A Wicked Game

by RandomPeon

When stuck into a rigged game, the best option was to not play and change the game. Now reincarnated as Torchwick's son, I faced a cruel game in which the other player, Salem, couldn't lose. Thus, time to play a different game. First fic, SI, partial Yu-Gi-Oh crossover, because the mc can't help himself.

2. Tutorial

Second chapter is out. Those of you who read the first chapter on the first day it was out might have noticed the story's name had changed. That's because I'm dumb and accidentaly put the name of the chapter as the story's name and only noticed later during the day.

Just like last time, RWBY doesn't belong to me, but to Rooster Teeth and is the creation of Monty Oum. Rest in peace, Monty.

---

It had been three weeks since I had my semblance unlocked.

We passed these three weeks experimenting with my semblance, doing everything we could to work out its finer details, while dad searched for a safe source of xp.

My semblance, which I will simply call the 'Game' from now on, could manifest on any reflective surface. Mirrors; sis' semblance; a scroll or computer's screen, preferably closed. Heck, it even worked on the shower's pommel, although it was a pain to see anything and find the Close Menu option. That was another thing with the Game. Once I open it on a surface I needed to close it, otherwise I was locked on said surface and couldn't open the Game anywhere else until it was closed.

Also, once I opened the Game it responded to others touch, meaning that if I somehow lost my scroll after I opened the Game, any random passerby could just look around in my soul.

Wasn't that a reassuring thought?

Also, the Game ate loads of energy from my aura. When it was closed, I regenerate my aura just fine, if several times slower than most people. But when it was open, the aura it took overtime was more than what I regenerated, causing a net loss.

Satisfyingly enough, the book dad gave me for my birthday covered this aspect of aura and semblances.

Active semblances, like Blake's for example, drew energy out of their user's aura when used and none when not used. However, someone like Qrow on the other hand had a passive semblance, which were semblances that were always on and couldn't be turned off. Those ones constantly drained their user's aura, reducing the speed at which their aura regenerated.

So Blake only spent aura when making a clone and regenerated her aura faster than someone with a passive semblance like Qrow.

My semblance on the other hand, was the worst of both worlds. When closed, the Game drained so much of my aura that instead of regenerating completely in a mere six hours, like those with active semblance did, it takes me almost a full day. 22 hours and 12 minutes to be precise.

Fun fact: the guy with the most aura consuming passive semblance alive regenerated his entire aura in around 15 hours. I was literally the world record of the most draining passive semblance.

If we discounted that one kid who died because his passive semblance drained his aura faster than it could regenerate, continuing even when it was empty and presumably drained his very soul. Talk about drawing the short stick.

Anyway. While the Game slowed down my aura regeneration by a lot when closed, that was nothing when compared to when it was open. We timed it and found my aura was emptied after only an hour. I closed the game before I was completely out of aura, so we didn't know if it then forcibly closed or if it would kill me like with the previously mentioned kid.

Dad didn't want to take the risk to find out the hard way. I didn't either, so we decided to assume the worst case scenario and just avoid me opening the Game when I was low on aura.

My semblance kind of sucked, to be honest. It was able to kill me in two different ways. Why did I have to deal with something like this?

We also tested the empty crystals left behind by the soul fragment. It could change size, either getting smaller if I pressed on two opposing sides with my hands or getting larger if I pulled instead. The best part was that the crystals were their own pocket dimensions. I could put an object, and only one at a time, in it and I was the only one who could access it. The object had to be roughly the same size or smaller than the crystal when I put it in, but afterward I could shrink it as much as I want.

We also experimented with how it might interact with the rest of the Game and discovered that I could put it inside the game and take it back whenever I wanted. It would still be there when I reopened the game later, whether it was the same surface or not.

Further testing also showed that cold milk was still cold and fresh after having passed several days inside and another test with a toast had it still hot after a few hours, showing that whatever was inside the crystal's pocket dimension was frozen in time. Or stayed preserved as the same it was when put inside it. Tomato, tomahto.

It didn't work with living things, unfortunately. We took a mouse and tested the pocket dimension, but the little rodent came out of it dead. The body showed no sign of damage to indicate the cause of death. Presumably, a human would yield the same result, we haven't tried. We didn't intend to either.

I did start to hear squeaking when the Game was open since then, though... Was I being haunted by a dead mouse?

Oh! We found the soul fragment that was at the Two Brothers' church too. Which meant I got another 500 aura, a second hammerspace slot and a new feature. I could now upload and download stuff in and out of the Archive. By the way, the Archive also had the option to translate text and audio into any language I knew, so I could translate them into valean.

