No update next weekend due to my horrible, horrible work event. I don't even mind attending and hosting the speech at it, but it's all the prep work that extends for a full month before the event that kills me. And every year I tell myself I'll delegate it next year, and every year I do and my team get so little done that I have to step in and take over. I'l half-convinced that's on purpose on their part.

Cover Art: GWBrex

Chapter 79

Their camp had swelled to twice its original size, with hundreds of refugees accepting charity and tents within their wooden walls. They had been a destitute and frightened lot at first, but fear was often made worse by the unknown, and it was hard for them to keep their terror when they'd spent days here without once being threatened. Familiarity breeds contempt, or so they said, and here it bred contempt of fear.

The Dark Lord walked, ate, and talked with people like a normal human being, and he didn't rise to the occasional insult thrown out by a grieving refugee or when a small child would demand tearfully why he sent his Grimm legions to kill their parents. Even if they didn't trust him, they could see with their own eyes that he wasn't insane. Maybe they thought themselves lucky, and that he simply hadn't succumbed to the madness yet. That he still had some humanity left in him.

Either way, they came and they stayed. It was a long walk between the walls and their camp, and after making it for a few days people began to give up and pitch their tents here instead. It was closer to food, warmth, protection and also far enough away from the priests and bishops who would come down and chastise them for their lack of faith.

Inside the walls, Jaune was sure the church was busy making this into an example of how those left outside the walls deserved to be because they had shown their true colours in accepting food from the Dark Lord. The people might even believe it, if only to assuage their own guilt at abandoning so many people.

"As far as we can tell there haven't been any spies so far," said Weiss. She, Pyrrha and Coco had been checking the people who came in for signs of unlocked aura,. "The Church seem content to sit behind their walls and wait out the end of the world."

"To be fair, they probably don't need spies to see what we're doing." It was rare for Coco to speak, especially around him, but seeing all these suffering people appeared to have jogged something inside her. "There are enough of them here still devout enough that they'll bring back as much news as the bishops want."

"Let them." Jaune shifted on his seat, leaning an elbow on the armrest and his chin upon his curled fist. "We have nothing to hide and they can see our numbers well enough from their walls."

There were few secrets between then anymore, though plenty of curiosity on his part as to what was going on inside the city walls. They could still see soldiers on the walls, so it was business as usual as far as Jaune could tell. He would have given his arm to know how much food they had, how many fighting men, how many Chosen, how much medicine. The kinds of questions that could tell him whether or not he should push for the attack right now.

"Patience has its place," said Ozma. "It takes weeks and months to teach someone to use their aura or fight with a weapon – and years to teach them the bow, to master their aura or to meet the level of those we bested in Mistral. Laying siege to her will not grant her time to swell her forces."

Jaune grunted, but kept Ozma's words to himself for now. That was pretty much his main concern. Every day they didn't act left him wondering if that was time Salem might use against them, but, as Ozma said, she couldn't recoup her forces that quickly. She'd lost thousands in Mistral, and those thousands were levied from Vale. They were fighting men of any good age, and it'd take years for more to grow old enough to match that.

A horse rode through the camp and came to a stop nearby, and a faunus jumped off, rushing forward while his companion dismounted and held the two horses. "My lord!" he cried. "Sir! My lord! I'm sorry to interrupt—" He made to bow to the three former Chosen, but Jaune waved him on.

"It's fine. What's wrong?"

"Grimm, sir!" he hissed, keeping his voice low. If he had shouted, then the refugees would have begun to panic. "A ways out yet, maybe three or four hours. It's a lot of them, though. Well over three hundred."

Pyrrha sighed. "I wondered when she'd make her move."

"Good work," said Jaune, slapping the faunus' shoulder. "Are there any more scouts out? How soon can we recall them?"

"We already sent our third and fourth to go warn them."

"Good thinking. More men like you and this war would be won already." It didn't cost him much to praise the good work, and the young man flushed bright red, saluting proudly. "Go get your friend and head back to the ships. Pass on the message there that we'll be emptying the camp, then get some food and rest in you. We'll handle the rest."

