Fortune Snow Chapter 2 – Pyrrha Nikos
Pyrrha Nikos?
Ruhe Stiert recognised the name as one well known. He had seen it printed finely in almost half the newspapers he had read through most of his life. Her name was a big deal indeed, according to the papers she had apparently been the winner of the Mistral regional tournament four years in a row. Ruhe would have entered himself if his schedule didn't occupy any time he wasn't using to train.
Perhaps this is a fight to be taken seriously
His eyes stalk his new opponent as she takes her position opposing him on the arena floor. Slowly and methodically, he unclips the briefcase from his back and holds it down by his side, eying his opponent carefully. She takes her stance.
Good stance
Yes, he would be using his weapon for this one. He slipped his overcoat off and tossed it to the side, revealing his bare arms.
He flicks his thumb and pushes down on the button built into the handle of the briefcase, the device emanating a small click as it began to transform.
The metallic structure wrapped around his right arm, forming a strong steel-like shield that perfectly fit the build of his arm, as though moulded for it, stretching until his shoulder joint. Its chrome-like appearance shimmers in the light and it seems as though it is a liquid, jittering slightly as it rests about the form of his arm. The metal shifts again, this time with a water-like viscosity, and a fifteen inch blade forms, protruding from the upper side of his wrist. He brushes his left arm against the liquid metal substance and a circular shield quickly forms in his hand of similar design and size to Pyrrha's own. The liquids solidify into a glossy metal.
Modal his right arm is christened. Regen is his left.
He cracks his shoulders with a shrug and lowers himself into his casual fighting stance, mirroring his unarmed stance with his shield held in front of his and his blade just behind his back and to the side.
He waits for the buzzer to sound. As it does, neither combatant makes a move. The crowd waits in silent anticipation, eager and keen for the battle ready to ensue.
Ruhe watches his opponent and she is stiff as a statue, motionless.
She won't make the first move. The xiphos looks mechanical.
Slowly, Ruhe advances, shuffling his feet forward cautiously. The steel soles of his boots never leave the ground and he advances prepared for any attack.
She did not choose to make any ranged attack, Ruhe observes, perhaps she has no ranged capabilities?
His slow advance quickly breaks into a run and his blade slams against Pyrrha's shield, the girl counterattacking with a quick stab that was blocked by Regen. She followed with a spinning slash that was blocked by Modal, Ruhe following with a hardy shove from Regen that pushed Pyrrha back.
She went on the offensive now, tossing her shield at Ruhe whilst Miló shifts into its javelin form. Ruhe ducks the shield toss and Miló extends, jabbing at Regen, propelled by the recoil of the weapon's gun form. He swats away the extended javelin and thrusts Modal forward, the blade erupting into a spear of liquid metal and flying straight for his opponent. She rolls just in time to evade the stream and catches her shield after it had rebounded off one of the far walls.
Ruhe wastes little time and tosses Regen, Pyrrha jumping to narrowly avoid it and the shield exploding into liquids as it collides with the ground. Her jump sends her towards Ruhe and he attempts to swat her out of the air with Modal as it reforms onto a thirty inch blade in his hand, though she blocks the blow with her shield and Modal glances off. Ruhe drops Modal to the floor and it forms a pile of liquid. He uses his hands to redirect Miló's aim away from his head, just glancing over his shoulder as Pyrrha brings her shield in to collide with Ruhe's face. He raises his arms just in time and they take the brunt of the impact, sending him sliding backwards before he rolls backwards onto his feet.
Modal slithers across the ground, reforming on his arm, back to its traditional fifteen inch blade and Regen reforming in his left hand. Mumbles spread about the crowd.
Alright then… I am entertained
He swings Modal in an arc and it breaks, creating a crescent of liquid flying towards Pyrrha. She jumps to evade but Ruhe had anticipated the move, tossing Regen just before she jumped. Regen hit its mark and exploded, sending the girl flying back. She recovered quickly, just in time to block a strike from the reformed Modal and counter with a swipe, blocked by the reformed Regen. He kicked her shield, sending her skidding back a few feet and rammed his fist against the ground, sending a small tidal wave of liquid metal towards his opponent. She blocked with Akoúo̱, but the shield is unable to block the entire wave and her aura drops into the yellow. Ruhe smiles inwardly at the effectiveness of Modal Regen.
