Fox of Remnant

by Zagger the Bloody Angel

A wish. His wish and dreams were placed into the hands of another. And their wish was for him to live peacefully. It seemed Fate was a cruel mistress and still had plans to use him for her gains. No more! He will fight against these chains that shackle and bind him! Naruto/Blake/Weiss. Berserk Cross. AU Naruto, RWBY Canon Divergence Tags: Action\Fluff\Humor\Angst\Drama\Hurt/Comfort

9. Volume I - The Fated Holidays - Part IV

As the morning light filled the cabin, having worked alongside the medics most of the night, helping clean and close some of their wounds and their blood staining his clothing, Naruto was satisfied Blake and Weiss were in stable condition and that their aura was taking over healing. The fact that there were people whose semblances revolved around using their aura to stabilize and heal others' wounds did not surprise him, and others that supported others' aura to amplify their own and stabilize their natural ability to heal was simply amazing.

Unfortunately, they all had low aura reserves themselves, and it wasn't a viable way to heal severe wounds. They simply didn't have the aura capacity to make complete regeneration possible. Instead, they had to focus on vital areas and allow the body to naturally heal and take over itself after closing up and packing the wounds. It was a similar issue for the healers of his world too. Aura, much like chakra, was a muscle that grew ever so slightly when it was used, and starting with a small amount meant it was difficult to increase the amount they possessed even after training it for years.

Naruto sighed. He wished it was possible to transfer and flow his chakra to them and convert it into aura so they could completely regenerate their wounds, but this was still nothing to scoff about. They would have a few battle scars on their stomachs, and Blake would have a few on her legs and collarbone.

That wasn't too bad. Not after a run-in with whatever that Seer thing was.

And the voice that controlled it.

Exiting the bedroom where they had been working on Blake and Weiss, Naruto crossed the threshold of the next room to see everyone was still awake and waiting in the larger living room area or was in the kitchen area, pouring a fresh cup of coffee for themselves. Ruby was the first to immediately rush to his side, a worried and concerned expression draped on her face as her silver eyes pierced into his. "Are Blake and Weiss going to be okay?"

Naruto chuckled, seeing her so worried and worked up. Of course, it also didn't help that he was stained in their blood, but that was due to his inexperience in closing wounds. "Yeah, they're going to be perfectly fine. Nothing was too life-threatening. They'll be good as new here in a few days.

"I told you, Miss Rose," Ozpin's voice came from behind as he trailed behind her with a bemused smile on his face. "Their wounds were not too severe and they were in the finest hands we could provide. Not to mention the field care they received was most excellent, and it helped keep them stable for our medics to do their jobs properly and efficiently."

While he knew the compliment was meant to boost his ego, it did not. Naruto was too irritated at the moment to care about the man's attempt to adulate him, and it only made him more cross with the wizard. His heated glare directed at the headmaster as he twitched at his words only added fuel to the fire burning within.

It seemed he wasn't the only one to know this was true. Glynda could read the tension, and seeing the lead medic exit the room following Naruto, she greeted the peach-haired woman to take attention away from the escalation building. "Professor Peach, is it all right if the students can go in and see their friends?"

"Um, that is rather soon after a serious surgery…" Peach looked at Glynda, a tad surprised knowing the woman was usually a bit more level-headed than this, before seeing the slight tilt in her fellow professor's head and following the emerald gaze of the good witch, she saw her focus was on an irate fox and the headmaster. "But in this case, maybe…"

"Oh, it's quite all right," Ozpin spoke nonchalantly, aware of his mistake and the justified anger being aimed at him, and took it in stride. "I was thinking about going out for a walk anyway. Care to join me so we can discuss everything?"

Without a word spoken, Naruto broke his glare and crossed the room, slipping past everyone to the coat rack and throwing on his heavy winter cloak. Then with a mocking bow and gesturing to the door, he growled at Ozpin. "After you, Great and Powerful Oz!"

"I feel I deserve that one…" Ozpin, despite not flinching, his voice seemed weary and withered as he made his way past everyone and to the front door before pausing and, without looking back, spoke. "Glynda, if you don't mind, I leave the rest of this at your discretion. I have a feeling this is going to take some time."

Getting a simple nod of affirmation from his headmistress, Ozpin exited the small cabin with Naruto in pursuit. The two walked silently together along the snow-covered road of the village, taking their time before speaking. Rushing it was pointless, and being overheard was something neither wanted. Especially by those in the cabin and considering one had exceptional hearing, they wanted to be as far away as possible before even uttering what needed to be spoken.

After all, what was to be said only needed to be known by a few.

Carefully walking past a few villagers having woken up to get on with their everyday routines, looking very weary given the loud action that coursed throughout the night before, Naruto kept his composure as they slowly walked. His cerulean eyes coldly gazed ahead as his ears twitched, listening as the murmurings of the people behind him fell on his ears. Obviously, his cloak was stained with a slight amount of Weiss' blood from carrying her, which was noticeable. With all the gunfire, as Coco was anything but subtle, it most likely awoke and startled many during the night and let them know that something had happened last night.

And the Bullhead parked in the middle of the street and in front of the cabins the Huntsman were staying in clearly indicated that something had occurred for the deaf and hard of hearing.

"So," Naruto took a moment to compose himself as he could no longer hear any footsteps but his and Ozpin's as they neared the outskirts of the village. "What exactly is this that you have involved me in? Why garner the world's attention in such an unprecedented move by having a faunus become a Huntsman in an odd manner while still attending and helping at Beacon? Is it to draw someone or something's attention because it most certainly did that with the media and I've noticed a few White Fang agents lately creeping around in Vale whenever I go into town or out for missions?"

"Damn lizard thinks I can't sense him, but he's not doing anything harmful from what I've noticed. Probably one of their few good members from what I know of them…"

"Or is it because it has to do with the fact that void controls the Grimm, a fact that you neglected to tell me before, and apparently, she wants something from me? When were these facts going to get to my ears? When were you planning to tell me I was the key player in luring her out, Ozpin?" Naruto spat out spitefully, his eyes glaring daggers at the wizard as they stopped once they knew no one was nearby and were confident enough that no one could overhear their conversation and had followed.

Ozpin was thankful that while he was rightfully angry with him, he kept his voice low and remained calm. Sighing deeply, ashamed of himself, he placed his cane in the snow and looked down and away. "It was never a guarantee that she would make a move against you in this manner or at all. It was simply a calculated maneuver to see if it would lure one of her minions out. I saw that as the more likely outcome, and to see if we could leverage information from one of them. Knowing your skills, I was never worried about her lackies as witnessing your skills firsthand gave me more than confidence. However, I had not expected her to make a move like this personally or for her to use her eyes. I failed to foresee she would risk a Seer to see you for herself…"

"Just to touch my mind? What could she possibly gain from that? What is it about me that she could possibly want, Ozpin?!" Naruto growled lowly, his voice filled with justified fury hearing his response as he clenched his fists. "She called off the attack immediately after accessing my mind, and I destroyed the Seer. I don't think the others could have handled it as the attack I hit it with…"

Ozpin raised his head curiously, hearing this, looking unsure what to say. He looked troubled and puzzled by what was said and couldn't explain it. Shaking his head, the headmaster seemed as lost as Naruto. "I don't have an answer for you. Years of knowing and having fought this darkness, I don't know what she is planning or what is going on. This doesn't seem normal, and I will have to call in a few favors to see if anything has changed on the information front. That doesn't seem normal, so I can't say anything for certain at this moment."

Disgusted by the answer he heard, Naruto bit back a nasty retort as he understood that game well enough. Unfortunately, sometimes the answer wasn't there. Despite thinking you knew an enemy well enough, they could always do something unprecedented and leave you guessing. It was why his sensei motto was to look underneath the underneath and expect the unexpected. You simply couldn't predict or know what would happen, so you needed to be prepared for every conceivable outcome, no matter how outrageous it was.

"So," Naruto took another pause as he heatedly glared back at the wizard, his ears flattening and his eyes narrowing. "What I can't understand is, with everything you knew, why did you justify sending them out here with me? You would risk their lives sending them out with me, knowing that even if an agent was to contact me, it is a dangerous prospect. Yes, I spend time with them, but that is forced upon me because they live next to me, and some of them have become my friends."

"I don't want their lives to be risked because of your damn game!" Naruto snarled in a hushed tone but made his point clear as his enraged eyes bore into Ozpin's. "It's one thing for them to join me knowing what I'm dealing with willingly, but I don't even know all the facts! So when is that going to change? Will you finally let me in on this and tell me everything going on, or will you keep me in the dark as you have been? I thought we had a sense of trust between us on here, but I guess that's not the case. Because the way I see it right now, after this year is done…"

"I'm out of here with how you run this ship, and I've only known you for two months."

