"This is humiliating."
Jaune sighed, as he slammed the blade of Crocea Mors into the giant nevermore's ironclad talons. The sword did nothing to loosen the bird grimm's grip on his torso as they soared through the air. At least they were heading the right direction, with Jaune seeing the cliffs getting closer and closer.
He knew he shouldn't have climbed that tree.
To ensure that they were heading the right direction Jaune suggested that they climb a tree to get a better view of their surroundings. Unfortunately, when they made it to the top of the canopy, Jaune and Blake became very much out in the open. Of course, a giant nevermore decided to swoop down and grab Jaune.
Blake had to act fast and threw gambol shroud at the boy as he was being carried off. Thankfully he caught it, but that just made it both of their problems, as Blake was forced to be dragged along. She was currently trying to climb the ribbon of her weapon, as Jaune struggled to escape the grimm's talons.
This is getting him nowhere Jaune thought, as he put his sword away, grabbing onto gambol shroud, and pulled the ribbon, pulling Blake, who was more or less dangling as the wind blew her back and forth, closer, and closer.
When Blake got closer, he swung upwards, tossing the brunette into the air, landing with impressive grace on the nevermore head, stabbing the bird in the neck to keep herself steady as it flailed and squawked, trying to throw her off.
"How's it going?" Jaune called out, as he went back to bashing the bird's talons with his sword. The secret faunus, replied as she began firing her pistol into the grimm's thick hide.
"Its skin is too thick" Blake grunted, as the rounds bounced off the aforementioned black flesh. She slid down the back of the nevermore, slashing over again at its wings. She tossed gambol shroud, and hooked it onto the bird's rear end, swinging down on the ribbon.
The kusarigama blade detached from the bird's flesh, and Blake went flying forward. Jaune reached out and grabbed her wrist, holding her up before she climbed up and over him, leaping over to the other talon. As they soared over the Emerald Forest, the woods opened up into a clearing, revealing a series of cliffs and some large ruins, a series of temples and bridges.
Suddenly the nevermore cried out, rolling towards the cliff. Blake was thrown off the bird, falling fast towards the earth. She swore she saw a familiar flicker of red as she tossed gambol shroud once again, hooking her weapon onto the closest tree.
The grimm's grip loosened as it swerved sideways, as Jaune saw his teammate fall. Thinking fast he pressed his now exposed shield, breaking the birds grip on him. He groaned as he felt gravity pull him down hard, as he realized he'd need a second landing strategy today.
In terms of potential partners, Ruby would have to rank Yang a 5/10. She wasn't nearly as mean as Weiss, mostly nice, could clearly fight well and even had a fighting style that matched well with Ruby's own. Damn, she was cocky though and teased incessantly. She didn't even try to be quiet, and they had encountered far more grimm than they should have as a result. They killed them easily enough, but Ruby was worried what would happen if they came across by one who wouldn't be easy to take down. Of course, her social awkwardness caused her to be unable to bring this up and instead Ruby struggled to keep up with Yang's stride lengths, as the blond led them through the forest.
"Did you see a blond boy before you saw me?" Ruby asked, "Potentially one stuck in a tree?"
Yang thought about this for a second "No. I saw my friend Ren chatting with one yesterday but haven't seen him since we were fired into the forest. Why would he be stuck in a tree?"
"No reason" Ruby sighed "Was his name Jaune?"
"No idea" Yang shrugged "He was wearing a bunny onesie though. That was pretty funny."
Yep, that's Jaune Ruby thought "Are you looking for your friends?"
Yang shrugged "One of them is loud enough that I'll eventually find her, and the other will probably find me. As long as you don't slow me down, we'll be good."
Ruby was about to say something back, but she found herself running into Yang and nearly falling on her butt as a result. Yang was staring at a dark cave that emerged in the forest.
"Oh, we are definitely going in there."
The forest opened, as Pyrrha and Ren found the clearing. The walk over had been pleasant, if not a bit quiet, as Pyrrha had found prying responses from Ren particularly difficult. He was polite, but very, very quiet, almost making Blake look like a social butterfly in comparison. In all fairness they were probably pretty even in that regard.
She tried to talk some more about the people they were trying to find, but he only gave them the bare bones information. He had attended Pharos, a combat school in Vale with his two friends, Yang and Nora, although Pyrrha did notice that his attire was distinctly mistralian. Granted, she was certainly one to talk. She originally lightly pressed for more, but he seemed unwilling to offer up anything else for now.
So, they walked in a mostly comfortable silence, down into the ruins, to a series of short pillars with chess pieces set upon them, very clearly the relics that Professor Ozpin sent them to collect.
