A/N (2/28/2022): During Aura unlocking scene, Aura color has been changed to initially yellow, then changing to white.
A/N (8/29/2021): Changed the order of the First Huntress' family's deaths and switched up husband's.
A/N: Man, it's really been bugging me. I've been putting some symbols and formatting for the game windows, but I just realized that none of them appear on the actual chapter after I copy and paste them over.
I like people's theories about Salem's magic, I assure you it's something a little more compelling.
Beta: Path of a Writer
/-A Requiem for a Gamer-/
"Princess?"
"Prince."
"Policeman?"
"...Policewoman?"
The twelve year old girl squinted at the paper in her hands. "Hm, I think we just say 'police officer' more for both these days. Still, very good. I think you'll do great tomorrow! One last one, Ruby. What about huntsman?" She brushed some of her blond locks away from her face.
"...Huntswoman?"
"No, it's a huntress."
"I always get this one wrong... Shouldn't that be the answer for 'hunter'?"
"No, no! ...Yes." The blonde frowned.
Ruby groaned, leaning back onto the couch. "It's so confusing… and boring! I want to go to the Forge, and yes, I know school is closed!" She turned around and pressed her face into a pillow. "I hate English, it's the worst class!" Came her muffled voice.
"How else are we going to impress the Grimm with our haikus?"
"Har, har, very funny."
"Hello, Mister Grimm,
"You are about to be toast.
"I am not sorry."
A pillow smacked into Yang's face.
"You really are not sorry!"
She laughed as her sister attempted to smother her with a pillow. They wrestled, before falling from the couch and onto the floor with a heavy thump.
"Rubes, Rubes! That's enough playing around." She caught her younger sister's arms, smiling. "Let's finish up and then you can go tinker with your tools while I make supper."
"Okay. When's Dad coming home?"
Yang shrugged. Getting up, she picked up the papers she had dropped, and they sat back onto the couch.
"Right… so... huntsman."
"Huntress. For some weird reason."
Yang's eyes widened. "Actually, I remember why now!" She sat up and ran off, coming back with a children's story book.
"What's that?"
"It's a fairy tale."
Ruby sat up, recognizing it. "We had that?! How come I didn't know about it?"
"You've heard it before at school."
"Yeah, but I haven't read this version! Where was it?"
"In one of the unpacked boxes. I guess I forgot about it. Mom used to read this one to me, before she… you know." Yang gripped the book tighter.
Ruby opened her mouth.
"Anyways, I think this will be a good break." Yang smiled, sitting beside her sister. "You don't want to?"
"No, no! Of course not! Read it to me, Yang!"
"Right." She lifted it up so that both she and her sister could see the woman depicted on the front, tired, worn, but still standing, on a mountain of slayed Grimm. An artistic depiction, since the monsters of darkness left no corpses on death. Beside her was an elderly man with a cane.
"The First Huntress." She read, before flipping it open.
/-A Requiem for a Gamer-/
Jaune was a man on a mission.
Untrained and armed with what amounted to an oversized butter knife, the twenty year old was lost inside a forest full of creatures born out of darkness. Thankfully, he had a plan. A very good plan, he'd say so himself, and it all depended on him succeeding on the very first step.
The first step being manipulating Ruby.
"Seems like the initiation objective this time is pretty hard." He stated.
"Yup! I'm not sure why they changed it this year. How will we know when we fail or succeed?" Ruby leapt over a fallen log half her height in diameter daintily. Jaune, on the other hand, climbed over it. He winced on the way down as the rough bark scraped his shin a little.
Damn it.
Ping! A game message popped up at the side of his vision, in addition to the failed dexterity roll.
[System]: Jaune Arc took slashing damage.
Thank you. I totally needed that.
"What was the initiation objective last year?" He asked.
"From what I found on the internet, it looks like each pair had to find chess pieces in the Emerald Forest. Then, pairs who found matching chess pieces become a team."
"Ah."
The conversation died again.
In order for him to attain his objective, it looked like he needed to attack from a different angle.
"If only I had a special ability that could make this easier." He sighed.
"Yeah, that would be nice! Then we wouldn't be wasting time like this."
And then she shut up again, her silver eyes focused on scanning their environment as they walked.
"Did the headmaster say anything else, like a hint towards where our goal would be?"
"Nope. All he said about our mission - "
There it is!
" - were just the obvious things."
Jaune almost planted his face into his hands. Dammit Ruby! Why is this so hard?!
The very first step of his master plan: manipulate Ruby into telling him the Main Quest objectives, without looking like an idiot for not listening.
"The obvious things?" Jaune parroted.
"Yeah… you know. We'll probably be scored on how we kill the Grimm, on top of the main thing we're doing."
