turned his attention to the two bookshelves on either side of the mirror. As the one on the left was larger and held more books, he turned to that one first, searching for any legible books. After a quick browse, Jaune picked up the book Knives and Daggers.

He opened it, and a blue and silver mist burst forth and entered his mind, shocking Jaune for Oedon knows how many times that night so far. Being lucid in a dream was not for the faint of heart, it seemed.

Accompanied by familiar sound of feverish whispers and breaking glass, Jaune thought, 'Kind of reminds me of insight. If this throbbing headache is what my characters felt every time I used a Madman's Knowledge, then I feel bad for them. Fuck, this hurts like a bitch.'

As the throbbing died down, he could recall things that he knew that he didn't know before; relating to daggers and knives. Stances, grips, slashes, stabs, proper forms for throwing, and more for a wide variety of knives were now imprinted into his mind as if he had trained for years with them.

Imagining a knife in his hand, though one did not appear form the ether, he slowly went through some of the forms jammed into his head.

'How did this book give me so much knowledge? I've only held a dagger during training and during the Grimm attack, and I haven't learned how to throw one, much less all this muscle memory that I seem to have now. Wait… Dad's family semblance! This is starting to make sense now. Perhaps my semblance is a slightly different form what he said about holding a hammer for the first time, but it's close enough. All in all, this Dream has been rather… insightful.'

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Unbeknownst to our Dreaming protagonist, elsewhere in Patch a certain red-themed girl was busy mustering every once of her budding stealth skills for a midnight snack of milk and cookies. As she passed by her sister's room, she heard her sister giggle, hopefully in her sleep. The sneaking teen recognized that particular giggle as being reserved for puns that she found funny, or 'punny' as she described them, no matter how bad everyone else found them. 'Somewhere, someone must have made a really bad one if she sensed it in her sleep. Oh well, back to Operation Midnight Chocolate Chip Cookie Goodness.'

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

'Damn, that was a bad pun. Glad I only thought it. I've already embarrassed myself in front of Doll twice, and that's twice too many. Wait, is she still there?' Turning his head, he saw her sitting on a chair, facing away from him, presumably staring at the teakettle, as if she had never seen one before. 'Then again, she probably hasn't.'

Seeing no other legible books on this bookshelf, Jaune walked over to the one on the other side of the mirror, containing only about a half a dozen books. They were as illegible as most of the other books, but what was different about these ones were that just looking at them gave Jaune his most painful headache yet.

With a quick yelp of pain before he looked away, Jaune thought, 'what is with all these damn headaches? It's time for video game logic. Other games have skill books to learn unique abilities, so maybe these are something like that? If the pain is any indication, then I am definitely do not fulfill the requirements to read them. Well, I'm almost done exploring, so I might as well finish up outside.'

Going out the other door in the back of the workshop, he looked outside to gaze at the horizon, or rather the lack of it. 'Just more fog and red/blue clouds and an intact moon. I wonder where Gomez got the idea for that.'

Looking to his right, where in the game was a small path to the messenger stump and a sleeping Gehrman; there was more ivy-covered iron fence and an edge dropping into the grey.

Looking to his left and below him, Jaune saw that the messenger bath had been altered. Jumping down to take a closer look, 'Because walking around is for noobs', the first thing that captured his attention was that the bath contained a few handfuls of a familiar black liquid. Around the rim were six goblets that looked like the Pthumerian Chalice, Depth level 2, and the only difference was that the gemstone on each of them was a different color. Next to each goblet are an icon and two numbers below each other. The icons were recognizable as the symbols used in game for different stats.

'Let's see. A heart, a teardrop, a bulging arm, an open hand, what I think is a splash, and a five-pointed star. Vitality, stamina, strength, dexterity, blood quality, and arcane respectively. If I'm looking at this right, than this must be where I, to quote the doll, [channel echoes of blood]. I guess that black shit I bled on the altar was more of this stuff.'

Looking at the icons, no numbers that would indicate a statistic was present. 'Well that's inconvenient.'

Walking around to the hunter's rune, Jaune spotted a spigot with two different valves on the side below the rune. Just above the spigot was some thankfully legible text.

Consume and become more than you once were.

