Chapter 82 - Argus and Sanctum - Milestone

Year 72VE, August

Cover Art by Mi Chumi

Cinder awoke to the subtle aroma and warmth of something aflame. She'd become amazingly attuned to such things, over the past… geez it had been almost three years? Yeah. Three years of training with Aura and weapon and Semblance.

She cracked open her eyes, even as her ears picked up the sounds that announced someone, some persons, were in her bedroom. She turned to see first a wavering flame, perched atop a small wax column, embedded deeply into a sweet-smelling and luscious-looking rounded cake, just large enough for one person.

Held by Visha. Probably made by her, too. Made for Cinder.

And reflected in that wavering candlelight were her mother and father's faces, full of love and happiness.

"Happy birthday, love," Selene breathed softly, scarlet eyes reflecting the candlelight in a really exotic way. Cinder had still not gotten tired of seeing those eyes. At the same time Garek, her father, murmured "Happy fifteenth, Cinder," his rounded ears twitching.

Cinder felt like her heart would break in half, just from the simple joy of it.

Over a year since her parents had gotten married and then formally adopted her, since she'd become their daughter in the eyes of Argus. Three years to the day since they'd rescued her from a life of pain and servitude. Since they'd changed her life. A past whose pain became more and more blurry, more impossible to imagine, as each month had ticked past, because they'd filled those months up with love.

Shown and told.

She blinked the last remnants of sleep from her eyes, and smiled even as her eyes threatened to well up.

"Oh…"

"Come on now, Cinder," Visha scolded with a smile, "before the wax runs all over it." Her smile turned wry. "Though if you don't want it, I'm sure we could box it up for one of your friends-"

Cinder sat bolt upright, causing Selene to cover her mouth in an effort to hide her laugh. "I'm up! I'm up!"

And then, just because she could, just because she wanted to show off a little, Cinder activated her Semblance. It was a small thing, a new trick that she'd been practicing at Sanctum and that she'd been waiting for the right moment to use.

Cinder Scoria had gained much fine control over Scorching Caress. Instead of blowing out the candle with her breath, she concentrated for a moment, letting heat build in her chest and form a marble-sized ball of flame in her uplifted palm, and then willed it to elongate into a needle-like jet toward the candlewick.

Where she willed it to do two things, almost at once. This fire was her creation, and until it was quenched, it was hers to command.

The first was to form a hollow globe around the existing flame, and then consume all of the oxygen in its vicinity, starving the wick of air.

The second was to then draw the heat she'd added back into herself, starving the wick of the heat required to auto-ignite, even as air rushed back in, leaving nothing but a burst of smoke.

The look on her family's faces would have been awesome…

If she hadn't just knocked out most of the light in the room and made it so she couldn't see them.

"Oh dang," she muttered, even as she heard Selene start to laugh in earnest.

"Cinder, I can tell you as a faunus, that the look on your mom's face was priceless," her dad said, his voice full of mirth. "That was really impressive, Cinder. Of course, the look on your face now is something else, too."

"Double dang," Cinder huffed, and funneled Scorching Caress back into her palm, careful to keep it clear of her bedding. She hadn't set her room on fire yet, and wasn't about to start now. The room was immediately illuminated in a warm yellow glow, and she could see their faces again, more amused than lovey-dovey now.

Oh well. Cinder felt a laugh bubble up as well, and let it, even as Visha moved over and turned on the bedside lamp, so she could extinguish her own light source, and yield to the hugs from her parents.

Cinder Scoria was fifteen. Or at least, she chose to be fifteen today. When she'd taken on her new name, they'd picked the day of her redemption, of her extraction from the Glass Unicorn, as her birthday. So, fifteen she was, by hook or crook.

She still had school today, unfortunately, which was why they'd woken her up like this, with a celebratory mini-cake. She was having a real birthday party the coming weekend, with all of her friends, at Pete's Emporium. Pete had promised free games for everyone, which Saphron Arc had then pulled him aside on, and had some choice words for him, and then Garek and Selene had insisted that they actually pay for the guests to play, and then Sophia had rolled her eyes at all of them and confided in Cinder that it didn't actually matter since the money all came from the same place.

