LoamyCoffee: Wow, this was a chapter. But first, the AN. Makes sense to me and Hamaknockers are people classified as troublemakers due to mischief or shenanigans caused by their playful nature.
Now, for the chapter. I think it's still funny that Jaune is the Robin of the story, I mean it hurts just a smidge that he keeps getting kicked while he's down but it's karmic. As for the Rotoms, Car Rotom is a little perv. The teasing is insane from Yang. Though her sharing suggestion was interesting, even if I don't think it'd happen.
Cat Girls? Trying to think of what series that could be, though could be OCs.

Re: What I can answer is the "cat girls" Ozpin asked for Jack's opinion about are not OCs. There's so many great stories out there I can make Cameos from that would mesh so-well with the World of Remnant, that I don't need to bog the story down with them, and I've left the barest of hints as to what Ozpin is really planning~
If you go over the previous chapter with a fine-toothed comb and are genre-savvy about old anime, I was actually quite blatantly obvious about one of the planned Crossovers in this Amalgam Universe. I wonder if anyone will piece it together~

Blaze1992: Oh Nora you never fail to make it funny.

Re: Yeah, Nora's such a free character in how she expresses herself, that I imagine she's the sort with no filter, which gives me lots of great dialogue opportunities to work with.

TM11: Why do I get the idea that you're sending Jack to the camp where the Cat Girl heroes from MHA trained class 1-A at?

Re: Good guess, but what Ozpin was alluding to was a little more obscure than that.
Not super obscure, but still kind of niche. And it isn't something I'm pulling out of my ass for a one-off, I've been planning this Cameo/Crossover for a while.
So no, it isn't the Wild Wild Pussycats from My Hero Academia.

*NEW WORLD*

Ozpin had seen many things across his many… many lives. Things that were wondrous, horrifying, breathtaking, and gut-wrenching in equal measure; and sometimes all four at-once.

Someone getting back up after having their heart circumcised?

That… was not one of them.

At least not under normal circumstances.

Ordinarily, Ozpin would've written the Faunus' concerns off until the next morning or let it fall onto someone else. But Jack's words delivered with such conviction, conviction only found in a man who had seen "too much" that couldn't be un-seen, had gotten to him like an earworm, and now he couldn't help but wonder… Was there a way for the "John Doe", Alumon, to get back to his feet even after getting their beating heart ripped out?

She could certainly take that kind of damage and get back up, but those were extenuating circumstances. Not the sort of power just anyone could get their hands on.

He hoped "just anyone" wouldn't be able to get their hands on that kind of immortality!

The world was bad-enough as it was without immortals making dynasties without end. At least when he did it, it barely counted since he wouldn't know who and where he'd reincarnate into until it'd already happened. It was trouble-enough passing down his Long Memory between incarnations like a baton; he couldn't imagine how-hard it would be passing the mantle of leadership. Hypothetically, a long-standing immortal could pose as their own son over and over again, but that would only work in the dark ages where most-everyone was illiterate and the masses would often never see the leadership. In the modern day with the advent of photography and the spread of information through the interweb, people weren't nearly that stupid.

That in of itself was part of why it was so-laborious rebuilding his wealth and influence from the ground up every time he died…

All of that idle musing aside, while Jack's fit of paranoia had taken root, he wasn't quick to think that this Alumon person was one of her minions. Not only was such a blatant and overt move not her style, but even if it was, she'd never cast aside a pawn so-formidable; at least if Weiss' testimony as to the man's strength was any indicator. Even without Aura, Jack was far from defenseless, and he'd supposedly pulled out all the stops to beat him; but even then it hadn't been a sure thing, and if Alumon was personally acquainted with Nicholas Schnee from the time he was a young man, that spoke volumes about the deceased man's possible breadth of experience.

And of course, Ozpin had no illusions that she was "the source of all evil" in the world; Jack Braxton and Weiss Schnee, either through some perceived fault of their own or that of their lineage, were just-as-capable of making enemies who would wish them harm completely independent of her involvement all on their own.