For one of the few times, Ozpin showed a visible wince at the ninja's words as they hit. Closing his eyes and turning his head away, a look of pain and regret spread across his face as he bit his lip and regretted everything he had to say. "I have made many mistakes, and I'm sorry. I truly am, however, as of now, there isn't much I can tell you. It's not that I can't trust you. It's that the situation is…"

"More dire than I thought and that if you were to know, you might not make decisions that are critical for you to make." Ozpin winced before he suddenly felt the wind knocked out of his lungs and fell to his knees, his cane holding himself up as he looked up into Naruto's eyes, having been punched hard into the gut, and pleaded with him. "I am truly sorry. It has to be done this way as if you were to know…"

"The world would change only for the worse…"

Naruto gritted his teeth as his body trembled, glaring at the silver-haired man kneeling before him. He clenched and unclenched his fist, wanting to pound his face a few times. He didn't even acknowledge that he had put his students in danger! It pissed him off that he still wouldn't tell him about what was going on, but he would have just walked away from him as he had already made his decision. The fact that he made light of keeping Blake, Velvet, Ruby… Weiss around him when dangerous people and entities would be seeking him infuriated him.

And he wanted to flatten him for that alone! They were hardly ready for the Grimm, let alone whatever he had planned for him! And he set them up with him! He wanted to grab the man's throat and…

"Ozpin!" Glynda's voice came from a distance, most likely having come to look for the two, having taken care of everything in the cabin before wanting to take part in the conversation, knowing it most likely had to deal with the order, having expected possibly bringing Naruto onboard would be the plan like she had expected from the start.

It made the most logical sense.

"Oh, Glynda…" Ozpin wheezed as he looked over and waved at the witch running over to them, trying to pacify his headmistress. "To be honest, I quite deservedly should have been hit far harder. I'm surprised I'm not being pummeled…"

"Thought about it. But, and if I'm being honest here, you're not worth the effort." Naruto retorted, relaxing his hands and letting his reddening skin fade back to its normal coloration before spitting to the side and glowering at the headmaster of Beacon one last time before turning away from him. "Whatever. I'm done here anyway. Do what you will, headmaster. Just know that while you and I may be on the same page, for now, it does not mean we're good if this is how you treat your allies. It's a wonder you have any followers if this is your example of how to make an ally."

"Good day to you, sir." Naruto waved at the wizard as he walked away, still pissed but knowing he needed to change and clean up as he didn't need to stay in the bloodstained clothes any longer while hearing Glynda round on Ozpin, wondering what had happened seemed amusing…

He wanted nothing to do with the wizard for now. All he cared about was his friends and their health, as the headmaster apparently didn't.

---

Much to Naruto's chagrin, it seemed Ozpin had decided it was best if he were to stay personally despite having an entire academy to run. In his words, seeing that most of the students had left for the holidays and only a few remained, he thought it wise to remain with some of the few still there and even doing work for the academy during the holiday. Besides, Ozpin seemed to trust Professor Oobleck, Port, Peach, Greene, and Mulberry to keep the rest of the students and staff in his and Glynda's absence for a few days.

It wouldn't be the first time the two had to leave for extended periods. They were influential figures in Remnant, and with him being on the Vale council…

So the fox was extremely annoyed as the New Year approached, seeing the headmaster sitting in the cabin, sipping a cup of coffee and acting as if nothing was wrong between them. He really wanted to tip that cup into the man's face and scald him. Still, he thought better of it, considering everyone around him and the fact that he was technically his superior could cause trouble for him in the hunter's hierarchy. Of course, he knew he wouldn't but still…

He simply needed to focus back on his plans and make sure his clones were training his crabs properly back in the dorm. The execution of his plan needed to be impeccable if he was intending to execute his most nefarious prank to date.

Ozpin would never see it coming.

Having kept a strict schedule of watches, he found it odd that the Grimm seemed to have vanished from the village altogether. Not a single encounter since the massive raid, even when he ventured further out of town. This made him grit his teeth. So somehow, it seemed that they all vanished from the area despite the still depressive tone everyone carried from losing their loved ones and the fear of having so many attacks occur in such a frequent amount.

Villagers, some farmers, and their families had flat-out left, and he couldn't blame them. The sheer volume of Grimm attacks within a week was startling, and something was wrong. But now for them to halt the moment after what happened on Christmas…

It was as if the voice had true control of the Grimm and had given these people respite. Or, more likely, she had gotten what she sought after and pulled her forces back and had no more need for this area, and if that was the case…

He had been lured here. But how? How could it have been predicted that he, of all Huntsman and Huntresses, would be the one to answer this job and turn up here? Or was she watching and waiting in the shadows for the right opportunity?

"Naruto?" Velvet's timid voice snapped him out of his thoughts, and he turned his attention to his fellow faunus, and his face fell.

Naruto felt a little sick to his stomach, seeing how jittery and shrunken into herself. He was positively radiating his intent around him, and while it wasn't directed at anyone, those sensitive enough to it were being irradiated and beaten down by his imposing will. And considering he was furious and his skin was burning once more, he cursed as he felt his blood boiling and had to calm down. He was not used to this and needed to get a hold of it.

This semblance was starting to become an issue. It was controlling him far more than he was controlling it. He would have to correct that.

"Sorry," Naruto sighed as he took a breath and let his skin tone return to normal, frowning. "Got lost in my thoughts and lost control of my aura. Going to have to rein that in and start working on that immediately. That's not acceptable."

"Damn man, I felt like I was in a room with a starving lion, and I was juicy steak," Jaune commented as he swallowed a lump in his throat now that he felt the pressure lift and could breathe again. "How the hell can you do that unconsciously? That's just scary."

"That's simply called a dominant aura or what you know as an alpha presence, my boy." Ozpin nonchalantly answered in a laid-back tone, sipping on his coffee as if nothing had occurred. "It's harder to detect for most people as humans have become desensitized to it over the years, but for faunus, well being more attuned, their auras are far more intact and potent. The stronger they happen to be, the more imposing their will can become. Their natural aura becomes far more potent as it's a mixture of natural pheromones and their physical attributes and aura. It's why younger female faunus tend to have difficulties around stronger males and tend to be drawn to them at first, even if the said male is not the most reputable person around."

As everyone looked at Ozpin oddly, who was glad Glynda was not here to berate him and out with Coco and Yatsu on patrol of the village, he took another sip of his coffee. He loved getting to speak about what he knew about the world.

"That…" Blake blinked at the Professor as she couldn't believe a human explained a faunus trait so thoroughly, internally flinching as she felt mildly attacked at that last statement before tilting her head confusedly at him. "Is extraordinarily accurate. How do you know so much about Professor? That doesn't seem to be something in a field you would study…"

"Oh my no. I learned it for personal reasons, my dear." Ozpin grinned, and Blake choked on her spit, and many eyes went wide before Yang soon sat nearby, her lilac eyes brightening in curiosity while Fox perked his head while trying not to make it too obvious he was paying attention. "I may have had a few suitors in my day due to my own aura when I was younger, and let's say I wasn't the upstanding gentleman I am now back then. I may or may not have played the field in those days…"

"Okay, didn't need to know any of that." Naruto closed his eyes and looked away as he tried not to envision a very particular sensei of his and failed miserably as he could hear his voice clearly. "I already had to deal with all the tall tales of my senseis exploits and conquests. Braggadocious behavior is fine and all. Hell, I fall prey to it all the time, but some things shouldn't be treated as such. Learned that the hard way, especially after having to pull his ass from bars all the time…"

"And hers, now that I think about it," Naruto muttered, opening his eyes and rubbing his right temple with his palm as he realized how often he had to pull his adoptive grandmother out of the red-light district even after she became Hokage, even after returning from his multiple-year training trip with the pervert.

If only to give his nee-chan a break. Shizune deserved a medal for dealing with Tsunade's more egregious behaviors over the years, and he wasn't sure how she didn't have a nervous breakdown from all the stress placed upon her.

Giving a side frown and pursing his lips momentarily, Ozpin could only tilt his head and give a passing nod. "Fair enough. Was not intending to make it sound like I was bragging. Simply stating where the knowledge came from and to ease the tension. Also, I don't think it would be appropriate for students to know what I was up to when I was younger for at least a couple more years. Professional boundaries and all."

"Dammit. There goes a tasty scoop. Thanks, Naruto!" Yang snapped her fingers while Ozpin only grinned as he sipped on his mug of coffee, satisfied with dashing the hopes of at least one of his students getting to hear a compelling story.

At least one played along! Naruto didn't have to spoil his fun accidentally! He was almost as bad as Glynda.

Sensing the mischievousness coming from the headmaster after that, Naruto wasn't sure what to make of it, and that left a sour taste in his mouth. He swore that if the wizard came up with his own pranks, this would not be a safe war between them…

And considering they were slated to hold their belated Christmas party now on New Year's Eve tomorrow night, this could be problematic as he could see the headmaster grinning as his eyes peered over the room straight at him. If he was willing to call war, so be it.

Let the pranking begin!

Ozpin merely grinned back, tapping his chain against the chair as he sipped his coffee. This would be fun. And at the very least, he took Naruto's attention away from his thoughts for now. At the very least, he needed to concentrate on something else until he had his semblance under control. It seemed more unique in that it was fueled by his emotional state, much like Yang's, and once it activated, it fed it more and more. It was something to take note of, and hopefully, the boy was catching onto it as well, which it seemed he was and could become very dangerous if his emotions got out of hand.

