Beacon's newest group of future students walked out of their airships soon after the doors opened.
Ruby walked next to Yang and Jaune, who decided to stay with the sisters, down the stone path after the group had retrieved their weapons. Ruby somehow resisted the urge to really show off Crescent Rose to Jaune. Since pictures really didn't do the pure awesomeness of the weapon justice.
Those who decided to quit walked down the southern path back towards Beacon. Which was maybe a five-minute walk away from the landing area. There was maybe a couple dozen people quitting, it was a bit hard for Ruby to see over the crowd, but it seemed like most of the potential students decided to stay. They made their way north towards the forest.
Soon they came to a temporary stage that had been set up where the path widened. Standing on the middle of the stage was a tall blonde woman. And Ruby meant tall. She was easily taller than Ruby's dad and her uncle Qrow and had to be at least a foot taller than Ruby. Who was only 5'2".
"Attention," The woman spoke into the microphone in front of her with a commanding tone as the potential students gathered around the stage. "I am Professor Glynda Goodwitch, provost of this Academy and lead combat instructor."
"You have very likely heard many different things about Beacon and the other academies initiations, and as Professor Ozpin told you earlier, you are well aware of the dangers." She said, paused for a moment, maybe to let anyone who wanted to leave last minute go. "And as such I implore you to listen to what I'm about to tell you carefully."
"Beacon's initiation will take place over a 28-hour period. At fourteen-hundred hours you will be deployed into the Emerald Forest at one of 10 launch sites. Once you have been inserted into the forest, you will then search for your partner. Who will be the first person you make eye contact with. Which we will be tracking." Goodwitch said.
Maybe a lot of people didn't like who they got as partners and tried to cheat before. Would Ruby have? No… well, maybe. If she got someone like that mean white-haired girl as a partner, she'd at least consider it. But she just had to find Yang, or maybe Jaune even if he seemed like he wasn't very strong.
"Once you have found your partner, you will be assigned two tasks. The first will be to find a relic. Which is a task assigned to all of you. The second will be a random task assigned specifically to you and your partner. You will be expected to complete both tasks by eighteen-hundred hours tomorrow afternoon."
"Once you have completed your assignments, you and your partner can be evacuated from the Emerald Forest from several different evacuation points. Between sixteen-hundred and eighteen-hundred hours. Those who do not complete their tasks and reach an evacuation point before eighteen-hundred hours will fail initiation."
Go into the Emerald Forst, find your partner, find your relics and do something else, and then leave. That didn't sound too hard to Ruby. The extra task was probably something like 'kill 50 grimm' or something. Of course, she knew exactly how hard it could be to survive outside of the walls of a town or city at night. Her uncle Qrow had taught her that much.
Though if she did end up with Yang as a partner, maybe her snoring would just attract grimm, or scare them away. Ruby couldn't quite decide which one she thought was more likely.
"More information will be available on your Beacon issued scrolls. While you may prefer to keep your current scrolls, the ones you will be receiving today are huntsmen models. They contain technology to help track your aura levels, as well as track your general location with far greater accuracy than civilian models, and all your important medical information is quickly available in case of emergency. While also being far more durable than most civilian and industrial models."
Ruby's old scroll was getting pretty beat up. So, she wasn't too mad about getting an upgrade.
But while the sisters were listening to the speech, they weren't paying attention to Jaune. Who noticed someone in the crowd, and immediately ducked down and snuck off somewhere.
"Your new scrolls and some general supplies will be provided to you in the locker room to my left." Glynda gestured to the old brick building not far from where they were standing. "Your locker number will be the first three digits of your student ID. If you have any questions, ask any of the other professors before initiation. Which will begin in 1 hour."
With that most of the crowd began heading towards the locker room to fetch their new scroll and supplies. "How do you think they tell when you make eye contact with your partner?" Ruby asked as she walked next to Yang.
"I don't know," Yang shrugged, "Maybe they've got a bunch of cameras hidden around the forest."
"That seems kind of dumb," Ruby said, "Going around, putting up a bunch of cameras when you could just… draw names or something."
"Maybe they just track how close your scrolls get." Yang said.
