"My lord, I was not aware that you had returned from your assignment. My sincerest apologies for the poor reception. May I inquire as to what brings you to our humble museum?"

The cloaked figure stepped out of the blizzard and brushed some snow off of his shoulders as he stood in front of the counter. "Yes, you may. Though it took me longer than anticipated I was able to complete my mission, however, on my return journey I came across a curious little trinket that I thought might interest Burratino so I decided to check if he was in."

The receptionist shook their head "Ah I'm afraid you've just missed him by a few days, after he returned from Remnant he was ordered down to Liyue in the hopes that he might be able to mend some of the strained relations that arose there recently."

"Strained relations? Hmm, I suppose that was because of Tartaglia's dishonorable actions during his mission then?"

The receptionist nodded in surprise "Ah! So you know of it already milord?"

The figure chuckled "I don't think there's a single person in Teyvat who hasn't heard of an ancient god's assault on Liyue Harbor, it was just a matter of connecting the doubts…but Remnant you say? I confess I am not familiar with the term."

"Oh, that must be because you were in the field at the time, a portal to Lord Burattino's homeworld was found and he himself led an expedition into it along with a hand-picked squad. After he returned, Lord Tartaglia was also ordered out there as a punishment for his actions in Liyue."

The receptionist reached under the counter and withdrew a sheet of paper and a key from a drawer. Before setting them on the counter and sliding them towards the Harbinger "Here, this a key to the records room, you'll be able to view the full folder there, and that sheet gives a brief overview of Lord Burratino's actions there.

The figure picked up the file between his fingertips and gave it a cursory glance as he stroked his shrouded chin. "Interesting, I think I would like to see more of it myself."


Vacuo, deep within the desert


"No no no no, please don't do it, please!"

A beaked figure wrenched off his mask and vented the contents of his stomach into an empty wooden trough as a bloody spearhead fall from his hand, around him the ruins of a merchant caravan smoldered in the desert sun, smoke still rising from some of the wrecks as vultures circled overhead. He staggered over to a wooden barrel that still held water and ducked his head inside before examining his reflection in the ripples. Blond hair from his father check. Blue eyes from his mother's side were also a check. He clasped a small square device on his chest and spoke into it "Ugh…I think I'm getting close. All signs point to them being just a bit further down this road."

There was a brief crackling noise before a staticky voice answered him "Are you doing alright? It's not getting to you is it? And getting close? "you've said that several times over the past few days, what makes you think this time is any different?"

"I'm fine. and I'm almost certain it's the right group this time. A feeling…the mole crab spawning season is in full swing right now, which makes most of the usual trading roads impassable, which means that these caravans have been forced to find alternative routes through these hills. And where the caravans go..." the youth trailed off as he spotted something out of place among the burned wreckage of the battle site. A mound of sand, raised a little ways away from the edge of the road and yet too far from the surrounding dunes to be a part of them.

"Bandits follow." the voice sighed. "I want you to know that I'm still not comfortable with you being on your own like this, what if it gets too much? Are you even sure you'll find the information you need if you can resist? What if it's the wrong tribe."

"No, it's the right tribe." the man replied he kicked away the sand covering the lump, revealing a decaying corpse. "I recognize him, he was a part of some of the earlier attacks, specifically the cartographer ambush," he said, pointing his scroll camera at the body.

"Hmmm… he lived long enough to get into some rough spots, but if I had to guess he probably died from that wound under his neck, but his wounds aren't consistent with the other bodies in the wreckage."

"Definitely a bandit, his clothing doesn't match the merchant's travel gear at all, plus look here." he used a knife to tap a spot below the gaping wound that had ended the man's life, the knife made a dinging sound as it hit something metallic

"Huh, poor bastard, if he had taken that hit an inch lower he'd still be breathing, you gonna try and take a look?"

The beaked man nodded as he patted down the corpse "Yeah, looks like his weapon was taken when he was buried." a growl of disapproval sounded over the scroll line before he continued "hopefully there's something else I can use…" he continued patting down the corpse and checking inside the pockets.

"Hmmm.. here we go! There's something hidden behind his chest piece, lemme just pry this up a bit annnd gotcha!." he withdrew a locket attached to a necklace from the inside pocket.

"What is it? Will it do the trick?"

The man popped open the locket, revealing that it contained a picture of a family, none of whom had any resemblance to the corpse. "Maybe… I can feel some karma coming off of it, but I'll have to dive in order to do a thorough check."

"Alright, but be careful Roland, don't let it overwhelm you. I'm not there to pull you out if there's any backlash"

"I should be fine, this level of Karma isn't nearly as bad as some of the artifacts I dealt with back home, but I'll keep the warning in mind." Roland quickly cleared a circle around himself as he sat cross-legged, yellow wisps of energy rising around him and pouring into the locket.

'Will you marry-' "No"

'I just went to see the doctor... I'm p-' "Not it"

'Ha ha ha! This is amazing, once we get this back to Shade we'll be lege-' "closer.."

'Amethyst… I'm sorry' "Almost.."

'Hey Citrine, I've been meaning to ask… where did you get that locket you're always carrying around' "Found him."

"Good, now just remember to take it slowly. There's no need to rush this one."

"As I said, I'll be fine."

'My first raid, some Huntsman out of Vacuo was carrying it when we attacked, kept it as a memento.' a gruff voice said

'Wow, you killed a Huntsman on your first raid? How did you manage that?" A younger voice asked

'Luck kid. It's the one thing you need if you want to live long in this profession, it wasn't talent or planning that won me that fight, but the fact that the wind blew sand into his eyes and not mine. Now keep your mouth shut. Sound travels far in these hills and if the caravan that's coming is tipped off it'll be your head swinging from by the oasis, not mine.'

