Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. By now, you should know what I'm here to speak about. I don't normally find myself covering grim subjects in Weiss Reacts, but I felt that it had to be done.

At 4:54 pm yesterday (as of this writing), Monty Oum, creator of RWBY, passed away.

That announcement alone brought shockwaves within the RWBY fandom, including the fanfiction community- that makes it myself, fellow writers and you guys, the faithful readers who follow us no matter what.

The man who had spent countless hours working on his ideas to entertain us and make it look badass, gone suddenly from us. I only found out about it in the middle of other activities, to the point I initially thought that it had to be a joke- it had to have been one. Surely, the same guy who basically worked twenty-five hours a day just to get his work done to the best he could couldn't just die like that, right?

However, it wasn't, as I found out and as you already know.

Now, I personally owe a lot to him. Without his work, I would have never begun RWBY fanfiction, and thus without him, Weiss Reacts and all of the fics that came from it would never have existed. Without him, I might probably not have ever started writing fanfiction at all- or at least, not until I felt something was comfortable to write about. Either way, my life was affected by his work to a great extent.

However, this is not about me and how I feel about the tragedy.

This is about how we should respond to it.

Now, I can't say that apart from RWBY, I knew his work very well. That would be a lie. What I do know, however, is that it contained some of the most badass, awesome, over the top fights and scenes that any mortal mind on this Earth could come up with.

So then, is it not proper that we send off Monty in a way that isn't sad, but rather badass? Deserving of the man's legacy?

That's what I'm going to do.

For those wondering about how this affects the Reactsverse, this is the part you might want to listen up to.

The Reactsverse will continue regardless- with the exception of a lack of an update this coming Wednesday for me to work on a piece for an unrelated writing competition. If I planned it to end in three volumes, it'll end in three volumes.
The show must go on, as I've always heard said before, and I feel that it is the duty of us fanfiction writers to keep it going- to keep the legacy of his awesomeness continuing on, not just for us and you guys, but for him.

I recognise that you guys read my fics and that, sometimes, it might even brighten your day. More than ever, you guys will need it- and to an extent, so will I.

Secondly, the Mafia chapter will be postponed for the next month. Black comedy at this moment in time is, understandably, undesirable. Instead, it'll be replaced with the aforementioned badass sendoff- it's only right that the man who brought Dead Fantasy and RWBY to the world be sent off with an equal amount of badassery.

Finally, as a sign of respect, starting from here, the exclamation 'Oum' will no longer be used in Weiss Reacts and replaced with what was originally used, 'Dust'.

To end this speech, I turn to everyone who writes fanfiction, especially if you write RWBY.

Please, carry on what you do. Entertain the audience, cheer them up, keep the show going. It's our duty, nay, our obligation to ensure that everyone here still gets to enjoy fanfiction regardless of what happens- our duty to our fans and to him.

Those of you planning to write tributes, I implore you to write the most badass ones you can, the most awesome and explosive ones possible. It's only right we send him off with the same heroic, epic and mindblowing atmosphere he spent his life giving us, is it not? Be not sad, but celebrate his achievements! Give him one last hurrah! Do what you can to make sure that every last person who reads our stories knows that that is his legacy- not tragedy, but awesomeness, the likes of which the world had never seen before.

I feel it is right to end the speech like this, really.

O-Monty-sama, from all of us here, we thank you for everything you've given us, and the countless hours of awesomeness you gave us. Now, it's our turn to return the favour.

This is ElfCollaborator, signing out until tomorrow.