"No rest for the wicked, I guess."

Ruby muttered as the group were loaded onto a bullhead. Most of them had just barely gotten over their jetlag by the time Oobleck told them it was extermination time. Apparently, they were headed to a place called 'Screaming canyon' (hopefully not an auspicious name) to clear out a nest of grimm that had recently taken to calling the region home.

Yang was to her right, stretching her arms and locking in her gauntlets. Weiss stood next to her, spinning the revolver portion of her blade and tapping it against the ground. Blake stood to her left, weapon holstered and body completely still as she stared out the window. Team JNPR, along with Coco and Velvet, were in a different bullhead, heading for the same destination.

For the first time since they landed, Ruby didn't feel nervous. Grimm she could handle. They were a clear threat with clear weaknesses—not some impossible darkness that seemed to envelop her the way her fear of this trip had. Grimm she could fight, and she could win. Rather easily, if she were to boast.

"Dropping in thirty seconds!"

Ruby hefted Crescent Rose into her arms, racking a bullet into the chamber and aiming at the door. Yang reared back a fist, crouching slightly as Weiss did the same. Blake, meanwhile, simply drew her weapon, holding it at her side and waiting.

When the doors opened, Ruby bolted out.

She saw dozens of beowolves beneath them, no doubt drawn to the noise of the engines. She flicked her rifle back into its scythe mode, activating her semblance. The others watched her dance across the beowolf skulls, slicing through them with the effortless grace of an experienced ballet dancer doing a pirouette. When she finally touched the ground, there were five dead beowolves in her wake.

Yang jumped next, firing her shotgun shells directly into the ground beneath her to launch herself up. She fired wildly into the crowd, laughing all the while as she kept herself aloft with only the force of her gauntlets. The beowolves scrambled up to reach her, only to get shot back down by her shotgun blasts.

Weiss hopped down after her, landing in a small clearing made by Yang. Blake followed suit, landing just behind Weiss. The two faced the oncoming horde, watching as they surged forward.

Weiss drew her blade, slamming it into the ground and casting a sheen of ice across the ground, Blake throwing her blade around Weiss—wrapping her up in ribbons. Blake proceeded to dash across the ice, as if she were a figure skater, firing into the crowd. Weiss, meanwhile, grabbed the end of the ribbon in one hand, dancing across the heads of the beowolves and stabbing into their necks, just below their skull plates. She twirled up into the ribbon, landing next to Blake as she at last stopped near Yang and Ruby.

The four regrouped as the last dozen or so beowolves charged forward, some slipping on Weiss's ice. "Bumblebee!"

Yang dashed forward, hand outstretched just in time to grab Blake's ribbon, letting her swing it around in a circle. She began firing behind her, swinging around at full speed before at last letting go—slamming into the lead beowolf. It exploded instantly, shards of its bones peppering Yang as she turned to face the others.

"White rose!"

Ruby took a few steps back, Weiss forming a time dilations glyph beneath her as Ruby activated her semblance. With their powers combined, time appeared to stop, letting Ruby dash forward with her blade nearly folding back in on itself. She slammed into the beowolves on Yang's left, a red blur all they saw as they were torn into dozens of tiny pieces.

Blake pulled her ribbon, dashing along with it and reaching Yang. She jumped over her partner's shoulder, slicing into a beowolf before Yang uppercut it into the stratosphere. She loaded a fire dust magazine, sending a slash of burning air into the beowolves that remained—the scent of burning fur filling the air.

Yang finished off the last of them with a hail of bullets, ripping into the now flaming grimm without so much as a breath of hesitation. "Is that all? Huh? That's all you got?"

Weiss pointed in the distance where team JNPR was fighting. "It's safe to say it's not."

The four rallied around Ruby before dashing across the rocky floor of the canyon. They heard explosions and minigun fire, bullets and blades clashing against bone as they neared. By the time they reached the group, they saw only a single beowolf left—just in time to watch Pyrrha slice its head off.

She looked up, flicking her blade clean. "Was your landing as smooth as ours?"

Ruby shrugged, gesturing to the piles of disintegrating beowolf corpses in the distance. "Seems like you guys got a bigger horde than us."

Jaune approached, throwing a beowolf corpse off his shoulder before brushing off his armor. "Do these things seem a lot more aggressive than usual, or is it just me?"

Blake shook her head, eyes flicking across the canyon walls. "I was wondering about that, actually. These grimm seem a lot more agitated than the ones we fought in the Emerald forest. They usually wouldn't converge on just the engines of a bullhead…"

Nora came forward, suplexing a beowolf corpse next to Jaune before clapping her hands. "Eh, who cares if they're a little extra spicy today? We'll kill 'em all the same!"

