Author's Note:
Hello everyone! Here is the next chapter of Earth's Mightiest Huntsmen, and boy is this one a pivotal moment in the story. But before we get to the epic battles against the Grimm to come, let's answer some reviews!
triscythe59: Hard to say really. Salem is immortal, so she technically can't die. But nothing like Ghost Rider has ever been seen before on Remnant. I'd say odds are 50/50 at best.
SuperSaiyanFever: Hulk's probably not thrilled that he hasn't been seen in this story yet. Fortunately, his time to shine is swiftly approaching.
Blackmetalzane22: There are going to be some pretty big fights this chapter, including some nice callbacks to some of the earliest encounters Team RWBY and Team JNPR had with the Grimm. Hope you enjoy it!
Guest: Not really. I just needed a way for all of them to see what was down that tunnel, and since none of them really have flashlights with them, I was down to using either a flare arrow from Hawkeye or Weiss using fire with her weapon. And I wanted to give Hawkeye something to do.
Deathwing: To be fair, Salem wants to exterminate humanity. Ultron's goals are somewhat similar. But I will say this: plans have been made for Salem's Inner Circle.
eliza styczen: Wow, that's big list of characters. I can't promise all of them are still alive, but I can promise an update on Remnant's status somewhat soon.
Guest: Definitely have to agree with you there. Plus the official DC/RWBY crossovers have been...sort of hit or miss. Particularly the latest comic crossover, which I stopped reading long before it finished because it was just too bizarre.
Guest: Not exactly.
Guest: Deadpool is a tricky one to write for, especially with how to balance the character with his 4th wall breaking abilities and how much he should use them. So I can't promise anything with the Merc with the Mouth.
Ironchef13: Definitely don't have this story completely planned out, but I will say that Magneto is coming sooner than you think.
Guest: Knowing Wolverine, it probably has something to do with a bar.
Thank you all for your continued support, be it through reviewing this story, adding on to the story's TV Tropes page, or answering the ongoing poll on my profile to help me decide whether or not I should add one-shots/What If stories to this one. Now, let's get back to the action.
Grim Incursion—New York City—November 5th
Jaune tried to keep his nerves in check as he walked with the rest of his team and the small squad of Avengers that they were with. After the attack from the Nevermore, he had been put on edge, even more so than usual.
One of the best things about Earth was that its citizens didn't have to face the Grimm. Sure, they had to deal with supervillains, alien invasions, and the occasional threat from Doctor Doom, but at least they didn't have to fight monsters like the Grimm. Until now, at least.
His grip tightened on Crocea Mors. Truth be told, he hadn't really thought much about the Grimm since Ultron's attack. He was glad that they wouldn't have to deal with them as well as the android's minions. But now…now he wasn't so sure. It seemed fairly obvious that Ultron had something to do with the Grimm arriving on Earth. The question was how. How did he do it? Ruby had supposedly smashed the gem that had gotten them all off Remnant in the first place. How could Ultron have gotten the Grimm to Earth?
A hand was placed on his shoulder. Pyrrha. "Remember what I taught you," she advised him gently.
Jaune took a deep breath, slowly nodding his head. At the very least, he knew what he was fighting this time—and he was with his full team. It might have been a different world, but it was still just the Grimm. This was an enemy they could fight.
"I am detecting movement several blocks away," Vision reported.
"I'll fly over and check it out." Tony took off for the sky, flying off towards the disturbance.
"Be careful!" Jaune called after him.
Tony floated overhead over the area in question, observing everything for a few seconds before flying back to them group. "I found the Grimm!" he called down, floating above. "A bunch of those Beowolves you mentioned, and few other types."
"What kinds?" Pyrrha asked.
"I saw some bears mostly, and a few boars as well."
"The bears are Ursas," Ren explained. "Very big and very strong. The boars are Boarbatusks."
"There's a lot of all of them a few streets away," Tony reported. "I don't think they saw me though."
"Then we shall have the element of surprise to vanquish these monsters," Thor declared.
"If possible, I'd like to capture one alive," Hank spoke up. "We might be able to learn more about them."
