"Alright," you say, holding Weiss' hand (at her insistence) out in the garden where you have chosen to convene after she figured out she could ask any of your maids to relay a message onto you, including her very own personal gem maid, "talk me through it. How does the Schnee semblance's summoning work?"
Weiss closes her eyes for a moment, obviously already deep in concentration. "The Schnee semblance is unique in that it is hereditary, and one of its abilities is to summon defeated foes so as to aid oneself in combat."
Mhm, curious wording there. "Define 'defeated foes'."
"The way it has been explained to me, they have to be personally fought and destroyed, in actual combat of at least some level. Whether with help from others or otherwise. I believe it may also be... easier to summon them if they pushed the user to the brink during the battle?"
Weiss obviously isn't entirely sure about this stuff, but hey, you can work with it. "Only aid in combat?"
"They require aura to summon, and I have never heard of anyone using them for any other purpose," Weiss says. With that, she lets go of your hand, twirling around in her cute white dress and thrusting her rapier into the soft ground as one of her glyphs appears around it, her kneeling position immediately tempting you to come over at pat her head (moreso than usual, anyways).
You resist the urge, of course.
Weiss stays like that for a bit, a bigger glyph appearing on the ground before her and simply turning in place, but regardless of the obvious concentration on her face, the knuckles white around her weapon's handle and what you'd imagien to be a steady stream of aura, nothing more happens.
Deciding to just go with what comes naturally, you simply step over towards Weiss, gently laying a hand onto her head and patting it a little.
"You said it was about limitations," you say as you simply stand there, watching Weiss work at it and completely ignoring what you are henceforth calling her summoning circle (and overlaying Kiron while you're at it to make this go smoother), "but... you've already overcome those limits. You have defeated whatever you are trying to summon. This?"
Kneeling down beside her, you give Weiss a kiss on the side of her forehead. "This is child's play by comparison."
Not tensing up anymore, Weiss calms down a little, she stops trying to force it... and immediately succeeds, a translucent arm carrying the same sword you saw when you went hunting with her stretching out of it and ramming it into the soft floor, dragging itself out after it and standing up.
A giant suit of armor is standing there, glowing brightly, swiftly kneeling down before Weiss and mirroring her posture.
"I did it," she whispers, disbelievingly.
"You did," you agree. "How does it feel?"
"Like... like I am controlling it. I may need some practice to use this effectively, however."
"Not like that, Weiss," you say with a huff. "How does it feel to summon whatever this big guy is?"
"... Good," Weiss eventually brings out. "It feels like... like I am finally living up to who I could be. It feels amazing." Looking down at her hands with wide eyes and turning them over, you can see what Weiss meant- the armored giant is mirroring her again. Looks like she's mixing up the controls for her own body and her summon or something.
"Well, good work. Now all you need to do is train with this and your combative abilities skyrocket," you tell her.
"This is... the Arma Gigas," she mutters, still having a hard time believing she actually did it. "A replica of my grandfather's armor, with a Geist possessing it. Father made me fight it as a 'test' if I wanted to attend Beacon- he didn't think I could win. It gave me my scar."
Well, Jacques Schnee was never very high on your 'spare this life' list, but now he's kind of sunk to the bottom. Not as deep as your own parents, of course, but pretty far down there.
"So much for that," you scoff. "All he did was make you stronger, in the end, if this guy is anywhere as powerful as he looks."
"I... really did it. It hardly even took any aura." All of a sudden, Weiss turns towards you, beaming smile on her face. "I did it! Thank you so much!"
The next moment, you have Weiss glomping onto you, giving you a big ol' hug you heavily suspect she is very much not used to giving... nor receiving, though you've been working towards changing that.
"You did, you did," you say as you pat her back, the short young woman being perfect cuddle bait again. "Now all you need to do is work with this. Another new skill set to learn and all that."
"Yes!" Wiping her eyes clear a little, Weiss gives you a bow. "Where do we start?"
Suffice to say, you're not allowed to return to the mansion for a few hours, Weiss requiring your presence for the remainder of her training. That's your story and you're sticking to it!
Oh, and also, you kind of demolish a bunch of trees again as a giant sword is swung around freely, but eh, details.
Sarah, being the ever-wonderful sister that she is, actually managed to find that one bunny faunus you got to take pictures of yourself, apparently also a huntress-in-training herself, of all things. Looks like you can't take five steps in this city without tripping over one these days.
Still, you aren't exactly going to complain about her in a bikini, a little sun hat with holes for her ears along for the ride, even, though she takes a bit to gather the nerve to actually wear it instead of fiddling with it as she holds it in front of herself.
"H-hello, nice to meet you, everybody."
That said, it isn't like she came alone. Not too surprising, given you made sure she knew she was allowed to bring someone along if she felt more comfortable that way.
"Didn't think you'd get our bunny all to yourself, did you?"
Coco, as you soon find out she's called, is twenty pounds of attitude in a two pound bag, but she does her best not piss anyone else off, at least, so you don't see any reason to throw her off the roof quite yet.
She also tried flirting at you, but you just flirted back. You're not sure she's really quite used to that kind of thing from how she actually blushes.
Ruby and Yang are, of course, in attendance, as are Weiss and Pyrrha, the full array of huntresses-in-training available to you present.
"It doesn't look weird or anything, does it? Please tell me it doesn't!"
"Calm down, you look fine."
"Look, big boy, you try anything, look weird at my sis, and I am punting you off the roof, got it?"
The 'outfit' that has everyone all in a tizzy is naturally Pyrrha's, the athletic redhead making little secret of her clothing choices.
"Why did you bring your weapon?" Ruby asks, being... herself, as usual.
"I like having it on hand, and Gabriel doesn't mind."
"Wait for me, Crescent Rooose!"
Nora declined to come, citing her need to preserve her youth by avoiding contact with younger people mingling. When you asked her to tell you the real reason, she said she didn't want to risk having to talk to strangers out in the sun, her own resistance to the baleful light still in its infancy.
Which, you know, fair enough.
That said, Okita was (surprisingly) up for it after Weiss 'persuaded' her to join in, presumably by talking at her until Okita just agreed to it to make her go away. Though she doesn't seem to mind, in the end, especially once she gets a few drinks downed.
Though you don't think any amount of talking will get her to actually take off her jacket and get into the water anytime soon.
Speaking of drinks, though, that part of things is actually taken care of by a newly created minion just for the purpose, a fairly inconspicuous one whose main abilities consist of mixing really good drink and creating them (and generally most simple, drinkable liquids, from milk to apple juice or carbonated water) by lactating them from her breasts.
Naturally, you had to test everything that might come up, both from the glass and fresh from the source, finding the results quite satisfactory. Though you're sourcing the food and drinks (and yes, you did set up a snack bar) from more mundane sources for today.
"Would you like another drink, master?"
The woman of the hour, of course, is none other than one Glynda Goodwitch, her quick reaction to the fighting at your mansion being the only thing that saved your pool from its ashen fate and making this rooftop pool party possible in the first place, a fact you aren't shy about announcing.
"Hey everyone, this is Glynda. Glynda, everyone." Velvet and Coco, if nobody else, do seem to recognize her immediately.
"P-Professor Goodwitch!"
Coco, for her part, just whistles.
