"Well, that's a surprisingly small number of grimm." Ren stated as the group of five looked over a small rock atop the edge of the ravine. Below, there were around twenty grimm roaming in no specific direction. The group was fairly odd though, with a combination of a large variety of grimm, but none seemed to be part of a group as they so often found in the wilderness.
"I see a spawning pit." Ruby stated as she used the detachable scope from her weapon as a telescope. "There's something metal-looking connected to it, but I can't really make it out because it's on the far side."
Weiss watched Ruby slowly turn a dial before lowering the scope in defeat. She looked out over the expanse and watched as a freshly born Beowolf slowly climbed out of the pit, the dark ooze dripping from it's bone-like armour as if the creature was bleeding profusely.
"We should at least close the pit." Jaune stated after a moment of thought. "The less of these things in the world, the better."
"If I can get a clear shot, I could freeze it, but the grimm will probably notice us." Ruby stated as she reattached her scope and unfolded her weapon to it's sniper form.
"I think we should focus on clearing the grimm first, and the pit second." Weiss commented as she looked around at the grimm. "I'd say that priority should be the death stalker near us, and the nevermore and griffins across the field."
"Okay, so here's what we do." Jaune nodded as he looked at his team. "Ruby and Nora focus on the birds. Me and Ren will keep the attention of as many of the other grimm as possible, and try to take down the weaker ones. Weiss, you provide support to both groups since you can use your glyphs to get above the fighting to move faster. Once the birds are dead, Nora, Ren and myself will focus on the Deathstalker, leaving Ruby and Weiss to deal with the extras and the spawning pit."
"Sounds good to me. Wait till I take the first shot." Ruby replied as she motioned for Nora to follow as she pushed herself up into a crouch and started moving along the edge of the ravine with Nora in tow.
Weiss watched as the two kept low and hid behind a distant rock. Ruby aimed her scythe over the top of it while Nora rested her grenade launcher next to her. Weiss watched as the two huntresses fell completely still.
A shot rang out and Weiss watched as the Nevermore's head snapped to the side, Ruby's round having torn a large hole through the beast. It fell to the ground as all the grimm roared in disarray at the unknown assailant.
Ren and Jaune sprung from their hiding place next to Weiss with loud battle cries, drawing the grimm's attention as Nora started firing her grenade launcher like artillery to bombard the ravine. Weiss moved along the side to get a better view of the battlefield before she moved in to assist Ren and Jaune who were in the process of cutting down a boarbatusk that had led the charge toward them.
Weiss used her burn dust to send a fireball at a nearby Ursa who panicked and started flailing its arms as it's black fur caught fire. She then used some electric dust to stun the Deathstalker before it could close the gap toward her friends.
She jumped above the grimm around her and her two teammates, looking to Ruby who was attempting to shoot a Griffon who was surprisingly agile for being so young. Nora attempted to keep the avian enemy at a low height by shooting her grenade so it would explode over it's head whenever it flew too high. Weiss saw two beowolves break from the main group and start charging Ruby and one more Beowolf followed, coming straight from the spawning pit.
Weiss jumped over the battle, ignoring the angry snarls of grimm as she raced to intercept the three creatures that would distract the other two from their job. She landed next to the lead wolf, and stabbed her rapier backward through it's thin hide before letting the wolf's momentum rip itself free from her blade. The other two wolves turned on her immediately, distracted from their original target. She used her glyphs to trip the first one, allowing it to dissect itself on her blade as it fell and then dodged the slashing claws that the freshly born Beowolf sent at her. She jumped as a second slash barely missed and returned a slash that very nearly removed the grimm's arm from it's body. It roared and attempted to use it's jaws as a weapon, but Weiss took advantage of it's exposed neck and beheaded the creature before it could close the gap.
"WEISS! A LITTLE HELP?" Jaune shouted and Weiss jumped back to the large mob of grimm. She fired two fireballs at the black monsters, one of which knocked a Beowolf to the ground with a hole burned through it's center.