Of course if I wanted to upload a copy of anything out of the Archive, I had to open the Game on either my scroll or a computer's screen because a mirror didn't have a memory card to take in information.

A thought: if the Game turned my soul into a program and data, and could take data in or out of my soul, could the Download functionality be able to do the same with another soul?

Did I have the soul transferring machine Ozpin and Ironwood wanted to use for the fall maiden's power built-in in my semblance? Well, not that I could use it without killing someone. I might be able to take Penny's soul and transfer it into another robot body, but apart from that it was way too risky for anyone else.

That being said, I uploaded a copy of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, translated to valean of course, into my scroll. Then I send it to myself in a e-mail, so that in case someone tried to steal it and pass it as their intellectual property, I'd have proof. I tried to make contract with an animation studio but when they looked at the first few episodes they send back a message saying that it was too violent and they could only publish the anime if they heavily censored the violence.

They also wanted to completely change the story to make it more family friendly. Turning it into a slice-of-life anime with Jonathan and Dio as genuine best friends.

No thanks! I wasn't changing a masterpiece like JJBA.

I then looked into Vale's law concerning televised series. Turned out the problem was not so much the studio, but the law. The council kinda went ham on the laws restricting the entertainment industry. Any stories that showed anything but black and white morality were to be rated T, at the very least. E rating had to have the protagonists being very good people, very heroic and all, and the bad guys (almost exclusively Grimm, if humans or faunus they tended to be more along the lines of comedic villains, like team Rocket) were always easily defeated and never an actual threat. Because God forbid they portrayed the Grimm as anything resembling a threat or showed that people could be bad. That might scare people and attract more Grimm to the city.

To put things in perspective, Ocarina of Time was rated E on Earth and was commonly considered a children's game. How it got away with this rating, even on Earth, was a mystery (redeads, Dead Hand... everything about the shadow temple?), but on Remnant that game would have been rated M, no question about it.

The worst part was that there was no difference in the frequency of Grimm attacks following the implementation of the council's overzealous restrictions, so as far as anyone could tell, it was completely unecessary. Good thing Vale won the Great War to preserve arts and self-expression, right? Looking at the council from a few decades after the conflict to today, one could almost wonder who actually won.

Oh well, corrupt politicians were corrupt politicians. Some thing just never changed.

Anyway, it turned out the studio I initially contacted didn't do M-rated material, hence why that was a bust. But even then, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure was too much for Vale's laws, so I had no choice but to pick another license. Unfortunate.

So I contacted a few others studios, those that were somewhat infamous for producing 'edgier' content and went with Yu-Gi-Oh! this time. If I couldn't have people recognize jojokes, I was at least going to import my favorite card game. I was still waiting to see if one of them would accept.

I sighed. The only thing left to test was the xp points. Dad absolutely refused to let me fight Grimm. What he did instead was finding an underground fighting ring and have Neo empty the ring's building while we waited outside.

Hence why Dad and I were just waiting, in the middle of the night, in front of a disaffected usine on the edge of the city, close to the Everfall forest. This gang captured Grimm for their illegal fight club, since these Grimm were held immobile by steel they were not much of a treat, making them free xp. Once Neo knocked out all members of the gang it would be safe for me to enter the building and just stab whatever caged Grimm there.

After a few more minutes, dad's scroll beeped. Dad opened his scroll and frowned.

That was not reassuring. "Is there a problem?"

"There shouldn't be. Neo finished cleaning the place, it's time for us to enter. Do stay close to me though."

I nodded and followed him. Sis opened the backdoor of the factory, smiling as if she hadn't just killed dozens of people.

I didn't buy the 'knocked off' excuse dad gave me, not even for a second. For one, letting dangerous criminals live after kicking their asses and destroying their 'merchandise' was bound to come back and bite us in the ass in the future and both dad and sis are too pragmatic for that.

Then there are the bits of blood on sis' clothes. I saw that. Even if it was just a few drops, it was still very visible on her white clothes.

Considering the lack of corpses, sis must have hid them before we entered. That or she led them elsewhere and killed them in a room that was not on our way.

The old factory was pretty clean, the criminal gang having turned it into their living space after getting rid of all the industrial machines. Except for the biggest room, the one where the mass produced goods used to be fabricated, which had part of it dug out and turned into a fighting pit. They even made underground tunnels to transport the Grimm to the arena without risk. Couldn't these guys have just found a normal job? It would have taken less effort and been less risky, on top of not having the police after their butts.