"Then why even have the 'make eye contact' thing? What do you think, Jaune?" Ruby turned to where Jaune had been when he was following them earlier. Only to find that he was nowhere to be seen. "Where did he go?"
"I think he left while the professor was giving her speech," Yang shrugged. "Probably wanted to get to his locker first or something."
"Probably," Ruby said, a little bummed that Jaune decided to just ditch them. He could've at least said where he was going. He was Ruby's second choice, out of two, to be her partner. So, she would've preferred him to stick a little closer. Maybe he just didn't want to be Ruby or Yang's partner. So that narrowed Ruby's list a little bit. "So, how are we going to-…"
"What's the best kind of pancake?" A short girl with orangish red hair said, causing Ruby and Yang to both jump in surprise. "Cause' Ren says it's blueberry, and while all pancakes are beautiful, blueberry pancakes are nowhere near the best and I need help to prove him wrong."
"Nora," said a black-haired boy wearing a green coat. Whatever he was going to say to Nora after her name was quickly shushed away by the girl.
"Shush Renny!" She said before leaning in close to Ruby. "Sooooo?"
"I like my pancakes with strawberry syrup," Ruby managed to stutter out. She was getting really tired of all the social activity she was having to put up with.
But her answer did seem to satisfy Nora at least a little bit. Who was now standing outside of Ruby's personal bubble, rubbing her chin in thought. "That's not a bad choice. Better than blueberry at least." Nora said, the boy from earlier trying to put a hand on her shoulder before Nora proceeded to zoom up to Yang and ask the same question. "What about you?"
Yang looked at Nora with an amused smile and her hand on her hip. "Chocolate chip," Yang said, with Nora giving her a nod of approval. "What do you think are the best kind of pancakes?" Which may have been the best or worst question to ask as Nora cocked her head for a moment with Ruby preparing for the worst.
"What do I think is the best pancake?" Nora said before wandering off with a puzzled look on her face.
"I would like to apologize for Nora," The boy that arrived with Nora said. "Nora can sometimes forget her manors when she's excited."
"Don't worry about it man," Yang said, before pointing to Ruby with her thumb. "Ruby here can be the same way. She almost blew up the airship we were on earlier."
"Yang!" Ruby fumed, her face turning a bright red color.
"Oh, that was you," The boy said, "Regardless, I think you both for humoring her. I have to go find Nora before she gets into more trouble." He walked off in the general direction that Nora went.
"Well, they were fun." Yang said.
"Fun," Ruby said in a flat tone.
The sisters then made their way into the locker room. Finding both of their lockers which were thankfully almost right across from each other, and there weren't many people by their lockers. Which was a double win in Ruby's mind.
Inside her locker, Ruby found some supplies as well as her new scroll. She wasn't quite sure what to do with the old one, so she just left it in the locker after she transferred everything she could over.
Most of the supplies were generic things one would expect to see. A day's worth of packaged rations, some water purifications tablets, and a small canteen came in a canvas pouch that strapped to her belt. As well as a first aid kit. There were also a few vials of various types of Dust. Along with some empty vials that Ruby couldn't really figure out what they were supposed to be for, but Ruby took them anyway.
But besides the standard supplies there were also a few more personalized ones. In Ruby's locker were some of the .50 BMG cartridges that Crescent Rose fired. Not only the standard cartridges that Ruby usually used, but Dust tipped cartridges as well.
Ruby inspected the purple tipped Gravity Dust round before placing it in her loose ammo pouch. The only Dust rounds that Ruby had shot before we Fire Dust, so she was more than a little excited to try them out during initiation. "Initiation is going to be so awesome," Ruby said, shutting her locker once she'd gotten everything, she needed out of it. "No more of that 'getting to know you' stuff. I can just let my sweetheart do the talking." Ruby cradled Crescent Rose like that precious baby of a grimm killing machine that it was.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that Ruby. There are going to be tons of other people in initiation too," Yang said, adjusting her combat gear. "And If you wanna grow up, you're gonna have to meet new people and learn to work together."
"You're starting to sound like dad," Ruby said with a groan. "And I'm plenty grown up, I drink milk!"
