Ω
There were footsteps.
If that doesn't seem like the most interesting opening to a chapter, I apologize but as this is a record of events, not something ridiculous like fanfiction, I am unable to embellish the details and must say only what happened.
There were footsteps.
Of course, just because I am bound by the oath of a narrator – that is to say the truth, the whole truth... that may be the wrong oath but the idea is the same – does not mean I cannot share with you my own opinions and intuitions on the facts of the case. Of course, I will always do my best to delineate between the two so as not to mislead you my dear reader.
Intuitions are funny things.
The first sort, is very rare and only to be found in a few our betters. These are impressions formed from years of experience and wisdom to produce a conclusion which may have little evidence but nevertheless possesses the strongest force of argument.
The latter sort of intuition, namely that of lazy blackguards and gossiping shopkeepers with overactive imaginations is of course the only type I, a longstanding member of that group, can utilise. I ask that you bare with me still though.
All that was heard were footsteps.
A more imaginative man would say that there was something more.
Not more than the footsteps, I have already made it clear that that was all that was there, but something more about the footsteps.
There were two pairs of feet and if the man recording these footsteps was one prone to fancies, he might say that the first one was an arrogant step, one that stomped down hard with no regard of the earth and that carried the high and broad shoulders of one who had an equal disregard for heaven.
The second was much quieter and if you will again entertain my fanciful overtures, allow me to imply that they were t he gentle steps of a pure maiden, that the footfalls were that of pure flower, a kind soul that had lived in the darkness of this world but had never known sin.
Many know of the Madonna that crushed the Serpent's head, and if you will not find me to impertinent, I'd say that this maiden was too pure even to slay the deceiver. The result of that was unfortunately, as prophesied, that her heel was bruised. If only you had been there my dear reader, then you would have heard it too; a step too gentle to even crush the dead leaves in its path that faltered every now and then as though it were under the strain of an injury.
The cloudy night gave way to the smallest rays of the fragmented moon and the two figures were revealed in its pale light.
The dark red garments of the first pulled the rays of the moon in around him as though his cloak were a hungry creature only able to be sated by the assimilation of this lunar light. With a flash of his sharp smile, it was clear why this first person's step was one of complete disdain for all things here and above. That was because he was a devil.
Do not be surprised that I say this, do not doubt it either, the man was a devil. How can he be a man and a devil at once? I do not know, but I do know that if 'Lucifer' was written across his forehead in diabolical script and infernal horns crawled out from under the confident brim of his top hat (which was, by the way, of the best quality) then I would be no more confident than I am now that he was a devil.
Still, you're right, I am imagining things. Forgive me.
Even if you don't believe me here, you will by no means doubt that my second intuition was correct because next to him was the angel I had been guessing at from her step.
She stood there as though her existence was there to contradict the foul being next to her.
Contrasted to the muscular and broad-shouldered man, her slight frame would have been obscure if not that it reflected the beams of the moon like a mirror. Her arms were bare and covered in scars and her eyes were an almost transparent grey that seemed to capture all of creation in them her in a panorama.
The moon sneaked back into the covering of the clouds and the two were hidden from all the world once again. And once again, there were footsteps.
Ω
It wasn't long before Jaune woke up, and in almost no time after that, the carrier that had dropped them off in that damned desert was seen and after much desperate signalling and a few frustrated arrows from Shouter, the team was carried off and treated.
It was the next evening now, and the group trained trained; not completely recovered from their truly gruelling experiences but not wanting to use that as an excuse either.
The only energetic one among them was Jaune whom they had all thought at one point to be a dead man. His energy was ungodly and they were all confident that only the thunderous Theodore could attempt a competition of this sort with the fourth generation Arc warrior.
He's a freak, Shouter thought with a playfully exaggerated expression of awe and dread.
Sky looked at him strangely too, although he was more worried that he was overdoing it than of anything else, the only one who seemed uninterested was their team leader.
That was however the opposite of the case, as he captured all the blonde warrior's movements with the small slit of his half-open eyes from his seat on the open window. The barely visible iris was filled with an expression quite different from the innocent shock of the dog faunus or the fraternal concern of the blue-haired Valean. It was the cold look of a predator, mixed with the guttural fear of a rival.
Cardin played it off though, and turned his attention towards the view that his window seat afforded him. The city was scarcely beautiful by a Valean noble's standards, it was too chaotic for such refined tastes, he was fair though and he acknowledged that there was something alive about it, but only in the worst sense.
There were buildings that had been started and never completed, quarters that were collapsing and rooms that were built upon one another like a jenga tower. It was like a mess of vines in a decaying swamp. Despite its apparent decrepitude it was functional though, not in the stumbling way of decaying cities (as was more common in the more sophisticated kingdoms) but in the active one of injured but patriotic soldiers.