Jack, other than being a Faunus who made most Humans look weak and impotent by comparison, was descended, at least visually, of berserkers and saboteurs from the previous war; still a sore spot for many. Weiss Schnee represented a life that many envied but few knew the true burdens of, and her father's… questionable business practices, derived scorn from Faunus and Human alike from both ends of the socioeconomic spectrum.

Of course, once the two of them got out into the world, it wouldn't be long until they had a rap sheet of enemies all their own.

Such was the burden of power and influence in the modern age.

Alumon had no ID on him when he'd been pulled from the Emerald Forest, but hopefully, a thorough investigation into the man's identity, and those of his associates, would shed some light as to why Weiss Schnee was targeted. Unless of course, Weiss was just used as a proxy target to get to Jack, a story as old as time.

Though Ozpin Greene was an infinitely patient man, he didn't broker attacks on his students, on his own school grounds no less, lightly. Not after the mountain range of corpses he'd had to pile up to make it happen…!

Thanks to the wealth of influence he'd accumulated over his current lifetime, no-one made a move to stop Ozpin as he entered the moratorium's restricted areas. Nor did anyone question him when he said he wanted to peruse the body in private. Since the mortician had left for the day by the time the man's body had been brought in, the "John Doe" had yet to be processed, and since few willingly went around to see the corpses beyond the weirdos who had to be put on a watch list *cough*necrophilia*cough*, Ozpin was free to take his time.

Possibly, some obscure clue on the man's body or even his in affects could lead back to her, but it was just-as-likely the man's motivation was more Human in nature, be it his own or at the behest of a third party.

*NEW WORLD*

Elsewhile in the "Jack Braxton Suite"…

"So… I hear you missed your ride home~" Jack said to Arthur with a wry grin behind his breathing mask as he, Ruby, and Blake stood at his bedside. A ragged cough filling his breathing mask a second later, Ruby zipped to his bedside and fretted over him while Arthur moved to the foot of his bed and read his chart.

"Lindzei's sake…! How the hell are you still alive?!" Arthur gawped, eyes bugging out.

"Why? What's it say?" Ruby asked curiously.

The *WHAP!* of the clipboard as he slapped it to his chest spoke volumes.

"What, that bad?" Blake asked.

Arthur throwing it into the nearby closet was his answer.

"Okay then…" Blake hummed blinking her eyes.

"Hey Jack…" Ruby said with a small smile on her face as she stood next to him. "How're you feeling?"

"Could be better… Could be worse… You should see the other guy," Jack returned with a weak smile. "How about you? How was your day?"

"Oh, you know…" Ruby trailed off exchanging a significant look with Blake and Arthur. "Just another mission."

"Heh… Glad to hear things went better for you than me," Jack grinned before coughing up into his mask. "So you guys were Oz's errand girls, huh?"

"I'm a boy," Arthur huffed.

"And there were three girls, what's your point?"

"Yeah, Ozpin wanted us to check in on his friend who lives… lived, out of town," Ruby answered, growing somber before shaking her head. "Blake drove your car, it was loads of fun. I almost nodded off a few times, the ride was so smooth."

"You did nod off. I have the drool stains to show for it," Arthur hummed.

"Glad I gave Blake those driving lessons, then," Jack hummed.

"When'd you have time for driving lessons?" Ruby blinked.

"Yes, you're quite welcome," Blake replied, ignoring her. "Anyway, it's getting late, so we should probably get out of your hair. Is there anything you want to say to the two lovebirds before we go?" she asked causing Ruby to sputter indignantly.

"Arthur…" Jack said laying a massive hand upon the younger Faunus' shoulder, nearly causing his knees to buckle. "Don't do anything I would do, and definitely don't do anything I wouldn't do. There's a little gray area in there, and that's where you operate."