"What are you going to do if you end up on a team with three people you don't know?"
"I won't be on a team with four strangers, I'll be on your team," Ruby said, "And Jaune can be too. If he doesn't start puking everywhere."
Yang pulled her hair over her shoulder and started stroking it. "Maybe you should try being on someone else's team?" Yang said like the betraying betrayer that she was.
"You don't want to be on the same team as me?" Ruby said, unleashing a vicious pout that could level a stone wall.
"I never said that" Yang said, still stroking her hair. "It's just that I think it would help you break out of your shell more if you weren't on my team. I'm sure you can find some people you can team up with who'll think you're the bee's knees."
"I don't need to break out of my shell."
"I'm just saying,"
"And I don't want anyone to treat me like I'm special. I'm already two years younger than anyone," Ruby said, frowning as she held Crescent Rose close to her chest. "I just want to be treated like a normal girl with normal knees."
"Okay, okay." Yang relented. "We'll try to team up if we can. I don't think Goodwitch said how they formed teams though. Just partners."
"We'll just have to be partners then," Ruby said, a little bit of excitement returning.
"Yeah, partners." Yang said, back to her normal peppy self.
It was too bad for Ruby that Yang wasn't planning for them to be partners. Though outside of Vomit Boy Yang wasn't really sure who she would've wanted to be Ruby's partner. She'd have to talk to him about that.
If they managed to find Vomit Boy again.
"Of all the places he could've went, why did it have to be Beacon?" Jaune said, trying to keep his head down while he looked for his locker.
He didn't exactly feel great about abandoning Ruby and Yang the way he did, but he couldn't risk being seen, and he didn't exactly want to explain why he was hiding either. So, he just took off, getting a few odd looks from the people he passed as he did so. He just needed to find his locker, stay out of sight until initiation started, and then hope he didn't run into who he was avoiding during initiation.
So, who was Jaune hiding from? If one were from Domremy, they would have a good idea what family that particular person came from.
The Winchesters.
Much like the Arcs, anyone who spent much time learning about the Great War would know the Winchester family. They played a huge part in winning the war for Vale and Vacuo and gained much wealth and power doing so. But while Jaune's ancestors chose to give up that power to return to their simple lives as huntsmen and farmers, the Winchesters decided to use their newfound wealth for their own gain.
They practically owned Domremy, and someone in the family held most important positions in the city. Heck, even the mayor was a Winchester. And he had a son. A son that Jaune unfortunately knew quite well growing up.
Jaune walked down a long section of lockers with benches in the middle. It seemed like most people had already grabbed their things from their lockers and only a few were left in the locker room. Mostly chatting about whatever.
Unfortunately for Jaune, that Winchester was one of them.
Cardin Winchester. The mayor's only son and possibly the biggest jackass in Vale. Who was currently talking to some girl who looked less than interested in his advances. Since Cardin was too busy striking out, he didn't see Jaune standing out in the open, but after that girl rolled her eyes and walked away, it looked like Cardin was going to start walking Jaune's way.
Jaune was screwed.
He didn't have enough time to hide behind the lockers. So, he was going to have to do something he hated doing more than anything else.
Rudely insert himself into the middle of someone else's conversation.
Jaune quickly moved in the middle of two girls who were talking near the wall of lockers.
Why exactly was Jaune so terrified of Cardin? Well, it might have had something to do with the ginger giant terrorizing Jaune every chance he got when they were kids. And even into their teenage years when Cardin went off to Pharos and Jaune still went to regular high school. It had thankfully been a few years since they'd met, but Jaune was willing to bet just about anything that Cardin was still the same person he was back then.
So Jaune waited there, blending in like he was in a video game while Cardin passed him. Jaune breathed a sigh of relief when it seemed that Cardin had passed Jaune without noticing him.
Now he just had to deal with the fact that he had inserted himself into a group of people. On his left was a tall red-headed girl that kind of looked like a spartan and who wore the sort of light smile Jaune's mom did when talking to someone she really didn't want to. On his right was… the angry white-haired girl from before.
Wonderful.
"You again," The shorter girl said, not exactly happy to see him. "Did that girl wearing the childish red cape send you to apologize in her stead?"