"Hello, girls. I trust I do not need to elaborate on what shall happen if talk of this occasion makes its way around the academy? That goes for all future huntresses in attendance as well, of course."
Yeah, a nice and proper pool party you've got going here. Might be a tad bit cold under other circumstances, but you literally have heating installed both in the pool itself and in its surroundings, a massive waste of heating costs that nobody seems to care about with the abundance of fire dust to be used.
Not that you'd ever actually use dust, of course. Fusion cores do the job just fine. You really need to thank your Hammerheads for getting all of this done so quickly.
Well, Glynda is busy relaxing inside the expansive pool itself with a glass of low-alcohol content drink in hand, sipping at it while watching everyone else.
Following her gaze for a moment, you see the glass of vodka you saw her leave on the roof's edge earlier, a bird of all things dipping its beak inside. They, uh, they don't normally do that, do they?
Either way, as you get inside next to her, holding your own drink and enjoying the heated water of the pool as you mirror her.
"It really is a marvellous pool," is what she says after a moment, stretching out her legs. There's a ledge under the water specially meant for just this purpose, as well as a little surprise you're about to unleash in a bit.
"All the better you saved it, really," you respond. "It was still about to finish renovations when the ash cloud incident happened."
"This certainly makes it worth it," Glynda says, her mouth quirked just the tiniest bit, but you saw her smile! "If only everyone were to reward such heroic acts like this, there would be far more heroes in the world."
"Well, it's about to get even better." Stretching out a hand, you point towards a little control panel built into the ground behind the pool, pressing a button. "It comes with jacuzzi and whirlpool functions."
Tensing up a little at the jets of water now hitting her back, Glynda relaxes after a long moment, sighing in pleasure as she moved up and down a bit to let them hit her everywhere before she stops, sheepishly looking around.
It still did... interesting things, to her bikini-clad bust and the waterline.
"I am not used to being around my students, prospective or otherwise, while relaxing," she mentions at your curious look, "so please don't take it too badly when I try not to show any lax sides of myself."
"Oh, please, don't force yourself one way or another," you beseech her. "No matter what side of Glynda Goodwitch I see, I find them all fascinating, to say the least."
Biting her lip, Glynda takes another glance around, giving you a haughty look. "In that case, you may just get to see her secret side."
Before you can say anything, you feel a hand on your thigh, moving upwards.
"It can be hard, being the strict teacher all the time, but someone has to be. The children would run roughshod over the academy, otherwise." As she speaks, her fingers stroke along your leg until they reach your waist, fiddling with your trunks' band. "No discipline whatsoever unless someone upholds it."
"I certainly understand, the younger generation can be... difficult, to deal with." Not showing anything on your face as her probing hand makes its way inside your swimwear, you give her your most charming smile. "Of course, when I was that age, I was the very model of good behaviour myself."
"I am sure you were," Glynda dryly retorts, finally finding your manhood with soft, but firm fingers, already hardening as it is. "Though this feels like the tool of a bad boy if I am any judge."
You smirk. "I said 'good behaviour', nothing about being good. I was the very worst boy I could be. And still am. It is only good behaviour to never leave any woman unsatisfied, after all."
Relaxing against the pool's side, you let her feel yourself up, a little reminded of your early childhood, in fact.
"Oh my, you sound like you need to be punished for that." Gripping your dick tightly, you feel yourself swelling to full size, Glynda's thumb scraping along your glans. "What do you have to say for yourself?"
"Oh, I deserve any and all punishment you can deal me, Professor Goodwitch," you flirt with her, noting she is still throwing the occasional glance at that crow.
"Indeed." And with that, Glynda begins actually jerking you, hiding the motion of her arm as she makes sure none of the other people present can see anything. "Truly, such a disappointing student, requiring my personal... persuasion... to study."
Honestly, both of you are having way too much fun with your exaggerated roleplaying, Glynda having to hold in actual giggles as you insist you have been so very bad and only her touch can discipline you. She also becomes a little more overt, as nobody says anything, properly giving you a full handjob and taking a few little breaks to fondle your balls and just touch your dick along its full length, commenting on just how long your 'list of disciplinary measures' is.
You do, of course, try to return the gesture, but she just shakes her head when you fiddle with her bikini under the water line, so you restrain yourself to massaging her thigh.
Eventually, you feel your peak approach after about ten minutes of concentrated manual stimulation, so you just tell Glynda you are about to attend detention. She gets the message, looking you in the eyes as she finds the secret button on your trunks, opening the front compartment up and pushing your dick outside.
"I had best... oversee it, then."
And with that as well as a last quick look around, now openly jerking you off underwater, Glynda takes a deep breath, submerging in short measure and bringing her head closer to the action.
As her lips open around your head, a quick tongue sliding over it, you readily come, Glynda drinking down all the fluids you have to give, one hand milking more from your cock, the other holding your balls as though to encourage them to produce more.
Staying in place once you're done, she makes sure there's nothing more to come before resurfacing, carefully packing away your package as she gives you a sultry smile.
You just give her back the short glass she left behind, Glynda flushing down your semen with the drink she'd been working on beforehand.
"Really, I should return for another... detention... at some point. Nothing brings me as much joy as disciplining unruly students."
"Well," you jokingly note, "as I said, I deserve all the punishment you can dish out."
"Challenge accepted," is all Glynda has to say to that, a sudden gleam on her glasses.
Is that... is that an aura thing or something?
"So, Sarah, how'd you like the show?"
Your sister, being her usual self, is naturally in attendance while simultaneously doing her best to pretend not to care about anything that's happening, her scroll in her hands taking up most of her visible focus.
Not that she would ever not be busy using her power on everyone in sight, of course.
"Pretty nice, pretty nice. Could've pulled her down to really get a taste of it all, though," Sarah drawls. "Seriously, though, she's pretty pent up. Also keeping a lot of secrets. That crow she's been looking at isn't just a bird, and that's just the bare top I've been skimming off of her."
"Mhmm..." Interesting. Veeery interesting. "Any of the others I should pay attention to?"
"Bunny girl and her gay friend. Who is very gay, by the way, though she's questioning her sexuality right now." Looking you dead in the eyes, Sarah's voice becomes dry enough to make the Saharah look like a tropical rainforest. "Wonder how that could've happened."
Genuinely curious, you nod. "Yeah. Like, it's not like I particularly care about other people's sexuality, everyone do whoever and whatever they want so long as it doesn't get in my way, but still."
Sarah just sighs, head falling back to look at the sky.
Coco POV
Coco Adel's first thought upon coming up on the roof to protect her little bunny teammate, having had no idea just exactly what kind of pool party to expect and being greeted by what had to be the hunkiest guy in the history of Remnant dressed in nothing but a trunk.
Gabriel Livsey, as he was called.
Don't get her wrong, Coco wasn't into guys. At all. She knew what she wanted, and more often than not she got it, too, whether it was a sweet new accessory or a sweet lady to flirt with.
But despite how guys usually left her cold, she couldn't help but want to stare at those abs. They hadn't done anything wrong! They were just on a guy! You could still grate cheese (and very different things) on them!
It wasn't her fault she had a thing for a bit of muscle on her ladies every now and then!
