Yang Xiao Long
Dancing is truly beautiful. Lights across the wall, stars through the sky, Magic through the air, people on a floor.
She could see it. A beautiful visage. She wore a dress, a beautiful dress that almost glowed with orange and yellow lights. Across from her, her dancing partner, her wife, she wore a black dress, one with purple streaks. Both of them looked stunning, and as they danced, they looked even better. Their bodies flowed, moving as one across the dance floor, never leaving each other's embrace. In this moment, it felt like no one in Remnant could dance better than they could. On one of each of their hands, there was a long black silk glove that stretched up to cover their elbow.
Fingers interlocked on those hands, the two of them used each other as a focus; a way to concentrate. Without one another, without that connection, they wouldn't be able to keep dancing. One wrong step, one wrong move, one moment of slipped concentration, and they would trip and fall; taking the other with them. This dance of theirs, it was truly beautiful, the most impressive of its kind.
But they danced as a duo. Someone else wore a beautiful dance, she also danced, but she did so on her own. It was a beautiful dress, just like theirs, it sparkled with a flurry of swirling colours. She danced nearby; she was their opponent. Despite their beauty, they could only barely keep up with her on her own. It was a contest, a battle. But victory didn't come from defeating the other, victory came from improving. Apart, they couldn't match her, together, maybe one day they could. Because unlike them, she wore no glove.
This visage, this dance of theirs, it was a constant in the back of her mind. It was required to keep going. One slip in concentration, one messed up detail in the image, and...
Grunting, Yang flew back as a boot connected with her stomach. The image in her mind, the dance, it was torn apart as her concentration waned. Disappearing with it, so did her arm return to normal, the pure-black substance covering it receding and fading into dark smoke. Hitting a wall, it took a moment before Yang stood. By the time she did, Blake was already at her side. Pyrrha stood at a distance still, no doubt waiting for them to come again.
"You ok?" Blake whispered as they stood. Giving a small nod, Yang shot her a smile. The hit was strong, but it was the first bit of damage she had taken, she could easily take more.
Climbing out of the wall, Yang stood tall in her half-form. Scales wreathed her body, Yellow with black lines outlining each scale. On her head, two horns were fully sprouted, and all of her limbs ended in black claws. However, unlike how it usually presented itself, she had no wings present. Dragons could retract their wings just like their tails, but often it served no purpose. Wings were a constant advantage, their size and power far greater than their arms; especially in Yang, Argus, and Summer's case. But for now, they only served as a distraction, she would include them later when her skill allowed for it.
Holding out her hand, she visualised it again, that ballroom, their dance. She thought of Blake, of taking her into her arms and standing together. Then, she thought of them both slipping on that glove. At her demand, her arm bubbled and blossomed a pure-black liquid that covered it entirely. With it came a surge of power, and she glanced over to see Blake's arm do the same. Unlike Yang, Blake only had two horns, and scales covering her forearms. Despite that, her mastery form outclassed her half-form.
With the both of them ready again, Yang's mind began to play the music in the ballroom, and the dancing began.
Surging towards Pyrrha, the both of them made for a deadly combo. Blake was stronger than Yang in every way, strength, speed, durability; it was the advantage of her greater form. But Yang could bridge that gap with her innate Spell. Her body not covered by that darkness lit up like the surface of the sun, and in doing so, she had become incredibly dangerous to touch. Between the two, Pyrrha had to be wary of both of their positioning at all times. None were a greater threat than the other, which left the Harbinger in a deadly two vs one.
But Conquest was equal to the challenge. Armed with a short sword and a shield, she blocked both of their simultaneous strikes. The force was strong, but not unstoppable, not when she was prepared for it. A charge surged through both her sword and shield, but the duo expected it, and pulled back just before the voltage hit them. Turning her body, Pyrrha charged Blake. The Shade Dragon expected it, and was able to deflect her first two strikes with her own sword before Pyrrha jumped straight up, avoiding a strike from Yang.
As she rose, two strikes of lightning pounded from above and barely missed the two Dragons. Lightning Magic had become Pyrrha's go to quite a while ago. Given it was the biggest Affinity she had, that was to be expected, but its speed had also given her reason to love it. When stacked with Holy-Magic, it made for a times four Affinity, and given Conquest's Mana pool, she easily could have ended the battle with a big enough attack. But that would go against the purpose of the training.
When Pyrrha landed, Yang and Blake were at her sides immediately. She was quick to deflect their blows, stepping back as she did to keep them both in front of her rather than block from two different sides. That worked against the Dragons, so Blake zipped behind Pyrrha quickly, attempting a strike from behind. Barely avoiding it with a tilt of her head, Pyrrha followed through by spinning her whole body on its side, turning around midair and kicking Blake in the side. The Shade Dragon barely blocked and was forced back a few metres, but in the meantime, Pyrrha was still midair with Yang baring down on her.