"Found them. They're camped out at an oasis a few miles West of here."

"There's no oasis marked around here on the maps we have. Perfect place for them to set up camp. How are you doing after the dive though?"

"I'm still Roland, Citrine's dead and gone, like I said, the karma here is weaker than back home. Speaking of, how are the others doing? Can't join any of the calls here cause of the service." he asked as he trudged through the dunes towards his destination

"Yea I hear that's something they're looking into addressing when they shift this stuff back home, hopefully without too many add-ons. But to give you a small update I'm still down here in Menagerie, things aren't great here, to be honest. White Fang is tearing itself apart with infighting, the main players right now are the Albain Brothers for Tauros' faction, Khan for the 'main' faction, though it's looking more likely that they might lose that title, and the Belladonnas leading the moderates. Oh! And that Blake girl is alive like we thought, I've seen her around the Belladonna house a few times, a bit of a coward but I think she'll mature eventually."

"In other news, last I heard was that the boss is still back home and the lieutenant is staying in Vale for now keeping an eye on things there. Meanwhile, Lord Tartaglia is making inroads in Atlas they've managed to subvert some of the Fang resistance up there and are looking into increasing their control over the populace down in Mantle. Lieutenant is doing what he can to delay Ironwood's return as the officers that Atlas tapped to fill his position are doing more for our recruitment than any amount of food aid we could send."

"What about Martel?"

"? oh, you weren't there. He's got his own mission in Mistral…"


"Oh gods, oh gods, oh gods" The man ran through the rainy night, fleeing the distant sound of thunder. "Oh gods oh gods they're dead" he tripped over a hidden route and fell face first into a muddy puddle with a massive crash. He lay still for a moment, His pulse was racing and his body was in agony from the wounds he had received in the first attack. As he pushed himself up again he listened for any signs that he had been heard, any noises of pursuit. Nothing. Not a single sound in the surrounding forest.

The man took off running again towards a nearby ruined house.

It could be anywhere, it had come out of nowhere, he didn't know what had lured it, he didn't even know what it was. All he knew is that it was coming and that it had killed the others, so all that he had left was to run.

He gasped for breath as he hid in the closet of a ruined bedroom, he was safe here, it couldn't possibly know where he wa-

A flash of purple light shone from outside, and a moment later he heard the door to the house creak open and footsteps on the old rotten floorboards. He stifled a whimper as the steps went up and down the stairway and even at one point paused outside of the room he was in. finally after what seemed like hours but was in reality only a few minutes the steps faded away towards the front door and he let out the breath he had been holding.

He looked at his hands, still uncontrollably shaking from the adrenaline, sweat glistening in the purple light of the moon…wait…purple light?

He turned around slowly and came face to face with a purple eye staring at him through a crack in the wall.

His screams were drowned out by the thunderstorm


The tapping of knuckles against a door echoed down the empty hallway. Dad and drun…uncle Qrow had both told her that she shouldn't do this, but in her heart, she knew that she needed to.

Ruby pressed her head against the cold wood of the door as she listened for any sign of movement from the room locked away behind it, but no response came.

"Yang, please open the door. I just want to talk." still no answer.

"I'm going to be leaving soon, Uncle Qrow said that the only way we can get my eyes trained is if we head for Mistral to find Ozpin." silence.

Ruby sighed and banged her head on the door "Please Yang, I know it hurts, I miss her too. But she wouldn't want us to fold in on ourselves like this." this time she heard a bit of cloth shuffling but no other response.

"If we find Ozpin we might be able to figure out what happened with Jaune?" she tried not expecting it to be the one to finally get a response.

"Is his fault." a hoarse voice sounded from behind the door.

"What?" Ruby asked

"Is his fault" Yang said as she opened the door.

Ruby stared at her older sister in shock, she hadn't seen her in weeks and had barely any interaction besides a few exchanges of words when she left food in front of the door. And as she looked at her big sister she could only think one thing…Yang looked terrible.

She had obviously been crying, the red markings around her eyes proved it, but her eyes themselves were bone dry as a result of shedding so many tears. Bags hung under her eyes and stress seemed to have aged her by years, and her lips were dry and chaffed, her left arm was held in front of her in a meek posture that was entirely alien for the brash young woman that she had been just a few months ago, cradled in its palm was the stump of her right arm, the skin around the end red from constant rubbing. But the most eye-catching thing was her hair.

"It's Jaunes fault! He could have done something! You told me what he did on the rooftop, that dragon could destroy entire academies as if they were made of fucking paper and butchered it without a single damn bit of effort. And that Cinder bitch, she killed Ozpin! Fucking Ozpin! And he didn't even give her a second glance. HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN THERE." Yang slammed her right arm into the door frame cracking the wood but also opening some of the wounds again.

"Oh gods, Yang you're bleeding, quick! Where are the bandages!?" Ruby panicked as she began to flit around the room in bursts of rose petals pulling open drawers and checking on top of furniture.

Yang hissed as she sat down in a chair, trying to staunch the bleeding with her left hand. While Ruby quickly located the bandages in a cupboard near the door to Yang's bathroom, she brought them back and kneeled in front of her sister, wrapping them around her stump.

"He should have been there for us." Yang whimpered as fresh tears began to fall. "We had trained so much, gone through so much and Adam still tore through us like we were freshmen at Signal…he hated her Ruby" she put her head in her hands and sobbed "he hated her so much, I tried to save her…I put every single bit of power I had into it, and you know what he did?"

Yang took her head out of her hands and looked Ruby in the eyes "He used it to cut off my arm. He would have killed me as well, but then Blake…then Blake" she started to wail again and Ruby wrapped her in her arms trying to mimic the way her mother had used to hug her when she was upset.

