He was starting to head towards the end of his adventures in Atlas. It felt like only the day before that he had woken up in Ansel, with nothing but Crocea Mors and something along the lines of a… pull towards Vale. And now he was almost three fourths of the way done. Or… kind of.
His main quest wasn't so far away from its conclusion, but he still had more things to do. Find his family, deal with Raven, possibly fight Salem again if he'll still be alive (and sane enough) to do so… and there was still the matter with that key that Taiyang gave him back when they beat Yang. And now that he was approaching the end, he could say it, loud and clear.
Atlas. Fucking. Sucks! This damn continent, the Grimm around and especially the braindead idiot that ran the whole thing. What he wouldn't give to have a… "friendly chat" with Ironwood. You know, solve everything with dialogue.
With a bat named "Dialogue" over the top of the dumbass' head, of course.
He sighed, calming himself down. His bloodlust spiked again. He really was deteriorating faster than he anticipated… better get a move on, before he completely loses himself.
He started heading outside where Winter was waiting for him, heeding Roman's reminder to meet him inside Ambrosius' portal thingy after he was done. Almost forgot about that one… good thing that the man reminded him. He still had no idea what the thief wanted…
He'll think about it later. As of right now, he had a much bigger fish to fry. Or a snowflake to melt, depending on perspective. He was hilarious, shut up.
Crocea Mors felt reassuring in his hand, almost as if the blade itself was trying to make him feel better. He had no idea why it even bothered…
He felt great.
That…was not him. Or… was it? Damn infection, messing with his head like that! He was running out of time… if he hadn't already and he was starting to turn. Wouldn't that be a doozy…
Winter regarded him with a solemn nod.
"Arc. I trust you're ready to proceed?"
He was. As ready as he could be. Was that enough? Hell if he knew. All that he knew was that he wanted to fight something already!
"Very well then. Hang on tight, we're going to blast right through the Grimm".
His Maidensickness was going to flare up again, wasn't it?
Help.
"Once inside, you'll be on your own most of the time, while I'll focus on taking out as many enemies as I can. By the time you reach my sister, I might be free enough to provide some support, but I likely won't be able to fight alongside you".
… he'll have to fight Weiss on his own. Not that it would be impossible, she was his friend and all but holy damn that girl literally never won a single duel since he knew her, but he was hoping to have to deal with RWBY on his own. He had gotten used to having assistance for those particular fights. Whatever, he'll manage. Somehow…
"Before we leave, there is something that I must ask of you. I have reason to believe that the rest of my family is also inside the mansion. My mother and brother are trapped inside… and I have been too busy fending off the Grimm to save them. Find them as well and I will forever be in your debt. Now, prepare yourself, Arc. We're gonna be even faster than last time".
… meep.
And faster than before they definitely went. Once again, you're the one screaming like a little girl. Not him. Nu-huh. He was cool as a cucumber.
Why did that saying even exist…?
Not even a minute later… they made contact.
A Gryphon paid with its life for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. An explosion of blue followed, the screeching of the beasts gave him an adrenaline boost. How he wished that he was the one capable of all that destruction…
"Brace for impact! I'm going to throw you inside!"
Throw him? What the…
Winter gripped him more tightly and started rotating while in the air, faster and faster, ending up with him being literally yeeted through the front door.
Was that necessary…?
Probably not. The older woman was definitely showing off or something like that. Whyyyyyy…?
Painstakingly, he managed to get back up, having to take an Aura Booster to try and get rid of the back pain. He just had to hit the stairs, didn't he?
Jaune turned towards the door, now blocked by a massive wall of ice. At least Winter had the decency to make sure that he was not going to be followed…
.
.
.
NEW AREA: THE SCHNEE MANSION
.
.
.
All right then, what's on the checklist? Find Willow and Whitley, teleport them to safety using the Proof of Passage, pillage what he could, find Weiss and give her a piece of his mind regarding her recent behavior.
Easy to say… not as easy to do. This place was massive, and he remembered precisely nothing of its structure. Granted, much of the place was destroyed, so perhaps it wouldn't prove to be too much of a challenge to navigate…
He was going to get lost, wasn't he? Stupid fucking Atlas, with its stupid fucking architecture and stupid fucking families…
Focus Jaune! Landmarks, do you remember any landmarks?!
The ballroom where Weiss was located should be on the right, behind the only door left standing…
Locked. Of course it's locked, why wouldn't it? Ah well, he was going to leave her for last anyway, no harm no foul.
Next… that room with the big table on the left! Then upstairs on the right was Jacques Schnee's studio, while on the right he was pretty sure that he'll find Weiss and Whitley's rooms.
Willow's garden was also an important place that he should try and discover… if only he knew where to look for it.