"That's not a good idea," Pyrrha warned. "Grimm die off if they're in captivity for too long without being able to attack anyone, and when they die, their bodies evaporate."
"Pyrrha is right," Ren agreed. "I'm afraid you won't be able to get much information from Grimm remains."
"Let's move in closer," Tony decided, still hovering above. "We'll box them in, and take them all out."
Jaune suddenly spotted several different small objects rising up from behind the buildings in the distance. "Wait," he said, pointing in their direction. "Something's coming."
Tony swung around, focusing in on the incoming objects. "Looks like a bunch of giant wasps," he reported.
Team JNPR exchanged looks. "Lancers!" Nora yelled.
"Lancers?" Tony repeated. But it was at this point that the Lancers were upon him. Three of them fired their stingers straight at him, forcing him to swerve to avoid getting hit. He spun around and fired several repulsor blasts that knocked the first two Lancers out of the sky.
Vision and Thor instantly took off to assist Tony. Vision shot a laser beam that blasted through another Lancer, while Thor threw Mjolnir, which smashed through a fourth one, completely tearing it apart. "Have at thee, monsters!" he bellowed.
Nora whipped out Magnhild and fired a few shots to provide some cover fire. "Just like old times!" she yelled with a laugh as another Lancer fell from the sky, sparking with electricity.
"More trouble ahead!" Pyrrha pointed with Miló down the ruined street. Jaune turned to see that more of the Grimm had arrived, climbing over overturned cars and slinking out of the shadows. Beowolves. Ursas. Boarbatusks. And at the back of the pack, skittering into view, a Death Stalker.
"That's…a lot of Grimm," Jaune commented with a nervous chuckle.
"What's the plan, Jaune?" Nora asked.
Jaune raised Crocea Mors. "We fight."
Hank, who was positioned behind them, nodded. "Fighting sounds good right now." His body instantly began glowing and growing, until he was about the size of a small building.
Jaune clenched his jaw and planted his feet, staring straight the Grimm straight down. "Come on, JNPR!" he yelled. "Let's show these Grimm how much we've learned!"
Yang punched the Beowolf straight in the jaw, sending it flying back with an explosive force. It smashed into the subway tunnel before slumping to the ground, dissolving into black dust. She kept moving, extending her gauntlet blades and slicing through an Ursa before stabbing another Beowolf. Ruby did her best to keep up with her sister, slicing into another Ursa before blasting herself back to avoid getting swatted by a third.
As she flew back, Weiss sent a summoned Boarbatusk straight at the Ursa, which knocked to the ground long enough for Blake to swing her chain sickles into it, tearing off its arms. At the same time, Janet flew over them all, zapping with her stingers at any monster that came close to her. Unfortunately, these blasts didn't seem to be doing anything other than annoy the creatures.
As an Ursa attempted to swat the tiny Avenger out of the air, Steve threw his shield, which bounced off the Grimm's paw and pushed it back. He caught the shield as he lunged forward, slamming it into the Ursa so hard that he actually forced the beast back.
Natasha fired twin pistols at a pack of charging Boarbatusks. But the bullets didn't seem to do much to them as they ran straight at her. She cursed in Russian and fired a cable from her own gauntlets, launching up and swinging over them, throwing several small grenades down into the pack, blowing them apart.
A pack of seven Creeps sprinted into view, barely illuminated by the flames remaining from Clint's fire arrow. The archer himself was moving backwards, firing multiple more arrows that exploded on contact with the creatures. As they stumbled, T'Challa threw a series of Vibranium knives that dug deep into them, allowing Ruby to speed over with her Semblance and finish them off.
Yang let out a laugh as she beat down a Beowolf. "This isn't so hard! I thought you said these guys were dangerous!"
"Yang—behind you!" Ruby yelled.
Yang turned around just as a Boarbatusk charged at her, spinning at top speed like a wheel as it slammed it her. The force of the impact knocked her straight into a wall, cracking it significantly.
