Chapter 9

~45 or so minutes back…~

A long, metal scepter guided a human through the forest. This human was clearly a newcomer to the forest of the Errantes Island, for she snapped off branches and such as she cleared a path to travel.

Several twigs and leaves stuck from her short brown hair like a sore thumb, but she didn't really care. All she thought about was getting through the initiation alive, with or without a partner. But another thought had been nagging at her for the last ten minutes or so.

Amy was worried, to put it simply. It was only ten minutes ago that she had been sent soaring through the air with the other students from the propulsion force of the platform. She had seen everyone reach the island… But Shige, that poor Faunus.

She has expected to look over her shoulder and find a screaming Shige- Or a Shige that was glaring at her. But instead, she had found that Shige's landing was going wrong, very wrong. Compared to her and everyone else, he was falling towards the Emerald Forest instead of landing in the island far above it. She questioned if he could even pass the initiation- Or even if he could survive the fall. Amy supposed he could survive, with proper aura and dust usage to soften the fall. She was still skeptical, for the height Shige fell was pretty high. Actually, it was very high, about a 20 story fall, that's all. Well, nevermind that, the fall could still be softened. Probably not enough to prevent a few broken bones and trauma, but oh well.

It was going to be a long day anyways. Amy was sure she could put the worrisome thoughts aside, right? She needed to continue on through the forest.

And so, she did continue her trek. It was going to be a LONG day.

~Current~

Several screeches echoed through the forest, a collective noise that grew more and more deafening- As if something was adding fuel to its flame.

The screeches came from a swarm of black bats flying rapidly in a thick, black circle with several dots of white appearing now and then- The masks of Grimm.

The bats seemed to be circling something, a focal point- And that focal point seemed to be the cause of several bats dropping from the air, dead.

A silver saber-like blade was seen, slicing through the black mass every few seconds, bringing down more and more of the aggressive creatures down.

"Stupid freaking bats!" An agitated voice came from the center of the mass. A form finally ran out of the ever circling black mass, presumably through a small opening. It was Ilyas- And his appearance was startlingly amusing. His golden hair was even more disheveled than before, in which anyone could mistaken him for a mad man. Several bat droppings dripped from his hair, much to his disgust, and in order to make the best of the situation, Ilyas kept his ears flattened against his head so none of the sticky, disgusting substance entered his ear cavities.

The tiger Faunus had taken to running towards a somewhat deep river nearby, with the bat Grimm hot on his tail. Upon reaching the river, Ilyas waded in and quickly dove under the ice cold river, ignoring the stinging cold against his skin. The bats shrieked from above the water, refusing to dive under to pursue their attacks.

Ilyas was grateful indeed to have the irritating Grimm off his back for now. He let the slow moving water of the river take him downstream and away from the hot zone for 'being pooped on repeatedly by over a thousand stupid bats-' That was what he was going to name that area of the island.

Ilyas swam with the current, pushing himself further downstream quickly. Once he deemed it somewhat-okay, he finally broke the surface of the cold water and waded to shore.

"Thank you, great Shou, for allowing more time before my death." Ilyas murmured under his breath, his hands together in a thankful prayer as he looked up at the sky. He remained in that position for a few more moments, eyes closed, before he returned to the water. He crouched down for a moment before dunking his head into the water, kneading his slender, but slightly calloused fingers through his orange-gold hair to remove all the droppings that had caked on.

The process lasted for over ten minutes, and what looked like a few hundred gallons of brownish-whitish-grayish (A very gross-looking combination of colors, to put it simply) droppings had washed downstream. Ilyas sighed, repeating the tedious action with his cream-colored Qing-styled tunic after peeling the sticky item of clothing from his skin.

In other words, Ilyas went the full nine yards in making sure he was clean. Well, at least clean enough. The tiger Faunus finally sat down on a boulder warm with the sunlight and set his tunic aside to let it dry somewhat before he could move on.

Sure, Ilyas may be very proficient with aura usage, but he does not wish to fight through the forest shirtless where he could be endlessly attacked by bloodthirsty mosquitoes and stupid bats.

The faunus had his saber at hand, and closed his eyes. He was completely silent, as he meditated to calm himself.