Ruby shook her head, eyes flicking across the canyon. "I think there might be more to it than that. There's probably a reason they're so agitated."

"Precisely!" Said Oobleck, popping up out of nowhere.

Everyone took a step back, Oobleck clearing his throat. "These grimm are exceptionally more aggressive than normal, prompting one to ask the question of why they are so agitated. It falls down to us to get to the bottom of this mystery! Everyone," he turned around, motioning for Nora, Ren, Coco, and Velvet to come with him. "Follow me!"

The group made their way deeper into the canyon as the bullheads departed, heading for safer ground until they were ready for extraction.

Ruby held her weapon at the ready, eyes flicking around the canyon. Every corner was a potential grimm ambush, every shadow a potential crawler or beowolf lying in wait. She forced herself not to get too stressed about it, as to not draw more grimm to their position in the first place.

Blake turned to Ruby, noticing her gaze. "See anything?"

"Not yet. Just a lot of shadows."

Blake nodded, eyes flicking across the canyon as well. "Good place for an ambush," she muttered, converting gambol shroud into its pistol state. This was exactly the kind of place a dust convoy would be ambushed and disappear off the map, only for the weapons they were carrying to suddenly reappear in white fang insurgent hands.

The group stopped beneath a large overhanging rock to rest, Oobleck taking the time to check his compass. "Hmm… interesting."

Jaune turned. "What is it, professor?"

"This compass isn't working properly."

Jaune walked over, seeing the compass, rather than pointing only north, was instead spinning in circles. He blinked twice, scratching his head. "Huh, well that's strange. Pyrrha? Is your semblance messing with the compass again?"

"Hmm? I don't believe so."

Oobleck shook his head, placing the compass on the ground. "No no no, Mr. Arc, this is very unlike a simple polarity semblance. This is something far stronger—perhaps a large vein of magnetic rock? Perhaps even the intervention of some large, nefarious grimm? It's hard to say for certain at the moment—but it adds only more perplexity to the current mystery."

Nora tilted her head. "So, what, there's a giant magnet somewhere?"

"A crass, albeit not inaccurate, statement, Miss Valkyrie."

The group continued to walk for a good twenty minutes before at last finding a cave—the compass spinning fast enough to generate its own wind current by the time they arrived. The closer they got to the cave mouth, the faster it spun. Oobleck slowly nodded, turning back to the group. "Everyone, stay close. Whatever the cause of the disturbance is, it surely resides within this cave! Miss Adel, cover our rear flank!"

Coco nodded, pulling out her minigun and migrating to the back—back flush against Yang's. The group made their way deeper into the cave, Oobleck's flashlight the clearest source of vision for all but the two faunus of the group. It shined across countless rocks, stalagmites, and stalactites—yet nothing out of the ordinary thus far.

Oobleck stopped when he reached a railway, along with a minecart resting on top of it. The compass continued to spin, but it was clear to anyone looking that the railway wasn't the cause. "Strange…there hasn't been a mining expedition to Screaming Canyon in months, yet this cart looks brand new."

Ruby looked over at the cart, shrugging. "Maybe it's just really, really well preserved by something here?"

Oobleck shook his head. "Unlikely. In fact, based on the number of salt compounds in the soil, it'd be more likely to decay faster than normal as the salt eats away at the metal. We may have stumbled upon something more than a simple grimm infestation."

The group, at the behest of Oobleck, began following the rail tracks deeper into the cave. As they went, the cave gradually became more of a mine—with wooden supports taking the place of stalagmites as they went deeper. Oobleck ended up turning off his flashlight after they entered a cave, dust-powered lights lining the tunnels making it unnecessary.

Everyone had their weapons drawn as they entered into a large, open cavern. In the center, there was a large, black cube, surrounded by what looked like small turrets pointing at it. As they entered the room, the group felt a collective lethargy fall upon them, the will to keep moving growing less and less as they approached the cube.

Oobleck walked up to it, finding a small, sliding door on the side. He opened the window within, eyes widening as he saw the familiar, skeletal face staring back at him. "By dust, apathy! Someone is keeping apathy grimm trapped down here. The question is why?"

Weiss frowned. "Probably to keep this place quiet to the grimm."

The group only had a moment to debate this theory before they heard Coco's minigun spinning up, her voice coming through a second later. "We got company!"

"Don't shoot!"

