Chapter 22
Percy narrowed his eyes at the explosions that came from the tower of Beacon as the tower fell. He boosted himself again, decapitating Grimm that stood in his way with ease as he pushed himself towards the tower. He sketched wards on his hands and forearms, adding an unsight ward to Anaklusmos as well, all while mindlessly exterminating the Grimm as he made his way to the tower.
It was time to show Remnant the true power of the stormbringer.
He pushed into the vicinity of the tower, slashing away the beasts of Grimm that dared converge on him. He saw Ozpin lying prone on the ground, knocked out, and Cinder casually strolling towards him, her amber eyes meeting his.
Cinder Fall narrowed her eyes at him, a flame appearing in her palm, flickering dangerously.
"Tell me where the Maiden is, and I will allow you, Vale, and Beacon to live. There need not be any bloodshed."
Percy looked into her eyes, "No."
"So be it. I will have the full Maiden power."
She leveled her hand at him, the flame flickering even more violently.
"Whatever it takes…" she whispered, a certain look in her eyes that he couldn't quite pinpoint.
He narrowed his intense sea green eyes at her dangerously.
"This is your reckoning. You killed all of these people. The blood of Vale, of Beacon, is on your hands."
"And?" the woman raised an eyebrow cooly.
"You'll die, for that."
"Oh?" the woman sounded amused, her amber eyes twinkling with humor, "Is that a threat?"
"No."
Anaklusmos flicked out in a sheen of gold, as he leveled the blade at her.
"It's a promise."
Percy quickly sketched an expel ward, firing it at the woman. She dodged to the left at the last possible second, her amber eyes narrowing at him.
Immediately, he was met with flame, a beam that scorched his chest. It was hotter than anything he'd felt before, and that was saying something considering he'd felt the inside of a volcano before. He felt his shirt singe off in the heat, and he knew he had to do something before it got bad.
Percy grunted, concentrating. He summoned the force of the ocean within him, creating water out of nothing but his power to block the flames. He extended his senses to deep underground and yanked water to him. The groundwater exploded to the surface and converged on his assailant, suffocating her. Superheated steam burst all around the place, extinguishing her flames. Before he could suffocate Cinder, she just barely managed to roll away.
She instantly attacked him with dual blades, but Percy danced away, before reengaging. Riptide burst forth in a flurry of celestial bronze that promised death and pain, and it expertly snaked around her defenses, chipping away at her aura. His arm moved so fast that it blurred, and the effect was augmented by the unsight ward on Riptide that made his sword look like a golden sheen, causing her to falter in her defenses.
Cinder snarled in anger, trying to press on the attack, but only found herself on the backfoot, forced to give ground. The son of Poseidon was relentless, never giving her even a moment to breath. He controlled the pace of the fight, the feeling of the fight. He made ward whips with his left hand to hook her limbs and blocked when necessary.
She blasted torrents of scorching fire at him, with rings of fire, but he withstood it all with grunts of exertion with his natural disposition against fire. Her swordsmanship was excellent, perhaps even better than Pyrrha. But all of that didn't mean she could keep up with him.
Riptide found small holes in her defenses, holes that he could exploit and widen with the constant changing of weapons in his left hand to attack.
He faked his leg faltering, and, as predicted, Cinder took the bait, immediately exposing a massive hole in her defense. He prodded at it lightly, knowing it was a fake, and sure enough, she instantly tried to counter, only for him not to be there. He brought down Riptide with the force of a train onto her shoulder, causing her to cry out in pain. He based her head with the pommel, once, twice, before she regained her senses and danced away.
Percy locked blades with her, the two of them pitting their strength against each other.
"Having performance issues?" Percy taunted, a smug smirk on his face that infuriated her.
"Shut up!" she snarled in anger, before Percy twisted his wrist skillfully, and she lost one of her swords.
Cinder only crafted another one instantly, but just as they were about to reengage, a massive dragon-like Grimm, a Wyvern, crashed into the ground just before them, causing the ground to shake and launching them high up into the air.
Percy immediately tackled Cinder, overpowering her with his demigod strength in a vice-like grip as he held her body below him, preparing to absorb the impact and smash her into a pulp.