And because of how expressive and hot-blooded he was, he would have to taper them even further. However, it seemed he already had a reasonable modicum of control already. At least until he could consistently trigger his semblance and keep it from reactively activating. And that took years of training for those with emotionally based semblances as it was not an easy task. However, given just what he was capable of maybe it wouldn't take him anywhere near as...

But now, a certain dread began to loom, and he felt like he might have regretted calling upon the forces of Naruto's deviousness upon him. Shrugging his shoulders and taking a sip of his coffee, Ozpin grinned.

Let him bring it. It would be fun, regardless.

---

"What are you doing?" Weiss looked horrified as she entered the room and watched as she watched Naruto slowly piecing together a trigger contraption of trip wires to see him test it and watch a chalkboard eraser fall while muttering to himself that he needed to make another adjustment.

Something about dodging…

All of this was at nightfall as Naruto had his clones out doing watch tonight, relaxing somewhat. He had a strange feeling the Grimm would no longer be bothering the village like they had over the past month and especially like they had in the last two weeks. He wasn't sure why but for some reason, he felt when the voice said she didn't need this village any longer she meant it, which was strange as he felt she was trying to harm Vale in the long term. He, for some reason, believed her.

He wasn't sure why, however.

"Preparing to humiliate Oz," Naruto answered simply as he set up his rig again, putting the eraser at the center, lifting it above, and fastening it as if it wasn't a big deal.

Weiss blinked owlishly, unsure of what she had heard at first. And seeing Naruto continue to test his contraption as the eraser fell and powdered the wood floor with more chalk, she only pursed her lips in further confusion. "And you think dropping chalk on him somehow will do that?"

"Nah," Naruto waved the eraser in his hand after picking it up and grinned at Weiss as he turned to face her. "I just wanted to throw him off my trail, but I think he's wisened up to the fact that it won't be me causing mischief and mayhem. Also, I wanted to test a theory of why my sensei didn't dodge the stupid eraser when I first met him, and I still can't figure out why he let it hit him in the head. He clearly was fast enough to dodge it, so I'm just trying to factor in other things while watching an eraser fall to relive the memory…"

"Classic." Naruto grinned fondly at the memory and saw Kakashi's hair coated in chalk in his mind's eye.

"Um," Weiss found herself at a loss of words, unsure how to even respond to that or why his mind was stuck on something like that of all things. "Okay then…"

"What's up?" With a quick motion, Naruto dismantled his tripwires, leaving Weiss further befuddled on how he was capable of rigging and taking it down so quickly before he focused his full attention on her after pocketing his materials in his pouch. "You kind of seemed off today whenever I was around you."

Cursing under her breath as she blushed and turned away, Weiss had to admit that was true. Earlier in the day, she had been shying away from him as it was her first full day being out and about, allowed out of bed with her wound mostly healed up and given the okay from Professor Peach as she stopped in to check on their recovery and to speed it up. Aura regeneration was fantastic, but the damage was still done regardless…

She lost a small portion of her intestinal tract, and they were able to attach the rest to repair and regenerate easily enough, so it wouldn't be too much of a concern. Still, she had to be under watch for the next few days, which probably explained why she was always under the supervision of one of the Professors or in Naruto's line of sight.

It was irritating, but understandable. Couldn't have her go into septic shock in case anything leaked out.

"Weiss, hello?" Naruto bent down slightly and locked his eyes into Weiss' icy blues, snapping her out of her thoughts and making her blush profusely as he was inches away from her face. "You kind of zoned out… Woah!"

"Don't get that close to me! I don't want anyone thinking anything, idiot!" Weiss instinctively shoved Naruto back with all of her might, nearly making the blonde lose his balance as he wasn't expecting that, but he quickly recovered and almost grinned, seeing the embarrassed heiress turn her head away in embarrassment. "Sorry, I didn't mean to do that…"

"Oh god, sensei wrote tropes about characters who acted like this and flipped between being rather snobbish and mean and showing a softer, more affectionate side only to those they care about. Tsundere, I think they're called…" Naruto started before taking a step back as he began to wilt under the icy glare from the Schnee heiress. "Or you know you are your own person. In your own class. Queen of your castle."

"Yes, I am!" Nora called out from somewhere in the distance in the other room, which made Naruto and Weiss falter on their feet as it was entirely unexpected.

"What the…" Naruto balked as he regained his balance and looked incredulously behind Weiss at the door as she turned to ensure they were the only person in the room. "How in the world did she even hear me?"

"She's a mystery that no one can solve." Weiss frowned as she slowly and carefully turned around, a little perturbed at the odd interruption, and wanted to make sure that nothing like that happened again before sighing deeply. "I… Blake kind of convinced me to come in here and check on you. Wanted me to come and see if you needed anything personally. Don't know why she didn't do it…"

Raising his eyebrow as Blake had been acting odd since around Christmas, and now she was acting weirdly, Naruto gave a short shrug of shoulders and curiously gazed at Weiss. "And what do you want to do? I was trying to throw the all-knowing wizard off my schemes. So with that failing miserably, I'm planning to start focusing and meditating to help work on semblance and calming it down. Also, because my therapist said I should…"

"Ah, sorry!" Weiss apologized and looked for an exit, nervously trying to find a way out of the conversation. "I'll let you be then. It would be difficult to concentrate with someone else in the room."

"Nah, not really. Had to meditate in far worse conditions before to master some of my abilities. Nothing you could throw at me could phase me, so don't worry about it. You're fine." Naruto grinned as he remembered all his sage training at Mt. Myoboku and the hardships he endured before moving to the middle of the room and slowly sitting down cross-legged and into a meditative pose. "You are welcome to join me if you like. It is quite relaxing and could help relieve some of that stress I can sense building in you."

"I am not stressed!" Weiss countered defensively, looking offended as she looked away and stuck her nose up haughtily for a moment before her gaze slowly lowered back down after a moment, seeing Naruto shrug and close his eyes.

"Well, thought I would ask. Seemed like you wanted to say something." Naruto commented before closing his eyes and interlacing his fingers onto his lap in a relaxed position, taking one deep breath before his breathing slowed.

Instead of focusing on bringing the natural world into him, as he had always done as he meditated, he focused inward and on his chakra. There was an odd, swirling sensation within, something he hadn't quite noticed before when he had been doing all his training, but it was there nonetheless. How it eluded him was a mystery, but perhaps because it was located in a very particular space where a certain fox's chakra should have been may have been why.

This turbulence within him was his semblance. It was wildly chaotic and spiralling out of control. It felt like a secondary chakra system within him, and he frowned, not having noticed it for two months. The strange thing about semblances, even those that had awakened auras, is that sometimes it took months or even years to discover them, with some of the strangest stories ever being told about how they did it.

He literally heard how Nora found hers through his clones, which was just something to behold. Kakashi could eat his heart out. Cut a lightning bolt in half with his ultimate move. Whatever. Nora ate lightning bolts for breakfast!

…After waking up from the initial pain of being struck, her semblance didn't apparently nullify her pain receptors from the experience. The majority of semblances seemed to be double-edged from what he saw, and very few had little to no drawbacks. So at the very least, he fit in there, but he would have liked to have something more like Blake's that didn't have any downsides, and a movement/cloning/replacement ability was right up his alley.

It was tailor-made for him!

Or Ruby's…

Ruby's was cool. It really could compensate for the loss of Kurama state…

And now he was sad, excellent!

No, he had this weird steam explosion if he got hyper-agitated, as, for some reason, it was innately connected to his emotional state. As a result, it was basically his blood that was rapidly accelerated through his body, which increased the oxygen levels in his blood and improved his muscular strength. It then further accelerated when his chakra was added, allowing his chakra to start flowing directly in his blood like a second network to enhance his strength further, but that was when his blood began to heat and started to physically boil within him and start to steam and find any possible release it could.

And once it reached critical mass, it violently ejected through his pores. This left him severely debilitated as he wasted a lot of his plasma as it evaporated in the process.

So he couldn't let it get to that point again as it did in the police office or in the forest by Beacon. One time he could deal with it without it hampering him too horribly as long as he could adequately hydrate himself soon after. However, depending on the circumstances, a second time could prove costly, even fatal. And given that, for some reason, he felt more easily excited and pushed when his blood started moving, he wondered if something was working with his adrenaline too. He also felt a hormonal surge when it was activated. It was possible, and it would explain his emotional imbalance as of late.

Outside of being a young man still trying to find himself, now stuck in a brand-new world.

Yeah, that probably didn't help things either.

His ears twitched as he heard the ruffling of clothes before him and slowly opened. He then pursed his lips together in amusement and repressed a mild chuckle that wanted to come out as he saw Weiss mirror his position a few feet in front of him. Instead, he tilted his head curiously and flicked his ears at her, and somewhere, he wasn't sure how he swore a cat was melting.

