Chapter 7: Wrath of the Deviant
No one told Jaune initiation would be this hard.
A legion of statues surrounded Ruby, Yang, and their makeshift campfire. Unlike her sister, Ruby was less interested in the warmth it brough and more focused on the sound emanating from the desolate forest.
"There's nothing you can do, Ruby. It's too dangerous to wander around in the Emerald Forest late at night. Even you can't see in the dark. Besides, look at what I brought." Yang held out a bag of marshmallows, two chocolate bars, and a box of cookies. "S'mookies!"
"I'm not in the mood for cookies."
Yang's face took on a mock look of shock. "My little sis, not interested in cookies? Be still my heart!"
"Who knows how many other initiates are fighting off the Grimm while I munch on sweets? If the two of us are alone, then our future partners must also be alone out there." She rose and switched Crescent Rose to scythe mode. "They could need our help."
"Who's to say that they didn't find another complete team of four and join them?" asked Yang.
"I guess? But what if–"
"Ruby, we're more likely to meet up with them if we stay put around this campfire. They'll either see the light or the smoke and head our way." Yang scarfed down a freshly toasted marshmallow.
Ruby continued to gaze into the wilderness but felt her resolve to venture out weaken. She's probably right. Yang's so smart.
"You might say the campfires's our shining Beacon!"
Never mind.
"Ok." Ruby shifted her weapon and attached it to her hood but couldn't break her head away from the trees, though. Something forced her to keep her eyes locked in place.
It proved to be the right call. A crippled Death Stalker slowly dragged its already dissolving body out of the blackness. Its stinger had been severed, along with its right claw. Two of its legs on one side were missing and the third was impaled by a thin rapier, prohibiting it from moving faster than a crawl. Yang crammed another s'mookie into her mouth as she saw it.
"Hyuh god diss, Roob?"
"Yeah, I got it."
Yang. Dad. Zwei. Crescent Rose. S'mookies.
Silver eyes opened, and the Grimm joined its brethren as its very own tombstone.
The light died down, and Ruby looked over her handiwork. The Deathstalker's tail broke off under its own weight and dented the carapace. The rapier was firmly stuck within solid stone.
Ruby nodded. The ability to instantly kill Grimm had come in handy when journeying through a Grimm-infested forest. Without any obstacles in their way, Ruby and Yang had already made it to the ruins and chosen their relic (Yang wanted 'the cute little pony'), but nightfall prevented them from returning to the professors with their prize.
"Hey, hand me one of them s'mookies–"
Ruby turned to see Yang shoving the last of their treats past her lips, melting chocolate dripping down her chin. A moment of silence was followed by a guilty gulp.
"You said you weren't in the mood!"
"YANG, YOU WHORE!"
Jaune handed the wide-eyed headmaster his relic. Behind him were Pyrrha, Dove, Russel, and the fading corpses of countless Grimm.
"My word! This has to be the most successful entrance exam I've ever seen. You've not only passed, my boy; you're the new team leader!"
Dove and Russel patted him on the back in congratulations. Pyrrha timidly walked up to Jaune. Seeing her approach, the boys backed off with wide grins glued to their faces.
"Hey, little lady. Something your team leader can help you with?" Jaune said.
"Um – eep! Hi Jaune. T-there's something I need to ask you." She was so cute when she was nervous.
"Well, go on. Mr. Arc's in a good mood, so he might just give you the answer you're hoping for."
"M-Mr. Arc, will you please be my… Arc, will you…Arc…Arc…Arc!"
Jaune's couldn't breathe. Not in anticipation of Pyrrha's question – he was already awake by this point, and the dream had faded away. The reason he couldn't breathe was because Dove hand was covering his mouth.
"Arc," Dove whispered. Jaune nodded to let his teammate know he was awake and was rewarded with a much-needed wheeze of breath.
"Arc. You must remain calm, and you absolutely must not make any noise. A Grimm is approaching rapidly. A dangerous Grimm."
A Grimm? But Jaune had checked every nook and cranny in this darned place. There'd only been some scorpion monster, and it was already dead!
That one had been a doozie. The scorpion had somehow snuck up behind him and chased him deeper into the cave. He'd lucked out and found a back exit on the other side of the cliff, but that scorpion kept chasing him. Then, when they were outside, there was a bright silver light some distance away, and some kind of giant crow thing fell out of the sky and squished the Grimm creepy crawly chasing Jaune. Weirdly enough, the crow Grimm had been made entirely of stone.
