Weiss Schnee
"Not the most ideal of circumstance..."
Perhaps the most casual way possible to assess this particular situation, but not at all incorrect either. While at first glance, the seemingly endless wave of soldiers charging straight at her was an issue, they were actually incomparable to what sat behind them. Weiss could cut through the army without issue, but the more of them she rended from this field, the greater the chances that she would simply be providing one of those weapons the line of sight necessary to turn Ruby into a single parent. All three of them could deliver enough damage to her body to prove fatal, even a shot to her chest would probably carve a hole into her so large most of her brain went with it.
For now, despite the brilliant wings behind her that seemed to almost glitter as the sunlight reflected from them, she was forced to stick to the ground. Transforming wasn't an option either, her base form was a downgrade in every way, and her full form would simply turn her into a bigger target in the current circumstance. With a sigh, the Queen drew her blade from its sheath, the rapier being completely wasted in such a circumstance, yet it would make what came next that much easier.
With a casual thrust of her blade, she quickly dispatched two of the Fae, drawing her sword by swinging it to her left and cleaving another in half. These opponents went down in less damage than she could deal in one strike, while the army did provide an intimidating figure, no doubt whoever Summoned them could have simply called one creature instead. It certainly would have been a bigger threat.
It only occurred to Weiss after a shot of pain rung through her body that perhaps that was the point.
Teeth grit and her scream of pain contained to simply a groan of uncomfort, Weiss took stock of the situation immediately. A line had been carved through the army ahead of her, the gap slowly filling as more and more of them tried to make their way to her. Looking down quickly to check over her body, she found no injuries until some light reflected off of something laying on the ground and hit her in the eye. Those same eyes widened as she recognised her right wing laying on the ground beneath her, having been completely rended from her body by a single shot of those weapons. Which, she became quickly reminded of the fact, that there were two more of.
With some quick footwork that left her sailing to her left and slamming through more of these endless soldiers, Weiss managed to dodge the second shot. Her game plan changed quickly as she realised that the first weapon was already being recharged, and she decided that attacking them head on was the best choice for now. However, she was forced to once again revise that plan as the third shot sailed through more of those Fae than she could count, this time hitting her knee and completely destroying her left leg, leaving barely an inch of a stump connected to her body.
That time, she didn't do as good a job of containing her voice filled with pain.
With a flick of her hand, a wall of ice was quickly constructed between her and the weapons. It wasn't overly large, and certainly not strong enough to stop one of those shots, but for now it was something to throw off their aim. With grit teeth, a Green light flashed from what was once her leg. The healing process wasn't as fast as she would like, but to replenish a lost limb in seconds would take more Mana than could be considered anywhere near efficient... Well, unless you had a Support Affinity. Her wing would remain missing for now, it wasn't needed and healing it would simply be a waste of Mana. She did, however, freeze over the stump where her wing should have been, deciding that bleeding out wasn't the best of circumstances.
Options were slowly running low. Any and all Mana she used dropped the amount she could heal if she took further damage... While the obvious solution would be to transform and destroy the weapons with her Breath attack... That wasn't a gamble she was willing to risk.
"The second I transform, all three of those things are going to fire... I can only take out one with my initial attack, and they'll have a much easier time hitting a vital spot in my full form..."
As if to make matters worse, there was still an army surrounding her. At first, she considered them a non-factor. It wasn't until a group of them begun to melt the wall of ice in front of her with their own fire Magic that she threw that previous assessment out the window. Her own Mana had to be spent to keep the wall up, but those hopes of outpacing their melting were quickly dashed as the entire thing shattered apart. At first, she panicked. While the shot had broken through the wall and hit the ground behind her, she hadn't felt any pain. The immediate assumption she came to was that it had put a gigantic hole in one of her vital areas, but slowly that worry faded as she realised she was fine... It had just missed.
Though, in her seconds of standing still during that worry... It had given the others enough time to take their aim towards her. Time seemed to slow as she cursed under her breath, with both one of her wings missing and one of her legs gone, her hopes of dodging this next volley were near-to-none. With desperation in her eyes, she poured as much Mana into her healing as she could, her leg quickly sprouting fully as it completed its regeneration... But, seemingly too late.
She watched the shots fire, the weapons letting out two giant pulses of Mana as she watched her incoming demise, her perception slowed to a crawl thanks to her panic.
"... How strange... I expected more from my end..."
Having skipped over the first four stages of grief and immediately landing on acceptance... Weiss quickly experienced those same stages in reverse as she watched her view become consumed by red.
