Ruby explored a couple more rooms after leaving the one Ren was in, and though she had found plenty of spare candles for awhile, she hadn't found any more symbols yet. She was starting to wonder if this floor was like the previous, where she'd needed two but only one existed on that floor. The girl was starting to run out of ideas when she heard a familiar crying, realizing Pyrrha's painting was nearby. With a little internal debate over whether or not she could handle the painting without dying this time, she took off in the direction it was coming from.
This time when she found the right room, there was no Ren to stop her from going inside. She pushed open the door slowly, and kept her eyes glued to the floor as she walked inside. This room seemed similar to the last one the painting had been in, the painting was even directly opposite the door. Ruby didn't let her gaze wander to study the room, instead she kept walking to the painting until she stood directly in front of it, still refusing to look at it.
Now that she was here she wondered for a moment what to do, but the idea to look behind the painting crossed her mind and she glanced at the edge of the frame, wondering just how to do that. She also briefly wondered if the painting could bite.
Finally, she decided to just close her eyes to make sure she didn't look at it, and reached out to pull it off of the wall. It came down into her hands without protest like any normal painting would, and she heard something fall from behind it and clatter on the floor. Noting that it sounded like a thin disk of metal, Ruby smirked to herself and carefully set the painting aside, making sure it was facing the wall before opening her eyes. She looked down at the floor, and saw the golden arcs of Jaune's symbol glinting in the light.
She picked up the symbol and looked at it for a moment. Pretty creative for it to be hidden behind the painting you can't look at. Then, she placed it on her belt alongside Blake's black Belladonna flower and Ren's magenta lotus.
Having found what she needed in that room, Ruby continued on her way. Her steady footsteps echoed around the hall faintly as she walked, and she wondered for a moment if Yang was anywhere nearby. The blonde didn't seem to be within earshot at the moment, though, so for now Ruby decided not to worry about her. She did, however, decide to worry about the ghostly figure that just appeared at the end of the hall.
It was out of the range of her candle, but Ruby could just make out the shape of someone there, wobbling slightly as if they were having troubling holding their balance properly. Ruby squinted, trying to get a better look at who it might be, but before she could really tell, a loud scream ripped through the air from them and they dashed down the hall toward her.
She recognized it as a ghostly image of Nora, but either she was moving too fast for her to see it or Nora just didn't have a face. Before she could really react or move out of the way, Nora ran past her and brushed against her side before vanishing into the darkness again, and Ruby suddenly collapsed as her leg buckled beneath her. Looking down, she noticed a large gash left in her thigh, and it was bleeding heavily. Ouch, did Nora do this? Ren was right, she is dangerous. I didn't even feel it happen. Ruby pulled herself over to the wall so she could lean against it, hoping a few minutes of rest would allow her to stand again. If she wasn't able to walk, she was definitely in trouble.
She noticed she'd accidentally dropped her candle, since now it sat a few feet away on the opposite side of the hall, leaving her just outside of its light. She was about to move to retrieve it when she heard the grating noise.
The girl froze, listening carefully as Yang grew closer, until finally reaching this hall and turning to walk down it toward Ruby. Nora must have attracted her with that scream. Maybe that's partially why she's as dangerous as Ren said. She watched Yang slowly step into the light of the candle, and somehow managed to not gasp at the sight of the blonde.
This time, Yang wasn't just wearing her normal outfit covered in blood. This time, she had multiple dirty, blood-covered bandages covering many different parts of her body. Her entire chest and stomach were wrapped entirely, as was her left arm, which was hanging limply as if she couldn't move it anymore. Her right leg was also bandaged, but those had come loose and were trailing on the floor behind her, and her head was wrapped up as well, covering her left eye. A thin line of blood dripped from her mouth, and Ruby noticed her hair was slightly shorter, looking rather torn and choppy at the ends.
How Ruby managed to not gasp or squeak, she herself didn't know. Somehow she was able to stay silent as the battered blonde passed by her, vanishing down the hall in the direction Nora had gone. As eerie as the sight of Yang covered in those bandages was, Ruby was positive she'd rather not see her without them. But for now, she was just glad she hadn't been spotted.
