Having completed the assigned task of sap gathering. Alicia, Co'Balt, and Jaxon had all been lying down beneath separate but closely grouped trees of the eternally red forest. Enjoying the fresh air and freedom from the cluster halls of Beacon. Conversing idly as they waited for any sign of either their team leader or chaperone to return.
"I'm just saying," Jaxon told his teammates. Coming back on a point he was trying to make, about one of the few things that the trio found they had in common. "That the Ghost 2.4 is still a better scroll than any gen five 'top-o the line' thing you can get out of Atlas."
Alicia sighed, resigning herself to defeat, "I still prefer Schnee tech. Market cornering has its advantages for finding things."
"I can get my Ghost to do everything one of their expensive napkins can do."
Seizing upon a thought that flicked through her head Alicia asked the blond Faunus, "Don't they have their own separate like everything?
Jaxon answered with his own raised eyebrow, "What's your point?
"How do you get Schnee tech on, not a Schnee device?
"...Don't worry about it… It's a victimless crime."
Co'Balt spurted out half a chuckle at that. But in the silent afterward a thought caught his attention. "So are we gonna talk at all about Kad?"
Jaxon looked his way, "How so?"
"Things have been… Off with him lately." Co'Balt observed.
"Are we sure this isn't him, finally on?" Jaxon asked, looking over to Alicia.
"Don't look at me," She said, "We're partners but I've known him for like fifteen minutes longer than you guys."
Jaxon smirked, "I think we closed that gap by now."
"Yeah…" Alicia said, "I don't know.
Co'Balt nodded, idly rubbing the tip of one of the horns on his head between two fingers. "I mean, we know he's not a bad guy…"
Jaxon interjected, when his partner trailed off into silence, "But?"
"No," Came a firm response, "No buts. Unless you've got one to add?"
After another moment the lion Faunus shook his head, "Yeah I guess, not. Still, someone should talk to Kad. Whatever's eating at him… It isn't right to keep it bottled up forever."
"Yeah," Alicia replied, "Might make you do something dumb thing, like"
As if they were in a chorus rehearsing a line all three of them spoke,
"Run off alone in the woods."
They shared a quick laugh together.
Before the noise had faded from the winds. Branches broke all around them before the conversation could continue.
All three of them jolted alert and to their feet with weapons in hand as suddenly a horde of their peers came rushing by yelling about an Ursa. The rank and file of Team APRC shared a collective look of confusion.
"One Ursa?" Co'Balt said with a keen disdain.
Alicia drew her long knife, "Well where there's one…"
Electing themselves to the rear guard position that their fellow students neglected. The three of them followed in a more sedated pace for the rendezvous point Professor Goodwitch had instructed them to meet at, after noon.
The gentle breeze carried roars of distant Grimm, even the Faunus of the trio could not discern wether it was a singular beast or many. It was a viscous cacophony that faded with distance but did not die entirely.
Emerging from the treeline the majority of Team APRC spotted the rest of their class and the tall figure of Professor Goodwitch counting marking how many of her young charges were present.
It did not take her long to notice who was absent. Or when part of that group she noted came walking over the nearby hills. Pyrrha Nikos, Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee and Jaune Arc being followed by a very defeated looking Cardin Winchester. Professor Goodwitch started walking to meet them halfway.
"What happened? Are there more Grimm?" She demanded.
Jaune stepped forward and quickly gave her an explanation. One that was rather hard to swallow for the venerable teacher.
"Are you certain it's dead?" She asked the blonde haired leader of JNPR.
"Absolutely." He replied with confidence.
"Impressive." The Huntress said in low words of her hard won praise.
Even jaded Co'Balt had to agree with Professor Goodwitch. Killing an Ursa Major all alone was pretty badass. The way the vomit boy saved the class dickhead not so much. Co'Balt knew in his heart anyone of his teammates would probably have left Cardin to his fate without a thought except good riddance.
Goodwitch turned back to finish her head count, finding all she expected.
But for one.
"Where is Mister Amaranth?" She asked, looking directly at his leaderless team.
They shifted uncomfortably until Co'Balt stepped forward. "He took off into the woods. We didn't think we needed to stop him."