She landed next to Jaune who was attempting to fight off two ursi at once and immediately used some of her wind dust to knock one back. Jaune took advantage of the reprieve and countered the other Ursa's swipe with one of his own that landed the creature on the ground without a head.
"What took you so long?" Jaune joked as the other Ursa advanced with two more creeps in its wake. Weiss took out one of them with a simple thrust of her weapon that pinned it to the ground as it twitched in it's death spasm.
"Just a little busy making sure the other team wasn't ambushed." She responded as she pulled her weapon out of the dead body.
"Ren's already started on the death stalker. If you can, get Nora over here and you join Ruby. They're coming out of the pit at about four per minute, and if we get another death stalker coming before we finish this one, we'll be in trouble." Jaune instructed as he cut down his second Ursa.
Weiss froze the second creep with some ice dust and left Jaune to his battle. There were only about four more grimm besides the death stalker, and it seemed they were already learning that rushing into battle against the team wasn't the best of ideas. She found Ruby and Nora in pretty much the same stalemate she'd left them in, except there were now two avian grimm coming at them from different directions, and Ruby had slowed her shooting in an attempt to make her shots more accurate.
Weiss watched as Nora fired a barrage to keep the grimm from flying high and came up with a strategy. She jumped on a glyph, using her wind dust to accelerate herself as she released it with a jump. She flew like an arrow directly at the first grimm which dodged to avoid her, but Weiss was able to slash one of it's wings with her rapier as she passed, sending the beast to the ground where Ruby's fifty calibre round blew it's head and neck into oblivion.
Nora fired one last round before offering Weiss a salute and heading to assist the other half of their team, the round exploded uncomfortably close to Weiss as she landed on a glyph next to the second Griffon. It shrieked in surprise at her arrival and attempted to slash at her with it's front talons, but failed as Ruby's round tore it's front leg off and then fell silent as Weiss froze it with ice dust.
The creature fell to the ground and shattered as Weiss jumped back to her partner.
"Thanks for the assist!" Ruby gave Weiss a high five as they joined up.
"Jaune said the pit spawns about four per minute. We need to close it ASAP." Weiss stated as she watched a Taijitu slither out from the depths of said puddle. "And now we have to deal with that."
"I got that thing, you get the pit." Ruby said as she rushed forward with her semblance. Weiss followed at her much slower speed as she watched the second head of the snake pop out of the black puddle for a moment before Ruby's scythe bit into it's neck and the following shot ripped it's head clean off. The second head lunged at her partner and Ruby swung her scythe down into the thick bone on it's head, pushing it's attack below her as she used it's body to slide back to the ground.
Weiss had only gone a few meters when she heard a loud buzzing noise come from over the opposite side of the ravine. A second later, large, barrel-chested grimm raced down the hillside, their huge arms swinging their bodies at an alarming speed. She counted seven in total and swore, changing directions to return to Ruby. The pit would have to wait.
"Ruby, regroup on Jaune!" She shouted as she intercepted the lunge of the giant snake, sending her rapier through it's eye before firing a round of ice dust. The creature dissolved as Weiss shattered the ice with a second slash and turned to find the others on their team already in combat with the first Beringel.
"If you have any ideas, now would be the time!" Ruby shouted as one of the creatures reached them, taking a swipe at Ruby who barely dodged and countered, sending the creature back only for a second to take it's place.
"One." Weiss replied, launching herself back from her partner. She summoned a glyph, focusing intently on the creature she'd killed in her pre-Beacon training. Alone, it wouldn't be able to handle the grimm, but it would be able to take a hit. And that was all Weiss needed at the moment.
"Any second now would be nice!" Ruby shouted, shooting a glancing shot off a Beringel that had been heading past her to Weiss. It turned and refocused on Ruby as she continued to fend off two of it's brethren.
Weiss glanced up, praying to whatever gods might exist that her summon would work. She heard Ruby yelp as she was thrown from the group, barely landing on her feet to defend against a second blow. Weiss was about to give up when suddenly, an arm popped straight out of her glyph. She focused harder and the rest of the knight jumped out, throwing it's sword at one of Ruby's three opponents who fell to the ground lifeless as the giant sword had pierced all the way through it's chest.