'Thank you clear, concise directions. Isn't that a fucking treat? So I got to drink that shit? Hope it doesn't taste too bad.' Concluding that each goblet is for its corresponding symbol, Jaune decided to pick up the endurance goblet first. After he picked it up, he noticed a small tile; identical in color to the gemstone of the goblet he had picked up, likely to prevent mixing them up, which he though was even more convenient.

Jaune placed the goblet underneath the spigot, turned the circular valve, and a small sip's worth of echoes poured from the spigot, and yet it impossibly filled the goblet to the brim.

'Well, here goes nothing. To weird-ass, but entertaining dreams!'

With that thought, he quickly drank and swallowed the liquid. Smacking his lips, Jaune found that it tasted pretty good.

'Fuck, that's delicious. That tastes like, like… Lime Curd pie? Huh, maybe that's what Gascoigne meant by the sweet blood? I wonder if the others taste different.'

Excited to try out, Jaune proceeded to upgrade each stat by one point. To the joy of his sweet tooth, each goblet carried a different flavor just as sweet and delight as the rest.

'Vitality is Apple Pie á la mode, Stamina is Lime Curd Pie, Strength is Cherry Clafoutis, Dexterity is Strawberry-Rhubarb Crisp, Blood Quality is Chocolate-Raspberry Mousse, and Arcane is Dulce de Leche. Now I know that this is a dream, because the same liquid tasting like my favorite desserts based on what I drink it from makes absolutely no fucking sense. Oh well, I suppose it could be worse, and I certainly don't mind the variety.'

Though he felt no difference after drinking Stamina, he could feel his body change in a different way for each of the others. The sensations were faint, but in the absence of reality, they were notable. Vitality had his skin toughen, and yet it looked and felt the same. Strength tightened his muscles; Dexterity massaged and loosened his tendons and joints; Arcane and Blood Quality were not physical feelings, but more like the emotional reaction of opening up to new experiences, without and within respectively.

'If this wasn't a dream I'd have diabetes by now.' Jaune broke from his inner musing as he heard the Doll call out to him without raising her voice, "Dawn will soon break in the waking world."

Jaune didn't know how she could possibly know that, let alone the fact that it hasn't felt anywhere near eight hours since he woke up in this Dream, "How do you know that?"

"Such is this one's purpose." Her response was cryptic, saying everything but revealing nothing.

"Okay then, how do I wake up then?"

"All in good time, Good Hunter. Before you go, this one… have a request. Thi… I desire a name. Could you bestow one, even if this one needs one not?"

Jaune smiled at her, "Well when you put it that way, how could I possibly refuse… Marie?"

Her crafted body shifted, perhaps in confusion. "Marie? Is that this one's name? What... what is this? I-I don't know, only... I feel... A yearning... something I've never felt before... What's happening to me? Ahh... Tell me hunter, could this be joy? Ahh..."

With that last sigh, a tear made of a stone, faintly glowing with a multitude of colors, unexpectedly dropped into her clasped hands with a tiny clink.

Worried, Jaune asked, "Are you all right, D-… Marie?"

Regaining her composure, the Doll now named Marie "Yes. This one am fine, thank you Good Hunter."

With a soft blush growing on his face, "Well, since you have a name now, Marie, could you please call me Jaune?"

With the faintest smile, Marie replied with, "Of course, Jaune. It is time for you to return."

"If I leave, will I be able to come back?" Jaune wanted nothing more to see her again, and to hear her say his name.

As if hearing his thoughts, "Of course Jaune. Merely fall asleep or be in total peace thinking of this place, and I shall be here, waiting for you. Now take my hand, and close your eyes."

Jaune acquiesced to her request, while also kneeling down in the same way he had his character do countless times. He felt the haze of the Nightmare Fog, as he liked to call it, creep and settle over his mind. The last thing he remembered in the Dream before the sensation of sleep overtook him was Marie saying, "Farewell Jaune. May you find your worth in the waking world."

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Jaune awoke with a start, instantly alert after such a vivid dream. 'Guess it was just a dream, after all. What a shame.'

Getting off of his bed to ready himself for the day, Jaune felt different. He felt… more than what he was yesterday. Curiously, Jaune felt something in his clenched hand. Pulling it out, it's a small stone, flawlessly spherical, faintly glowing a myriad of colors.

