For a moment, there was no answer.
The Grimm must be understood. I shall Dream of them, and their mysteries.
Her eyes widened. You can do that?
Here in this place of connection...yes.
...Okay. What can I do?
Meditate. You are the Arbiter, and your soul shall be the Flame. You are the link that allows my attention to fall upon this place.
She nodded, and stepped forward. She closed her eyes, ignoring the remains of the tree before her, ignoring the body that still lay there. For now...they weren't important.
"Blake?" Yang's voice from nearby made her ear twitch.
"Obsidian...is going to Dream. To find out more about the Grimm. We'll need to stay here for a bit."
"Is that...safe?" Weiss' voice was almost calm, but Blake knew her enough to hear the slight fluctuation. "Considering all that we've seen here..."
"If Obsidian thinks it is, then I trust her."
"...Okay." She heard the squelching footsteps as Ruby stepped up beside her. "What do you need us to do?"
"Just...be here. Make sure nothing happens."
She didn't hear them answer, but she didn't need to, either.
You Dream.
You follow the currents of pain and suffering. You dive into the connection forged so long ago, deep into the black pit of the Voice. But it is not the Voice you seek. You wield the conceptual force of that laboratory – a place where your power and the Grimm became one, if only briefly. A place where one human threw away everything for a chance to understand the Grimm. The place where, even now, your connection to the world of mortals waits for you to complete your task. And, as you dive deeply into the abyss –
Obsidian! The Voice calls out to you once more, its infinite mouths greeting you with joy. You have finally come! It has been so long. We waited for you, and never did you come. You weave your Dream, seeking to draw back; seeking the place where your eye might see the Grimm in their true whole.
The secrets that are sought...you denied them, before.
Ah! So you have been seeking our secrets all this time? And what have you learned, oh Dream Queen? At every turn, the Voice follows. Its eyes and mouths wrap around your awareness, maintaining their distance even as their gravity mindlessly tries to pull you in.
...Little. Your secrets are well-guarded.
Indeed, indeed! So many have sought us, and so few have found us. Tell us, what did you think of our new shapes? Without you to bridge the gap between us, they might never have been born. The thought of your power as a bridge...is a familiar one. You have used it for such purposes yourself in the past, and Ruby Rose did the same on her own initiative.
Your manipulation of biology was flawed. The forms were weaker together than apart.
Yes...it is such a shame that we are rejected so utterly. And yet, from the ashes of such failures was born something greater! If only they had more time to grow before they were tested...alas. We shall have to reshape them again. You are making no progress in your true goal. With reluctance, you begin to pull back from the Dream. You are leaving already? Oh, Obsidian...perhaps we shall have to find a different solution to our loneliness. You are so reticent.
What I seek...cannot be found here.
Hah! Of course. You seek our secrets...we wish you luck, then. But...if you have not already found them, are you likely to? You ignore the Voice's needling, and you pull farther back. In a moment that stretches and stretches...you are back with your Arbiter.
Obsidian? She felt the attention return to her...along with a feeling she wasn't familiar with.
The Dream was unsuccessful. The Grimm...resist.
She blinked, feeling the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Around her, her team's expression are frozen in shock and horror. They can...they can do that?
Evidently.
How did...how does that even work?
The connection between my self and this place is insufficient. When I Dream of the Grimm...their origin, their secrets remain veiled.
She opened her eyes, looking down.
Reflected in the Grimmsblood, her distorted face stared back at her with golden eyes.
She licked her lips nervously. What if...you had a stronger connection?
A stronger connection might allow for success. But -
Will you - will you keep me safe? For the first time in her life, she interrupted the voice in her soul.
For a moment, there was silence.
Yes.
She nodded. Then, she stepped forward – and at the same moment, her shadow slid out, undoing and removing her boots. As she felt her foot sink into the Grimmsblood, she was struck by how...warm it was. A sickly heat that seeped into her skin. She grimaced, but planted her other newly-bare foot next to the first.