He was not prepared when she used the winds on him, a powerful gale of wind throwing him off her and towards the ground, all as she hovered in the air. As he was falling, she sent beams of fire towards him, forcing him to focus on blocking with his shield wards.
Percy grit his teeth, trying to summon the winds to carry him to safety. They worked, at least partially, cushioning his fall somewhat as he rolled to his feet.
She fired a beam of burning death, with arcs of fire surrounding it. He blocked the beam with a brilliant shield ward. The beam was one of the strongest yet, as the pure power of the beam caused him to slide his feet backwards in the dirt, sparks flying off the magnificent ward as he was pushed backwards. Still, he was wasting too much aura keeping it up, and he had to change tactics.
Percy clenched his fists, ethereal sea green eyes beginning to glow bright with the true power of the stormbringer. He reached deep inside himself, summoning his true power. Gales of wind began rushing at an unnatural pace beside him, and dark, stormy clouds began gathering above.
Bolts of lightning fell from the heavens, striking the ground with tremendous force as his silhouette lit up the very sky. A small hurricane formed above them, turning the winds into an overwhelming gale as the downpour of rain invigorated him, and thunder blared in the distance.
The rush of power, the ability to just cut himself loose; it was addicting, exhilarating. It felt surreal, intoxicating even, to finally be able to unleash himself.
It felt good to be back.
He felt a small force of will trying to take control of the skies from him, but he swatted it away like an errant fly undeserving of his attention. He stalked towards her, his face set in a cold mask, Riptide dragging behind him across the ground, sparks erupting from the contact. He would show no mercy to her; she was just another monster to be put down, one of many in his life.
"It's- not possible-" Cinder backpedaled, a shocked expression on her face. She had a strange, foreign expression on her features, her body shaking like a leaf.
Then, it hit him.
She was scared.
Of him, because he presented an unsurmountable obstacle that she hadn't seen coming, something unexpected but powerful. Dangerous.
A wild card.
He terrified her.
He relished her fear, basking in it, bathing in it as if he were bathing in the sun, driving back the shadows.
"You have no idea what's possible."
A cruel smirk danced on his red lips as he twirled the celestial bronze blade in his hand, the xiphos humming comfortably in his grasp.
He was on her in moments, Riptide out for blood.
Every swing she took was hampered by the winds, and every one he took was aided by them. It was all Cinder could do to backpedal, and she attempted to harness lightning from the sky above to send at him, but Percy denied it instantly.
He could see the fear and desperation in her eyes, and he loved it, relished it, bathed in it. He wanted her to feel the same fear the people of Vale had felt, to feel the same loss they had, to pay for what she had done to Vale.
She crafted projectiles out of nothing by superheating them, glass shards attacking him in swathes, but the gales of the wind brushed them aside with contemptuous ease.
Cinder only grew more and more desperate as he pressed her, pushing her on the backfoot. Small tornadoes sprung from her blade that he couldn't control, torrents of fire and bolts of lightning channeling through her blade into his blade, then his body. He bore it all with a mere grunt, ignoring the pain and soldiering on, like he always had.
He called bolts of lightning down from the heavens, striking her once, twice, then three times, the discharges flowing through her body. He lunged for her, Riptide piercing her and forcing her backwards with a scream of pain.
He was met to the face with another beam of fire, but he simply grabbed the rain and forced it to him, suffocating her flames. He brutally forced the water down her throat, clogging her nose, causing her to hack her lungs out.
Riptide burst forth in a flurry of a dozen strikes, a golden sheen of celestial bronze as she futilely tried to cough her lungs out and defend at the same time. His boot slammed into her chest with force, before he brought down Riptide with the force of a truck onto her shoulder. She let out a cry of pain, and he slammed his boot into her stomach. She went flying backwards, her back slamming into the ground.
Her aura fizzled out in a brilliant crackling of orange, and she tried to flee, using her maiden powers to try and fly away. Except the rain doubled in intensity, dousing out her flames, and every time she tried to use the wind to fly away, Percy denied her ruthlessly. She would not find friends among nature, not today.