All was calm, until…

"Well, you like to maintain hygiene. That's a good habit!" The owner of the flamboyant voice found himself threatened by a saber-spear pointed at his throat.

The light blue green-haired newcomer dressed in a kneelength heavy royal blue naval officer jacket embellished in silver embroidery and white trousers stumbled back with a startled yelp.

"Whoa, there! Are you trying to kill me?" He squeaked.

Ilyas relaxed his position, drawing back his spear with an exasperated sigh. "You shouldn't be so careless. Prince Azrael VII of Knight, correct?"

Azrael let out a laugh, brushing his hair back in a rather princely manner. "Also, the House of Vigilancia. There aren't many people who are as dim as you, but I accept you. I haven't encountered many who don't fawn over this beauty~"

Ilyas' eye twitched agitatedly. He said sarcastically, "Thank you for accepting my normality."

"You're welcome, fellow youth!" Ilyas' eye twitched yet again. Azrael really doesn't get it, does he? "You know, you do have a lot of potential to have as much beauty from the inside out, just like I. Since from now on, it seems that we are partners, I can teach you the ways of princeliness!"

Ilyas muttered agitatedly under his breath as he took his tunic and slung it over his shoulder, and began walking northwards, toward the center of the island. "No thank you, your highness." Unintentionally, the honorific came out faintly more venomous. Who could blame the guy?

"Are you sure about that? You have a lot to learn!" Azrael quickly followed, pulling out a short staff of sorts with a halberd blade at its end. He extended it to a polearm, preparing himself for dangers ahead.

"Thank you, but no." Ilyas remained polite in his speech, but one could tell he was holding back agitation in his tone.

"Alright." The prince shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm sure later one this year you'll consider it, so I'll leave this opportunity to become beautiful like I open."

"Sure." Ilyas lied through gritted teeth.

"Ah, I was sure you'd agree!"

A pit of dread formed in the tiger faunus' gut as Azrael began his extravagant speech.

"First, you must speak more! Become more involved with others around you! You have to open yourself, and let yourself free…!"

"For the love of shit! Will this ever stop?!" A snarl accompanied several blasts of flame Dust and squeals of dying Grimm.

Amy found this to be very agitating, to the point of not holding back with her angered-fueled words. Several black abnormally large rats kept flooding the area, leaping at the crossdressing girl with angry squeaks. Amy managed to keep up with the amount of attacks with her own Dust attacks, but all in all, it was annoying to deal with weaker Grimm in large numbers.

Amy soon found herself cornered against a thick tangle of trees and vines. As the rats created a wall, pressing Amy closer to a very bad situation, she focused her aura in her hands and channeled it through the scepter. Amy swept it in a wide arc towards the rats. Instantly, all of the rats were blown back several meters, multiple sent smashing against the trees all around and others just stunned and unconscious. Those who recovered from being stunned immediately withdrew from the scene with several squeaks upon seeing their brethren scattered around them, unconscious and others, dead.

Amy looked upon the scene, a triumphant smirk playing on her lips. She removed herself from the area, stepping over the fallen Grimm to silently exit the scene.

She knew that she wasn't going to be fighting any more Grimm- For now. They should be smart enough to avoid her for a little bit. Hopefully.

Amy continued her trek towards the center of the island. Judging by how far she has hiked, the ruins shouldn't be that far ahead. Not at all. At least that was something she has to look forward to.

Amy, as she walked, took her scepter in both hands and swiftly extended it to a polearm. With all the Grimm, it was better to have something longer ranged- Amy did not want to be bitten by anything. Even aura couldn't really lessen the nasty damage it would entail.

Amy grimaced at the thought, and pushed it aside. Right now, she should be focusing on completing the objective: get to the ruins, grab the artifact, and use quite a bit of Dust manipulation to get back to the cliffs. She honestly didn't care if she finds a partner right now; surviving initiation is all that matters.

Throughout her thought process, Amy mindlessly traced random doodles on the colorful Dust orb at the end of her scepter-staff. She mistakenly was oblivious to her surroundings, with only the general direction in mind.

It turned out to be a serious mistake, when a quiet squawk caught her attention, her step faltered.