So yeah, she had been... distracted for a bit. That was why when their host came over towards them, every step showing off clearly defined, but not overemphasized muscles. Oh no, oh no, think gay thoughts!
"Hey there, you two. Doing alright?"
Aaah, he'd be just as fuckable as a woman aaah!
"We're doing fine, thank you," Coco got out instead of panicking, congratulating herself for keeping her cool.
"Y-yes, we're fine," Velvet agreed, her bunny ears flopping with her nod. That was right, think of the cute bunny ears.
"Glad to hear it. Would be such a shame for such beautiful ladies to be bored at my little party of all things."
Aaaaaaaaa-
"Oh, don't worry, Coco is alright so long as she has beautiful women to ogle." Velvet, what! Why! Please!
"Oh my, looks like we have more in common than I would've thought."
AAAAAAAAA-
"So who would you say you could go for the most, Coco?"
AAAAAAAAA-
"P-Professor Glynda is a lot different than how I'm used to seeing her at Beacon. It's... different." How in the world was she keeping her voice calm and casual like that?
"Ah, hot for teacher, huh? I totally get it. She really is beautiful, after all. Though speaking of Beacon, what's it like there? I never attended any academy myself, but I'm a little curious," Gabriel Livsey said.
Coco could see Velvet's ears wiggle in the corner of her vision, the little traitor. "Beacon is... Beacon. They have dorms and stuff, yeah."
Oh gods, why was she like this? She was bad enough around beautiful women already!
"Good to know," Gabriel smiled at her. "Any more details? How about visitors, are those allowed?"
Oh gods oh gods oh gods-
"Not normally, no. Only Beacon staff and students. Though I think you can get permission to visit on weekends?" Wait why was she answering all his questions, Velvet-
"Too bad, I would've liked to come by every now and then." A hand moving over, almost in slow motion, Gabriel held one of Coco's hands, looking down a little to her face. "Still, thanks a lot."
Okay, calm down. Deep breaths, Coco, deep breaths. Yes, sure, he was oddly attractive, and yes, she wasn't turned off by the thought of guys quite as much as she'd thought, but that was no reason to go all spaghetti.
"Don't mention it, handsome," Coco said as she gave his hand a squeeze and decided to walk over to the bar. She really needed a drink or two, and they were free, so why not?
Though she still gave Gabriel's ass a good smack on the way. That was completely normal Coco behaviour. And if she did her best to remember the feel, well, that was just a bonus.
"Heh, just like home." And Gabriel wasn't helping! "Still, tell me more about how it's like to study at Beacon. What they teach there, how the teachers are like, that kinda thing."
"Sure! Just let me refuel a little first."
A long and emotionally exhaustive conversation later, the only ones sitting at the bar were Coco and Velvet, the bunny faunus greedily partaking of the carrot juice it had stocked for some reason.
"Why'd you do that, Velvet? And don't play dumb, you know exactly what I mean." She did know her teammate tended to be on the quieter side, but she was usually better about coming out of her shell around Coco or the other two.
"Mhm. I saw the way you looked at him, so... I wanted to see how it'd turn out? Worst case I was wrong. Was I?"
"... No."
Dammit all, but Coco was going to get shitfaced like she never had before and then she'd go on a shopping spree like Vale hadn't seen before.
She needed a new hat anyways. Maybe a new beret?
"Hey, Yang. You doing alright?" Ruby's sister, somewhat contrary to expectation, isn't hanging onto her sister like an overprotective limpet, instead just lying down nearby where Ruby and Weiss are chatting and trying to get along.
And drinking, of course. With her bikini top taken off, presumably tanning herself?
"What, homing in on the first free-hanging pair of tits in sight?" She asks, taking another sip from the bottle she requisitioned from the bar.
"Hardly, if I wanted tits, I'd have just asked Pyrrha to strip," you half-joke, taking a seat next to her. "Just wanted to see how you're doing."
Looking back towards her sister, Yang sighs, stretching a little. "I'm doing alright, and I still can't stand your guts. More importantly, Ruby's actually getting out of her shell a little, isn't she?"
Glancing at her and Weiss talking placidly, you shrug with a nod. "She is."
"That's actually something I've been worried about for a while," Yang confesses, swirling her drink around in its bottle. "She may seem like a hyperactive blabbermouth, but... she doesn't really have any friends or people she talks to outside the family."
"Or had," you amend.
"Yeah. I'm..." With a sigh, Yang rolls her eyes. "It's something I don't have to worry about as much, okay? I'm still breaking your legs and sending you to take a swim if you hurt her, though."
"Oh, no worries," you grin, getting up and measuring the hit, "if anything, I'm worried she might be too 'enthusiastic' and hurt me!"
And with that, you slap Yang's ass, earning an outraged squawk that follows you as you go to join the two objects of your conversation.
"Hey Ruby, hey Weiss."
Elsewhere, a certain crow nearly begins a nosedive right through a certain someone's eyes, but settles for returning to observation instead after all, a certain niece just shaking her head with a huffing smile for a moment.
A dozen trees fall, people dropping fragile objects in a two-mile radius even as others stub their toes, bump their heads, accidentally break hinges and even accidentally detonate dust vials all over the place.
Certain parts of Vale just so happen to be quite unlucky today.
Patting the girls' heads, you note with amusement Glynda's bikini seems to have broken, incapable of restraining her bust quite entirely, only for her to subtly gesture at it and see it repair itself.
"Gabriel!"
"Hello, Gabriel."
The two girls you're here for greeting you, you turn your full attention back towards them, Ruby and Weiss both adorable in their swimwear and looking up at you. If you didn't know better, you'd think you had a thing for short girls, but they're just attractive by being themselves.
"How are you finding this little get-together so far? I hope you're not too bored," you ask.
"No, no, I'm having tons of fun talking with Weiss and she said she lives here and I'm so jealous and I read that your paintings and stuff are super valuable and-"
Shutting Ruby up by giving her a kiss on the forehead and reducing her to mumbled half-words, you turn to Weiss. "And how about you?"
"I am entertained plenty, no need to worry." Aah, from her expression, she's just been trying to get used to Ruby? "The pool is wonderful, by the way, by any standards I would care to name."
"Yeah, I've had my semblance at work on it ever since I could decide how I wanted it," you smile at her. "I am planning to get as much use out of it as I can."
"If I didn't have to stay home in Patch for Signal, I would live in the pool," Ruby pouts.
Laughing, you mess up her red and black hair, the girl leaning into you in response. "That's right, the school year is starting soon, isn't it? What are you two planning until then, anything to do in particular?"
"I was planning to simply stay in Vale and prepare for my academic responsibilities," Weiss says primly even as she tilts towards you, wordlessly demanding her own headpats back, something you oblige with an indulgent smile on your face.
"Oh! I'm coming to Vale all the time during vacation, I mean, I am now, but I was planning to do window shopping and that kinda stuff." Ruby is almost rubbing into your bare chest by this point, prompting Weiss to do the same on your other side. "Dad is letting us stay as long as we want again, so I'm going shopping after this, too, actually."
"Too bad I will be preoccupied, otherwise I would offer to come along," Weiss sighs, at least somewhat truthfully, to boot. "I am training with Pyrrha in the evening."
"Oh, you got her to agree? I got the impression Pyrrha is pretty shy about that kind of thing," you remark.