Punching straight down at her with her full weight, Yang's fist met Pyrrha's shield with an ear-splitting ringing noise. Stuck between the ground and Yang's fist, Pyrrha sent a charge through her shield again, but this time Yang simply took the blow. She felt the surge travel through her body, but did her best to ignore it as she kept the dance playing in her mind. Keeping Pyrrha down took priority, and finally Blake arrived back with a swing of her sword aimed for the Harbinger's head. Before it reached too close to her to call the match their win, Pyrrha slammed her head upwards and met the blade with her forehead.
Stunned by the move, both Dragons watched as the blade bounced back against her head. Her skin had been hardened, made rock solid for a moment before it faded. Using the chance they had given her, Pyrrha kicked Yang's feet out from under her and quickly darted to a crouch, leaping back and taking a moment to breath. The Dragons, also tired, did the same.
Yang was puzzled by the Spell Pyrrha had used, but she couldn't question it. Going down a rabbit hole of thoughts would just be a distraction. She had to focus on the dance, she had to keep that image sharp in her mind. Glancing at Blake, it seemed that she was having even more trouble than Yang. Her eyes were a bit hazy, the distraction she was feeling was easy to see. Blake had less practice at this, the image she kept in her mind was harder to maintain than Yang's own. Looking to Pyrrha once again, the Harbinger took in a deep breath.
When she let it go, they all charged once again. Yang and Blake struck one after another, a constant rhythm that went twice as fast as one of them could do on their own. Still, Pyrrha blocked the strikes. They attacked her from a forty-five-degree angle, then ninety, then a hundred and eighty. Even on opposite ends of her, they couldn't get a hit in. The Harbinger was giving this battle their full concentration, while Yang and Blake could only give a fraction of their own. That difference was clear, neither Yang nor Blake had the mental capacity to maintain the image and think ahead enough to avoid traps in Pyrrha's style.
Eventually, Blake fell into one. She moved a step in too close as she swung downwards. Her blade hit Pyrrha's own, but the sword didn't block the strike, it let Blake's own slide off the end as Pyrrha brought it around to the Dragon's neck. The strike stopped less than an inch from Blake's skin, and all three of them stopped moving at once. Once again, like every time they fought, Pyrrha had won.
It wasn't a surprise, but it also wasn't disheartening. Yang could remember how they were when they first started fighting as a duo against her, these practice sessions had begun with fights that lasted seconds. Now, they lasted minutes. Even missing most of their ability to concentrate, Yang and Blake could keep up with the Harbinger. In physical stats, they were extremely close to her. She only beat them out categorically in Magic now. Besides, this wasn't the end of the road for the Dragons.
The Reaper Mana, the Regret Magic, that black liquid. It had started out as something just covering a hand. Overtime, the more they learned to use it, they could push it further and further. The bigger they maintained it, the stronger the boost it gave them. They were only scratching the surface, currently. With it, they were getting stronger, and one day, it would be too much for Pyrrha to keep up with. Even with Magic.
"Again." Yang declared with a smirk. One that both Blake and Pyrrha shared.
Heavy breaths, gasps for air that their lungs desperately needed. Tired didn't begin to describe it, exhausted was too weak of a word. Both Yang and Blake were sitting down, leaning against each other to stay up as they tried to slow their hearts and calm their screaming bodies.
And then there was Pyrrha, watching on with a gentle smile without a care. "You two are getting incredibly strong."
"Shut up, Pyrrha..." Blake said between gasps.
"Yeah..." That was all the support Yang could give.
Pyrrha smiled at their words, she knew they didn't mean it. "Seems like it's progressing well."
That was a bit of an overstatement. "Twelve years to reach the elbow." Yang groaned out between her harsh breaths. "You'd think we'd be past that by now."
"We might not even have to." Blake had begun to calm her body already, meanwhile Yang still huffed like a dog. "If we can reach a mastery of this stage, it would be more than enough of a power boost if we could get our concentration back." It had taken a long time to channel the Reaper Mana enough to reach their elbow, but at this stage, covering just a hand was incredibly easy. The both of them could do it with a minimal amount of effort. If they could reach that stage with the power provided by how far they could push it now, Blake was right, it would be enough to push Pyrrha to use her Magic fully.