"She tried to lead him away." Yang bawled "he had- he had already stabbed her in the stomach when I got there, she didn't have enough Aura to survive another hit like that but she tried anyway." the brawler sniffed "I thought I saw her you know? In the hospital. While I was in the ICU I thought I saw her standing over my bed…apologizing." she let out a sobbing chuckle "Why would she apologize? It wasn't her fault." she broke down into sobs again as Ruby cradled her in her hands and rubbed circles on her back.

"It's alright Yang, it's alright." she pressed her face into her sister's dirty blond hair, it smelled foul after going days without being washed, but at the moment she couldn't bring herself to care. "They're still finding people holed up in some of the old apartments and shelters, and there's even some students who were MIA but ended up having been transported to the other kingdoms in evacuation ships, there's still a chan-"

"No." Yang said "you don't know what that Tauro monster was like Ruby, and you remember what it was like that night…all the Grimm…he didn't even let us have a body to bury" Yang's voice cracked as her sobs broke through again.

"It's all Jaune's fault…he was our friend, he was my friend. But he hid all that power from us. He could have made a difference" she sobbed "he could have stopped them, he could have saved her, he. Should. Have. been. There." For a moment her voice had some of her old steel in it and her eyes flickered red before fading again. "He should have been there~" this time it was quieter, more like she had breathed out the words rather than spoken them. Ruby spent a few more minutes stroking Yang's back as the exhaustion from her tears caught up to her and the blonde fell asleep in her little sister's arms.

"I know. Yang. he should have been there." Ruby said as she gently placed Yang into her bed and drew the covers up over her. She looked down at her big sister, dabbing away a tear that was spilling down the side of her cheek. "When I find him, I'm going to make sure he has a good answer for why he wasn't. And then I'm going to punch him…for Blake."


Ruby shot awake as she felt someone shake her shoulder, only to see Ren crouched in the entrance of her tent.

"Ren? What time is it? Is it already time for my watch?" she started asking before he held a finger to his mouth and dropped his voice down

"Qrow's back, he found something nearby and wants us to wake the others.."

It wasn't the first time that something like this had happened on their journey, it was rare that they were able to get an uninterrupted night's sleep with the increased Grimm activity along the roads.

"What's going on? It shouldn't be my turn to pull lookout duty." Pyrrha yawned as Ruby shook her awake, the younger girl shushed her before she could continue.

"Uncle Qrow found something, and wants us to be on alert."

Pyrrha groaned as she unwrapped herself from her sleeping bag cocoon, grabbing Milo and Akuo from their respective places by her pillow and quickly strapping them to her armor. She wrinkled her nose a bit at the smell as it'd been quite some time since she'd last had the luxury of bathing or removing her armor.

The Mistralian mainland was not the safest place and The Battle of Vale had far-reaching ramifications, they'd passed through far too many ruined villages with screens still set up in bloodied town squares. Once they had come across one that was still somewhat working, but it was frozen on the scene of the aftermath of her fight with Penny. That had been a particularly difficult night due to almost constant assaults by Grimm.

Pyrrha drew aside the tent flap and stepped outside to see that Ruby had already started to pack up her tent while Ren was slowly but surely dragging Nora out of her own. Qrow was standing at the edge of the clearing they had set up in, keeping an eye on the surrounding woods. As she approached him she wound up stepping in a slightly muddy puddle, sending water flying over them both.

"Well..there goes my last pair of clean pants." He remarked as he waved away her profuse apologies.

They finished packing up their campsite a few minutes later as the first light of dawn broke through the remaining clouds from the previous night's storm. Once everything was in order they started through the woods, heading towards a column of smoke they could see poking out over the trees in the distance. While they walked Qrow laid out the situation for them.

"I decided to do some forward scouting last night, just to make sure that the way ahead was clear. As you know by this point a lot of the villages around here were destroyed in Grimm attacks, so usually there's a large Grimm presence in the area. Under normal circumstances, I would have expected us to come under almost constant attacks as we moved through these woods. However, I noticed that as we moved further and further into this region we encountered a significant drop in Grimm numbers."

He paused as they jumped over a small ravine, the plumes of smoke were very close now.

"Normally I'd chalk that up to traveling huntsman, or bandit activity considering we're in Mistral. But there's one problem with that assessment, the Nuckalevee. " Nora and Ren twitched and suddenly began to pay much more attention to his words.

"After it destroyed the villages it essentially claimed this entire region as its hunting ground, the Mistralian council did try to send a few expeditions to reclaim some of the lost territories but they lost contact with most of them, and the ones that did return…well that's beside the point. The main thing is, I've traveled through this area a few times after all that, though I never stayed here for long. Frankly, I wasn't planning on leading us down this route, but if our encounter in Oniyuri taught us anything it's that the main roads are being watched by the Queen's agents."

Pyrrha winced a bit at the memory of Oniyuri, they'd been attacked by a scorpion Faunus that Qrow had later explained was a wanted serial killer that had gone missing years ago. The attack had been unexpected, but it had quickly swung in their favor because the Faunus was demonstrably not ready to take on a full maiden and an elite huntsman at the same time.

They had him on the back foot, Pyrrha's flames having broken through his aura and engulfed his lower body. Qrow had been about to finish him off (much to the team's apprehension) when a swarm of Nevermore had suddenly descended on the ruined town. By the time they had managed to clear out the flock, the Faunus had disappeared leaving behind his distinctive wrist blades.

Pyrrha was brought out of reminiscences as Qrow kept on talking.