"You mean Ruby?" Jaune said, he actually thought the cape was kind of cool. "No, I was just… looking for my locker." And it what had to be the only bit of good luck that Jaune had experienced that day, there it was. His locker, number 636, was right in front of him. "But you really shouldn't be so mad at Ruby. She was just looking for her sister and happened to bump into you."
"And besides, it was just a little bit of Dust," Jaune said, unlocking his locker with his scroll.
"That 'little bit of Dust' was high quality Light Dust. That single vial cost twenty-thousand Lien on the open market," The white-haired girl said, and Jaune would've done the most impressive spit take ever if he was drinking anything at that moment. "She's lucky I'm only asking for an apology."
"Yeah, I guess she is." Jaune said, taking the supplies from the locker. "That girl in the bow did have a good point though. You really shouldn't keep that stuff in glass bottles if it's so expensive."
"That girl," She growled, "I could go the rest of my life without seeing that girl again." She paused and straightened her skirt. "As for my methods of transporting Dust, I assure you that the rest of my Dust vials are made of high carbon steel and more than durable enough to survive most incidents without setting off the Dust inside."
"As to why my Light Dust was in a clear glass vial, I believe you can see the problem with something meant to emit light being in an opaque container," The white-haired girl said, and Jaune could see her point there. "Unfortunately, Light Dust is too reactive to be transported in most metal or even plastic containers."
"Wow, you really know a lot about Dust," Jaune said, shutting his locker. "Does your family work with Dust or something?"
"Do you not know who I am?" The girl said, with a look on her face like Jaune had just asked him if Remnant was round or birds were real. With Jaune shrugging in response. "I am Weiss Schnee, heiress to the Schnee Dust Company. You do know what the Schnee Dust Company is right?"
"I think my dad mentioned them once or twice. Are they like a big company or something?" Jaune said, and Weiss' eye visibly twitched.
"Yes, it's a big company," Weiss said, "Do you know who she is?" pointing to the red-headed girl standing on the other side of Jaune. Who had been surprisingly quiet during this whole conversation and gave Jaune a small wave when he looked at her.
"Hello," The taller girl said in a cheery tone.
"Hmm, no I don't think I've ever seen her before." Jaune said, and the girl's smile got a little brighter as he said that.
"That's Pyrrha Nikos. She graduated top of her class at Sanctum."
"Oh, that's in Argus, right?" Jaune said, and Pyrrha nodded. "My sister lives in Argus. Do you know a Saphron Cotta-Arc?"
"Sorry, I'm afraid I don't." Pyrrha said apologetically.
"So, you know Sanctum. Then you must know about Mistral's National Tournament? Which Pyrrha has won the last three. Which is a new record." Weiss said.
"Nope," Jaune said, "But congrats,"
"Thank you," Pyrrha said in a cheerful tone.
"You barely know about the largest Dust company and perhaps the most famous tournament fighter in all of Remnant." Weiss said with a deadpan look. "Have you been living under a rock your whole life?"
"No, I grew up in Domremy." Jaune said, totally sincere. "Why?"
For that question, Weiss had no answer. She simply stared at Jaune for a long moment, closed her eyes and took a deep breath, and walked away.
"Did I say something wrong?" Jaune asked Pyrrha.
"I think you just frustrated her," Pyrrha said, the pair standing there for a moment with Pyrrha giving Jaune a bright smile. "I should probably go find her, but it was nice meeting you."
"It was nice meeting you too," Jaune said as Pyrrha walked off.
"Hey, Vomit Boy," Yang said, walking up to Jaune with Ruby by his side. "Done trying to flirt with the rich girls?"
"I wasn't flirting," Jaune said, he didn't exactly have time to worry about dating when he was just trying to get into Beacon alive.
"Right," Yang said, clearly not believing him. "So, is the 'Invincible girl'-…" Yang tried to say before the intercom system interrupted her.
"All initiatives are to report to their assigned deployment areas." The person on the intercom said. With everyone heading out of the locker room, Jaune thankfully having the same launch area as the sisters, while Jaune told Ruby and Yang about his conversation with Weiss.
