The Burning Beacon
6. Fan the Flames
Mirta's first foray into weapons handling happened in the outdoor target range after classes let out for the day. The tiny redhead found herself surrounded by a gaggle of fellow gingers—Bloom Goodwitch, Nora Valkyrie, Ruby Rose, and Pyrrha Nikos—and an assortment of weapons that made her brain spin in circles. Most weapons in the magical dimension were single-purpose; no one there thought to combine a spear and short sword, or a hammer and a grenade launcher. Add that to the fact that most folks with any active magic typically never picked up a traditional weapon and she considered herself a bit of a pacifist…yeah. She was on the verge of a breakdown right now.
"Now, until we figure out exactly how your Aura manifests itself, you'll probably be using a focus wand like Mom and Stella to manage magical output in a fight," Bloom explained, "But if we find something you can use effectively against a Grimm, there's no reason why we can't incorporate the focus wand into it."
"How do you not know your power source, by the way?" Mirta turned to look at Princess Stella when the blonde spoke. The fairy sat close enough to hear them but far enough away not to become target practice. "I was under the impression that Cloud Tower ran the same entrance tests that Alfea did."
She sighed. "They do…but the administrators haven't figured out what it is I do yet, besides a talent for illusion spells. They said they've never seen a source like mine before."
"You're not the first entering Huntress to be in the dark, so don't worry too much about it." Pyrrha smiled. Mirta tried to return the gesture but probably ended up with a grimace, knowing her luck. Pyrrha was calm and mature and nice and very pretty. She was never going to reach that level of cool. "Our teammates volunteered some of their weapons for testing. I would advise starting with something small, like the dual-wield energy pistols or the crossbow before working your way up to swords."
"How would you incorporate it into a focus wand, though?" Nora asked. "Focus wands need to be, well, wand-shaped."
"I wonder…" Stella frowned. "Well, the method never worked well for me, but a lot of fairies with Earth or Spirit class powers tend to channel magic through crystals way easier than traditional wands alone. Could we try that?"
"Using Dust crystals as a focus is really dangerous." Ruby winced. "Dust tends to be pretty…excitable. And explosive." Mirta thought there was probably a story there but wasn't about to ask what it was.
"I think she meant normal crystals. Rough gemstones, to be precise," Bloom said. "There's a shop in town that sells them…we can check it out later and see what calls out to you, Mirta."
"O-okay." She winced at the stutter she seemed to acquire in their presence. "But…weapons?"
"Staffs and spears first, especially if we're outfitting you with a focus wand." Pyrrha decided. "You don't have the strength to pick up Brunhild or make Amber Cilica work without throwing your shoulder out, and beyond that you have no real training. Staffs are a foundation weapon; figure those out and you can use about two-thirds of the weapons in this school."
"Won't be very fierce against the Grimm." Ruby pointed out.
"No, but if her illusion spells are up to snuff, she can misdirect them long enough for the rest of us to finish them off." Stella shrugged. "We'll work something out."
"But maybe we should let her try out Artemis and StormFlower so she has an idea what a mid-range weapon feels like, just in case?" Bloom suggested. "Nothing long range yet; the kick-back would knock her over."
"Maybe throwing knives?" Nora offered. "Ren's got a few he keeps as back-ups in case StormFlower's down for repairs."
"We can ask him if he's willing to work with her on it later." Bloom shrugged before focusing on her again. "So, Mirta, are you ready to start your training?"
No, but since she didn't want to fall even further behind, she nodded her approval. "N-no time like the present, right?"
"Well spoken." Pyrrha nodded, hefting a long spear up off the table. "Since both you and Stella need to learn to wield staffs as a weapon and not an extra-long wand, Bloom and I will start working with you on it."
"I thought you were teaching Jaune swordsmanship?" Ruby blinked.
"She was until he saw Riven fight that Ursa today." Bloom smirked. She almost felt sorry for her new teammate, but he did mention that he knew how to use a long-sword within earshot of half their year-mates. Any tutoring sessions following that revelation were his own fault. "And since Schnee can't stand him and he's too scared to ask Blake, Riven's really his only other option."
Knut wasn't paid enough to ask where and how his Mistresses procured a hunting troll. That way lay pain and misery. No, he didn't care that they knew how to send it through a portal either. They knew a lot of stuff he learned long ago not to ask about.