Weiss gave a mild blush at the endearing and bubbly look and the shining cerulean blue eyes that reminded her so much of the sapphire jewels she cherished. "What? You said I could join you, and as much as I hate to admit it…"

"You're right. I am a tad stressed with everything and need a moment to clear my head. And from what I know, meditation helps, and strangely enough, for someone as knuckleheaded as you are, you seem to know what you're doing. Therefore, I'll follow your lead." Weiss admitted sullenly as she looked down and away, almost defeated. "With everything that it took to get me here, everything that has happened since I got here, and now all of this…"

"I need to really evaluate some things and maybe take a moment, and de-stressing like this is a healthy thing. I have never tried it before despite the fact that we have a Zen garden that Klein upkeeps delicately for me, saying I would grow to appreciate it one day. So, I might give it a try now if you'll teach me." Weiss lifted her head and gave a warm smile, attempting to be cheerful and trying to fidget as it was awkward to press like this.

She simply wanted to spend time with someone else. There was her team, but she had been a bust so far. And as much as she tried to blame them for it, she knew it was her fault on some level. Her icy demeanor, sarcasm, vitriol towards the slightest of things they did wrong when she expected perfection…

Because it was always demanded of her, she was unintentionally holding others to the same standards.

Weiss wished she had more experience dealing with people outside the elite's social etiquette. She hardly remembered what it was like to act normally. It wasn't easy to relate to anything Ruby and Yang did. And when politics or business ever got brought up…

Well, she had an idea where Blake stood after they had that row with one another two weeks back after watching the news and seeing a faunus protest here in Vale. Seeing what was under her bow now gave her context, but…

Why was she so defensive about the White Fang? They were thieves, thugs, and murderers, from what she knew. That's all they ever were, and unless she was missing something…

"Weiss, you're zoning out again." Naruto snapped her out of her thoughts, his smile was the first thing she saw as her gaze fell back onto him, as a scarlet hue filled her face. "Are you sure you can do this? The first step of meditation is relaxing and letting everything in your mind go. It's difficult to do, believe me, but once everything is off your mind, everything starts to feel so much better."

"Right!" Weiss nodded, shaking her head, and she followed Naruto's example and took a deep breath but looked very stiff while trying to do so." Like this?"

"Oh no. This is going to take some work." Naruto bit his lip to refrain from laughing, but even then, his chuckle escaped, and he quickly tried to cover it up by placing his hand over his mouth like he was coughing. "Ahk, I mean, uh…"

Hearing his laughter seemed to affect Weiss, however. First, her shoulders lowered, her chest loosened, and then it began reverberating as she brought her hand to her mouth to stifle her gentle laughter. "Oh, I guess I should focus more on letting go than copying everything you're doing."

"Yeah, everyone meditates slightly differently. How they reach their center depends on how they calm down and focus. Some need music, others need quiet, and no people around, and others need to be surrounded by nature. I can only show you the path. The rest is up to you." Naruto replied truthfully with a smile. "You seem calmer now, so it should be a bit easier. Laughter is a terrific way to calm the nerves and break the tension."

"Also helps when yours is cute to listen to."

Seeing the flush of red fill Weiss' face from his comment, Naruto grinned widely. It wasn't so much that he preferred hitting on Sakura all those times. He just liked getting reactions from her. That's why he kept coming back for more. It was a game for him, and it was fun. And if Weiss was anything to go by…

"Idiot, stop playing around…" Weiss muttered as she turned away from her blush and tried to hide her embarrassment from him. "Can we focus?"

"Huh, neat." Was all Naruto could say as he expected to be pushed down or smacked as that was the usual response he got back home when he made moves like that and only on a certain heiress and a ponytail blonde were they ever effective on.

For two entirely different reasons. One he found out later, the other was…

Unfortunately, for training.

"Anyways, start calming your breathing and cutting everything else out of the room." Naruto returned to teaching Weiss while trying to meditate himself, taking a deep breath and starting to focus once more. "Cut out all the noise until nothing is left but you and your thoughts. And then let those go and free yourself completely, unburden yourself…"

"I will end you and that burning red light from hell, Yang!"

"What the…" Naruto and Weiss nearly stumbled out of their attempted meditation as the door slammed.

Their attention was drawn to Blake, who was laboriously breathing with righteous fury burning in her golden eyes.

"Uh, Blake. What's wrong..." Weiss began as she tried to greet her teammate but was ignored as she stormed, limped over to the bed she was sleeping on, slumped onto it before pulling out Cruel Beauty, and started to read angrily.

"I don't know how she found out, but I swear to the Brothers I will beat her ass if she does that shit again. That's not funny. Not when I'm still recovering…" Blake muttered to herself, ignoring that Naruto and Weiss were in the room with her as she was instantly lost in her story. "Oh, Nyx, if only I could be you instead of me and not be here…"

"Anywhere but here…" Blake quietly muttered to herself as she turned away and started to read quietly, absently melting into her own world and blissfully ignoring that anyone else was in the room with her.

As Weiss looked on, unsure how to process what she was seeing as she had never seen Blake this angry or comfortable to read like this before, Naruto only pondered for a moment as he critically examined her. Then he turned to Weiss and gestured over to his fellow faunus reading. "And that there is a form of meditation."

"What?!" Weiss couldn't help but be baffled as she looked back and forth between Naruto and Blake, not sure how to comprehend what Blake was doing was meditation. "But, how is that?"

"It's entirely autonomous. She's not using any thought processing, and she has shut out the outside world and is entrapped in her own private world. It is essentially a form of meditation." Naruto answered as he gave the other person reading in the room a quick glance to confirm his suspicion before nodding and grinning as a devious thought crossed his mind. "Yeah, completely lost in her own fantasy world. Probably could sneak up on her and…"

"So," Weiss gazed over at Blake reading, trying to take inspiration of her own to find a way to meditate for herself. "It's like you said, everyone's method is different? I have to find what comforts me and shut the outside world off?"

"That's the first step, yeah." Naruto turned his attention back to Weiss and smiled brightly. "All the other stuff about finding inner peace or centering yourself comes later and, to be honest, is unnecessary if you want to relax. A lot of problems stem from outside, and if you cut that crap out, you'd be surprised at how much better you feel. Doesn't always work though because sometimes the greatest villain does come from within…"

"Did you apologize to him yet?" Blake suddenly spoke up, interrupting as she flipped a page in her book without glancing in their direction.

Weiss immediately flushed scarlet as she remembered the entire reason for being forced to come into the room. Naruto simply blinked as once more he was lost, and he turned back to Blake, who lay gingerly on her bed, seemingly calmed down and happily reading her book as she lay on her stomach. "Excuse me, what? Are you functional now or what? Do I need to call a repair service?"

"Functional. For now." Blake responded in short fragments as she was completely lost in her reading, her right foot occasionally kicking up as she seemed to enjoy herself. "Maybe later. Might need maintenance. Too much to deal with."

"Well, your humor is still intact." Weiss dryly commented before frowning as she had never heard Blake open up so much before or so quickly in the month and a half of living with her, and to see her casually do so to Naruto…

Irked her slightly. She knew she had her faults, as did Ruby and Yang, but to trust someone else that she wasn't even sharing a room with, despite doing that over the last few days, over the three of them, just made her feel horrible. Were they that inept as teammates? Or was she just not used to them and more comfortable around her own…

Yes, that had to be it! She was more comfortable around Velvet, too! It made too much sense! She didn't even know where Blake was from, much less where she had lived before. So she could have come from Menagerie, and of course, all she would have known there would be other faunus…

"Did you apologize?" Blake asked once more, her gaze not leaving her book as she traced the words of the page and was captivated by every word she read.

"No, it's not like it's that big of a deal. They're just ears…" Weiss muttered as she blushed once more and turned away, as Naruto suddenly realized what Blake was asking of Weiss. "And I wasn't in the right mind with that medication…"

"Excuse me, not a big deal?" Blake snapped her book closed, and her golden eyes burned brightly as she felt her anger rising once more, and she heatedly glared at the Schnee heiress as she picked herself up and sat on her bed. "Did I just hear you correctly? Did you really just say that?"

"Wait, hold on. I should be the one getting upset here, not you." Naruto countered defensively as Weiss was taken aback by her teammate's sudden ferocity in the relatively calm setting, unprepared to handle and deal with it. "So you can back off and go back to reading and not force yourself onto the situation, Blake."

"Dammit, Naruto! She needs to know better if she's intending to live outside the damn white walls of the safety of her mansion! And so do you, as you don't know shit either!" Blake hissed at him with narrowed eyes, and her gaze refocused on Weiss with renewed intensity. "Let me put it simply for you, ice queen! You think it's just okay for a drunk to grab a woman's ass, is that it?!"

"What, no?!" Weiss looked alarmed and leaned her head back instinctively despite the distance between her and Blake, the eye contact making her somewhat uncomfortable. "That is never acceptable, nor should it be! The same applies to a woman doing it to a man! Or anyone, quite frankly!"