Ruby… I hate you so much…
"Still, there's gotta be some way to make this easier. Maybe landmarks or painted white arrows?" Jaune said.
"Painted white arrows?" A moment of thought later, she nodded. "Maybe. It would be very cheap if he just hid them in a pile of dirt somewhere and told us to find them."
Use some more nouns, for god's sake! What's 'them'?!
Ruby ignored his inner monologue. "I can try scouting from above, actually. Be right back!"
"Wait!"
She didn't wait.
Before his eyes, her body morphed into a stream of rose petals. A surprisingly strong wind blew them away, scattering them and forcing him to brace himself, before about twenty meters away from him all the petals took a right angled turn and suddenly headed towards the sky. A few seconds later, the petals reformed into Ruby, before she fell back down. Jaune watched with a little shock as she took out her scythe and cleaved the blade into a nearby tree, slowing her fall by carving the tree in half most of the way down.
...is that how scythes work?
No, Jaune was pretty sure that's not how scythes work. Then again, the scythe was bigger than the girl, so there must have been a good amount of weight behind it.
"I thought you said you didn't have any special abilities that could help."
Ruby looked to the side. "...I didn't forget."
"You didn't forget." He deadpanned.
"W - well, you got us lost!"
"W - what? You noticed?"
"Not entirely, but you just confirmed it!"
Jaune looked to the side. "...I didn't get lost."
"You did! You just admitted to it!"
Jaune coughed. "So, did you find anything up there?"
"Actually, I did. There's some ruins up ahead. There's just some Grimm, we can take care of them, then search around!"
She readied her scythe.
"Last one there's a rotten egg!"
Without waiting for his response, she turned back into a spiral of wind and flower petals and passed through the trees.
Jaune stood still for a second, before swearing and running after her. He attempted to clumsily unsheathe his sword while running, wincing as he accidentally gave himself a cut on his arm due to his motion.
He was not ready to fight more of the monsters. He didn't know how to use his sword. He didn't have Aura. He didn't have a gun. How was he supposed to do anything?
Unease welled up inside him.
Maybe he should have just told her about his situation, somehow, even though the gods had warned against it.
/-/
Ruby spun, easily dodging an Ursa's claw. Firing her scythe, she kept her spin and chopped a few Beowolves that were aiming for her back in half, which continued until she made an entire three-sixty and came back to attack the first Grimm.
It was a practiced dance for her, moves she had mastered over more than ten years of her life. Every move was done with precision, power, and confidence, cleaving through the flesh and bone of the Grimm with ease.
A swirl of death. A bladestorm of destruction. Perhaps she would have felt bad for the Grimm, if they weren't murderous monsters aiming to reduce humanity's existence on Remnant to a short, meaningless mark in history.
With Aura, she was untouchable.
The tip of her scythe sank into the Ursa, stopping as it got stuck between two plates of bone armor. It roared in pain, it's claws tearing frantically at Ruby with little results as she weaved between the blows, all while still holding onto her weapon. Then, she burst into petals and reappeared above the Grimm. Keeping the forward momentum and one hand on her scythe, she pulled on it on her way down behind the Grimm, twisting her weapon in order for it to push against the monster's bone shoulder plates from inside its body. Her weapon acted basically like a lever and the Grimm's flesh resisted for only a second before she popped the entire arm off with a sickening squelch. The Grimm didn't even have time to whimper before Ruby's newly freed weapon penetrated into its skull.
Ruby took a moment to breathe, eyeing her surroundings again. The ruins, composed of mostly small cobblestone structures, were empty of Grimm, having all been cleared out by her. Their bodies dissipated as they should on death, leaving only scorch marks and torn earth as proof of their battle with her. In the distance, the sounds of other battles continued.
"Shouldn't we be protecting these ruins more? Don't history people care about this?" She said out loud. No one answered. "Jaune?" Did he really not catch up yet? She looked back at the way they came. No Jaune.
"Jaune?" She started walking back the way she came, before speeding up into a jog as it became clear that her friend was clearly not near. "Jaune!"
Ruby arrived at the spot where she left him. Again, Jaune was nowhere to be found. Something caught her eye, however, and she kneeled down in front of it to investigate.
It was a very little bit of blood, smeared on the grass.
"Jaune!" She yelled.
"Shhh!"
She blinked.
"Down here." A little away from her, beside the roots of a huge tree, Jaune was hiding in a bush. His face was coated with mud. "There's one more, I don't want to attract it!"
"...What are you doing?"
"I'm hiding from the Gri - Ruby! Look out!"
A Beowolf leapt at Ruby's face from behind. At this range, she had no time to bring Crimson Rose to bear. It happened too fast. Therefore, there was only one thing to do.