"Blake? What the f-" Yang looked ready to carry her bodily from the room. Which...okay, fair enough. I should explain. Quickly.
"The connection wasn't strong enough. So...I'm going to help."
Without further explanation, she gripped Shroud and Veil in both hands before planting the tip in the ooze between her feet, holding both hands atop the hilt like one of those statues of old heroes. She felt...a bit ridiculous. And yet...in her hands, she felt the blade thrum once. She tilted her head down, eyes following the length of her blade down to where the black liquid rippled from her recent movement. She considered everything that had happened here. She considered what this place had represented, before – and what it had come to represent now.
Her lip curled in disgust. You think this place is yours, but it isn't. It never was. You stole it. This was Obsidian's long before anything else. Then, it was Penny's – and no matter what you've done here, you can't destroy that. You don't get to destroy what this place should have been. And someday...you won't destroy anything again.
She could almost feel Obsidian's own gaze behind her eyes. No, not almost – she was there. And –
Yang stepped towards her again. "...Okay. I don't like this, but okay. What do you need, Blake?"
She licked her lips. "I don't...I don't know. I can feel something, but it's not..."
"If it's the connection...then it's a lot like what we did to get you back." Suddenly, Ruby was there, peering at her with silver eyes. "We're all connected to Obsidian. If she needs a better connection...then that's up to us." She reached out, laying a hand atop Blake's own.
Below their hands, Shroud and Veil thrummed once more. She locked eyes with a shocked Ruby, the blade in her hands vibrating gently in time with the silver flickers of her leader's gaze, and all around them Obsidian's power swirled and danced.
As Yang laid her own hand atop the hilt, as Weiss and Penny moved closer themselves, Blake looked down at her reflection once more.
Perhaps it was a trick of the light, but she thought she saw a light shimmering up at her from below.
The hairs on Ironwood's arms stood up as he watched the five girls, standing in a circle with eyes closed. Around them, the Grimmsblood...shifted. It was like they had suddenly become subject to the tides; it pulled in, and pushed out. It swirled around the corners of the room. It splashed gently against his boots.
It slowly crawled up the sheath of the blade that had been planted in the center of the room.
And yet...none of that mattered. Ironwood found himself transported once more to that Dreaming sea; that not-quite-imagined place where he'd come face to face with something.
Because the Faunus' shadow had spread wide beneath her, and the flickering patterns it cast on the waves had formed a spiked profile –
– and there, just at the base of her feet, he could see a sphere of cold light shining through.
Deep within the crust of Remnant, something cracks and bends...slowly, deliberately, a single baleful eye opens, shining a beacon of light into the darkness of the underground.
You reach out once more. Your mind anchored; your five mortals stand in a circle around the symbol of their connection – to each other, and to you.
Your Arbiter and her soul of living Flame lash out at the Voice unknowingly, wielding her pain like a whip and followed by your other mortals without question...and for a moment, the Voice draws back.
You seize that moment. You wrap the core of your self in all the meaning you can draw forth:
This place, born of your own power.
This place where new life has been born: both your daughter and the Grimm.
This place where answers were sought with ever-increasing desperation.
And so cloaked, you open your eye –
And D̷r̴e̷a̶m̶.
You are the Ataxia. You wait as your other delicately pieces together another puzzle. Slowly, perfectly, the Clockwork's infinite hands finalize the design of the creature before you. Its multitude of lenses examine and catalog every attribute and function.
Finally, its work complete, it withdraws. It observes. And your turn comes.
You reach out with your uncountable tendrils. You dive into this new thing. You seek out the places where it is weak, the places where it has grown flawed in its distance from its creator, and you rend it asunder. Your mouths consume its pieces, your eyes observe its motions in death.
Finally, your work complete, you withdraw. You observe. And your other's turn comes.
The Clockwork reaches out with infinite hands and begins to create something new. Its spindles turn as it weaves the matter. It adjusts as it works, removing the flaws you exploited in the previous iteration. It adjusts the joints where the last creation's death throes revealed weaknesses or inefficiencies.