"I've worked my entire life for this! I deserve this power... I am unchallenged!" her amber eyes were wide, frantic and crazed, as she screamed to the heavens, "I am powerful! I have value! You will not deny me MY DESTINY!"
"I already have."
He was her judge, and her executioner.
Percy strode towards her with purpose, slashing at her with Riptide. Without aura, she was pathetically vulnerable to everything.
He leaned from side to side, avoiding her desperate slashes, and got into her guard with ease, brutally stabbing her in the stomach with Requiem, then twisting it. Cinder howled, and he tore the gladius from her stomach, blood flowing freely from the wound. He bent under another desperate slash, along it to pass overhead, and he whirled Riptide in a reverse weave to cut open a massive gash on her leg.
Cinder cried in pain, stumbling. Requiem turned into a pistol, and he fired shots everywhere, Cinder desperately trying to parry them even as more than a few slipped through and tore at flesh. She screamed, but he didn't care.
Percy closed the gap, batting away her strikes with contemptuous ease, and grabbed her head, smashing her face into his knee, once, twice, then three times, breaking and bloodying her nose. He slammed his boot into her stomach, before lunging at her with Riptide. She moved her head at the last second, but it wasn't enough. Riptide pierced her eye, and Cinder howled to the heavens in pain.
He was going to kill her, he realized. And, maybe in the past, he might have felt a bit of sympathy.
But, for some reason, Percy couldn't find it in himself to care.
He twisted Riptide before ripping it out brutally. Riptide carved an ethereal golden arc upwards from the ground. A slight tug, and his faithful blade carved through her shoulder like butter, and Cinder's left arm fell on the ground, separated from her body.
She gave a scream of agony unlike ever before, her stump spurting blood, and he almost pitied her, before reminding himself that she was a monster. He was going to kill her with no remorse.
Death was too good for a monster like her.
He lifted Anaklusmos, preparing to finish her off when his senses tingled rapidly.
His body immediately moved of its own accord, forcing him to spin out of the way.
Still, something pierced straight through his bicep, straight up ignoring his massive aura reserves.
A teal boosting ward appeared beneath his feet, and he created several feet of separation.
It was venomous; Percy could already feel the poison spreading through the shoulder, and his body was working overtime to expel the poisonous substance. The rain helped too, already mending his muscles and bone.
Percy grunted as he turned to look at his new attacker.
It was a yellow eyed scorpion faunus with brown hair, who wore a dark brown cloak and white pants. He had a wrist blade on each side of his arm, with guns attached to each of them.
He had no doubt this was either another one of Cinder's lackeys, or a pawn of the Queen herself, Salem.
"Who are you?"
"Why my friend, my name is Tyrian."
Ozpin backpedaled as a massive giant towered over him, the man clenching his fists as he stabbed two lightning dust crystals into his arms.
"Ozpin… you will pay for what you did."
Hazel Rainart swung his fist at the headmaster, who ducked away, trying to stall in order to regenerate his pitiful amount of aura that was left.
The giant of a man pursued him in anger, his smashes cracking the ground where Ozpin had just stood.
"I was a mere shadow of a man once, desperate. Fighting in an underground ring for money just to feed myself and my sister… you took me in, cared for me, offered me a job, first as an assistant professor, and then as a full-time professor. If I had known beforehand what would happen, I would have never accepted."
"I-"
"Shut. UP!" The man smashed his fist into Ozpin's stomach, sending him backwards painfully. The headmaster went flying through the air, landing on his back. His green aura crackled, then faded away, letting him know that his reserves were done. Cinder's attack had taken everything out of him, and he knew he wouldn't be able to put up much of a fight against Hazel.
Ozpin forced himself to his feet with the Long Memory, grimacing in pain.
"You let Gretchen into Beacon a year early! You didn't know at the time since she registered under a different surname, but when I brought it up to you, what did you do? WHAT did you do!?"
The headmaster ducked under more punches, his cane blurring with movement as he pushed his former friend back, and then rolled away to create space.
"Nothing! You refuse to remove her from Beacon!"
"It was her decision!" Ozpin argued back, "She was perfectly capable! You loomed over Gretchen so protectively that even her own team was on a rocky relationship with her! No one wanted to be friends with her!"