This quality was by far the most egregious in the Winchester heir's eyes; he believed (as most aristocratic people did) that he was able to understand and sympathise with the struggles of the poor. He could even praise the habits of the vile, but in all truth, he despised life that struggled although if pushed more about what he meant about that, he would find that he probably hated life in general or at least despised it. It may seem shocking that anyone could have such a view, but it was quite easy to believe, especially as an elite.
Cardin was not one who could be said to be constantly contemplating, but he sometimes dabbled in the vice and when he did, he found out why he didn't do it more often. He found that he didn't care for life and that he hadn't cared for it for as long as he could think. He found that he hated himself and hated the world in equal measure.
The previous night, he was tormented with nightmares and since he had neither company to keep his mind away from dark regions nor activity to keep him occupied, he delved into the deep end. His current mood was the result of that.
He looked disdainfully at the masses beneath his gaze, at the trying masses, the vibrant masses, the vermin masses.
All his breast coagulated into a spiteful draught and if it were possible with a single wish, he would send fire down and wipe out the city and himself with it. He had never felt more spite than he did in that moment, if not for the city's effective defences that made sure no Grimm were in the immediate vicinity of the city, it may have been able to call in the creatures of darkness.
The dark storm festered in his heart then, brooding at the injustice of life.
His morbid meditations were cut short by the appearance of their History Professor, the impish Rumpole. Her face was rather the same as usual, hinting at some sort of mischief and sending eerie signals down the spine of her unfortunate students.
The group all looked at her with rapt attention, confident that what was coming was terrible news.
It was.
"Firstly," she began, very casually, as seemed her only manner of speech, "You were expected to survive in the desert at least a week, but in only a few days, you needed rescuing."
"That's unfortunate because it shows that you guys aren't prepared in the least to be Huntsmen, but also because that field trip was worth a whole third of your grade."
Who grades field trips? Shouter asked himself in exasperation.
"Is there a way to make up for the grade?"
"There is," she said, schadenfreude scrawled over the smooth curve of her smile in an almost visible script.
Ω
A few days passed and after a similarly botched excursion, team RAVN was sort of listlessly moving through the Beacon Academy compound. Even Nora was much more subdued than her nature generally permitted her to be. A good part of the reason for this behaviour was the distraction and unease of their taurine teammate Vulpes.
The redhead had been spaced out all the morning and his comrades were truly concerned for his well-being.
"I'm not the only one worried about Adam right?"
Nora whispered a little distance behind the nearly two-metre tall faunus, probably forgetting that faunus had really good hearing and also forgetting that her whispers were not at all quiet.
"The doctor said he was okay," Ren responded in a whisper also, not because he thought it would stop him from being heard, but to maintain the illusion that his friend's whispers weren't really loud, "... He does seem to still be suffering from something though, keeping an eye on him while giving him space will probably be the best route."
Pyrrha concurred silently although her bright green eyes scarcely left the back of the subject of their conversation.
The man was aware of the dialogue that surrounded him, but his distraction made him push it to the recesses of his mental space as he tried to piece something together. It had been bothering him during the day and in the part of his night that was not dominated by that nightmare.
The double effect of his faltering memory and the ghastly and inscrutable phantoms that haunted morphean arena of his sleep destabilized him, he felt as though he was walking down a spiral staircase but stumbling on every step downwards, he knew that if he didn't right himself soon, he would crash into the bottom of the dark stairwell.
He felt a soft hand on his arm, he didn't need to turn around to see that it was Pyrrha. He knew because for a second all the matters on his mind stopped clamouring for his limited attention and faded into the background. For a moment, he felt comfort.
I don't need comfort, he said to himself instinctively, pulling his arm away like her touch was a brand, I need clarity.
Their eyes met and her emerald ones quivered. He knew he shouldn't have done that, still he doubled down and looked away, breaking away from what he felt as the oppression of their hovering presence.
Almost as soon as he separated from them, he felt the intense gaze of someone else. The person made no effort to conceal themselves so he sat on a bench and waited for them to approach him. He was surprised to see the red-haired Brid walk up to him in a few moments.
He was irritated, so his hand flew to his side, brushing the hilt of his trusted blade lightly but not grabbing it.
The action made the girl jump slightly, still she walked forward with an impetuousness that was generally the trait of all those who had lived in (more accurately survived) Vacuo.
Adam looked at her inquiringly, although the corner of his gaze was still covered with the haze of his recent distraction.
"Lug wants to talk to you."
Adam's gaze turned queer as though to ask what that had to do with him and more importantly who that was?
"He says it's important and that you'll want to hear it. Also he told me to give you this."
As she spoke, she pulled out an envelope and handed it to the listless ex-general.