Jaune was just a few steps away from getting into Beacon, and he couldn't decide if he was excited or terrified.
Ruby, Yang, and Jaune made their way to the cliffs overlooking the Emerald Forest with about 40 of the other potential students.
Standing there at the cliffside wasn't Professor Goodwitch, or any other of Beacon's professors, but Professor Ozpin himself. Who was leaning on his cane and looking out towards the forest. Which, despite the fact that it was November and decently chilly, was still completely green.
"Afternoon," Professor Ozpin said without turning around. "Would you please stand on one of the platforms in front of you." He pointed with his cane in the general direction of the platforms. Which were these sort of silver tile things that stuck up a few inches from the ground.
"Was he this weird when you met his last night?" Yang whispered to Ruby before taking her place on the platform to the right of Ruby.
"Well, the first thing he asked me about was my eyes," Ruby whispered back, "So yeah. Kind of."
"Why do they have us standing on these things?" Jaune asked, standing on the platform to Ruby's left. With that white-haired girl, whose name was apparently Weiss, standing on the platform on the other side of him. "Do you think they do something?"
"Oh, you shall find out soon enough Mr. Arc," Ozpin said, having turned around. He walked up to Jaune, taking a sip from his mug as he did so. "And I must say that I am happy that you chose to continue your family's tradition of attending Beacon to complete your huntsman training. I'm sure your father is quite proud of you."
"Oh yeah, super proud." Jaune said, rubbing the back of his head and not making eye contact with Professor Ozpin.
"Good. Though I hope you're more diligent with completing your assignments in a timely manner than you are with turning in your transcripts. You were only a few hours away from the cutoff and the only students to apply after you were Ms. Rose," Ozpin said, looking over to Ruby. "Though she is a special case." He turned back to Jaune. "And Ms. Belladonna."
The girl with the bow in her hair, who was standing on the other side of Pyrrha Nikos, glanced over to Ozpin for a moment. So, she must be the Belladonna girl. And Ruby could've swore that she saw that girl's bow twitch when her last name was said. It was probably just the wind though.
"And Ms. Rose," Ozpin said, now walking over to Ruby. "How are you enjoying your time at Beacon so far? I hope it hasn't been overwhelming for you."
"It's been awesome so far! I can't wait to see Beacon's forge once I pass initiation." Ruby said. It was the most advanced weapon's forge in Remnant outside of Atlas. Where generations of huntsmen and huntresses have forged and upgraded their weapons. So of course Ruby was excited to see it. Not just for the history of the forge, but also because if there was a way to make Crescent Rose even more awesome, Ruby was going to find it in that forge.
Ozpin chuckled, "You truly are your mother's daughter. I'll inform Professor Mulberry of your interest in the forge." Ozpin said, before turning to Yang. "And I trust Signal's top student will perform well during initiation, Ms. Xiao Long."
"Yeah, I think I'll do pretty well," Yang said, leaning back with her arms behind her head. "Can't be Beacon's best fighter without getting though initiation." She glanced over to Pyrrha who it seemed couldn't care less about Yang's indirect challenge.
"I'm sure Ms. Nikos will appreciate the competition," Ozpin said, before looking down at his scroll after it beeped 3 times. "It seems that initiation is about to begin. Professor Goodwitch has already informed you of the structure of initiation, so I won't repeat her."
"Though I will inform you that while you are in the Emerald Forest, you must not hesitate in your actions combating, or avoiding, the enemies you will face during this test… or you will die." Ozpin said as the potential students stood on their tiles without making a noise. Except for Jaune, who nervously laughed.
"You will be monitored for the duration of the test, and graded on your performance," Ozpin continued. "And our instructors will not intervene except for in two cases. First being any of you attacking your fellow initiates. The second will be a planned medical evacuation tomorrow morning. With all who are evacuated failing the test, of course."
"You will be graded on several criteria as you make your way through the forest. This grading will not determine if you are accepted into Beacon and are simply meant to determine your current skill level and help our staff develop your skills further." Ozpin said, "Any questions?"