They had gone for ten rounds today, not their personal best, but the number ebbed and flowed overtime. As they mastered a stage, how long they could do it for increased, but it went down again when they pushed out more strength. "In an actual fight, it would only be safe to use a hand at this point." The cost to their focus and concentration was too great otherwise. If they fought someone strong enough to require this power, they would need their wits about them.
Pyrrha seemed to disagree. "I don't know, Yang. Fighting the both of you at once is a bit overwhelming."
"But that doesn't matter." Blake chimed in. "Even us together couldn't beat Hazel, and individually we should be able to beat Cinder." She was only a Demon after all, they weren't aware of any Titles she had.
It was all a bit of a moot point anyway. Baring Salem, who was there even left to fight? Hazel, Cinder, the Silver Wizard, the Bronze Wizard, Adam, and Mercury. All of Vale together wasn't enough to beat Salem, but they were hoping they wouldn't have to. Qrow could take Hazel, Hazel had confirmed it himself by running away from her uncle. Cinder would lose to either Blake or Yang surely, and Mercury was a non-factor. That wasn't even mentioning Jaune and Pyrrha. Pyrrha was obviously a Harbinger, but on top of that, she could use Holy Magic like Jaune. So far, they knew that Holy Magic would be incredibly effective against Adam and Cinder at least.
Jaune at this point could probably beat Cinder, it was that favourable a matchup. Pyrrha could easily dispatch Adam in that case, and that left only the Bronze and Silver Wizards. Not much was known about them, but it wasn't feasible to suggest that they were enough to fill the gap. After all, Rose was still a factor. When the time came to fight, she would no doubt appear. Yang knew she would. Rose didn't show herself to them, probably to protect their feelings. If Yang ever saw her, it would either be because she was saving their lives... Or trying to kill them.
"Rose probably just wants to kill all of us. Salem's side too." Her bloodlust for Dragons was kept in check by that cloak apparently, but if she was free of it, no doubt Rose would simply want to wipe the board clean. Get rid of everyone that even had a trace of Dragon in them.
Thinking about this wasn't helping. Yang sighed and glanced at Pyrrha's forehead. "What was that Spell, by the way? The one that hardened your skin?"
Blake perked up, no doubt she had been curious as well. "Oh," Pyrrha seemed surprised they wanted to know. "It's just what it seemed like. I think it's called stone-skin? Something like that... It's a buff Spell, some Support Magic I never really found a use for." That explained why she had never used it before, but is also outlined a key facet of Pyrrha's power. There were things not even she knew she could do, Spells that sat in her back pocket that would no doubt have a use if she just remembered them. That was obviously a lot to keep on mind, especially in a fight. The fact that she was now using Spells like that was proof that this training was helping her too.
Heading inside a nearby building for some drinks, they took some seats around a table. The Arc estate had quite a few people living on it, yet Yang was always surprised they never seemed to run into anyone. Probably just a testament to how big this place really was. This particular 'house' was quite small, likely just for a single guest, or what they used it for every time they trained. That being relaxing inside, and talking about their training.
Pyrrha often started with a similar question. "What is it like?" Neither Yang or Blake minded answering this over and over; explaining it could help them better understand it themselves.
"It's like..." Yang started, but she always struggled with this, they both did. "The opposite."
Despite how strange that sounded, Blake agreed. "Take all the Magic you know, and pack it together. Even Holy-Magic and Anti-Magic. Put all of it together, and flip it. Invert it. That's Reaper Mana." The way Ozma had explained it to Weiss, and how she had explained it to them, was through Satisfaction and Regret. All the Magic they used; everything was all a part of what came from the Satisfaction in a Soul. Reaper Mana, was what came from the Regret. It was the other half, the other side of the coin.
"It goes against everything I know about Magic." Channelling it was confusing to put it lightly, and all the practice they had with ordinary Magic had seemed to work against their training in Reaper Mana. "It's like trying to write on a pencil with a page." Every rule, every guideline or explanation for standard Magic, all of it was broken and actively rejected by Reaper Mana.
"By itself, it isn't very strong." Blake said after a moments silence. "But when you combine it with normal Magic, it boosts the effects." Neither of them was at a point in which they could actually use a Spell with Reaper Mana, but they knew it was possible. So far, they could only improve the Mana in their bodies with it, and that by itself had been an incredible boon.
Listening along like always, Pyrrha broke from her norm by cutting in with a question. "The Harbinger Titles apparently use this Mana... So, can we assume their effects are based on things you can do with Reaper Mana?" Usually, she was just content to let them explain, but it seemed that she had some kind of idea brewing in her thoughts. "Like War's ability to break the Affinity cap... Is that something anyone could do with Reaper Mana?"