We walked past neutralized (probably by sis) automatic turrets all pointing toward a door inside the building. If they put that much money into making sure the captured Grimm wouldn't escape and kill them then there couldn't be that much left to pay around a hundred people. Why did this gang even exist? What was their purpose, risk their lives and work hard for the same amount of money a real job would have given them? Maybe the highers up of the gang made loads of money, but I didn't understand the goons' decision to enter such a group. What was the bloody point?

We opened the door to find a big room full of steel cages. The Grimm inside these cages might have been trying to break their prison and escape, but shackles kept them firmly in places. Easy pickings for anyone looking for exp (me.) I couldn't wait to level up.

We approached one of the cages, containing a Beowolf, I swallowed out of nervousness when the evil beast's eyes turned toward me. I'd probably have stepped back if it was not for it being completely immobilised and having dad and big sis with me.

"I have to hand it to them," Dad said, "they sure know how to immobilise Grimm."

Yeah, these Grimm really couldn't do anything. All I haved to do was stab them.

"How did they keep so many Grimm?" I asked.

There were around... forty Grimm? Grimm were notorious for dying quickly in captivity, to have such a high number in cages at the same time, how did a bunch of thugs in leather managed that?

"That's the thing," dad answered with a cocky grin, "they didn't keep them, they freshly captured them. They usually host small events but when they plan to make a big one, they capture a bunch of Grimm right before the fights. These ones where supposed to be used tomorrow's night, that's why I choose today to act. We have lots of subject to test your semblance."

That made sense. I thought the gang found a way to preserve captive Grimm but they just captured them at the last minute.

Not interested in the criminals' methods anymore, I drew my cane-sword from its sheath and stabbed the defenceless Beowolf through its eye, piercing the brain...

Did Grimm even have brains? Nobody managed to dissect one before they evaporated. We actually had no idea if they had internal organs or anything other than black smoke, blood, etc. They died as if they had them though, so piercing a Grimm's head was a guaranteed kill.

After the dead Beowolf dissolved I took my scroll and waited for the Game to open.

You killed 1 beowolf. 3 XP.

That was it? I still needed over a thousand xp to level up!

Let's see... divided by 3, that made over 333 Beowolf to kill to level up. And I lowballed it by a lot...

That was completely ridiculous!

If I killed an entire pack of Beowolf every night, which I was not strong enough to do yet, it'd still take me... uh, it'd take around two weeks to level up. That wasn't actually as bad as I thought.

Or it wouldn't be if I was able to kill thirty Beowolves without getting myself killed.

"Oh, this is going to be... problematic." Dad said after looking at the screen and having come to the same conclusion as me.

'See the bright side of things.' Sis' showed with a sign post made from her semblance.

"What bright side? It'll teach me patience?" I didn't need patience, I needed a kill-Cinder button.

'Nah, you'll be my cute and defenceless baby brother for ages. You're adorable with twin tails.'

I shuddered. I woke up with stupid haircuts and makeup in the past. Jaune, I have learned much more of your sufferings than I'd ever wanted to.

At least now sis couldn't do that in my sleep anymore. Not that it would stop her.

"I'll pass." I said without hesitation, to which sis' smile only grew.

"Enough you two," dad said, "we don't have much time. Gem, you still have Grimm to kill."

Right, might as well take all the xp I can. I walked to another cages and stabbed the Beowolf inside.

Then another beowolf. Stab

Beowolf. Stab.

Beowolf. Stab.

Beowolf. Stab.

Beowolf. Stab.

Beowolf. Stab.

Beowolf. Stab.

Ooh, Alpha Beowolf... Stab.

Three boarbatusks. Stab. Stab.

Five ursas, including a major. Stab. Stab. Stabbity. Stabby. Stab.

Stab. Stab. Stab. Stab. Stab. Stab the beowolves.

Another Alpha. Stab.

There were lots of stabbing that night, it was pretty relaxing.

...I didn't mean to sound like a psycopath.

Stab. Stab. Stab. St... Oh my freaking God! Was that a Beringel!?

How did these guys managed to beat a Grimm that powerful, let alone capture it? How did they even survive that?

"Holy... right, that explain why." Dad said when saw the beast.

Sis' mouth took a 'o' shape and she actually winced when she noticed that the Beringel's shackles were bent.

Neo, the strongest person I knew, winced at the thought of fighting that monster.