Adam shot up out of his seat like it had been electrocuted, after inspecting the face of the lass and ascertaining that she knew nothing about the contents of the paper she had handed him, he rushed out of the park. The haze in his eyes had disappeared.
What was written on such a small piece of paper that could have evoked such a reaction from him?
The paper, now a pile of ashes from a trick with his aura, had only two lines written on it.
"Adam Taurus."
"Blake Belladonna."
Ω
Jaune's brow was distorted with effort as he struggled against the heavy stinger of a Desert Death-Stalker. This variation of the Creature of Grimm was deadlier than the ones found in the forests of Vale. Although it lacked the venom that made the Valean variant so feared, it made up for it with a frightful amount of speed and a conversely much tougher armour.
The team was engaged with this creature and so far hadn't made any progress.
In order to deal with the beast's speed, Cardin was using his Magnum Onus to make it heavier and therefore slow it down. This allowed a duo of Shouter and Sky to target its joints, the archer landing elemental arrows that weakened it before the blue-haired user struck those places with Feather's Edge. Since using his ability against such a large mobile opponent was tasking, Cardin stayed out of the fray and provided support which left Jaune as the only one initiated in direct combat with the beast.
The durable Crocea Mors pushed back the heavy sting of the creature – made heavier by his team leader's Semblance- and he rolled away suddenly from the pincer attack that two Wind Dust arrow shots from Shouter had slowed down so he had barely the time to dodge.
The creature wasn't happy at all as it swung its stinger rapidly in the offender's direction, surprising everyone there that it could move so fast though it was weighed down. Even more surprising was that before the tail could strike the dog faunus into a coma, a yellow and white streak got there first. Tackling the tail with his great shield, he unbalanced it and made the creature kick up large sprays of sand in an effort to not be turned over.
Not one to waste a good opportunity, Shouter aimed at the joints in its legs with Ice Dust arrows and, swift as a song, Sky swiped at the arachnid Grimm in the weakened spots and a sickening crack rung through out the desert.
With some of its legs damaged, its speed was severely affected and the result was inevitable.
Team CLAD stood over the rapidly dissolving corpse of the Grimm creature, all a bit winded. All except the now ever energetic Jaune.
He had definitely taken the most damage among all of them, but you wouldn't believe it with how composed he was.
Conversely, Cardin looked a mess.
His face was a lurid mask, the pale countenance relieved only by the dark circles around his eyes and the shock of hair that looked almost a dirty brown in contrast to his wan complexion.
He hasn't slept in at least a week.
The worried thought was declared simultaneously by Shouter and Sky, there was real worry in their expression.
"How many tasks left?" Cardin asked the question after the group had rested for a while and pickup vehicle from the local Hunstman guild had been called for.
Shouter pulled out a scroll and pulled up a list and crossed an item off it. He scrolled down and met at least a dozen more.
"Too many," he declared in exasperation, looking at the eternal list.
"Damn that old hag."
The old hag in question was Professor Rumpole, when asked if there was a way to make up their grade, she had given them that scroll. The scroll was a Huntsman badge, hers. It allowed them to, among other things, get access into certain secure places depending on their clearance and get free transport, accommodation and the like from the Huntsman guilds. Why did she give this to them?
Because to ,make up their grade, they would be completing missions that she had undertaken but had no intention of finishing.
It wasn't an entirely novel practise; experienced Hunstmen would give missions to students in order to test them and introduce them to the benefits of being a member of the guilds.
The problem was that Rumpole was pure evil and had been working the lads down to the bone on this pretence. Worse still, she was accepting new jobs daily. They would get the extra grades and some payment but it felt way to exploitative.
Cardin looked pensively for a moment.
"Are there any new A-rank missions?"
They all looked at him in surprise, wondering why he asked the question.
"One A rank is worth more than a dozen of these C and B ranks we've been doing. If we complete just one we can stop slaving away for that dwarf."
Jaune, never one to think things through, was all onboard for the plan.
"We can't access the A rank missions though," Shouter countered, "Not without her own access code. Rumpole's careless, but even she wouldn't risk the disciplinary action by the guild if she let kids undertake an A rank."
"We'll have to convince her to let us take a crack at one of them, but you guys all have to be willing to get into the fight of your lives."
Ω
Adam pushed open the door to Whitey's silently, not as someone who was sneaking in, but as someone who was in no hurry. The change that had occurred between his destination and the school was remarkable but it was due to a decision.
I couldn't possibly foresee that these people would end up being such a problem... I may have to kill their leader.
There were a number of complications with that approach though; the biggest one being that he would have to slay Brid too as she knew he had come here. That would be impossible to do silently; Hunstmen-in-training didn't just go missing.
I could fake a training accident maybe.
Since it truly would be a hassle, he would wait and see what the lad had to say for himself.