One step at a time. First, left of the bottom floor. He had no idea if and how many Grimm were around, so he'd rather not waste any time. He'll just have to make it up as he went… you know, the one thing he promised himself he'll try NOT to do!
Twin Gods help him, he was so damn screwed…
He brought his shield up, blocking a charge from an Ursa and thrusting his sword forward at the same time, ending the beast's life. Yup, enemies inside. He should have known. Not that it was a problem…
He needed to let off some steam.
He was the one charging now, throwing a Beowulf on the ground and spiking its head with the tip of his shield. He heard a noise behind, which caused him to duck down and allowing the other Ursa to pass over. He slashed it cleanly in two while it fell.
Crocea Mors became a greatsword, which he used to block a Boarbatusk in its track, forcing it to come out of its ball form and stabbing it down in the stomach. He smirked lightly, almost hearing the adorable voice of his best friend.
"The belly is the weak spot!"
Heh… I got you, Rubes.
Another Ursa bounded to him, only to end up with its head cracked open in half by his swing. He dared not to use Mors Renata in this case, being down to less than half of his ammo. He must have really lost it in his fight against Clover, if he ended up wasting so many bullets…
And another aura. He winced a bit at the memory, now that the post fight calm settled in. Sure, Vernal was a psychotic bitch who really needed to stop thinking that Raven was gonna give her the time of day (kind of like another green haired girl that he had the displeasure of knowing…), but she did not deserve to be… erased from existence, he guessed.
Nobody does… with a couple of exceptions, of course.
The halls of the mansion were littered with corpses. Normal, Turned, soldiers and servants, all the people that either did not make it out during the fall of Atlas… or came back here after their death or corruption.
Wasn't that a sad thought.
With a grunt, he pushed open the doors to the… conference room, he could call it? Why weren't there some… signs or something? Damn rich people and their need to make everyone else waste time just to show off.
The interior was… less messy than he thought, honestly. You know… except for the bodies of the Atlas executives around the table, in the exact same positions as they were before the fall. Someone has a vendetta… again. Did Clover pass through here as well…?
Maybe. Or maybe somebody else had similar feelings…
Brain malfunctioning. Too much thinking required. Reboot.
What he found on the table, though, was very interesting…
Obtained: Rusty Key
Obtained: Willow's Letter
To whoever is brave enough to venture past the Grimm and into this cursed home. I am aware that I have not been… the best mother around. My two daughters and my son all know that very well. I could stay here and keep on blaming my husband for the rest of my life, but that will never change the reality. I could have been better for my children. Should have been better. And while it is much too late for me… they're still out there. In a danger that they should have never been thrusted in. This key will open the door to where I hid Whitley, in the hallway outside of this very room. You know where to look, if you are a friend. Winter is out there fighting. She's strong, but not invincible. Try to keep her out of anything she cannot handle. Weiss… is I'm the ballroom. And one of them. Do whatever you need to do to set her free.
Beware of the studio on the second floor. Jacques is there… and not himself either.
Please… save my children. They are all I have left. If you manage… then my duty as a parent will finally be fulfilled.
Willow Schnee
What a wall of text just to say "I suck lmao, find my kids for me". This alcoholic idiot really thought she had any right to ask for help?!
He breathed in. Calm down. Save the kid first, think about punching the mother in the face later. Now… where could she have hidden the boy? Jaune shot exited the room, not even a second look at the people slaughtered inside.
What did the letter say? "You know where to look, if you are a friend"...
He thought back to when Weiss had joined them, back in Mistral during their quest for the Relics. She and Klein used a secret passage in the library… which was located on this same hallway. He reached the entrance of the room, trying the door and finding it closed. Let's see if he was right…
Bingo.
Used: Rusty Key
Pushing his way inside… he found disaster. The entire thing had fallen in itself, books upon books strewn everywhere on the floor. If only Blake could see this, she'd have a heart attack…
He proceeded inside, rummaging through paper and covers, calling Whitley's name and hoping that he was not too late.
"Hello?! Is anyone out there?! I'm here! Help me!"
Oh, thank the Twin Gods…
He followed the sound of the boy's voice, eventually reaching a fallen bookcase.
"Down here! I'm stuck and I cannot get out! Hurry, please!"
Jaune acted quickly, using his greatsword as a lever and pushing the object out the way, revealing a sealed entrance. Different from the one that Weiss used to escape, on top of that.
For once, he was glad for Jacques' paranoia.
"Oh, you are one of Weiss's friends, aren't you?! Thank you, thank you so much! I thought that I was going to die of lack of oxygen down there…"
Jaune helped Whitley out of the hole, patting the younger man on the back. He did good, all things considered.