A different sound rung through her ears from what she had expected. It was like nails on a chalkboard, two incredibly loud ringing sounds as muscle was reduced to mush and bone shattered under the force of the strikes. The two unstoppable forces met an immovable object, and luckily, fate decided that the shield would be the victor today. Weiss's eyes filled with relief as she fully recognised what she was looking at, the familiar red scales being strange to observe from under the large form of the Dragon, looking a darker crimson thanks to the shadow of the creature.
"Sorry. I had to grab my Magic items." Ruby's explanation was delivered via telepathy, but in Weiss's opinion, her wife had been right on time. The large figure standing over her provided her with an immense feeling of safety, even as it started letting out a rumbling of a growl that was probably supposed to be quiet.
With another pounding of a sound as the only recharged weapon fired, Weiss heard a repeat of the previous sounds. The projectile hit Ruby's wing this time, right on its claw. The digits looked mangled and broken from the impact as the object that hit her dropped to the ground, but the blunt impact that had hit her was leagues easier to deal with than the overwhelming piercing force that had torn Weiss apart. With a quick flash of green, the hand of the Dragon attached to her wing cracked itself back into place, her broken leg quickly repairing itself as well.
"Weiss, can you take two of them out?" Her wife's voice made sense after a moment, after all, Ruby's only real ranged option remained as her roar, this particular Rose Dragon not being skilled enough at using spells to take out the people operating the weapons from this distance... Not without wasting too much Mana, anyway. The question of why Qrow wasn't helping wasn't one the Queen needed to ask, after all, this was looking like a perfect circumstance for Hazel to take out both Dragons if he was present... But, he couldn't do that until he knew where Qrow was. Neither one of them could act until the either did, assuming Hazel was even here, of course. But, that wasn't a risk that needed to be taken right now.
With a crackling sound of ice forming and shattering, the Frost Dragon lay pressed as close to the ground as she could, the Rose Dragon standing over her from above dropping her stance a bit to cover the white Dragon beneath her as well as she could. Three shots blasted across the battlefield again, all of them slamming into red scales and shattering bone hidden beneath them... But not hitting any of the white scales that they were protecting. With a blast of her Breath weapon from underneath Ruby, Weiss quickly took care of one of the weapons, turning her head in time to hit the other one before another volley came.
Ruby casually stepped away from Weiss, the red Dragon heading straight for the third and final weapon now that only one remained. The white Dragon, however, made sure to keep her wife between herself and the weapon at all times. Ruby had been right with her assessment after Vacuo had gained these weapons... While they could pierce through a normal Dragon with no problem, her Magic items allowed her to survive those blasts with only minor issues.
Five more shots rung out as Ruby made her way over to that weapon, none of them dealing any serious damage save for one that hit her head, destroying one of her eyes and causing the Dragon to roar in pain. Luckily, she controlled herself just enough to not pour any Mana into said sound. Once she reached the bottom of the sand dune, her wing casually reached out and grabbed the whole cart, her other limb flicking the Fae still clinging onto it for dear life.
Approaching as her wing slowly regrew, Weiss spoke with a careful voice. "While we're here, we should find that Summoner. This army will prove to be an annoyance." With every step they had both squished a fair amount of them, but the vast majority would easily be able to make it to the Barrier... Not that it mattered, apparently. Since they lacked the orders necessary to actually make them cross the Barrier or attack anyone on the other side, for now, they were basically just a pest. Her views on that matter changed once they both moved up the dune, and they saw what sat on the other side.
It wasn't an understatement to say that neither of them could even see the desert anymore. For as far as even their eyes could see, there were only the specks of brown colour thanks to their leather armour that was the Summoned Fae soldiers. There wasn't just thousands of them, perhaps maybe not even just millions... It was a sight that made the concept of absurdity even too small to describe. This was done by a Bronze Wizard, there was no question of that... But even still, how much Mana did they have...?
"A feat like this... Only Harbingers should be capable of this..." Suffice to say, both Dragons decided against proceeding.
Not for fear of the army itself per se, rather, for fear of what could be Summoned instead of it.
Ruby Schnee
"Well? What do you think?" A question more to show her impatience rather than actually requesting an answer, after all, they were both here to wait for Ruby's thoughts anyway.
Glancing over the device on the table again, Ruby gave it one last look over before answering. Mostly white with light blue accents, as was the calling card of anything made in Atlas apparently, the weapon was about three metres long and built around a barrel of sorts. The solid tube that ran through the centre of the device was meant to keep the projectile on a straight path after it left the weapon, said projectile seemed to be formed with Magic. There were ports that seemed to be designed with tubes for funnelling Mana or even Dust directly into it for automatic fire, but when used manually, one or multiple people could simply pour Mana directly into it.