Arthur for his part could only blush a bright red as the deeper implications of the elder Faunus' words dawned on him. Ruby just had a glassy-eyed look with how confused she was by Jack's roundabout statement, and Blake got a good laugh out of it.

*NEW WORLD*

No matter how many lives Ozpin lived, moratoriums and graveyards continued to be a sobering sight for him.

While any death, premature or natural, was a tragedy, with the fall of those above and below Mountain Glenn being a scar he would carry for the rest of his eternal life, no matter how-long it lasted, he was always reminded of the "rest" he would be eternally denied. While he had spent lifetimes living in obscurity letting the world pass him by, or in the bottom of a bottle as the weight of a more-and-more impossible goal beat him down, those fits of pique against the Gods that had cursed him to such an unending existence were the bygone habits of a younger Immortal.

Nowadays, if the word "younger" could even be fitfully applied to an Immortal, most of his time was dedicated to his work.

In the past he'd had to rise to the top of the world's hierarchy in order to control anything, or more-specifically, everything; it was simply the only way anything could get done in a time period where illiteracy reigned supreme and metaphorical "power" rested in the hands of a select few. Nowadays, not only could he establish policy that could potentially transcend individual mortal lifetimes, but he could also ingrain a sense of duty and competence into others so that not only would he not have to micromanage others while living, but he could leave the running of the world to those he'd left behind as he was starting over in a new body from a new place with new circumstances. By equal measure, he strove to maintain a healthy work/life balance so as to maintain the health and sanity of his current host body, and as society advanced, that perilous balancing act only served to grow easier as new medicine and technologies, as well as advances in education, gave him more leeway to tend to his mortal lifespan.

The wall of stainless steel drawers and how clean they were kept, hinted at the dignity that the bodies held within were shown. Certainly, a pleasant change of pace from when bodies strewn across battlefields were not shown such niceties. The last war by far was one of the most-horrid.

True, conflicts between Human and Faunus had been going on since the two "tribes" first met and realized the other looked radically different from them, but the Faunus Rights Revolution had still been one of the most violent with its blend of modern firearms dropping countless bodies to the ground, and modern medical practices extending the fight longer than would've been done in the past.

He knew the culprits of course, those that did a good portion of Salem's work for her without ever realizing, but because their influence rivaled if not exceeded his own in some places, even if he did manage to unseat them, it ran the risk of upending the tenuous peace he'd spent lifetimes creating and maintaining.

Sometimes, the weight of the current world made him want to hit the reset button with rigorous alcohol poisoning and try again in a decade or two.

Shaking his head to dispel such thoughts, he turned his attention to the scrap paper in his hand telling him where the "John Doe" had been stashed.

Ozpin had seen thousands upon thousands of dead bodies in his existence, some intact, some mutilated beyond measure. Given Jack's reputation and what happened at White Chapel, it was amazing that anything of Alumon's body could've been brought back at all. At the very least, this means any investigative backtracking would be aided by the somewhat intact state of the man's body.

What Ozpin didn't expect to find when he opened the moratorium drawer, was a giant blood stain and no body to go with it.

"Oh dear…"

*NEW WORLD*

Elsewhile, back in the "Jack Braxton Suite"…

" . . . What am I looking at here?" Jack asked as Nora held up her Scroll for him to see, a video clip of Jaune getting his ass kicked by Weiss' diminished Dullahan playing in the dim lighting.

"A recording~ I recorded it, so you could fall asleep to it every night~" Nora replied with a grin.

" . . . Nice~" Jack nodded before coughing raggedly into his breathing mask.

"Here, you should probably drink this," Ren said pouring some water into a nearby glass and holding it up to the Faunus' lips as Nora lifted his mask. The Faunus drinking deeply, after two or three glasses of the stuff did his coughing begin to subside.

"So, where's Pyrrha? If anything, I thought she'd visit just to be courteous."

"Icing Jaune's spine," Ren answered.

