Chapter 06: Silver-Blooded Fun!

"Here we are, in Akagashima!"

Ruby Rose cheered as Jaune finally entered into one of Mistral's cities, his motorcycle rumbling across the streets. "Jaune, we should stop for Mistralian noodles! Or as they call it, ramen!"

"We didn't come here for the fun of it, otherwise Blake would've snuck along." Jaune replied as he made a turn after a brief check of the city map. "Our extracurricular takes priority, remember?"

"...and then, ramen after." Ruby insisted. She really wanted to know for if there was any actual difference in it's style or it was national pride that gave it a different name. "So our target this time is Deathly Stalker Sonson J, right? Isn't he known for only striking at night?"

"All the more reason to memorize potential ambush spots during daylight." Jaune answered as he handed over the map. Spreading it out, Ruby noted that there were already many circled spots with a marker. Well, at least they wouldn't have to go actively searching for new ones. After parking the bike, the duo immediately started on their search.

However, Ruby's pleasant mood soured soon after accidentally bumping a guy. "Oh, sorry."

She only made it two steps before the guy grabbed her by the collar and dragged her back.

"Hey, hold it, you!" The guy snarled right into her face, Ruby wincing at the bad breath. "What's the big idea, bumping into me like that?! Do you know who you're messing with when you do that?! You being a chick ain't gonna save you!"

"I already apologized." Ruby had all but lost patience with this guy. First he somehow didn't hear her apology, then he attempted to ruin her clothes and even remind her of her short height with how she's on her tiptoes so that her top wouldn't get ruined. Now she was being assailed with a mix of bad breath and loud shouting up-close. "Also, please go take a breath mint. And some lessons on how to talk to girls."

"Oh, bro! These foreigners giving you trouble?"

"You think you can talk shit to the Momoketsu and get away with it?!"

"We'll teach you how to use that mouth for much better purposes!"

Ruby made a note of the three other men surrounding them. "Were these guys just waiting around for trouble?"

"Ruby, want any help with them?" Jaune offered.

"No, no, I got it!" Ruby waved her Meister away. "These guys are weaklings, after all."

"Weaklings, you say? How about you say that again with yer guts leaking out, yer bitch?!"

Ruby smoothly diverted the knife the hoodlum hadn't thought she'd see coming, twisting about the offending arm and palming his face hard enough to crunch his nose. Jerking him around as she could finally stand on her own feet, Ruby wasted no time in slamming her heel into the back of his knee and breaking the leg. "One."

The second hoodlum tried to rush her with a raised baseball bat, only for Ruby to easily punch through it and hit his eye. Wincing as he recoiled from the hit, Ruby found it easy to drive a knee into his torso and break at least two ribs. "Two."

Without even waiting for the third one to charge, Ruby rushed forward and leapt into a brutal double kick that had him collide his head against a nearby brick wall and slump down. "Three."

When she looked around for the fourth, she only saw Jaune who then pointed at the last hoodlum already a mile away on foot. "Oh, he ditched his buddies! Not cool!"

"No matter. He'll later be facing punishment from his own friends for abandoning them." Jaune shrugged before leading the way. "Let's go start our investigation."

"Go on, eat."

Many hours later, up in the skies above Akagashima, a carpet-like cloth floated along unnoticed with it's edges aflame. Sitting on it was a woman was long wavy locks of ebony and was adorned in a crimson dress upon her slender frame, alight with special runes that glowed as amber as her eyes in the backlight of the broken moon.

"You are the apex form of Meister and Weapon." The woman called out, her words reaching the ears of a person below her.

Within the building below, a girl with shaggy long emerald hair stood alone, dressed in a plain tunic while surrounded by many more members of the Momoketsu, including the injured ones earlier.

"Hey, what do you want?" One of the guys demanded.

"Eat lots of souls."

"I can't..." The girl whimpered. "I can't handle it yet..."

"What's your deal?" Another of the hoodlum queried. "You lost or something?"

"Besides, aren't these ones plain humans?" The green-haired girl muttered. "Not a single Grimm here."

"I asked you what you're doing here!"

"Who are you talking to?!"

Up above, the flying woman flicked her finger, releasing a spout of flame that took shape into a snake composed of glowing ashes that swiftly slithered downwards. "It's alright. Have faith in yourself."

The flame snake reached the church tower, slithering around as it continued to make it's way down.

"Emerald, you will be become an Asura. And remember..."