Glancing over at the recovered projectile that had hit her wing, Ruby's best assumption was that it was usually about twenty centimetres long, and when fired from the weapon, the end of the barrel would form a sort of thing film-like Barrier. The projectile was moved without magic, rather, an explosive force was delivered behind it to send it out, the Barrier at the end would be carried along by the projectile after it was fired, meant to add damage and piercing properties. From her best guess, said Barrier would be formed mostly with Anti-Magic.
"This... Isn't just a Magic structure or new kind of Magic technology... This is an advancement in technology completely separate from Magic." Being careful with her words, Ruby wasn't sure how to properly communicate to them both how amazing this was exactly. It was no exaggeration to say that the last new technology made without Magic was developed before the Great Erasure. "I mean, this does use Magic... But only to add onto it and amplify its effectiveness. Theoretically, you could make something similar, albeit a bit weaker, without any Magic at all."
Even after her best efforts, the others were still left confused. "So, what does that tell us?" Weiss's voice was calm, and as she spoke her arms folded. To be honest, Ruby couldn't help but stare at her, both relieved that she was ok... and relieved that she wasn't annoyed at her. It had actually been quite a while since Weiss hadn't been annoyed with her...
"Can't say I don't deserve it, though."
Besides, even annoyed, her wife was far from aggressive or rude to her.
"As far as I'm aware, Atlas doesn't have a Silver Wizard." Glancing up to see Weiss's confirmation - that came in the form of a nod - Ruby continued. "So... This was either made with from an incredibly large group of people-" Unlikely, given that too many people working on it would have almost definitely had the design or at least part of its process leak. "-Or they used their Relic."
"They can't use the Atlas Relic." Qrow helpfully chimed in, seemingly knowing more about that than Weiss did. "All the people who knew how to open the Vault were killed."
A frown crossed over Ruby's expression as she heard that, she wouldn't deny for a second that she had wanted to see the Relic of Creation.
"Dammit Rory."
"Are we sure the enemy Silver Wizard didn't upgrade it?" Weiss seemed to want to move on from the talk about her ancestors being murdered.
Ruby actually knew the answer, luckily. "Yeah, he wouldn't have had the time." While it was true that he had been interrupting Ruby's work for the last year and a half, that also meant that his attention had to be constantly taken up by watching the Barrier. If he had left for even a day to work on the weapons, Ruby would have finished the Barrier. There was also the fact that just glancing at this weapon even now, Ruby could already think of several upgrades to give it. All of which even a Wizard with a single Silver Affinity could spot.
"So we don't know how this was made?" It certainly seemed that way. "I'll have to contact Ironwood, ask if Atlas has had any Silver Wizards recently-"
"Well... 'recently' is a bit of a stretch."
"I should see if they have any new Golems I could use as a Summon while I'm at it..." That last part was just a mutter, but Ruby was curious about it anyway.
As far as she knew, these weapon designs hadn't changed in roughly a century. "Call him when we get home." Ruby spoke with conviction, and didn't elaborate as she turned to exit the tent. Well, that was her intent anyway, her cool exit was quickly ruined by the Queen rushing after her and walking alongside to the tent by the Barrier.
"Qrow filled me in on your plan." Her voice seemed to dictate that Weiss understood at least a little bit as to why Ruby hadn't yet done it, even if Ruby was sure that her uncle had done a poor job of explaining it. "This word that no one else knows of... Does it have to do with-?"
"Yeah." Ruby didn't want to meet Weiss's eyes as they made their way to the tent's entrance. "I'm sorry I didn't do it earlier."
After a heavy moment of silence, Weiss shook her head. "I understand your hesitation, and in most other situations I would tell you to come up with a new plan, but..." The end to her sentence didn't need to be said. For how irresponsible as it may have been, Weiss needed Ruby home. Argus needed her home.
"It should be safe anyway." Ruby gave her a smirk with as much confidence as she could muster. "He won't be able to take it apart before it naturally collapses in a few years. Not unless he has a double Silver Affinity."
"The chances of that are exceedingly low." Weiss's words were an understatement. Strangely, out of even the Big Four, Silver and Platinum seemed to almost never naturally pop up. The only known people in the whole world possessing a Silver Affinity, as far as Ruby was aware, were members of the Rose bloodline, and Maria. With Argus and herself being the only two to possess a double Affinity for it. Of course, the Silver High Wizard Title and Masamune both granted a Silver Affinity, and thus far were unaccounted for. So, Ruby had to assume that the enemy Wizard had one of those.