Yang lay still for a moment, but then got back up, cracking her neck. "That the best you got?" she asked, her eyes flashing red as she activated her Semblance. She kicked off the wall just as the Boarbatusk charged again, shooting into the ground to flip herself over the running beast, where she proceeded to shoot it again with one of her explosive rounds she had evidently gotten from the Guardians, which blew apart the creature almost instantly.
Ruby sighed with brief relief, only to nearly get surprised by another Beowolf, which she quickly dispatched with a slice of Crescent Rose and a few follow-up blasts that quickly caused it to die and dissolve.
Janet grunted in frustration as she flew overhead, shooting another barrage of energy blasts from her stingers. "My stingers aren't having any sort of effect!" she yelled.
Steve wrestled with another Ursa. "It seems like nothing short of high impact weapons can put these things down for good!" he agreed.
Weiss parried a claw strike from a Beowolf before jumping over a swinging tail of a Creep. "Little help here!" she called.
T'Challa charged over, leaping over two Boarbatusks and using his clawed hands to slash a Beowolf, picking it up and throwing it into the Creep before leaping onto the other Beowolf, slashing it repeatedly until Weiss was able to stab it in the chest, killing it instantly.
The amount of Grimm in the tunnel was lessening as the Avengers and Team RWBY cut them down. But despite this, the remaining creatures kept attacking with ravenous intent, trying to tear them to pieces. "These things just won't stop!" Clint yelled as he stabbed an arrow into an Ursa, before kicking off it to avoid getting smacked by it.
Blake swung her chain blades into this Ursa, cutting deeply into it repeatedly. "All the Grimm want is to kill humanity," she reminded him before dashing back to avoid a spinning Boarbatusk, leaving behind a shadowy vestige of herself behind. "They won't stop until they achieve that goal."
"Well, that's just great!" Janet complained, fluttering overhead. "Just how many of these guys are—" An Ursa, the last Grimm left, suddenly swatted her, knocking her straight into the wall. She slumped to the ground, slowly growing back to her normal size.
Steve threw his shield one final time, launching it with such force that it decapitated the Ursa. The head flew one way, the body fell to the ground, and both pieces soon dissolved into nothing.
"Well, at least we save time on cleaning up dead bodies," Clint quipped.
"Not the time, Clint." Steve ran over and checked on Janet, who was passed out on the floor. "Wasp needs medical attention."
"I'll get her back to the mansion," Clint offered.
Steve nodded in agreement. "Good. Widow, go with them. Keep them covered in case you run into any more trouble."
Natasha nodded and helped Clint lift Janet up. Together, the three of them went back down the way that they had come until they were out of sight.
"What about the rest of us?" Weiss asked.
Steve looked at the Remnantians. "Any chance that was the last of them?"
"Not likely," Blake admitted.
"Then we press on. We need to search these tunnels to ensure that we've take out every Grimm…in the…" Steve trailed off as T'Challa moved forward, his yellow eyes narrowing.
"What is it?" Ruby asked.
"There is something up ahead," T'Challa answered. "Something flowing through the connecting tunnel."
The rest of the group exchanged looks before following. As they walked, Ruby and Yang both took this brief moment of peace to reload their weapons. While the tunnel was dark aside from the last flickering embers of Clint's fire arrow, the other end had a faint, flickering light overhead.
T'Challa stopped at the edge of the tunnel. "There," he said, pointing down.
When Ruby saw what he had seen, her eyes widened in shock and horror. She had never seen anything like this before.
"What…is that?" Weiss breathed, her face pale.
The entire floor of the tunnel was covered in a thick black sludge of inky darkness that flowed even further down the tunnel, straight towards another staircase that led to the surface. Ruby could feel the pure malice and hatred coming from the sludge. But the color of this sludge…there was no doubt about what it was.
"It's…a river," Ruby realized. "A river of Grimm."
Jaune slashed into an Ursa, cutting it down in an instant. Next to him, Ren fired a flurry of shots at a few charging Boarbatusks. When these shots failed to do much damage to them, Pyrrha used her Semblance to pull a nearby dumpster in, smashing into the sides of the Boarbatusks and smashing them against the side of a thrift store.
"More incoming!" Jaune yelled. "Nora!"