"I really believed that I was done for! Especially when mother shoved me here… wait…"
His eyes widened.
"Mother! Oh Lord, where is she now?! She cannot be… no, she's not…!"
Whitley started panicking. And he was doing so well too…
He stopped him, saying that, if she was alive, he would find her. But that now, he needed to go somewhere safer.
"You'll find her? Promise? Okay… okay, I… I trust you…"
Whitley started breathing, calming himself down.
"What… is going on here…? Why is this happening…?"
Aaaaand the obvious questions follow. He had no time for this…
He swiftly took out the Proof of Passage, explaining that it would bring him to Beacon, where he could find some answers.
"Magic? I… are you sure…?"
Jaune raised an eyebrow. If the white haired teenager had a better idea, he was all ears.
"All right… all right, don't look at me like that. I said that I trust you, so… do what you have to do. Just… please, find everyone else, okay?"
Jaune nodded, placing the object on Whitley's forehead, who was quickly teleported to safety. One objective down, several more to go…
Kind of annoying, but what can you do? It's not like he could ignore these people…
Or could he?
A quick smack to the temple followed. Nope, not going there…
He checked inside the hatch, for good measure, finding another peculiar item.
Obtained: Flare Gun
Probably entrusted to him to call for help in case he needed it… to call Winter, he realized. This could be useful, he thought, while pocketing the red pistol.
Okay then, this side of the bottom floor was clear. He had to check upstairs now, with all the fun surprises that he will definitely find.
He grumbled under his breath, backtracking to the entrance of the mansion and heading up the stairs, followed only by the sounds of Winter fighting outside and kicking some major ass.
He headed left first, to deal with their little Jacques shaped issue. There's another guy that he would be more than happy to slaughter in cold blood…
The hallway leading to him was weirdly vacant of enemies. Something's fishy here…
He turned around and smashed his shield against… a flying pot? The utensil broke, revealing a Geist. Oh great, these things now…
Of course, it wasn't alone. Three more circled him. Suddenly, they darted off in search of objects to possess. With quick reflexes, Jaune surged forward and stabbed one of them, before it could reach anything.
He was forced to duck as another pot smashed itself atop of his head, revealing the monster that he quickly put down.
A giant painting of Jacques tried to flatten him, but he barely dodged out of the way, planting the blade of Crocea Mors to keep the object still and killing the Geist by stabbing its exposed mask with his dagger.
The last one…
Took one of the suits of armor. Of course it did…
Fortunately for him, the monster did not know the finer points of sword combat, so he was able to side step one slash, parry the next one and transform his weapon in its greatsword form, destroying the armor in one slash, before finishing off the ghost Grimm with two diagonal slashes.
This was revealing itself to be much more trouble than it was worth…
Having ran out of patience, he kicked down the door of the studio, only to find… nothing. The room was quiet and unassuming, nothing seemed out of the ordinary… if you didn't count the mess around. He narrowed his eyes and stalked forward, inwardly thinking that, maybe, the Schnee matriarch was either wrong or her information was outdated. By how much?
Not too long, considering that Whitley hadn't died of starvation, so that ruled out the option.
Turned had been getting more intelligent, lately. So perhaps…
He heard the footstep behind him a millisecond too late. Ambush, damn it!
An arm wrapped itself around his neck and a blade stabbed down on his kidneys, over and over again, trying to break his aura and bury itself in his flesh.
The surprise allowed his assailant to get enough hits to break his natural shield.
Not one more though.
With a mighty grunt, Jaune grasped the arm and bodily threw his enemy on the table of the studio, breaking it and drawing a shout of pain from the man that almost managed to kill him.
What a fucking joke. He survived assaults from monsters, trained combatants, people than would have skinned him alive without breaking a sweat…
And this disgusting coward almost ended him. Just like that.
His teeth almost cracked from how hard he was clenching them. One hand flew to Jacques Schnee's throat, while the other one extracted Mors Renata from its scabbard, pointed right against the older man's forehead.
What a pathetic sight… this bastard spent his entire life trying to prove himself better than anyone else, especially faunus… and look at him now, growling and foaming from the mouth like a rabid dog.
Last second, he changed his mind. This… thing did not deserve one of his bullets. If he was a rabid dog, then was going to be put down like one. He gripped his pistol from the point… and swung down, hitting Jacques with the handle. Over and over again, similarly to how he killed Clover mere hours prior. He continued until only the blood was left, the body having started to evaporate halfway through his work.
Pathetic. Completely and utterly pathetic.
He finally calmed down, noting in his head how Clover being able to talk seemed like an exception, rather than the rule. How lucky of him…
Amid the confusion he had failed to notice something that now drew his attention with its shininess.