Ruby attempted to stand, and found her leg could support most of her weight now. Moving into the range of the candlelight, she noticed it had been carefully bandaged, and stared down in blank confusion. Wat. She blinked. When did… Who… How did it get bandaged?! Okay that's it I'm officially going nuts. Remembering her previous injury from Weiss, she checked her sides and those, too, had been mysteriously taken care of. She hadn't even noticed before that they'd stopped hurting.
Regardless of how her injuries ended up being treated, she decided to stop questioning it and just be glad it enabled her to keep going. With that in mind, she picked up her candle and continued down the hall, away from Yang and Nora.
By the time she reached the end of the hall, her leg was starting to hurt again from being used, but she chose to ignore it. She couldn't hang around in one place forever, she needed to keep moving. Seeing a door down the hall to her right, Ruby limped over and pushed it open, peeking into the relatively bare room. There weren't any monsters in here, but the glinting on the table in the middle of the room immediately caught her eye, and she moved to look at it.
Pyrrha's red spear and shield symbol sat peacefully in its spot on the table, and Ruby picked it up. Well, at least now I won't have to deal with the painting anymore. Placing it on her belt beside Jaune's, she noted that she now had four in total again. Hopefully this time she wouldn't die before she got the fifth one.
She turned and left the room, going back into the hall yet again. Continuing on her way, boot dragging slightly against the stone floor due to her limp, Ruby kept a close eye ahead of her for any monsters. It seemed empty, though, giving her an eerie feeling of being completely and utterly alone. She walked on in silence for a few more minutes, or maybe an hour, she couldn't tell. But eventually, when a familiar laughter started echoing toward her down the hall, Ruby wished she was alone.
Again, Ruby couldn't control her own actions as she began to follow the sound to another door, and pushed it open. The first thing she noticed was that light bled into the hall, making her realize Dark Ruby was in the ladder room. Then she noticed the dark version of herself was stabbing someone again, over and over with Ren's corrupted guns.
This time it was Jaune.
Dark Ruby seemed to grow bored of her little game of seeing how much red she could splatter all over the room, and reached down to pick up Jaune's sword. Ruby watched as the sword became enveloped in that same twisting blackness when her dark counterpart touched it, and cringed slightly at the poor weapon's fate.
"Oh hellooooo Ruby, nice to see you again." Ruby's eyes snapped back up to Dark Ruby's face, seeing that she was now watching her. "I didn't get to kill you before, your damn friend Ren dragged me off. When I made him let go I did find Yang, though. She put up a good fight, but I know she's in worse shape than meeeee right now. Won't be long before I have your beloved scythe, Ruby."
"So you're the reason Yang was bandaged up." Ruby narrowed her eyes at the blood covered girl.
"Yep! That was aaaaaaaaaaaall meeeeeeeee!" She spun around the room as she sang those two words. "Maybe I can actually kill her next time with this sword. But regardless of that, right noooow… Ruuuuuby's neeeeeext!"
And then Dark Ruby lunged toward her, black rose petals flying into the air again as she aimed the corrupted sword right toward Ruby's chest. She didn't have time to try and dodge, since Dark Ruby had her Semblance, but a fuzzy and distorted image of Jaune appeared between them. He caught the dark blade in his hand, effectively stopping her.
"Awwww, not again!" Dark Ruby whined, while Jaune glanced back to give Ruby a reassuring look.
"It's okay Ruby, we've got your back." Then he grabbed Dark Ruby and the two appeared to be violently expelled from the room, the golden arcs symbol on Ruby's belt glowing angrily as it happened.
Ruby blinked. The symbols ward off the monsters, banning them from coming near me. He just broke that rule and forced his way here anyway to save me. I guess since he was holding onto Dark Ruby, it forced her away too once he stopped fighting to be near. Judging from what the other girl had said, that's what happened last time, too, except Ren had been the one to break the rule and come save her.
So first I broke a rule by coming back after death. Now, this place is trying even harder to get me killed, and the monsters have started breaking the rules too… What's going to happen when no one listens to this world's rules anymore?!