"The requirements for the High Wizard Titles is to be recognised as the greatest Wizard in Remnant currently without one. As for Masamune, that one's more difficult."
Perhaps a bit subjective, Masamune required an odd task to be completed for someone to obtain it. Simply put, whoever had crafted the most dangerous weapon out of every living soul in Remnant would get the title.
"I'm not too sure which they could have..."
Someone Else
"What the hell is going on?" The sudden scream in his ear did nothing to help the situation, or improve his mood.
"Must you raise your voice?" Being rather dismissive with her concerns for now, he viewed his work as more important. They were practically the same thing anyway, and he was sure that the issue he was currently facing was the same thing she was no doubt about to continue yelling about.
"I thought you were keeping them from upgrading the barrier!" And like that, he was confirmed correct. "It looks pretty upgraded to me!" Her scaled arm shot out and gestured towards the rather obvious sight of the Border Barrier fully becoming a bright blue field of solid light.
"Yes, I noticed." Once more being dismissive, his sight returned back down to the Scrying Orb in front of him, the device being about a foot in diameter and working as a sort of remote operator, connecting to two different Orbs at opposite ends of the Barrier. Right now, he was doing his best to destroy them both from here before they were discovered, or more likely, if.
Seemingly rattled by either the situation or his uncaring attitude towards the circumstance, she stepped back with a tremble in her legs, eyes wide with fear. "We... We failed... She's going to be angry...!"
Finally showing emotion, his head snapped to look at her, eyes filled with rage at even the notion of him failing. "WE. Did not fail. Our role was to keep them here for as long as possible, and that was a success." His own efforts had kept them here about six times longer than they were no doubt expecting... Meanwhile, she only helped at the very end. And rather minorly as well. "If there was any failure, it was your attempts at showing off. You should have started off smaller before showing your full power."
"Pulling millions of Fae into this Plane was completely unnecessary."
"So... What do we do...?" Another sigh of his sounded, and his work stopped once more.
"Return and report, I shall remain here for now and clean up this mess-" He froze, his mind seemingly catching up with what he had seen through the Scrying Orb, before his vision snapped back to looking through it. So far, only one of the remote access Scrying Orbs had broken... But the other one, it was now showing him the freshly upgraded and remade Ritual for the Border Barrier. "This... This is the work of Intention based Magic..." He nearly salivated as his eyes scanned over it, taking the brilliance of it all in.
He felt like a simple animal staring up at the starry sky, understanding nothing he looked at save for one or two things, yet admiring the World's beauty anyway.
"This requires a password to work..."
For a moment, that perplexed him. Surely, the Wizard who had cracked the Dragon Formula wasn't such an amateur that they would make such a terrible mistake... Right? This had to be a trap of some kind...
"No... She couldn't leave a trap on this, it wasn't of her making, after all."
Intention based Magic was strong, but it didn't allow the freedom that manual work could give. So, had she simply made a fatal mistake...?
"What are you looking at?" With even more anger did he respond to her interruption, standing up and flaring his Mana to fill her with fear and make her back off. The woman practically cowered as she stepped away, bowing her head and letting her mohawk dip over her face.
At first, he wanted to chastise her... But an epiphany struck him before words left his mouth.
"No! I know what she's done!"
Looking back at the Orb with glee in his heart, his grin couldn't be wiped from his expression as he once again studied the ritual. "The Dragon Formula... I've tested every single word possible five times each in order to try and crack its fifth Phrase... But none worked! None fit!" He almost sounded crazed as he spoke, and no doubt was scaring the other woman further. "There is a word I don't know! A hidden secret of the Magic language not written anywhere! She found it, it's the last Phrase!" And if he had to bet, it was almost certainly what she had used as a password.
"I don't need to worry about breaking the Barrier, all that matters is tearing that Ritual apart and finding its password!"
"Tock!" Refusing to look away from the Scrying Orb, she no doubt stood to attention as he spoke. "Relay a message to Hazel for me, I won't be leaving this place, not yet." While it would no doubt take years still to dismantle Intention based Magic... For the first time since he had been presented with those four Phrases, he had a lead!
His grin displayed his pride and determination better than any words could be used to describe his elation.
Finally, he would see the Formula in its whole!
"I swear it! On my right as The Silver High Wizard, and Masamune!"
5th Day, Ninth Strike, 2116 PE