"And it's incredible he actually has one of those," Nora nodded sagely.

"Hey, give the guy some credit. He did come clean of his own free will after all."

"That's not what happened!" Nora whined.

"Heeere we gooo…" Ren sighed, rolling his eyes.

"What?" Jack asked.

"Nora seems to think that Jaune had to relive the same day over and over again like the movie 'Groundhog Days', and it only seems like he came clean right-away to you because you don't remember all the past loops," Ren explained.

"And why does she remember?"

"Because during that recurring causal loop, supposedly, she happened to drink coffee and remain connected to her sum consciousness," Ren sighed.

"Hey, what do you mean 'supposedly'?! That explanation makes perfect sense!" Nora pouted. "The RA would totally agree with me on that one!"

"I'm sure he would," Ren hummed patting her head.

"So, you've been training Jaune up before going on a real mission?" Jack asked.

To tell the truth, he pretty much just gave Jaune that "100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats, and a 10 kilometer run" hokum to keep the guy out of his hair for a while.

Well, that, and you don't build a castle on sand, you build it on bedrock; a form of substructure Jaune completely lacked upon his arrival at Beacon.

For a guy who claimed to have wanted to become a Huntsman to honor the family legacy, he didn't seem too keen on putting in the work until whatever life-changing epiphany struck him.

"Yeah… He's making some progress, though he's far from an ideal candidate," Ren hummed. "Honestly, I think the team would be better served with you as the head. Wouldn't even have to change the name."

"J… N… P… R…" Nora hummed tracing the letters in the air. "J… N-P-R! Oh my gosh, you're right!"

"Well… revisionist timelines or not…" Jack said shooting Nora an understanding look, "at the very least he deserves some opportunity to earn your trust back."

"Hey… Jack?" Nora said somberly before going up to his bedside and wrapping her arms around his neck. "I'm glad you made it out of there in one piece."

"Heh, you should see the other guy," Jack chuckled, causing Nora to giggle giddily. "Huh, I didn't think it'd be that funny."

"It's not that," Nora giggled as she rubbed her face into his hair. "Your neck's just so big and beefy! It's like hugging a side of beef!"

"Well, that is typically what 'beefy' means," Ren chuckled patting his friend's back. "I assume this is Bishokuya-related?" he asked gesturing to his larger, more-muscular form.

"Yes and no," Jack said waggling his head. "I used Senjutsu to convert nutrients and energy into bone and muscle mass, but only after using Senjutsu to condense my body into a sleeker form."

"So then you're saying this is your… final, form~?" Nora giggled.

"Something like that," Jack hummed. "Once my wounds heal enough, I'll probably go back to my sleeker 'Summer Model'. That way I can fit through doors again."

"Hey, how did they get you in here?" Nora asked looking at the normal-sized doorway they'd entered.

"They used butter, but me-personally, I'm a fan of good ol' lard."

" . . . Its rather telling that I can't tell if you're joking or not…" Ren hummed aloud.

For Nora, steam billowed out of her ears and her brain short-circuited.

"Oh great, you broke her," Ren sighed.

"Hey, don't pin this on me, Mr. Pancake."

"Hey! Only I get to call him that!" Nora cried suddenly.

"Of course you do…" Jack sighed as Nora seemingly rebooted herself.

*NEW WORLD*

Elsewhile…

"What do you mean you couldn't find the body?" Gylnda asked irately, moments away from going to bed early the first time in a long, long time after managing to finish her work early for the day, only for Ozpin's call to drag her away from a soft pillow and an even softer duvet.

"What I mean is, I opened the drawer in the morgue, and the body Port, Oobleck, and Peach recovered from the Emerald Forest isn't there."

"Are you sure you checked the right drawer?" she asked tiredly, feeling like she were talking to a child who'd replaced their toy. "Did you maybe read the number wrong?"

"Glynda, I checked all of the drawers. The 'John Doe', Alumon, isn't in any of them."