Amy waited to listen for the squawk again.

"Holy." It came. The blood drained from her face.

"No way." She breathed.

"Holy."

Amy hurried her step, starting to jog. New objective: Find a deep enough body of water nearby.

"Holy." It louder suddenly, and it was accompanied by the rusting of foliage. Amy skidded to a stop.

Directly in front of her was a large, terrifying beast. It looked somewhat like a primate from that back, but with large, black feathered wings extended but forming a shield around its torso and face, and feathery, bird-like legs with scaly, taloned feet. Below the large pair of wings, two smaller pairs of wings were folded. In total, the Grimm had six wings.

Amy froze at the sight of it, bristling with her hair standing on end. The Grimm turned to the left, the largest pair of wings separating slightly to reveal its head and primate torso.

"Holy."

"Holy." The two squawks overlapped each other, indicating that there were two of the Grimm.

The Grimm that looked straight at her in the eye resembled a Nevermore, however it had three pairs of glowing red eyes and its bone white mask extended to the top half of its face. The Grimm now turned it's entire body to face Amy.

"HOLY." It hissed this time. Two other faces were to be seen, on the same head, but on both sides of its neck. The faces were much smaller than the main, but one could clearly tell the left was that of a lion, and the other, an ox.

A twig snapped from behind Amy.

"HOLY." The second Grimm announced its arrival.

"HOLY!" The two shrieked in unison. Amy ran perpendicular to the two, quick to use her aura to boost her speed. She zigzagged through the trees at swift speeds, not even bothering to try to fight the Grimm, for she knew they were too dangerous to fight one on your own. The two Grimm screeched as they chased Amy, but they were slowed down as they smacked into a few trees in their clumsy chase.

Amy soon came to a somewhat wide river, on a cliff. She looked behind her shoulder to find that the Grimm were gaining on her quickly. Amy frowned and let out a breath. She took a chance, and ran to the cliff's edge, where the river became a tall water fall, then… Jumped.

Brown feathery wings burst from her back, slowing her descent slightly. Amy glided down to the medium-sized lake the waterfall deposited into. The Grimm followed after her, taking flight as well. Amy swiveled her body around to face the Grimm, and gestured her scepter at the two. The Dust orb glowed a hot red, and blasted the Grimm straight on with a super-powered heat attack. The Grimm shrieked as they lost quite a bit of distance.

Amy swiveled back around and folded her wings, diving into the cool water of the lake after holding her breath. She swam deeper into the water before turning to look up at the surface of the lake, her golden hawk eyes sharp.

Two shadows of the Grimm above fell upon the water, circling. A minute or so later, they were gone.

Amy swam upwards, breaking the surface of the water with a sharp gasp for air. Her short hair was wet, but ruffled much like wet feathers. One could tell that her hair was made from several tiny individual feathers that formed a collection that could easily be mistaken for normal human hair when its dry.

Amy let out a long breath of relief, glad that she survived that meeting with two of the most dangerous Grimm recognized throughout Remnant.

"Never would've thought that you were Faunus." A voice came from behind Amy. The crossdresser turned to face the voice, to find a brunette boy with blonde streaks much shorter than her swimming in the lake as well, his brown Husky ears twitching in fascination.

Amy rolled her eyes. She swam to shore, and once she was standing on solid ground, she extended her wings and shook her feathers to remove as much water as she can.

The boy had followed her to shore, and settled for just sitting on a dry patch of grass. "Well, the name's Santiago Montero."

"Amelia. Amelia Blauerozen." Amy nodded to Santiago, offering her hand to him after she had dried herself off somewhat. The two shook hands politely, and Amy took a seat beside Santiago. "I guess we're partners now, hm?"

"I guess so." Santiago nodded. He adjusted the brown-tinted goggles that clung to his wet head so that they hung from his neck instead, and moved on to taking off his long, brown hoodie and squeezing out water onto the grass beside him. "Those were Angeli, right?"

Amy's face grew grim. "Yes. I never expected that they would be on this island."

"Well, it's a good thing we learned how to run from one and use it's weaknesses at Signal… You went to Signal right?" Santiago asked.