She booted it in the face with her steel-toed boots.
It died.
"...That was anticlimactic, but that's all of them, I think." Jaune exited his hiding spot and patted away the dirt that got onto him. "As expected of a high level-ed character."
Huh?
"What are you doing with all that?" Ruby asked, a little confused, motioning at the mud that covered Jaune.
He awkwardly laughed and rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, I think I saw this in a show once. Said it would hide your scent."
"Your scent?" Ruby frowned. "But Grimm's negative emotion detection is much stronger than their smell."
...Was Jaune…?
"Ah! Well, I knew that, but I'm very good at hiding my fear, you know. Smell is the problem for me."
Oh. That makes sense.
"You should have told me you were a stealth type!" Ruby crossed her arms. "I was so scared when I saw this red stuff that looked like blood on the ground."
"Oh, that?" Jaune raised one of his legs and lifted his shorts a little to reveal more of his knee. "I scraped my knee when the first Beowolf attacked me."
Ruby's eyes widened. "Did you forget to raise your aura?"
He sheepishly laughed. "No, I just don't have any yet."
She nodded. "Ah, that makes sense, because you don't have any… yet…"
Ruby stared at him.
"I really thought I was a goner there! It wrestled me to the ground and knocked my sword up into the air."
The sounds around her became suddenly distant. Far away.
Her heart beat pulsed in her ear.
"Then, the sword fell back down and pierced through its chest! Haha, pretty lucky, huh?"
She was struck with a sudden sense of vertigo as everything around her faded, leaving her to only focus on the greatest idiot in the whole wide world in front of her.
"What did you just say?" She asked.
It came out much more calm than she felt.
/-A Requiem for a Gamer-/
When man was first born from dust, he was not gifted with a garden or showered with love. At the beginning, before the kingdoms, before Dust, before Aura, we were born into an unforgiving world filled with immense danger. For at the beginning, when we were born, so were the Grimm.
Our greatest enemy.
A race of creatures consumed by anger towards our existence. Savage, terrible monsters who seek only the destruction of everything we have built. An unending tide of twisted beings, many as strong as hundreds of men. The truest forces of malice and fury. Perhaps, it is even them, that brought the very concept of suffering to this world.
In order to survive, humanity hid. We shied away from the light for it had already been conquered, and laboured in dark, miserable caves where we slaved for the barest of food. It is in these caves that we finally found... Dust. Nature's Gift.
We thought we had found hope.
We were wrong.
Dust, for all its power, was scarce. Even in the deepest of caves, we would only find slivers. So scarce, that tribes would fight and massacre each other for even a pinch of it. This borrowed power became, instead, a source of division between us. Some started to think of it as a mockery.
Like throwing a single loaf of bread at a group of starving beggars and watching them fight among themselves, reveling in their pain as entertainment. Just enough to keep them alive, in order to keep them suffering longer.
Nature's Gift was perhaps not a gift at all.
Who is the god that created such a world? A world where we feel endless suffering, where good barely scrapes by while evil lives with its swollen stomach full of stolen gains? Whoever it is… it must be a villainous god.
A cruel god, that reflects the very world he has made.
And it is in this bleak past, that our fairy tale begins.
/-/
A woman sat, sharpening her spear in the middle of a cave entrance, illuminated by moonlight.
"Do you need more Dust?" Another woman asked. She stepped out from the darkness behind the first, carefully. Unsurely.
The first woman didn't respond and focused on her work.
"Maybe a drink?"
Having finished the grinding, she used a stick to apply some of a mixture in a bowl beside her onto the stone blade. It was extremely viscous and stuck well. She lifted it to eye-level, checking something.
"Erm…" The woman behind her fidgeted.
The first woman nodded to herself, accepting something, before she grabbed the nearby leather cuirass and strapped the front of it to herself before showing her unlaced back to the woman behind her without a word.
"Oh, uh, of course!" The other woman hurriedly rushed to tighten the laces and straps on her back.
They worked in silence. When they were done with the torso, they moved on to armoring the limbs.
Outside, something terrible roared.
When they finished, the now armored woman stood up and grabbed her spear, slinging a bag over her shoulder.
She headed out.
"T-thank you!"
She continued walking.
"An explosion was the signal, right?"
Her boots thudded on the rock, before the sound slowly became more and more muffled by grass.
"We'll find a great new place to live!" The remaining person in the cave yelled. "With all the fresh fruits and vegetables, we'll build an altar! Pray to you every year!"
The armored woman stopped for a brief second.
Then she left.
/-A Requiem for a Gamer-/
Ruby's head was tilted forward so that her short hair fell in front of her face, shadowing her expression. Her hands at her side were tightly gripping around Crimson Rose, slightly shaking. In fact, her whole body was tense.
