The bell for the final round rings, time to bring home the bacon.
Now, to conclude the battle and fully reunite team RWBY!
Deep beyond the halls of the Emperor's castle stands a massive door that protects the most important figure in the Boiling Isles, swathed in a large white and brown cloak with a gold trim while donning a golden mask with antlers. But the emperor is not alone in the room right now, for with him is a short, red bipedal demon with large conjoined hands for her hair, pointy ears, bird-like limbs, and a left eye has yellow sclera that has a brownish red iris. She wears a white tunic overtop a black ensemble, as well as a high-collared veil which shrouds the lower regions of her face.
Aside from the two of them, there's a tall, middle-aged witch, with long, straight, dark navy hair, and mint green eyes. She wears a long-sleeved two-tone dark gray dress and boots with a sky blue gem attached to it. Holding a crystal ball with ivory hands, she broadcasts the entire scene through a glass ball while another coven guard but with a golden helmet and golden shoulder pad stands silently beside the throne.
A titanic heart continues to beat atop them all as they watch with bated breath about the whole mess.
"The riot has escalated, sir. More of these freakishly armed fiends entered the fray and refused to bend the knee. The ones that escaped are slowly slipping away," the demon turns to a shadowy throne, presumably addressing the emperor sitting on it as the feed pans to Yang and Blake.
"Calm down, Kikimora. The Owl Lady's student is also in the picture, so this is less unusual than expected. I'd chalk it up to another scheme they've concocted to continually defy our Emperor," the witch adds as she zooms the feed to focus onto Luz instead.
The emperor stands up and slowly steps forward to the two, grabbing the crystal ball and holding it up to his eye level.
"Kiki, Lilith. I do not need to tell you two about what must be done, do I? The Titan is patient, but his will is absolute. Neither the Titan nor I will hear complaints from messengers who have yet to deliver."
"Yes, Emperor Belos!"
As the two women set off hastily and close the doors behind them, the emperor glances to the guard and merely states, "take this as a cautionary tale and a learning experience, Golden Guard."
And with a nod, the guard sets off while Belos walks to another hallway with the crystal ball in hand and an agenda as it finally shows Ruby's cloak fluttering about, "fascinating. Absolutely… Fascinating…"
BANG!
*Cue RWBY's Ignite at Timestamp: 3:12*
Amity peeks her head up from the debris as soon as she sees Ruby use the red metal box and it transforms into a long rectangle that fires something to Wrath's face.
"A gun… It works like a crossbow. But the power of it… Where are the projectiles?" She observes.
Ruby lands gracefully with one foot after the other, dispelling the fog and revealing her hooded figure to the rest of the enemies as the ends of her cloak flap gently against the soft wind. Holding up her sniper rifle behind her with her shoulder, she lets the weapon unfurl and reveal the curved blade of her humongous scythe.
"It really can transform into a scythe," Amity widens her eyes in awe as she remembers Ruby's description of her weapon.
In one more display of theatrics, she twirls her scythe around as she passes it back-and-forth between her hands -demonstrating her expertise in using her scythe, before sinking the tip of the blade into the ground on her left with a resounding-
SHINK!
Upon scanning the crowd do they meet her gaze under the hood. Focused, proactive, patient, her silver eyes showing a clear intent, akin to being on the hunt.
"Now that's a huntress!" Luz proclaims as the hairs on her nape start standing up and she gets goosebumps.
Half of the coven scouts gulp and start sprinting away, "this ain't worth it!" "Let's get out of here!" "We're gonna get killed!"
"Get back here and get her!" But the braver (or more foolish) half of the guards and scouts stand their ground as they approach and surround her whilst drawing their magic circles, but they hesitate long enough for Ruby to take initiative.
Too slow.
Bang!
Ruby flips herself to lie down along her scythe's shaft and pulls the trigger, firing a round at the scout on her left. Using that as propulsion, she launches herself to the nearest scout she'll intercept. With both boots, she kicks them to a nearby store and renders them unconscious. Holding her scythe with both hands and with a foot off the ground, she fires another round as she swings her scythe backwards.