"Then why is it not a big deal to grab and stroke an equal sensual body part to a faunus!" Blake yowled as she made her point clear. "I am so tired of hearing, 'It's not a big deal!' 'They're just ears or tails!' 'You show them off all the time, so it should be okay!' It's not the same thing! They are so damn sensitive and sensual to touch, maybe even more so than most human body parts!"

"And you can't just cover everyone's ears, tails, paws, fins, wings, or scales and make them inconspicuous! It's just natural body parts for those with hypersensitivity that they just have to deal with, along with a litany of other things that other humans just don't have to do regularly! Very few faunus can get away with concealing their features as they're so prevalent that even the attempt to hide them is so blatantly obvious it's not even worth the effort." Blake's bow twitched as she sadly looked away at that last portion.

"So, please, never say something like that again, Weiss." Blake pleaded with Weiss' compassion in her voice before her attention focused on Naruto. "And please do not defend anyone doing something of that nature again. You can't imagine how I felt when I saw you take action against Cardin and his flunkies for what they did to Velvet! What they did to her was sexual assault, even if the police will never, ever see it that way, and most faunus still falter in the fight against the Kingdoms in this climate even though they know they deserve better rights than what they have now."

"We deserve true equality, not lip service." Blake finished with a hushed whisper as she turned away, lay back on the bed, and sighed. "Sorry, didn't mean to get political. Something learned by example, I guess."

Everything was silent as Blake finished and said her peace, no one having even noticed the door had opened, and a few more individuals were standing there slack-jawed, unsure how to digest what Blake laid onto Naruto and Weiss.

Ruby wasn't sure what she was trying to jump into. All she knew was that she heard arguing and tried to rush in and stop it as she had enough of her team fighting after Blake scolded Yang. And hearing Blake go after Weiss, she knew something was off. Blake might have been in a sour mood already due to being sore from still recovering and Yang setting her off for some reason. She honestly wasn't sure why as she thought it was funny, and Blake was in on the act. And Weiss was…

Well, she was Weiss and could trigger any of the three of them from what she knew during their month and a half spent in a room with one another. Even if she was getting better in the last few weeks, she still rubbed her the wrong way a lot of the time, and it seemed to hold true for Blake too.

Yang came running and wasn't sure how to handle any of this. She already felt terrible, having discovered Blake's secret a while back in a freak accident. Sharing bathrooms was difficult, and she may have gotten a peek at her partner stepping into the shower and discovering what was under that bow of hers…

It explained quite a few of her eccentricities and odd moments a tad better. And she really felt guilty as she had poorly timed her laser pointer prank. It probably would have been funnier if Blake wasn't coming off of having multiple penetrating wounds. Despite the best care and regeneration Beacon medics could provide, they were still sore and painful.

But now she wasn't even sure what to do in this scenario, as she just wanted to make sure both her teammates were okay.

Velvet had rushed overhearing the discussion with her exceptional hearing beforehand, and as soon as Blake's voice started to rise, she knew she needed to try to intervene. But by the time she got into the room, Blake was full-on into her speech, and she just stood there and listened. And she couldn't help but agree…

Why were she and most faunus so weak and willing to go with the status quo? Why couldn't they fight back?

Being the only male in the group to respond, Ren couldn't help but feel a tad out of place but understood Blake's point. He had seen it everywhere he turned and could not help but feel that level of sadness. Just being there for what happened to Velvet and seeing Naruto step in recently showed him how the disparity didn't even care about Huntsman and Huntresses and was only pronounced for those who didn't have power.

If only…

"Is that why you wanted to set up all those mistletoes?! To try and get Naruto and Velvet together! As they definitely have chemistry after what happened!" Nora crashed the somber mood with her hyper energy as she came crashing in with the force of her hammer, knocking nearly everyone out of her way as she cleared her path to Blake's bed. "You should have just said so! I was setting them up to try and trap any old couple underneath with a surprise and get them to kiss! I would have thought it out better if that was the plan!"

Blake recoiled and nearly flipped off the bed at the sudden arrival of Nora, who slammed her hands down on the bed and looked excited at the thought despite the fact that they were attempting to conspire against two people currently in the room. Everyone else looked at the two, flabbergasted and confused by the switch of tone. And then there were two specific individuals suddenly highly annoyed at this, one raising his voice about it. "The fuck?! I think an explanation is in order!"

"I agree." Velvet slowly parted through the rest of the group, her ears stiff and on edge as Fox slowly entered the room, having sensed the blood lust coming from his partner and came in to calm her down. "I believe that for someone so passionately defending others' rights, you seem to have forgotten something fundamental about not forcing things upon others…"

"Oh shit, someone's dying," Fox muttered as he watched from the doorway before turning to his side after hearing a peculiar sound. "Is that popcorn? Professor?"

"Quite the show, isn't it?" Ozpin grinned before offering his popcorn to the young man, who, after a quick scan of Ada, could tell where the bowl was and took a few kernels for himself. "Ah, what I wouldn't give to be young again. To be carefree and full of wonder."

He smiled softly, hiding a veil of sorrow behind it as his chest rescinded with a sigh. If only his youth were ever peaceful.

"Velvet, it wasn't meant like that!" Blake hopped out of bed and used it to put it between her and the rabbit. "I had only wanted to kick start something because I thought I saw something there, and then I started to doubt it when I saw something else with Weiss…"

"Excuse me!" Weis jumped, incited at hearing her name dragged into this, and her icy blues focused on Blake. "Velvet, you take left, and I'll cut off her right! Naruto, make sure she doesn't escape through the middle!"

"On it." Naruto slowly stood from his meditative position as Velvet cut off any angle Blake could take, going to her left and over the bed, hopping over quickly as Weiss stalked her from the right of her, slowly making her way to it as Naruto made sure she didn't jump over.

"Wait, it doesn't have to end this way! Nora! She was in on it too!" Blake tried to deflect and protect herself as Velvet and Weiss slowly descended upon her, shrinking into herself.

"Uh-uh! I only put it up because I thought it was a good idea! I didn't know that was the plan! I just figured it out myself!" Nora stated, taking a big step away from the scene and used Ren to shield herself in case they came after her.

"Don't use me as your shield if this turns around on you. I had nothing to do with any of this," Ren commented and stepped to the side as Nora gave an embarrassed giggle.

Seeing Weiss and Velvet dangerously close and knowing that she wasn't supposed to try and flex her agility at this time and wasn't sure if she could out-match Velvet without her semblance, Blake began to nervously laugh at the two before her gaze landed on Yang in one last gasp attempt. "Oh, come on. Yang, partner? Save me?"

"Oh, where was my help the past few days, huh?!" Yang countered, her eyes flaring red in annoyance at Blake before she took a deep breath, closed her eyes to calm herself down, and opened her lilac eyes to glare at her partner. "Yeah, I screwed up just a little while ago, and I deserved you calling me out. But this, you deserve it just as much as I deserved those boots up my ass! Take your lumps!"

"Yeah! Nora and I had to take ours when this all started for breaking the chandelier Professor Goodwich was bringing into the dorms!" Ruby pumped her fist as she watched the events take place before her, having no remorse for her teammate in this situation, given everything that had happened and knowing nothing harmful was about to take place.

"If only two people weren't sprinting like absolute maniacs and paying attention, nothing would have happened. I'm never letting the two go off together again, even if it's for cooking where you both are considerably calmer." Yang twitched before she grinned as she looked at her baby sister. "Someone must have a fire extinguisher ready when you are near an oven."

"Like you are any better, Miss grease fire extraordinaire! Uncle Qrow had to help treat dad for weeks for all those burns he got from protecting you from that fire!" Ruby countered before hearing her sister turn and mumble something under her breath that sounded awful like… "What was that?! You want to go?! We can go!"

"Oh yeah! Let's do this!" Yang's eyes burned before she pushed Fox and Ozpin out of the way, with Ruby following after her big sister, cracking her knuckles and popping her neck as she left the room. "Best of seven series! I'm Soaring Ninja this time!"

"Drat! I was planning to pick him because Uncle Qrow always picks him and wins!" Ruby complained loudly from the other side as what sounded like a game was started up.

"No! Don't leave me! Help me!" Blake cried in horror as she tried to scramble over the bed only to be pushed back by Naruto gently on his shoulders, hissing at him as he did. "No! You were supposed to save me! I only wanted to make everyone happy!"

"Well, time to return the favor, Blake!" Velvet popped on her right before grinning and locked her arms around her in a warm embrace as Weiss did the same at a slightly lower angle. "Group hug! Feel our combined social love for you!"

Weiss suddenly had a wicked glint in her eyes as she turned to Naruto and tilted her head, motioning him over. "I've got to pay you back somehow for the mistletoe! Get on in here and make her suffer by putting us through that embarrassment!"

"No! Get away from me! I want to be left alone!" Blake warned as she saw Naruto grin as he moved to join and squeeze himself into the hug. "Traitor! I hate all of you!"

He only grinned as he booped her on the nose, which narrowed her eyes towards him. "Maybe you shouldn't try to set people up, Ms. Antisocial. It could be possible that we all have our agendas and want to do our own things, hm? Now it's time to eat your just desserts and set up the grand finale."

