Hello everyone! To those of you who are just recently picking up this story, welcome! And to those who have come across the first volume before and are now coming back to it again, welcome back! I'll be kicking things off with a bang in the first chapter, which is being posted at the same time as this A/N, but first, I wanted to once again go over a few of the things I mentioned in the A/N at the end of Volume 1's final chapter. For ease of reference, I'll be compiling them on this page. So, here we go:

1a: The story now begins approximately 4 years prior to RWBY: Volume 1, instead of the previously stated 3 years.

1b: Emerald and Mercury are now 15 at the start of the story, 16 currently, while Lee and Neo are now physically 17 at the start of the story, 18 or 19 currently. While I'm not sure if I've stated it, both Lee and Neo are currently claiming to be 16 on any forms they have to provide an age for. This includes their Huntsmen(-In-Training) Licenses, the registration form Lee would have signed for the MRCT qualifier, etc.

1c: Neo is no longer telepathic; she now communicates through a variety of sign language, scroll messages, facial expressions, body language, and non-linguistic sounds. Thus far, Lee and Cinder are the only two in the group who are actually proficient in sign language. Lee came in with a good understanding thanks to a college course in his previous universe, and honed said understanding through repeated conversation with Neo; Cinder is Cinder. Emerald understands some basics, which she began to learn after discovering that Cinder understands sign language, while Mercury is completely clueless.

1d: Neo no longer possesses the ability to teleport. Hers and Lee's infiltration of the Xiong's club was thus done through use of illusions. Any other mention of her teleportation that I might have missed while cleaning up Volume 1 should be treated as instead being accomplished through illusions.

2a: As Neo no longer possesses the ability to teleport, she and Lee now infiltrate the club by going through the front door, under illusions. Neo now participates in the assault.

2b: The Xiong Family did not include the parents of Melanie and Miltia Malachite, as previously told. Those will instead be changed to be two other, original characters.

2c: The head of the Xiong Family at the time Cinder's Gang wreck the club is named Hei Xiong, not Beiji Xiong. Seeing as this makes him Hei "Senior," and Junior, well, Junior, he no longer has an older brother. Instead, Da Hui Xiong is renamed and the relation to the Xiongs removed.

2d: Hei Senior survives the assault from Cinder's gang.

3a: Winter Schnee still goes on the mission where her partner and Summer are killed. I had originally planned to retconn this, but I think I found a way for this to still make sense. Thus, it's being left in.

3b: Summer no longer wields katar/magnums; these are replaced with a pair of kusarigama with blades on the end (for those of you who may not recognize them, think of a chain with a sickle blade on one end and a weight on the other), placing them in the same category as Emerald's and Blake's weapons. While Emerald's weapons are primarily guns which happen to have the capability of using the attached bayonets as kusarigama, and Blake's is primarily a katana/cleaver/pistol combo with the kusarigama used primarily for utility, Summer's weapons are very clearly kusarigama above anything else, with what appears to be revolving dust chambers added for additional utility. For a visual, search for Dishwasher1910's portrayal of Summer Rose.

3c: Summer's Semblance is no longer just a metabolism boost (though, admittedly, to say it was just a metabolism boost would be like saying the Kaio-Ken just boosts the strength of the user. While effectively correct, the oversimplification leads to incorrect leaps of logic). Additionally, it no longer comes with no visible side effects; now, it generates white-red rose petals to make it canon compliant, and is more effective in direct sunlight or under a UV lamp than it is at night or indoors. Among the things she can do are the ability to enhance her physical strength, speed, and durability. While doing so, she'll leave rose petals of Aura in her wake. She also does so when she takes damage while using this.

4: In keeping with the original reason why he went for the katar/pistols, Lee no longer has those either. Because the memories of Summer were what inspired them, Lee instead has the same kind of chain sickles that Summer did. However, he is still a firm believer in not resorting to non-intuitive mechshift or combination weaponry if he can avoid it (the design of Summer's appears like it would be very fragile around the base of the blade's curve), and thus his are designed to be a replica of the chain scythe that Tsubaki Nakatsukasa becomes in Soul Eater. That being said, the blade is sharp on both edges and capable of rotating 90 degrees so that it resembles a curved sword, sort of in the same shape as Cinder's. Additionally, due to their nature, Lee no longer has the grappling harness (a la Attack on Titan), as he can simply use the sickles as grappling hooks. He does, however, rely more heavily on the impressions he receives from Summer (in addition to lessons from Emerald) in order to become an effective combatant with them in sickle form, as they have a higher skill floor (but also a much higher skill ceiling).

5: While they do still kiss in La Vida Loca, the incident in which Emerald bites Lee's lip now produces the logical result: Lee ends things right there. Thus, the two never have a "relationship," and it does not provide as much tension in the relationships between Lee and Emerald, Lee and Mercury, Lee and Neo, Mercury and Emerald, and Emerald and Neo, as it previously had.

6: Due to the additional challenge posed by learning to handle the kusarigama, Lee does not sweep the competition in that preliminary tournament; instead, he places second, losing in the final round to Sombra Talon. Sombra will be renamed, and no longer speaks any language other than English.

These retcons may or may not actually result in me going back to rewrite parts of Volume 1. In the interest of keeping the story moving, however, I'm going to focus on writing Volume 2, and only go over Volume 1 if I reach a point where I find myself with some extra time. If I do and make the rewrites, I'll make a mention of it as an A/N at the beginning of the current chapter.

So, thank you again, and without further ado, here we go!