'No way, how'd I get this? It couldn't have been from Marie… Right? But if this is here, then that means…'

Quickly pulling off his shirt, looked down at his chest, and was stunned to find the three runes from his Dream tattooed on his chest, right above his heart.

'It… was real. That Dream was real! Holy fucking Oedon!' Jaune was ecstatic to find out he was just like a character from his favorite game, but was more curious as to how it was possible. The first thing that came to mind was his semblance activating. After all, it was awfully convenient that this should happen the night after he verbally declared his desire to become a Hunter.

'I know that I love the game, but for it to have altered my soul? Maybe I was a bit too obsessed, after all?' Jaune could smell the aroma of breakfast cooking downstairs, and a question soon popped into his mind. How would he convince his parents that last night was more than an ordinary dream, without being sent to the funny farm with the nice men in white jackets?

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

During a nerve-wracking breakfast, at least for Jaune anyway, he figured out a plan of how to convince his parents. "So Mom, Dad, I had a weird dream last night."

Hans was quick to jump in. "Well you see son, when a boy and girl like each other very much –"

"No! Not like that you perverted old man! I… Do semblances usually come to people in the dreams?"

Sensing that this was not the time for joking, Hans finished laughing at Jaune's outburst. "Usually no. Most of the time, it happens under the stress of battle. Or, in my case, it just clicks and comes naturally. So to answer your question, yes it happens, but not very often. Do you think that it happened last night?"

Trying to ease his parents to his conclusion, "As a matter of fact, I do. I think that my semblance is an altered form of what you described as your Weapon Bond, Dad."

With a small bit of consternation, Hans asked, "Altered? I have the exact same semblance as my own father, and his father before him. Altered in what way?"

"I might as well describe the Dream."

The next part of Jaune's plan was to describe the events of his Dream, and have them figure it out if they could for themselves. As he recounted the events of his Dream, he was sure to leave out some details so that he didn't cause any unease, such as Marie.

'Though that's mostly to avoid any heckling of dreaming of a beautiful woman' and any pain he experienced. He could see some worry form on his mother's face when he got to the part of drinking the echoes, but that dissolved into a light chuckle when he described the various flavors he tasted. "You always did have a sweet tooth, dear."

Hans was listening to his son's tale, observing every detail that he recounted and taking notice of hints that his son was omitting certain details. He didn't attract his wife by being a lumbering brute, especially since they had met before he had his … growth spurt, as it were. A dumb Huntsman is a dead Huntsman, after all.

As he heard some of the details describing the place, some red flags were raised. Hans, in a successful effort to bond with his son, on occasion played some video games with Jaune to better understand why his son loved them so much. They weren't really his schtick, feeling more comfortable working in the forge, but he could understand why they were Jaune's. He even tried the game Jaune's been playing for the past year and a bit extra. After being unable to kill that one crazy priest with the axe in the graveyard, he was more than content to watch his son's skill on occasion. And the Dream he was describing sounded very familiar.

"Jaune, are you talking about the Hunter's Dream from your game?" he asked, almost half-wanting to know the answer.

A small frown formed on Julie's face, as she turned her attention to her husband. As she did not want anything to do with those games that she deemed a waste of time, she was unable to come to the same conclusion as Jaune's father did. "Really, Hans. I seriously doubt that –"

Before she could get into another rant, Jaune answered his Dad with "Actually, yeah. I wasn't quite sure how to put it, but yes it was."

Whatever Jaune's parents were expecting, that certainly wasn't it. After a brief moment of shock and disbelief for the two of them, Hans was quick to continue before his wife could.

"Really Jaune? You do realize how ridiculous that sounds right? Getting your semblance from a video game?"

"But what if I – " Jaune grew a bit desperate to prove his point, but his father interrupted him, raising his hand to placate his son.

"However, I've seen something similar before. Julie, remember on your last mission before we found out you were pregnant with Bianca? That one hunter we camped with for a week?"

"How could I not? That bastard had balls of steel to hit on me even after seeing the ring on our fingers. What about him?"

"I ran him a year later. I was called in as backup for a search and destroy that got out of hand. Anyway, after it was all over, we went for a few drinks, and somehow the conversation went to talking about our semblances." At this, he turned to Jaune. "Rule of thumb, it's impolite ask about another's semblance unless you are very good friends, or family. It's a very deeply personal question, so don't take after my example."