"I can fight, sir."

"We won't be fighting the Grimm. That's what she wants. We'll be saving the refugees and taking out to the water again. Rest and food." Jaune gave him a little push. "You've more than earned it."

The young man hurried back to his friend, delivered the message and then they were off. Jaune, Pyrrha, Weiss and Coco rose more slowly, walking out their tent and into the evening air. They didn't shout or cry out warnings because that would terrify everyone. Instead, they spread out and approached faunus guards one by one, whispering in their ears and passing the news on as the ships in the shallows creaked toward the shore.

It was orderly. Slow. Enough so that he wondered if Salem, surely watching this, thought she had them caught with their pants down. It took an hour, but soon the ships were ready and near the water's edge, and the refugees had finally begun to take notice of supplies being moved back onto them.

It was then that he had Pyrrha take to a raised platform in the middle of the camp.

"Hear me!" she cried, raising her arms out wide and using some subtle aura to make her hands glow a pinkish-red. As a Chosen, she'd probably given speeches and sermons before, and she looked at home with it here. "All you refugees cast out from Vale's walls, hear me and listen. I beg you."

The crowds shifted, and tent flaps opened as men, women and children stepped out. Even if they didn't trust him fully, they weren't about to close their ears and ignore their hospitality. They listened, one and all.

"The Grimm approach our position and are but an hour or so out." Her words cast panic among the audience, but the mention of an hour kept them from flying into a panicked frenzy. "The Church tells you that we control the Grimm, but we do not. If we did then we would have used them in Mistral against the Church's army, not here against innocent people. They come to slaughter us, as they have you, and we will take to our ships to escape them."

"What of us!?" cried a man. "What happens to us!?"

"You are welcome to join us on our ships, sir. Each and every one of you."

"Don't listen to her!" screeched a hysterical woman. "She's a traitor! Who knows what they'll do to us on those ships!"

It was hysterical, wild and pointless, and yet people murmured. They'd grown up with the Church, as had Jaune, and he knew he'd have been swayed by faith and dogma just as easily as them. He'd gone to bed every night praying to Salem to protect him from his nightmares. Nightmares that he now knew were Ozma's many memories.

"You will be fed and protected as you have been now," she said.

"Liar! Only the Goddess can protect us!"

"That's not—"

"She speaks for the Dark Lord!" shouted another. "We shouldn't be here. We never should have come."

"Why is he not the one talking to us?" yelled another.

Yet more cheered, and Jaune could already see some bundling up their clothing and supplies, ready to leave and make their way back to the walls of Vale where they would be slaughtered. Jaune swore, pulled away from Weiss and Coco and vaulted up onto the stage. He summoned fire to his left hand and brought it down in a mighty clap onto his right. Sparks flew and the sound was deafening. The crowd rocked.

"You want to hear me!?" he shouted, anger bleeding through. "Then here I am! The Grimm come, and they will kill you. Every single one of you. Your faith to the Goddess won't protect you, but we will. Despite how you act toward us."

"Don't listen to him!" shrieked the same woman as before. "He'll corrupt us!"

"Is that your greatest fear, madam? Then stay. The Grimm won't corrupt you; they'll just murder you and your family." Jaune let that sink in. "You have a choice, pure and simple. Stay and die. Or come with me for an uncertain future. I can promise you won't be harmed, but apparently my promises don't mean anything. Still, it's the same choice. Certain death or uncertain life."

"The Goddess can protect us," said a man.

"Like she has been these last few weeks?" asked Jaune, silencing him. "Tell me, how protected do you feel? The Grimm lay waste to Vale, and your goddess and her forces have sealed themselves shut behind their walls, abandoning you all outside with no food, no supplies and no shelter. How protected do you feel?"

"The Grimm are only here because of you!" howled another woman.