"When I noticed the Grimm activity had dropped well below what I'm used to I got suspicious. So, last night I decided to scout ahead a little on my own, to try and get some more information on the sudden lack of Grimm. I wasn't able to find much due to the storm, but I came across a bandit camp..well actually I came across several…this one's the closest"

They stepped out of the woods… and into a horror scene. A rough palisade wall had been constructed with rudimentary defenses lined up along the base to ward off any enterprising Grimm. It now lay broken upon the ground, splintered logs torn asunder from their bindings and scattered through the field. An old dirt path led through the patchwork gates, it looked as if some massive beast gouged out the earth that it was made out of, with deep craters dotting its course. But what drew their eye the most were the bodies…they were everywhere in the field, it seemed like no matter where they looked the young hunters would see human remains of some sort...

Qrow gave them a moment to take in the scene, a necessary reminder of the world they lived in and the situations they would have to deal with in their professions. But after that moment passed he pressed them on again as they went about one of the more unglamorous aspects of said profession.

It was simple really, they were running low on supplies due to their detour through the back woods. They needed to stock up a bit and here was an abandoned bandit camp that could fulfill all of their needs. Of course, actions that were taken for granted by a veteran huntsman like Qrow were not so easily swallowed by students that were yet to even enter their second year. For all that they had experienced already, for all the power that some of them had. In the end, they were still barely out of their freshman year and wholly unprepared for these measures...

They passed through the field picking their steps carefully to avoid tripping over the numerous corpses. For the most part Ruby and Nora tried to look everywhere but the ground, though unfortunately the more they looked around the more bodies they spotted, draped over walls, slumped over tables…by the time they had entered the main part of the camp they were keeping their eyes firmly on the sky.

Ren continued stoically, the world keeping the greyscale tint that had become the norm for him over the last few months. a little behind him, Pyrrha grit her teeth and marched forward putting up a tough front.

Meanwhile, Qrow was darting back and forth between the rows of tents and small sheds that made up the camp, drawing on his experience growing up in similar camps to quickly secure a large burlap sack which he proceeded to fill with whatever essential supplies he could scrounge up. By the time they had passed through the gates on the other side of the camp the sack was almost bursting and he had divided up smaller packs amongst his students.

Around a half hour later Qrow finally decided it was time for a small rest as they settled down in a small group of rocks near the path. He divided up some rations among the team, though Ruby and Nora just played with theirs, unable to muster up any appetite after the scene they'd just walked through. Pyrrha got through about half of hers before she had to stop, while Ren and Qrow finished theirs before Qrow spoke.

"We're going to need to be more alert from now on, we've been having it easy due to the lack of Grimm attacks recently, but from now on two of you will be sharing shifts as lookouts. Whatever ransacked that Bandit camp it wasn't any Grimm. I'm sure some of you noticed?"

Ren, the only one who'd managed to bear looking at the bodies for any tangible amount of time responded. "There was a large amount that didn't have any wounds on them, additionally though the damage was widespread it didn't resemble the kind of destruction a Grimm attack would inflict."

Qrow nodded "Correct, but you missed another point of intel, nothing was taken from their supplies. If another bandit tribe had done this they'd have cleaned them out of any supplies they had before leaving, the fact that I was able to scrounge up this much tells me that whoever attacked that fort wasn't interested in their supplies. But on the subject of a Grimm attack, I feel like we should address the Goliath in the room. Ren, Nora? you recognize the road we're on don't you?"

Ren glanced at a slightly shaking Nora before nodding again.

"Right. I'm telling you now that I've read your files and I know your history with Kuroyuri. And I'm sure by now you've also picked up on some of the signs I've seen, something isn't right here. The Nuckelavee would never let bandits set up a camp like that in its territory, yet none of the destruction I've seen has matched it at all. Something has happened, and whatever it is the place we're most likely to find answers is Kuroyuri. Will you be able to handle that?"

This time it was Nora who opened her mouth to answer before she was stopped by a hand on her own. She looked over to meet Ren's gaze his eyes shifting slowly from grey to a pale pink as he squeezed her hand. Nora slowly swallowed before she turned back to face Qrow again with her response. "Yes"


"...due to the large number that moved in after I cleared out the Grimm in the area. But I did find it in the end."

"Good work Martel. I'll look into getting you reassigned once you've completed you've finished."

"Has there been news from Teyvat?"

"We'll probably get our recall order soon, from the missives I've received it looks like Lord Tartaglia will be making his move soon. For now, I'd advise you to wait in place and keep an ear to the ground."

"Acknowledged."

As the call ended Martel stood up with a quick stretch as he headed over to an old cabinet he had repurposed. Drawing out a loaf of bread he set it on a table, he pulled out a piece quickly toasting it with a burst of electro energy before he spread some preserves on it. Just as he was lifting it to take a bite a loud crash and the sound of something collapsing echoed throughout the ruined town. He paused for a moment before slowly lowering down the piece of toast and blinking away in a flash of purple light.


Qrow stared at his leg in disappointment, before drifting his gaze over to the piece of wood that he had accidentally kicked, setting off a chain reaction that had resulted in one of the old homes falling in on itself.

"Damned semblance."

As they walked through the empty village they immediately noticed something was off, and it didn't take long for them to figure out what it was. There was a steady deep hum in the air and every house they passed seemed to have its lights working in some fashion or another. Something that should have been impossible in a village that had been abandoned for as long as Kuroyuri.

