"you think he's alright?" Kate asked Neil , slightly out of breath, who was a few meters away , leaning against the corner of a stone House and panting.

Neil straightened his body and looked up ,to the shining sun and a bird's silhouette circling througth the sky above them "I guess, he was very calm about the whole situation and he claimed to be a hunter."

Sophia mumbled as she searched the pockets of her sweatshirt and cargopants.

"where is it?... where did I put it?..."

concerned that his daughter was hurt , Neil quickly crouched down next to her "Hey Soph' ,are you hurt ?"

"No , but i tried to take one of the shells Graham dropped and i can't find it" Sophia faced Neil, looking slightly dishevelled.

Smiling softly , Neil stroked her hair "dont worry ,we gonna find it"

a tall man stood ontop the wall. His dark skin contrasting against his white hair and ram horns atop his head, He wore a olive chestrig over body armor and brown-green camo clothes

"Hey Neil ,you said that the guy that saved you wore a duster , tricorned hat and looked like a walking armory , right?" the man put down his binoculars but remained in the same position , facing away from them and towards the outside

"yeah?" wondering why the guard asked him , the fox faunus turned to face him

"found him"

rushing up the stairs leading up the wall , Neil looked outside , searching for Graham. He stopped about thirty meters away from the wall , weapons in hand.

"Its him, let him in"

Neil thought that Graham heard him , as he sheathed his sword , but trashed the thought as he opened his gun and switched one of the bullets with another one , the only difference was a bit of cloth wrapped hunter gripped the gun with his right and held it towards the sun.

"Is that some kind of peace sign?" Ivory raised an eyebrow at Neil

"Dunn-" a shot rang out , the bullet whistling throught the air , in the direction of the birds sillouette

both men ducked behind the sandbags ontop of the outer village wall , Ivory shooting an angered look at Neil "I'll take that as a no"

While the guard readied his MR-C rifle ,Neil crouched next to him , confused at Grahams behavior, first he saved him and his family and then he opens fire at them? That didnt make any sense. While Neil wondered what his reason was, Graham switched his gun back to his left hand as he took out his Beastcutter and activated the whip version ,as he focused on the birds coming his way, growing in size as he came closer.

Looking up , Neil saw a massive Nevermore with a wingspan of over eight meters fly in Grahams direction. Neil and Ivory sprung up to their feet , only to hear a second shot ring out and hit the Nevermore in the face, making it lose its balance a bit.

Graham stepped forward and swung down the beastcutter with full force as the Massive bird was flying right over him , two or three meters off the ground.

Ivory saw how the club seperated itself into large chunks , held together by a steel cable and tore throught the Nevermore, its speed pushing it into the saw-like teeth.

The beastcutter slammed into the ground as the Nevermores body flew over him , biseceted from head to tail and both halves slid over the road behind him.

with the Nevermore's dark blood forming an arc above the hunter,he reverted the Beastcutter into its normal form and began walking towards the village walls at the gate and looking up to the two men ontop the wall ,Graham sheathed his weapons.

Tipping his hat ,Graham stood about a meter infront of the wall

"Hello Neil ,Are you and your familiy unharmed?"

Neil shifted his view from the dissolving Nevermore to the hunter looking at him "yes , and thanks for that"

"I'm just glad to hear that" Graham nodded ,turned around and began to walk away from the village only to stop dead in his track as the other man began speaking

"What the hell?... Grimm don't bleed , how and why did you do that?"

The hunter turned around his head to face the men "Well... I don't know , I'm used to the beasts bleeding and why do you want to know why I killed it?"

"So ,is that your Semblance?"

"Beg pardon?"asked a baffled Graham

"Your special ability" Ivory looked into the hunters face , his expression unchainging "The manifestation of your soul as an aspect"

"No I doubt that "a grim chuckle escaped his lips "but, it would be fitting "

"okayy... mind me asking if you have a mission right now? and if not , mind helping us out? our village could use a Huntsmen's assistance"

after Ivory asked for Graham's help it felt like the temperature dropped .Graham's red eyes were dull , allmost empty and what little emotion faced was Hatred and fear.