That was apparently the wrong thing to say, as Hazel roared in rage, injecting more dust crystals into his arms.
"Except Team STRQ, a third-year team at the time," Hazel recalled quietly, his voice a deep rumble, "And you took them into your inner circle, revealed to them the truth of the war against Salem. And how did that turn out? One deserted, a coward. One went missing, presumed dead. One became a drunk, and the last retired from all the madness, having lost both women he ever loved."
It stung, but Ozpin refused to let it show in his face, his calm façade never cracking.
"The disbandment of Team STRQ was never something I intended."
"But it was something you damn well knew would happen, and you were prepared for it! Exactly like you were prepared for Gretchen's death when you sent her and her team to the abandoned town to clear it of Grimm. You send children to their deaths for a cause that you know has no victory, no end!"
"Someone has to try!" Ozpin snarled, finally having lost his cool.
Hazel roared in anger, sprinting towards him with a speed that belied his frame. Ozpin ducked and dodged, rolling away. He unleashed more strikes, but it did nothing to his former friend. Hazel slammed his boot into the man's stomach, Ozpin being far too exhausted to even dodge.
Ozpin flew back in pain, landing with his back on the ground as the wind was knocked out of him. Most of his ribs were broken, and he was in too much pain to even move.
Hazel approached him, crouching down to look him in the eye.
"Joining Salem is not the answer…" Ozpin managed to get out, his voice raspy and cracked, "She only wants to destroy the world…"
"Then I'll worry about that after I have my vengeance," Hazel replied simply, his large hand reaching out to grasp him around the neck.
At first, it was gentle, like a cat playing with its food, and no sooner than it had come, it went away.
Ozpin felt an incredible pressure on his windpipe, and he jerked instinctively, his hands coming up to desperately try and pry the larger man's hands away from his throat. His legs began kicking against the man's body, his breaths coming out in short rasps as he desperately struggled in his grasp. Nothing worked.
His heart beat rapidly in his chest, lungs swelling painfully as he choked, Hazel's hand squeezing and crushing his windpipe. His eyes became bloodshot, veins visible, blood slowly pooling out of his mouth.
There was a certain kind of grim satisfaction in the giant's hazel eyes, but the man did not smile.
"I will find you in the next life, Ozpin. And then the next, and the next."
With a final clench of the fist, Ozpin's windpipe was brutally crushed, and Hazel Rainart dropped the corpse of the headmaster onto the ground.
His work here was done.
Jaune looked on in horror as red blood pooled onto the floor, a visible hole through Weiss' abdomen. Her mouth was wide as she staggered, their two teams circling her and Yang, who was unconscious and missing one of her arms, on the ground.
"Jaune! You have to do something!" Ruby ran up to him, shaking his chest, her silver eyes wide with panic.
"I- but-"
"It's not the time! Both Yang and Weiss need help! You said Percy was helping you with your semblance right! It has something to do with aura manipulation, but not in the combat way! That means it must be healing right! Please…" Ruby begged.
Jaune steeled himself, his face set in a grim line.
"I'll do it."
He broke out of the formation, running to Weiss as his teammates covered the gap for him.
Weiss' back was on the floor, the hole in her stomach still wide open.
He knelt, placing his hands over the hole of the stomach. He willed his aura to her, trying to help her.
Nothing happened.
He panicked, desperately trying to save her.
Finally, after several seconds, white aura began to flow out of his hands, covering and mixing with her own light blue aura that had begun flickering. Her aura greedily sucked white aura from him; it didn't care, only that there was aura for it to survive on, and Jaune aided it by adding more and more aura into her body. His aura spread over her body, covering it in an ethereal white glow.
He could feel her hurricane of emotions, her pain and her confusion, her panic.
The wound began to agonizingly slowly, his aura stemming the bleeding and Jaune sighed in relief. As he poured more and more aura into her, his aura reserves began to deplete slightly, and Weiss jolted awake with a gasp.
"Wha-What's going on?" she asked drowsily, her ice blue orbs blinking slowly as she tried to rise from the ground.
Jaune pushed her down gently, "I'm healing you with my aura."
