Every heartbeat pounded in my head, just barely audible over the ringing screeching in my ears. The arrow in my hand was blackened by soot, but as light as glass.

'Pyrrha…'

The trembling of my hands was stopped cold, settling for stone-steady. In my head the scenario played out between Pyrrha and that woman. The incredible fight she must have put up, one that knocked the building around them apart. A fight that was ended with little glass arrows, just like this one.

'No!'

I remembered the last arrow I had seen. In the chamber beneath Beacon where I was meant to stand guard while the Headmaster put Pyrrha into that machine. The foreboding aura of the thing was crushing at the time, and the failure of it that led to Pyrrha letting out such horrible screams was still fresh in my mind. That failure was caused by a little arrow like this. One sent straight through the glass, and through the heart of the girl in the machine.

'Her…'

That woman showed up wearing a red dress, the one with coal black hair and amber eyes. She was the one that let the arrow fly. She did something similar when she fought during the tournament, using glass to fight against her opponents. According to general consensus, she's the one that killed the Headmaster.

'What was her name?'

I now remember their debut fight so clearly. All her teammates, the way they fought, who they fought against, it was clear in my mind. That voice that hijacked the broadcast during the tournament and induced panic belonged to her. The names they listed during the tournament for her fight…

'That woman's name was-'

The glass arrow shattered in my hand, and the shards crackled on the stone.

"CIIIIINDEEEEER FAAAAAAAALL!"

I roared the name of that rotten creature with everything I had. I poured every ounce of emotion into the words. Every bit of disappointment, regret, annoyance, rage, hatred, loathing, fear and grief I felt was let out all at once, finally coming to a head too large to bury under a layer of stoic indifference. The ringing in my ears graduated to a loud tone that droned through my shout. It was accompanied by the loud heartbeats that racked my body and the veins that popped on my forehead. The crackling of stone snatched my gaze away from the shards of glass. Instead, my head whipped towards the noise.

The Wyvern settled neatly in my sights. Three red eyes looked down upon me from one side of its head, and I could see that the ash that layered over the entirety of the Grimm was fracturing and falling from its surface. The massive head eased up further over the edge of the tower, and the stone coating the masked head cracked around the jaw before shattering entirely. It chattered the large teeth lowly, just before two enormous wings flared behind it and blotted what little light came down from the quickly clouding sky.

"SCRRRREEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

The screech shook the entire tower and doubtlessly echoed all over Vale. The remaining stone coating the Wyvern exploded off of it into mere powder as it reared up powerfully.

I barred my teeth at the Grimm in a massive scowl that twisted my features. Crocea Mors was in my hand and brandished without having to think, and the glare I was sending to the creature was hot enough to burn holes through Atlesian warships.

"You helped her."

The words were machined, ice cold with jagged edges. The instinctual urge to fight took me, and I prepared to follow the call. The Wyvern came down fast, pivoting low with a mighty flap of wings to bring its giant maw snapping down towards me. I steeled myself, adjusting and preparing to leap just out of range so to counter, but I never got the chance. Before it even got close, a sparkling purple sheen bubbled into place around the Wyvern and it stopped. A massive screech devoid of movement shook the tower once more, but my eyes snapped behind me in spite of the monster.

"Professor?!" She was there with her crop extended towards the massive Grimm.

"I k-knew we should never have come here!" Her voice was shaking, and her face was pale. Sweat beaded on her forehead from the over-exertion of holding it back.

"Hindsight is 20/20." I griped, only to turn back towards the Wyvern after a splash caught my attention. Dark black globs dripped from between the ribs of the Grimm, despite it being unable to move. As they impacted the floor they flattened and smoked. I scowled as Grimm stalked forward from the smoke. "It makes Grimm… great."