"I had to promise it was just because she is also... " Weiss looks at Ruby. "Living with you, rather than because of her fame as the Invincible Girl."
"Well, I'm glad everyone is getting along with each other," you smile at her.
"Mmmrhh... I also want to get along with everyone," Ruby pouts even harder. Weiss, on the other hand...
"That's- that would be easier if you... lived here, too, but it can't be helped, can it? You wouldn't want to leave your home behind, would you?"
"No... But," Ruby perks up, "I could take Zwei, and it would almost be like home!"
"Zwei?" You ask.
"Our dog! He's a very good boy. Also really, really smart, he's had his aura unlocked for longer than I've been alive."
Huh.
The first to have to leave, eventually, is none other than Glynda, mentioning she has to return to Beacon before her patrol of Vale later this evening, followed by Coco and Velvet taking this as an opportunity to get away (mostly Coco), the bunny faunus giving you an apologetic smile and nod as she follows after Coco.
You give her an understanding smile as you nod back. Coco needs to figure herself out, and that's totally okay.
Pyrrha is next, having had enough of lying on her front and tanning herself, so she comes over to give you a kiss on the cheek before returning to the rest of the mansion (and whispering she can't wait to take off her bikini).
Ruby and Yang, at the urging of the latter, are the ones to follow, the blonde pushing her sister ahead of herself with both arms to 'get back home sometime by tomorrow'. Weiss, smiling a little in a way that makes her scar crease in just the cutest way, comes after them, leaning against you and closing her eyes for a moment before leaving.
Okita looks like she's just gonna keep smiling into space for a few hours if left alone, so you just go to pick her up as Sarah (finally) gets up, collecting the empty glass left out for that crow. Overall, you'd say this whole pool party was decently entertaining, with a lot of fun to be had and some actual crap getting done, mostly in terms of socializing a few of the girls.
No, really, Ruby and Weiss especially are almost painfully incapable of quicktalking people. Fuck's sake, Weiss immediately got along with Okita- nobody that really gets people and isn't completely bonkers themselves does that.
Anyways, the bartender minion you left up there can go around cleaning everything up and refilling as much of the alcohol used as it can before popping; you have a Nora to spend time with in the evening, hopefully helping her get used to the sunlight she can now endure.
Honestly, when you and Nora left the mansion in search of anything from a quick meal to some shopping, whichever caught your eyes first, the one thing you hadn't exactly been expecting to find was... this.
"OH MY GODS SHE'S SO NICE CAN WE KEEP HER REN, PLEASE?"
"Nora, you can't keep people. No. Stop it."
As the ginger-haired young woman shook her apparent friend, your own Nora gave you a smile that spoke volumes of the laughter she was repressing. "Yes, Gabriel, can we keep them, please?"
You just sigh. Honestly, why does this kind of thing just keep on happening in this dimension? "You know what, fine. You two wouldn't happen to be new in Vale, orphans, running away from home or otherwise not in possession of a secure place of residence, would you?"
The vaguely asian-looking (Mistralian?) guy blinks. "That... fits, I suppose? We're here to attend Beacon, we've just rented a cheap room until then- they actually have discounts for new students, and the academy itself has its own lodgings."
"Alright, go get your stuff, you have just been adopted. Meet us here in five minutes and we can show you around your new home until beacon."
"WOOOOOOHOOOOOO!"
"I- What?"
Nora (your Nora, anyways) just smiles at you, knowing it was really just a matter of her asking.
Luckily enough, it's evening already anyways, and so it isn't particularly hard to arrange for everyone else to come together; Weiss and Pyrrha have been hard at work training and need to eat dinner, Okita took a quick nap to sober up and immediately got hungry (thralls still do need to eat, just not that much), Sarah isn't fundamentally opposed to eating human food for taste and you had to actively try to restrain Nora from cooking herself.
Ren and Little Nora were quite surprised, of course, to see your semblance's creations running around doing stuff, including all the cooking, but hey, semblances, right? Nobody really questions what you do with 'em.
Then there's a question of what to make, of course, so you just ask.
"PANCAKES! Can they do paaancaaakes?" Little Nora asks, her voice going deep as she does.
"Nora, it's dinner time. Pancakes are for breakfast," Ren chastises in turn.
You just fire off a mental query, having one of the three slime maids you got on this look over the ingredients you have in stock. Turns out your Nora did a pretty thorough job when she decided she wanted to cook for your weird little family.
"We can do all the pancakes, Nora," you say, snapping a finger as the slimaids get started on mixing the pancake batter. "Also, we do not obey useless societal conventions in this mansion. If you want pancakes, you get pancakes, the time of day doesn't matter. Brothers know half the people living here, myself included, just eat whenever, anyways, so this may as well be breakfast."
"WOHOOO! THANK YOU, DADDY!"
Ren sighs. "Your funeral. Just make sure she actually eats something else on occasion, too."
"Oh, I made sure the slime maids know to feed everyone well-balanced meals. Besides, we'll probably run out of eggs a few hundred pancakes in, anyways," you assure him. "Also, daddy?"
"You feed us and you give me pancakes when I ask for them, so you're daddy!" You do kind of wonder whether Nora ever will run out of energy or whether she's just always like this out of principle.
"Eh, can't argue with that logic," you shrug either way. "So, let me formally explain what's going on here. Simply put, I'm Gabriel Livsey, I live in this mansion with my family. I also usually allow people to live here for whatever reasons they might have, hence your 'adoption', so for now feel free to treat this place as your very own home. If you ever need anything, just ask me or any of my creations, alright?"
Holding out a hand, you create one of your ever-handy sweets fairies, directing it towards an empty pitcher standing on the desk, soon having it create thick, golden syrup flowing into it.
"So... You just allow people to live here?" Ren asks. Well, he's probably right to be cautious about this whole thing.
"I do! Not just everyone, of course, but people that someone already living here invites are generally welcome," you clarify. "Also, look at that, the first load of pancakes is ready."
With that, a slime maid carefully lowers a small tower of the things, fluffy dough piled up high on the plate she's carrying. Nora's eyes become little stars, and before it hits the desk, she has a stack of three of the things already on her own plate, pouring the syrup you just created onto them. "Mhgmhmnomh!"
"Glad to see you like them, Nora," you smile at her. "Oh, and before I forget, let me properly introduce everyone."
"Mhnomnom- YES PLEASE, DADDY!"
"That would be appreciated, yes."
Pyrrha just smiles at them herself. "I can already see they will liven things up around here."
The tricky part of not using your claws, mostly on account of not wanting to deal with everyone asking about how you have them, is that you can't exactly tear through the Grimm like wet tissue paper without them, your bare hands protected by aura, but otherwise simply very punchy fists rather than extremely sharp engines of destruction that never dull.
So you have to rely on other ways to enhance your attacks. Luckily enough, there's a little trick with aura that lets you basically 'ripple' it through a target, rupturing its insides and dealing some very decent damage to it. Takes a decent amount of aura, but you can regenerate it easily enough, combined with using the Grimms' strength against them, grappling and throwing and such while you wait to gather your strength again, to keep on fighting.
Except for that one time you were too busy smashing an ursa onto a beowulf, Nora's explosive hammer drowning out the sounds of another one that briefly managed to ram into and gnaw on you, causing you to unload several ripples into everything in reach.