Obtained: Key of the Broken
It was a fairly standard key… with only one exception.
The base of it was shaped like a leaf. This was probably the key to Willow's garden. Good to know…
With another grunt, he was back on his feet. Maybe this wasn't a waste of time after all…
One more side to check, then he could focus on Weiss.
Whitley's room was bare. He found a bit of Scrap Metal, but nothing more than that. His sister's room was another story. In there, he found exactly what he was looking for.
Obtained: Key of the Loneliness
At the end of the hall, though, was the biggest surprise.
Another door, yeah… but the shape of the keyhole made him realize just what exactly he was looking at.
Used: Key of the Broken
The garden. Indoor, yeah… but a garden. Or… what used to be a garden. All the plants were dead or dying, the water was black and muddy and it was full of bottles everywhere.
Whiskey, Brandy, Rum… all rigorously empty.
A growl resounded from his left and he quickly slashed, dissecting middair the Beowulf that was jumping in his direction. Grimm, just the one, likely having entered from the broken window which had now been sealed with ice. Which could only mean…
He gave a small sigh. Poor Whitley…
In the end, he found the last remaining member of the family…
In a pool of her own blood, fresh from what he could tell, with an expression of pain and terror forever frozen on her rugged face. Not even the time for a final goodbye… just killed and munched off by a Grimm mere minutes before being saved.
What a sad way to go…
He knelt down in front of the woman, closing her eyes. He might not have been the biggest fan of hers, but nobody deserved to go like this…
She was holding something in her hand. With a quick apology, he pried the objects off her still tepid fingers.
Obtained: Daughter's Carillon
Well… at least she died with some measure of comfort…
The small object played its music, a somber tune, meant to soothe children into going to bed. He played it, hoping that the melody will accompany Willow on her final journey… one that she will never come back from, if she's lucky.
He stood back up, looking over the corpse of a woman who made plenty of mistakes… but that, at the end of the day, cared about her children, even if she had a weird way of showing it.
You can rest easy now… I will save Weiss. That… is a promise.
Hello?! Is this thing on?! It is?! Noice.
Welcome back, dudes and gentleladies, to another episode of Auraborne, the show where generational trauma is a mere side issue.
And another one bites the dust, as the song goes. Next chapter is the Weiss boss fight, and I'm kind of pumped for this one. I still have no idea if it will be better than Yang's or even Robin's, but I have quite a few ideas for it. Anyone that actually played Bloodborne might recognize what one of those ideas is.
Review Responses:
Guest: Thank you, going for the gaming vibe was exactly what I meant. As a big fan of Soulsborne games, I tried to keep the whole thing as close as possible to the way they make characters and general storytelling (like the descriptions of the auras), so I'm very happy to know that I managed.
Essiter1987: Who knows how much time has passed? Ever since his first trip to Beacon, the world had been swallowed by an eternal night. It could have been hours, days or even weeks and no one would know. Yup, Weiss is best girl. Not that it's a high bar to clear, but at least she feels like she had a proper character arc, instead of regressing (like Yang) staying the exact same until very recently (Ruby) or just being plain bad ever since like Volume 5 or 6 (Blake). Which kind of sucks because I really like pre-volume 5 Yang, Blake (she used to be my favorite, believe it or not) and Ruby. From what I heard, volume 10 hasn't even been greenlit yet (unless my info is outdated, which it probably is), and I'm probably going to watch 9… eventually. I don't want RWBY to fail, but man do they have a lot work ahead of them to drag its name out of the mud… you know, until Rooster Teeth does something controversial yet again. Only a matter of time at this point…
I'm probably going to either write a long one-shot or a short multichapter… and if you know how I write my protagonists, it ain't gonna be all fluff and rainbows. Only mostly.
behaartzas: You gotta remember, this story is convoluted when it comes to its timeline, but baseline is, the group already tried to fight Salem once and failed miserably. Anything could have happened during that timeframe, which will be explored later on during and after the Vacuo arc, for reasons that you'll know as soon as the whole thing starts. The Clover thing is just a way to reiterate that Jaune is now a lot stronger than he used to be, which means that the Ace Ops remembers him being a lot weaker than he is now. Jaune might have been physically strong back then, yes, but not strong enough to keep up with someone as skilled as Clover. You also have to take into consideration that our favorite noodle started training only like… a year before Volumes 7 and 8, which means that Ren could and would have kicked his butt, simply for the difference in general skill and familiarity with the weapons. Jaune didn't even had a ranged option…
Aura techniques were something that I wanted to do, but ultimately decided to scrap, in order to keep everything a bit more grounded. I'm not saying that they won't make an appearance at all, but it's highly unlikely.
That's all folks! Ta-ta for now!