Jaune's hand shot up, but everyone else was silent. Ozpin looked over the potential students and made eye contact with Ruby after she slowly lifted her hand.
"How do we know who our teammates are going to be?" Ruby asked, knew that they were probably going to be some random people, but she still wanted to have the only people she knew on her team if she could help it.
"To avoid potential pre-initiation alliances, the method in which Beacon determines it's teams is confidential." Ozpin said.
"Why is your partner just the first person you meet in the forest?" Yang said, "If you're going to assign us a team, why not assign us a partner?"
"You won't always be able to choose who you work with while out on the road. Sometimes who you will be working with is simply a matter of who was at the right place at the right time."
"Professor Ozpin, sir." Jaune said, waving his hand in the air like a preschooler who really needed to ask the teacher to use the restroom.
"It is time for us to begin. Now, take your positions." Professor Ozpin said, with Ruby and all the other students getting into a ready position.
"I've got a question, Professor." Jaune said, missing the students to his left starting to be launched into the air by springboards. "So like, are you going to be dropping us off in the forest or something like that?"
"No. You will be falling." Ozpin answered as more students were launched.
"So do we get parachutes or maybe gliders or something?"
"No, you will have to use whichever landing strategy you prefer."
"Okay… what's a landing strat-…" Jaune didn't have the chance to finish before he was launched from his platform. Flailing like it was his first time falling off a cliff and screaming the whole way down.
For a moment Ruby wondered if Jaune was going to be okay, but she didn't have too long to think about it before her own platform shot her into the air. Yang being launched a few seconds later, with the sounds of Ember Celica being fired and some excited yells from Yang being heard loud in clear.
Though Ruby couldn't quite see where Yang was going, Ruby knew the general direction she probably was. So, Ruby whipped Crescent Rose around, firing a few blanks to help slow her down. Ruby knowing Yang, she probably went farther into the forest that Ruby was planning to, but it wouldn't take Ruby too much time to catch up with her.
Unfortunately for Ruby, while she was busy worrying about where Yang was going, she didn't notice that she was on a collision course with a black bird. "Birdie, no!" Ruby said as the black bird, which Ruby thought looked like a raven, fell for a few dozen feet before seeming to recover.
Firing a few more blanks off, Ruby managed to slow down enough to transform Crescent Rose into its scythe form and grab a tree trunk with the blade. Falling a few feet down and landing on the forest floor. Quickly taking out Crescent Rose's now empty magazine and replacing it with another full one. Before collapsing the weapon down and placing it on her back.
Ruby looked around, listening for any signs of nearby grimm or, worse, people she didn't know. The Emerald Forest was dense and full of foliage. To Ruby it seemed almost unnaturally hot in the forest. It wasn't quite a hot summer's day, but it was a lot warmer than it should've been with winter starting next month.
But Ruby didn't have time to think about that. She had a wonderful older sister to find before someone else did. So, Ruby activated her semblance, pointed herself in the general direction she saw Yang going, and started to run at incredibly high speeds.
So fast that most people would've had trouble not running face first into a tree. Which Ruby had done plenty of times while she was first learning to use her semblance. But now, as long as she was concentrating, she could run around Patch a dozen times without even coming close to hitting anything.
"Gotta find Yang. Gotta find Yang. Gotta find Yang." Ruby repeated to herself as she ran. "Yang!" she yelled through the forest. If Yang heard her, she wasn't answering back.
'Oh, this is bad," Ruby thought. 'Oh, this is bad, this is really bad... What if I can't find her? What if someone finds her first? Well, there's always Jaune. He's nice. He's funny! He… didn't seem very huntsmany.' Whatever that meant.
'There was that one girl who really liked pancakes. Nora? But she seemed a little… too much for Ruby when they met. But there was that Ren guy that was with her, he seemed cool, but they did kind of seem like a couple or something. So maybe I shouldn't be getting in the middle of them.' She didn't want to have to deal with her partner getting kissy with someone all the time.