[Relationships]: -30 reputation with Ruby Rose.
[Relationships]: -30 reputation with Ruby Rose.
[Relationships]: -30 reputation with Ruby Rose.
[Relationships]: -30 reputation with Ruby Rose.
[Relationships]: -30 reputation with Ruby Rose.
[Relationships]: Warning: ranked lowered to: Acquaintance.
Jaune rubbed the back of his neck. Was the way he killed the Grimm really that bad? Certainly, it wasn't a work of art and mostly due to luck, but it didn't matter how he did the job, right?
"...stupid." She whispered.
He felt a little insulted. He wasn't stupid, just a little dumb!
"Stupid!" She yelled, shocking him.
Her hands twisted and with a single swing, her scythe cut through the thick trunk of the tree whose roots he had been hiding underneath previously. For a second, it seemed like nothing had happened, but then the several tons of ancient wood started moving. Jaune watched with wide eyes as it groaned, before tilting agonizingly slowly. The branches, and even other trees in the path of its fall gave away, before it landed with a thunderous boom. Dust and leaves were blown into the air by the force, forcing him to cover his face with his arms.
As it cleared, he lowered his arms to reveal the sight of a pissed off Ruby. He was pretty sure she was angry, and she did have a giant death scythe in her hands, but for some reason he didn't feel that put off. Maybe it was because of her pout.
"Hey, hey, it isn't that big of a deal…"
She stomped forward into his personal space, glaring up at him. Huh, she's about a whole head shorter. Looks like my height has stayed constant in both -
"Jaune," She stated seriously. "How is your life not a big deal?"
A chilly autumn breeze blew by, making their clothing flutter.
That's… right, thought Jaune. The realization came to him slowly, trickling in like drops of water.
From his point of view, he was just playing a game. None of the events really happen, the people don't actually exist, and the bonds and stories he will make aren't real. Fakes, delusions that were made to befundle his senses in order to experience a temporary, fantastic lie. In a few hours, he will wake up, and the dream will pause.
All of this was ingenuine.
All of this was an illusion.
That is… to him.
But suppose you take a moment and think it out from outside of his own narrow point of view. To leave Jaune's limited perspective, and then take a moment in the shoes of the characters around him. What do they see?
An idiot.
Even the Grimm in this starter area - assuming the gods didn't decide to turn the difficulty slope of a usual RPG into a rollercoaster - were forces of nature. Jaune had not forgotten how the Ursa literally threw trees around. If they actually got a hold of him, he would have turned into… into… pepperoni! Or in reality, something less delicious.
And him walking, willingly, into a forest full of these monsters, was it anything but insanity? He didn't have Aura. He didn't have magic. Heck, he didn't even have any combat training at all. For someone like that coming to combat school…
It was suicide.
"I need to tell a professor."
"No!" Jaune hurriedly tried to stop her. If he gets discovered, he would get kicked out of Beacon for sure. That means he would fail the main objective and the corresponding penalty will befall him. He barely had $300, losing $6000 would put him into debt, and ruin his credit score, maybe. Actually, he had no idea what would happen if he lost more money than he had in his bank account. Would he lose some of his possessions? Would he somehow be kicked out of his apartment? Would he lose some of his League skins?!
Ruby slammed the blade of her scythe into the ground, locking it in place, before grabbing him by his hoodie. "This isn't a joke!" She cried. There was anger in her voice - no shit, Sherlock! - and a sliver of… desperation?
Being so close face to face, Jaune could see every small detail about her expression. His eyes met hers; her silver eyes glittering with worry and fury. A bone gray shade.
...Bone gray?
Why did he describe it like so? He wasn't even sure himself. But the longer he stared, the more his mind weaved odd threads between unrelated concepts. The silver of her eyes suddenly started to remind him of cremated ash, pure in its singular composition and tainted by its connotations. It reminded him of his grandfather from his father's side, who had fought overseas. He would spend many days staring at pictures, a faraway look in his eyes, living through memories of an experience that Jaune could only fathom. But at the same time, it also reminded him of his grandfather from his mother's side - an artist, an inventor, a dreamer. He saw, in her gaze, dedication.
For a second, he didn't even breathe.
He didn't know why.
"No matter how easy huntsmen make it look, for a civilian, even a Beowolf is impossible to take on!" She screamed. It was shrill, it was painful, because his life mattered to her and he couldn't fault her for her misunderstanding.
In response, somewhere out there, the Grimm roared.
Jaune opened his mouth.
[Admin]: I will warn you again. This game stays between us.
Light…
He wanted to tell her that this was all a game to him. That he'd come back from death with nothing lost other than just money. But even if he could speak about it, would she understand? How would she understand? Did she even have the capabilities, as a video game character, to understand?