Amy shook her head. She replied, quieter than usual, "I went to Coronet in Atlas for a few years before my family moved here when I was 14."

Santiago winced at the mention of the school. "It must've been harsh over there. I wouldn't know how bad humans treat Faunus there, but I heard it's a lot worse than Vale."

Amy laughed, clapping Santiago on the shoulder. The tiny boy pitched forward with a squeak from the force. Amy smiled as she stood up. "Haha, yeah, you wouldn't know the full extent. It was hard, yeah, but I survived!"

"I-I suppose…" Santiago sweatdropped at the tall hawk faunus. He grimaced slightly as he held his shoulder, slightly sore from Amy's display of strength.

"Hey, Santy, we should get going now. It's better to get the artifact and get back to the cliffs quickly." Amy said, stretching as she walked away. Santiago quickly stood up to follow, grabbing his drying hoodie.

"Yessir!" Santiago said. He began to follow for a moment before pausing in his tracks.

"...Santy...? SANTY?!"

"Well, this is certainly an interesting development." Ozpin commented.

"Of course it is. Especially when you found the malfunctioning platform 'interesting!'" Glynda wasn't able to help but irritably add. Ozpin grimaced.

"It was interesting. We got to see the extent of Shige's capabilities in situations like this."

"He could've broken more than a few bones with the usage of aura. He would've died without." Glynda's voice became more homicidal by the moment.

Ozpin was silent for a moment. He pointed at the screen, "Look, a banshee."

"WHAT?!"

The headmaster ran.

The Lamia's head was sliced off in a single, smooth movement by a black metallic blade of a scythe. Instantly, Grimm blood was sprayed everywhere- Including it's poor victim: Shige.

Shige stared dazedly above him, for he expected his inevitable death to come and go when the Lamia reached to rip out his throat. He was alive!

The sound of the Lamia's screeches and a blade slicing through flesh quickly invaded his senses.

"Don't just lay there! Fight!" A smooth female voice snapped, accompanied by a gurgled scream of a dying Lamia.

Shige blinked once, then twice blankly. It took his a second, but he finally pushed off the dead Lamia off his body with some effort and sat up, wisely paying no mind to his blood splattered forest green t shirt. At least his hoodie was black, so the blood wasn't noticeable.

Several dead Lamia surrounded him, however, there were more living than dead. Shige searched for whom the voice belonged to, and soon deduced it was the tall, cloaked figure gracefully battling Lamia with a tall mechanical dual blade scythe, swiftly spinning the polearm expertly and slashing at the attackers.

Shige watched the battle with admiration for a moment before sneakily crawling towards where his left gun was discarded and grabbing it without any Lamia noticing-

Actually, one did. The stray Lamia screeched and lunged at Shige, slashing down at the snake faunus with its claws.

Shige swiftly shot it point blank at its head, bringing it down without a sound. He pushed himself to his feet, and began shooting at some of the Lamia the figure was fighting. Of course, this attracted attention to him. Some of the Lamia advanced, lunging at him simultaneously. Shige easily met them with a couple point blanks, and when the Lamia got too close, he mechashifted one of his guns to sai. He swung his sai at one of the Lamia's necks, and the blade pierced through easily. The Lamia let out a gurgle as it fell. As its body fell, Shige jumped up, leaping off it with an aura boost. A small deep violet circle of light surrounded his foot momentarily as he pushed off the Lamia, and he instantly gained quite a bit of height with his maneuver. Shige twisted in the air, his sai mechashifting back into a gun, and he instantly brought down four or five Lamia with a few Dust bullets. Shige landed, and swiftly fired a few more shots at the other Lamia. Soon, both guns just responded to the trigger pulling with clicks instead of shots.

Shige muttered under his breath, slightly irritated as he mechashifted one of the guns back to sai and fended for himself just like that, while digging out another clip of ammo from the extra supply he brought.

For a few moments, Shige withdrew from battle to quickly reload his guns. It was too late when he heard a shriek of an attacking Lamia, and turned around to see long claws slashing towards him. It was too late for him to dodge or shoot, so Shige made the best of the situation to put up his aura in a shield- It's better to have a dent in your aura than a dent in your lifespan that leaves you only a few seconds to live.