If it finishes breaking its shackles, the cage will be nothing to it. Then... then we were all dead.

"Gem, if you don't kill that thing now, I will." Dad said.

I didn't lose a moment before raising my sword.

"ROOOAAAAAAAARRRR!" The monster screamed as I was about to kill it. It was not enraged at dying, but at not being able to shed our blood before its own demise.

Stab.

I was going to scream too if it didn't give me more xp than a beowolf. I looked back at my scroll.

You killed 19 beowolves. 57 xp.

You killed 11 beowolves. 44 xp.

You killed 2 alpha beowolves. 16 xp.

You killed 3 boarbatusks. 24 xp.

You killed an ursa. 6 xp.

You killed an ursa. 7 xp.

You killed an ursa. 8 xp.

You killed an ursa major. 25 xp.

You killed a beringel. 64 xp.

Hmm. There were Beowolves that were slightly bigger than the others. So the older they are, the more xp they gave. As it should since Grimm got gradually stronger as they aged.

They didn't stay all at the same level and suddenly pop into an upgraded version... As it was, stealth killing solitary Grimm seemed to be the only chance I had at farming xp. On the condition that I upgraded my stealth.

I still thought it was bullshit that I only got 64 xp from a flipping Beringel. In any balanced game, killing an ennemy multiple time stronger than you would at least give you a full level up, maybe even two or three more level. Not less than a tenth of your current low level.

I sighed. There was nothing I could do about the stupidly low amount of xp I got. Let's see, tonight I won a total of 254 xp which put me at a total of... of...

I looked at my stats.

Name: Gemini Alexandrite Torchwick

Level: 16

Exp: 728/1600

Age: 12

Sex: Male

Aura: 6000/6000 (60%)

Stamina: 440/440

Strength: 14(34)

Constitution: 14(34)

Dexterity: 28(48)

Agility: 28

Intelligence: 128

Skill Points: 3

I now had a little less than 900 xp left to level up. If I managed to gain as much xp as tonight... No, let's not fall to the planning fallacy. When I'll get regular killing of grimm, let's plan more for around... err... 50 xp per day? That would take almost 18 days to level up. I still had three more years before the start of canon events. I'd like to calculate how many levels I could get until then, but the amount of xp needed was almost guaranteed to increase as my level do and I didn't know yet at what rate it will increase.

I did think it will take me one more... planning fallacy, right... two or three more levels, maybe four, to have enough dexterity to avoid detection. Finding enough Gri-

"Alright," dad interrupted my train of thought. "We should not waste too much time here. It's time to go."

I followed dad and sis outside. As we quit the street under the cover of sis' semblance, we saw police cars pass by us and go toward the old factory.

"What are the police doing here?" I asked.

Dad grinned. "I gave them an anonymous call so that they'd come arrest the knocked out members of the gang."

I was surprised to learn sis left them alive. "I thought sis killed them and you just didn't want to tell me?"

"What!? No!" Dad exclaimed. "Killing so many people would end up with the police heavily investigating us. These guys may have been criminals, but murder is murder and the police wouldn't have taken so many death lightly. Neo's job was to knock them out and lock them in a room so they couldn't run away, even if they woke up, before the police arrived. As it is, the cops will suspect a vigilante huntsman or something. They will give a token effort of investigating the events of tonight because vigilantism is still illegal but apart from that, they won't really bother and just take the gift for what it seems."

Oh, that... was actually more pragmatic than killing them would have been.

"Wait, but what about Neo? Wouldn't the thugs remember what she look like and try to find her to take revenge?"

Both of them deadpanned at me when I said that.

"Did you forget about Neo's semblance already?" Dad said, while sis used her semblance to disguise herself into a tiny old man.

Right. Now I felt dumb. "And the blood on sis' clothes?"

'Hey, just because I knocked them out doesn't mean there weren't a few broken noses.' Neo answered with a large sign post.

Nevermind then. But I still had a question to ask.

"Dad, why did you frown when you received sis' message?"

"You still remember that? It's just that Neo reported that there were only around thirty people inside the factory, we weren't sure where the other two thirds of the gang was and half expected an ambush. I only understood that the missing members were likely dead when I saw the bBeringel."

It was kind of a false alert then?

But why would they go after a Beringel if they weren't strong enough to survive it? Ah, wait. They probably didn't. Now that I thought about it, it was probably the beringel who went after them. There's none of them close to Vale but sometimes a strong grimm managed to cross the mountain chain protecting the kingdom. When it happened, a team of huntsmen are deployed to take care of the threat before it cause actual damage. It was just the gang's luck that the Beringel met them first while they were capturing Grimm. They were at the wrong place at the wrong time.