Slipping through the cracks, the ashen snake found it's target and shot down faster than anybody could react, it's fangs biting into Emerald's nape as it sunk into her dark skin.

"...to have fun."

"...pft! Pfthahahaha!" Emerald burst into giggles, her shoulders shaking slightly. "That's right. I can't become an Asura without having fun."

"Don't think you can just waltz into our castle and do as you please!" One of the moronic hoodlums spoke again.

"This is a public establishment." Emerald refuted. "I can have as much fun in here just as you are, especially as nobody gave this place to you. So let's have some fun as Mercury eats you all, right? Also, you ever think of how weird that the doors only ever open inwards?"

Emerald tunic suddenly writhed, as if something within her body in a violent manner.

Then the screaming began.

"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"

"Like a snare to trap the prey in~"

"We finally found him." Jaune dropped down upon a rooftop, Ruby(spear) hefted over his shoulder.

Opposite them on another rooftop was the Grimm he and Ruby had been seeking, the scorpion-like Grimm made clicking noises from his throat while his golden stinger pointed at him menacingly. "Meister, huh?"

"Deathly Stalker Sonson J, homicidal maniac of Emerald Lake, we'll be taking that soul of yours!" Jaune declared as he charged forward.

"Revolting. How is it that a brat like you gets to kill as much as you want, while I can't-" Stalker Sonson's words choked in his throat just as Ruby(spear) tore through it, the girl transforming back just as Jaune landed.

"Our twenty-third soul for the bag!" Ruby cheered before swallowing it up. "And now, we can go have ramen to top it off!"

"Come to think of it, I wonder if Yang and Pyrrha's soul collection is going well." Jaune mused. It wasn't that he doubted their capabilities or work ethic. It was just that... Yang tended to be...

"If nobody sets off Yang, they should be doing well." Ruby instantly spoke up what Jaune had been reluctant to state. "Yang's temper can be really detrimental... along with her destructiveness."

"Poor Pyr." Jaune winced, only to suddenly freeze as his Aura-sensitivity suddenly picked up a massive aberration nearby. "Wait, Ruby..."

Looking around rapidly, Jaune fixed his attention on the church in the distance. "That building..."

"Did something happen?" Ruby looked over. "Another Grimm?"

"I'm... not sure, actually." Jaune clenched his fists in worry, his ears starting to ring as he concentrated Weirdly, the noise got louder the more he stretched his senses despite not moving. "One Meister... and their Weapon... with around fifty souls, all inside the church... Wait, it's those weaklings from earlier..."

"Woah, you can tell that much?"

"This is a first for me..." Jaune winced at the state of the Meister and Weapon's souls. Not only where they conjoined in a perverted sense of {Aura Resonance}, it seemed that... No, that was impossible. But still... "Ruby, we're going!"

"Eh?!" Ruby exclaimed in surprise when Jaune suddenly took off, her harried steps soon sounding close even as he leapt off the roof and dashed for his parked bike. "Jaune, what's going on?!"

"Just get on!" Jaune ordered. Soon, they were racing across the streets towards the church, his worry increasing along with the annoying noise his Aura-sensitivity was picking up. Finally reaching the church, Jaune barely waited for the vehicle to come to a stop before striding up towards the church doors, his ears now painfully ringing until-

"What the- That's impossible!" Jaune stilled, a worried Ruby coming up to him.

"What's wrong? What happened?"

"All gone..." Jaune swallowed. "All of the human souls in there just disappeared in a single moment... Now, it's just the Meister and the Weapon..."

Walking up to the church again, Jaune paused with his hand just shy of touching the doors as trepidation like never before filled him. Right now, he was filled with the strongest urge to ignore this mess and get some ramen with Ruby as she'd wanted. To not open the door before him.

But he had to see. As a Meister of Beacon, he couldn't turn his eyes away from this. Pressing the doors open, Jaune stilled at the sight of the person inside.

It was a dark-skinned girl his age with green hair, her body held up awkwardly with an almost drunken expression. "See? The doors open inwards."

"It's just one girl." Ruby whispered from his side. "Where's her partner? I thought you said-"

"What the fuck?" Jaune paid little attention to Ruby, his full attention on the girl before him. "How do you two even exist like that?"

"Lady Cinder, two others have arrived." The other soul spoke up, his voice disembodied. "The-"

"Keep it down." The green-haired girl muttered. "Mercury, you need to shut up."

"The souls I'm reading are those of a Meister and a Weapon, and they're definitely both right in front of us." Jaune answered Ruby in the best manner that he could. "But somehow, the Weapon's inside her body."