"That's true." Jaune's casual admittance shocked them. "They are here to kill me. They are coming to lay waste to my army. Curious, isn't it? It'll be even more curious when, despite attacking every town and village in Vale, they conveniently choose to leave the city itself unmolested. Of course, the Church will say that it's the divine protection of Salem that has made it so. Not that it'll comfort you much as you're massacred outside the walls."

There was silence. Silence and fear.

"Our ships will rest in the shallows for the next hour," said Jaune. "Any who wish safety are free to board them. You will be given food, shelter and protection. If you do not wish to, then you're free to head back to the city and hope the goddess will protect you. Or to strike out on your own in any direction. I wouldn't suggest south as that's where the Grimm are coming from. But," he stressed, "I encourage you all to think of your families. If you have children then do not condemn them to their deaths just because you refuse to listen. Choose what is best for them."

The hysterical woman who had first shouted out placed a hand on the shoulders of her son and daughter, neither older than ten years. "I will choose what's best!" she shouted. "And I'll choose to protect their immortal souls!" To everyone else, she said, "You should all do the same. Remember who has protected us all these years."

The crowd did not move.

The woman and her children left, and a few others did, particularly those of advanced age, too trapped in their beliefs and not having as much to lose. The worst part was watching them take children with them, trusting children whose only crime was loving and trusting their parents and grandparents.

Jaune considered ordering his men to abduct them and force them into safety, but he couldn't. There were too many here and it would turn into a full melee, trapping them here long enough for the Grimm to come and finish the job.

"I pray for your sakes that they open the gates and let you into the city," said Jaune, his voice carrying. "I truly do. To everyone else, thank you for making the wise decision. I don't ask you to trust me; I don't ask you to love or worship me; I don't even ask you to give up your faith to the goddess." He sighed. "All I ask is that you let us keep you away from the Grimm. Once they're gone, you're welcome to get back off and form the refugee camp outside the walls of Vale again."

/-/

The ships were filling up once more, but there was plenty of room yet. They'd come with more people than this when they landed on Mistral, and the refugees they'd taken on board didn't yet match the number of brave faunus they'd lost. They had supplies and room aplenty, and yet the refugees crowded the decks and watched the shore, and no one stopped them.

And then the Grimm arrived.

They came from the forests and onto the plains where Jaune had erected their camp, and they savaged the fortifications and temporary shelters they'd set up, destroying them in search of his forces. Jaune sent a huge burst of fire through the air and down onto them, echoed by many others – and arrows, raining down on the monsters. Their ships had stayed close enough for that, and the fire illuminated the monsters as they were stuck down.

In their tens, however.

No more.

These weren't humans and they didn't die like them. Jaune watched as a Beowolf kept moving with at least fifty arrows peppering its body, tossing its powerful shoulders left and right to scatter off half of them. Another had its arm blown off by one of Ruby's spells, and yet it lumbered along on two hind legs, using its final arm as a crutch in the middle of its body. They didn't bleed out, nor register pain, and, robbed of their prey, they turned on the only ones left alive.

The devout refugees outside the city walls who had refused to believe him.

"Keep going along the shore!" Jaune shouted to Neptune. "Follow them – kill as many as we can!"

Neptune twisted the wheel and their ship creaked along the shore, giving them more time to fire arrows and spells at the monsters for a while, but soon they drifted close to Vale and then a mighty ballista struck into the water by them, fired from the city's walls. Arrows came too, but they were out of range of that, and they splashed into the water as a dire warning.

"We can't go on!" said Neptune, twisting the wheel back and drifting them away from the shore. "I'm sorry!"

There was nothing that could be done. Jaune clenched his teeth tightly as refugees cried out and asked why they were being fired upon and not the Grimm. The truth was that the Grimm were being fired on as well, but that was only because the soldiers on the walls were ignorant of who controlled them. They did their best to pepper the beasts and drive them back, but Jaune's eyes were fixed on the gate.

"Open," he hissed. "Open, damn you. Come on. You can let them in."

The refugees pounded on the mighty gates and screamed for aid, begging the goddess to protect them. It would have only been a small risk to open them a few feet and let them slide through, and yet the great wooden doors remained firmly shut.