Oh well, better them than innocent civilians. In a way, that Beringel did a service to the law abiding citizens of Vale.

/-/

After our little raid, dad took sis and I to a clearing not far away from the city.

During a few hours, every two days, sis would break the limbs of the Grimm we met while dad stood close to me, guarding me from the Grimm who had the bright idea of attacking me instead of sis. It was usually the alphas, who noticed dad and I staying away from the fight and seemed to think it meant we were weaker, they promptly learned that dad was just as capable of immobilizing them.

All I had to do was stab the Grimm once they didn't have functioning limbs anymore. I'd have pitied them if they weren't monsters of darkness hell-bent on killing as much humans as possible.

Since weak Grimm were absolutely everywhere outside the walls of Vale, I could get three or four beowolves' pack worth of xp. This gave me an average of 244 xp per expedition. Or 122 xp per day.

It took eight days to level up. Thanks God I had years before Cinder's showed up.

Now being level 17, leveling up will now take 1700 xp.

I believed it safe to think it will continue to raise by 100 for every level. That was around three more Beowolf packs to kill every level. This was going to rack up pretty quick.

Once we were finished with killing Grimm for the day we got in the bullhead and flew back to Vale. I took my scroll and opened the Game, eager to finally raise my stats.

Name: Gemini Alexandrite Torchwick

Level: 17

Exp: 6/1700

Age: 12

Sex: Male

Aura: 6000/6000 (60%)

Stamina: 440/440

Strength: 14(34) +

Constitution: 14(34) +

Dexterity: 28(48) +

Agility: 28 +

Intelligence: 128 +

Skill Points: 3

Let's see, I needed more Dexterity to be able to stealth kill Grimm on my own but I couldn't just let all others stats as they were. Constitution was the one I need the least, its main purpose being to raise my stamina, but I first needed to be able to beat the Grimm before I extended how long I could fight them. I couldn't raise my Intelligence without killing myself either(which was still stupid,) so that was a bust too.

Honestly, with the boost in Strength and Constitution I got from aura, I mostly needed to raise my dexterity and Agility to go with dad and sis' training. Though I guessed I still needed to boost my Strength since my speed depended on it too.

I decided to raise my Agility later, as it wasn't what I needed the most right now, and I tapped the plus sign once for Strength and four times for Dexterity.

When I distributed the fifth and final point to my stat, the screen changed.

These changes are irreversible. Do you confirm?

Yes/No

I tapped yes. Then, I fell to the ground and for the next minutes, I screamed in pain on the bullhead's floor as I felt what should have been weeks of training happens in mere minutes.

I felt my muscles tear apart as they expanded, healed and reinforced themselves several times over. The feeling of sore muscles after a workout, usually satisfying to feel, was now unbearable. But the worse were my nerves. The rapid growth of my nervous system, which the human body wasn't designed to develop so quickly, felt like it was replaced by liquid fire as I felt it burn everywhere.

It hurt the most on my face, where I felt tears flowing down from my eyes, further stressing my already over stimulated nerves. The pain receptors sent constant signals which caused more tears, making me cry even more from the pain. The horrible loop fed itself without pause and I could only suffer until my semblance finished its work.

There had been a point, at the beginning of this torture, where I felt hands touch me. But dad and sis let go of me when it only made me scream louder, their touch having the same effect on my nerves as the tears did. I heard dad shout too, but because of the pain, I couldn't understand what he said.

I could do nothing but suffer, wishing it would just stop. Meanwhile, they could do nothing but watch until it ended.

I hated my semblance.

I. Hated. It. So. Flippin'. Much.

Squeak! Squeak!

Shush, you.

/-/

A month and a half (and three more session of torture) later, I had finally reached level 20 and was now good enough to stealth kill most Grimm around, along with being fast enough to escape from Grimm I couldn't beat.

Dad was currently rethinking our schedule as I was waiting in his gang's hideout; which was an underground bunker hidden in Vale's Industrial District.

Now that I would be capable of killing Grimm on my own, dad and sis didn't need to help me anymore and had to focus their time back to the gang's activities. From now on, I will have to farm xp on my own. That was fine, I already knew that and I didn't need help anymore.

The problem is that even if I could get a regular source of xp, I would only manage to get around level 38 by the time Cinder arrives in Vale. I calculated it. I was not going to be able to beat her alone, which was not surprising, but I would need to get to Beacon to contact team RWBY, JNPR and any others I would need help from.