"Anyway, he talked about his semblance and how he got it. He loved drawing and the fine arts. Turns out that his semblance was the ability to make his drawings come to life."

'Wow, and I thought my Semblance would be strange.' Jaune stifled a snort of amusement.

"So while yours might be the strangest I've ever heard of, Ink gave me a more open mind to this sort of thing. Who knows, there might be even crazier ones out there?"

"What, like the ability to control magnetism or replace yourself with clones?" He asked hypothetically.

Hans nodded, "Who knows? Almost everyone is different, and even those who seem to have similar ones work a bit differently, individually tailored to the… individual."

Jaune sighed in relief that his father believed, but his mother was still in doubt. "Would it help if I had proof?"

Taking the tear-stone out of his pocket, "I picked this up in the Dream, and I think that it's how I woke up. And if that's not enough…"

Standing up, Jaune took off his shirt and both parents were shocked to see that the runes that he described were indeed on his chest, just like in his Dream.

His mother weakly asked, "Are you sure you didn't just get those?"

Jaune shook his head. "To be honest, I was thinking about getting some tattoos like this when I was older, but no, I didn't. I was not the right state of mind to do that the last few days, and even then Ms. Lowe down the street would likely say that I'm too young to get one."

Hans, now without any doubts as to his son's claim, came to his defense. "He's right, Julie. I know Nickel. She has a strict sixteen or older policy. She threw one kid out of the shop as I got my own ink." Not wasting a chance to show off, he tensed his left arm, displaying the rampaging Goliath inked on it with pride. He got it after his greatest as a hunter of killing a fully matured one by himself, a feat no one else had done before or since. That, combined with his weapon of choice, is how he acquired the epithet 'The Black Hammer'.

Sighing, Julie conceded to the apparent insanity. "Fine, I'm convinced. So what can it do, Jaune?"

Happy that his parents believed him, he listed all of the benefits that he knew about at the moment. "Well … I think I can get stronger and improve after killing Grimm. I might get more of these runes later for a variety of benefits, but I won't know their exact effect unless I unlock them. Oh, and Dad, this is the part where I meant about an altered version of your semblance. I opened a book in the Dream, and suddenly I have muscle memory of working with knives of all kinds, including throwing them."

A while back during his training, Jaune tried throwing knives at trees, and to say that he was a natural would have been a horrid lie.

His mother pulled out one of her throwing knives from somewhere, holding it out with the hilt towards Jaune, "Prove it."

Holding it for a bit, moving it around to gain a feel for its balance and weight, Jaune grabbed the handle and threw it straight as an arrow towards an apple on the counter on the other side of the room. Hitting it dead center, Jaune retrieved it, and took a bite out of the apple before cleaning and returning the blade.

From her experience, one does not simply learn how do that overnight, yet it seemed to be that her son had. With a nod, any vestiges of doubt that Julie had were washed away, and she got up to do the dishes.

"So if you really can improve overnight from killing Grimm, then I can definitely get you up to snuff for the Beacon Entrance Exam and then some." Hans mused out loud.

"Meaning that I wouldn't be able to go to Beacon if not for that?" Jaune asked warily.

"It's not that, you could have, but you would be… behind your future peers. To be fair, they would have a couple of years of experience and training over you, not to mention any earlier training they might have gotten. I know this one hunter who started training his two daughters when they were each nine."

Jaune widened his eyes. "Well when you put it like that, I would have sucked in comparison to them."

"Pretty much. Anyway, let's go to the forge. Time to make your weapon."

"Not just one, I think, because I've got a few ideas." Jaune said, smirking with excitement for the next 18 months before the exam.

'Jaune Arc joins the Hunt. Damn, that sounds so fucking badass. Thanks Gehrman.'

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Chapter End

I would have stopped after Jaune found out that everything was real, but I'm time skipping to Beacon next chapter, so it felt better to put everything after he woke up in this chapter.

For the Stat flavors, I'm a pastry chef, so this weird idea came up.

I know that in the game it's called skill, but I find the term dexterity to be a better fit. As for Blood tinge, blood quality is a more accurate translation from the original Japanese.