"When was this?"
"Like, right when we got here."
More howls and roars of Grimm sounded in the distance.
"Show me where," The Professor commanded,
Ruins,
Nothing like the ones that held the trophies of initiation in the Emerald forest. Here was a piece of times long past, huddled against the outside world in a much smaller clearing. The vegetation around the chiseled gray stone was brown and long dead over black soil. The eternally red trees withered and leafless around the few standing stones that remained. Shrouded by trees many many more meters taller than the lifeless husks further afield. The purpose of this place, only to be speculated. And Kad was no archaeologist.
A few jagged rocks circled the shadowed clearing, pointing in like a rank of spears keeping a foe at bay. The remains of a larger structure perhaps Kad thought as he circled. The few stones still in their original position were blackened and scorched. That he could tell running his index and middle finger over a rough broken edge
One wall, the largest still standing caught his eye. The only part of the ruin in relatively good condition. And as the giant knelt down to study it further. He came to realize what was sculpted into the ancient stone. It was a mural wall, weathered by the passing of uncounted seasons.
Tiny figures standing up from a pool of nothingness, reaching for the sky and the cities that rose around them with tools and weapons that grew from their hands stretching towards the crystal that grew into focus the further he panned his ember eyes along the chiseled fresco.
The history of Mankind, their quests and the thing that allowed them to pursue safety and prosperity. The Dust. A tale all the children of Remnant were told in their cradles of the growth and struggle of their kind on this world.
But there was something else lower on the wall.
A few dead piles of brush that Kad brushed away hid more carvings. Another tale.
He saw several figures entering the scene from above, three taking prominence of the group that seemed to float down from on high. Two men, and a woman alongside them. That Kad could gather. Taking places amongst their people, huddled around a tiny shard of Dust that they cradled together like a newborn child. Before each turned to look out in a different direction. The woman to a shadowed place of darkness. A darkness marked with a prominent pair of dots and slashes that Kad took to be eyes.
The woman returned to the fold. Embraced by her friends and family. Oblivious to the darkness spreading at her back. Sucking all it touched into oblivion. She turned and flitted around one man, who was busy sculpting something with his hands. The woman appeared to be pleased with his work.
Some of the next panels were utterly unreadable, as if damaged in a battle. On the next clear slates, Kad saw Grimm rise up from the earth, both males stood again defiant with their people. The darkness coalesced into the Grimm and the woman who stood amidst their beastly ranks. Kad shifted to move more brush out of the way, intrigued by what seemed even in its minimalism more history than any book at Beacon contained.
The Grimm swarmed, dragging the sculptor down to the ground and death, the man's hand reaching out one last time to his comrade who rushed with a hand outstretched in a last desperate gambit.
Kad grew irked as more damage had ruined the next panels. His un-locked scholar's heart curling back behind his disappointment that there appeared to be nothing else to give context to the images. Or any other clue as to anything else of their nature or history.
The giant stood to at least snap a few photos of this marvel with his scroll. Thinking he could perhaps extort some extra credit from Professor Oobleck. As he did, Kad's eyes were drawn upward towards another mark at the top of the mural above everything else. Near the massive break in the stone from where the top half must have been violently removed.
It seemed like half of a medallion, arrows pointing outward from barbed concentric circles around a sliver of flame curling around the remaining half of an orb.
The hair on the back of Kad's neck stood in warning.
Cinder's voice echoed in the back of his mind. "Distraction means death…"
Adrenaline shot through his veins as he mentally kicked himself and focused again on his surroundings.
The shifting leaves out of this circle of decay,
The flickering light piercing the thick canopy high above his head,
And the two Beowolves silently rushing toward his vulnerable back.
Kad reached up and grabbed the hilt of his sword, knocking it free of the buckle that held it in place. A full scabbard would have made grabbing his weapon awkward and slow. Two more things that could get him killed.
He spun left, bringing both hands onto the hilt aiming for the beast's average neck height. Swiftly decapitating both wolves with one swing. Lifeless and headless bodies tumbled past the giant, who's own momentum and the weight of his sword spun him around.
"Scouts, more will come."