"On it!" Nora took aim with Magnhild and fired several shock grenades at once, creating a perimeter that sent thousands of volts of electricity into more of the charging Grimm, causing many to back off in pain and a few to even explode.
The streets shook at Hank ran forward, batting aside Lancers and squishing Beowolves and Boarbatusks underfoot. Several of the Grimm leaped at him, biting at his feet and shins, but if the hero was feeling the pain, he wasn't showing it. He grabbed the burnt-out husk of a bus and threw it, smashing several more Grimm under it.
Above them, thunder roared and lightning crackled as Thor blasted more Lancers and arriving Nevermores with his lightning. Next to him flew Tony, who shot more repulsor blasts from his hands that took down a Nevermore's feathers as they shot at him. He then flew down to the ground, firing twin laser beams and a volley of missiles that incinerated another line of Grimm.
Vision punched a hand through one of the Lancers, killing it almost instantly. He then swung around and fired his forehead laser, cutting through three more hovering Lancers. As he did this, three other Lancers launched their harpoon stingers at him, each one digging straight into his body. The android grunted slightly, then phased his body through the harpoons, freeing himself. He then grabbed onto the harpoon stingers of all three Lancers and swung the creatures together before throwing them aside, where they were promptly pummeled by Thor's hammer.
Jaune kept his focus on the ground battle though—particularly at the Death Stalker, which was skittering its way towards his team. Hank tried to move in to intercept, but a trio of Nevermores swooped in, launching a volley of feathers that actually forced him to stumble back slightly, nearly trampling Pyrrha underfoot.
"We've got to take out that Death Stalker!" Jaune yelled.
Pyrrha closed her eyes and raised her hands. The street lamps around them began to creak and bend as she exerted her Semblance's dominance over them. She began to pull them up from the ground and then, with a grunt of effort, she threw them all like lances straight at the Death Stalker, which managed to bash several of them out of the way with its tail, but one still managed to knock it back several paces.
Jaune sprinted forward, whacking aside a Boarbatusk and ramming his sword through the maw of a Beowolf. Ren ran with him, flipping over the Beowolf's dying body and shooting and Ursa repeatedly with StormFlower until it was eventually whacked by Nora. Together the three of the, joined seconds later by Pyrrha, ran straight towards the Death Stalker.
Flashes of JNPR's fight with the Death Stalker on their first day at Beacon ran through Jaune's mind as he and the others charged. He looked back towards his team. "Like we did on the first day of school!" he ordered.
Nora gave him a snappy salute, grinning. "On it!" She fired multiple blasts at the giant monster. As it moved its pincers in to block the blasts and swing them in to attack, Jaune and Pyrrha raised their shields, deflecting the pincers off to the side. This allowed Ren to flip up and grab onto its golden stinger, which he proceeded to shoot repeatedly right on the joint.
Nora fired another few rounds from Magnhild, causing the Death Stalker to screech in pain while it still tried to shake Ren off. As it shook its pincers, trying to knock her aside, Pyrrha threw Miló, hitting the Death Stalker right in one of its beady red eyes. It let out another screech pain, swinging its tail around. Ren, losing his grip, quickly slid off, but landed well, skidding back several paces, but keeping his grip on his weapons and continuing to pelt the Death Stalker with darts.
Jaune looked at Pyrrha and nodded. Pyrrha threw her shield directly at the stinger joint, which was barely hanging on at this point. The shield cut through the joint, dropping the stinger straight onto the Death Stalker's head. It dropped to the ground hard, letting out another screech.
Nora laughed, running in and firing a shot from Magnhild as she converted it to its war hammer form. "Hammer time!" Her armor pulsed with electricity as she transferred it to her weapon before firing one final shot, which propelled her straight down onto the Death Stalker, slamming the head of her war hammer directly on the stinger. Lightning crackled from the impact, driving the stinger completely through the head and deep into the ground.
Jaune took a deep breath as he watched the Death Stalker's body disintegrate into nothing more than particles. This fight had been significantly easier than the first time his team had fought one of the giant scorpion Grimm—a clear sign of how much stronger they had gotten between then and now.