More and more thoughts came to him. Confusing ones. Loopy ones. Thoughts that made his head hurt. What was that stampede in the distance? Grimm? Should he alert Ruby to it? Did she hear it? He couldn't think.
"Ruby," He said, "wait."
"Wait what?!"
He reached to place a hand on her shoulders, but she instantly knocked his arm aside with a violent slap. It was so much stronger than he expected. It stung. What was he trying to do with that? Help her calm down, maybe? He felt a little hurt.
It must have showed, because she also looked surprised at herself.
"Look at me, Ruby. Look at me." He didn't say it for her. He said it for himself. To give himself time to think of something. Organize his thoughts.
Jaune of this game, why are you here?
"I am!"
Think about that later. You need to care about the present. In order to calm down your customer, you must be calm first. "Do I look like a suicidal man?"
"Yes."
Jaune coughed. "W-Well, the point is I'm not! Think about it." Deep breaths.
"Think about what?"
Breathe. Don't let her agitation affect you. "Why… hmm… Do you…" A random idea came to him. "Do you really think it'd be that easy for a person without Aura to enter Beacon?"
"What…?"
"Beacon is not just any school, right?" It's a combat school.
Ruby looked a bit less furious and a little more contemplative. "Yes, it's the best academy in Vale."
...Er, yeah, sure, that too. "And would the best academy in Vale really..." ...send their students to die?
She frowned. "No, you are right, it's really easy to check if people have aura or not."
"That's exactly what I mean." He raised his hands placatingly. "I assure you that I am not suicidal. There's some... circumstances."
"What kind of circumstances?"
...Weiss, I feel you right now, even if you are an asshole.
Jaune was silent. How should he word his response? Is there any way he could explain his situation without explaining his situation? As he thought in silence, Ruby stared back at him expectantly. "I... can't tell you." He finally said.
"Jau-"
"Maybe I'll tell you someday. I want to tell you." He reassured her. "For now, Ruby, I need Aura."
[Relationships]: +20 reputation with Ruby Rose.
She looked uncomfortable. In the distance, now a lot closer, the sounds of creatures rushing through bushes grew louder.
"Are there side effects to getting Aura?"
"No… but Aura isn't the answer to everything. You need to learn how to use it and that takes years. Long years with lots of training."
"But it'll help me survive against the Grimm, right?"
"Hmmm…" She played with the hem of her skirt.
"Ruby," He kneeled down to her height, "Believe me. I want to live. I'm not here because I want to. We can talk later, but now, we need to do this."
She looked down at the ground. Her small hands were balled up tightly into fists as she contemplated if she should trust him.
They could now hear the snarls of the encroaching Grimm.
She grimaced, before she placed her hand onto his chest. "I don't like this."
"Don't think I do either." Jaune made a similar expression as her. Of course the gods would make even getting the initial powers part of the game, rather than some railroaded quest.
Ruby closed her eyes as she suddenly began chanting. "For it is in passing that we achieve immortality." Around her, a red aura shimmered into existence. Jaune guessed that it was the visual cue for the magic system of this game.
Finally! It's taken enough ti - Jaune's hands clamped around the girl's. "No."
His fierce eyes bored into hers.
"It's not." He stated.
"Hah?" Her expression was slack with surprise.
Jaune narrowed his eyes. "You don't need to die in order to live, Ruby." He growled. Then, he threw her hand off his chest. Instead, he placed his own where hers was before.
Ruby was clearly terribly confused. "What are you saying? You can't unlock your own Aura! And they are just words! Do you really not know anythin - "
"For it is in surviving that we learn mortality."
His hand glowed gold.
Ruby stared. While it was the light of Aura, for some reason it looked darkened by shadows.
"Through this, we become a shameful reminder of the lost virtue and glory that was before all."
A few Grimm breached the perimeter. Ruby sprung into action, ripping her scythe from the ground.
"Infinite in distance, and unbound by death, I release your soul, and by my light - "
White light flickered around Jaune as the dark yellow dimmed. It started sporadically. First, just one flicker. Then, two. Like an old motor, slowly getting back up to speed after decades of unuse, his Aura came to life.
Jaune growled in satisfaction.
"...charge thee."
Jaune blinked.
"Okay, what was that?" He asked.
"That's my question!" Yelled Ruby. She ducked underneath the swipe of an Ursa as her scythe awkwardly came around to reap more victims. The trees and bushes around her made it difficult to use her scythe at full capacity.
"Ah." Jaune paused. "Sounded like foreshadowing. It happens a lot in the opening act."
"What?"
"Nothing. Hey, now that I have Aura, lemme help!" He unsheathed his sword and brandished it giddily in one hand like some kind of baseball bat.