"Well it has to be in the morgue somewhere," she said tiredly, sorely tempted to just 'fuck off' and leave the logistical work to Ozpin for a change. "It isn't like a dead body can just get up and walk away or anything…!"

" . . . "

"Ozpin…!" she growled in response to that tense, knowing silence.

" . . . "

"What aren't you telling me…?" she asked irately.

" . . . "

"Ozpin, you answer me, or I swear to god…!"

*NEW WORLD*

Meanwhile, at the edge of Beacon Academy grounds in one of the sub-basements of one Dr. Franken Stein, Beacon's resident "mad scientist" loomed over the body he had discretely relocated from the moratorium to his own laboratory. Personally, he didn't care as to why the altercation between the man on his laboratory slab and two of Ozpin's potential guilt-slaves occurred, but there were certain questions that required answering that never could be if a certain someone got their hands on the body.

Hopefully, the "John Doe" wouldn't make him work harder for those answers any more than was wholly necessary.

"Get up, I know you're faking," Dr. Stein said as he nursed an unlit cigarette. "Lord Death hasn't punched your card yet, but that doesn't mean I can't have a little… fun, in the meantime~" he said with a manic glint in his eye as he held up a scalpel and poised himself over the man's still form.

"Ah, Dr. Franken Stein," Alumon croaked out, cracking an eye open. "Your reputation precedes you."

Bereft of his crimson devil-themed mask, Alumon was a possessor of strong, extremely masculine features that were at peak-desirability during the medieval period. His hair, bone white and cropped short, crowned a face marred by the scars of three claw marks running diagonally across his face from his left temple to the right of his jaw. He was the definition of rugged, and derived of his affects, his body was clearly one honed by decades of hard work, muscles shifting like tectonic plates as he moved. He had the scars to show for it, including but not limited to a large sunburst on his chest.

"I'd say the same about you, but I only know of your reputation, by reputation," Dr. Stein replied as he set the cutting implement back down on his tray. "I've examined Immortals before; yours is derived from Blood Magic, an ancient and forbidden art that few know of today, and fewer still practice," he said slowly turning the bolt in his head. "That just leaves the next question in my mind. Why provoke Jack Braxton like that? Blood Magic or no, unless you knew you'd regenerate your heart, that 'heart circumcision' could've easily killed you for certain."

An Immortal was only "immortal" until something managed to kill them, after all. Ozpin, by and large, could only be considered immortal as long as you put big quotation marks around it. [Reincarnation] aside, and he was just-as-mortal as anyone else.

"Perhaps, but it was a risk worth taking to lay the cornerstone of the bulwark to pen in the False Shepard."

"Really? The 'False Shepard'?" Dr. Stein asked aloud. "I just call him 'The Lich'."

"I've fought Liches before. Comparing Ozma to them would be an insult to the undead," Alumon spat as he sat up, the sunburst of his chest glowing with dark magic as the scar tissue slowly vanished at the edges.

"And you know his true name," Dr. Stein hummed with a glint in his eyes as he ceased ratchetting the bolt in his head. "That's a rare piece of knowledge you have there. One that few are privy to."

"You're one of those select few yourself, I see," Alumon returned, throwing his legs over the side of the bed before putting his weight on them, staggering slightly before making his way over to his effects, which sat folded in a pile off to the side, alongside his weapons.

"If you're going to leave, could you wait until the Witching Hour?" Dr. Stein asked tiredly. "Someone from the morgue will notice the missing cadaver eventually, and if you're seen moving about the school grounds, you're likely to cause a panic."

"Hah. I walked the grounds of this keep back when it was still young," Alumon chuffed as he began to clothe himself. "If I'm seen, it's because I'll want to be seen."

"Good to know," Stein hummed as he slowly ratchetted his head-bolt again. "Though I feel the need to ask you something personal."

"You were my host as I recovered. You're owed the hospitality."

