Ch. 72 Project Phoenix
As Jaune turned away from Oscar after Oz retreated into the back of Oscar's mind, he spotted a conversation he would much rather be a part of.
"So really while we could stay here and go to classes. We have options now!" said Ruby to the attentive duo of Ren and Nora.
"Isn't that just the two of you though?" asked Ren.
"As much as I'd love to go on an adventure with you and Jaune. We still don't have our Huntsman licence…" Nora added with uncharacteristic seriousness.
"But me and Jaune do and you can get them too…"
"I don't believe it will be that easy or that fast Ruby. Haven will need time to get back up and running before anyone can issue our licence here." Ren interjected.
Ruby was clearly getting a little frustrated at being unable to finally get to the point when Jaune approached.
"It will be a little easier than that luckily." said Jaune as he joined the conversation. "Thanks to our work with General Ironwood and Doctor Polendina we've managed to figure something out for you two."
He smiled at the two as Ruby took out her scroll and pinged her team members with a notification.
"An invitation… to project Phoenix?"
Ren voiced his confusion as he read the ping. Nora's mood on the other hand did a complete one-eighty as she returned to her normal bubbly self.
"Oh! Are we going to become secret agents protecting the world from the shadows?"
Jaune nearly groaned at that since that was basically what Ozpin's inner circle was but kept the thought to himself.
"Better! You'd gain temporary licences as a part of your internship with Arc-Rose Reforged. In two years you'd gain full licences independent of your stay on the team." Ruby explained happily.
"Why the cryptic name then?" asked Ren.
"Because of a technicality, Arc-Rose Reforged is contracted under the Atlas Military R&D division's project Phoenix. It's what we did for Weiss and some others and research to improve that. Since you'd be working for the company you'd need to be licensed and would fall under project Phoenix too…"
"...although really it's something we came up with thanks to Penny and Winter and it only really works thanks to your pre-existing affiliation with us." interrupted Jaune. "You being on team RNJR acts as a… pre-screening process of sorts. If we were to try and do the same with Yang and Pyrrha we'd need to go through Atlas to get it approved which would take a long time and they probably wouldn't approve it in the end anyway because students are unlikely to actually assist us with the project."
Ren nodded in understanding and Nora was jumping on the spot with excitement as she realised they could actually go on that adventure.
"So what's the plan, when are we leaving, where are we going?" she asked in rapid succession.
Jaune and Ruby looked at each other with a smile as Ruby's scroll signalled the invites were both accepted.
"Well first of all, I think we'll be staying for a while… I have some projects and ideas to work on before we leave, like the bow for Ren to use. Plus I'm sure Yang will appreciate some time to spend with her sister before we split again."
=O=O=O=
"So you're the new headmaster of Haven then? Congratulations.'' Qrow spoke up when he spotted the man sitting on a bench observing the students hauling timber to repair the damaged parts of the school.
"There is no need to congratulate me mister Branwen after all it is hardly a joyous occasion to replace a madman who'd endanger so many lives by feeding Huntsmen to the Grimm."
The old man wore a loose traditional Mistralian robe in golden brown and leafy green colours. The robe's long loose sleeves hid both his arms but those that knew the man knew why he hid them.
"So, what made you accept the position? I'm pretty sure you didn't want it in the past."
"Necessity I'm afraid. The students need guidance and I already stepped up to give it when Lionheart closed the academy's doors."
"Heh who'd think I'd see the day the old Verdant Dragon came out of retirement."
"Didn't take you for a fan of an old geezer like me… I'm just Ichinojo Verdant now though, I haven't been the Verdant Dragon since my injury…"
Qrow grimaced as the proprietor of the Dragon's Bonsai spoke of his injury. It was a well known story when Qrow was still at Beacon. How a single man stopped an Elder Colossus from breaching the city of Mistral's defence perimeter.
"Heard you injured yourself by overusing your semblance."