With that I launched towards the closest one, scowl set firmly on my face. The Ursa reared up to slam its front paws down on top of me, but I dropped and slid across the stone between its legs. Crocea Mors slashed out as I passed, and I took its left leg as my toll. It roared in pain and tumbled to its front legs with a slam that shook the floor, but I didn't let it rest. I leapt back towards it the moment my feet caught the ground and straddled the back of the Ursa, smacking the spines of bone with my shield and snapping them off at the base. I raised and slammed my sword between the shoulder blades of the bear before yanking sharply upwards along the spine towards the head. The beast fell limp and began to smoke, and I was already onto my next target. A Beowolf singled me out the moment I hopped from the back of the corpse, and I welcomed it. The Grimm ran and leapt at me with its arms wide out to slash at me, and at just the right moment I lunged for it. I slammed into the Grimm and slammed it into the firm stone beneath us, taking a mere second to cave its head in from beneath with my shield.

Claws lashed out at me in that second, and I was forced to simply take the hit across my shoulder. The pauldron threw sparks from the hit and my aura flared briefly, but the second claw that rocketed towards me had no chance. I bucked against it with my shield and sent the Beowolf off balance. As it tried to straighten out on its hind legs I slashed from beneath, and my blade carved through the muscle and bone of one arm. I stopped the momentum and reversed it, changing the angle of my attack only slightly. On the way down, a second arm was severed with a growl from the target. A simple jab from my shielded arm threw the Grimm helplessly on its back, and after taking only a few steps I stomped on the skull of it until it sprayed all over the floor.

"Too close." I growled, slashing in a horizontal arc to my right without looking. A roar came from the large Ursa as the tip of my blade had caught him in the eye and sliced straight through bone and flesh to cut through the second socket. Smoke poured from the wound and the Grimm thrashed in pain, but a simple puncturing through the bottom of the jaw up through the top of the skull ceased everything. I extracted Crocea Mors, slinging the smoke from it idly. A Creep jumped on the back of the corpse and catapulted itself towards me. I simply bashed it away with my shield, and watched it fly over the edge of the tower.

"I- I can't hold it back!" Glynda's haggard voice called out peaking over the gurgling of the Beowolf I cut the jaw off of. "We must leave immediately!"

I stomped on its paws and chopped the head off the Grimm with no difficulty, and took the precious few seconds to glance back at the Professor. My teeth grit at the sight, nearly cracking under the pressure. Ms. Goodwitch was slumped to one knee with a sheen of sweat covering her skin and a clammy pallor. She looked ready to drop her crop at any minute. Despite this, she wasn't what had my attention.

Behind her, half-formed from a sludgy blotch on the ground, was a Lurker. Its bloated distended arm was raising up high, wicked bone claws prepared to rip into the unsuspecting Professor. I dropped any idea of continuing to brutalize these Grimm and sprinted before I could think. The distance was covered by large strides, and I felt the leather around the handle of Crocea Mors dig into my hands even through the gloves. The Lurker was nearing completion, and barely any time was left on the clock.

"GLYNDA MOVE!"

My shout and sudden movements caught her attention, but too late. I'd closed the distance and did the only thing I could think of. I shoved the Professor aside with my shield roughly, sending her sliding across the floor as I watched with relief. Then the jagged spindly claws of the Grimm came down across my face and down the ruined face of my armor. My aura flared to compensate for the damage, but the attack still stung like needles being raked across my skin. I snapped towards the lanky monster and grabbed it by the shoulder, just in time to anchor it in place as I thrusted Crocea Mors into its stomach and upwards behind its ribs. The point punched through the side of its clavicle, spraying smoke onto the skull mask of the Grimm.

"KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-"

The bleached skull chattered at me, clawing all the while at the protrusion from the side of its neck. I yanked the sword out, effectively disemboweling the creature and swung the heirloom blade only once more. The skull mask of the Grimm cracked on the stone when the head fell from its shoulders.

"JAUNE!"

I turned, but everything in sight was eclipsed by the gaping maw of the Wyvern right in front of me. Teeth, muscle, tongue and darkness were all I could see. It was all slathered in a sparkling purple, and it held in place for but a second before shattering like glass. That was all I needed to ready Crocea Mors and snarl at the Grimm. It came for me fast, but I was swift enough to keep up. Rather than let the teeth snap closed around me, I jumped. I lashed out as the maw closed around me and my weapon caught my target nicely. The grouping of muscles between the top and bottom jaw was sliced cleanly apart, and I could only smirk and take a deep breath as the loose strands of muscle were wedged between razor sharp teeth and gnarled as the maw closed me in complete darkness.