"Look out, Jaune!" Jaune whipped his head around at Pyrrha's voice just as the Boarbatusk ran into him. He flew back into Pyrrha, knocking them both to the ground. The Grimm ran at them again, but was instantly blasted down by Tony as he landed in front of them.
"You guys okay?" he asked.
Jaune got up, helping Pyrrha back to her feet. "We're fine."
Thor and Vision landed next. Though Vision had a few holes in his body from the Lancers' harpoons, neither Avenger looked worse for wear. "These abominations are quite persistent," the Asgardian grunted. "But at least they are easy to vanquish."
A low booming sound echoed throughout the buildings—a sound that appeared to be large footsteps getting closer and closer to their location. "You may want to take those words back, Thor," Tony suggested.
A large hulking shape appeared from behind a skyscraper. It was a giant, made out of what appeared to be broken vehicles and various metallic dumpsters and streetlamps. At the top of the giant, on what was presumably the head, was a bone white mask with red markings and a single yellow eye.
"Odin's beard," Thor breathed.
"What kind of a Grimm is that?" Tony asked in astonishment.
"It's a Geist," Ren realized. "It's possessing the vehicles to make up its body."
Hank, still much larger than normal, ran past the group. "Let's see it pick on someone its own size!" he boomed.
The Geist swung its car arm at him, decking him straight in the face. Hank went skidding back towards the heroes, shrinking back down to normal size as Vision caught him. "Not one of my better ideas," he admitted.
The Geist marched towards them, towering over them all. "This," Jaune thought with concern, "is not going to be easy."
"A river of Grimm?" Yang repeated with disbelief. "I thought these things were physical beings, not a pool of liquid."
"Evidently, they can be both," Blake noted.
"Then let's try not to fall into it," Weiss suggested.
"How do we clear this out?" Steve asked.
"I—" Ruby stammered. "I don't know." She was still trying to process the massive river of Grimm before her. How had something like this been able to form on Earth? Did Ultron literally transport the entire river here?
"I say we should just start shooting." Yang aimed her gauntlets straight at the river and fired a volley of rocket rounds straight into the inky blackness. Unfortunately, the explosions didn't seem to do anything to it.
"Not every plan involves punching and blowing up everything in sight, Yang," Steve told her.
"Well, what do you suggest?" Yang demanded to know.
"We're going to need some sort of concentrated energy blasts to vaporize all of this," he answered. "Iron Man or the Human Torch should be able to take care of it."
Suddenly, the river began to bubble slightly. "Something is happening," T'Challa warned.
As the group watched, a shape emerged from the Grimm river. Before they had even realized what was going on, a black snake head shot from the liquid, slamming into Blake and Wiess and knocking them back down the tunnel.
"It's a King Taijitu!" Ruby cried.
"Fall back!" Steve ordered, holding his shield up to block everyone else's retreat. The King Taijitu shot forward, ramming into the shield, but the Avenger held it back.
"Come on, guys!" Ruby helped Weiss and Blake back to their feet.
"Uh, Ruby?" Weiss pointed with Myrtenaster. Ruby turned around just in time to see Yang leaping up to attack the now fully formed King Taijitu, which had fully emerged from the Grimm river.
"Yang!" Ruby sprinted past Steve.
"Don't worry!" Yang called back. "I can handle an overgrown snake!"
"But Yang!" Ruby yelled. "It has—"
That was when the second, white head on the King Taijitu lashed out at the same moment Yang was preparing to fire a blast from Ember Celica. The sudden strike knocked her arm up, which fired the missile blast straight up into the top of the tunnel, causing rubble to begin to rain down. Ruby was barely able to tackle Yang in time to save her from getting crushed.
"Ruby!" Steve's shout was cut off as the tunnel behind her was sealed behind a ton of debris.
Ruby and Yang were now alone against the King Taijitu.
As Yang crawled back to her feet, the snake creature—apparently called a King Taijitu—slithered towards her and Ruby. She dusted her jacket free of rubble and cracked her knuckles. "You could've warned me that this thing had two heads!" she complained.