That was another thing that had happened. The adults had apparently had some sort of meeting, and they'd decided that Cinder needed to know some things. More things than the fact that her mom was part Grimm-stuff and one of her grandmothers was the Queen of the Grimm when she wasn't just Selene's mom. They'd told her about the fact that there were bad people out there, way worse than Madame, who were working for the Queen, and that they were a super-secret club that was working against them To Save The World.

If it had been anyone else, if she had been anyone else, she would have laughed and accused them of making things up.

But she was Cinder Scoria, and they were her mom and her dad and The Lone Huntsmen and Rhodes. They didn't joke about stuff like that. Well Pete had all sorts of wild theories about stuff, but it wasn't just him.

That had been heavy. They'd made her swear to all the gods that she wouldn't discuss this with anyone else, made sure she understood that this was knowledge that was just as dangerous as her mom's 'Secret Identity' as Sarah had dubbed it.

Cause yeah, of course she'd told Sarah a version of the truth. Sarah was her bestie. Like practically her sister. And she'd made sure, this time, that her bestie knew not to spill the beans. And she'd told Argent, because Argent was half of her heart, and you couldn't keep a secret like that from yourself.

And they'd discussed it, and decided to tell Laurel, too, because the Grimmslayers stuck together.

It had all gone exactly as she'd expected it to. Argent hadn't believed her, not at first. She'd been sure Cinder was joking with her. Cinder had planned it all out, saving it for a long weekend so she could be there, in person, repeatedly, for Argent to 'get it all out' in private. It had taken an entire weekend for her girlfriend to start to believe that it was not, in fact, a joke. She'd had a lot of questions. About what Cinder's mom was really like. About what this Grimm Queen was actually doing.

About whether this meant Cinder's life was going to be in danger and whether she really should go through with being a Huntress, since it meant not just protecting the world against Grimm, but putting herself in the middle of an actual war. That was probably the only part that had shocked Cinder, that her girlfriend would even think about suggesting that. That part of the conversation had ended up in tears, with Argent confessing as she clung to her that she was just scared for her, for them, and that she didn't want Cinder to think she was telling her she couldn't.

And Cinder had cried too, and promised that she would be careful, but that she had to do this. She felt like, with her Semblance and the fact that Selene and Garek had found her, and rescued her, and they were who and what they were… that this wasn't something she could just walk away from. It was like, destiny or something.

It had changed their relationship, dramatically. Cinder felt like it had made them even closer, which was shocking because she hadn't imagined that she could be any more in love with Argent than she had been already. If Garek and Selene had been her life raft, Argent had been her rock. And now it was just… more.

The trust she'd shown her had changed Argent, too. Before, her girlfriend had not been sure exactly what she wanted to do with her life. She'd thought about going into the same field as her mom, who was an office manager for a medium-sized retail chain in Argus. But this? This was huge. This was important.

"If you're going to do this, then I have to do my part too," Argent had told her, kissing her. "We'll figure out what I need to do, and I'll train for that." She toyed with Cinder's bangs. "Not fighting, of course. But… there's other things that you'll need. Stuff like what Sophia does, though I'm not techie like that, either. But I bet there are other jobs. Jobs that are important to have someone you can trust, right?"

It had to be true love, Cinder had reasoned, if your girlfriend was willing to change the whole direction of her life, because she trusted you.

Sarah had been easier.

"Oh, hell yeah. I knew something was up with the whole secret lair!" Sarah had shaken her head in wonder. "That freaking explains everything."

Sarah had also been the one that had drawn a comparison between the comic books that Tomas had introduced her to (though he'd denied even owning them until she'd pulled one out of his locker) and Selene's situation. Cinder hadn't doubted that Sarah would accept Selene, just on Cinder's say-so. But she'd been a little worried that the whole Grimm part would freak her out a little, you know, being in training to kill Grimm and all.

Nope.

It had turned out that Tomas had fully infected Sarah with the Comic Book bug, though she still insisted they weren't officially dating.

"Your mom is totally a superhero with, like, a super-secret identity," Sarah insisted, "That's the deal. Happens all the time in the comics. The scion of the big-bad has to take on a masked public persona so his dad won't know, and so no one else will tie them together, and then goes around thwarting their evil schemes. Totally believable."

Cinder's bestie was just freaking incredible, as long as she remembered to keep her mouth shut. And she had gotten a lot better about that over the last two years, it was true, partly because she was also working with the White Fang behind the scenes, now.