Luckily, though it was dark and tight, I still felt all of my limbs. My gamble worked, I had avoided all the teeth and was still in one piece. Assuming I was still in the mouth I went to work with Crocea Mors. I flung it every way that was possible, lashing at every angle I could maneuver it and sawing through anything it caught on. The tongue my body was resting on writhed under me and I could feel myself sliding, so I put up a last-ditch effort to avoid being swallowed. I struggled and cursed in my head until I managed to wedge my shield between the tongue and the roof of the mouth, something that left just enough room to properly manipulate Crocea Mors. I narrowly managed to straighten the blade vertically, and simply un-wedging the shield drove the sword into the vulnerable flesh through the force of the Grimm's own muscle. The entire area shook around violently, and it was only thanks to the tight grip I had on my sword that I didn't slam into the walls of teeth lining the mouth. The maw opened briefly, and I immediately took greedy gulps of fresh air.

"SCRRREEEEEEAAAAAAAAA!"

The screech it let out nearly deafened me, and the air buffeted against me from the lungs of the beast. Smoke obscured my vision as it rushed past me, seeping out of the countless gashes in the Wyverns mouth and carried out by the breath. It was only a few seconds before the vibrations in my body stopped and the mouth closed around me again, but it was enough for me to fill my lungs yet again. This time, everything was different.

Gravity shifted entirely, and I was left to flip and nearly tumble down the gullet of the giant beast. The only thing that kept me from falling was my sword, still embedded in the tongue and whatever was underneath. I dangled by one hand, and struggled until my second hand wormed its way through the mouth to latch onto the handle. All the pressure that pinned me between the tongue and the roof disappeared in a single second, it was as if the Grimm puffed up its mouth with air. A massive jolt went through the entire thing, and I couldn't stop my eyes from snapping wide open when I felt Crocea Mors budge. A scowl settled on my face as a second quake changed everything.

Whatever my sword was stabbed into had given out from the jolts, and even though my grip never faltered on the handle I began sliding down the throat. With the sword still firmly impaled it was like sliding down a banner. The tongue was sliced along the length of the edge all the way down until the base, then there was no more tongue to anchor to. I tumbled down the lining of the throat cursing for a few seconds before I managed to wedge myself precariously. My feet dug into the membrane wall of the Wyvern's throat, and my shoulder caught against the opposite side. Fresh air rushed past me deep into the beast, and as it was being drawn in I stole some for myself.

As the air was forced back out in a screech, I smirked.

I gripped my weapon and slashed, cut, sliced and stabbed anything and everything in the throat. Another screech that shook my bones only meant another breath of fresh air to me, and I took full advantage. Eventually after what felt like minutes of hard work the edge caught the thick membrane just right. I jabbed Crocea Mors through and sliced down savagely, creating a man-sized incision through the lining. The tip of my blade found itself embedded in the cords of flesh and muscle beyond and was used to carve them from each other.

'It distracted her.' The words buzzed in my brain as I chopped and sliced. The droning in my head was slowly growing bolder, after having disappeared when Glynda caught my attention. 'It helped Fall do all that to her!'

The blackened armor was burned into my mind, just the same as the little glass arrow.

The ancestral war blade was thrown forward with much more force than before, and I moved with fervor. Cords of muscle and flesh snapped apart as the blade sliced them cleanly through the middle, and sightless as I was I could tell smoke was building up with the canvas of gashes that littered the inside of the Wyvern. I yanked Crocea Mors free again, and jabbed it forward with all my strength.

'She probably thought nothing of it when she hurt her so grievously…'

I sawed away at the flesh, and through the smoke light filtered onto me. I hacked away feverishly at the layer I had hit and tattered black skin and what little muscle was left in front of me peeled away. Wind hit me hard, making it tough to keep my place wedged in the throat of the Grimm. I looked out of the animalistically torn throat, with stray strands of membrane and diced flesh waving wildly from the gusts, out into the great open sky.

"I'll kill your pet first!" I spat, each word ground out between a snarl.

[AN- We're into the meat of it, now. Thanks for the comments, follows, favorites, all of it.]