Except I couldn't get into the Academy because I won't meet the age requirement and I wasn't not stupid enough to think I could go early. I would need Ozpin's support for that but I doubted what he would view as a random kid could convince him. Given that my eyes weren't silver, that was unlikely to happen.

At best, he'll tell me to come back in two years.

At worst, he'll get suspicious, does a background check, discover who my father was and once he realize my dad work for Salem's maiden, send Qrow after my butt and I get tortured by Ironwood for information that I would be happy to give them but would mark me as being in Salem's circle of trusted agents because they wouldn't be able to think of any other ways I could have knew all these things.

Hey, I did say 'at worst.'

In any case, it looked like I will have to contact team RWBY and the others before they go to Beacon. But from there it was a question of who I could contact. I had no idea where Ren and Nora were before going to Beacon. Weiss and Pyrrha were the opposite problem, I could find them easily because they were famous but for that same reason, I couldn't take them in an early alliance against a secret evil group aiming to destroy our civilization. Plus, Weiss was likely to not believe me and I kinda suspected Pyrrha was the type to tell the authorities, because that was the sane thing to do. Except that the sane thing to do would either result in mass panic and thousands of deaths, Lionheart assassinating Pyrrha or Ozpin tracking me down. I'd like to avoid all three of these scenarios.

I could go to Ansel, I guessed. God know Jaune could use some training before going to Beacon. If he had his aura unlocked beforehand I wouldn't need to worry about accidentally causing him to go splat on the ground during initiation because I changed things and Pyrrha ended up not taking notice of him. Butterfly effect was a bitch and Jaune was a nice guy, I was kinda partial to him not dying.

I was adding helping Jaune to the checklist of stuff I had to do. If I didn't have time to go to Ansel to help him, maybe I could send someone his way? I'll see.

Blake seemed to be the best option I have though. After all, it wasn't like she was blowing up trains in the company of dangerous racial supremacists terrorists or anything like that.

Note to self: must not go too far with the sarcasm. Too much of it poisons the soul.

Yeeeeeah... Blake was out. I was staying far away from that girl and her current company.

It looked like my best option was going to be Patch.

Not only it was full of weak Grimm, which made it the safest place I could find to train but it was also where I would be able to meet Ruby.

I needed allies I could trust to not stab me in the back, Ruby and Yang were the most accessible ones. Making friends with them was a must.

...How did I made friends again?

I sighed and decided to deal with that later, I first needed to convince dad to let me live on Patch for a while.

That wasn't going to be easy.

I heard footsteps approaching and someone called out to me.

"Hi Gem! Guess who coming back from her trip to Sumire?" Maroon said with her usual cocky grin.

Maroon Robin was one of the rare fighters under dad's employ. She was nowhere near sis' level, of course, but she did graduate from Beacon Academy three years ago, although she was pretty average for a huntress. Dad hired her because of the fire power she has with her bow and as a contact with her home city, Sumire.

She had a slightly tanned complexion, brown hair reaching to her shoulders and maroon eyes matching her name. She wore a bright green vest over her brown shirt and had a dark green bandana around her neck. She also had a knee-length skirt (sorry, a combat skirt, whatever that meant) the same color as her vest. And boots, with steel cap. She kicked pretty hard with those, a shame she never managed to land a kick on my sister during training.

She also had a small scar on her right cheek. When asked, she always boasted about how she got it from a fight with a huge ursa major, way bigger than anything you'd have ever seen.

It was a lie.

I knew that because she let slip, while drunk, that she cut herself when she was a kid. Discovering her semblance was an accident that could have easily being far worse than that. She was pretty lucky to not have cut her own head off.

Well, that and the ursa got bigger every time she told the story. Last time, it was the size of a mountain. Ridiculous!

"Is it the idiot?"

"Nope! Try again." She said without her smile diminishing even by a little.

"The drunkyard?"

"Wrong again." She was still just as upbeat.

We were going to do this for a long time if I didn't tell her what she wanted to hear. I sighed and said in the most unmotivated voice I could muster:

"The prettiest, smartest, strongest, bestest and most awesomest auntie to have ever lived in the history of all bestest aunties' history?"

Was 'awesomest' even a real word?

"Yep! Aren't you happy to see me?" She asked, crouching with her arms open for a hug.

"You know sis is going to kick your butt again for trying to take the spot of surrogate auntie again, right?"