Laurel had been… a bit more difficult. She was willing to take it on faith, because of the other three, but deep down, they could tell she was harboring a seed of doubt whether this was all just some long, drawn-out prank they were pulling. But she still gave a solemn promise not to say anything.

And really, the reason for all of that was simple. Cinder knew now that she had to be super careful what she said over Scroll, because not all of her friends had secure scrolls and she couldn't justify giving them one. And that meant she had to make sure they didn't pry into certain things, or ask certain questions over text. She'd been relieved to learn that apparently the White Fang was already operating under that assumption too, mostly because they didn't trust Atlas technology to not be eavesdropped on, but it worked out the same.

The only thing she hadn't shared with her friends, her closest friends, was what she'd done that horrible night, there in the clearing. That she'd killed someone, though she hadn't wanted to. She'd done it without thinking, because her mom had been in danger. And it hadn't been anyone's fault. Not really, no matter the fact that her parents kept saying it was their fault.

She wouldn't do anything like that again, though. She'd figure out some other way to save people without having to hurt people who were just making a mistake. She was sure of it.

But really, she suspected they had guessed that something bad had happened. Sarah had made a comment, once, after she'd confided in them about her mom and the whole evil world-ending plot thing. She'd hinted around that she'd put two and two together about her mom and something really bad happening, and Cinder running away.

And then she'd seen the look on Cinder's face, and had said they could talk about it when she was ready, and had hugged her and then changed the subject. And then later, Argent had said she'd talked to Sarah, and that she was there for her, when she was ready.

That had been two months ago.

Cinder still wasn't ready. But she would be, someday.

. . .

Breakfast was special too. It had become a birthday tradition to make a little of everything, in memory of her first breakfast at the hotel where Selene and Garek had hidden her. Birthday Sampler Special, they'd taken to calling it. It was a tradition now, one that Visha happily facilitated. And her Scroll was blown up with happy birthday messages from all of her friends, and Rhodes and the Lone Huntsmen, and the Roses from way out in Patch, and Dania of course. And her grandparents in Ansel who were even traveling in this weekend, and the Arcs because she'd made friends with Saphron's twin sisters, who were pretty close to her in age, and Pyrrha Nikos and her sister Helena who was Selene's bestie and almost like an aunt. And Crystal of course, who Cinder highly suspected was also a superhero with a secret identity based on a few things she'd seen and heard. And the Belladonnas. And Headmaster Lionheart.

And her other grandmother, too. And she'd sent a message back to her saying 'thank you and love you' and had totally not called her Grimmmother even though in her head it sounded hilarious.

Even Vernal had sent her a message, but it just said 'You still suck, bitchface' which had actually just made her laugh, because at least she didn't have to deal with her every day. Vernal had sorta become… okay in small doses. Kinda like a frenemy.

And then her family had sent her off to school on the streetcar. Sarah had met her two stops down, Tomas at her side. "Happy birthday, Cindy!" Sarah yelled at the top of her lungs as they hopped aboard.

Dangit, Sarah… "Listen here, Butthead," she hissed back.

"Today! On your birthday! I am proud to be your Butthead!" her friend proclaimed loudly, drawing a chorus of laughs from the other riders and a snort from Tomas. And some of those riders were their schoolmates. Mostly, she realized with a start, schoolmates from classes below hers. Youngsters. Little kids who barely had their Aura unlocked.

Of course, a couple were from her class, and one was a fourth-year. And that meant that the news that it was her birthday would spread like wildfire at Sanctum.

And that meant hazing. All. Day. Long. Oh not the ugly kind. She'd seen it before. Just good-natured calling out, pranks, run of the mill stuff. Heck, she didn't even have to worry about Candy, now that most of her bullcrap verbal ammunition had been rendered waterlogged and squibbed because Cinder had been well and truly adopted.

Also, Cinder could and would beat the ever loving crap out of Candy in a spar. And so could Sarah.

But all that aside, it felt freaking weird. It felt like time was speeding up. She was almost three-quarters done with Combat School. By this time next year, she'd be applying to a Huntsman Academy. And she even knew which one.

One that didn't even exist yet.

And that still left her stomach roiling. Because…

Crap. No not crap. Shit. Yes. That was worth a 'shit', at least inside her head, because Argent.