She strolled up to a black rook piece, picking it up and showed it to Ren.
"Is this Rook, okay?"
Ren gave the chess piece a quick look and gave a shrug in response.
"Sure, that should be fine."
"I'm glad this wasn't very difficult."
"Yes, I suppose this place wasn't particularly hard to find."
Ruby sighed, as she trailed behind Yang, both of them using their scrolls as a light to guide them through the cavern.
Yeah Ruby, lets go in there, there's spooky cave drawings, this is definitely where the relic is. Ruby thought to herself as she trailed behind the blond, who barely needed the light of the scroll. Ruby swore she was glowing, literally fricken glowing! How was that fair?!
"Yang, I don't think this is…"
Yang interrupted "Come on Red, where's your sense of adventure? You wanna be a huntress, right? Act like it! Can't be scared of the dark when you fight monsters."
"Scared! Are you kidding me?" Ruby shouted "I just don't think the relic is here! We've been walking for like 20 minutes and nothing!"
Ruby could hear Yang roll her eyes "Fine, how bout this. We don't find anything in five minutes we turn around alright?"
Ruby groaned "Fiiinnneee"
Grumbling her annoyances and insecurities, Ruby stormed behind Yang, who was strolling through the dark damp cave without a care in the world. Distracted she did not see a large stone by her feet, causing the reaper to trip and fall into Yang. Both huntresses in training dropped their scrolls, the embarrassingly fragile devices shattering at their feet.
"What did you do…"
Yang stood straight up. Even in the darkness, Ruby could see her beautiful glow, although there was something different. Her eyes were no longer purple but a deep crimson, a strange heat eradiating off the blond. Ruby realized very quickly how angry her partner was.
"Yang, I am sooo sorry, I slipped and bumped into …"
Yang's eyes suddenly snapped back to normal, distracted by a new glow of an object behind her. Both her and Ruby stared at it entranced as the strange object floated back and forth in front of them. Yang extended her arm to reach out and grab it, as the object daggled at head height.
"Is that the relic?" Ruby asked, as she reached out to do the same.
A scream could be heard from across the valley, a shrill panic filling the silence of the forest. Pyrrha could recognize it somehow and despite never hearing this person scream she could somehow identify it.
"Ruby?"
She had little time to wonder, as a rumbling echoed from the treeline, and with a powerful roar an ursi burst from the bushes. Its terrible call faded quickly as it collapsed, with one very familiar girl to Ren riding its shoulders.
"Awe, it's broken…" Nora pouted as Weiss followed after her, breathing heavily as she leaned on the now dissolving bear grimm for support.
"Wh...at, were…you thi…nking you dunce?" Weiss panted; her hair unusually drenched in sweat "YOU…RODE…AN…URSA"
Her words fell on deaf ears however as Nora had already rushed over to Pyrrha and Ren, nearly bowling over the latter in a flying hug.
"OHMYGOODNESSIFOUNDYOURENNOWALLWENEEDISYANGANDWEWILLHAVEATEAM" Nora rambled as she squeezed tightly.
Ren tapped lightly on Nora's head, half to get her attention, and half because he needed air.
"Nora, I have found a partner, and it look as if that you do as well."
Nora shot her head sideways to look at Pyrrha, her eyes narrowing as Pyrrha raised her hand in a polite wave.
"Hello, I'm Pyrrha" Pyrrha greeted "and I'm sorry." She added as Nora frowned, getting closer and closer. She tried to look friendly, as Nora scanned her up and down carefully. Her frown quickly turned into a gigantic smile.
"HELLO PYRRHA!" Nora yelled cheerily, as she jumped over to grab the champions hand, shaking it so vigorously that Pyrrha was nearly lifted off her feet "I'm Nora, it is so exciting to meet you. You seem really nice, so I'm glad that Ren got you as a partner, not someone grumpy like I got. He's kind of quiet so I'm not sure he'd manage as well in this kind of situation. Did you hear how upset she got at me when I rode the Ursa here? Why would you be upset at someone for getting them here faster?!"
Nora paused, pupils dilating as she rushed over to the white queen placed on the pillar. She picked it up, examining it carefully. Suddenly she thrust it into the air, racing around the open field, yelling about being the queen of the castle.
"NORA!"
They all turned their attention to Weiss, who was still on the ground, cursing the hyperactive hammer-wielder.
"Coming Ice Queen!" Nora raced over to the heiress, scoping Weiss up in her arms, racing back to Pyrrha and Ren. Weiss was still hanging on for dear life, before realizing how it looked, crossed her arms.