"Sorry!" Ruby apologized. "I forgot you didn't remember what the Grimm were like!" She slammed her scythe's point into the ground and fired several shots from it, which seemed to do little more than annoy the giant snake.
Yang grit her teeth in frustration. It was bad enough that she couldn't remember anything about her past. It was even worse when that information could've given her some sort of advantage. And she could tell that Ruby was frustrated with this problem as well. She couldn't explain how she knew, but she could see it in her face every time she missed some detail about what she had been through on Remnant.
But she shook her head free of those thoughts. She couldn't focus on what she couldn't remember. Not when there was a giant snake thing try to eat them both. "How do we kill this thing?!" she asked.
Ruby thought about it for a moment. "Okay—okay, I remember Ren saying how he killed a King Taijitu on the first day of school. I think he managed to take out the fangs and stab it with them. But if we just keep hitting it, we should be able to take it down."
The King Taijitu suddenly struck, wrapping its coils in a barrier around the two girls, trapping them from moving any further back or forward. Not that they had anywhere else to go, of course. The way back was blocked by debris, and the way forward was blocked by a river of Grimm. Both its heads then leered down at the two of them, hissing.
"Then let's send this thing out with a Yang!" Yang pounded her fists together, channeling more energy through her body due to her apparent Semblance. She then shot herself straight at the black head, punching it upside the jaw and knocking the head back slightly. The white head shot in, trying to bite at her, but Ruby was there, having also launched herself with both her weapon and her Semblance, slicing it across its nose.
The snake reared back, unfolding its coils slightly as the two landed back on the ground. Yang fired several more rocket blasts, raking explosions all around the King Taijitu's body. Ruby followed up by zipping onto its body and dragging her scythe down it, cutting as deep as she could into it.
The snake lurched, with the white head snapping at Ruby, forcing her off and back to the ground. As the black head shot down to attack her, Yang jumped in, grabbing both fangs and holding the jaw open. She grunted with effort, trying to keep the mouth open.
"Little help here!" she called.
"On it!" Ruby switched her weapon to its rifle mode and fired multiple blasts straight into the King Taijitu's mouth. It let out a hiss, moving back while the white head struck from the side, which Yang countered by blasting it straight in its eyes.
The coils curled back as the snake retreated. Seeing this, the sisters looked at each other and nodded. Yang, acting on instinct, ran at Ruby, who knelt down and placed her hands on the ground. When Yang reached them, Ruby boosted her up, launching Yang into the air. She twisted around, firing a shot that propelled her directly at the King Taijitu. She extended her gauntlet blade and slammed her fist directly into the top of the black head, stabbing it straight through the head and the jaw. The creature screeched again, but then slumped down, unmoving.
"Yes!" Yang cheered, wrenching her arm free from the head.
Ruby breathed a sigh of relief as Yang rejoined her. She noticed a smile on her face as she passed. "What?" she asked, turning around.
"Just…I missed this," Ruby admitted. "Fighting together. We still make a great team."
Yang returned the grin with one of her own, then remembered that she wouldn't be able to see it with her helmet on. "Yeah…I guess we do," she agreed. "When we were fighting, I felt this…connection with you."
Ruby's smile broadened. "Some things are just natural," she said. "Some bonds just can't be broken, no matter what. Even without your memories, we just…click."
Yang nodded. "I may not remember anything about our world, or the apparently really freaky monsters that inhabit it…but I do know that we're a good team."
Ruby smiled again. Yang opened her mouth to speak again, but suddenly froze. The white head of the King Taijitu was rising up again, opening its mouth and preparing to dart in to attack Ruby while her back was turned.
Yang didn't think. She just reacted. "RUBY!" she screamed, blasting herself forward with her gauntlet at the same time as the snake closed in.
Time seemed to slow down as she flew in. But Yang barely noticed. In one motion, she shoved Ruby to the ground. With another movement, she punched her right arm straight into the mouth of the King Taijitu as it bit down.
The first thing she heard was the retort of her gauntlet as it fired, blowing a hole straight out through the back of the head of the snake. But the first thing she felt was its fangs biting straight through her arm.