Knut did, privately, question the wisdom of sending only a hunting troll in, blind, at the closest spot his Mistresses could manage to their target's location. If it really was Remnant, there were rumors about that place. This was the planet that, supposedly, blew up their own moon testing weapons in the battle against the dark creatures overrunning their world. The planet whose atmosphere did wonky things to traditional spells. The planet where the pesky redhead nearly set him on fire. He didn't want to go back there, even with a hunting troll for back-up.
They dropped in within sight of the school's gates, but a large cliff separated them from the students. He was thankful that the Dark Queen and the Ice Empress managed to talk the Storm Bringer out of sending them both back the morning after the fight in the woods. He'd needed the time to heal and, as the Dark One pointed out, they needed to ensure they could send things onto Remnant's surface without the beings in question getting damaged or rearranged in the process. Tests with small objects and Helspawn worked, so Knut and the hunting troll now found themselves outside the gates of some kind of campus. School? Prison? Didn't matter much to the troll, but he knew the two housed totally different kinds of people.
Now, he knew he wasn't the smartest, or prettiest, or well-spoken ogre. Heck, he could barely see without his glasses! But he knew going through the front gate would be suicidal. Any guards living here would be on them in seconds, and Remnant's guards were known to be ruthless.
The troll, however, barged right up the side of the cliff and on toward the courtyard. Knut watched the great lug climb, weighed his options, and decided he'd be better off outside the gates with the Grimm than inside with whatever the troll pissed off.
Jaune Arc's training with a sword prior to Beacon Academy barely covered the basics, so Riven found himself starting from virtually square zero with the kid. The boy had enthusiasm to spare, but skills? Not much of that to speak of.
"Your weapon is a longsword; it's made to stab, slice, and hack at things to do damage. The stabbing bit is important, since that's the best way to get through armor or tough hides." All of this was stuff Brandon and Sky learned during their first year at Red Fountain, and things that he'd unwittingly picked up by just being in the same room as the two Eraklyonites. "Draw it."
Jaune's draw left much to be desired, but he managed not to stab himself in the process. "Uh, do you want me to attack or something?"
"Not until you fix your stance, or I'll knock you on your ass in two moves." Or less; kid's stance was terrible. Cordatorta would have kittens if he saw this. He sighed. "Feet at least shoulder-width apart, dominant foot slightly forward, torso bent slightly at the waist, shoulders squared but slightly hunched." He drew his own sword and demonstrated. The cutlass wasn't handled the same as a longsword and technically required a different stance, but he wasn't about to try explaining that to Jaune on top of everything else.
He spent another five minutes drilling the kid on the uses for that particular brand of long-sword when a loud crash at the gates forced their focus elsewhere.
"What is that thing?" Jaune squawked as a great blue thing with a large club continued to try smashing its way onto the grounds.
"The hell is a hunting troll doing here?" He growled. Hunting trolls were a highly protected and regulated species in the magical dimension; no breed of troll called Remnant home in past or present times. For one to be crashing down the gates, someone with major magical power or connections had to have sent it here. 'Looks like the princess really does need protection from someone,' he thought.
"That's a troll?" Jaune asked.
"Yeah, and we're gonna have to take it down the hard way if the girls can't scrounge up enough energy for a containment circle." Which wasn't likely to happen and he knew it. Containment circles were nice, but required power and skill to throw up in a hurry. Stella, Bloom, and Mirta might have the power for it, but not the skill. They'd have to deal with the ugly bastard by beating it senseless. "Don't come at it from the front; that club has a long reach and hurts." He learned that during last year's class on them.
"Y-yeah. Let's do this." The boy gave a shaky nod as their female teammates, draw by the noise, descended on their location.
"What the…" Ruby frowned once she got close enough to see the commotion.
"Is that a hunting troll?" Stella gaped.
"Wait, you have trolls in the magical dimension?" Bloom demanded. "I thought those were a myth!"
"They're highly regulated and restricted, which means this guy has some friends in high or low places, depending on how you look at it." Stella cocked her head to the side. The troll seemed to have more trouble getting through the gate than planned, which made sense given how that structure needed to be Grimm-resistant during high-stress times such as Final Exam season.
"How do you fight a troll? Will we get in trouble if we hurt it?" Ruby asked.