Ren actually has a similar trick up his sleeves, though he doesn't seem to have it down quite right, which is why you take a bit to show him how exactly to do it just right to leave Grimm as exploding clouds of mist.
He's slowly getting there.
In other news, Ren's weapons seem to consist of two green machine pistols with these big blades affixed to them, while Nora's weapon is a sizeable hammer that also seems to function as a grenade launcher for these cylindrical dust canisters with a heart symbol on them that release pink explosions or, alternatively, contain said explosions except for the firing chamber, creating shaped explosions whose recoil she is using to move herself around.
It's honestly pretty interesting. Aura and magically resistant materials really do allow for a variety of strategies and choices you simply wouldn't have thought of yourself.
"Why aren't you using your semblance?"
Ren's question is what pulls you out of your easy combat trance, turning to regard him with a tilt of your head. "Well, there's several reasons, really. First among them being that this is a training mission, and not one I'm spending training my semblance."
"So you aren't summoning things... because it would make things too easy?" He asks.
You shrug. "To an extent. More importantly, I do have to be good with personal combat just as much as with my semblance. Especially as what I like to call a summoner."
"How so? Because your semblance is cumbersome, maybe it takes concentration? Or is it just a matter of aura consumption?"
"Partially, yes," you explain. "But more importantly, any intelligent enemy is naturally going to target me as the guy that creates more fighters. It's just a matter of combat priorities- take out what makes the most trouble first, unless that's impossible for you to do. So I can't just be a big target- I have to be a big, dangerous target. Hence, close combat."
"Hm." Ren doesn't continue asking, obviously just thinking your words over. Hey, maybe you actually accidentally'd something important he'll be taking to heart.
Stranger things have happened.
"Sooooooooo... You can make anything you want to make, right?" Nora's question would perhaps give a lesser man halt, making them question what they were about to say.
Luckily, you, standing there in the 'garden' to the back of your mansion, are not a lesser man. "I can. They need aura to stay around, but that's pretty much the only limitation aside from my imagination."
"Theeeeeeeeen... Can I have a unicorn?" Nora asks, pushing both hands against each other as she looks up at you from up close, eyes big and puppy dog-like. "One that farts rainbows and sounds really cute?"
Well, that isn't as bad as you were expecting. Doesn't mean you'll just give her what she wants though.
"Mhm... Nora, quick question, what's your semblance?" Kinda important for this.
"Oh, I get stronger by absorbing electricity. I discovered it when I got hit by lightning!"
Good to know, that. Also, really? That sounds like SO much potential to be horribly abused, but you don't see any amount of lightning dust on her... "In that case, I can do you one better, even. Give me a moment."
Concentrating on what you want to do, you draw out the idea you estimate to work for Little Nora. Big and strong enough to survive Nora being herself, with some added fur to resist fangs and claws of Grimm and, of course, a lightning breath attack to both devastate entire areas and charge up Nora, according to her testimony.
And, naturally, pink.
Blithely ignoring the newly created crater in your backyard, you point a thumb at the giant humanoid pink sloth you just created. "How 'bout this guy?"
"This. Is. Aaaaaawwweeeesooooooooooome!" Shouting such, Nora promptly runs up the arm currently resting against the ground, burying herself in the white collar of fur around your creation's neck.
"He also has lightning breath!" You call after her as she begins pulling at the fur, already getting a hang of how to steer her new mount.
"Gooootchaaaa~! Come on Pinky, we have a world to conquer! Mwahahaha!"
Well, so much for that. That said, right next to where you're standing, Ren is sitting down cross-legged, his eyes closed as his arms rest at his sides. At you curious look, he elaborates.
"I am taking what calm I can before Nora comes back. I am going to need it."
Well... he's probably not wrong.
Honestly, while you probably could just walk away at this point, you feel like the correct thing to do here from a fatherly standpoint would be to engage Ren in a way he can work with, so...
You sit down a decent bit distanced from him, not enough to make casual conversation difficult, but far enough to make it clear you don't want to intrude on his space.
You just remain like that, entirely unmoving, for several minutes, mutely watching Nora make a mess of the small park that's currently part of your property, bowling over trees and telling your sloth (that you instructed to follow her orders, of course) to attack random places, its strong limbs and sheer weight reshaping the landscape.
She'll probably need to pump all her aura into it soon-ish if she wants to keep it around even in its smaller size, really. You made it with as much aura as you could give it, but this guy wasn't built for longer fights.
"Why are you really doing this?" Ren's question, drawing you out of your reverie, is somewhat sudden, but you feel like it was probably building up for a bit by now.
"Why am I doing what? I may need a bit more detail here, Ren."
"Randomly taking people in. Taking us out to hunt Grimm and teaching me about aura. Feeding Nora pancakes and giving her a giant pink lightning sloth. Pretty much all the interactions we've had with you so far. Why. Did you do it?"
"Nora wanted to take you in," you shrug. "As in, my Nora. Nora the first? Elder Nora? Doesn't matter, you know what I mean. That was enough reason for me to consider the two of you as part of the family, so no matter what you want to see in me or the others, you have a home here."
Because say what you want, but you actually are capable of being empathetic... you're just also just as easily capable of turning it off. Vampirism for the win once again. "And hey, I'm not the worst example of an adoptive dad out there. My parents sucked enough balls I know the broad strokes of what not to do, at least."
Ren is quiet for a long moment, the sound of lightning striking washing over you as Nora tries everything out. Eventually, he sighs. "We didn't exactly ask for a new family after all this time."
"You didn't, but you're getting one anyways." Screw holding anything back, after all.
"The joking aside, I don't think either of us can just see you as a father of all things. You're too young, for one thing," Ren continues.
And there's probably their actual parents to consider, too. The dead ones and all that. "And that's okay, Ren. I'm not trying to replace the family you had before, or forcing things onto either of you or anything like that. All that's really changed is that... there's a possibility now, you know? The rest is up to you."
Another pause in the conversation as Ren considers your words. "I... see. As it is, then, please know you have my thanks for your hospitality on behalf of both myself and Nora," he tells you in this formal, stuffy voice.
"I appreciate your thoughtfulness and return it with my own," you return (heh) in a similar fashion. "Besides, I can just consider this practice for Nora's kids- The elder one again. She's pregnant and, uh, just a little kid crazy, if you didn't guess already." Smirking, you wave in his general direction. "Do prepare to be mothered no matter what you think about it until she is sure both of you are fine, by the way. She still hovers over Weiss as it is."
"I see."
"Oh, you really don't. Remember how much it took to keep her from cooking for you herself? That wasn't even the tip of the iceberg."
"Reeen! Looook! Look how tiny and cute Pinky is!" Nora, having discovered another feature of her gift from you, comes running as she waves the small and almost cartoonish pink sloth in your direction.
"Yeah, Pinky runs out of energy at some point, so when he's low or just saving it up, she goes all sleepy and waits to be refilled with aura. Do you know how to do that?" You ask, explaining the whole thing.
"I am completely certain that I have absolutely no idea!"
Ren stretches his limbs a little as he gets up at this point. "Both of us are mostly self-taught, and Nora never got much into fine aura control."