The claws never hit the shield. There was a blood curdling scream from the Lamia as it fell… In three severed parts.

Shige stared at the cloaked figure, who had sliced apart the Lamia in a matter of a couple seconds with their dual scythe- Which currently was separated to form two kama. Shige regained his speech, "Thanks."

"No-" The figure decapitated another Lamia. "- problem!"

Shige nodded to the figure, cocking his newly reloaded guns. The Lamia pack had reduced by over four fifths, leaving about five or so left. Shige smirked as he fired off another point blank, instantly killing a Lamia. He thought to himself, This should be easy now!

He couldn't be even more wrong then, for the area flooded with an entire nestful of Lamia- Presumably to help their brethren.

Shige cursed under his breath, "Fuck…" He soon found himself back to back with the cloaked figure as the Lamia circled them.

"Got a plan?" The cloaked figure asked.

"Depends on your weapon. Can it be mechashifted into a firearm?" Shige asked. The cloaked figure immediately smiled slightly from beneath her hood in understanding.

"I'll attack up close and personal and you'll be attacking from a long range?" She questioned.

"Exactly." Shige nodded. There was an unspoken agreement as three second later, they shouted, "Now!" They attacked the Lamia instantaneously.

Shige continuously fired off shots into the surrounding nest of Lamia, while the cloaked figure sliced through the mass swiftly, killing many in a short amount of time. The two backed each other as they fought, with Shige firing at Lamia that threatened to attack the cloaked figure from behind, and the cloaked figure slicing apart the Lamia that got too close to Shige.

Soon, it grew overwhelming- To the point that Shige had to use both long range and short range attacks, with one gun, and the other mechashifted into sai. The sai was not as effective in killing Lamia, but it was enough to fend off those who got too close.

As Shige continued to bring down more and more Lamia and slash through other Lamia's vital points, the cloaked figure had changed tactics once again. The kama mechashifted into two sabers (Strange looking, with the scythe blade and all, but effective). She was quicker in fighting through the thick throng of Grimm with the even shorter range weapons, with a slightly more variety of attacks as she not only slashed, but stabbed as well. The nest of Lamia were dropping like flies by now. Less and less Lamia attacked, to which Shige mistakenly relaxed a bit on his attacks. He had never fought Grimm- At least, not in swarms- so it was a very grave mistake to let his defenses down for that moment in time.

A Lamia slashed diagonally at the snake faunus, instantly inflicting a long cut in Shige's side. Shige hissed at the sharp pain, swinging his sai upwards and successfully slicing deeply into the Lamia's arm. The Lamia shrieked in pain, but it was abruptly cut off when a bleeding slash appeared at its throat- The cloaked figure was slightly too late in fighting off the Lamia, but the kill was amazingly fast, fast enough that the human eye can't see, and even faunus would have a hard time seeing.

Shige fired off 5 more shots, bringing down the last of the Lamia while he held his wound tightly, applying pressure to stop the bleeding.

"Are you okay?" The cloaked figure asked, speaking as if she didn't fight a whole nest of Lamia for the past minute or so.

Shige breathed heavily, now down on one knee in exhaustion. He didn't respond for awhile as he tried to catch his breath. Finally, he spoke, "Chipper." He stood, still holding his side. There was a faint deep violet glow of his aura healing his wound, but the wound was not healing in the usual time it should take.

The cloaked figure frowned from under her hood at Shige. "You don't seem okay."

"Really, I'm fine!" Shige insisted. The cloaked figure grumbled under her breath, taking the scruff of Shige's neck and easily dragging him to sit down beside a tree, much to his protests.

"There's something wrong with your aura." The cloaked figure deadpanned. "It's being drained by something." Shige stiffened under her scrutinising gaze, her red brown eyes stark against her pale skin. She reached out a pale hand, growing unusually close to Shige's right eyes- As if to pull off his medical eyepatch.

"No!" Shige's exposed eye widened in horror. He quickly smacked the cloaked figure's hand away, ignoring the uncomfortable tingling and faint stinging of his wound very (very) slowly sealing.

The cloaked figure's eye twitched. "Just let me see it."