Argent's mom was freaking out, because Argent had tested the waters with an off-hand remark about maybe, just maybe, moving away from Argus when Cinder went away for Academy. And not freaking out as in yelling or screaming, but as in looking like someone had killed her best friend. It had nearly broken Argent, and she'd sobbed on Cinder's shoulder for hours, saying she didn't want to hurt her mom, but she didn't want them to be apart, either.

That had been one of the reasons that Cinder had spilled the beans about the whole "Mission to Save Remnant" thing. She had to make sure Argent understood why she had to go off to Academy, and why it wouldn't be Haven. And they still hadn't resolve what was going to happen next year with Argent.

Life was speeding up. And it was getting complicated.

And sweet. And beautiful. And stressful. But awesome, too.

Sarah and Cinder had become a little mini-pre-Huntress team. One that was respected not only at their class-level, but by the fourth-years, too. The boost that Rhodes and Garek had given her had, she'd decided, put her at least a year ahead of her classmates at this point. And Sarah's competitive nature, parental support, and access to Cinder for informal spars, had pushed her up there, too.

And her bestie had unlocked her Semblance, which ended up complimenting and obfuscating her faunus trait, to her relief. Weld allowed her to use Aura to basically attach herself to anything her skin could touch, whether it was a wall, ceiling… or your freaking weapon that you really, really wanted her to let go of. But until her Aura ran out, it was hers, not yours, and no amount of bitching was gonna change that. And Aura meant you couldn't exactly tear her hand off, either.

And Sarah Tourmaline was finding some really freaking creative ways to use her Semblance. And the two of them had started trying to scope out how to combine them to completely thrash an enemy without frying Sarah to a crisp. It was a work in progress.

And that was important, because Sarah Tourmaline, her bestie, had already worked it out with her parents, that wherever Cinder went to Huntsman Academy at, Sarah was going there, too. No ifs, ands, or buts.

And Sarah hadn't said, but Cinder was like ninety percent sure that her parents had met, very quietly, with Ghira Belladonna, and that Sarah's parents knew exactly which Huntsman Academy that was going to be.

And Sarah hadn't said a word, but she'd gave some knowing looks.

Yep, she's getting better at not being a total bigmouth.

"Happy birthday Cinder!" the entire class yelled when the walked into fourth period. Mrs. Regalia was leaning against the edge of the sparring arena, one corner turned up.

Dang it, Sarah. You're gonna pay for your big mouth someday.

. . .

"For today's spar, since it is apparently a special day, I think we'll have… Miss Scoria," Ms. Regalia said with a totally not smug expression on her face. "And you may choose whomever you please as your opponent."

Cinder's head turned glacially to the right, where Sarah sat. The look on her bestie's face was priceless. Her eyes went wide, and her face paled.

Yeah. That's right Bestie. Payback time. "Oh I totally choose Sarah," she said with a thin smile.

And then Sarah looked at Ms. Regalia. Cinder could see Sarah's brain trying to decide whether opening her mouth and getting detention was worse than what Cinder was about to do to her in the arena.

And then she shook her head, laughing at herself. "Alright. Beat down it is."

"Don't worry, Sarah," Tomas said gleefully, "I'll visit you in the hospital."

"Jerk!"

"Enough chatter, Miss Tourmaline. Gather your weapons and get down here."

Cinder was already halfway down, unsheathing Midnight's twin blades as she went. Arriving at the arena floor, she listened to the murmurs with a smile as Sarah arrived, tightening her bracers before drawing her own mechashift weapon, a combination of short sword and sling that she'd dubbed Sfenxiphos.

"Alright, ladies. In light of the fact that spirits may be running slightly high, I'm going to set a few more ground rules. No offensive use of Semblance." Cinder frowned and Sarah started to look slightly happier. "And no ranged attacks for this round." Now it was Sarah's turn to look slightly glum. In two sentences, Ms. Regalia had neutralized both of their primary strengths. Oh well. "Take your places. We will spar to 50% Aura." She pulled out her scroll, and synced it to the girls'. "Ready? Begin!"

Cinder felt her blood sing and pulse quicken, and saw the moment Sarah's expression changed as well. This was living. Really living. Any previous bad feelings or doubts just fall away in the arena. She wasn't even actually mad.

