A/N: Hey guys! I'm back! Sorry it's been so long, school's just been screwing with me lately. I have the next two chapters written, they just need to be beta-read. Anyways, hope you all enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 6- The Emerald Forest

The sky was peaceful over the Emerald Forest. The only thing in the air was the lone blackbird, flying happily above the- SPLAT.

"Birdie no!" Ruby cried as she crashed through the bird at terminal velocity.

She quickly got over it and prepared for her landing strategy. She took out Crescent Rose in its rifle form, fired several rounds to slow her descent with the recoil, then transformed her weapon into a scythe, caught a tree branch with the blade, swung up into the air, and landed gracefully. Meanwhile, Weiss conjured a glyph in the shape of a snowflake, landed softly on it, then leapt off into the forest. Ren caught a tree trunk with the edge of Stormflower's blade, spiraling him around the trunk and to the ground. Yang simply fired her gauntlets, maintaining flight for several hundred more yards just above the treetops, kicked off two tree trunks, landed and ran off.

Victor took out his miniguns, took out two red Dust crystals from a pouch on his belt, and inserted them into his gauntlets. He began firing, the crimson rounds exploding violently in bursts of flame as they hit the ground. His descent slowed, and once he was about 30 feet off the ground, Victor ceased fire, maneuvered himself upright, and landed on his feet with an earth-shaking 'BOOM.' Nicholas focused, Maelstrom's orb glowing white, and fired a pale sphere of energy, which exploded violently upon impact, the shockwave timed perfectly to slow Nick's descent at a comfortable rate and carry him an extra 100 feet forward, where he landed, rolled, and got up. Chamele threw one dagger, the cord wrapping around a tree branch and swinging her up above the treetops again. She descended, and landed 50 feet away in a fighting stance. Luxia closed her eyes and focused, conjuring a green sphere of energy around herself in mid-air and stopping her descent. She opened her eyes and smiled.

"I love my Semblance." She said, then slowly lowered herself to the ground.

Victor had been running for about 30 minutes when he reached a clearing. He stopped for a short while to catch his breath when suddenly he heard the sound of cracking twigs and rustling leaves. Victor stopped, and listened. The noise continued, still a ways off from the clearing, but getting louder.

"That's... Odd," Victor thought to himself. "It just sounds like a human moving through the bushes, but it sounds way too big to be a human... I'm not even that loud, I don't think."

He frowned, then closed his eyes and furrowed his brow in concentration. After a couple of seconds, he opened his eyes again. His irises, once a deep, cobalt blue, were now obsidian black. He smiled as he felt large quantities of new strength originate somewhere near his heart and course throughout the rest of his body. It was almost like settling into a warm bath. Victor then readied himself, preparing for whatever may be coming. Little did he know, Chamele was about 50 feet away, on the opposite side of the clearing. She had heard Victor coming, and, thinking he was a Grimm, had hidden in a tree and made herself invisible, which was her own Semblance. Now, she watched and remained hidden, wanting to see if Victor would be a worthwhile teammate like she had hoped.

Meanwhile, back on Victor's side of the clearing, the noise stopped. He closed his eyes, listening intently for any telltale noises that would tell him where the unknown creature had gone. He heard a small rustle directly behind him, and muttered under his breath, "Wait for it..."

A few seconds later, with a crash and a roar, a massive humanoid figure charged out of the bushes. It was easily 10 feet tall, with black leathery hide, and bony protrusions coming out of its vertebra, elbows and knees. It also had very large claws on its hands and feet, and it had bony armor and red markings all over its body, including its shins, forearms, hands, back, chest, stomach, and all over its head and face. It had 6 sets of yellow eyes, and large serrated teeth. Its body resembled that of a very large heavyweight boxer. Victor's eyes snapped open and he dodged the large Grimm as it charged with a loud roar, swinging its giant bony fists at him.

"Crap... A Deinigrum. I better hope I can land a solid hit without getting injured."

The Deinigrum skidded to a stop and spun around, growling murderously. Victor extended his swords and miniguns, and inserted white Dust crystals into Hellfang. The giant roared and began charging again. Victor smirked and began running directly at the rampaging monster. Chamele's eyes widened, as she began debating whether she should step in and prevent almost certain injury and be stuck with him as a teammate or wait and hope for the best.