"Huh..what are you doing here…I thought it was just some bandits at first, but I never expected to find this. You're a fair bit off of your original route aren't you.." The figure shook his head as lightning shrouded his form "I'll have to call him back now to give him an update… but this also brings a pretty good opportunity. I've wanted to test myself against you guys for a while, shame that there's 3 missing. But no worries." in a flash of lightning he was in the middle of them "I'll be gentle"

"SCATTE-" before Qrow could finish he and the rest of the team were blasted back by a wave of electricity. Qrow twisted in mid-air to try and arrest his momentum by driving Harbinger into the ground, only for lightning to flash from behind him

"Not happening" The enemy stated as he grabbed the back of Qrow's neck and slammed his face down into his sword following up with a knee to the stomach before grabbing the front of his neck and throwing the Huntsman through the wall of an old house. He then spun around just in time to catch Crescent Rose's blade on his knife, matching gazes with Ruby, before the fight began in earnest.

"Well, well. Well. Ruby Rose. I've heard a lot about you, the 'Prodigy of Beacon.'"

Over her shoulder, he quickly assessed the positions of the other members of her team. Pyrrha and Ren were moving to try and take up covering positions while Nora was digging herself out of the rubble she'd been thrown into. Ruby disengaged using a shot from her scythe to try and gain some distance but the Agent saw through the move and closed in while parrying the blows from her scythe. Continuing his one-sided conversation all the while.

"They called me a prodigy too at one point, it's always interesting when I meet another with the moniker, though frankly, I'm not too impressed"

At one point she threw out a powerful downward swing, causing her body to bend forward as Crescent Rose embedded itself in the ground. The Agent managed to dodge the blow, but it left an opening for Pyrrha and Ren to start sending shots at him while Ruby was below the line of fire. Realizing this Martel delivered an electro-infused kick into the side of Crescent Rose, shocking Ruby through her aura on forcing her to let go. giving Martel the opportunity he needed to grab her and spin her around to absorb the incoming fire. Ren and Pyrrha could only watch helplessly as their shots hit their teammate several times, straining her aura.

Once the gunfire ceased Martel kept talking as if he'd never been interrupted "it's not your fault to be fair, it's more a result of the utterly shameful priorities of your teachers. I can understand not wanting to train someone into the ground too early, but I'd say that you could easily be twice as strong as you are now if you just had a slightly different training regimen. All that can be excused, however, but what can't be excused is the fact that you've barely tapped into your innate magical abilities at all. It's simply inexcusable that no one walked you through it before."

"WOULD…hah…YOU….hah…JUST SHUT UP"

Martel rose an eyebrow as he moved the dangling Ruby slightly to the side (still keeping her firmly placed between him and Pyrrha and Ren. "I see you managed to dig yourself out… finally" he deadpanned as he looked at the panting Nora, streaks of lightning still flashing over her body causing her to twitch as she glared at him.

Though her body had been able to process some of his attacks thanks to her semblance, the innate differences between the divine nature of the lightning conjured from a Delusion compared to more natural sources had won out in the end and overpowered her absorption. This had resulted in her being knocked out of the first stages of the battle as her semblance went overdrive in trying to process the surge of power that was wrecking her body and aura.

She let out a growl as she hefted Magnhild over her shoulder -forgoing its grenade launcher form in favor of the standard hammer shape- and began to charge at him.

Martel quickly gauged her pace and scanned over the positions of the two long-ranged hunters. Noting an opportunity near Ren's location he quickly put his plan into action. With a simple flex of his power, he shocked the dazed Ruby, charging her full of Electro energy before punting her into the charging Nora like a makeshift grenade. Nora's eyes widened as she changed her hammer blow into an open-armed catch out of reflex, and caught the full brunt of the Electro energy head-on as it transferred into her like a lightning rod

Using the chaos he had caused from this move Martel flipped out one of his knives, spinning and throwing it down towards Ren's location. The quiet boy was hemmed in on one side by an old house but managed to jump out of the way, landing in a puddle as the knife embedded itself in an old gutter spout on the wall.

As Ren landed though, he found that he was unable to control himself as his body started to spasm and he toppled down. Through the constant shocks, he realized that the spout that the knife had embedded itself into was linked to the puddle he was now lying in. in fact, it was the origin point as a steady stream of water from last night's rain was pouring right into the puddle he was now lying in.

For a few seconds, he found himself in constant pain as the electricity coursed through the water he was lying in, he struggled to breathe as his muscles contractor in on themselves. thankfully he was saved when the knife was yanked out of the wall by Pyrrha using her semblance from across the courtyard. The maiden's brow was creased in concentration though as she found it unusually hard to control the electrified knife and she had only just barely deposited it a safe distance from Ren when her senses screamed at her as a heavy impact slammed into her head jerking it to the side and dealing some heavy aura damage.

Luckily she was able to draw on her tournament history to shrug off the hit in time to spin around and raise Akuo in a defensive stance that was just in time to block another attack. She glanced over the rim of her shield to get info on what he was hitting her with, only for her heart to skip a beat as she saw Martel calmly ejecting a shell from Crescent Rose's sniper form. To his side, Ruby's ammo pack lay spilled out on the ground, and he plucked shell after shell from it as he took pot shots at Pyrrha.

As another shot impacted against the increasingly dented Akuo, Martel slotted in an earth dust pellet cartridge and raised the rifle again, only to pause for a brief moment before spinning and firing off the shot directly into the chest of an onrushing Nora as she lept out him with Magnhild ready for a powerful overhead blow, blasting the ginger girl back with the force of the magical ammunition.

The moment of distraction that she created allowed Pyrrha to reach out and try to grasp Crescent Rose with her semblance to get it away from him. A process she'd done multiple times during spars at Beacon to exploit Ruby's weakness at hand to hand.

She was therefore understandably shocked when she found that she couldn't exert control over the weapon, a feeling that she had only felt before when she had tried to use her semblance on metal that was already being attracted to another magnet. Suddenly the pieces slotted into place as she realized why she had been having trouble removing the knife from the gutter earlier, somehow the man they were fighting had figured out how to use his electricity to control the magnetic properties of weapons. A feat that had previously only been theorized by Semblance researchers due to the lack of Electrokinesis semblances.