She was going to beat Sarah into the ground, but it wasn't because she was mad.

It was because it was freaking fun.

And Sarah intended to do the exact same thing.

Her bestie began a slow circle to her left, grinning broadly and rolling her left wrist to swing Sfenxiphos in a lazy figure-eight, loosening up her arm and, at the same time, seeking to draw Cinder's attention. Which she totally wasn't going to take the bait on. She held her dual blades loosely but firmly, angled in front of her body, right in front of left, and eased to her own left, matching Sarah's movement. Knees and elbows slightly bent, stance loose. Her bangs fell across her right eye, and she ignored them. Sarah had long-since refused to fall for the little ruse of 'oh dear, my bangs have fallen in front of my eye, I shall flip my head to get the hair out of the way and give you an opening to attack'.

With absolutely zero change in her expression, Sarah darted forward, swinging her sword in short arc that was halfway between a slash and a stab, as if she was unwilling to commit. Cinder met it with crossed blades, metal ringing on metal, and then quickly slid her righthand blade out of the block and back to meet the fist that was heading right for her face, blocking it with the flat.

Sarah didn't wince, but that had to hurt a little.

Nice move, Bestie!

Cinder crouched suddenly, lithe as a cat, causing Sarah's blade to slide off Midnight and that would have left her open, except her friend danced back instead, eyes narrowed.

Oh, are we dancing, my fine faunus friend? Wouldst thou wish to tango?

This time, Cinder slid forward, blades spinning. Sarah sidestepped and turned, presenting her profile and blocking one blade on her bracer, the other with Sfenxiphos, and then tried to nail Cinder in the knee with a side-kick which actually connected a bit, causing her to pull that leg back even as she slammed her forehead into Sarah's forehead, drawing a yelp of pain out of her and causing her head to snap back.

But not knocking her down, because one of the things Sarah had fine-tuned over the last two years of training was her footwear, which had a strip of sole that slid back at need, allowing a portion of her bare soles and toes to contact the ground.

Skin that was suddenly Welded to the floor, allowing her entire body to snap backward nearly horizontally to the ground, before she rebounded back with a look of pure malice. Using her momentum, she grabbed the spine of Cinder's freaking right-hand sword, Welded her hand to it, and slammed the butt end of it right into Cinder's throat.

Cinder staggered back, gagging for a second even with Aura taking the brunt of the blow. Her golden eyes nearly glowed as she saw the sneer on her best friend's face.

So. Much. Fun!

Up in the stands, Tomas leaned in to Clay and murmured, "You know, I really think they get off on beating the crap out of each other…" The taller boy just nodded sagely, and Tomas watched for a few more seconds.

And I think that it's freaking hot, too… he thought as the savagery of the spar ramped up to the next level.

. . .

Minutes later, the match had ended with Sarah disarmed and latched onto Cinder's back, legs wrapped around her hips and both hands having Welded to the backs of Cinder's blades so that Cinder couldn't get a good strike in with them. But Sarah was regretting it at the same time, because her hands felt like they were on fire now, and Cinder had thrown herself backward and then slammed the back of her head into Sarah's face repeatedly until her Aura finally dropped below 50%, only a bit below Cinder's 54%.

"MATCH!" Ms. Regalia called, and the lights in the Arena shifted, signaling that it was over.

Sarah released her hold, panting, and couldn't decide whether her face or her hands hurt more. Her face was covered in patches of red and slight purple bruises, but Aura was already causing them to fade. "Ow! I thought we weren't supposed to use our Semblance offensively!" Sarah complained as Cinder rolled off her. She examined her blistered palms through watering eyes, even as the redness began to fade.

"You were trying to disarm me," Cinder replied with a grunt. And winced, one hand fingering her sore throat, and the other gently prodding at her ribcage where Sarah had tried to pry at least two of her ribs off her body a few minutes prior with Sfenxiphos.

Probably not broken. Probably. "That's totally defensive."

"I'll allow it, Ms. Scoria. And Ms. Tourmaline, you would do well to remember that not everything is a good idea to latch onto."

"Totally assumed she couldn't do that. Wouldn't have tried it otherwise," Sarah grumbled, then grinned and gingerly levered herself to her feet. She started to do a high-five, then frowned at her palms and went for a fist-bump instead. "Good match, bestie."