"And that is pretty close to the truth. My left hand mostly recovered, but my dominant hand is irreparably damaged by the backlash. I'm in no state to fight."
The man stood from the bench and walked over to a sapling that was replanted to replace a tree that was destroyed in the fire. He reached out with his left hand and a leafy green aura enveloped the sapling causing it to rapidly get bigger and grow into a full grown tree in a matter of minutes.
It just so happened that in those few minutes another man currently wearing traditional Mistralian clothing approached. When the headmaster took his right hand and put its palm against the bark of the newly grown tree Ren froze in shock before the wheels in his mind started to turn.
"With my arm like this I may not be able to fight like before, but I can still impart my knowledge to students so perhaps that might be enough."
The man shrugged and started walking away.
"Isn't that the owner of the gym? And what happened to his arm?" Ren asked Qrow.
Qrow smiled at the younger man "Well let me tell you a story of the Verdant Dragon."
=O=O=O=
Jaune stood in the middle of Haven's forge. It was a lot like Beacon's forge used to be though some of the equipment appeared to be older and had seen more use.
He was about to light the forge when Ren walked in, seemingly in a hurry.
"Jaune! I believe I found a candidate for project Phoenix!"
"Huh? Ren, you didn't have to. The employment to ARR is just…"
"I happened to learn about it by chance. It's the new headmaster. Professor Verdant has a very damaged dominant arm."
"Okay? And what about the weapon we'd use?"
"...no, he fights unarmed using his semblance. You see the hand itself is the potential material. It's wood!"
Jaune frowned "What do you mean it's wood?"
"His semblance can make living wood grow incredibly fast and apparently his hand got damaged when he overused his semblance. It looked like four fifths wood, maybe more."
Jaune considered it for a second before nodding in agreement. "Okay, let's go tell Ruby and then let's meet the headmaster."
=O=O=O=
"Ah, mister Arc and miss Arc-Rose. Allow me to welcome you to my new office. I saw your fight with the young Dragon, very impressive." he nodded to Jaune "She is your sister, correct? Forgive me when I say, you two don't look all that much alike."
"We both look like our mothers…"
"Ah, that would explain it… indeed… but enough small talk. You wished to see me?"
"Yes sir. We… sorry… we're here to talk about your injury."
"I see… did mister Branwen regale you with tales of times long past? My arm is indeed damaged but I have long since accepted that as the price for protecting the kingdom all those years back."
Jaune looked at Ruby before he took a step forward.
"May I?" he gestured to the sleeved arm.
The new headmaster considered for a second before pullin back the loose sleeve from his arm.
"It is unsightly but for day to day I get by. My semblance helps me move it about though it is slow and I've lost feeling in it. It is a unique affliction I brought about to myself."
Jaune looked at the arm in recognition. It was as Ren said mostly wood though to Jaune and Ruby it evoked a different image.
"...Would you believe me if I told you it isn't exactly unique? We've seen this type of damage before… correct me if I'm wrong but do you have an abnormal amount of Aura?"
"Above average, yes. Though during the incident I had even more thanks to one of my teammates. Her semblance allowed her to directly transfer a measure of her own Aura to another. We both abused our sembances that day… she didn't survive."
"Aura compression…"
"I'm sorry? What do you mean by compression?"
Jaune considered for a second before he stepped back and ignited his Aura. The white gold flames flickered as Jaune forced them to keep close to his body until they were no longer translucent and appeared closer to a liquid metal than flames.
When he extinguished his Aura again he explained. It was somewhat bizarre not knowing if it was something he came to understand himself or if it was Jinn feeding him knowledge but Jaune chose to ignore it for the moment.
"Normally Aura is a dilute form of energy. The old stories called it Magic but it is my understanding that Magic is just a high amount of compressed Aura with a given purpose, like our semblances. The more energy is compressed the more powerful the wielder becomes in that moment though if you used your semblance it is possible that the energy of your semblance at that moment was… well it was Magic and your body suffered from the backlash of it since our bodies aren't normally used to handling Magic."