Bang!
This rotates her horizontally like a spinning top towards two more scouts and she clears them away using the blunt sides and edges of her weapon, careful to not actually slice them apart. Only minor cuts. Two fireballs are thrown at her in different directions, which she cuts through with her spinning scythe.
Seeing a Conformatorium guard drawing a magic circle, she stops and slams her scythe down and pins him to the ground with the force of Crescent Rose's momentum. Three more scouts draw magic circles, and she takes this as the cue to cock the sniper again and pull the trigger, she shoots a sniper round point blank to the guard's face and that launches her into the air, avoiding the lightning bolts and other magic spells.
Joining Luz's vision aside from the superhuman red blur are Blake and the White Ghost, picking off the remaining scouts and guards with pistol shots and ice javelins respectively, the two even doing pincer attacks to others.
What Luz didn't notice was the newly-risen Warden Wrath behind her. But Ruby sees the approaching enemy and she aims her Crescent Rose behind her
Bang!
"Yheeeeaaa!"
This reorients her and she boosts with Petal Burst, quickly speeding past Luz before the latter could register what's going on. Luz hears metal vibrating and turns to see Ruby parrying Wrath's sickles by clashing it with her sniper-scythe while Weiss enters Wrath's left flank with her rapier, landing fire and wind strikes. Wrath hastily breathes fire, causing the three to back up, Weiss grows a glyph on the ground behind her and Ruby uses that as a launchpad to spin herself vertically into the air and deliver a downward slash. But Wrath catches mid-swing by holding the scythe on its sides.
Ruby grits her teeth and pulls the trigger, firing a round onto his chest, knocking him back and propelling herself away from him. Wrath sees Luz putting her pen on more rose petals and he charges at her.
"Come on! Come on! Come on! Just one more! Gah!" Luz spots Wrath running and she panics. Putting her arms up, she braces for a life-ending strike. Yang witnesses this and she remembers a nasty scene from some time ago… When a grown-up Ursa was about to chomp an unarmed Ruby during their time practicing close quarter combat.
Her boots dig into the ground and she launches herself.
Bang!
WHAM!
An impact is heard, but Luz is unharmed. Opening one eye, Luz sees Yang standing in-between her and Wrath, her arms crossed to block the attack.
"Thank you!" Luz exhales in relief, gaining a chuckle from Yang.
"Don't mention it! Now if you think their tricks are cool, watch mine…"
Wrath snarls, he winds up a massive left hammer and brings it squarely onto her.
"Yang!" Luz panics, but Ruby just smiles unconcernedly.
BOOM!
But Yang doesn't budge, unfazed, almost as if only a pillow was thrown at her. She grins confidently as her lilac irises fully turn red and her yellow hair glows even brighter, fully standing up and flaring with little blades of flames coming out of it.
"Whoa… Qué hermoso fuego…" Luz lets out.
Yang's grin turns into a scowl as she glares at Wrath, followed by a supercharged right fist towards his stuck hammer.
"HHHHHRRRRAAAAHHHH!"
BOOOOM!
She punched the hammer out of him with twice as much force as he dished out to her.
"AAAARRRGGHHH!" Wrath shouts in pain as he takes a couple of steps back and retracts his arm, his hammer instinctively returns to its regular fist.
"Come on, just one more should be fine…" Weiss gathers some energy before flicking her rapier to Yang's location, a glyph drops and expands onto the ground, taking the form of an analog clock with roman numerals. Time Dilation.
"GET 'EM, SIS!" Luz and Ruby cheer, with the latter adding the 'sis' part. Yang takes a quick step forward and she's suddenly in front of Wrath. With both knuckles red from clenching in fury and from her semblance, Yang unleashes her Burn onto Wrath as she splatters her flurry of blows all over his body.