Coco obeyed for the moment, watching as several men in miners' clothes walked out from the shadows, their hands in the air. The four of them were all faunus—two deer and two boar—pickaxes on their backs as they approached. All looked terrified out of their minds, staring at the woman with the large minigun aimed at them.

Oobleck turned, walking to the back of the group. "What are you doing here?"

The taller of the deer faunus spoke up. "We're miners. We're coming in to work. What are you doing here?"

Ruby spoke up. "We're huntsmen. Our job is to kill the grimm in Screaming canyon. Why are you working in a place called Screaming Canyon when there are grimm just outside the cave?"

The shorter boar faunus spoke up. "Lady Nave gave the order to keep working when the mines were closed. So we kept coming in. No grimm have attacked us since we started up the Apathy program in the lower levels of the mines."

Jaune frowned. "Apathy program?"

The boar faunus nodded. "Yeah, where we take a few apathy and trap them in a cage near the center of the place. It dulls our emotions enough that grimm don't attack us, even when they get close to the entrance of the caves. Makes things easier to ship out the hematite."

Oobleck slowly nodded. "I see. So this is a hematite mine, then?"

"Yes, sir."

Oobleck grabbed his compass, seeing the needle still spinning rapidly. He walked to the nearby wall, letting go of the compass only for it to fly into the rocks, sticking to them. "I see. That explains why the compass wasn't working. Essentially, the entire section of the ground here acts as a massive interference for it."

Blake frowned, walking over to the faunus. "Who's this lady Nave you keep mentioning? Does she own this mine?"

"Yes, she does."

Blake slowly nodded, looking back at her team. "It sounds like we've stumbled across an illegal mining expedition. And a dangerous one at that, using live grimm to keep it hidden from more dangerous ones."

Oobleck nodded. "Precisely, Miss Belladonna. This mine must be reported to Vester Gold immediately."

The faunus collectively surged forward, waving their arms around. "No! You can't!"

"This is the only work we can get!"

"We're not hurting anybody!"

"Please don't report us!"

Oobleck frowned, staring at the group. "How many faunus are employed in this mine, exactly?"

"Two hundred, sir. At least."

Oobleck's eyes widened at that, flicking down his glasses and staring at the four for a moment. Then he flicked them back up, turning back to the group. "Well, be that as it may, we'll still need to report this mine. Especially if the actions taken are illegal."

"On the contrary, our actions are quite legal."

The group turned, seeing a white-haired woman walking out from around the side of the cube. Her eyes were a deep violet, with long, spider-web like tissue running along her arms. It was clear to anyone looking she was a spider faunus, her eyes flicking across the group. "My mine has a permit to operate under the Mistralean Colonial Government for the next ten years. How we operate is none of their concern."

Blake stepped forward. "And what if the apathy escape? You're risking two hundred people's lives for your bottom line."

"You'll find that risk is minimal, at worst."

Weiss glared at the woman, striding forward. "Minimal risk or not, you're still operating outside the law to bring apathy grimm in 're in violation of several statutes indicating no facility may operate when grimm are within fifty meters—let alone literally inside of it."

Nave smirked, leaning back against the cube. "If I recall, Miss Schnee, your father has violated that statute several times over. My company is made up of many former Schnee Dust Company employees—many of which can testify that fact. At least my way is proven to work."

Weiss glared stronger at the woman, held back only by Yang and Ruby standing in front of her. Blake, meanwhile, turned to Oobleck. "Are we sure reporting this is the best idea? We'd be putting two hundred faunus out of work, bankrupting a faunus business woman, and…frankly, her method seems to work, too."

Velvet nodded. "I'm inclined to agree with Blake, professor. They aren't hurting anyone, so, what's the problem?"

Oobleck turned to Blake and Velvet. "The problem is that they're in violation of at least one law—despite being cleared by some others. As huntsmen, our duty is to uphold peace and the law."

"But our duty is also to protect the people. How are we doing that by putting two hundred people out of work?"

Oobleck slowly nodded, looking between Nave, Blake, and Velvet. His eyes flicked to the pleading faces of the faunus workers for a moment before he sighed. "I suppose what Vester doesn't know won't hurt him. Come along, everyone. We've still got the rest of Screaming Canyon to clear out."

The group made their way out of the mine, heading back the way they came and out into screaming canyon. Oobleck stared out into the distance, pointing near the entrance to the canyon. "Three beowolves at the entrance to the canyon. Everyone be ready, they'll lead us to the rest of the pack."

The group began to follow, leaving Nave's mine behind.