'There was that girl with the bow. She seemed… mysterious?' Ruby was pulling at strings at this point, and starting to think that she maybe should've talked to some more people before initiation. As much as it hurt her to think that. 'Who else do I know at this school? Yang, Jaune, Ren and Nora, and…'
Before Ruby had a chance to finish that though, she realized that she was running right towards some white thing. Ruby dug her heels into the ground and began sliding to a halt. Dodging around the thing would've probably meant crashing into one of the trees. But Ruby just managed to stop before running into…
Weiss, who had turned to face Ruby, was staring right into Ruby's eyes. A pregnant pause filled the air as Ruby and Weiss' scrolls both beeped.
It looked like Ruby had her partner, she could only hope Yang and Jaune were doing well.
Jaune still didn't know what a landing strategy was, but he really wished he had one.
Maybe then we wouldn't have ended up in his current situation. Which was dangling from some tree branches several feet above the ground. Which he would have to admit was better than becoming a pile of blood and armor on the ground, but it's still not a great way to start initiation.
"Great," Jaune muttered to himself as he tried to figure out how to get out of the tree without falling out of it. He still wasn't sure how exactly he'd managed to get stuck there, but maybe it was just his luck turning around.
Snap
And just like that the universe decided to punish Jaune for his foolish thoughts with some of his patented Jaune Arc luck. Though he didn't have time to think about his good or bad luck while he was plummeting to Remnant. The underbrush doing little to break his fall as he landed straight on his back.
For a moment Jaune laid there on the ground staring up the canopy of the forest around him and the little bits of sky poking through. Focusing on his aura as he waited for the pain of falling from the tree to go away. He had taken a pretty bad fall and was going to need to check himself for injuries and it was going to be harder to do that if everything hurt.
Once Jaune felt that the pain had died down enough, he slowly tried to pick himself up. He could move his legs decently enough and had no trouble breathing, and he didn't see any blood on his clothes. He was about to think that he'd gotten lucky and not managed to have any major injuries from the fall when he tried to put weight on his left arm and felt a huge shock of pain run through the limb.
He quickly shifted his weight to his right arm and looked at where he'd felt the most pain. On his left arm was a fairly deep gash. By Jaune's estimation, it was most definitely going to need to be stitched up, and there Jaune was down an arm and sitting in the middle of a grimm infested forest with nobody to help defend him.
Great. At least he was right-handed. Sometimes you just have to look on the bright side.
It wasn't much of a bright side though as his blood was dripping on the ground Jaune shut his eyes and did what his dad had always told aura users to do when they were injured and continuous enough to listen.
"Focus your aura on the injury," Jaune muttered to himself as he sat with his eyes closed on the forest floor. Completely defenseless. He hoped that his aura would heal the injury enough that he hopefully wouldn't bleed out or pass out before initiation was over. From what Jaune had seen from aura users with similar cuts, that was about the best he could expect. Hopefully Beacon packed some string and a few needles in their first aid kits.
A warm sensation ran through Jaune's arm where the wound was as he concentrated. Not daring to open his eyes and lose concentration. At least not until the warm feeling came and went, along with the pain in his arm.
He opened his eyes to find nothing left of the wound besides the drops of blood on the ground and on his torn sleeve. With a soft, almost silvery, glow where the wound used to be. "What the hell?" Jaune said, as he stood up. Rubbing where the wound had been and finding no soreness. In fact, he didn't really hurt at all. It was almost like he never took that fall at all.
Everyone who did even just a five-minute internet search on aura knew that it could heal wounds, but Jaune had never seen aura heal that much of a wound, and he had seen plenty of injured huntsmen and huntresses. So why did his injury heal so fast?
It wasn't a question Jaune was going to get the answer to. At least for the moment. As he was suddenly reminded that he was in the middle of a grimm infested forest when he turned his head to the noise some rustling in the underbrush nearby only to find a pair of red eyes staring back at him.
Jaune had barely survived the last time he fought a single grimm, when a dozen more revealed themselves, he was certain that he couldn't beat all of them. So he did the only thing he could think of in that moment.
He ran like hell.
Author's Notes:
I originally planned for this chapter to be two scenes longer. But the chapter was getting a little long so I decided to save those for the next chapter. Which should get some more focus for Weiss and Blake.
Thanks for reading and if you want to leave a comment, I'd love to hear your thoughts.