"Well, I'd best teach you how to do it, then, not like it's terribly hard. Here, just touch the little guy and concentrate a bit..."
In a certain place in a certain city, a certain girl with a certain sister were 'hanging out' inside a certain dust shop, reading magazines and looking over the place's wares, respectively.
Indeed, Ruby Rose and Yang Xiao-Long had been idly checking out various things, the red sister reading the newest issues of 'Dust Weekly' as she was scouring the engineering section for any new ideas and inspirations she could crib for her own baby, treasure and adopted sister Crescent Rose, vaguely disappointed in not staying in the mansion of her crush a while longer but willing to have vacated the premises for the sake of her sister's mood, whereas said yellow sister was trying to ensure she only bought the best dust munitions for Ember Celica, which was the excuse she told both herself and Ruby as to why they'd had to go.
That said, both of their activities were rudely interrupted when a bunch of obvious criminals that had openly swaggered through the streets of Vale all the way towards this store, a certain criminal commanding them around.
The robbery in progress was stopped, however, when two of those same goons were catapulted right out the windows, crashing through them as the sisters objected to the prospect of being interrupted and soon realizing they had made a certain acquaintance already.
"Wait, aren't you the guy that tried to rob Gabriel? What're you doing here?"
"Who are you again?" Further conversation was sadly stopped by a yellow-clad fist bouncing off Roman Torchwick's face, Yang taking out certain frustrations on the first target that vaguely reminded her of a certain slimy asshole she was absolutely not thinking of all the time.
"Less talky, more punchy!"
Suffice to say, a fight shortly ensued.
"Urgh!" Coco Adel, as some might imagine, was not in a good mood, sitting at a bar she sometimes frequented in Vale after a little shopping spree, preparing herself for the rest of her night with a few drinks. Velvet, good widdle bunny Velvet, was sitting next to her, having declared herself her official caretaker, something Coco was vocal about decrying as unnecessary.
When she wasn't busy being a whiny drinker, that was.
"Look, I've been gay ever since I really realized you could be," Coco said, none too shy about her orientation, not that anyone really took offense about the topic in general, "and I liked it that way, okay? Made things easier. Straightforward."
"You literally freeze up and stammer every time you have to talk to a beautiful girl, Coco."
"I know! I know, but that was okay, too. I'm just saying," Coco explained, downing a shot of whiskey, "him being hot to me calls in question everything I ever thought about my sexuality, yeah? All of a sudden, I have to consider whether I would go for any given guy I see, too, and I generally don't, and it's just one big mess, okay?"
"So far, you've only gone into stammer mode for him," Velvet drly retorted, adjusting the shopping bags sitting under her barstool.
"It's all totally your fault, Velvet, I hope you know that."
"Hey, you insisted on coming along, you have only yourself to blame."
Just at that moment, however, the two huntresses-in-training about to descend into a playful squabble, both of their scrolls gave off a certain sound, causing them to tense up and forget their argument. Pulling them out, both realized it was an automated call for reinforcements by the Vale City Police Department, the usual channel through which help against aura-empowered criminals was requested.
Naturally, by the time they arrived at the scene of the crime, a certain Good Witch had already handled it, currently scolding two younger girls for uncoordinated action endangering both themselves and others, not to mention the property damage they had caused in the process of beating half a dozen criminals to a pulp as they fought a dangerous individual.
One that had gotten away on a bullhead, to boot. At least they could get back to shopping once they went back to pick up their bags?
Coco and Velvet had already met everyone involved in this scene earlier that very same day, of course, but neither of them wanted to arouse attention at this point.
"I demand a lawyer!"
"I am the law, young lady."
Weiss was quite nervous, knocking on the door of her odd, but nice friend, dressed only in her pajamas and clutching her pillow.
She quite liked it. Her very own aura-maid, carrying some bedding for the sleepover they were planning inside her miraculous pocket dimension rigth now, fluffed it up for her every evening.
When the door opened, however, Weiss did not come inside, being too shocked at Okita's current attire to do anything else.
She, however, simply laid down on the expanse of white cloth the maids had prepared on the floor of her room, giving her a curious look. "Are you coming?"
"W-w-what- why are you in underwear?" Weiss stammered.
"I always strip down when I go to sleep? Why are you wearing clothes?"
"This is sleepwear! Fluffy white pyjamas! The thing that people wear to sleep!"
"That's weird."
Clearly, this was going to be an exhausting first sleepover. Especially as... Weiss refused to look at them. They were bigger than her head, and Okita was not that much taller than herself!
"It was a fuckin' shitshow, Tai." Qrow, being his usual self, was drinking as he talked to his old teammate, using the opportunity of his nieces being busy in Vale to do so. "From start ta finish."
"How bad was it, exactly? Do I need to get the explosives from the basement?" Say whatever ya want about Tai, he didn't screw around when it came to his daughters.
"Worse," Qrow told him with a heavy heart. "Much worse. You were right, Ruby's found a guy and is following him around expellin' little hearts from her ears when nobody's lookin', and Yang is along to keep him from takin' advantage of her."
"About what I expected, then," Tai said with a grim face, already deducing something else was coming. "What makes it worse?"
"Simply put? The guy Ruby's pinin' after. Nasty piece a' work. The things I saw in his mansion... Seriously, he's just as bad as you were back in tha day, if not worse."
"Oh, now you're just joking around," Tai said, relieved as though that wasn't somehow horrific in itself. "Also, a mansion?"
"Tai, it's worse. He's rich, holdin', like, galas and shit, in his mansion. Worse, he's good at it, and dozens of women willingly pilin' up in heaps of unconscious flesh is exactly like you when the team was together." Qrow didn't blame Tai for getting with first Raven, then Summer, team STRQ dissolving as it had had all been on Raven's disappearance, but still, Taiyang had been a constant target of jokes for how many women he'd slept with outside the team long before any of that happened.
"Come on, I never... What. And he's going after Ruby?" It wasn't often that Tai got particularly angry nowadays, but there was murder in his eyes now.
"As I said, it's fuckin' worse. I saw Ruby draggin' Yang around an' I saw the places he just fucked 'em right next to the ones he went through beforehand, but neither of 'em was ever in any real danger. Only found out afterwards, but Ruby knows, She kept on watchin' each time, an' she wants in."
It was little surprise when Tai slammed his face into the nearest surface, the kitchen plate keepin' an impression of it for the time bein'. "Ruby... Why?"
"'Ey, like father, like daughter, eh?"
"I will punch you, Qrow." Oh yeah, good ol' Tai. "Why didn't you pull them out immediately?"
"I tried," Qrow defended himself, "I really did! Blasted in through the window an' all. Didn' even break his stride, he started talkin' at me and dodging bad luck 'til I bought a piece of art from him. Oh yeah, did I mention he's an artist, too? Probably also an engineer or somethin', his private bullhead was modified somehow."
"Urgh."
"There, there, Tai," Qrow pat his old friend's back, "Leastwise you know the problem now. Means you can do somethin' 'bout it."
"Right. I can't exactly keep Yang out of Vale with Beacon around the corner, but Ruby isn't stepping foot inside the city, and if I have to chain her to Zwei after I promise him hourly treats around the clock," Tai said, the little mutt coming around the corner with a hopefuly expression.