"No to the second; it's destroying school property so we have the right by law of magic to defend our 'home' from the 'invader'." Stella glanced over in his direction. "We don't cover dangerous creatures until sophomore year at Alfea, so fighting it is Riven's area of expertise."
He didn't know if he should feel relieved that the princess didn't think she knew everything or annoyed that she put him on the spot like this. "Trolls are strong, tough, and magic-resistant enough to give anyone at our level a lot of trouble, but also stupid and very slow to react. Best to stay out of striking range to deal with it or close enough to it that it can't hit you easily."
Ruby and Nora shared a look that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. "Leave it to us."
Jaune groaned. Bloom simply rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I think you two have this one. Just let us know if you need help."
"I think those of us who use swords should be ready to back them up, just in case." Pyrrha spoke. He sighed and nodded an affirmative while Jaune gulped.
He hadn't got the chance to see either of the hyper redheads fight during the 'brawling with style' class Professor Goodwitch taught, but he knew Nora carted around a big-ass hammer that could do some damage to a troll's skull or joints if it were as heavy as it looked. He still didn't really get to see Ruby fight because the girl ran from one place to the next so fast he had to follow the trail of rose petals to figure out where she'd been. Not that that helped much; she disappeared into some of the trees along the outside of the gates and he lost visual. But Nora…damn, that girl could swing. Oh, and the hammer? Totally doubled as a rocket launcher and could be propelled by that means to enhance the force of impact. She lacked Ruby's speed but made up for it by mashing the troll's fingers so bad it howled.
The troll swung with its club, but by the time it was halfway there, Nora'd moved and landed a blow to the back of its knees. Another roar of pain filled the air when it fell. Now thoroughly pissed at the tiny human, the troll swatted at her with the club; this time it caught her and sent her into the wall with a sickening thud. It struggled to stand…and a single crack of gunfire sounded at the same moment it fell. Riven loosened his grip on his phantosabre's hilt and smirked. Most specialists avoided using guns as a primary weapon in basic training, since they were tricky to properly enchant (too many moving parts that had to be individually charmed and calibrated, according to Professor Young back at RF) with phantotech…but a sniper rifle was dead useful if you were patient and skilled enough to use it right. And little Ruby Rose, possibly the worst damn fidget he'd ever met (including Timmy), managed to hit a troll at the weak point where the skull joined the spinal column. She dropped from the tree she'd been hiding in as the teachers finally arrived on scene. "Did I kill it?"
No rise and fall of the chest and torso, no movement in the limbs, and no gulps for breath—he nodded. "Yeah, I think you did."
"Good heavens, what is that?" Dr. Oobleck exclaimed.
"A very dead troll, if I'm not mistaken." Headmaster Ozpin drawled. "Another non-native species…it seems someone is trying to make a point."
"Or look for something." Ruby edged closer to her kill, frowning at something that'd fallen onto the path during the troll's brawl with Nora. She gingerly knelt down and lifted a ripped piece of orange fabric for them to see. "Riven said it was a hunting troll…I guess this belonged to whatever it was hunting."
"Hey! That's from my dress!" Stella shouted. "Ooh, when I get my hands on these jerks…"
"Miss Nikos, Mister Arc, please take Miss Valkyrie to the infirmary," Professor Goodwitch spoke, bringing the Solarian's tirade to a screeching halt. "Miss Rose, if you would return to your team…"
"Oh, let her stay, Mom. We need her and Pyrrha to help Mirta and Stella in staff training anyway, and she's the one who killed the troll." Bloom met her mother's stare without flinching. "She at least deserves to know why her services were needed today."
A short staring contest followed before Professor Goodwitch closed her eyes and sighed. "Fine. We will read them in, but no one else. The more people who know…"
"Yes, yes, the greater the danger. You said that when she started term," Bloom stated. "But you have concede it's better in the long run to have others who know what we're up against if she's targeted while the rest of us aren't there to help. First an ogre and some lesser Helspawn, and now a troll? Who's to say they won't send a dragon next time?"
"While I doubt they're quite that desperate, the original point stands." Ozpin said. "Miss Nikos and Miss Rose will be briefed on the current situation. It will be up to them to decide how much to tell their teams, though I do suggest you only discuss this matter in the safety of your dormitories. We don't need word of this getting leaked outside the walls of this school."
Riven sighed, wondering how the hell his life turned into one of those B-grade spy films Brandon loved to watch so much.