"Open!" he shouted, sure that those people were screaming the same thing. "Open the gates! Open!"

Jaune judged the distance, the size of the doors and gathered his aura.

Only for it to be cut away from him,

"Ozma—!?"

"You cannot blow those doors down, Jaune. Leaving aside that there will be Chosen alive and protecting them from spells, think of the many more within. You would not save these people. They would die as the gates came down, and then the Grimm would have an easy path into the city." Ozma's voice was said. "You did all you could. There is nothing more to do."

Jaune let his arm fall, frustration and fury boiling within him. Everyone was watching, too. Everyone on the walls, everyone on the ships, every one of the refugees who had trusted them, and, presumably those who had trusted the goddess, watching as their final hope was taken away and as the goddess, in fact, did not protect.

It was a slaughter.

Families wept on the ships and cried out in pain and grief. There was confusion aplenty, as people wondered why the goddess had not saved the refugees, and what they could have done to cause all this.

He wondered if the sentiment was shared within the city walls."

/-/

"T—The Goddess works in mysterious ways," cried a young bishop, his stave raised high. Sweat ran down his features and his skin was dark red. His knees felt weak, and his words were being drowned out by the agonised screams outside the gates.

"I don't give a rat's arse about mystery!" howled a soldier, grabbing him by his robes. "We could have saved them! We could have brought them in!"

"The Goddess commands the gates be closed to all but those she has marked—"

"I know that, holy man! What I am asking is why we have those orders, and why my men had to watch innocent people be slaughtered!"

"I do not know!" he cried, dropping his mask for a moment. "Do you think I am any happier!? I only know what I'm told, and that's what the Goddess has told the high priests! I'm just passing on their words."

"Release him!" shouted a young, feminine voice. The bishop's stomach dropped, which should not have been his reaction to one of the Goddess' Chosen coming to his rescue. The young woman, freshly minted, who had been assigned to protect him waded forward with a drawn sword. "Release him or I shall strike you all down as blasphemers and heathens."

The bishop tried to shake his head and warn her that she was making matters worse, but his protests went ignored. The girl was full of herself, and full of her new special position and awe for the Goddess. And she was badly failing to misread the mood of these soldiers forced to ignore their duty.

"There is no harm!" he shouted. "The captain is rightfully upset and I—"

"He questions the Goddess' word. That alone is enough reason for him to be executed. Maybe he's one of the Dark Lord's spies."

There was an angry growl among the assembled soldiers, who closed around them. The Chosen might have believed they were angry and on her side, but she didn't realise that the soldiers respected and trusted their captain more than they did her. Worse yet, the "Dark Lord's spies" was becoming a far worse hunt than it should have been. There had already been two hundred "spies" executed, many of them faunus, and many of them the bishop would have bet his soul on being innocent.

"Watch your words, Chosen." The captain spat the title out. "Your kind should be out there protecting them from the Grimm, and yet you're the ones hiding away like cowards while good men and women die."

"Good men and women?" The woman scoffed, even as the final screams died outside, along with their owners. The bishop closed his eyes and prayed for their souls. "If they were truly innocent then the Goddess would have protected them. That she ordained the gates be shut should tell you of their innocence. Traitors, one and all. Heathens who the Dark Lord betrayed and fed to his Grimm!"

"We do not judge!" said the bishop. "Be silent lest you make matters worse—"

He was silenced by a sword pointing his way. "Are you siding with these treasonous sorts, bishop? I had thought better of you, but mayhaps I was assigned to you not to protect you but to sniff out your treachery. I will see you and everyone here swi—"

Twang!

The crossbow bolt sprouted from the young woman's neck before she could finish her speech, and it was a sign of her inexperience how slow she was to bring her aura forward. An older, better Chosen would have known to have it up from the start, but the better and older Chosen were dead. They had died in Mistral.

With a gurgle, the woman dropped.

And the captain still had a hold of the bishop's robes.

"I saw throw her life away to try and save people from the Grimm," tried the bishop, feeling more tired than afraid. "If that will suffice…"

The captain drew his sword. "It will not."