THIS IS FOR IMPRISONING ME!
Bababababang!
FOR THE INNOCENT WITCHES!
Bababababang!
FOR MY HAIR!
Bababang!
FOR OUR FRIENDS!
Bababababang!
Wrath starts stumbling back further than his feet would like, but Yang doesn't relent. She focuses her blows on the center of his body as he no longer has the time or strength to block, causing him to curl deeper around Yang's fists.
AND
Bababababang!
FINALLY
Bababababang!
THIS
Bababang!
IS
Bababang!
FOR
Bababang!
MY
Bababang!
SISTER!
KAABBOOOOOOOMMMM!
Finishing it with a crunchy uppercut to his chin that may or may not dislodge a tooth, she sends Wrath flying meters high into the sky. She looks around to see Blake and Ruby rounding up the remaining enemies together while Luz grabs two scout helmets (to be delivered to Eda) and drops two rose petals on the ground. It lights up and a pink ice pillar suddenly grows from it, launching the scouts and guards.
"It works! Haha! I-It actually works!" Luz laughs at the discovery.
"Weiss!" Ruby shouts and Weiss nods, understanding. Swiping her rapier to the side, she creates a long icy floor connecting to a semicircle slide that curves upward.
"Yang!" Weiss calls out to her, shouting, "now!"
Yang follows up as she gets on-! "w-whoa! Okay, okay, steady now, steady…"
She stumbles as she bends her knees a little and lowers her hips to stabilize. As soon as she stops shaking, she propels herself across the ice using her gauntlets behind her, "I'm good! Blake!"
Blake sprints forward and catches up to a speeding Yang, she tosses her Gambol Shroud and Yang catches the pistol, Blake pulls on it and the slinging begins, Blake sees their team leader running ahead and calls out, "Ruby!"
"Luz! It's all up to you now!" Ruby shouts as she approaches Luz and squats. As soon as Blake hops onto Ruby by landing her feet on her shoulders, Luz taps six more rose petals and smacks it to the ground.
"I call this one: THE MAGIC ROSE!"
And with that as her line, she lets go, jutting out a colossal tower of rose-covered plant stalks from the ground that launch Ruby, Blake, and Yang. Ruby feels the plant stop growing and jumps, pushing Blake off her shoulders like a launchpad. A falling Wrath meets with the tossed-up scouts and guards before seeing Blake coming at them, spinning herself forward before flinging something from behind her shoulder. That something happened to be Yang with a triumphant yell and a fist at the ready.
WHAM!
With a final punch, Yang finishes the fight by sending the entire enemy group towards the tower of the Conformatorium,
BOOM!
And they both begin their descent…
"Ooh~! Souvenir!" But not before Yang notices a dislodged sharp tooth hanging in the air.
As soon as the duo land on the tower of roses, they follow Ruby in descending quickly to meet up with the rest of their friends.
"The first group, find those freed prisoners. The rest will apprehend those ruffians, do not disappoint the emperor!" The group hears a feminine voice command. Turning around, they see Kikimora with more scouts following just behind her, their magic circles drawn and ready to fire.
"Freezerburn," Ruby says, Yang and Weiss nod. Yang jumps into the air while Weiss strikes her rapier Mytenaster into the ground, creating a thin sheet of ice on the floor. Yang uses her Ember Celica gauntlets to melt the ice instantly and create a mist, fogging up the immediate area.
"Where did they go?!" Some of the scouts ask as they cautiously enter the fog blindly.
"I'll be right behind you guys with Petal Burst, go," Ruby whispers as she hugs Yang one more time before giving the baseball bat to her and ushering her to ride on Owlbert with Luz and Blake. Weiss vanishes without waiting for Ruby to tell her that. As soon as Amity stands up and moves away from the fog, Weiss appears right beside her.
"Take me to where they're going, please," Weiss tells Amity, to which the latter nods and leads the way as they watch Luz, Yang, and Blake escape into the air with Owlbert.
