The wind howled through the cold streets of Atlas, carrying flecks of snow through the towering spires of the Kingdom. The sky was a deep gray, thick with storm clouds, but no snow fell, only the biting wind, as if the land itself held its breath.
A battle had just ended.
The Grimm lay scattered and lifeless across the frozen battlefield, some of the bodies already fading into wisps of nothingness. Huntsmen and soldiers moved through the streets, securing the area, ensuring there were no stragglers left to terrorize the civilians.
Usually, all the Grimm would turn into black smoke, but Merlot's Grimm didn't
Pyrrha Nikos pulled her cloak tighter around herself, her red hair damp with sweat and snow, her chest rising and falling as she caught her breath. She turned, scanning the aftermath of the battle, until her eyes landed on him.
Jaune Arc stood a short distance away, his armor still gleaming with the remnants of combat. His blade, Crocea Mors, was planted into the ground, but his hands rested on the pommel as if he needed to hold himself up. He wasn't exhausted, not in the way a man might be after a hard battle, but rather… distant.
Silent.
Pyrrha frowned.
He had been like this for weeks now. Ever since they had left Vale, ever since they had stepped into Solitas.
Jaune had always thought deeply, but this was different.
It was something else.
Something she didn't understand.
A quiet sigh beside her made her glance to her side.
Weiss Schnee stood with her arms crossed, her white combat dress stained with blackened dust from a fallen Grimm. Her sharp, blue eyes were locked onto Jaune's with an expression that mirrored Pyrrha's own. Concern.
"He's been like this for too long," Weiss murmured, barely audible over the wind.
Pyrrha nodded. "I know."
Neither of them moved for a moment.
Then Weiss exhaled, frustrated. "I'll talk to him."
Pyrrha placed a hand on her arm, stopping her. "Let me."
Weiss hesitated, looking between Pyrrha and Jaune, before sighing and stepping back. "Fine. But if you don't get anything out of him, I will."
Pyrrha gave a small smile, then turned and made her way toward Jaune.
He didn't react as she approached.
Pyrrha stepped carefully, her boots crunching softly against the icy stone beneath them. She came to a stop beside him, standing close enough that their shoulders nearly touched.
She waited.
Jaune didn't speak.
He didn't even acknowledge her.
That wasn't like him.
Pyrrha swallowed before finally breaking the silence.
"You fought well today."
A simple statement. A truth.
But Jaune didn't answer right away.
His fingers tightened slightly around the pommel of his sword before loosening again.
"…Thanks," he murmured at last.
Pyrrha turned slightly, watching his expression. His face was calm, unreadable. But his eyes, those deep blue eyes that had always been so open, so full of life, were distant. Like he was seeing something that wasn't there.
Like he was somewhere else entirely.
Pyrrha hesitated, then tried again.
"You've been quiet," she said softly. "More than usual."
Jaune let out a slow breath, his shoulders rising and falling.
"I'm fine," he said.
A lie.
Pyrrha's chest tightened.
"Jaune…" she started, choosing her words carefully. "If something is wrong, you can tell me. You can talk to me."
For a moment, she thought he might.
His grip on his sword tightened again, his breath hitching slightly. But then, just as quickly, he let go of whatever was on his mind, forcing a small, tired smile.
"I appreciate it," he said. "Really. But I'm fine."
Pyrrha searched his face.
She knew he wasn't fine.
She had seen Jaune at his lowest before. She had seen him at his most vulnerable.
But this?
This was something else entirely.
And she didn't know how to reach him.
"…Alright," she said at last, though the word felt heavy on her tongue.
Jaune nodded, exhaling slowly. "We should regroup with the others."
He pulled Crocea Mors from the ground and turned away, walking back toward the others without another word.
Pyrrha stood still, watching him go, feeling a weight settle in her chest.
"What did he say?"
Weiss approached.
Pyrrha barely had time to return to Weiss before the other woman was already questioning her, arms crossed tightly, her foot tapping against the icy ground.
Pyrrha sighed. "Nothing."
Weiss narrowed her eyes. "Nothing?"
Pyrrha shook her head. "He just said he's fine."
Weiss scoffed. "Of course he did."
Pyrrha's expression softened slightly. "I don't think it's that he doesn't want to talk. It's more like…" She hesitated, searching for the right words. "It's like he's not sure how."