Alarmed at their new attacker, the dark apes met the unarmed knight head on. Weiss focused on controlling the movements of the knight, hoping Ruby would see that she wasn't in a position to move at the moment.
The next minutes were spent with Weiss's knight guarding against the creatures while Ruby attempted, and succeeded at killing them. By the time they'd finished their small battle, the other four attacking their teammates had been reduced to one.
"They're good, lets…" Ruby trailed off as she watched the dark cloud just above the far rise of the ravine. "FALL BACK! LANCERS!"
Weiss followed Ruby who left a trail of rose petals in her wake as she raced up the side of the ravine they'd come from. Once there, she opened fire, the rounds ripping into the cloud as small black specs fell from it. Next to her, Weiss found Jaune and Ren finishing off the last Beringel who had lost both its legs and was flailing on the ground. Nora was replacing grenades in her weapon with ones from her belt as she ran up the side of the ravine to the place where Weiss's group had started their descent.
Weiss reached Ruby just as Ren and Jaune finished their work and stowed their weapons for a hasty retreat. Down the edge, Nora had opened fire, sending what could only be a higher quality of flak rounds into the black mass that was now spilling into the ravine. Two Beowolves had emerged from the pit during their escape, but they were quickly swallowed by the cloud of black.
"Find their queen!" Ruby ordered as she kept firing. "It'll be ten times the size of the small ones!"
Weiss looked through the fading daylight at the creatures, not seeing any thing that stood out. "They're grouped too thick. I can't make anything out.
"Hold on!" Ruby reached for her belt the second she cocked a round. She fired at the same time she ejected her current clip, slamming a new one into place and locking the bolt again in barely under a second. Weiss quickly brought up a glyph, infusing it with fire dust just as Ruby pulled her trigger, sending a streak of red through the dusk before a bright yellow explosion lit up an area of the ravine as the grimm were decimated by the explosive round.
Ruby kept firing, leaving bright streaks of light marking the air and giving a slight boost to the lighting as scores of lancers were killed. Weiss noticed Ren and Nora had taken over firing just below them on the ridge to keep any unwanted guests from their high ground. Jaune was helping Nora reload her shells as well as filling empty magazines for Ren out of his backpack. Together, the three seemed to be doing quite well. Ruby however, appeared to be on her last clip.
"Ruby, how many rounds do you have left?" Weiss asked as she looked desperately around the dwindling masses of lancers.
"About twenty explosive, fifty normal, and the rest is propellant." Ruby quickly stated as she carefully selected her next target and fired. "Nineteen explosive."
"Alright." Weiss thought quickly. The swarm wasn't too large anymore, only numbering about fifty, but still more than what could be realistically handled by a team of five in a melee. Somewhere there was a queen, but it wasn't visible, and the light was only continuing to fade as the group of assorted grimm using the swarm as cover slowly grew from the spawning pit. What they needed, was light to find the queen…. "Ruby!"
Ruby's head snapped sideways for a moment to see Weiss pointing high above them at a white glyph. Ruby smiled, aiming her rifle as Weiss moved the fire infused glyph along with her weapon.
Ruby's shot hit the white glyph perfectly and exploded into a ball of fire that shone a bright flickering yellow over the entire ravine. Weiss and Ruby were both watching as a large black blot flew away from the sudden light even as the light started to flicker and die.
"I've got it, just keep me covered." Weiss said as she dissolved her glyphs and stepped onto a new one that she used to jump over the ravine, outside of the range of the dark wasps.
Weiss heard Ruby call out to her other teammates and everywhere in the valley was set ablaze by random fire, distracting almost all the creatures from Weiss as she flew as fast as she dared toward the dark shadow that was the queen.
On instinct, Weiss dodged to the side as the queen's stinger flew past her. She landed on another glyph and attacked, sending her rapier through the stinger before the queen could retract it. Weiss almost laughed as she watched the head of the stinger fall along with an impaled ursa to the ground. She quickly braced herself as the queen slammed into her with it's body, its powerful wings giving it quite the speed.