Before she could reach an answer, Victor fired a short burst from his miniguns. The bullets hit the giant straight in the chest, exploding with a massive flash of light, blinding the giant and the off-guard Chamele. The Dust crystals were discharged out of the gauntlets and caught by Victor, who put them in his pocket for the time being. The Deinigrum roared and stumbled, waving its claws around wildly while Victor continued rushing towards it. Victor reached his blinded adversary, and slashed his swords towards a chink in between the armor plating on its stomach and chest.

At the same moment, the Grimm swung its claws, blocking both swords and knocking Victor back a few feet. The Deinigrum slowly began regaining its vision as Victor stood back up. The giant roared again and ran towards Victor, who had no time to dodge to the side. Victor, thinking quickly, swung his left arm towards the giant's claws, using his gauntlet to block the attack and then drove his right fist into its stomach with tremendous force. The giant flew about thirty feet backwards, to the astonishment of Chamele, before landing and sliding another ten feet on its back.

Victor smirked, waited for the giant to shakily stand up, growling, and rushed at the monster once more. The giant swung its claws again with a roar, but Victor suddenly jumped over the attack, and slammed his right fist into its chest so hard the bony armor protecting it shattered. Simultaneously, Victor drove his left-handed sword through the roof of its open mouth and fired another short burst from his miniguns. The giant fell backwards, Victor using his swords as anchors to front-flip off of it as it hit the ground loudly and lifeless. Victor landed, knees bent, then straightened up. He closed his eyes, relaxed his muscles, drew a deep breath, and gave a loud sigh. He opened his eyes, now back to their normal cobalt blue. Chamele, who had regained her vision, simply stood there, smiling to herself. So, his semblance was strength.

Just then, Chamele noticed another, smaller, leaner Deinigrum, grayish and about 8 feet tall, behind Victor. Unlike before, he hadn't noticed this one; it had snuck up while he was distracted with finishing its comrade. Chamele, thinking quickly, threw Backslash across the clearing, barely taking aim. The Deinigrum roared, charged and swung its claws. Victor heard it, and begun to turn, but it wouldn't have been in time. Just before the monster's claws reached striking distance, however, Backslash flew through one of the monster's sickening yellow eyes. The instant it had done so, with a loud gunshot, it flew back the way it came. The giant was dead before it even registered the pain. It hit the ground with a dull thud, not as loud as its larger, bulkier cousin, but still fairly impressive. Victor had turned around just in time to see this happen, and looked around, pale faced and surprised.

"Who's there?" He called.

As he did so, he felt a light breeze as Chamele dashed towards him, stopping 10 feet away. Victor saw the trail of dust that Chamele left behind and saw where she had stopped.

"Hey, I know you're there. You just saved my ass, I'd kinda like to thank you face-to-face." Victor said, calming slightly.

Chamele became visible again, grinning smugly.

"No problem, tiny." She said, giving a small laugh at Victor's shocked expression.

"Chamele? How-"

"It's my Semblance. I can turn invisible." Chamele answered before he could finish.

"That's... Actually really damn impressive and useful. I guess you can tell what my semblance is already. If you had enough time to spot the other one, you probably saw me take down the first one."

"Yeah, I saw the whole thing... I didn't know that kind of strength was possible. Oh, and you owe me some new corneas, by the way."

Victor laughed at this.

"Thanks, I worked hard on that. I don't think I've ever seen anyone with that kind of aim, either. And hey, I didn't tell you to look at the flashbang rounds. That's on you."

Chamele laughed with him.

"Whatever! Thanks though. We should probably get going, anyways. We don't want to be the last ones back."

"Right. Let's move."

Chamele sped off, until she realized a few seconds later Victor wasn't behind her. She backtracked and found Victor, stopped mid-stride in the clearing, barely feet from where they started.

"Ummm, are you gonna follow me?" Chamele asked, confused.

"Well, there's something I need to tell you." Victor said, visibly suppressing a smirk.

"What is it?"

"Well, I'm slow as all hell for one thing..."

"And?"

"We're headed in the opposite direction."

Chamele turned red and said quickly, "Right, I knew that."

Victor chuckled and they both sped off, this time in the right direction.

A/N: Hope you guys enjoyed, hopefully I'll update again in the near future. Tell me what you guys thought about the fight scenes, I'd like to know how to improve my writing. Anyways, have a great one guys, and I'll see you soon!

~VA