It was an interesting thought, and one that definitely warranted looking into. However, "I wouldn't even know how to start looking into that." Yang couldn't even do Spells yet, messing with an Affinity was much too high class for her.
Blake seemed to agree, though, she did have some ideas. "Maybe if we could make it reach our eyes?" That still had a long way to go though, there was a fair distance between the elbow and eyes. "Or maybe our Soul, somehow?"
"Is there any reason you have to start from your hand?" Pyrrha asked the obvious question.
Yang shrugged. "I've tried to spawn it from other spots, but my hand is the only place I can manage." She wasn't too keen on trying it on her other hand, either. If it messed with her prosthetic and broke it, she wasn't confident Argus could fix it.
"I think it's just a matter of time now. There isn't any way to get past it, we just have to keep training." Speaking the unfortunate truth was something Blake excelled at, but it still led to all three of them sighing. Time wasn't exactly their friend. Sure, Yang and Blake had infinite of it, but giving their enemy that much time was bad too.
"There's no telling what they've already managed to do with twelve years..."
Cinder Fall
He looked like a madman. If Cinder didn't know any better, she would believe he was one... Or, maybe he had driven himself insane already.
Strewn about the room, what had once been an organised and refined workshop, were bones. Skeletons, gigantic ones. The creatures these bones came from were thirty meters long, what little of the room was revealed beneath the piles was a single Magic Circle drawn by hand on the floor. One he sat in front of.
He looked a mess to put it lightly. Hair frazzled and greasy, clothes torn and unkept, Cinder could smell him from here; he hadn't bathed for two years by now. This state he was in, she had asked the others multiple times, even gone so far as to ask her but to no avail. Leaving him to his own devices was necessary, despite how strange it was. Arthur was tearing himself apart like this, obsession didn't even begin to describe it.
Every few minutes, he would scream. The sound was awful, like he tore his throat every time he did it. But it was never just a noise. He always screamed "HOW!?" or "WHY!?" or something like that. It was consistent, he had been like this for over two years now.
Two years ago, ten years after Carmine's death and Cinder's acquisition of the Golden High Wizard Title, a question had finally been answered of theirs. How did Ruby Schnee kill Carmine? They had guessed it was a weapon, even if Arthur had been hesitant to suggest such a thing. Then, after Tock died, they knew they needed answers. So... In order to get results back, they had to send out some of the Grimm. But... different ones. Stronger ones. Some of the ones she was saving for the end of her plan.
Cinder still didn't exactly understand what the difference was between them and the usual Dragon Grimm they sent out, but these ones left skeletons behind. That was enough to gather data. Enough to find out how they were dying. However, their results had to wait. Recovering the bodies was incredibly difficult. Anyone sent through Vale's borders would probably suffer the same fate those Grimm had.
It had taken nine years before they recovered the first one. Two years ago, that day when they had all seen the damage done to it for the first time... Hazel and Tyrian had barely understood it, but both Cinder and Arthur had. They knew what they were looking at... and it was impossible.
The cut, the separation along the bone. It didn't make sense. They were separated perfectly. By all logic, it was impossible to say those two pieces were ever a part of the same whole. It couldn't exist. If they didn't know any better, if they didn't know it was two parts of the same bone, neither of them ever would have accepted it.
What kind of attack could have done this? What kind of power was capable of this? Not even the Harbingers could do it, not even Hazel, no one could. It was impossible. She kept coming back to that word, it was the only way to describe it.
Cinder had done her best to move on, to accept what was and have nothing more to do with it... But Arthur couldn't. He kept digging, he just had to know how this happened, he had to know what did this. In his obsession, he had determined the only possible culprit. The only way this could have happened.
Somehow, someway, there was an object with infinite sharpness out there.
Not infinite thinness. Arthur and Cinder had both discredited that idea immediately. It was impossible. No two-dimensional object could exist in reality, there was no way to make one either. So somehow, there was an object with a thickness, that was infinitely sharp.
But that obviously raised the question, "HOW!?" Arthur howled yet again as Cinder stood watching from the doorway. In order to create something like that, you would need infinite Mana. But there was no one with Infinite Mana, not truly. The closest that existed was her and the High Devils. Not even they could do this, not even they could sustain such an objects existence.
"HOW!?" He screamed. "WHY!?" He pleaded. Arthur was completely lost to this challenge; it had reached the point that none of the others could even attempt to help. Cinder could have tried, but he was so far into his ramblings and theories that she wouldn't be able to make sense of it. They were stuck, all of them, waiting for the solution that this madman would cook up.
In the meantime, Cinder had to do her best to not go mad herself. "How... How did Ruby make such a weapon...?" She thought. "Why... Why can't I figure it out...?"