"I forgive you."

"You better. No one else gonna put up with you."

Cinder snorted.

Except Argent, but that was different.

. . .

"Alright Cinder, please demonstrate Fine Control Scenario 3," Mrs. Plum requested as they stood in the stone-lined Aura training room.

Cinder nodded confidently. "Yes, ma'am. Fine Control Scenario 3."

And she was confident. She'd been working on this one all week.

Water.

Water was, she'd determined, more cool than she had ever imagined. And it was weird, because you'd think someone with a fire-based Semblance would not like water, not one bit.

But water was cool, because it was very, very predictable how it reacted to her Semblance. Other stuff might burst into flames or melt before she expected it to, because the material wasn't what she'd thought it was, or had other stuff mixed in.

But if she took a container of water, and applied her Semblance, it would increase in temperature pretty much in a straight line as long as she added heat at a steady rate.

And that skill, she'd nailed two years ago.

But that wasn't the cool part. The cool part was, once it started boiling, the temperature didn't change at all. Nope, at that point, instead, what she made was steam. And the rate that Scorching Caress added heat was the rate that she made that steam.

And this little contraption was designed to provide direct feedback of that. It was, Mrs. Plum had told her, basically a slide whistle that ran on steam. But instead of a slide, there was a ball that could be pushed up the tube by the steam pressure to vary the note that it played, and the position of that ball depended completely on the amount of the steam flow into the pipe pushing against gravity.

And she controlled the rate of steam produced. Scenario 3 involved getting the vessel to boiling as fast as possible without overloading the metal's ability to transfer away that heat, and then quickly stabilizing the steam production rate to produce a specific note.

And then, she would play a very simple nursery rhyme, using steam as the 'wind' through the pipe and varying its production to vary the notes.

She held the steel vessel cupped in both hands, and let the heat build in her chest and then bloom evenly across her hands. And then ramped it up almost as quickly as she could, watching the surface of the steel change colors around her fingers, and backing off only when she began to see a very well-known rainbow effect.

Within seconds, she could feel the vessel begin to rumble as bubbles began to form and collapse.

Steady. Steady.

With a quiet but high-pitched whistle, steam began to flow out of the pipe exit, building rapidly, and Cinder felt the world narrow in focus.

There was only the vessel, and the sound, and the feel of Scorching Caress flowing through her heart, into her hands, and into the vessel.

Tongue bitten gently between her teeth, she set to her task, ramping and building. Easing and falling.

Creating music. Not good music, this wasn't a flute or anything. But recognizable music.

"Excellent. Great job Cinder," Mrs. Plum encouraged. "You're almost therrrree. Andddd…"

With a pipe-gurgling flourish, Cinder cut off the heat, and then stepped back and gave a curtsy. It was something Laural had taught her, and she'd thought it was silly and fun.

"Oh bravo!" Mrs. Plum laughed. "And nice touch there at the end. Wonderful." Cinder basked in the praise, allowing the vessel to cool slowly so as not to damage the various metal bits. She looked up to see Mrs. Plum's face had gone softer, and more serious.

Uh oh. Now what?

"You know, Cinder, I don't think you have to continue our one-on-one coaching next year. I really don't," her second-favorite teacher said.

"But… I like training with you! And I've learned so much!"

"Oh dear. I am touched. I really am. But…" The woman sighed. "There are younger students, some of whom really are struggling, who could use my attention as well. You, young lady, are already far beyond expectations for your age group. It wouldn't do to monopolize, now would it?"

No. No, I guess it wouldn't. I mean, what if it was Pyrrha… no bad example. Pyrrha's dad had money and would just hire a coach. What if… no Yang has her dad. And Ruby has her mom. Umm… someone who didn't have a coach. Umm.. little Blake?. What if it was her trying to catch up, and… and I was hogging all the instructors.

Yeah okay. Fair. Cinder nodded. Not happily, but accepting.

"Now don't look so glum," Mrs. Plum continued, "we still have the rest of this year. Now. Let's look at Radiant Transference again."

Cinder recentered herself. Right. Radiant. Ugh.

That one was still giving her fits. She could do what they'd explained to her was conductive transference. That was applying heat to one spot, and having it flow like a river through solid material to somewhere else.