It all happened so fast. One moment, Yang was knocking her to the ground. The next, Ruby was watching in horror as the King Taijitu was biting through her arm, even as Ember Celica blew its head to bits.
As the white head collapsed to the ground, Yang screamed in agony, stumbling back and clutching the bleeding stump on her arm. "Yang!" Ruby caught her sister as she fell backwards.
Yang let out another cry of pain. Ruby started to panic, clutching her tightly. Flashes of her crumped form following their fight with Ultron ran through her head. "No, no, no!" she pleaded. "Not again—not again!"
Yang let out a ragged cough, reaching up with her remaining had to touch Ruby's face. "Ruby…" she breathed.
Ruby tore her goggles off her head and reached down gently, taking Yang's helmet off. "I'm here, Yang!" she exclaimed.
Yang let out another cough, her eyelids starting to droop. "Is it…dead?"
Ruby looked back over, seeing the entire body of the King Taijitu disintegrating. "Yeah," she croaked. "It's—it's dead."
Yang gave her a weak smile. "Nailed it…"
"Why?" Ruby choked. "Why did you do that for me?"
Yang brushed away a lock of Ruby's hair. "I've…always got your back, sis," she affirmed.
Another memory flashed in Ruby's mind—not of the death and destruction caused by Ultron's attack, but a different one. A memory of her crouched over Yang, who was sprawled against a tree. A memory of her sister putting a hand on her shoulder and saying the exact same line to her.
But Ruby barely had time to process this as Yang's head slumped to the side. She was unconscious—but if she didn't get medical help soon, she was—
A roaring sound drew Ruby's attention back to the river of black tar several yards away. More creatures of Grimm were emerging from it. Beowolves. Creeps. Boarbatusks. They were all growling and hissing, staring her down.
Ruby's heart began to pound. The Grimm were coming. Yang was down for the count. Dying. It was all…so much. Too much to comprehend.
She barely registered any of it at that point. Barely registered the Grimm approaching her. Barely registered the rubble behind her beginning to collapse as Steve, Weiss, Blake, and T'Challa finally managed to cut through it. Barely registered the robed, bald man floating behind all the Grimm, his gaze fixated on her.
None of that mattered to her as Ruby's head began to pound. She let out one final scream of desperation, anguish, and even a little bit of fear.
And then everything went white.
So...yeah, that happened.
Honestly, I'm sure all of y'all were predicting that Ruby's silver eyes would be unlocked at some point during this arc. But did you expect it would happen due to Yang losing her arm?
Now, I get it-the circumstances of Ruby's silver eyes going off aren't nearly as shocking as what happened in canon or in other stories like Hunters of Justice. But I still think it works out here-especially since Yang's got one arm left and is bleeding out in her arms. As for Yang losing her arm, well...it was bound to happen eventually. I decided to have it happen sooner rather than later just to get some more shock value from this chapter.
In terms of what Grimm I wanted to use for this chapter, the big, named creatures were obviously out, and I already mentioned before that I didn't want to use the Apathy quite yet. So I used a lot of basic types, including Beowolves, Boarbatusks, Ursas, Creeps, and Nevermores, and threw in the Lancers, Death Stalker, Geist, and King Taijitu for added flair. The Death Stalker fight in particular is to pay homage to Team JNPR's fight with the Death Stalker way back in Volume 1, though this time around the fight went much smoother due to how much the characters have improved...and due to the fact that they weren't fighting it in crumbling ruins with a giant Nevermore circling overhead.
The Geist fight is coming next chapter, and that will be the toughest one yet for the aboveground team. I based this one's design slightly off of the Petra Gigas from Volume 4, but with more urban pieces such as cars and dumpsters. And there's going to be a very fun moment between two characters that's been suggested/requested by many of you during that fight.
Next chapter finishes off not only this arc, but also what I like to call Act I of this story. That's right. Almost forty chapters in, and we're only about 20% of the way through this massive story. And boy do I have a surprise to end next chapter. Because if you thought the cameo I snuck in at the end of this chapter was shocking enough, just wait until you see who's showing up next time.
But anywho, that's all from me. Until next time, this is Guest 1138, signing off.