Weiss rolled to the ground, dodging the stinger of a regular lancer before cutting it open with a slash as she found the Queen attempting to flee. She jumped back into the air, firing round after round of ice dust, which was dodged by the creature until an explosion ripped one side of its wings off entirely. Ruby would be getting a big thank you from her later.
She landed on the queen's back, slicing off it's remaining wing before summoning the sword arm of her knight which she used to pin the creature to the ground. She jumped off and drove her weapon into the soft body between two hard scales, the fire dust coating her blade frying the creature from the inside until she heard a sudden shift in the buzzing of the normal lancers which seemed to be crying out in anguish as they fell from the sky. Weiss found Jaune and Ruby finishing off the group of assorted grimm that had spawned from the pit as they were the only grimm left in any fighting condition as the drastically reduced number of lancers attempted to flee only to be met by Ren shredding their wings and legs, or Nora blasting them apart in groups.
Seeing that the others were busy, she focused back on the spawning pit.
Weiss finally reached the pit and found the strange device that Ruby'd mentioned with two thick pipes leading into the murky ooze. Weiss heard a pitiful roar and looked once more at the rest of the ravine to see the state of her teammates.
Jaune had just finished the last Beowolf, and Ren and Nora were leaning on the crushed husk of the Deathstalker that was smoking slowly. Weiss saw a claw emerge from the pit next to her and reacted with a round of ice dust that froze the ooze and then cracked as the liquid froze all the way to the bottom of the deep pit. The grimm that had once been about to crawl out was dead before it ever saw the air. That's when she heard a very obnoxious beeping that she just knew couldn't ever mean anything good.
"GET CLEAR!" Weiss shouted as she raced away from whatever that machine was, noticing a flashing red light on it's side as the beeping picked up in pitch and frequency. "NOW!"
Ruby jumped back, stumbling on the uneven ground at the sudden shout. Ruby let out a cry that could only be pain and Weiss abandoned her retreat, instead rushing to her partner. What she saw in front of her as she looked back at the machine was something she'd never seen before.
A large wave of pure darkness spread out from the machine across the ground, engulfing everything in it's path, creating a shadow like world. The air remained clear, allowing a view to the spreading black ground on the other side come to a stop at the steep ridge that marked the other end of the valley. The remnants of grimm that hadn't completely dissolved turned completely black like silhouettes, and Weiss watched in a primal terror as the darkness brought a prickling chill to the air. She pulled Ruby along as the rest of the team crested the hill and looked back.
"W-Weiss… go!" Ruby pushed her partner as she collapsed on the ground. Weiss noticed the odd angle to her leg and rushed back to help her. "No! Save yourself!"
"I'm not just going to let you die here!" Weiss shouted back as she picked Ruby up in her arms. The chill from the steadily approaching shadow was terrible, and Weiss felt her skin burning where the chilled air touched her.
Ruby fell silent as her breathing started coming in ragged gasps. Weiss fought valiantly to move but every step got harder and harder as the darkness approached. It was almost as if the blood within her veins was freezing. Ruby's breathing quieted as Weiss approached the beginning of the incline, her legs shaking from the extra strain of carrying Ruby and fighting off the cold.
Weiss saw the rest of her team waving to her to hurry as their mouths shouted words that were lost beyond the burning that sunk deep into Weiss's ears. All she knew was she needed to keep going, so she forced one foot in front of the other even as Nora tried to jump down from the ledge and was caught by Ren and dragged back over the incline. Weiss felt confused as to why the three members of their team collapsed on the hill in seeming defeat. She watched as Jaune pounded his fist into the ground, as his mouth opened seemingly in an anguished cry.
Weiss stepped forward once more before she felt her legs refuse to obey her commands.
"S-s-s-so c-c-c-c-cold…" Ruby stuttered as she kept cuddling into Weiss's arms. Weiss couldn't do anything other than bow over the girl in her arms and press one final kiss to her lips. Even then, she couldn't feel anything.