Heck she'd done that without even thinking about it to… um… that creeper who had tried to grab Argent. Which no longer made her feel all twisty and squirmy inside with the hindsight of two years. Especially not compared to that… other time she'd used her Semblance.

They'd gone further, training her how to use conductive transference to set stuff on fire, say for example the coating on an arrowhead, and then firing that from Midnight in bow form.

Easy. Peasey.

And then there was the trick she'd used that morning. Convective transfer. That involved actually moving a flame from her hands from point A to point B through the air. That was also easy after two years of training, and mostly involved sensing which way the flame wanted to move, and using her Aura to change the focus of heat on one side or the other to counter that and aim it where she wanted it to go, creating a tiny backward jet of flame propelling it the other way.

No, radiant was different. That required applying heat to her hands, and then in some way she still didn't totally understand, directing that heat through empty space to another object farther away without heating up the material in between, and not baking every freaking other thing in the entire room in the process.

That had taken a lot of trial and error. Trial and error where her instructors were outside the room, monitoring the process using remote cameras.

Cameras that, cough cough, they'd had to replace the first three times she tried it, because they… kinda melted along with the target, along with anything else in the room that could burn.

And her shoes.

It was also a good thing that they'd upgrade her school uniform to fire-resistant materials, too, because even that had started to smoke and char. She'd even let them convince her to leave her pendent in a smaller locked container outside the room, which was good because she highly suspected it would have melted, too.

But she was getting better. Lots better. It wasn't perfect yet. The rest of the room still got uncomfortably warm for anyone else around, but now she could heat a glass bottle into slag from ten feet away, without setting the entire freaking room on fire.

And her teachers felt safe in the same room with her.

Wearing a thick, fire-resistant overcloak and with Aura active, of course. Just to be safe.

Progress. Yeah.

[A/N]

So yeah, ANOTHER time skip from May in Kuroyuri to August in Argus. I did promise an update on our core characters. Not a lot this chapter from Garek and Selene (though you can infer a lot), but a ton of focus on Cinder, and stuff going on 'off camera'. Apologies for the heavy exposition, it was just one of those chapters. I do hope you enjoyed the growth of her character in personality and capability. We should be starting to see seeds of the devastating skill (minus Maiden Power) that Cinder Fall exhibits in canon, though she's got eight years to go before she hits that level. And I tried to reflect that in the spar with Sarah, and in the use of her Semblance with Mrs. Plum.

But while her skills are developing as you'd expect, her personality is continuing to diverge. This isn't a person tortured by the soul-crushing hatred of being a slave, nor the Antisocial disorder of someone who was tortured for almost a decade before manslaughtering the source of that pain.

Cinder Scoria believes in Destiny, but it's a very different one that canon. And unlike Cinder Fall's henchmen, Cinder has formed her own little mini-cabal with the Grimmslayers, one of which is her love interest, and the other of which is her peer.

And we also get a bit more depth on Sarah Tourmaline's abilities, including her weapon (short sword sling called Sfenxiphos), Semblance (Weld), and fighting style (freaking savage).

Special Thanks to recent reviewers AtomicR4y, Rookie80, Shadowstorm-Vash, Knucklesfan, and my guest reviewer on Chapter 38.

AtomicR4y: Yep Dania has been going through some things, but to be fair she's been gradually getting better since the loss of her team, this was in some ways the capstone on that. The only potential trauma left would be finding out that her "little sister" was responsible for killing her Teammate, and that Selene is the "Grimm Monster" and I'd totally never use that later in the story...Totally.

Rookie80: So glad you found the method and circumstances reasonable. I really love writing Nora and it's been fun exploring non-orphan Ren and Nora and hope you enjoyed this chapter with Cinder and Sarah!

Shadowstorm-Vash: Yep things getting wild in meat-space and story-space both!

Knucklesfan: Fair play. Fair play. And Rhodes will be getting his happy ending (maybe) at some point, so fear not!

Guest reviewer from Chapter 38 (not sure when you'll see this): I am SO GLAD you enjoy my portrayal of Salem's MPD and how it's impacting this story. Believe it or not, that was NOT an original intent of the story. Like many concepts, it "emerged" from the narrative as things progressed, and I'm so glad it did. Thank you for flying Callows Airlines, please feel free to puke about the cabin!

Hope you all enjoyed!