The giant considered perhaps he hadn't taken Professor Goodwitch's warning for all it was worth. Kad didn't see any shadows indicating a larger pack. Which in part disappointed him, he had been hoping for more of the creatures to vent his frustrations with his lot in life upon. But in the end he decided it was better to be safe than sorry. He had no stomach for the lecture he would get from taking an unlikely wound. Kad turned back the direction he came, only to stop as a flicker through the shadows drew his attention to the ground.
The moving ground.
Dirt, bushes and rocks and the rotating forest floor moving clockwise, dragged along by something below the scrub brush shifting from slumber of ages. Scanning his surroundings Kad saw this happening all around the clearing.
Kad cursed under his breath.
A King Taijitu he had awoken slowly eased out of the ground. Twin black and white halves slowly coiling on top of each other blocking all routes of escape.
Kad took a firmer grip on his sword. Raising the point high to the sky on his right. One head then, the other rose above its scaly length right in front of Kad.
A wave of nausea churned the giant's guts, Kad wretched as his protecting aura began to drain his strength. Feeling like a length of rope was beginning to constrict around his head. Kad stumbled half a step but remained standing against the heavy force he felt pooling in the air.
The rope drew even tighter.
And a pair of voices invaded the Primarch's mind. Scraping and squealing like a rusted knife through plate armor.
"Outsider."
"Hunter."
"The hidden one."
"Secreted away, denied."
"Now tearing at yourself down to the marrow."
The Taijitu heads leaned closer. Kad summoned his strength and aimed his sword, trying to deduce through the growing cloud of insanity and voices in his head which unholy voice was where.
"He knows more now."
"But still so little."
"She could not hide you forever."
Very little could stun Kad but this left him speechless.
"What do you want child?"
"To obey?"
"To change?"
"Help the weak. Defend your world... selfless."
"You could be so much more."
"You sit in a web of lies and think yourself a spider."
"You sit in that school and think yourself a hero."
No Grimm had every talked before, not to him not to anyone.
Kad knew them inside and out, their habits their tactics. All his training had been on how to kill the creatures. But he had neither seen nor heard of any trying to make contact.
"Come, speak for yourself boy." One hissing entity bade him.
Kad found his tongue struggling to make words while he sought to make sense of just what was happening.
"Hehehehe, his fire's gone out. Smothered down to an ember where it could have been a blaze. Can't do anything without a hand to hold."
"We expected more from you."
And now whatever this is, was insulting him. His muscles tightened, rage began to burn inside him. The air near his sword started to rise in temperature, the red blade glowing as he subconsciously projected his aura out.
The manifestation of anonymity, yet here he was confronted with a pair of distinct wills. Powerful wills, forcing him to submit.
But his sword kept glowing bright and defiant. Kad could feel the warmth of the Dust giving him strength. The two heads reared back, wary now. The young Primarch managed to grin. Pleased that they seemed to fear him.
He had slain dozens of their kindred, and not seen any indication of inteligence. But here he was, caught as if under a microscope. With all the power something that small could wield against the observer.
"Why so harsh? Truth does not come easily, Huntsman. And you have been denied it oh so long."
"What truth," Kad growled through clenched teeth, "Riddles and chaff more like it, what do you want?"
"Ssssssssssss, what you want for yourself child… Nothing more, nothing less…"
Something within the Primarch's brain snapped. A reflex that had not been spun out of his blood. An animal snap of teeth. Instincts of fight or flight turning to the only option the Primarch had.
The only one his fear would allow.
Blade burning bright. Kad pushed through the clouds in his mind and leapt forward. Bringing his sword overhead and down into the side of the snake.
Scales parted and burned, but he hadn't cut anything vital. Both heads screeched in pain and surprise.
The black head darted down, ricocheted off the forest floor and launched at him jaws open wide to swallow him whole. Easily pulling his sword out of the snake with a hiss of burning flesh Kad rolled backwards out of its way. But with an impact like a semi-truck the other head crashed into his right side.
It did not sink its fangs deep in his geneforged body, just knocked Kad flying into the clearing. The giant rolled a few times backwards and came up swinging at the black head coming around. Ivory fangs bright and hungry.