"Jaune, no!"
He charged at the crowd of Grimm around Ruby. They did look a bit scary, but he had super powers on his side now. There was literally no way it could go wrong.
One of the werewolf-types noticed him and changed targets. Yelling a war cry he had seen in a movie somewhere, he swung his sword at the monster with all his strength in a wide arc as if he was playing shot put. The enemy swiped back at him with a claw. Now that he was up close, he realized that these creatures were surprisingly big. Bigger than a normal man, for sure.
The claw and sword met.
The claw was deflected.
The sword was reflected.
That is, reflected into Jaune's face.
A flash of pain blossomed on his forehead as his full body flinched backwards, stumbling. For a moment, he thought he might have cut himself, but inspecting himself with his other hand revealed that he was unwounded.
Ping!
[System]: Rolling dexterity… Fail!
[System]: Jaune Arc took impact damage.
"It's just a scratch!" He declared, before raising his bent sword up for another try.
Jaune stared at his sword.
"I told you, Aura isn't that easy!"
Jaune looked up.
The wolf thing from before leapt at him with a savage roar.
"Oh shit."
Thankfully for him, a huge paw batted the wolf thing away from him in mid air. He was ready to automatically thank it, until he realized what he had just seen, as from some more foliage, a Grimm taller than any of the others he had seen revealed itself. More armored, more spiky, and much cooler, this was clearly a tougher enemy variant. It towered over Jaune, shadowing him underneath its massive form. It raised an enormous paw.
[Echoes]: Ursa Major UNLOCKED
He braced himself behind his sword, blocking. "Save me, sword!"
"Run!"
"Oh yeah, that's a better idea!"
The giant Grimm's paw smashed into him like a truck. Easily bending the steel of his weapon, it continued to crash into his Aura. Unlike his mental simulation of him awesomely blocking the Grimm monster using his blade, in reality, all of the kinetic energy was instead transferred into him rather than magically dissipating into nothing.
Pain flashed.
[System]: Rolling dexterity… Fail!
Therefore, Jaune was sent flying through every single tree there was in a straight line, carving an unforgettable Jaune sized-mark into the forest. Tree after tree was decimated by his body, contributing to the ongoing worldwide deforestation, cause if you think about it, it really sucks to be a tree in a world that was filled with Grimm and superhumans.
He felt every impact, as if someone was booting him in the back every so often.
Ping!
[System]: Rolling dexterity… Fail!
[System]: Jaune Arc took impact damage.
Ping!
[System]: Rolling dexterity… Fail!
[System]: Jaune Arc took impact damage.
Ping!
[System]: Rolling dexterity… Fail!
[System]: Jaune Arc took impact damage.
...
Yes, I KNOW! I can feel pain, you know!
Suddenly everything froze.
No, rather, it was his body that suddenly froze in mid-air, amid falling leaves, fractured branches, and a shattered bird nest. Sorry, bird!
Roll for your teammates!
[Yes]
His mouth was still screaming, though. "AaaaaAAAAAaaaaaAAAhhhh." He screamed, his arms frozen mid-flail. "AaaaaAAAh - ok, I got it out of my system." He tried to move to massage his throat, but just as he expected, his entire body couldn't move. Might as well get on with it, then.
He verbally clicked on the confirmation button as usual. "Cli - "
He paused.
He took a look around at the bird in flight beside him, whose body was contorted in such a way in order to dodge the Jaune projectile. "Hmmmm…" Its face was distorted in the avian version of shock, which communicated surprisingly well across species barriers.
He twisted the other way. Shards of the previous tree he had crashed through were floating in mid-air. "Hmm… Hmmmm…"
He turned his head a little further, as far as he could with most of his body frozen, in order to see that the next tree he was about to crash into was actually just an inch behind him. "Hmmm - hm!" He tilted his head upwards. "Hm… It's a sugar maple." He nodded to himself. "Which means," he turned back to the floating window in front of him, "in this menu, I also have all the time in the world to think."
Perhaps this was a bug, since pause menus were supposed to be disabled during combat? Was he even still in combat? Actually, what is even defined as still in combat? Was there a timer after the first blow was exchanged? Did he have to be a certain distance away from enemies? He took a long moment to contemplate the mechanics of this game, at least five whole seconds, before he kind of shrugged, which turned into a bizarre nod due to his paralyzed body.
Eh, what happens, happens. He didn't feel like thinking too hard, what if he overheated his brain or something. He needed to leave some energy for the more important question…
…
Do I actually have something to think about?
He certainly had some questions, like how he was able to unlock his own 'Aura', when Ruby clearly thought it was impossible. During the whole thing, he was actually entirely aware and kind of in control. It definitely felt like being a passenger in the sense of not being in control, yet, at the same time, the entire exchange, strange words and all, felt so natural. As if it was natural to be suddenly annoyed when Ruby said that incantation thingy.