As Dove moved to wake Russel in a similar manner, Jaune saw that Pyrrha was guarding the entrance to their cave. Her sword was drawn, her shield raised, and her eyes scanning the exit to their temporary shelter.
Oh, right. Even if he cleared out the cave, there was still a forest full of monsters.
Jaune tiptoed over to her and adopted a similar pose. "Where's it coming from?"
"Dove wasn't sure. Like he'd mentioned, his aura and semblance have been going into overdrive since he met up with us, and he can see farther than normal. He said it was 4 klicks northwest of us at first and that was a safe distance. But then it was 3 klicks southwest of us 5 minutes later. Last he checked, it was 1.5 klicks west-southwest and making a beeline for us."
"That's not a lot of klicks. Not very many at all."
Pyrrha's eyes broke from the forest to look at Jaune like he was a newborn puppy. "A klick is the same as a kilometer."
"Then why don't they just call it a kilometer!" Jaune exclaimed.
"Keep your voice low, Arc," Dove quietly uttered to them from behind as he filled in Russel.
"Can we hide deeper inside the cave?" Jaune asked Pyrrha.
"No. It may be a dark out there, but there's at least some moonlight. In the cave, we'd be blind, and the Grimm would be able to sense us by our fear. Whether we retreat or make a stand, it must be outside."
"I vote retreat."
"It traversed 5 kilometers through a dense forest in 5 minutes. That's 60 kilometers per hour. The fastest human can run up to 40 kilometers per hour. We'll never outrun it, even with a head start."
"How do you know that?"
"Pythagorean theorem. If it's northwest then southwest, that makes a right angle, so–"
"No, I mean the fastest human's speed?"
"Because I'm the fastest human alive."
Jaune gripped Crocea Mors. The team was awake, in position, and ready for combat. Except for him, of course. He wasn't ever really ready for combat. Maybe he was still dreaming. Wouldn't that be nice…
Jaune and Dove stood at the mouth of the cave, while Pyrrha hid amongst the bushes on both sides. The two swordsmen would be the bait, engaging it first and slowly drawing the Grimm into the cave. From there, Pyrrha would ambush it from behind and hold it off until Jaune and Dove retreated. Russel, who'd scaled the cliff, would drop down, discharge his Dust rocket daggers, and bring down the mountainside on the Grimm.
Dove's plan was genius. It didn't even rely on Jaune to do any important task alone. He just needed to help Dove draw the Grimm into the cave.
The leaves rustled.
Dove tensed. "It's here, but it's… just…"
"…a Beowolf?" finished Jaune as the Grimm emerged. "The four of us could take one of those, easy. Why didn't you say?"
"I couldn't clearly make it out at that distance when I first felt it," Dove muttered. "But it's speed…"
"www–"
"wwwwww–"
The Beowolf was quietly humming a growl to itself as it inspected the two knights in dusty armor. It drew closer, and Dove sighed as he loaded some rounds into his revolver-sword.
Now, Jaune Arc was no great swordsman, leader, or brilliant tactician. He wasn't even a regular tactician. But, unlike Dove, he had two eyes that were wide open, and he couldn't help but see what he saw.
That was no Beowolf.
This Grimm, if he could even call it that, had four tusks in place of fangs. Two jutted straight out of its mouth and ended with a serrated pattern that resembled the jagged teeth of a saw. The other pair protruded from the bridge of its snout and curved back around as though they were put there to protect its skull from oncoming attacks. Instead of the bone spikes that normally dotted a Beowolf's arms and legs, this one had four short black flaps hanging down limply that stretched from the torso to the paw of each appendage. At least its tail was normal. Nope, scratch that – its tails were normal. But what scared Jaune the most was its eyes. Jaune always though that the glowing red and yellow eyes of a Grimm were the most terrifying things in Remnant. He now knew that a Grimm with thick, gloopy tar dripping out of its soulless eyes was much, much, worse.
"www–"
"Worry not, team, you may come out," Dove called out. "It's just a Beowolf."
The Grimm thing looked at Dove when he spoke, then paused and looked to the left and right. It was kind of like it was…searching…
It understood him.
"No, wait," Jaune said. His mouth began to move faster than his brain. "Let's just play it safe and stick to the plan. Dove and I will push it back into the forest and pin it down, then Russel sneak up on it from behind and stab it to death. We'll stick to the plan, the original plan." Jaune put extra emphasis on the last line, hoping his team would understand.