The Grimm's own momentum sealed its fate. The sword left a blazing wake as Kad sidestepped and swung. Steel met flesh and he cut the top of its head off through the mouth. The rest of the snake limply slid to a stop. The sundered top falling just behind Kad, the cut he made burning bright like a plasma cutter had been taken to the beast.
The head of white reared up. Kad knew normally killing one half would send the other berserking. But the monster just hung there. Kad could swear it was satisfied.
"A start whelp, you can slay the vessel, but never us. Time is not on your side little one, She cannot protect you forever… We, we will be waiting."
The ruby red eyes lost focus, the snake looked confused/ Until the injuries he inflicted suddenly registered on whatever passed for its brain. The Taijitu hissed ferociously and dove down to avenge its opposite half. Plowing through the rest of the ancient mural. Flourishing his flaming sword right handed Kad reached to his left where he now kept Amaranth's knife and drew it in a reverse grip.
The Taijitu opened its mouth.
Kad raised his sword.
And plunged it, burning down the monster's throat. The young Huntsman dragged along through its momentum he had not overcome. Boots carving twin trenches in the dirt until he planted both feet in the ground. And with a mighty roar from his gut dug his fingers around the fighting knife's hilt into the black flesh and rolled the squirming serpent belly up.
To lean around the twitching convulsing throat. And with a shout half of triumph and half of relief, plunge his knife deep into the nearest red eye.
After a few moments convulsing and choking its last breath the creature died. Wisps of foul black smoke began to rise from its corps.
And Kad was alive. Shaken, coughing wondering what in the world he had just encountered. But he stood.
"His fire's gone out."
Kad pulled his sword out of the Grimm. Think of fire, his fire. A word called out to him from a distant place.
Fire, Flame, Cleansing, Burning, Purifying, all consuming…
Ignis…
That word came through from the deepest depths of his mind. One completely foriegn yet somehow he knew what it meant.
The Primarch had his fire, right in his very hand. And a name for his sword.
Kad looked one last time at the battlefield and shattered ruins. Trying and failing to surmise just what in the world had happened. What he met, and fought… What the voices had tried to tell him.
The warmth from the newly christened sword Ignis filled his veins.
Giving battle to the chill that refused to leave his spine.
Eyes in the dark cloud, down into the Grimm
And he had no idea if he could or even should tell anyone what he had seen.
"Could Cinder help him? Could anyone else?"
After another near minute of silent contemplation. The giant thought No. He did not know what people would think? Certainly no one would believe him. Or at best they would say he was crazy.
And they wouldn't even know half of it.
And that might jeopardize his mission.
Shaking the last of the clouds from his mind, Kad set off at a run back the way he had come. A firm comforting grip around the hilt of his sword. The light of its Dust keeping the darkness at bay.
"Are you sure he went this way?" Professor Goodwitch asked her young Faunus student.
Sarcasm was plain in his voice and the robotic pointing movements he made while once again explaining what he knew. "Yes we were sitting here he left that way, you all came panicking. Rounded us up over there. And now here we are again."
Goodwitch wasn't taking kindly to Co'Balt's tone. But she was far more concerned with her missing pupils at the moment. The other students were on the lookout for Grimm but the creatures appeared to be moving off. If the sounds in the distance were any indicators.
Pyrrha walked up to Alicia speaking softly, "Why did you let him go?"
"He was acting weird," Alicia answered with a shrug. "Wouldn't talk to us so we were just going to let him walk whatever it is off… I mean, what were we supposed to do?"
The other Huntress could not provide an answer.
It was not long before Jaxon found the hole Kad had ripped in the thick branches. Preparing to call the others his rounded lion ears twitched towards the sound of a tree cracking and falling over. Jaxon saw the familiar almost glowing outline of his leader in the shadows, easily recognizable with his bright leather jacket. Which he noted looked a little more beaten than a simple hike through rough terrain might have caused.
"I found him!" The Faunus called to the rest of his class.
Kad stepped out of the shadows. Quickly swallowing down the hard heavy breaths wracking his frame, and banishing the dark thoughts of his encounter to his cloistered memories. His eyebrows creased and came together as he pondered why the whole class had appeared.
"Did I miss something?"