Her aura absorbing the true effect behind the attack, Pyrrha tosses Miló in its javelin form, her movements obscured behind her shield. Caught up in his internal gloating and with his vision of his opponent obscured by Akoúo̱, Ruhe is unable to completely dodge the javelin, the projectile spiking his shoulder and dropping his aura by a tenth. The impact sends him tumbling back and surprises him.
What? How did I let that hit?
His thoughts are broken when Akoúo̱ comes flying at him, Ruhe raising Regen just in time to block it, though the kinetic force shatters the shield and Regen scatters about the floor in liquid form. Without blinking, Pyrrha is all over her opponent, slashing Miló left and right whilst Ruhe blocks each attack with relative ease. The girl mixes in a couple kicks to her barrage which are blocked by either a raised leg or his free left arm. As Regen reforms in his left hand, Pyrrha changes her targeting to his left side, hoping to immobilise his arm and take Regen out of commission.
Recognising the change in tactics, Ruhe directs Regen to form a shield around his arm, just as Modal had formed on his right arm. He used his reinforced arm to block a couple attacks. Pyrrha's tactics changed again, this time going for his legs. Unfortunately for her, Ruhe's leg movements were too fast to keep up with and she often found herself striking and kicking at nothing but air.
Ruhe uses the steel sole of his boot to deflect Miló twice with extreme force, the second rebound staggering Pyrrha slightly as she almost failed to keep grip of her weapon. Seeing an opening, Ruhe strikes at her sword arm and succeeds in disarming her, though she manages to quickly create istance between herself and her opponent with a powerful shove from Akoúo̱.
She quickly reclaims Miló from the ground and raises her shield to block a flying front kick. The kick is delivered with aggressive force, shoving Pyrrha back a full meter as she moves to defend herself from a volley of kicks. One kick succeeds to disarm her again, though only tossing it into the air momentarily and allowing Pyrrha to block another kick with her forearm and catch Miló as it falls. She sidesteps a strong front kick and strikes at his idle leg, only for Ruhe to jump and deliver a swift jumping spinning back kick that sends her rolling back.
Pyrrha recovers quicker than anticipated and Miló shifts into its rifle form, firing off a volley of bullets at Ruhe. Regen shifts to form a barrier and the bullets are lost in the liquid. Regen reforms into its shield form and blocks multiple swipes from Pyrrha before Ruhe uses Modal to disarm her, dousing the weapon in liquids and sending it twirling to the edge of the arena. A barrage of kicks is blocked with Akoúo̱, but Ruhe's persistent attacks disallow Pyrrha the time to retrieve her weapon with her polarity semblance.
She blocks a kick with her arm for the second time and her aura drops into the lower halves of the yellow section, and she uses Akoúo̱'s edge to strike at Ruhe, though she misses wildly as the Stiert displays an inhuman amount of speed to dodge the attack. Her shield out of place, she catches an elbow to the temple and a boot to the gut.
An impressive display initially, but still a feeble attempt.
"Enough!" Goodwitch called the match as Ruhe pressed Modal to her throat, a boot on her shield arm and his other on her midsection. Ruhe did not know what her semblance was nor did he see anything that could possibly account for one during their spar.
Is she holding back?
Either way, after Ruhe was able to efficiently analyse Pyrrha's fighting style, the match was already lost for her.
He removed his boots from her and Modal Regen shifted back into its briefcase form. He didn't offer her his hand. She wasn't good enough.
"You have had your sparring matches, Mister Stiert," Goodwitch's voice was curt and harsh, "Now I would suggest you leave."
Before departing, he looked at Pyrrha who was slowly rising from a knee and to her feet.
"Keep training." He offered his simple advice.
He was far from satisfied. The first four medieval-looking fellows had been a cakewalk (and he had managed to send Cardin, their leader, to the infirmary to fix up his nose) and Pyrrha Nikos, whilst living up to her name, failed to fulfil the values he looked for in a fighter. She wasn't fast enough for him.
Ruhe found himself a bench to rest on for the time being, a place to vent his anger and disappear off into his own world. He closed his eyes and removed himself from reality once more, envisioning himself in nothing but space.
It was a fine escape. Focusing on himself allowed him to contemplate decisions and events, focus in battle, and reduce his frustration. It was something he would do often, just find a quiet place to sit down and wander about in nothingness as time quickly passed by outside. It was his form of meditation.