"I and others before me have followed your work. You've been Immortal for a long time, longer than most before their hubris got the better of them, so I have to wonder… What did the 'False Shepard' ever do to make you hound him so thoroughly?" he asked rolling the nickname across his tongue.

"Do you truly wish to know?"

"I don't ask questions I don't want the answer to; no matter how-unpleasant those answers might be."

" . . . The answer is quite simple," Alumon said in turn. "I need to bring him to task for what he has done."

"Uuugh! What did he do this time?" Dr. Stein groaned irritably raking his fingers through his hair.

All in all, it seemed like Ozma caused more problems than he actually solved…

"He stole the body of my comrade, and the culmination of his life's work on top of it," Alumon growled angrily. "He'd have stolen the body of a child if he could've, used her up until there was nothing left, but Knolan sacrificed himself for her, kept the False Shepard from gaining control of him long-enough to make him pay for his temerity."

"Oh, now this sounds exciting~" Dr. Stein said with a manic grin. "What happened next?"

" . . . I don't know how he did it, but Ozma managed to spirit away the secret to Time Warp from under both our noses. So as payback, Knolan made it so Ozma would never be able to possess Gully, nor would he be able to coerce her kin into participating in his crusade. For all his alleged power, the bloodline of Aramus is shrouded from him, never to be a part of this damned night war."

"But aren't you worried about them becoming pawns of 'that woman'?"

"No. They're shrouded from her notice as well. I hope the bloodline of Aramus will know peace, at least for as long as I live."

"Which, for an Immortal could either be very long, or as short as another five minutes," Dr. Stein said with a roll of his wrist. A moment later something flew his way, the mad doctor snatching it out of the air. "What's this?" he asked looking down at the ordinary-looking journal tossed his way; it was red like blood, a simple cross pressed into the cover, and no other ornamentation.

"My Death Note," Alumon chuckled as though he were telling a good joke. "You're clever and sensible-enough not to leave the world's future in the hands of the False Shepard, so I'll have you be custodian of my 'memoir' until you're certain Jack is ready to receive it."

"You want to turn him against one of the most-powerful men in the world?" Stein asked with a raised brow.

"Not in as many words, and Ozma is only 'one of the most-powerful men in the world' as long as he inhabits his current body," Alumon said frankly as he patted himself down, taking stock of what had been left behind in the Emerald Forest. "I simply want him to be armed with the knowledge to make an informed choice about his future. So that he can create a path to the future that the False Shepard would sooner destroy."

"And you don't see fit to wait a little longer before you leave?" Stein asked looking at the hanging clock on the nearby wall, which like most things he owned had a stitch-mark pattern going across it.

"No, I don't," Alumon said as he made his way to the stairs. "After all… There's no rest for the wicked."

*NEW WORLD*

AN:
Originally this chapter was going to be attached to the end of the previous, but I felt like it would've taken away from the good-enough ending to be found there, as well as made the chapter drag on longer than it should've.

To those that it wasn't made abundantly obvious before (like maybe by the Reply in the FanMail segment), Alulmon, as well as the other names he referenced, are all characters from the game Battle Chasers: Nightwar, based on the 90s comic series prefixed of the same name. I never read Battle Chasers when it first came out, I was more into trading cards than comic books, but after playing the game (a follow-up to the comics made by a Kickstarter campaign) I couldn't help but read it and fall in love with the diverse and unique characters and world building all over again.

Battle Chasers is actually where I drew inspiration from for the progression of Airship technology in Remnant, on top of An Aeronaut's Windlass by Jim Butcher; but that's a separate matter altogether.

In addition, I decided to address some of the "nuance" surrounding Ozpin's own form of Immortality (which compared to the many other forms of [Immortality] is actually quite weak, and completely useless against other Immortals), the way he runs the world from the shadows, and how this could rub others the wrong way. Especially when other Immortals tend to have long memories.

As thought-provoking as I hope for this to be, I hope to get some good Reviews out of this to go over next time!