"What?" Blake's bow perked in horror seeing Naruto's grin become devilish, and dread began to settle in the pit of her stomach.

"Ruby! Nora! Group hug! Blake's the target!"

"Group hug! Time out, Yang!" Ruby bolted into the room as Nora had already figured it out and lunged into the pile with deadly force, nearly knocking everyone overseeing the group, her eyes widening to pink hearts. "Yay! Leave it to me! I'll finish the job!"

Flashing over with rose petals flying everywhere, jumping to the pile and making Blake's life even more miserable, latching onto her and rubbing her cheek into Blake's face. "Feel my special attack, Blake! Rose Crush of Loving Doom!"

"No!" Was heard throughout the farming village.

---

"This is quite unusual, I do say." Ozpin looked quizzically at the scene before him, his lips pursed before sighing as he put down his hand of cards. "I must say I'm not used to losing this often. But I do admit that poker is not my game of choice, but our options are quite limited out here."

"Knight to C-six to take your Queen!" Naruto barked on the other side of the room as Ozpin leaned back while playing Fox, Jaune, and Yang in the hand of Poker.

"And Bishop to E-six, checkmate." Ozpin casually ended their game of invisible chess as he surprisingly took a sip of the punch they had made for the small party they had been trying to hold for the past two weeks, finally holding it on the eve of the new year. "That was a nice attempt in this game, but again, you were too aggressive. The queen, while valuable, means nothing if it costs you the victory. So I merely used mine to snare you into a trap and catch you unaware in mine."

"Best of seven now? I do have a three-to-one lead at the moment." Ozpin questioned, giving a humorous gaze at the annoyed fox as his ears twitched.

Taking a deep breath, Naruto rolled his eyes and thought better of it for now. "Yeah, yeah. Maybe later. I need to rethink my strategies and plans of attack. Chess differs from shogi despite its similarities, and it takes time to learn the nuances."

Oz only nodded as he sighed as he took his new hand from Yang, not liking his odds so far in this game of bluffs and deceit. "Fair enough. That first win was an eye opener. I wasn't prepared for your level of play, considering your lack of knowledge of the game. It caught me off guard, but in fairness, shogi is similar and the more difficult game to master."

"You know how to play shogi?" Ren perked up as he and Yatsu were having a small discussion on the side, his interest caught at that as it seemed Daichi's was as well. "It's kind of funny. Yatsu got me on the gift exchange, and that's what he got me. If you are up for a game, I'm willing to grab the board and bring the board over if you want a game or two."

Yatsu nodded in agreement, seeing Naruto was rather fidgety and looking around even though he was sitting around with his friends, kind of ignoring the conversation Coco, Pyrrha, and Velvet were having while Ruby and Nora were off on their own, playing a new video game Nora got with Glynda moderating the evening's events, smiling as everything seem to be pleasant and calm. Something it obviously had not been, and suddenly, as soon as they had arrived…

It was odd.

It was almost as if he was looking for something, anything else to do. Then again, the other two in the group seemed very similar, with Blake ignoring everything, reading her new book off in the corner, still mad at everyone, and Weiss didn't seem to know what to really do.

"You seem kind of tense. A game might help you focus and help you see with clarity after you take a moment from it to relax. Once the game is over, you can see things more clearly after." Yatsu added, pointing out what he noticed about the blonde.

Frowning, as that sounded very similar to what a certain lazy cloud gazer would tell him when he made him play shogi, Naruto did note he was somewhat off. He wanted to be out doing something. Spending time with friends was fine and all, but currently, he had so much he needed to work on. While his clones were doing fine with patrol and even substituted out with Fox and Velvet so they could be at the party, with everything that happened over the past few weeks and hearing that voice…

He needed to be doing more. He had a semblance to work on. He had begun working on his chakra natures again upon unleashing the Grand Fireball technique. He felt the intensity for the first time since he had been here on Remnant. He recognized just how much stronger his fire affinity had become. While he had been working on all his natures and mixing them, he needed to get back to basics first if they were much stronger than he recalled…

Then there was his sealing that he promised the pervert he would get to as he left his life's work to him, sealed away with him, and kept him on his person. Luck smiled upon him, for it was on his person and whatever it was that transported him upon his death kept whatever was on him with him. So he had that but man…

Learning seals without knowing what they did and without a mentor was difficult. And no resources to help him along made his life miserable, and it was by sheer willpower that he made any progress.

"Play the damn game, Naruto!" Blake hissed from her corner, her eyes lifting from her book and glaring at the fox as she gritted her teeth. "If I have to try and pretend to be social after what everyone did to me yesterday, by the Brothers, you are going to stay here and suffer with me too! No more whatever it was you were doing when I found you. Party and have fun! No forest fires!"

"It was pretty cool to watch him breathe fire, in any case. It was like, whoosh! Flames concentrated in a massive ball of fire!" Ruby excitedly jittered as she came upon the scene with Blake and beamed brightly as she bounced in her seat. "It was awesome! I totally wish I could do something like that! There's got to be a way to replicate that with Dust! Weiss! I need all your red Dust!"

"Not on your life!" Weiss flinched back and looked horrified before snapping at the so-called leader of her team. "I was thinking I might be kind to everyone once we got back as I know Dust supplies are running short and the prices are getting high and lending everyone a little bit of my supply, but for you…"

"Not after that comment! You'll burn the whole forest down! At least Naruto was doing his stuff in clearing nothing around and being careful about it! I can't trust you!"

"Please, the people of this village do a lot of logging during the winter, so let's not take out their second source of income. Enough tragedy has befallen here. Let's not add to it." Ozpin commented as he took another sip of the punch and swirled his cup. "Ms. Rose. Dust is a tool and should never be used so wantonly and should always be done in a controlled environment, so he specifically went into a clearing, had several trees felled, and then put his techniques into practice."

Seeing Ruby deflate, the smug smile on Weiss' face, and a satisfied nod from Glynda, hearing him discipline one of his students, Ozpin took a moment to let his words sink in before continuing the lesson. "But, in theory, you are correct. With enough red Dust and the proper application, you could do something similar with a concentrated burst. I believe Ms. Schnee's use of combustion fireballs with her weapon and application of her aura is proof enough of that principle. However, the intensity seems to be the real issue, as I don't think I've ever seen Dust-heated fire sear quite so efficiently. It takes quite a powerful application of Dust and semblance to melt an Apathy."

Instantly perking back up, hearing that her idea was validated, Ruby felt better and brightly beamed again. And Ozpin took a sip, returning to his game of poker, having felt accomplished in his duty seeing the rose bloom ever brighter.

Glynda's right eye twitched before she exhaled, knowing Oz could be impossible sometimes. She then had to repress her desire to laugh, seeing the annoyed expression on the Schnee's face. To hear Ruby be told off and then be validated in the same statement must have been a bruise to her ego. And then to be used as part of an example. A grin escaped from the corner of her lips as she continued to moderate and watch the party. She and Oz had decided to stay behind, feeling responsible for having sent the group out here on a mission on the holidays. And with so few having remained in Beacon, it didn't hurt to leave Port in charge for the remainder of the vacation.

Some time away from the academy wasn't necessarily a bad thing. And getting to know her students was a nice change of pace. Now, why weren't they sleeping in gender-assigned cabins…

Although hearing about Blake and Zwei was a funny story. And on some level having all three faunus in the same room did make sense, and keeping it as team-oriented as possible…

She shook her head. There were some benefits to how it was run but also some downsides. She sighed. There was no one right way, and she knew it. Seeing Ren return with the shogi board from the other cabin, she couldn't help but smile, seeing the other boys find a simple place at the table to set up. Everyone seemed to be…

"Weiss," Glynda noted that the Schnee heiress was peculiar, not participating in anything, except Blake, who was willingly away from everyone reading and only seemed to be present yet kept stealing glances over towards either Naruto or towards Blake, so she was curious. "You don't seem to be involved in anything yourself. Is something the matter?"

"Oh, I'm sorry!" Pyrrha immediately caught the cue as she was sitting by the Schnee heiress and almost frowned as she had practically forgotten she was there, having not said anything during their entire conversation, which was rather odd. "I don't think we meant to leave you out of the conversation."

Flushing and looking away as she was sitting at the middle of the table in the middle of the conversational group, just not taking part in it as it was nothing she was really interested in anyways. It was a simple small chat about shows she had never heard about. It wasn't like she wasn't interested. She just never had a chance to watch anything like them growing up. It was always operas or ballets. The most expensive movies and performances. Dramatic theater.

She didn't know what the shows were. All her knowledge was focused on marketing and commercials. How to focus them and use them effectively. Ironically, she knew more about Pyrrha than anything else. Having discovered she was a four-time Mistral tournament champion because she was used in their advertisements all the time for Pumpkin Pete's cereal, it was why when she saw her here at Beacon of all places and heard the rumors about having to pair up with someone she concentrated on her.