Ivory recoiled , the eyes that seconds ago looked at him confused , now stared him down with a utterly terrifing glare. "WhAt.do.yoU Mean?" while speaking , his voice ceased to sound human and came out far darker

Neil saw how Ivory recoiled and tried to defuse the situation "Yeah .the frequency of grimm attacks tripled over the last couple of months"

An instant later, Graham eyes returned to a calculating gaze and his voice returned to its normal tone "I'll take care of it"

Snapping out of the fear that he felt after looking at Graham , Ivory was unsure how to talk to him

"While its nice to hear that you are willing to help ,we can't afford to pay you" Ivory scowled as he regained his composure , they had hoped for weeks that a hunter would come by to assist them , they asked Beacon for help but nobody came. Now there was a Hunter in front of them but they could'nt afford to pay him . He didn't know how much longer they could hold their own with the rising number of attacks.

"Payment isn't something you have to worry about. As said , I am a hunter, getting paid is far down the list of priorities" Graham turned his head to look towards the woods and wanted to go his way only to stop again as Neil shouted his way

"You serious? do you want anything else or what?"

"Yes I am , and well while it would be nice to have some books but they're pretty expensive so... no"

Both men looked dumbfounded

"Any special topics?" Ivory quickly pulled out his scroll and texted another guard to go to the libary

"If its possible then History ,both about the world and its occupants, so Faunus and Humans , with a stronger focus on Faunus. And medicine"

After sending the hunter's book topics to the guard in the libary ,Ivory looked up from his scroll "Why do you want to know more about Faunus?"

"Because they're new to me, and the only knowlegde I have is the very brief summary Neil told me"

"Thats weird , but eh ,at least you want to know more"

after that, a silence settled in which was dissrupted when the sound of someone running to them could be heard.

"Oi Ivory ,catch" Graham only saw how a bag was flung towards the horned man, who fumbled with the bag for a second before getting a good hold of it.A kid's voice could be heard ,albeit muffled throught the defensive wall "Dad, who're you talking with?"

Neil turned towards the voices source"its Graham, should i ask him about the casing?"

Seeing Sophia nod , he briefly faced the hunter "mind giving me a shell casing?, Sophia really liked the look of 'em" Graham opened his gun and threw one of the empty cartridges to Neil who thanked him after catching the shell and showing it to his daughter

"Here ya go" Ivory bend over the wall and held the bag of books out to Graham, who came closer to take the bag out of Ivory's hand "Thank you...- " "oh, its Ivory Wolmark" " - Mr. Wolmark"

"With your part fullfilled , I will take care of these Beasts" Graham slung the small duffel bag over his shoulder ,earning a confused look from Neil

"Why dont you calm down first, want something to eat?"

"I'm fine, I'll dispatch of the Beasts as fast as possible" Graham began to run away from the village , only to rotate his body to catch what appeared to be a small metal box in the dimensions of a brick ,painted black and had a appendage reminicent of an antenna "Here's a radio to stay in contact" Graham looked at Ivory, at the 'radio' in his had and back at Ivory. Shrugging his shoulders, he dissapeared into the thick foilage.

"He's an odd one" Neil turned away from the wall and walked down the stair to his daughter , to which he handed the casing.

Thanking the guard , Ivory resumed watching the forest "from what I've heard , there are no 'normal' huntsmen"

"But he seems nice" Sophia said offhandedly as she was amazed by the details on the coloured outside of the shell , which ranged from a yellowish bronze over traces of dark purple into deep shades of blue and scorch marks on the tip. it depicted multiple huntsmen ,One reminicent of a crow who stood next to a figure that looked like Graham.

A woman wielding a saber stood facing a figure with a mask hiding the upper half of his head.

The last two were facing each other, a hunter holding a large weel and standing opposite of a figure who's head was hidden behind a metal mask with an cape like that of the crow. on the bottom of the casing there was the picture of a Monstrosity with tentacles growing out behind it's slitted mask.

the casing still had some warmth.

Ivory sighed as he stood atop the wall , looking over the fading Nevermore's body into the woods , as his radio sprung to life "Wolmark , Herring here , your shift is over so come back to the Tower. And the mayor wanted to have a word with you , do you copy?"

While letting out a glad sigh that turned into lesser happy tunes at the mention of having to meet the authorities he reached for his radio "Wolmark copies" and left as he saw another guard come his way

As he headed for the tower, located in the city center next to a lovley little inn he'd be shure to visit later, Ivory slowed down to spend more time strolling between the old stone buildings. Their stones showing marks of the rising Grimm populance and why they were here, to make sure that those were the only signs of the 'beasts' as the newly met headache-to-come Graham called them.