"Mmm…" she closed her eyes, "sounds… nice…"
"Alright Weiss… just lie still, and don't move."
"Mmm sure…" she drifted off wearily, as she laid back on the ground.
"What…"
Jaune turned to Nora, who looked shocked, but soon modified it with a grin and gave him a thumbs up, "Keep doing what you're doing. We'll keep breaking the Grimm's legs!"
Nora soon ran off, as Blake hurried up to him with an expression akin to between relief and anxiety.
"Can you- can you boost Yang's aura?"
As Jaune finished pouring his aura into Weiss and the wound was sealed up, he turned to Blake, biting the inside of his cheek, "I can try."
"Do it."
Weiss' aura soon refused to accept any more of his, and he turned to Yang. He pushed his white aura into hers, and hers drank it in, greedily.
It seemed to only beg for more, and Jaune moved to oblige. It drank like a man thirsty for water, like someone who hadn't drank in ages. He could feel his own aura dipping ever so slightly, but he had more than enough reserves to completely fill up her aura. Still, she didn't wake up, even when he tried to force more of his aura into her.
"That's it," Jaune let out a gasp, finally breathing. Doing that had taken the wind out of him, but Blake looked grateful for him doing so, and he didn't regret it.
Blake nodded, a small, grateful smile on her face, "She's going to be knocked out for a bit. Thanks, Jaune."
"No problem," Jaune said, and they hurried, rushing back towards the front lines. Pathfinder was in his hands, reloaded and ready to fire. The Grimm swarmed them in the hundreds, but they managed to hold them back, firing with fervor.
He just had to hope they could hold out long enough for Percy to come back.
Ruby's worried voice came through the channel, startling him slightly, "Percy? Status?"
"I'm fine," he intoned, looking at the faunus warily.
Percy didn't have time for this. Vale and Beacon needed his help, and he had to finish off Cinder. But first, he had to piss him off.
"Tell me, Tyrian, do you serve Cinder?"
"Only in her wildest dreams!" he snarled violently, showing his teeth, much like a feral animal, before finally calming himself.
"No, I only serve the one true goddess, her grace."
"Well, tell me, how hot is she?" Percy smirked.
The faunus apparently didn't seem to get the memo, "Oh, she's beauty, she's grace-"
"No, I mean how hot is she? Like on a scale of one to ten? I mean, cuz I dunno if I wanna tap that-"
The scorpion faunus snarled in pure anger, lunging forward, "How dare you speak about our goddess like that!"
Percy smirked. Just what he wanted. With the combination of his healing abilities from water and aura, his left arm was already back in the game.
His warded longsword formed in his left hand, and he pushed expertly, Riptide and Convergence snaking out in perfect harmony again and again, chipping away at the faunus' aura. The faunus was apparently medically insane, however.
The man laughed in glee at the fight, the insults towards his "goddess" forgotten, as he used his scorpion stinger to try and sneak through Percy's defenses. Percy blocked it with the blade of Convergence, retaliating with a boot to the stomach.
He drew upon his power, as a cocoon of water surrounded him. The water invigorated him, strengthening his mind and body at once.
Percy burst forth like a man possessed, Riptide and Convergence becoming pure blurs of speed as he attacked the maniacal faunus relentlessly.
The faunus was on a different level of unpredictable, one that made Percy look like a textbook by comparison. He used breakdancing moves at times; other times, he gracefully pirouetted like Weiss would, and he even attacked aggressively like Yang.
Percy used the winds to his advantage, however. The thin sheen of water that constantly covered him boosted his already powerful attributes, and the gales of wind aided his every swing while hindering the man's swings.
He pushed, before noticing Emerald helping Cinder out of the corner of his eye. Quickly, he detected no bodies of water in that position, but rather two bodies a couple yards to the left. So Emerald was using that pesky hallucination semblance of hers again.
He deflected the man's attack, lunging towards the two bodies he'd detected. Riptide and Convergence slammed into someone's stomach jointly, causing a cry of pain. The illusion faded, and Percy saw Emerald beneath him. He rolled off her immediately, allowing the insane faunus to shoot at her instead of him. Percy tried to make a push for Cinder, but the faunus jumped in front of him, having already anticipated this.