It was the person she had any knowledge of due to her being a part of sponsorships, not due to her actual skills, which she knew were formidable. They kind of had to be to win a tournament four years in a row…

"It's okay. I don't know anything about TV shows or movies, for that matter. Never watched one, as the only reason ours ever came on was to stay up to date with the news. We only attend the most prestigious showings of movies I doubt hardly anyone else has even heard of. I know all the ins and outs about making commercials effective and targeting key demographics with them..." Weiss meekly commented before she started to pick up what she had learned, but she stopped, frowning as she didn't want to talk about any of that.

It reminded her of the reason why she wanted to get away from Atlas.

"Uh, right then," Coco shared a look with Velvet and gave a light, hesitant laugh. "But fair enough. We don't get enough time for shows nowadays. I can barely keep up with all of the good stuff that keeps getting brought up in the cafeteria. I have one guilty pleasure, and that's about all I have time for with school, schoolwork, training, and heading out on jobs. Then trying to have a life outside of that, let me tell you, it is something else. Not to mention as in-training Huntsman and Huntresses, we're kind of celebrities in our own right, and the more we accomplish, the bigger followings we get, so it makes things tough to venture out at times. And that's going to explode here soon with the Vytal festival."

"Right, Vale is holding it this cycle since Mistral held the last." Weiss perked up as it was something she was invested in and was part of the reason she had picked Beacon as her academy of choice.

The last three winners of the festival had all come from Beacon, and in the past twenty years, it had become the most dominant academy in Vytal tournament history. Ever since Professor Ozpin had taken the role of headmaster…

"Isn't there going to be new rule changes instituted this year?" Pyrrha asked, quite interested in this topic herself, and her emerald eyes shone as she hoped to be able to take part this year even though historically, first years rarely participated and four years graduated before the tournament officially started.

So it was almost always upon the second and third years students to represent the academies.

"Quite unfortunately so," Ozpin spoke with a rare scowl as he folded and glanced over at Fox momentarily, gauging the young man before sighing and turning his attention to the conversation at the kitchen table. "It seems after several tournaments where the winner was from Beacon and many in the last two decades, the Kingdom's themselves got involved and decided on how to try and more fairly balance the tournament. I fear in their minds they thought it made their Kingdoms look weaker if their Academy wasn't doing so well, and only Beacon and Vale looked too strong in the public's eyes."

"How they forgot we're in a time of relative peace and focusing on protecting one another from the threat of the Grimm…" Ozpin muttered and trailed off at the end, tapping his cane against his chair as he saw Fox win another hand. "How are you doing that? Is Ada scanning the cards for you, or are you going in blindly and bluffing your way through this? Either way, your poise is incredible. I can't tell when you're bluffing or not."

"Wouldn't you like to find out?" Fox grinned, hearing he had the upper hand against the headmaster as Yang dealt another hand, twitching as this was starting to become a massacre in this game.

"It feels like I'm playing Qrow in cards, and I don't like this." Yang bitterly spoke as she dealt and sighed, seeing her hand. "All right, I can work with this."

"Can you? I thought the same with my last hand, but these two outplay us every time." Jaune commented as he scratched his head and sighed. "I'm just folding here and now. I've got nothing worth trying to build on or go for, and three of you can tear me apart with your bluffs and calls."

Yang bristled but stayed quiet, determined to prove the quitter wrong. She would win this round!

Ignoring the poker game and rolling her eyes, Glynda decided to carry on for Oz. "Indeed, Ms. Nikos, there will be revised rules, and it will change how we approach the Vytal festival from now on if the public likes how the tournament turns out. Unfortunately, more fighting most likely means they'll enjoy more, so I fear it is here to stay."

"There will now be three separate tournament brackets based on how the tournament fights have worked in the past." Glynda continued explaining as she perched her glasses upwards as they slid ever so slightly on her nose. "In the first round, it was always a team four-on-four battle. The next round filtered into a duos round with the remaining members chosen by the winning teams. And finally, it ended with the final eight in a single one-on-one competition to crown the champion."

"I believe this is where a lot of the issues came from as Beacon, as of recent years, had become so dominant in the team and duos rounds that we had nearly three to four members always reach the finals while each other academy had two at most. So this year, they changed the rules to where there are now simply four-on-four, duos, and a singles tournament each, with the catch being that the team selected for the four-on-four is ineligible for the doubles and singles tournament, and anyone in the doubles tournament cannot participate in singles action."

"Every academy sends four teams, four doubles partners, and four singles competitors, significantly less than the eight teams originally allowed to compete, but more fights will occur. Therefore, the tournament will begin nearly a month early on the first day of July. Unfortunately, it will cut classes short this year as we'll have to focus entirely on the tournament and defense." Glynda sighed as Coco tilted her sunglasses down at her and narrowed her eyes.

"Wait, what?" Coco bit back a snarl as this was the first she had heard about the changes. "That totally changes our game plan! You told us at the end of last year we were guaranteed a spot in the Vytal Festival team with how well we performed?"

"That doesn't change. Team CFVY is one of the best in Beacon, and I would not dream of keeping the four of you off the big stage." Ozpin announced before he mused, seeing he had lost yet another hand, bringing his hand to his chin and rubbed it while Yang gritted her teeth in frustration. "The conundrum came from how to place your team with how they set up the tournaments. However, seeing how well your team works together, I feel that you would represent Beacon best within the four-on-four division."

"As such, you are the only team so far to be chosen at this time to represent Beacon in the Vytal festival this far due to this unusual change in format as we have to reshuffle how we approach our selection, and everything and everyone is available to be chosen. Including first years." Ozpin finished before sighing as he leaned back in his chair and shrugged his shoulders. "I concede. You have bested me this day, for poker is not my game of choice. It is for a certain friend of mine, however, if you ever get the chance to play him."

Pyrrha's emerald shone brightly, and Weiss seemed excited at the prospect, the former beaming at what she heard. "So, does that mean we have a chance to be chosen this year?"

"As long as your grades clear, you stay out of trouble, and you can prove yourself in the arena, yes." Glynda sternly warned as she saw quite a few excited faces amongst the younger class and refrained from sighing. "There is also the small fact that you are competing against everyone else in the academy for limited spots. Previously, first years hardly would have been considered with eight teams. There are even fewer spots overall, which will make it even more difficult. You will have to work extra hard to improve your teamwork and skills if you want any chance of being selected."

"For you, Ms. Nikos, that shouldn't be an issue." Glynda gave a warm smile, and then she scowled as she turned towards a particular blonde leader of her team. "However, for others…"

"Ruby! Blake! Yang!" Weiss interrupted Glynda's thought process and took charge as it didn't seem Ruby was planning to, being too focused on whatever she was doing with Nora and stood up from her chair, standing as close as she could to the center of where her three teammates were all at so each could hear her. "I know we've had our differences since our team was formed, and it has been rough on all of us…"

"Says the Ice Queen starting half the problems…" Yang muttered before frowning as a small part of her realized she, too, was at fault, and she really didn't like that.

"But I believe we can do this! We can work together and prove we are good enough to take four slots easily!" Weiss built momentum, fire burning brightly in her eyes as she tried to motivate her team. "After classes start back up, as soon as the day ends, we spend an hour or two practicing and training and getting used to each other's moves and abilities! Spend more time with each other getting to know each other! It's a little bit of a sacrifice, but it's something we can easily do!"

"Heck, I'm down for that!" Yang grinned and cracked her knuckles, and popped her neck. "I was born to fight, and you guys are starting to grow on me. And we're teammates anyway, so let's show them what we got!"

"Oh yeah, we can do this! We put our heads together. Nothing can stop us!" Ruby pumped her fist, putting down her control and happily jumping up before waving over to Yang. "Yang, tag in! Nora is being mean to me! I can't get a punch in, and it's been like ten games! It's been a brutal massacre!"

"What! No one beats up my helpless sister in video games but me!" Yang growled, jumping over and sliding into the seated position by Nora, taking up the control, and her eyes narrowed and focused while Ruby grinned and hoped to watch Nora lose. "You are going down!"

"I am the Queen of this Castle! I am unstoppable!" Nora roared back as buttons began to press and be mashed on their controllers.

"Kick her butt, sis… No, stop! Oh, the horror! It's a bloodbath! "Throw in the towel already!" Ruby yelled as she pumped her fist in the air before covering her mouth with both hands.

"Shut up, Ruby! You're distracting me!" Yang barked at her sister as she was being destroyed in a game known as Arcadia Fighters…

Weiss simply blinked at the scene that unfolded in that corner in front of her. She decided to ignore what was currently happening with them as they had agreed to her terms, and putting up with their eccentricities any longer might break her more than she was willing to be broken. So all that was left was…

"No." Blake caught Weiss off guard as she turned to face the bow-headed girl, who didn't even take her eyes off reading Cruel Beauty and almost made her stumble back.

That answer was not what she expected. However, recovering, Weiss almost snarled as she took a few steps toward her teammate. "And why not? This is a great opportunity for us! To prove ourselves! To show the world…"

"And that right there is why I have no interest." Blake finally tore her golden eyes from the pages and met the icy blues of the Schnee heiress. "Whatever grand design you have in your head, I want no part of. To me, exposure is the last thing I want or need. I will help everyone train and work together, as Ruby and Yang are all for it. Help keep Ruby and Yang from failing as their grades haven't been the best, and their studying habits are horrible, as you've noticed…"

"Hey, I resemble that!" Yang angrily yelled before frowning at the screen in front of her. "Best two of three?"