And while it works, you consider. You agreed to assist your other in its quest, and you have held your end of the bargain – but what interest you had in the outcome has begun to wane. Your other's attempts to stymie the endless degradation have already born fruit, but no matter how many iterations this dance takes you do not believe it will arrive at its perfect form. Entropy, you argue, is a part of reality that cannot be removed. Yet, as with every other time, your other ignores this. In your boredom...you find your eyes drawn to your other's motions as it spins its creation into being. You wonder.
Its work done, it withdraws. Your turn comes.
Mechanically, you reach out. You disassemble the creation once again. You find new flaws. You observe its new motions. You destroy it. And you withdraw.
And as the Clockwork reaches out once more...you turn away. You reach out, tendrils thinning and imitating. You spin the tiniest bit of something into being.
It perishes immediately. Yet...there was something there. Something that makes you wonder. You do it again, more smoothly – your creation perishes. You are not suited to creation, and you never have been.
Yet. At that moment of death. You felt something – you always feel something.
Perhaps...
...
...
It takes you many cycles. Many observations of your other. Many careful studies of death. Yet...you've found something.
And this time, when the Clockwork withdraws from its creation...you do not reach out. You do not tear it asunder.
Instead, you present your own creation. It is small. And it is weak. And it is quickly destroyed.
The Clockwork's lenses are focused on you, now. There is a question there, and you answer it with pride.
And your creation returns to existence, heedless of the fact of its destruction.
Your other questions you further as your returned creature destroys its own exhausted project.
And from that death, from that destruction, another of your engines of entropy is born.
The waves of your mind crash together in satisfaction. You do not have your other's talents. You never will.
But at least you understand that if something cannot be stymied; if there is a law that you cannot change;
you must simply make it your own.
Your other poses a new question, and you consider. Given your new interest in creation...perhaps this might prove an interesting venture.
For the first time, the tendrils of the Ataxia and the Clockwork's hands begin to work in tandem.
A̴n̸d̵.̷.̵.̴
Blake finally let out a gasping breath, leaning forward. The others already released the sword, panting and dredging up the last bits of their magic to stave away exhaustion. Even her own well has been running dry, sputtering on the flow she receives even now from Obsidian...but she knows she can't keep it up.
She's been so focused on maintaining her trance that she didn't notice the Grimmsblood climbing up her calves. With a grimace, she reached into it with her shadow and splashed it back into the pool. For a moment, it stuck fast to her skin – and then it was gone, and she let out a breath of relief.
As she felt the gaze settle upon her...she hoped. Obsidian? Did you find what you were seeking?
A pause. But just as her heart began to beat faster...Obsidian answered.
Yes. The information must be sorted...but much has been learned.
She smiled.
You have made progress towards satisfying a Curiosity.
Dream: Sea of Chaos acquired. The infinite mind of that which destroys. The endless crush of entropy upon the universe; the inevitable end of that which exists. The return of all things to the primordial sea of matter and radiation that created them. Once upon a time...that ancient thing did something it was not intended to do. Instead of destroying, it created. Instead of consuming, it gave birth. And it created its own perpetual machine, crafted in its own image as a simple proof: for that which has power, no law is absolute. [Obsidian has gained significant insight into the creation and destruction of matter via metaphysical means. Additionally, Obsidian has learned the 'name' and original purpose of the Grimm: the Entropy Engine, a perpetual motion machine that powers itself conceptually via destruction and death. Yet...the original prototype was weak. A proof of concept...]
You have advanced a skill. Ex Nihilo: D+ = C The ability to create physical objects from nothing. At this level, you can use magic to transform materials into other materials that you are familiar with. This process can be complex, depending on the input and output, and requires time and uninterrupted focus to perform. Additionally, you can "grow" materials from a sample of themselves, repairing items or increasing the quantity of materials. This, too, requires time and effort – compared to transmogrifying materials, it requires less time but additional effort and magic.