The scorpion faunus seemed to prioritize offense over defense, as he found numerous openings in the faunus' defenses. Percy had zero problem with doing the same, as the two of them traded blows at increasingly fast blurs. The faunus somehow pierced through his aura at times, specifically when his eyes and hands glowed purple, but Percy always managed to minimize the damage so that he could draw upon the water that encased him.
Percy allowed the scorpion faunus to bypass his aura, stinging his venom into his abdominal region in exchange for Riptide and Convergence both piercing into the man's chest.
The man's aura crackled and shattered in a brilliance of dark purple, as Percy bled slightly, the water already working overtime to heal him.
The scorpion faunus laughed insanely in glee.
"Well, my friend, as enjoyable as this must be, I'm afraid this is where we must part ways! Toodles!"
The scorpion faunus began running away, and as Percy allowed the large hurricane to subside, he saw a giant of a man leaving as well.
He cocked Requiem, firing it at them. As much as he hadn't trained with guns at all before, he at least knew how to use one, and the two of them were a rather large target. The bullets seemed to be on target, but the man shielded the scorpion faunus, and the bullets only bounced off the man's back like pebbles.
He would have chased them down, but he had to look for Ozpin first; the headmaster was more important right now. There was no sign of Cinder or Emerald, and Percy searched for Ozpin in the aftermath of the storm.
"Ozpin?"
He came across the headmaster after several minutes of searching.
He took a step back in shock. The man's brown eyes were bloodshot, wide and glassy, his throat shriveled, as if his very windpipe had been brutally crushed.
No…
The man had been kind to him, allowing him into Beacon purely on fighting a criminal… His friends were a direct result of that. He had forged new friendships and bonds here at Beacon Academy.
Ozpin had allowed him into their inner circle, opening his eyes to the key to his true quest on his path to protect Remnant. Even if the man had more than a few secrets behind his old eyes, Percy owed him his thanks.
He clenched his fist, gripping the hilt of Anaklusmos tightly. The blade's glow darkened, reflecting his stormy emotions.
They would pay. Part of him desperately wanted to chase after the scorpion faunus and the giant. He knew that he could make it there and take them down.
But the people of Vale were more important than his own petty vengeance, and he had a duty to uphold.
He bent down, gently closing the headmaster's eyelids over his wide eyes. He whispered a small blessing under his breath, before standing back up.
He turned towards the city.
"Uh… yo?"
Percy whipped around to see Mercury Black standing behind him, his hands raised in a placating gesture.
He leveled Riptide at him warily, the tip glistening even against the backdrop of the dark clouds in the sky. He thought about attacking him, but he held back on it. He could at least hear the guy out, right?
"What do you want?"
"To join your side?" the guy shrugged nonchalantly, as if he wasn't literally being held at sword-point, "Or more specifically, escape from Cinder. I'm a survivor after all, and I have no loyalty to her cause."
While his gut told him to reject Mercury because of his former villain status, his mind told him that he could be extremely useful to them; just fear would be enough to keep him on their side. And it wasn't exactly like he could throw him in jail right now.
"And what makes you think I can protect you from Cinder?"
"I mean…" Mercury trailed off, waving and pointing at the destruction that he'd caused. The ground was ripped up, the tower in shreds, and remnants of the storm still lingering above.
"Touché," Percy acknowledged. Mercury shuffled in place awkwardly, scratching the back of his neck.
This entire situation was too bizarre for Percy's liking. He'd have to be dealt with later. For now though, they could use any help they could get.
"Go find the three teams PRWBY, JNPR, and SSSN, and help them kill Grimm, the obvious."
"Sir yes sir!" the gray-haired man saluted sarcastically. Percy flipped him off as the guy started running towards the docking bay.
He tapped his earpiece, "Team PRWBY, Team JNPR, if you see Mercury Black, don't attack, unless he becomes hostile, then you can light his ass up. He's switched sides, I'm sending him towards your position. Meet with Team SSSN at the docking bay."
A chorus of questions came through the earpiece, but he tuned all of them out internally in favor of pushing towards the city. People needed help.
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