Something within the green-haired girl's tunic writhed.

"I screwed up." Glynda Goodwitch muttered as she cursed her misfortune. "To think that Jaune would leave for an extracurricular and I missed him asking for me to see him off as usual!"

If it hadn't been for her mission suddenly having complicated issues right at the end, she'd have made it! But even then...

There was a beas- bastard that had gotten much closer to Jaune than she could've anticipated or permitted.

Qrow Branwen! Why was he now hanging around her boy too much?! Sure it was a relief that Jaune never sought him out on his own, but Glynda hadn't missed the sudden increase in Jaune's Aura-sensitive skill.

Is this what they called 'fattening the cow for the cook'?! Still, Glynda wouldn't lose! If that bastard was training her Jaune in Aura-sensitivity, then she'd just have to return to teaching him more of the Aura manipulation he'd learnt from her.

She would be victorious!

The door to the empty classroom she'd been pacing about in suddenly opened, revealing the bastard in person. "Yo, Glyn. I've been looking for you."

Her response was purely instinctual, her neatly manicured fingers digging into the table before it was effortlessly flung towards the bastard's head. The poor table got backhanded and smashed against the wall for it's trouble.

"Haha!" The bastard had the audacity to laugh. "You're still fun as ever!"

"Bastard, your reflexes are still regretfully sharp as ever." Glynda bit out. "What do you want, Qrow?"

The bastard's grin faded away. "Quicksilver's shown up."

Glynda froze. "...what?"

"What do you mean, Jaune?" Ruby asked. "There's a Weapon inside her?"

"Get ready." Jaune took a stance. "They're coming out now."

Almost immediately, the girl flinched as her body within the tunic writhed and contorted, a strangled groan of pain and pleasure escaping her lips as silvery liquid tore itself free from her back.

Jaune choked as the silvery amorphous mass defied gravity as it surged upwards and began to take a humanoid shape, gaining many solid details until it basically resembled a shirtless teenage male with his lower half still connected to the girl's back, his entire body composed of what was looking more and more like mercury.

Was this... what the girl had called 'Mercury'?

The mercury construct tilted his head before rapping the girl's head with a hard dopeslap. "Emerald, what are you doing?"

A construct of mercury, named 'Mercury'... and now a green haired girl, named 'Emerald'...

Weird naming sense striking again, huh... Also-

"I-It talks?" Jaune muttered. So this really was the Weapon? A sentient... mercury construct? "You two should know that you shouldn't be devouring human souls. Are you two Beacon students?"

"Beacon?" The green-haired girl tilted her curiously. "What's that? Besides, she said that it was okay to eat them all and have fun. What's wrong with having fun? Are you no fun?"

Jaune narrowed dangerously while Ruby stiffened besides him. "Fun? You think reaping the souls of people is fun?!"

The girl stared back a bit without answering before looking away... bashfully? "I'm no good when talking to boys... This is a new type of fun, right?"

"Never mind that." The mercury construct grabbed her head and turned her forward again. "His soul looks pretty tasty, Emerald."

"A Meister or Weapon cannot reap the soul of a human for any reason whatsoever." Jaune held out his hand, grasping Ruby's hand as she transformed and became his Weapon. "Right here and now, I will put a stop to this!"

"Let's do it, Emerald." The construct shook Emerald by her shoulders. "We've been called out."

"Mm... Well, I've never fought another Meister before." Emerald beamed. "Should be fun~"

The construct nodded before dissolving itself into a floating mass of liquid metal, Emerald raising her hand up to shove it in before receding with a large handle grasped in it. Once she'd grabbed it tight enough, the silvery liquid reformed into...

"An axe?" Jaune wondered at how she could hold such a huge weapon with no change in her body stance, the axe being almost as large as the greenette was tall.

Emerald twirled it about before before suddenly dashing forward with a cleaving swing from below, her speed surprisingly quick. If not for Ruby(spear)'s warning, Jaune might've missed the chance to hold her steady when she moved on her own to block the weapon.

A vicious backhand forced Emerald back("I didn't know boys could hit girls like that-"), then a sudden thrust even as the greenette dodged back out of range, Ruby(spear) lifting Jaune of her own accord so that he could knee Emerald into the ground.

Shifting Ruby(spear) into place, Jaune didn't hesitate to stab downwards into Emerald's shoulder.

Up above, the woman on the flaming carpet in the sky chuckled. "You can't pierce into her..."