"No."

"Yes."

"No!"

The cloaked figure finally gave up. "Fine."

There was an awkward silence. One minute. Two.

The cloaked figure broke the awkward silence, "Well, it's nice that we exterminated an entire nest of Lamia."

Shige looked at her strangely for a moment. "I guess so. But we should be worried about the Queen Lamia. Who knows when she'd find out and come to get revenge?"

"Then shouldn't we be running?" The cloaked figure sighed exasperatedly.

"Exactly!" Shige huffed, standing. He grimaced slightly, pain flaring up in his side. The wound hadn't fully healed up yet.

The cloaked figure stood up as well. She said as she began walking, "Then, let's go!"

Shige then noticed the physical details of the cloaked figure for future reference. She was clearly female, from her voice and what he's seen of her face. But otherwise, it was hard to tell. She was tall and slender- Taller than Shige was by an inch or so. There weren't any womanly curves- And if there were, it was probably hidden under that loose black cloak of hers. At her hips, a belt was fastened with multiple compartments attached to it. Shige presumed the compartments contained Dust and other weapons.

The other student's weapon hung from her belt, in the form of a rather short staff. The scythe blades were disconnected from the staff, both attached to the other side of the belt in the form of sabers.

A feeling of nostalgia struck Shige then. He felt that he recognized the style of the weapons, and the style of the other student's fighting, but he, for some reason, couldn't recall.

"Aren't you coming?" The cloaked student called. Shige shook his head from his thoughts before quickly following.

The silent trek began. Which meant more awkward silence. Shige was honestly uncomfortable with it, but the other student seemed happy with it.

Five minutes went by and Shige was fidgety. He didn't know anything about this student, and this student looked like a very valuable ally. And so, he spoke.

"Sooo… The name's Shige Naga-" The snake Faunus quickly caught himself. He did want to keep his anonymity after all. "-yizumi." Shige offered his hand, to be polite and as gentlemanly as he can.

The other student stared at him, blinking. She was rather confused. "Shige Nagayizumi?" She looked up at something unbeknownst to the snake faunus above his head, almost as if double checking something. Shige looked up to double check if there was in fact something hovering above, only to see the greenery of overhanging trees.. He raised a quizzical eyebrow at the other student.

"Yes…?"

The other student finally shook her head. She reached out and shook his hand in response. "Kumori Hikage."

Shige was honestly surprised. "Are you from Vacuo?" The other student was thoughtful for a moment.

"No. Technically, I am. I associate myself with… A village. It's a powerful one, but you probably haven't heard of it." She replied monotonously. Shige sweatdropped. How vague could she be? Well, it was at least something he could go off of.

Shige was silent about the issue, wise enough to not call her out on it. He simply questioned, "Does it have a name?"

Kumori's thin lips pulled into a faint smile. "I suppose not."

END

Well, it's one of the longer chapters. I actually had this done since October, but I hit a roadblock at Chapter 10 because no matter what I do, I can't write a great fighting scene at the moment. But hey, at least I actually used the time to do some heavy editing!

And wow, to think I started this a whole year ago. And I barely wrote 10 whole chapters. *collapses onto my desk* I sometimes can't even believe myself. I'm so behind schedule on this fic.

I'm going to be honest here. I won't be posting frequently at all, unless I am gifted with a few weeks of super inspiration and thus able to punch out 5 more chapters before spending a few months on break. Why? Well, I may have overpacked my freshman year. Four clubs? All competitive? Yes. And with all 7 periods of mine filled up with all core subjects as Honors and AP. The other two consists of one honors Engineering and the other, a normal Comp. Tech. Gah, the stress! I should've stuck with 2 or 3 clubs. -.-'

Sorry about that little rant there. Now I can scare myself how my next 3 years of high school will look like if I continue in this path. But hey, at least I'm headed in the right direction to become a physicist! ...Right?

Anyways, please review! I actually had a preference for criticism. I mean, those nice reviews of encouragement are nice and all (...please don't stop them) but I really need criticism from fellow fanfic authors out there. So yeah, please click that lovely review button and please know that you're making a writer's day by doing so!

再见! Ja ne!

~Hemo