Ruby evens out her breathing first, she squats down to readily use Petal Burst one more time as she orients her scythe behind her, "okay, they're good… Now to-!"
An urgent, dreadful feeling shoots through her nerves and she stops, quietly surveying her surroundings when she stands back upright again.
Where…
Her finger at the trigger and her scythe ready to swing. She knows she has to get out of there, but she stays still in the fog first, with an intuition that there's someone else close by, the moment she leaves is the moment she'll be shot from the sky, trapped, caught.
Who…
Ruby doesn't finish her questions as she looks to her left. Nothing.
To her right. Also nothing.
Behind her? Nothing here either.
All she hears are just the boots of the scouts and the energy of their magic spells.
Yet she turns, cautiously, her gaze squinting with vigilance as her boots barely dug the earth beneath her and she orients her scythe to be in front of her.
Bleenk!
A brighter red streak flashes behind her, she snaps her head to the direction of the sound and light to see another coven scout, but this helmet is different. It's less pointed and colored gold instead of the usual light gray. This scout appears to turn aggressively to her as soon as they make eye contact.
She spots them also holding a staff with a red gem at one end, it has an unfamiliar maroon energy flowing out from it and encircling the gem. Wait, no, not holding, SWINGING IT!
Danger! Move! Move! Move!
Ruby's body enters a battle stance and she pulls the trigger.
Bang!
This propels her scythe to swing faster, catching up to the magic staff. The tip of Crescent Rose meets the energy bubble of this… "Golden" Guard's staff, colliding with an explosion.
Boom!
"Agh!" She hears him grunt at the force.
This pushes back the two combatants as Ruby skids her boots across and firmly digs Crescent Rose into the ground. As soon as she looks up, so does the Golden Guard. He vanishes into a blur of red streak again heading towards her.
Bleenk!
Ruby fires her sniper one more time-
Bang!
Which dislodges her scythe from the earth and forces the Golden Guard to divert his path. With this opportune moment, she simultaneously stores her Crescent Rose, activates her Petal Burst, and vanishes into the fog. As soon as the Golden Guard swipes at the mist, he sees her retreating further from his grasp, a red blur leaving behind rose petals.
"What kind of magic was that? It's a different color than the rest…" Ruby whispers to herself as she zooms away.
"Hmm…" was all he audibly let out to nobody in particular as he caught a rose petal before riding his magic staff and flying away in a bright red bolt.
She's faster than I thought when up close. Maybe as fast as me. This should be interesting and exciting…
As soon as Luz lands the trio with Owlbert, Blake and Yang get off the staff and take the time to stretch their limbs.
Yang tosses Luz the baseball bat, "was that magic, kid? That's super awesome, I didn't know you could do that."
"Aww~ Thanks! But, well, kinda. I'm only doing magic because of these drawings called glyphs and-!"
"LUZ!" Gus and Willow shout as they sneak up behind her and pile up on her, hugging her tightly.
"Gus! Willow! Hey! Did you guys see that?" Luz responds with as much energy as she hugs them back.
"We sure did! You guys blew up the marketplace!" Gus jokes, "my dad's gonna ramble about this for a while during dinner."
"And you. Were. Amazing! You've managed to outmuscle the Warden even though he's way bigger than you!" Willow says as she runs up to Yang.
"Come on, don't make it sound like a big deal," Yang puts her hands behind her head and fakes a whistle.
"You're liking the praise," Blake deadpans.
"Oh shush now, Blake," Yang retorts.
"Whaddaya know, looks like they live up to their self-proclaimed huntress titles," Eda greets as she walks out with King mounted onto Zwei while Hooty extends from his door to tower over the rest.
Bark! Bark!
"Zwei!" Yang joyfully runs towards Zwei and picks him up.
"Nye?!"
Along with King, unknowingly.
"Hey, Eda. And as you requested, scout helmets!" Luz offers as she fakes a "kneel-and-bow" like a medieval servant.