She wasn't given much time to ruminate over this new realization as Ruby of all people had closed with the man and begun engaging his hand to hand as she tried to get her weapon back. The young girl had improved her close combat skills considerably during her time at Beacon (partially due to her incredible frustration when sparring against Pyrrha, due to obvious reasons) and they nowhere near resembling the…state of existence they had been in before she had begun attending the academy. So when attempts at putting the fight into words only brought up monikers such as 'pathetic' or 'pitiful' something was wrong. But Pyrrha couldn't help but call to mind those terms as she witnessed her teammate's utter dismantling at the hands of their opponent, especially when he began talking again.

"Your guard is down." whack! "That right hook is too telegraphed" slam! "I honestly thought you'd be better than this by now, did you learn nothing from your experiences during the Battle of Beacon?" he asked as he parried another blow with her scythe as spun it around behind his back, and swapped it into his left hand to deliver a hefty blow to her head, jarring her and creating an opening for him to attempt to grapple her with his free hand only to grasp nothing but a handful of rose petals as her semblance activated out of reflex. Martel cocked his head at the sudden cloud of rose petals surrounding his arm, then let out a sharp laugh and channeled Electro energy into the limb before plunging it into the cloud eliciting a scream from the young prodigy as she suddenly reformed with her neck held in his right fist.

He stared at her for a little bit as she dangled in the air.

"You truly have earned the title of prodigy, if I hadn't known about that technique beforehand then I would have been caught utterly off guard… I wonder, what is your ambition in life Ruby Rose? Is it one that the gods themselves would take an interest in? Or do you also fail to measure up to their standards?"

She tried speaking, but the hand around her throat prevented it, and the words come out garbled. Intrigued, Martel brought her closer to his ear and relaxed his grip a little. "What was that?"

"Your guard is down." there was a beat, a moment when Martel's brain tried to catch up with his ears as he processed what he had just heard before he snapped into action dropping the girl and flicking a knife into his hand from up his sleeve as he spun around with a preemptive slice only to come face to face with the oncoming blade of Akuo. Predicting his reaction, Pyrrha had lept into the air as she closed in on him going for a high slash as his counter swing whiffed a few feet beneath her, exactly where she would have been if she had not leaped beforehand she noted.

There was a brief moment where Pyrrha's blow made contact and it felt like the world paused, Pyrrha saw that somehow his reflexes had been quick enough that he was already in a ducking motion when her blow landed, causing it to hit his mask on his forehead rather than his main facial area like she had intended. And then it was over, as Pyrrha continued onwards before landing.

Taking a moment to regain her balance after coming down from the arc of her jump, she spun Akuo back into a ready position, as she readjusted her grip, however, she noticed something off about her weapon. Something warm was dripping from her blade and falling onto her hand. Confused, she glanced down at her hand only to freeze in disbelief. It couldn't be…could it? She brought her hand up along her spearpoint, only for it came away red. Her mind reeled as she tried to come to terms with the impossible, but…nothing else made sense now that she thought about it, the power behind his blows, the fact that he didn't seem to care about firing off excessively powerful attacks…The way he had used Ruby to block their shots earlier in the fight instead of tanking them the way a normal aura user would. There was no other explanation.

She jumped back and shifted Akuo into rifle form, thankfully nothing jammed this time. "Everyone be careful!" she shouted to her teammates who had started to approach when they saw the enemy go down.

"He's bleeding! He doesn't have any aura!" She shouted only to receive puzzled stares in return.

"Does that mean we won?" Nora questioned, only to be shut down as Pyrrha spoke again.

"No, you don't understand! It's not that we broke it, he's never had it! It's not aura!" She trailed off as she noticed their enemy had fallen into a kneeling position while she was distracted, both halves of his mask clutched in his hands. They could see his face now, framed by purple hair and marred by a red jagged cut along his nose and forehead, a pair of purple eyes shone from behind the stray strands of hair, the power coursing through them causing them to shine in purple light...

And once again Pyrrha froze in shock and recognition as a memory flashed through her mind, of a time when she had been called out of Beacon unexpectedly and had run into Jaune meeting with a small group of men at a cafe she had stopped by. But in the present day, her mouth had yet to catch up with her mind and so finished what she had been saying before

"He's been using magic the whole time…"

He let the broken mask fall from his hands as he continued to glare at her, now that Pyrrha was able to see his eyes she was able to read his mood a little bit better. There was anger in that gaze certainly, even a little bit of hatred. But to her surprise, the most prevalent emotion she could see was…disappointment? She was confused as to why before she got her answer as he held out his hand to the side and a massive warhammer formed in a shower of gold. A split second later he was gone in a flash of light, and Pyrrha was being sent smashing through the walls of one of the houses that lined the street.

Good god this chapter was kicking my ass for the longest time, whenever I planned to work on it or set aside time to put words in I would inevitable start doing something else cause life's a bitch. Thankfully managed to finish it in the end though, even if it did take me like 5 months. In other news, part of the reason I took so long to work on this was because I was writing some other fics in the background which should be set to publish soon if you like Warhammer Fantasy crossovers, or Pokemon you might be interested.

Also in the time since last chapter I have managed to secure Yelan, Kazuha and Zhongli…don't ask me about the methods I used through, I still have flashbacks to when me and Azazyel0714 (author of A Hunter in Teyvat) were in a vc on the SGO (Shiro's Gaming Omniverse) Discord Server streaming our pulls and we both lost Zhongli pity to Qiqi…I think I have her C4 at this point, and I'm increasingly worried that I won't be able to snag Ganyu in the short time she has left.