"Hey buddy, not yet. Though, uh, keep an eye on Ruby for me, 'kay?" Qrow said, leaning down a little to scratch the dog's neck.
"Raff!"
"So you really can't stay around?" Tai's question brought Qrow back to him, his own smile washed away as he thought about why he would be gone to investigate... what they'd done to Amber, the poor girl.
"Yeah. Official Oz business, can't tell ya much 'bout it, but I'll be too busy to stay in Vale or Patch for the time being," Qrow told him. "May be out of touch, too."
They both knew what he meant; Qrow may or may not have to stay off the radar for a while as he investigated something.
Hours later, of course, with the dark-haired scythe-wielder already gone, Taiyang Xiao-Long received news that Ruby had gotten herself into trouble along with Yang and was promptly offered a place in Beacon Academy in the coming week's newly beginning school year, together with her sister, meaning meaningfully keeping her out of Vale was impossible.
"Brothers' sake, Ruby..."
When you wake up from your brief 'beauty sleep', your training rarely having been this pleasant, you do so to your sister sitting by the bedside of your expansive harem chamber, the renovations you had your hammerheads do looking really nice, with a wide, sweeping room filled with a bed all in dark red taking up a good two thirds of its space and matching curtains on the windows.
"Hey Sarah," you greet her, causing her to roll up her scroll and turn towards you. You also do take a quick breath, confirming that, indeed, someone had sex with you while you were unconscious.
"Hey Gabe, how you feeling?"
"Like someone that could nap for a century or two without getting any wrinkles," you smile at her. "Anything in particular happen while I was out?"
"Well, your little toys, Ruby and Yang, got themselves arrested for a bit before being released. Also, Ruby is going to this Beacon academy a few years ahead of time."
"... Fuck my unlife, I don't know whether I should actually sleep a few hours in the day more or less often."
Well, apparently, Ruby and Yang did stay in Vale overnight, after all, Sarah having made sure to send them a message saying they could stay the night at your place, so they have rooms in the mansion, now, too, much earlier and easier than you expected.
Not that you're about to complain, though.
What this means is that finding Ruby is as easy as getting out of your room and walking on into the kitchen that meals are usually served in, finding pretty much everyone there and eating breakfast.
And Nora is cooking, of course, giving you a sweet smile as you come in.
"Why're you half-naked?" A tired Yang asks, more confused than her usual angry and sleep still infesting her face.
"I just got up, count yourself lucky I even bothered with pants." It's true, too, it's kind of a pain to put clothes on and off all the time.
"Anyways, Ruby," you say, turning towards the much more active sister that's been oogling you from the corner of her eyes ever since you came in, "I've been thinking about going over everyone's weapons later, do a little upgrading on the side. You want to help me do it?"
"Yesofcou- I mean, yes, of course," she corrects herself. "I would love to join you in your workshop and work on weapons with you all day. There... miiight be just a tiny little issue in that, though."
"How so?" You ask, already readying yourself to murder something over this.
The next moment, the door slams open, a blonde guy with tanned skin stepping through. "Good morning, everyone. Who is up for some fun, wholesome parental supervision?"
Ruby just facepalms with one hand, the other one poking a thumb at the man. "That."
After a quick round of introductions during which Taiyang (And, really? He named his daughter literally himself without the 'tai'?) doesn't even mention the fact you're walking around shirtless, it thankfully doesn't take all too long to get everyone to agree on coming by the workshop at some point during the day, including Ren and Nora.
That said, once there with your 'team', aka Ruby, her dad and their dog Zwei, for some reason, a wholly different issue popped up.
"Nuh-uh! We have to make you a weapon first. Not having one is just not acceptable!" Ruby, the adorable little battlemuffin that she is, is surprisingly insistent on this particular point. Taiyang, of course, isn't helping once he sees you being recalcritant about this.
"Sorry to say this, buddy," he says insincerely, "but not having your own weapon disqualifies you as a fighter."
"Exactingly!" Ruby agrees. "You really, really need one. Do it for me?" With her pouting at you, just as Taiyang grimaces over in his corner, well, there's no way you could say no, right?
"Alright then, given my style, I'll need something that leaves my hands mostly free for punches and clawhands. What did you have in mind?"
Taiyang naturally pinches his chin at this new information. "Mhm, we should spar sometime. Make sure you're up to snuff."
"Right! Dad's also a brawler, it's where Yang got it from. He's really good, you should try it sometime!" Aww, Ruby doesn't get he's thinking about punching you until you go away under false pretenses. So cute.
Ruby, of course, immediately moves to block her father's sight, citing the need to protect her babies with you from his lecherous gaze.
He looks like he got punched in the gut, you are mildly amused and Ruby has seemingly no idea how what she just said might be taken. It only gets better from there, though.
So, once you have a few smittens and metalheads, in the workshop, you get right to it, taking Ruby's input on what you should be doing- that is, once you push through your boycott for fucking dust.
You hate the stuff, you think, you really do.
"But how is your weapon going to be strong if you don't feed it with any dust?!" Ruby, of course, has a very personal view of how weapons are supposed to work.
"Don't worry, I do have a few ways to create strong metal without dustforging, just you wait."
"Butbutbut, how is it going to penetrate all the Grimm?"
"Again, no worries. I have a few tricks up my sleeve."
Taiyang, of course, just stands in the corner, watching quietly.
So yes, as you aren't using dust, you'll have to get a little more creative. To begin with, what Ruby wants to do is a pair of gauntlets or however they're called, basically metal contraptions that protect your lower arms and, in this case, contain piledrivers out to the sides, allowing you to 'pack some real punch'.
You are using metal made with your manufactory down in the basement to make them, of course, using more minions to ferry the stuff into the workshop where you and Ruby do the rest by hand, using the various machines to form and twist the different alloys you're using for this.
Ruby has taken over the forge itself, of course.
"Come on, stoke my fire even hotter so you can stick your steel inside until it's red hot!"
"It's technical a titanium alloy, but sure, Ruby. Whatever you want," you say to the sound of Taiyang facepalming.
Hammering the pieces into form also has to be done by hand, apparently, to give them a personal touch, even if you'll use a machine to finish them off later anyways.
"Yesss, with how strong you are, you can get it into folds so easy, now hammer away with all your might!"
"I'm on it, Ruby."
More facepalming ensues, and it continues to ensue as you arrange the mechanical parts with the help of your semblance...
"Come on, we need to get all the pistons into place so you can thrust to your hearts' content!
... and as you hammer the piles themselves into the perfect shape.
"If your stamina holds, we can go this all day and we can make your alloy so hard it can go into anything you want it to!"
"That's the idea, yeah. Though I may want to have the smittens get a turn, too, they look like they want to try this out, too."
"I understand that, I'd like a turn on your rod, too."
And once you have the rough shape of it down, you naturally have to add a bit of your very own special touch.
"No touchy, Ruby! These are energy sources, they're going into the laser gun part of these babies."
"Lasers! Buuut... do lasers have recoil? If they don't, how will you move around?"
"I have two healthy legs and arms, respectively, I'm confident I can think of some way to keep mobile."
"Nooh! You have to have a way to turn a bad move around! Dad taught me and Yang, you can't just not have something like that!"
Over in his corner, Taiyang wipes an imaginary tear out of the corner of his eye as he plays with Zwei.