Ok, weird, but… Oh. He replayed the entire conversation in his head, going through every detail. Oh. Oooooh…
He glanced suspiciously skyward.
Putting that matter aside for now, Jaune turned his attention back to the game window. This time, there were two slots to roll. Teams of four? Unless I have to roll again later. He clic - Argh, wait! He stopped himself again. There were a few more things he suddenly realized he should check.
"Status Menu."
[Back]
[Stats]:
Offense: 100
Defense: 500000
Dexterity: 25
Stamina: 48/100
AP: 934/1000
?: 0%
HP: 1931
PP: 40
Other stats hidden due to low intelligence.
Jaune stared at his defense stat. Fifty… fifty thousand?! No, no, five hundred thousand! Was that from unlocking my Aura?! No wonder Ruby's weapon had damage up in the tens of thousands, he thought. How insane. He was also pretty sure that the other stats had changed - those question marks looked very suspicious, but other than that, he couldn't tell what was different. Well, whatever, he's pretty sure he'll figure it out at some point.
"Skills Menu"
[Skills] (Prestigeable at Lv. 10):
Sugar Addiction - Rank 3/10
Video Game Addiction - Rank 2/10
Advanced Burger Flipping - Rank 2/10
Novice Customer Service - Rank 6/10
Bachelor of Arts - English - Rank 3/4
Sprint - Rank 0/100
̴sight - Rank 0/100 [Deactivated]
'Sight'? He didn't remember unlocking it. Did he just miss it at some point? It seemed like it also wasn't capitalized and there was a particle of dust or something on the screen beside the 's'. He tried blowing on it. It did nothing. Can this virtual screen even be dirty?
Additionally, it was 'deactivated'. He clearly had the ability to see currently, so how could it be deactivated? He toggled the skill.
Nothing changed.
"Just tell me what everything does, for god's sake!"
[Admin]: Classic millennial.
And what would you even know of hard work? You are literally god, you have everything, can make anything!
Out of the clear blue sky, a giant lightning bolt smashed down beside Jaune. A thunderous boom almost blew out his ear drums.
[Admin]: Watch your words, mortal.
Ok, ok! I get it!
The scorched earth below him where the lightning struck faded away, returning to its unblemished state.
Hmph, when he insults me, he gets away with it, but when I do it, noooooo.
He raised imaginary middle fingers at the sky.
[Admin]: What did I say?!
Jaune yelped. Shutting up, I'm shutting up!
Refocusing on his current task, Jaune opened up the Menu Menu in order to check which menus he hasn't opened yet. Just the Objectives Menu and the Inventory Menu. The first was as he expected and the second one… was also as he expected.
Useless.
A bit of messing around revealed that each of the additional inventory boxes could be unlocked… with a one-time purchase of 4.99$. However, if he bought two within two hours, he could get a third one half-off.
He resisted the urge to curse out the developer. Yeah, he was not spending any amount of money in this stupid game.
Disappointed, he closed the menu.
He was so overloaded with things to figure out. So much didn't make sense. In order to complete the game and escape from this trap designed to sap his money, he's going to have to make some sacrifices.
He's going to have to think.
…
That was not his strong suit. Usually, he and Nora left that to Ren.
Closing the menu, he went back to the previous game window.
Roll for your teammates!
[Yes]
He pressed yes.
Congrats!
You get:
[Pyrrha Nikos]
[Legendary]
Description: An exceptional huntress nicknamed the 'Invincible Girl', she's pretty much invincible. Which is true, because it's even said in this description.
Other stats hidden.
Wait, another legendary?!
[Weiss Schnee]
[Common]
"Common, aw… Nevermind, suck it, Weiss!"
Description: Standard tsundere package, except this one only has a single pigtail.
Other stats hidden.
[Accept] [Reroll for 10$, 5/5 remaining] [Drop Chances]
Jaune would have passed his fingers through his non-existent beard in thought if he could move. The text was correct, how come that Weiss person had only one ponytail? Isn't that illegal for characters of that kind of personality type?
He clicked accept. Getting a common sucked, but dissing Weiss was well worth -
His head smashed through the tree behind him.
Back in motion, Jaune the cannonball burst through the forest. This time, he only had a moment to scream before his back finally slammed into a sturdy rock solid object and started to lose momentum. The both of them carved a trench into the ground, stopping at least twenty meter away from when he was first caught, leaving a trail of destruction.
"Are you okay, Jaune?"
The iron grip around his arms loosened and Jaune dropped to his feet. "Thanks Pyrrha," he said, having recognized the voice. He patted himself, getting rid of bark, wood shards, and other debris.