The instant I said that, her face lost all colors as she tried to suppress a still very visible shudder.

"N- now, you wouldn't sell out your favourite auntie, right?" She said, her smile now nervous.

"What favourite auntie? You're a sellsword my dad hired."

"More like a sellbow."

"Sellbow then." To admit it like that... Have you no pride, woman? "What do I get for not taking my sister's side this time?"

When she heard my words, Maroon perked up instantly. "See? Now we're talking the same language." She looked around to make sure nobody was listening and then leaned toward me. "The usual. Five of them." She whispered with a serious expression on her face.

As she should, this wasn't not something to take lightly.

The huntress reached into her pocket and showed me the merchandise.

"Everything seems in order." I licked my lips, happy with what she bought. I needed my fix. "I accept your deal."

As my dad always told me: 'Listen well, son. When someone offer you a bribe to do something you were already going to do, you might as well take it. And if you weren't going to do it, take the money anyway and just don't do it. What are they gonna do? Call the police?'

To be fair, this will be well over the twentieth times I scammed her and tell sis anyway. She really should have learnt her lesson since then. At that point, it was her own fault.

I jested, of course, we both knew the 'bribes' were just an excuse for her to spoil me.

I took the gift she offered me and started eating one, she always brought good raspberry filled cookies.

"Thanks," I said, "they're delicious."

She smiled. "It's a pleasure. So, do you want to hear about my mission at Sumire or do you want to talk about what made you make the face you had when I walked into the hideout?"

Ah, she might act like a ditz sometimes but she was actually kind of perceptive. She was an archer after all.

"Actually, I'd like to ask for a favor." I said. I just got a great idea, Jaune could thank me in three years. "Didn't one of your teammates back at Beacon use a sword? The one with an electric rapier?"

A look of surprise crossed her face. "Wait, when did I talk about my team?"

"You were drunk. And I saw the videos of the Vytal tournament your team participated in."

They were kinda lame. They got their butts kicked in the double rounds after having barely managed to win their first fight.

They were carried by their team leader, too. It was pretty embarrassing to watch.

"Oh." She said. She averted her eyes with a slight blush on her face. "...Why are you asking?"

I smiled. "It's for a pet project of mine. Nobody must know, and I mean nobody."

She nodded with a bemused smile, probably thinking that it was for some sort of childish game or something. I suddenly got the feeling that not being taken seriously because of my age was going to get old real fast.

"There's a guy I've heard about," I explained. "he wants to be a huntsman but doesn't have any training. So I was thinking; if I made his dream possible, he would be indebted to me, wouldn't he? I can't go to his village to help him myself because I have other things I need to do, but I can hire a tutor and send him his way."

She took a more serious expression as I made it clear I was talking business.

"You're planning to form your own criminal group, like your father." She realized.

Pretty much, just not for the reason or the goal she was expecting. And it was going to be a regular group, not a criminal one.

"Are you sure it's a good idea, though?" She asked without keeping her worries out of of voice. "I mean, not only there's no guarantee this guy you're talking about is someone you can trust or would even want to help you, but to have Onyx teach him..."

She had a decent point, but I was expecting his cooperation to fight against Salem, something he would end up doing anyway. I was just making a future ally stronger.

Also, what was the problem with this Onyx guy? It wasn't like I needed him to turn Jaune into a master swordman. Unlocking his aura and teaching him the basics would already make a huge difference comparing to being a civilian in Beacon.

"What about Onyx? Is there a problem with him?"

"Uh, well... He is kind of a flirt." She said.

"...That's it? And it matters why?" I mean the guy got his ass ended to him in the tournament because he was putting more effort into flirting with his opponent than fighting but Jaune wasn't a girl anyway, so what was the problem?

"No, I mean, he is a huge flirt. Back at Beacon, he passed most of his free time trying to seduce me, or seduce our team leader, or others student. He even tried with Goodwitch. I'm just concerned of the influence he might have on the guy you're talking about."

He tried to seduce Glynda? Was he suicidal or something?

"I just want him to teach the basics of sword fighting." I said. "It's not for now because I don't have the money yet, but I have another project that should bring me the Lien to pay him in a month or two..." Planning fallacy. "Never mind, probably more around four months." Or five?

The animation studio I contacted actually agreed to publish Yu-Gi-Oh!, but they said that the animation was too old and that they wanted to remake it up to modern Remnant's standard.

...Considering Remnant's animation developed toward 3D animation and they got really good at it, that meant one my favorite series was getting a gorgeous looking hd remake.