"No, I think you might want to pay attention…" Nora, for once, was the voice of reason and put her controller down and winced, sensing that tension was rising in the room.

"What do you mean you have no interest?" Weiss raised her eyebrow and frowned at Blake and was confused at her teammate's reluctance to have a chance to take part in one of the most significant national events in the world. "I mean, I understand any hesitation about performing on the big stage and in front of so many cameras and people. That's a big deal, and for someone like you..."

"Being an introvert has nothing to do with it! I've dealt with far worse and been perfectly fine with all that! I don't want to be exposed, so he can't find me..." Blake hissed and narrowed her golden eyes at Weiss before her face became rigid as she suddenly realized what she had said, and the look on Weiss' face said it all.

Everyone's eyes were on her as her body tensed. She had nearly let slip why she was here. The actual reason she had come to Beacon. It wasn't so noble even if she at one time wanted nothing more than to help people like this when she was younger. It was why she trained and honed her skills.

They were meant to be used for this purpose, not what she used them for.

"Blake?" Velvet slowly strolled away from the table, her head tilted as she timidly approached her friend as she sensed something was off about her.

And Ruby and Yang were approaching in a slow, soothing manner, Ruby trying to use her youthful enthusiasm to calm the situation. "You can talk if you need to…"

"It's okay. We're here for…" Yang started as she tried to comfort her partner when Blake strolled past her, ignoring her.

"You do not know anything. Any of you. And for your sake, it's better that you don't know." Blake said sullenly as she stopped momentarily as she passed Yang, dropping her head and bow depressing before walking away and slamming the bedroom door shut behind her.

Ozpin grimaced before rubbing his right hand on his temple. "I'm afraid this might not have been the most appropriate place or time to bring up Vytal selections or what was happening. I made a critical error in judgment in letting that information slip."

"Um… Naruto, where'd you go?" Ren suddenly spoke, blinking at the mysterious vanishment of the fox in front of him as they were playing a game of shogi which he was surprisingly quite thoroughly dominated in. "That is strange…"

Suddenly, a small smirk appeared on the corner of Ozpin's face as he noted two missing coats and boots. "Maybe you are the one that defies Fate after all…"

"Let's see where this will lead, shall we?"

---

Storming into the room, her footsteps heavy, Blake threw herself onto the bed she had been using since her arrival at the village onto her stomach and buried her face in the pillow. The pillow muffled her scream as she used it to smother herself.

Memories flashed in her mind and made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. Images of everything she saw. Her parents were brutally murdered at his hands. All her newly made friends were slaughtered as they incurred his wrath for standing in his way. And even someone as indomitable as him was cut in…

Her entire body froze as her bow twitched, hearing footsteps behind her. It couldn't be. Was she found?! Not now?! She didn't have time to flee! Not in the middle of this place! There was no escape here! How did he find her here, of all places?!

Feeling something warm flutter over her before two objects smack her in her round behind, making her hiss in annoyance, Blake rounded as she suddenly realized this was not the intruder she thought it was, only to see the second to last person in her thoughts and her eyes widened at what was thrown at her.

It was her snow boots and winter coat.

"Let's take a walk," Naruto stated as he walked over the window seal, inspecting it for a moment as he slid on a pair of boots. "The sun is setting, and it looks nice out. Should be nice and calming."

Glaring at the fox, Blake shook her head. She knew what game he was playing and wasn't falling for it. "I don't want to talk about it. It's not something I can. Not with you. Not with anyone."

Naruto shrugged as he turned to Blake and gave her a warm, comforting smile. "Who said anything about talk? I said, 'Let's take a walk.' So get your boots and coat on, come and join me for a relaxing stroll away from everyone, and enjoy the sun setting."

"If you don't want to talk, that's fine. I'm not trying to make you. You're not ready for that, and it's self-evident, but something is wrong, and you need someone around whether you know it or not, so let's get out here for a bit." Naruto suggested as he slid on his winter cloak and grinned as he met Blake's gaze. "And hey, if you don't want everyone to know we left, we could use the window here. Avoid all the awkward staring and attempted apologies for a few hours anyways. Pretty sure you might want to get dressed and moving if you want to avoid those too."

"I can sense your team coming in this direction."

Gazing into Naruto's cerulean eyes as he spoke, finding them oddly calming, Blake sighed and slid her boots and coat on before hopping off her bed and making her way to the window. And as Naruto cracked and held it open for her, she gave him a half-hearted glare. "No staring at my ass as I go through."

"No promises. It's a big buxom target and right in my face." Naruto grinned as Blake flushed in embarrassment before she elbow-checked the fox and grumbled as she climbed through, rolling on the other side.

"Pervert. Show him a thing or two. Thinks he can best me. Wait until I'm in a better mood now that I'm out of heat..." Blake muttered as Naruto came through and had a clone close the window on the other side. "Thank you, but I'm not willing to spill anything. It's much too personal…"

Naruto nodded in understanding as he walked alongside her and the two slowly began to march through the snow. "That's fine. Whenever you are ready, if that time ever comes, you can talk. Until then, let's just enjoy a short time away from the others. Lord knows I could use some time away from everyone else. I'm starting to feel a little crazy myself. Can't imagine how you deal with them all day."

"It's a talent." Blake laughed as she smiled upon hearing that and felt the tiniest amount of relief lift from her as she walked beside Naruto.

Taking a deep breath of the blistering cold air, she sighed, content as they walked and looked at the setting sun. No words were needed as they walked for what seemed to be forever. She had no clue how long this walk had lasted, but the sun was nearly set when all was said and done.

She needed this. She felt way better after getting some time away from everyone. And for some reason, she felt the most comfortable…

When he was around…

"Naruto," Blake smiled as she looked at the setting sun as they walked and felt a renewed strength within her, knowing what she had to do even if it meant dealing with her team and mainly giving to their needs, even if she wasn't happy about it before turning her full attention to the person she was standing beside. "Happy New Year. And thank you. I needed this."

"Tis my pleasure. It's the least I can do," Naruto gave a welcoming smile, seeing and feeling Blake was far less stressed and looked more like her usual self. "I only wish I could do more. Just know I am here if you ever need me and if you need to talk. And a happy New Year to you too."

"Now, let's get back before the others send a search party wondering where the hell we ended up. I think Weiss is probably about to blow a gasket. Ruby's probably panicking, bouncing everywhere, and Yang's most likely burning her aura dry." Naruto grinned and scratched the back of his neck while chuckling.

Blake only giggled as she brought her hands to her mouth and nodded, envisioning the heiress losing her cool, and turned around and walked in stride. However, as she did, an odd thought came across her mind, and she flinched and shook her head.

This was not right. He deserved better than her. Someone like Velvet was perfect for him despite his weird reaction to her. Or even Weiss, as at least she seemed fixable…

He didn't deserve someone as defective and dangerous as she was…

She would only bring ruination to him and her friends. She needed to run soon, but how? How could she escape? He was there just now, so…

"Blake, you okay?" Naruto's voice caught her off guard and snapped Blake out of her thoughts. "Something troubling you?"

"Nothing! I'm good." Blake panicked as if she swore he knew where her thoughts had taken her, but shook her head and smiled, trying to show him that she was okay. "Still caught up on what happened earlier, but I'm getting over it, I swear."

She wanted to run. But she didn't think she could. Not around him. At least not now, knowing he considered her a friend. And he needed them. So she would stay for a while longer. But only because of that. Once everything was better…

Blake needed to flee before Adam came for her.

Before he torched everything to the ground to find her. Or worse yet, if he ever found out about Ilia...

Frowning as he knew that wasn't true, feeling an entirely distinct emotion building within her that caught him unaware, Naruto bit his lip. Something was eating away and building up within her, tearing her apart. But he couldn't do anything about it as she didn't want to talk. So putting on his old fake smile, Naruto tried to appease her by flicking his ears and tilting his head. "All right then. Let me know if you need anything. And like I said if there is anything you need…"

Seeing her give him an endearing look before she turned and walked in stride with him, his face straightened, and he made a mental note. Naruto was going to keep an extra eye on Blake for the foreseeable future.

Something was wrong. But for now, he could offer his support with a smile.

"I'm here for you."

---

Course Stabilizing...

Returning to Original Route.

New Route Detected...

Analyzing New Shift...

Satisfactory.

Initializing...

The Summer Maiden.

---

Tis the end of the Fated Holidays.

At last, I hope you enjoyed the cut content.

It was a blast to come back to Volume I.

Now for those reading, here is a treat for the new year for you.

It might not be out yet, so just be patient.

It will be there shortly either on New Year's Eve or Day.

A beta opening for a future story of mine.

A RWBY/Persona 5 Cross over, From the Shadows of Your Heart.

Hope you enjoy, Happy New Years!