He arrived at the tower after roughly ten minutes, and with another sigh , he made his way into the old guard tower that was their BoP (Base of operations) for the time being and headed up the tower , past the barracks on the bottom , the armory over them and into the Command center on the second floor.

Ivory sat down on one of three empty desks in the middle of the large room , in which you had barely enough space for two people walking next to each other as the area was cluttered with tabels and equipment for the Coms.

"So? What did you do this time? " a voice accommpanied by a mug of hot coffee settling on the desk before him came from behind

proping his right arm on the chair's backrest , he turned his head to find a familiar face plopping into the chair next to his own , another mug in hand.

" I met a guy who almost shot me , asked me for some books and and tore a bloody nevermore in half "

Streched his arms and let the popping joints fill the short silence as his friend took in the information , he took a good look at his mate , Communications Staff Sergeant Matthew Herring , a bear faunus with a quite normal looking frame standing at 1,87 m tall with short black hair , they first met while in basic training and later after Ivory came back into base on his thrid deployment , and they discovered that he was the units new Observer , their source of information and eye in the sky.

"... sooo you didnt play golf with old v40 minis,... again?"

"Oi, that was Avril . Why does everybody think I did that?"

Taking a sip from his mug , Ivory's shoulders dropped for a second

"Well , you got yelled at in the end , and we all heard it. Maybe even the whole city.. even when I think about it , my ears start to ring"

The bear-faunus spun his officechairs backrest around and propped his elbows ontop of it , his mug half empty.

"The only things I remember are carring her into the barraks after she walked two meters and smacked into four buildings , and getting yelled at in the morning , but my god she was absolutely piss-drunk"

"The mayor?" matthew looked at his colleague and raised an eyebrow with his mouth having a massive grin plastered on

"yeah sure , you tit"

as both of them laughed at the thought of the mayor doing so much as touching any alcohol , Ivory wondered where she was

"On that topic , didn't ya say that she wanted to yell, ahem talk , at/to me?"

Herring looked towards the entrance, sighed and stood up

"yeah , and she just came in , 'nother one?"

drinking the last bit of coffee , he gave his cup to his mate

"sure , thanks a bunch"

both mugs in one hand , Matthew chuckled and went towards the coffeemachine

"no bigge, just please keep it down this time"

smiling at the figures back , he replied "oh shut it " and stood up ,turned to the advancing women , the mayor.

She was dressed in her usual , very formal attire , consisting of a white dress shirt , a black jacket ,a black pencil skirt and nice but uncomftable looking shoes (A/N : I have no clue about shoes )Her red-ish maroon hair was up in a inverted braid , contradicting her fairly pale complexity

"Hello miss Rowey"

Green eyes scanned him from behind the thin grey frame of her glasses "Mr. Wolmark, please sit down"

"Sure, and I'm certain that you want to talk about the guy I met, right?"

"thats correct , so who was that?"

"he introduced himself as Graham Himura , not to me but Neil Gardner . Apparently he titled himself Hunter of hunters and beasts , so I'm not quite sure if he wont come here again to add 'and faunus' " Ivory saw a hand carring a mug enter his perifial vision and turned his head to see the comms staff hold up a cup of steaming hot coffee "Thanks mate"

"Lets hope that thats just a thought , but he didn't speak to you ?" Miss Rowey chimed in

"He did , and made a contract , he got a couple of books and he promised to take care of grimm in the Forest"

"did it occur to you that he lied and just stole a couple of books?"

"Yes it did , briefly , but from what I could tell , he cared less about his payment and more about fighting. besides that , if he wanted to rob us , he just could've asked for an advanced payment and then leg it , not for some books"

"can you contact him ?"

"Yes, I gave him one of our partol radios"

Ivory turned towards Matthew , who sat on his seat , facing a buch of monitors "could you open a channel , frequency is 68.2"

"sure" a window poped up on one of the monitors and displayed the said numbers

After thanking Herring he turned back towards the mayor "there you go , it should be connected to this tables mikrophone"

"Hello?"

"..." The Speakers stayed completely quiet

"Hang on "Ivory held his hand up towards the mayor in a stopping gesture "There's a big button on the left side , press it , then speak"

shortly after that a crackling could be heard before the speakers on the table sprang to life and gave out the dark, gravely sound of Garahams voice

" 'ello , can you hear me now?"