"No problem."
A flurry of petals swirled into view behind him, recollecting itself into Ruby. "Are you okay, Jaune?!"
He turned around, ready to reassure yet another person about his relative-still-togetherness, when he saw a flash of annoyance in Ruby's eyes. He thought it was at him for a second, but realized that her gaze went past him, over his shoulder.
It's Weiss, isn't it?
"I heard some great disturbances from over here. Are you okay?" Instead of coming from behind him though, the voice came from his far left, towards the side of their little clearing. Weiss exited some bushes only to come face to face with two out of two people she didn't want to meet. Jaune knew it both because of what had happened over the last few days and the distraught expression on her face as their eyes accidentally met.
"Since two negatives make a positive… if I called you 'snow angel' again right now…"
"Then I will be positively angry." She snapped back. "You better hope you already have a partner, or else."
"Yes!" Ruby grabbed Jaune's arm pulling him aside. "We're partners. You'll have to take Pyrrha Nikos." He didn't expect her jerking action and stumbled.
Weiss seemed to be very satisfied with that answer, turning to Pyrrha. "How fortunate. With us two working together, our years at Beacon will be a breeze, Pyrrha."
Pyrrha just smiled and nodded.
As the two huntresses shook hands and exchanged pleasantries, Jaune and Ruby walked to the side, away enough to be out of clear earshot. "Wow, you really hate that Weiss person."
"It's not that!" Ruby hissed back. "It's just we can't let them figure out you came to Beacon without Aura!"
"Oh, yeah," Jaune tried to make himself a little more serious. "That's bad."
"That's bad - of course that's bad! Using Aura defensively is generally very simple. However, using Aura offensively requires tons of practice." Ruby's gaze, turning a bit sorrowful, drifted to the scrap metal in Jaune's hand, a weapon that had miraculously stayed in his grip during his flight through the forest. Most likely because the sword was smacked into him, rather than away from him by the Grimm. "Practice and conviction."
"Ah, I just need to swing around a sword more, huh? I can do that."
"No, no. Conviction. Aura is the power of the soul; it is the manifestation of your will. You can't just swing your sword, you need to mean it with your very heart."
Jaune scoffed. "Soul? With your very heart? That sounds romanticized for certain." Imagine that, a video game character telling me about the soul. Actually… that's a pretty common plotline. Nevermind, spout me your bullshit all you want!
Ruby didn't look too happy with that. "Jaune, is there something that you are passionate about?"
He blinked.
Passion? Isn't that just a word that those career counsellors and motivational speakers throw around without meaning a single thing? Or maybe what bosses say they look for, when they barely pay you enough to live?
His partner saw his reaction and looked frustrated. "We need to find it and fast, Jaune." She grabbed at her dress nervously. "How are we going to accelerate through ten years of work in a single two-day Initiation?"
In story driven video games, the protagonist is usually fueled with a drive that will push him throughout the game, empowered by his backstory. A goal that he desires with all his heart, a mantle given to him by the gods, or maybe even the pursuit of something greater than himself.
But what about Jaune?
He was just a regular guy. His family was generally happy. He had a job, had a place to live, and couldn't really speak of any grand destiny that drove him. He was just…
Jaune.
Average.
The only thing special about me is that I'm tall. And uh, I have six sisters. Both of which have nothing at all to do with me. He couldn't help but think. And what did Ruby say? Ten years of hard work? How was he supposed to train his way to their level, when the story of this game had already started? Isn't this game just setting him up for failure?
...Of course it was setting him up for failure. The very first mission was impossible.
"And don't think we're done talking about the fact that you came here without Aura, either."
Oh joy.
/-A Requiem for a Gamer-/
The armored woman walked to her certain death, spear in hand and bag hanging on her waist.
She could see the Grimm now, in the distance. Even from so far away, they were imposing. Humongous. Even the smallest ones were about twice as tall as a normal man.
But she didn't care.
"For Atilla, my son, whose corpse was strewn in pieces across the field of flowers he had loved so much."
Her free hand entered her bag, taking out a single sparkling, staticky pebble.
"For Vasilica, my beautiful daughter, whose head was smashed into unrecognizable gore."
She took out another pebble. This one was icy to the touch.
"For Michael, loving husband, who'd used to somehow always make things feel alright until he and his optimism withered away."
One last pebble. This one burned like the sun.
But she didn't feel the static. She didn't feel the cold. She didn't feel the burn - not really, because she felt empty inside.
She came here to die, for she had nothing left.
/-A Requiem for a Gamer-/
A/N: We've been doing the Comedy part of Comedy/Adventure, time for the Adventure part!
Next chap: July 25, 2021