He reflected on the battle he had just concluded mere minutes ago, replaying the event over in his head. His vision turned grey (as it would always do when envisioning the past) and he saw the battle carry itself out a second time. He saw himself move through his own eyes without having to lift his limbs. He analysed the matchup, picking out mistakes and possibilities. There were few noticeable errors on both combatants' halves which left Ruhe disappointed. Furthermore, the Stiert could learn nothing from the experience which had left him further irritated.
Most unproductive.
Something poked him on the shoulder, forcing out of his dream state and back into the real world. His eyelids shot open and his eyeballs immediately darted to the right, where he had felt the sharp sensation.
"Who are you and what do you want?" He spurted out quickly; one of the 'greetings' his body was programmed to automatically evoke whenever he was contacted by someone unfamiliar to him. It took a moment before his vision was able to clear; still adapting to the new light level he was exposed to outside of his dream reality. Somebody had seated themselves beside him, he could see that much, but he could hardly make out any other details. All else he could see was red… quite a lot of red and a softer colour he couldn't quite pinpoint yet.
As his vision cleared, he came to recognise the person's figure and defining details. Red hair, bronze armour, physically fit figure…
Pyrrha Nikos
He rephrased his greeting, though he still managed to keep it curt at: "What do you want?" She frowned slightly, disapproving of the rudeness of his tone. If Ruhe had to guess, she didn't exactly want to do this either.
She sighed, "Why are you so blunt?" She was looking ahead – not at him – at the garden ahead of the bench.
Blunt?
"I believe no such words to be associated with me." He stared ahead, just as she did.
She sighed again, "You're Ruhe Stiert, right?"
"…What's it to you?" he replied. She gave him a look as if to say, are you serious? It was much similar to the look he had given Ozpin earlier that day.
"Well, you're part of one of the richest families on Remnant, isn't that quite a 'big deal'?"
He observed the girl through the corner of his eye, "You have won the Mistral regional tournament four years in a row. That is more of a 'big deal' than being born into royalty."
Pyrrha turned her head to face him. He was still staring off into the gardens, a blank look crossing his eyes. He wasn't flaunting – judging from the attitude he had displayed earlier, Pyrrha had thought he would do the opposite.
"Your name is bigger than mine."
"We are not the same people."
"But we still have similar status."
He looked at her blankly, "I was the son of one of the richest men on Remnant. You are known for your prowess with a blade. Our names are different."
Pyrrha caught on to his slip-up, "Was?" she asked.
Ruhe cursed internally. Word had not gotten out of his father's death yet. Ruhe was hoping that would stay under blankets until at least a day or two afterwards. Images flashed in his mind; he heard the vase break again, sounding just as it had that night. He switched the subject, an amateur move to avoid sensitive topics and one that basically screamed at the other person to not poke around there anymore.
"You are a fighter, I am a politician." He summarised
"Well, I wouldn't quite say the same." The corners of her lips curved up slightly. Did she just compliment him?
His eyes glazed over, "Don't compliment me."
"Well I-"
"Do not compliment me. I will not accept compliments from lesser fighters." His fist balled, showing his aggressive mind through the small physical action. Pyrrha's small smile faded.
"…Why are you so adamant to have someone congratulate you?"
"I see no compromise in accepting comments from those who have not achieved an equal footing or greater in the field they are commenting about my performance on." He went back to staring emotionlessly ahead and a silence befell the two.
"How lonely does it feel?" The question caught her off guard. His voice turned soft, previously being monotone.
"I…"
"It's lonely, isn't it? Being famous." As Pyrrha tried to formulate a response to the question, she failed to notice how much she was staring at him.
"It…"
"I have no friends my age."
Stop talking, Ruhe
"I-" He cut himself off abruptly and his eyes suddenly widened. Sudden thoughts rushed through his mind. What the hell was he doing?
He gathered his briefcase negligently and made off down the path. What the hell just happened? He hadn't even noticed what he was saying and it just… came out. He mentally scorned himself for being so careless in a social interaction.
Pyrrha Nikos was left sitting at the bench, confused. It was like he became a completely different person for a moment; from cold and careless, ruthless and violent to… well, normal. She didn't know the boy at all, just his name and what she had seen of him during public displays from the Stiert family and from what she had gathered he seemed like quite a bored, rich boy who though little of others. From what she had just witnessed, she was beginning to think there was a little more than meets the eye with the Stiert boy.
She would just have to dig around a little bit to find some more.
Seems like the hype train has to stop for refuelling! All of us non-sponsors have to wait another 17 hours or so for Volume 3. What a painful wait this is going to be.