"Yes, loud and clear"

A sigh came throught the radio before the hunter spoke up again "Why did you decide to contact me ,I am holding my end of the bargain up ,so there shouldn't be any need to reach out to me "

the mayor piped up "We called you for that exact reason , I , the cities mayor would like to make an offical contract in case of any complications and to let this be put into your file"

the Rustling of leaves coming throught the old-military issue radio was followed by Graham speaking with a hint of confusion and annoyance in his voice "Why should you want that ? There's no reason to establish any form of written agreement over such a thing . Oh and , miss mayor , may i know your name since I guess you're already aware of mine"

Rowey began to grow weary of the hunter who seemed to dread any from of conformation "Oh , I'm sorry , my name is Priscilla Rowey. And the documentaion of your actions should be registered in your reports ,so may I ask why you are against it so strongly ?"

"Apart from being a pointless waste of time , the fact that I can barely write and came here this morning should be good enough reasons to keep this unoffical"

Both the mayor and Ivory were stunned at the confession .The guard was quicker to make his confusion audilbe "are you kidding ? How did you manage to get throught one of the four academies without writing ?"

Graham voice still sounded confused , but now the barest hint of embarrassment made itself known "what are you on about? Which academies , the only one I know of would be the school of mensis which I'd never consider a ground for knowlegde. And I never was propely schooled"

After Priscilla regained her composure she lifted her glasses and pinced her nose in frustration "let me get this straight , you never were in any kind of education system?" a affirmative grunt rang throught the speakers " and you dont know how to write?" "not exactly , I can write , just not very fluent " " and you claim to be a hunter , that asked for books as payment? Books which i assume had text in them?"

a second later ,as the voice came out the radio again , it was devoid of emotion "I dont 'claim' to be one , I am a hunter and believe me , not one you want to see in action. And yes I asked for books, I said that i cant write much , but I am quite the bookworm. Hunters fight beasts , not essays so there never was any need to be teached"

"I think our dear Ozpin sees that matter very different" Ivory emptied his second mug of coffee and began to retrieve his scroll from the plate carrier he still had strapped to his torso. After fishing out the small metal plate , he opened his contacts and searched for 'Ozzy' , the man who brought him into Vale and started to type a message conveying his newest encounter with a hunter

"and who'd that might be?"

"Where the hell were you raised? Azaroth?"[1] Priscilla slowley began to feel an incoming headace from the complete obliviusness of the apparently very foreign hunter

"No, wherever that might be ,but it sounds like one of the surrounding counties. I dont remember much from my childhood , but I know that I was born and raised in the hinterlands before living in world's end , and subsequently its capital , Yahrnam the City of blood"

Ivory put his scroll down after the long text was send to Opzin and chimed in "why does everything there already sound grey and broody? Couldnt it be named not quite as edgy?"

"Directly next to world's end , there were Workeystair,Daler,the northern lands , which for some odd reason was the most south county and Wookie"

"Wookie? Are shitting me? Why did they name it after those big fluffy things" the Ram faunus was completely baffled and had a hard time not grinning , before remembering that Graham could'nt see him and his mouth's corners made their way upwards fast

"uhrg... wot? I never heard of anything being called a wookie baring the peopole from there , and some of 'em may be bearded but 'fluffy'? 'com'on"

After overcoming her inital suprise of the Hunters complete lack of Knowlegde about Remnant , she wanted to get him inside the village , contract in the back of her mind "Were are getting extremly off topic , Mr. Himura , when could you be back in Sovstgarde? I would like to at least talk this out with you eye to eye"

"I'd estimate one or two hours, but I still am requested to fight these beasts , so I'll return in a couple o' days"

"Thats sounds acceptable , please use the radio to notify the guards if you're near the Village and ask them to contact me"

"all'ight, farewell"

The snapping of twigs acommpanied by the rustling of leaves wispered throught the desk's speakers

Ivory sighed and got closer to the mikrophone "You can stop pushing the button use it when just want to talk"

and the rustling stopped.

"For god's sake"

Ozpin's eyes darted between his scroll and the montors infront him as he watched a figure in a tricorned hat shot throught the emerald forest. The apparent hunter called 'Graham' allready had some encounters with Grimm , which didn't last long as his movements reminded him more of a ghost or whisp than a hunter or human , but a pretty big ghost of over two meters with a pretty broad build hefting around a arsenal of arms.