To be honestly, I'm not quite fully pleased with how this chapter turned out in the end, sure there's parts that I like, but I know I can do better, I just need to find my stride I guess. Anyway as an apology for the lateness here's three Omakes I decided to shunt in at the end here. The first one's fully canon.

The Battle. Qrow's POV:

Qrow dazed from the blows to his head (and from being slammed into his own sword no less!) was unable to stop himself from being hurled bodily into the old house. Crashing into what used to be a mantle piece his head slammed back against the side of the wall, causing vibrations that unbalanced the mantle above him and sent various old vases bouncing off of his head adding to the already severe damage to his aura. Just as he managed to regain his clarity after the severe beating he was distracted by a groaning creek from above him. Looking up at the the old rafters in a moment of grim realization all he could manage was a brief "Oh no" before they collapsed and pinned him to the ground.

All in all it was quite the unfortunate turn of events.

Author's Note:While researching this chapter I looked at pictures of Salem's castle and I am disappointed. Salem's chair is on the same level as all the other chairs at the table, which IMO doesn't mesh with her character at all. The following excerpt is something that I had written and originally planned on including in the chapter but decided not to due to feeling that it wasn't really living up to my expectations (I was honestly just having a bit too hard a time structuring it properly) it's mostly canon to the story in how I think Salem views the world and my additions to her backstory


Salem, was displeased. Quite displeased in fact. Though she would hesitate to call what she was feeling anger she did feel that it was closing in on that point. Of course, none of it showed on her face, it wouldn't do to let her inner feelings show when there were others present. The only sign of her current mood was her finger tapping on the arm of her throne. Openly venting her frustrations would wait until later, when she was secluded within the inner chambers of Evernight.

She pondered why she was even out here watching her slaves bicker when she could be in one of the castle's many libraries, reading through tomes that were older than even her grandfather's grandfather. There were powerful tomes locked within these dusty halls, writings of mages that were legends back when the world was whole. After the gods had fled, she drifted purposelessly through the empty world passing through the empty ruins of great bastions of sorcerous knowledge, often she would come across arcane objects that still lay abandoned where their masters had left them before the gods had wiped out humanity.

But even then these objects were still layered with the protective enchantments that their owners had placed upon them, enchantments that would take extraordinary amounts of time to break. Luckily, time had been something she had in abundance and slowly but surely she broke through and claimed most of the items that had been left behind by her predecessors. By the time that she had taken her place as a god she had amassed the greatest collection of mystic texts that the world had ever seen, and after Ozma had murdered their daughters she had grown that collection even further as the early stages of their war ramped up.

Salem valued her library above anything else, and guarded it jealously, it was not uncommon for her to abruptly conclude the service of some of her underlings who happened to stumble across it without invitation. It was the proudest piece of her collection, trumping even her menagerie of Grimm hybrids, and while desperate souls willing to join her cause were easily replaceable, the items contained within her library were not. And if the remaining members had any doubts, the presence of some new Grimm monstrosity looming by the side of her throne silenced them before they could be spoken

Throughout the ages, she had relied on the library in order to find solutions to Ozma's feeble attempts to thwart her plans. The combined knowledge of even a fraction of the old world was more than enough to crush any obstacle in her path… which is why she was most displeased at the moment because for the first time in thousands of years her library had failed to grant her the information she sought. It was unthinkable, infuriating even…worrying…terrifying, a small part of her whispered. Yes, deep down, though she tried to hide it Salem was terrified because of what this event meant.

Somehow, someway, someone in Remnant had gained access to magic. Powerful magic at that, if the corrupted security footage of the battle on top of Beacon tower told her anything. And that scared her, because for all that she propped herself up now there was a time when she had been powerless in the face of magic wielders far greater than she or Ozma had ever been. It had been no small miracle that she had even managed to convince so many to join in her rebellion in the first place, let alone silence the one's who refused.

Even now, there were some books that she still wasn't able to break into. Tomes whose masters had weaved such intricate spells into their bindings that even after thousands of years she was still no closer to understanding their secrets. Let alone the more esoteric magical schools whose hidden redoubts she had never been able to discover despite knowing they had to be out there somewhere. The times when she had broken into some dusty old ruin buried in the Vacuon sands or some other wasteland only to discover that that halls had been somehow picked clean before she got there. She would have suspected Ozpin, but if he had stolen them then surely he would have used some of the techniques in their battles by now.

So the fact that a man of all things was able to kill a maiden and a powerful ancient Grimm in single combat -and easily at that- was something that drove a small chill of fear into the blackened dead heart of Salem. She feared, for she did not know what spells did he know? What others was he keeping lying in wait for a more opportune time? What was that transformation he did? If there was one thing Salem feared it was the unknown, because every matter had an antimatter, every spell a counterspell, every curse…a countercurse…even hers. And if the boy by some miracle held just the spell that could counter her, then he was not something she could allow to exist.

Also because I feel like it have another Omake this one decidedly not canon:

Jaune watched Mercury and Yang go back and forth from his seat in the crowd, his eyes tinged a cold blue as he viewed the bout on a deeper level than anyone else in the audience. It was a habit he had picked up back while watching bouts in some of the arenas back home, it was an invaluable tool when viewing fights and when participating in them himself, especially when visions or delusions were brought into the mix.