"That is certainly a curious theory but I'm more interested in hearing about the other case you saw. You say you've seen this type of damage before? Semblance damage?"
"No, I meant the wood specifically… We've seen a… a more severe case of it. A man entirely encased and rooted within a tree, his whole body was like your arm."
Jaune fell silent as did the headmaster. That was when Ruby stepped into the conversation.
"During our time in Atlas we worked on prosthetics and their Aura conductivity. It was something that stemmed from our previous research, the results of which was what you saw at the end of Jaune's match with Yang."
"I see… I assume you're here to offer me a chance at replacing my arm? I appreciate the gesture but I am unwilling to part with the reminder of that day."
"You wouldn't be… not entirely." Ruby said before looking to Jaune to continue.
"See our research proved that objects and weapons especially that are exposed to one's Aura then carry a piece of it. We used weapons as materials to forge the new limbs."
"But in your case it would be your arm that would become your new arm."
Headmaster Verdant looked pensive before replying.
"I believe I'll need some time to think this through… I hope you'll allow an old man that much…"
"Of course sir. We don't plan on leaving anytime soon."
=O=O=O=
Neptune was laying on a bed in his team's dorm room. Most of it was left exactly as they left it when they left for Vale all those months ago and now that classes would be starting again they made it their home again…
Except there was a piece missing. A blond idiot shaped hole in the team. His bed was neat and tidy and his desk was only a little sticky from the banana peels that Sun would leave there after eating.
The rest of the boys were out so Neptune just went back to scrolling on his scroll. Then he received a message. Then another and another sent days apart but only arriving now when the sender got in range of a Mistral relay.
Neptune quickly scrolled down to the newest one.
Arrived to the port town. Will be back in Mistral in no time! Prepare a feast for my return!
"SUN! You bloody idiot, you're coming back!"
Neptune hurriedly dialled and waited for Sun to pick up.
"come on, come on… Sun!"
"Hey Nep, how's it hanging? Guess we're finally in range huh."
"...told you we would be."
"Sun it's so good to hear you! And is that Blake in the background?"
"Yeah! We went to Menagerie, took care of some things, fought some Grimm and now we're on our way to Haven! Oh and we bought some souvenirs! Hope we didn't miss anything important."
"Oh man, yeah, yeah you did miss a bunch. Hurry up back here and we'll tell you all of it. How much longer will the journey take?"
"Oh, uhhh… Blake?"
"Shouldn't take more than a week. A few days if we go by train."
"You heard the lady."
"Yeah, yeah I heard her. Man you better take the train, classes start in a few days."
"Huh? Didn't classes… like did they stop or something? Did I miss a holiday?!"
"I'm telling you a lot happened, tell you when you get here?"
"Sounds good, bye for now, we're gonna catch a train."
"Yeah man, see you."
Neptune adamantly refused to acknowledge that he was on the brink of tears. He definitely didn't get emotional because of his best friend turning up alive, that would be so uncool.
=O=O=O=
Author's note:
Hey, unlike the original show I didn't write Sun out of the story. But that's not the important part is it... Well Jaune's explanation of Aura, Magic and Divinity is not wrong, but it is incomplete for two reasons. For one, Jaune even with the Relic's help is only now figuring this out, secondly headmaster Verdant is not in the know so to say, so he only shared what he considered necessarily to explain.
Jaune has taken on some projects now but he will take on a few more before their stay in Mistral comes to an end.
Personal life wise, my phone is falling apart so thats fun. The screen is holding on for dear life on cables alone. I'm getting a replacement soon especially since I currently write and post from my phone.
But hey if you want to support me you can do so on P a treon . com (slash) OlympianScribe
Anyway I hope you enjoyed and are looking forward to the next chapter: Ch. 73 An offered hand