Swirling his cup , he called out to his secretary with little hope that she found anything about any of the mentioned places or Graham himself .Sadly her search brought forth nothing exept the picture of a Wookie holding a surfboard witch now was set as her scroll's background.

"Glynda, please inform the students of team RBWY and JNPR that they should find themself in my office as soon as possible"

"Ozpin , why are you taking them? sure the hunter didn't seem very dangerous while talking , but he still called himself 'Hunter of hunters' and you want to take two teams of first years , while combat-experienced , they are still very young, to take on a potential psychopath?"

"I can understand your concern for the safety of your, our pupils , but I have faith in them , and to make sure that you can sleep well , you will be accompaying us"

after letting her head fall forward and mumble something about revenge, Glynda took a deep breath and raised her head to glare at Ozpin "You wanted to take me with you from the start , right?"

"You know me so well" Smiling and raising his mug to Glynda ,he never got bored at poking at her.

3 Weeks later , Sovstgarde

Ivory sighed as he , once again saw Graham sleep right next to one of the gates ,at noon.

Since the hunter came , things changed. The cities trade routes were a lot safer now and the mood lightened noticeably.

Standing a couple of meters away from the dozing figure , he picked up a small pebble and threw it towards Graham , who , as soon as the tiny stone hit his hat , sprang to life , drawing a worn out looking revolver from a hoster on his right knee and aiming straight at Ivory. As he recognised the man , he stored the gun away again

"Mornin' "

looking up into the sky , towards the sun , and back down at the hunter , Ivory smiled as he walked up to him and sat close next to him . Graham's only reaction was to grip one of the knifehilts sticking out under his coat

" Morning , here ,breakfast you twichy bastard" he handed him the picknick basket he carried.

removing his hand from the knife , he raised an eyebrow at the guard "Uh... much obliged"

"dont thank me, its a gift from Neil and Kate , together with an inivtation to dinner"

resting his arms on his cocked legs , the hunter responded "Please give them my deepest gratitude , and tell them that I'll try to make it one day"

snorting , Ivory started to inspect the basket's content "Nope, You'll do that, you cant just pop into the city every couple of days , collapse against next to the nearest soild object and then run out again. They are worried , like anybody that knows you here , 'cause if you keep this up you'll die for sure"

standing up and streching himself , Graham looked down to the guard picking apart the crates content "I beg to differ , it takes a lot more for me to drop"

the guard sighed and held out a pack of sandwiches towards the hunter, which he took and stored in his bag "what makes you so sure? You're a hunter , but that doesnt mean you can ignore sleep-deprevation and malnourishment, you arent Immortal"

Graham let out a grimm chuckle , drew his shotgun and aimed at his own head "Wanna bet?"

"For Oum's sake, stop it you friggin' nutcase " Ivory paled as the hunter scraced his cheek with the guns barrel

holstering the rifle , he made his way up the wall "dont ask , if you dont want to be proven wrong , well , pariatallly wrong"

"Oh, man you're a fucking plainwreck .Wont you at least try making it to dinner or even eat in company " sighing , Ivory stood up , tossed a bottle of some kind of juice towards the hunter and started making his way back into the city

The last thing he heard was a very clear "no" before the hunter jumped over the sandbags ontop of the wall and the sound of rustling bushes

[1]: This phrase may seem familar , if you watch a certain video game critic who doesnt seem to breathe , judging by the way he never pauses

It's done , Chapter 2 , bugger me it's been a while and

To make the explanation for my absence short , shit happened in me life

anyway ,I'm really happy about how well this story was recieved ^^

now onwards to the reviews

Commissar Carl&joshualk98(concerning the spelling): I hope I fixed most grammar mistakes in Ch 1. and so please make me aware if I missed any and changed the formating a bit to prevent large blocks of thanks to the both of you

doughxDude87: Thank you for the praise

TheNightstriker: thanks and sorry for the long wait ^^,I hope you liked the chapter

Now , the title change : I find the new title far more firring for the message I want to convey , so ... yeah , thats the whole reason.

I'll try to bring the next chapter out much quicker

But for now I'll nibble on a brownie and try to get some sleep (It's about 2 am right now)

Till next time , dear Reader

Sincerely ,Darth daver \[T]/