But here it was not quite as helpful save for the odd occasion, such as when he made the connection between Cinder and the dying girl below the academy due to him seeing the thread of magic that bound the two. It also helped him see the illusion that Emerald was crafting off to the sidelines, no doubt prepping for some larger plot that was underway, but as long as it didn't affect him or threaten the lives of his subordinates (subcounciously he filed the comrades he had made at Beacon under that designation)

Normally such a bout would at least be somewhat interesting, no matter how lacking the skill was when compared to the matches back home. But it was obvious that the show being put on for the contestants today was a farce. Mercury was clearly much more skilled than Yang was, despite the blond's somewhat passable skill at close combat. Of course, Mercury's experience was obviously of a more life threatening variety when compared to Yang who was more used to spars in controlled environments and whose experience in serious combat was mostly restricted to fighting against Grimm and the odd clashes against the White Fang. and even those weren't the most dangerous situations, due to the fact that aside from a few outliers the main bulk of the White Fang's chaff lacked the protective shield of Aura.

Her opponent was the opposite, Jaune could tell due to his own training and his experience in training others. Many of Mercury's movements were slightly overexagerrated and several times Jaune had seen him narrowly prevent himself from landing crippling blows out of reflex as Yang pressed her attacks. Oh he was selling it well enough, or at least enough to fool even the trained huntsmen watching the fight, but if Jaune was only as observant as an average huntsman then he would have died long ago or been compelled to resign his position.

The only reason that Jaune was still attending the match was due to the fact that Yang was included in the short list of people that he had grown attached to at Beacon. It was a quirk of his personality that carried over from the boy that he was before he fell into the Abyss, and was still present despite the harsh environments he had matured in. Perhaps that was why he was able to quickly fit into the role he played during his time at Beacon, the personality of a backwoods boy who just wanted to be a hero, was not dissimilar to his goals when he had joined the Fatui. The difference being that he had achieved his hero status, to some extent. It was unquestionable that as a Harbinger (and one of the more reasonable ones if one asked the soldiers{though considering his competition that wasn't much}) he was the example to many in Snezhnaya, he was the one that parents would hold up to their children as the premier role model…sometimes…Capitano actually held the top spot in that regard and it was by a long shot.

Jaune had been drifting further and further into his thoughts as the match went on, drawing some confused glances from his teammates when they noticed his inattentiveness. But what finally drew him out was not the hush in the crowd as the match drew to a close, nor was it Emerald finally triggering her illusion in an attempt to entrap Yang. Instead it was a voice on the wind.

"Before we get ahead of ourselves, we need to be ready for an even worse scenario. Imagine if this door isn't the way to the innermost depths of the Domain... but just another mechanism"

Jaune shot up in his seat, startling Ruby and the others sitting near him with the sudden movement, he ignored their questions as he shifted his eyes back and forth scanning the arena with his elemental sight. Unbeknownst to him the amount of magical energy he was pouring into his eyes was causing them to visibly glow an icy blue and the air around him turned cold as he subconsciously tapped into his vision's energy. The turn of events shocked the members of team RWBY and JNPR sitting around him as their breath fogged up in the suddenly cold air.

"...think this gives us an opportunity. If the space creates phenomena meant to deceive us based on our imaginations, then we have to keep imagining, Traveler."

There it was again… a voice on the wind, but this time it wasn't one he knew as well, though it did send a tingle of familiarity down his spine that he couldn't place. But his eyes were now picking up on a growing buildup of magical energy over the center of the arena, it wasn't visible to the naked eye yet but something was forming using the energy from Emerald's widescale illusion as a catalyst.

"Can you feel that? Let me see... I think it's here."

Jaune barely noticed that Ruby stopped asking him why his eyes were glowing, but he did hear her ask "Does anybody else hear a weird voice all of a sudden?"

The other members of their respective teams took their eyes off him to look at Ruby (except Weiss who kept up her suspicious stare)

"Ohhh don't jinx it!"

"Hehe, I'm just exploring the what-ifs. There's no guarantee that it won't happen, right?"

This time the other members of the teams reacted as they too heard the voices, though this time Jaune's outward reaction was slightly more muted inside he was reeling slightly from the shock of hearing Ajax's voice when he was supposed to be over a world away.

Suddenly the energy above the two fighters turned turbulent and cracks started to appear in midair that were visible even to those not graced with the ability and the voices were growing more and more audible.

"The chaotic space! It's shifting! Conqueror of Demons be careful it's not safe to try and cross over right now!"

"Yanfei watch out!"

"Wha!?"

"Well, if the Domain does rearrange itself again, you should watch your backs and try and stick together."

"And you'll be off on another solo combat mission, I assume?

"Oh, don't worry about me 'll be making the most of it!"

The sound of breaking glass tore through the air as all hell broke loose. The rift above the fighters fully manifested, distracting Mercury from the charging Yang who was still under the effect of Emerald's illusion. Overhead the sky took on a shardlike shape as if something had smashed through a window pane while numerous dark gaps in space popped open around the arena. The spacial rift in the air started spitting out numerous pieces of broken up earth, he heard someone gasp from beside him when a horned girl dressed in what Jaune recognized as a customized version of a Liyue barrister's outfit fell from the rift Behind her another form broke through the closing rupture in the air, a boy, seemingly around the age of an average beacon student as jumping from rock to rock midair in bolts of electro energy as he closed in on the falling girl.

Once he reached her he grabbed her in both arms before turning and holding out one hand towards the rapidly approaching arena floor. The winds whipped up and an anemo tornado formed underneath them, slowing their descent until he was able to safely put the girl on her own (slightly shaken) feet.

But Jaune's shock at seeing someone with the ability multiple elements was overshadowed by his rising dread on witnessing the other events happening in the arena. Because while all the action was happening overhead, Ajax had strolled out of one of the more stable portals accompanied by a strange looking girl and a floating paper doll…and the elder Harbinger distracted by the ongoing conversation with his companions had walked straight into the path of Yang's oncoming fist.