"...with a thrust like that." Emerald finished, Ruby(spear)'s point only having managed to break through cloth and skin, and not moving an inch further despite Jaune's weight on the shaft.

"Silver... blood...?" Jaune stared at the tiny driblets of the liquid that welled up from the wound, instead of the expected red.

"Yes. My blood is silver." Emerald leaned forward with whisper into Jaune's ears, her complete lack of discomfort or pain causing him to back off warily.

"What's up with his body?!" Ruby(spear) hissed.

"...the way I figure it, I think her blood itself is her Weapon." Jaune blanched at the possibility of what he was saying. "I don't know how they can exist in such a state without one killing the other, but that's most likely why I couldn't stab past the blood vessels as easily as I did her clothes and skin. The blood hardened and stopped you from going deeper."

"Then, is they any way to cause significant damage?"

"I'm not as good as using Aura offensively like Yang and Branwen." Jaune raised up one of his fists, the forearm lighting up in white. But if I use it as a makeshift armor as usual, I could still deal some internal damage."

"Emerald, why are you taking this so easy?"

"Well, this is my first time with a boy." Her project answered. "Shouldn't I enjoy it?"

"How silly of you." She chuckled from the naïvety. "When a boy comes up to you and tries to shove his long, hard shaft into you with no care for your sake... you should obviously kill them."

"Jaune, who's she talking to?" Ruby(spear) muttered as Emerald tilted her head to a voice only she could hear.

"Oh, I should kill him, huh?" Emerald's grin widened into a leer. "I didn't realize that. A boy being like that is no fun. And things that are no fun... should get eaten! Mercury, [Screeching Resonance]."

A wicked sharp-toothed grin manifested over the axe's large edge. "▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"

Jaune winced as the noise that had bothered in Aura-sensitivity a while ago returned with severe vengeance, almost distracting him from the screaming slash of Aura-filled mercury that was swung their way.

"Another one again! [Screech Beta]!"

"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"

Dropping down from above, Emerald unleashed another {Screech Beta} up-close, the impact forcing Jaune back some more.

"Jaune, here she comes!" Ruby(spear) warned. "Guard and attack, like you planned!"

Jaune did as she said, diverting the massive axe over his right side while he cocked his left fist and-

"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"

"GYAAAAA!"

Jaune choked at the sight of blood spurting from Ruby(spear) as Mercury(axe) vibrated with enough intensity to shred through her Aura and injure her directly. "Ruby! Why you...!"

Directing his Aura to his foot, Jaune's glowing boot slammed into Emerald's stomach and sent her flying across the aisle until she landed near the altar. "Ruby, are you okay?"

"D-Don't worry about it!" Ruby(spear)'s assurance was very lacking, especially as blood still dripped despite the increase of Aura to heal the injury. "I'm prepared to die for my Meister!"

"I'm still not okay with that oath you guys swore!" Jaune cursed whoever came up with that shitty thing, grimacing as Emerald quickly recovered and eyed them from afar.

"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"

"Aura-shredding vibroweapon and distractive screaming..." Jaune resisted the urge to wilt from the audio onslaught. "What a terrifying combo. Add in my lack of offensive Aura attacks..."

Emerald came charging again, Mercury(axe) swinging to cleave his head off. Dodging downwards, Jaune slammed an Aura-filled uppercut into her torso before headbutting her.

Dazed, Emerald stepped back for a second... only to reel forward and hit him with a headbutt of her own, hitting his face hard enough that he was sent flying into the church doors.

"The doors...? She hit me that hard with a normal headbutt against my Aura...?" Jaune grunted as he leaned against it, only to give a curious look to it. "Why didn't it open from the impact?"

"That's no good at all. I guess a no fun boy like you wouldn't realize..." Emerald raised up Mercury(axe) again.

"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"

"You need to keep a firm grasp of the playground you're in, whenever you're having fun." Emerald charged forward, slamming the vibrating axe into Ruby(spear)'s shaft again and earning another pained scream, albeit much lessened due to Jaune's Aura Reinforcement. "Those doors open inwards, you know..."

One of Emerald's hands dropped from Mercury(axe)'s handle, forming a long thin blade of liquid metal.

"Shoot!"

"...like a snare to trap the prey in~"

Red spurted into the air from Ruby's unguarded back, having transformed back to push Jaune out of the way...

"RUBY!"

...and inadvertently take the blows instead from the two vibrating slashes.

KingVessel: Hope I did the first Jaune(Maka) vs Emerald(Crona) fight well. Please review~