"NORA, PUT ME DOWN!" WHOMP! Nora dropped Weiss, the heiress glaring up at her, face turning redder still. Sensing a tantrum about to brew, and knowing Nora's reaction to those, Ren decided to defuse the situation.
He extended a hand down to Weiss to help her up. Weiss looked at it, carefully deciding if to accept it or roll her eyes and get up on her own. She decided to accept it and was pulled easily to her feet. She felt a wave of calm wash over her, and about 50% less likely to tear Nora's head off.
Brushing herself off, she looked at the chess piece in Nora's hand. "At least you got an acceptable relic."
Nora smirked "Shocker, the Atlas Princess likes the white queen piece."
Weiss was about to retort back, but found her voice blocked by two screams and a massive crash.
A nevermore soared over the tree line, seemingly carrying two people, or rather dropping them. At the same time, she saw two girls burst in flying from the tree canopy.
"They are going to collide, aren't they?" Weiss asked
"Yep" Ren deadpanned
"Do you know any of them?"
"One of them. She'll probably be fine."
Weiss recognized the blond boy falling from the nevermore, as the boy who told her off in the locker room, and the girl with the red cloak from the airship compartment. She watched with some satisfaction as they collided in midair and fell to the ground, with the much larger boy unfortunately landing on top, both groaning from the impact.
The black-haired girl from earlier also fell from the nevermore but landed gracefully on her feet instead, the ribbon from her weapon snapping a tree to slow her fall down. She narrowly avoiding the blond girl who Weiss reprimanded for arm wrestling, who went flying into a nearby tree, which somehow caught fire and fell to the ground. How did Weiss know all of these losers?
With that Ren and Nora went racing to the tree where Yang landed, and Pyrrha and Blake hurried over to the heap that was Ruby and Jaune, helping both to their feet. Suddenly a Deathstalker broke through the trees, and Weiss quickly figured out what threw those hooligans. With the nevermore flying overhead and the deathstalker approaching quickly, Weiss knew that they would need a plan, and would need one fast.
Jaune piped up, after being pulled to his feet by Blake "We can't fight both of them at once, and we won't be able to attack the nevermore from where we are now. I'd say we should try to take down the deathstalker, but I'm not sure any of us can actually make it through that armor."
"How bout we immobilize it, so that we can get to somewhere better to attack?" Ruby asked
"Okay that works, do we have anyone that can do that?" Jaune agreed
"Well, my family is the largest dust supplier in the world, and I specialize in ice dust" Weiss chimed in "I'm sure I can freeze it, if it stays still long enough for me to release the dust."
"I can keep its attention" Ren volunteered.
"My semblance can probably help there too" Blake mentioned.
"I should as well, since I don't have any ranged weaponry" Jaune added.
Ruby nodded "Okay, then the rest of us focus on keeping the nevermore off our backs long enough for them to do that. Maybe this way we'll actually be able to kill one of them before the end of initiation!"
Everyone nodded. Ren, Blake, Jaune and Weiss, raced to meet the deathstalker, while the rest fired at the flying bird grimm, preventing it from skewering their friends with its razor like feathers. Nora on the other hand simply aimed her weapon at the grimm, as she had a low number of grenades, and Ruby insisted on saving them for when they really needed it.
Ren and Blake quickly became blurs of black and green, stinging the deathstalker like bees, while Jaune got to work on one of the legs, trying to chop it them down one at a time while it was distracted by his speedier allies. Weiss kept her distance, creating a path of glyphs towards the deathstalker, as the barrel of her sword glowed light blue.
"NOW!"
Ren, Blake and Jaune scattered, and the ice burst from the sword and hit its mark, encasing the grimm in a wall of ice. It struggled and hissed but was unable to move its massive frame, as the four huntress's and huntsmen in training ran back to assist their allies with the nevermore.
"YANG!" Ruby called out, and Yang leapt onto the blade of the scythe. With impressive strength, Ruby swung it around and threw Yang at the bird grimm. Using her gauntlets to project her further, Yang made it to the grimm's face, battering it hard.
This stunned the grimm, and Nora was able to fire off a singular grenade, landing square on the nevermore's face. In an explosion of pink, the nevermore fell, crashing onto the ground. It did not get back up.
A cheer broke out among them, as the group celebrated taking down not only one, but TWO powerful grimm that would even give a pro huntsman trouble.
With a crack however, the ice around the deathstalker shattered, and scorpion broke free, slowly but surely making its way forward towards them. The nevermore rolled to its stomach, lifting its self-upwards before raising its wings, letting out a massive cry into the forest.
"SERIOUSLY!" Yang cried out as the two grimm charged, and the teens were forced to retreat, heading further into the ruins.