Lug was seated on the first floor of the bar in the empty lounge. This lounge overlooked the street and therefore he had seen Adam before he walked in. Indeed, the pair had locked eyes for a second and exchanged sarcastic smiles.
Adam climbed the silent staircase, his gait stiff like a wound-up doll, ready for any surprise the dog faunus had in store for him. He didn't meet any, but sat in an ornate wooden chair in the large and slightly sybaritic room, facing the lad who was reclined comfortably in one of the expensive couches the Winchester settlement had allowed him to purchase.
Despite his reclining posture, he held his five-pointed spear firmly. He was clearly a bit nervous.
Adam sneered at this and looked coldly into his opponent's eyes.
Feeling pressured, the lad decided to speak first although he perceived that doing so might give him some sort of disadvantage as far as bravado was concerned.
"I didn't call this meeting with you," he began, "I also don't know the contents of the envelope I had delivered to you, none of my subordinates do either."
Adam scrutinized his face for a second, and after deciding that he believed him. It was quite impossible that someone was able to discern the pair's identities.
That was for the simple reason that they were using the most impenetrable disguise possible... Blake's bow.
Despite how funny that may have seemed, I am actually not joking. The bow is a piece of a special artefact know as the Nightshade Cloak. It has the effect of obscuring the identity of the wearer, unlike most disguises, there were actually no changes to the wearer's appearance, merely an inability to connect their features with the person that was known. She had given him part of the bow and explained its significance, he wore it on the inside of his clothes at all times.
If such a measure hadn't been employed, it would have been impossible to live in Vale undetected, especially with the growing collaboration between the gangs and the Fang.
It was impossible that someone knew, and yet here they were, someone clearly knew to have had that message delivered to him.
There was an abundance of such items all over Remnant, either in the hands of powerful families and factions or held by the Huntsmen Academies and many hidden in deep recesses that no one knew. For simplicity, I call them magical items, but my more "scientifically-minded" peers scorn at this name and would rather call them other more scientific names but seeing as I am the only narrator you have, we will continue with my own tag.
"Today's meeting was called by my benefactor, the Augur... you seem to have heard of him."
He said this last part because the taurine student's eyes lit up a bit with the glare of recognition at the mention of the name.
Indeed, he knew who the Augur was. Just before he left the Fang, the top echelon were in negotiations with him in order to form a partnership.
In the land of Remnant, few organizations survived as islands. The Vytal Festival was a perfect example of this; continuous cooperation between the four schools was not only a great way to exchange talent and foster competition but served as a signal to all their enemies that Huntsmen were united all across the land.
The philosophy was similar for smaller entities. From the marauding tribes of Mistral and all about the continent of Anima, to the gangs that struggled for power in Vale, strong alliances were being made daily; the underground was growing, it would soon be too large to remain under. When that happened, there would be hell to pay.
"He instructed me to give this to you," Adam's slight reaction seemed to give the boy no small pleasure as he handed a dossier to the man.
Seeing that it was the Augur's handiwork, the boiling blood of the brutish blood settled and he scrutinized the documents enclosed seriously.
First and foremost was a short letter.
"
Long time no see, Mr. Taurus.
Before we get started on the business I have unfortunately had to bother you with,
I'd like to make a clean breast to you so as to put your mind at ease.
Firstly, your disguise is impenetrable; even if I sat face-to-face with you
I would not recognize you despite the fact that I know of you well.
However, due to my abilities as an augur, I was able to foretell you'd end up here.
I remember you were sceptical of those abilities when we first worked together.
Do they seem a little more credible now I wonder?
Secondly, I am the only one, so far as I know, who
knows your identities, rest assured on that point.
Now, on to the matter for which I called you; there is an assassin by the name of Geran Gascon,
I require you to kill him.
If you wonder why I called you for this specifically, well it's because we've worked together before
and most importantly because he's in the city of Vale on the behest of the White Fang.
Yes, they're after you and the Belladonna heiress.
You taking him out will give you the double benefit of saving your skins and winning my
favour.
The man has a hostage with him, a young girl of about fifteen that is always by his side.
You must do all you can to ensure she isn't harmed, for that I'll make sure you are well-rewarded.
All the information I have on them is enclosed in the file.
My subordinate will give you instructions for the ambush.
You can burn this page once you're done.
"
Adam did so promptly before looking up at the dog faunus. Lug had been watching Adam's face intently, although other than the fact that it turned uglier and uglier with every line he read he wasn't able to gain much.
His benefactor was as mysterious to him as to everyone else, and he could not imagine what he wanted from a newly-enrolled Beacon Academy student for the life of him.
You're not paid to know that much, he chided himself, curbing his curiosity.
He delivered the instructions to the seemingly absent-minded Adam and handed him a box of about a metre's length before seeing him out.