Eda whistles, "you sure did deliver. Wasn't actually expecting that."
"Oh, are we paying tributes now? Guess here's mine," Yang says as she shifts Zwei (and King) and pulls out-!
"Bury my bones… You knocked a tooth out of Warden Wrath?!" Eda gasps as takes a closer inspection.
"Smells like it!" King says as he jumps from Yang's hair to Eda's.
This catches Yang by surprise and gets her asking, "whoa! Are you a talking Beo-!"
"We aren't sure yet," Blake cuts off the question.
"Okay! It's my turn to offer something to Eda. HURK! GULK!" Hooty joins as he coughs out an owl pellet. From the looks of it, it seems to be an undigested rat.
Yang nearly gags and turns to bury her face onto an unaffected Blake's shoulder, "there, there, Yang, it takes some getting used to."
Leaves rustle among the trees and bushes, and out pops Ruby, stumbling in her steps as she walks her way back to the group.
"Ruby!" Gus and Willow call out as Yang catches her.
"Well, would you look at that, she lives to fight another day," Yang proclaims and hugs her, "I'm so proud of my little sister!"
"Really, Sis, it was nothing. We just had to help you get out-!"
Realization strikes Ruby like a lightning bolt as she freezes up.
"Uh… Ruby, are you okay?" Blake asks as she puts a hand forward, but Ruby immediately wraps her cloak around her and starts rambling.
"Oh no! We just helped Yang bust out of prison! We're criminals! I didn't think about this! I don't wanna be known as Ruby Rose the Little Red Rascal! A rebel! Wretch! But if we didn't do that, Yang could've been killed…"
More leaves rustle as everyone turns to see Amity leading Weiss to The Owl House.
"Ruby!" Weiss calls out as she runs up to her.
"Weiss!" Ruby reacts joyously as she runs up as well.
"Ruby…" Weiss' tone lowers to something Ruby recognizes as irritation.
"Weiss?" Ruby slows down her running to a standstill.
"Ruuubyyy!" Weiss growls as she sprints even faster towards her.
"W-Weiss?!" Ruby starts running back to everyone else, she would've used her Semblance if it wasn't for the fact that she's expended her aura and focus by now.
"You absolute dolt! Did you just realize what you've done ever since yesterday?!" Weiss yells as she chases Ruby and circles the friend group.
"REEEEE!"
"Chillax, Weiss," Yang puts a hand on Weiss' shoulder, but Weiss isn't having any of it.
"I have had a trying day, okay?!" Weiss snaps and points a finger up to the sky, "first, Ruby broke Atlas tech, sending us to who-knows-where!"
"I didn't break it!"
"Called our scrolls and alerted any potential dangers to us!" Weiss continues as she puts up two fingers this time.
"A-Actually, Malphas isn't going to kill you," Amity reasons, but Weiss isn't listening.
"Then all three of you made us public enemies!" She finishes with three fingers pointed at the three huntresses before glaring at Ruby, "are you trying to get us killed?!"
"I'm sorry, Weiss! I'm so sorry!"
"Is this… Normal?" Amity awkwardly asks as Willow and Gus hide behind Blake.
"Oh, this? It's just a slow Tuesday for them. Give her ten minutes, she's not gonna stay mad at Ruby for that long," Blake shrugs as she approaches her and the wheezing Luz as Weiss tries to pin down and tie up Ruby as Yang boisterously laughs with Eda. Pretty convincing reassurement, Blake.
Unbeknownst to them, Lilith has been peeking through the foliage, "Huh… So you actually know them, Edalyn… That proves me right and makes my job easier."
Now I understand there were a lot of changes and early introductions with some characters... But keep in mind that these are FOUR characters that came from somewhere else entirely, Amity predicted such herself a few chapters back. Who knows what else can happen.
That being said, what do y'all think? Any reactions, predictions, suggestions? Lemme know in the comments below.