Dove sighed and looked at Jaune like he was daft but put up no argument. That's it. Just think I'm an idiot who forgot the plan. Please, Dove, don't correct me in front of the enemy, please.
"wwwwww–"
"Very well. If it makes you feel safer, Arc, we'll proceed as initially intended."
They rushed at it. Jaune swung his sword over his head and wildly tried to lop off an arm, but one of the tails swept his legs and he fell to the ground. Dove, now using his semblance to make out the oddities, probed the Grimm with a few shots and went for the head. His blade bounced off the upper tusks without inflicting any damage. A tail wrapped around his sword, but he shot off a round and used the momentum to pull free. Jaune used the moment to get back up to his feet. The pair of them backed off.
The Grimm did not move from its position.
"wwwwww–"
Dove tried to make sense of it. "Is this a century-old Grimm? One whose longevity enhanced its survival instincts?"
"Then why does it look so weird? How would a Beowolf grow extra tails and tusks?"
The two backed towards the cave as Dove fired a few more shots. He may not have understood that Jaune was trying to trick a Grimm by feeding it false intelligence, but he at least seemed aware that something was out of the ordinary and followed his teammate's lead.
The Grimm still held its position. It looked to its left and right and hummed.
"wwwwww–"
Jaune would've called himself crazy for thinking a Grimm sounded frustrated if it weren't for the fact that everything about this was crazy.
It knows Dove and I have backup. It's…scared?
No. It's cautious.
A bullet tore through the Grimm's arm flaps. Pyrrha stepped out from her cover with Miló in rifle form.
No! "Pyrrha, the plan–"
"–has failed. This Grimm is not following you two into the cave. We've no chance of springing any traps. Our best option is to fight it head on."
Her weapon shifted into a short-sword as she charged. She threw her shield into the air, but it sailed harmlessly over the Grimm and landed past it. Then, the shield magically shot towards the Grimm's exposed backside. The Grimm rotated around and knocked the shield out of the air with a swipe of its paw, but Pyrrha was on it the moment its back was turned. She slashed across the monsters back twice in an X and switched her weapon to a javelin.
Without warning, the dangling flaps that were previous flat against the Grimm's black arms and legs stood on end, and the flabby skin transformed into rigid fins. Pyrrha aimed her javelin at the Grimm for a finishing blow, but its right arm fin sliced her leg and she fell to her knees. Miló slipped from her hands and missed its mark.
Wait, why wasn't she bleeding? Oh yeah, aura. Pyrrha had a magic force field that protected her. The realization that such a blow would've lopped Jaune's leg clean off only fed his growing sense of panic. I've killed us all. I wanted to play hero, and now they're going to die because I'm a fake. All three of them are going to fucking die against this crazy super-Grimm, and it's all because my team can't rely on me!
All three of them…
"Retreat to the cave!" Jaune screamed.
"The plan's fucked!" Pyrrha replied.
"Just trust me!"
Dove covered them while Jaune helped Pyrrha up. She reached her hands out, and her weapons again flew through the air. The spear turned into a gun when it reached her, and she joined in on the suppressive fire. The Grimm was blocking every shot with its fins that were now held out as shields, but it wasn't able to follow them into the cave.
"Russel!" Jaune yelled.
The final member of Team Fuck this Fucking Grimm leapt down from wherever in the cliff he had perched. "Yeah, boss?"
"Russ, fire but only on the cave's entrance! Everyone, get into the cave!"
Russel's eyes lit up in understanding. "On it!"
They'd be sealed in, but the Grimm would be sealed out. Dove's semblance would be enough to navigate through the cave to the back exit on the other side of the cliff, even in the complete darkness that was soon to surround them. As they retreated into the cavern, Jaune looked back. Russel was launching dust shots at the roof of the cave, and huge chunks of rock were falling down. The last thing he saw before being completely sealed in was the Grimm stare at Russel with its black dripping eyes, then turn away with a low snarl that almost sounded like disappointment.
"wwwwww–"
Omake
Jaune: This Grimm is beyond insane. It's wiping the floor with us!
Dove: It can think and has advanced weaponized body parts. How can we face off against such a powerful monster?
Pyrrha: There's no backing down now, team. We're need to stand and fight!
Russel: *playing solitaire* I wonder how things are going down there.
Omake 2
Pyrrha: I'm the fastest human alive.
Ruby: Good one.
Next Chapter: Inferno – All hell breaks loose.