Seeing the old characters and their cards' monsters in a 3D animation that blowed every 3D animation there was on Earth was going to be awesome.

And the cherry on top? I didn't even have to worry about them changing the scenario, because they'd have to hire voice actors and redo all of the series' dialogue which would cost way more. Why would they do that when they already had everything, outside of 3D models and the animation, already done for them?

They were more than happy as it was, since having only that to do took out a huge load of work. I singlehandedly solved their increasing crunch problem.

Of course, they asked how a single kid managed to do voiced episodes in an old, now unused, drawn animation style on his own.

I told them the truth. 'I have a really weird semblance, the details of which I wish to keep secret.'

See? Not a lie.

That was enough to make them stop caring about where it came from, the people of this world being used to the strange powers some people got from their soul, and we worked out a deal where I gave them the drawn episodes in exchange for a cut of the profit they made with the 3D ones. The first episode was set to air in nine days. I should start getting money soon afterward.

And the kicker? The studio's name was 'Illusion Industry'. It was too close to Pegasus' company's name to not be a sign of the universe.

Maroon pressed her lips together. "Then... maybe it's better if we talk about it when you'll be able to actually finance this pet project of yours?"

"Sure, that's fine with me." I agreed, and the conversation moved to her mission.

Officially, she went to Sumire for a Grimm extermination mission but that was just to make the kingdom's official think she was a regular huntress with no link whatsoever to the infamous thief Roman Torchwick. None at all, nothing to see here.

After killing the Grimm, she went and checked on dad's contact in the city. Now she was back for her report to dad. That was how dad kept his activities in order, everything the members of dad's gang did, calling themselves the Wicked Thieves, was hidden by legal actions that didn't stick out. They left no clue that they were affiliated with dad and didn't break the law themselves. Only he and sis actually took an active part in crimes, and the police wasn't even aware sis existed.

The door of the Wicked Thieves' planning room opened and dad, sis, Perry and the old Grey walked out.

"Ah, Maroon, you're back already." Dad said. "I'll be hearing your report in just a few minutes. If you can wait for me inside, please."

"No problem, boss." Maroon said, before giving a mock military salute.

"Oh, by the way sis," I said, "Maroon bribed me to not tell you she called herself my auntie, again."

Sis locked her pink eyes on her and cracked her joints, sending the silent message that she is going to kick her butt right after she gave her report. Maroon's face lost all colors.

"Whyyyyy?!" She whimpered.

What could I say? I was a good son who followed his dad's teachings.

Dad shoed a crying Maroon into the planning room, as otherwise she'd have just stayed here to beg for sis' mercy. Silly Maroon, you should know by now that sis didn't know that word.

No, really. I once read her the dictionary definition and it just confused her.

Anyway, once the others went back to their business, dad took me aside to talk about his decision concerning my training.

Crapbasket, I hadn't had the time to find a valid argument to convince him to let me move to Patch.

"Son, I've decided where you will continue your training now that you can somewhat hunts Grimm on your own." Dad hesitated for a moment, scratching his nose, showing an unusual sign of reluctance from his part. "Now, I know it'll be a bit strange at first to be on your own. Well, not really on your own, Perry will accompany you and make sure you don't lack anything. But Neo and I will be busy in Vale and I can't really go where you'll be going so I won't be able to visit you in the meantime. But I guess you can come to Vale and visit us anytime you want, you won't be far after all."

'Won't be far'? But there's only two place that are both close to Vale and safe from Grimm too strong for me. One was a harbour city three hours south of Vale, on foot. It was pretty much absorbed into Vale proper at this point.

The other was...

"Gemini, you've always been pretty independent, so I know you'll be alright. Just stay careful and don't take risks you don't need to take, okay? You will continue to train on-"

...Patch.

"-Patch."

Wow! Now, if only beating Cinder was that easy.

---

So... yeah, this chapter is mostly about explaining how Gemini's semblance works in more details and setting a few things for the future. Should I have mentionned sooner that this fic's first few chapter were a slow start?

Anyway, in canon, Torchwick only really had Neo, but fatherhood can change people. He's mostly the same, but more willing to expand the number of people he trusted. Him having his own gang kind of required making OCs, but I'll try to limit it as much as possible and keep them as tiertary characters. They aren't the focus of the story.

Maroon was based on Robin Hood, but this chapter was written before Volume 7 was out and I'm too lazy to replace her with an OC based on another character.

Chapter 3 will be out September 10th, though its still part of the fic's slow start.