"I thought as much. Make it quick."

The bishop closed his eyes and held his arms out, welcoming the sword into his body. It hurt, but, he suspected, it did not hurt as much as those outside the walls had hurt. He had joined the church to protect the flock and to guide those who needed him, and yet this was where it had led him.

Do you work in mysterious ways, goddess? Or do you not work at all?

He had never regretted as much as he did in that moment.

/-/

"My Goddess, the people are terrified and in need of answers!" begged the high priest, down on his knees with his face pressed to the marble tiles. "They are afraid, they are uncertain and they cannot understand why things are as they are!"

"Do they not love me, high priest?"

He licked his lips. "T—They do, my goddess. As we all do. But—"

"But what? Is love conditional now? Do they only love me so long as I grant them total happiness?" The goddess, sat upon her throne, looked down on the fancily dressed man. "I have granted my people peace and prosperity for thousands of years. This is the first real hiccup in that time."

A hiccup. Is that what she called the slaughter of many good people, and the Grimm ravaging the landscape? The high priest licked his lips, and swallowed what would have been impassioned pleas.

"If we could at least know why we must refuse entry to those who come seeking our aid then that would ease the minds of many…"

"You refuse them entry because he will slip his people among them."

"A few spies, my goddess, among hundreds or thousands of desperate people. We can root them out. We have been doing—"

"No. No risks. Not now. Things are bad enough. He is pushing harder than he has ever pushed before, and I will not allow Ozma to undo all that I have accomplished now." She snarled and said, "You will just need to tell the people that their goddess demands their obedience. That is all they need know. If they are loyal, they will accept that. If they are not, then you have yourselves spies of Ozma to be killed."

"M—My Goddess," he whispered. "W—We cannot simply kill every person who expresses their thoughts. The people are confused, lost and do not know what to think. Your instructions are… while I am sure they are clear to you, your flock lacks your ineffable foresight. We can but do our best to understand your reasons."

"Then they shall have opportunity aplenty to learn. Have the faunus been purged?"

His face paled. "My Goddess, that—"

"Have they or have they not been?" she demanded. "I have my instructions. The faunus have sided with him, so they are lost to my grace. Round up every last one within the city and burn them in a great pyre."

"My goddess, please! They are innocent—"

"I AM YOUR GODDESS!" she screamed, and her voice shook the cathedral. "I DECIDE WHO IS GUILTY AND WHO IS INNOCENT. I DECIDE WHO LIVES AND WHO DIES. ROUND THEM UP. ROUND THEM UP AND KILL THEM ALL!"

The high priest fled her rage, exiting the chamber to meet his fellows. Several of them were faunus and looked sickly pale. Not a one of them looked happy, even the ones who were human. They had all heard her voice.

"My lord," said one. "What… What do we do…? Do we really…?"

"No, my son." He smiled, but he did not feel any cheer. "She… The Goddess is angry, p—perhaps rightfully so, given the deaths of her beloved people. We shall conduct a census. Find and list all the faunus, but do not give the order yet. Let us hope that she calms down, or that victory finds its way to our grasp."

"And if it doesn't?" asked a faunus priest.

"Then… Then I shall petition the Goddess myself and offer my own body and soul up. Perhaps such devoutness will change her mind or… or…" His face fell. "I am sorry, my children. I do not know. Never have our lives been so uncertain."

"The faunus make up half the city guard, father. If they catch wind, they will rebel."

"I am aware, my son. That is why we must follow the spirit of the goddess' wishes. Her ways are ineffable, her words mysterious. Rarely does she give us the exact path but rather guide us to decide our own."

He knew it was a long sell, but everyone here wanted to believe it, so they all nodded with him. It was blasphemy, pure and simple, but he would rather his soul be condemned than he orchestrate the massacre of so many good people. Women and children included. He could only hope the goddess would forgive them in time.

Reminder of no update next weekend as I'll be horribly busy doing last-minute prep for my event.

Next Chapter: 1st October (Two weeks)

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