"No member of our family can go without!"
Aaand he's back to facepalming. "Tell you what, how about I add little railguns oriented towards the elbows? That way I get recoil and another way to horribly obliterate everything in sight."
"You can do that?!"
Ultimately, however, you soon find you need more energy to supply to everything, from the semi-automatic piledrivers themselves to the two ranged weapons you're adding. So... more fusion cores.
"Really, what are they made of if they aren't dust?"
"Secret, for now at least. I will say that anyone trying to open them up is as likely to blow themselves up the hard way as they are to survive the experience, though. Ah, would you hand me the screwdriver?"
"Hooooh... We made some beautiful babies together," Ruby finally says as the completed product is lying on the worktable in front of you. "Wanna test their thrust out with me?"
"Maybe later," you calm her down as you blithely ignore Taiyang's somewhat desperate choking, the poor man having run out of air twenty minutes ago. Instead, you try them on, finding your new armaments to sit snugly on your lower arms.
"Oh, they need a name! A very special name for very special weapons! Everyone gives their weapon a name, too, so no trying to weasel out!" Ruby can be oddly pushy when it's about weapons, you noticed...
"I think I'm going to call them... Last Embrace," you smile at Ruby, giving her a little hug. "Because I'm never letting go, you see?"
Ruby just blushes, fidgeting, even as Taiyang gives you a very disapproving look in the background. "That's an, uhm, very pretty name? It's good for our first real babies together, yes."
Aww, you just want to gobble her up at this point. And not in the vampire way, at that. "Hey, we still have a lot of other work to do, hm? We can play with the pistons later."
"It's a promise and I can't wait. Now who are we doing next?"
Well, the very first thing you need to do is get Okita a more permanent weapon for at least this dimension, and so the one thing you do next is designing a big, fuck-off sized sword with, naturally, the best material you can scrounge off of Yoshi's memories and an in-built ion weapon to boot.
Okita had to be there and help out a little bit, of course, something she wasn't exactly opposed to, though when her idea of contributing involved fiddling with your waistband as she tried to pull your pants down, you had to stop her with reference to Tai being in the room.
She actually asked him to leave in response, he refused, Okita began sulking. It was surprisingly cute on her part, plus Ruby began chewing out her dad for 'inhibiting the cute girl'.
Taiyang's face was fucking amazing.
Still, you and your little crew of rotating minions do some good work, forging a pretty huge sword with what amounts to a single-shot burst ion cannon she can deploy through either the tip for high-precision ranged fire or the flat sides of the blade to shoot them off in either direction.
"It's big enough to make me feel good."
"Glad to hear that, Okita."
"U-um, it's my first time doing it with someone else, so please be gentle!" Ruby's reaction to hearing you and her are going to be working on Crescent Rose together as a way for you to repay her for helping you with everything else, with her hands balled at her chest and looking up at you, basically screams for headpats and cuddles.
Both of which you apply, in great quantities. Especially as Taiyang can't say anything about it after you mention she's a very cute girl that deserves all the headpats and cookies.
Hence, a few... additions are made to Ruby's scythe, such as a few replacements of dust-forged parts, especially the segmented scythe blade she uses to liberally hack through pretty much most things in her way, followed by her sniper rifle's firing mechanism.
No longer shall Ruby use shitty dust rounds, instead relying upon superior engineering in the form of a short row of fusion cores embedded in her weapon, powering either an ion laser or a rail gun more than replacing that stuff. Sure, she doesn't have elemental rounds anymore as is, but she can totally load dust instead of the small metal balls you gave her in excess for the rail gun, at least in theory.
May take a bit of practice to avoid accidentally blowing herself up, but hey, that's exactly what practice is for.
"Now we have just the same equipment for shooting things out!"
That said, as it is a railgun, theoretically any scrap of metal of the correct size should suffice as ammunition for it, you'd just prefer she avoid accidentally damaging the equipment is all, which is always a risk with anything but perfectly formed round ball bearings.
And while you're at it, you also of course get a little... creative with the whole thing. Thus Crescent Rose can now have pulses of ion lasers surround its blades for a moment on demand, a new energy gauge along the handle letting Ruby know how much juice is left in the fusion cores and they need to be replaced... which is going to take a while, given you estimate about a million ion shots to be in this thing before it runs on empty.
You still do promise to supply her with replacements, of course. Ruby, suffice to say, is very happy.
"Now Crescent Rosee is both of our baby and she is going to be awesome I can tell already and I'm going to polish each and every of her parts and she will kill so many Grimm!"
Taiyang just gives off a defeated sigh in the background.
Designing and creating a weapon for Nora (Elder Nora, you mean) is, honestly, much for difficult than one might think, with her own powers making doing so surprisingly hard.
Much like all the other vampires you have created so far, Nora has a power of her own in addition to the stuff she gets through eating enough people usually copied from yourself. Hers, in particular, you discovered through some messing about in the name of SCIENCE! is the ability to use any and all means of inflicting bodily harm equally well.
That's, uh, a bit of a convoluted way to put it, though. To keep it simpler and closer to what it looks like in practice, Nora has an equally easy time using any weapon, improving is one normally would by just training with one, but this improvement as carried across any and all weapons she uses, including her bare hands.
Yes, she can use a flail with the same precision as a sniper rifle, or a broadsword with the same ease as a knife. She can incapacitate others nonlethally with just as easily with a chokehold as she can with a bullet, knowing exactly where to put the latter to do the exact kind of harm she wants to and no more, stab someone with the same frequency as she could accurately land burst fire with a machine gun... It's not exactly a reality warping effect or anything, she's just supernaturally good at fighting, really.
The only thing that really matters for her are the physical properties of the weapon in question, so after you explain to Ruby (and Taiyang) how her 'semblance' works together, Ruby's dad actually bringing in some surprisingly good suggestions and warnings brought about by long, long experience in keeping unruly kids learning to fight from fucking up their weapons.
It's pretty interesting to learn more about Signal, in fact, the preparatory combat school whose graduates oftentimes move on to Beacon, as well as the place Taiyang teaches at.
Still, here's Nora's weapon. It can do everything from sniping to shooting a lot to several configurations of its halves allowing dual-wielded swords, a scissor mode and both of those with added shooty options, again with the by now usual configuration of both ion lasers and a railgun.
You've actually set the manufactory to just churn out a few thousand railgun shots at this point; better safe than sorry and all that. Nora gives you a happy kiss on the cheek by the time you're done turning the designs you brainstormed earlier into reality, the loving gesture somehow only serving to escalate Taiyang's ever-growing exasperation.
Ren's dual automatic pistols are, to put it simply, lacklustre. You don't tell him as much when you squeeze in some upgrade time for them after you're done with everything else, standing in the workshop and concentratedly working on taking them apart for improvements as he is, but you think it.
Unfortunately, making entirely new weapons is out of the question, both due to time constraints and because you doubt Ren would give up StormFlower, as he calls it, just like that. Hence, you resign yourself to simply replace the blades with new and better ones, as well as taking out the actual gun part and just smacking down a new ion laser design meant to emulate his previous rate of fire.
"I really don't mind, Nora can play with her sloth while I get some calm and quiet."
Hey, you'll just take that as a positive.