Weiss pursed her lips. "That doesn't make it any less frustrating."
"No," Pyrrha admitted. "It doesn't."
Weiss huffed, her breath visible in the cold air. She looked away, toward where Jaune was speaking with Ren and Nora in the distance.
"He's been different ever since we left Vale," Weiss murmured. "Ever since we came here."
Pyrrha nodded. "I've noticed."
Weiss tapped her fingers against her arm. "He's always had this bad habit of carrying too much responsibility on his shoulders."
"That's true."
"But this…" Weiss trailed off, her expression darkening. "This feels different."
Pyrrha's fingers curled slightly at her sides.
Weiss was right.
This wasn't just Jaune feeling guilt or pressure.
This wasn't like before.
This was something deeper.
Something they couldn't see.
Something they couldn't reach.
And Pyrrha hated it.
Weiss let out a breath. "What do we do?"
Pyrrha was quiet for a long moment.
Then, slowly, she shook her head. "We wait."
Weiss frowned. "That's not an answer."
"It's the only one we have," Pyrrha said quietly. "For now."
Weiss pressed her lips together, clearly dissatisfied.
But she didn't argue.
Because she knew, just as well as Pyrrha did that Jaune Arc was keeping something from them.
The snow kept falling.
It had been a full day since the small skirmish in Solitas, and the team had returned to Atlas to rest, but there was little peace to be found.
The rooms they had been assigned were warm, safe, and quiet yet the atmosphere among them remained uneasy.
Jaune Arc sat at the edge of his bed, polishing Crocea Mors with slow, mechanical movements. His armor had already been cleaned, every dent and scratch tended to with the same precision he had developed over the years. His weapon gleamed under the dim light of the room.
And yet, he wasn't there.
Not truly.
The others noticed.
Team RWBY and Team JNPR had initially given him space, believing it could exhaustion causing his silence. But as the days stretched on, his continued distance became more apparent.
Pyrrha watched him carefully from where she stood by the window, her arms crossed.
Weiss sat nearby, pretending to read something on her Scroll but barely glancing at the screen.
Nora and Ren had tried to distract themselves with food, but even Nora had barely touched her plate, something that was far from normal.
Ruby sat at the table, playing with her fingers, stealing glances at Jaune now and then. Yang, on the other hand, wasn't being subtle.
"Alright," Yang finally said, breaking the silence. "I've had enough of this."
Jaune didn't look up.
Yang narrowed her eyes. "Jaune. Talk."
Silence.
Weiss sighed, closing her Scroll. "Jaune, we're not going to let you keep pretending that nothing's wrong."
Jaune stopped polishing his blade for a fraction of a second.
Then he resumed, as if nothing had been said at all.
Pyrrha felt something tighten in her chest.
"Jaune," she tried gently. "Please."
Still, nothing.
Nora finally lost her patience, slamming her hands onto the table. "Okay, no." She marched over and plopped onto the bed next to him, dramatically throwing herself across his lap.
"Jaune Arc, if you don't snap out of it right now, I swear I will start singing the most annoying song I know and never stop—"
Jaune finally responded.
But not in the way they had hoped.
He smiled.
A small, polite, empty smile.
"I'm fine," he said softly. "Really."
A lie.
A blatant, obvious, painful lie.
And it was worse than silence.
The air in the room grew heavy.
Blake, who had been quiet until now, spoke up. "That's not true."
Jaune didn't react.
Blake leaned forward, her amber eyes sharp. "You're not fine. You haven't been fine. We've all seen it."
Jaune just kept smiling.
Pyrrha couldn't take it anymore.
She crossed the room and grabbed his wrist, forcing him to stop polishing his sword. "Jaune."
His blue eyes finally flickered toward her.
"Stop pretending," she whispered, voice tight with emotion. "Just tell us what's wrong."
For a moment, just a moment, something flickered in Jaune's eyes.
And then—
Nothing.
The emptiness returned.
He gently pulled his wrist free. "It's really nothing, guys. I just don't know what to think. It'll go away."
Yang ran a hand through her hair, frustrated. "Okay. New plan. We beat it out of him."
"Yang!" Ruby shot her an incredulous look.
Yang threw up her hands. "I mean, not literally! But something's got to wake him up!"
Weiss sighed, rubbing her temple. "This is impossible."
Ren, who had been watching Jaune closely, finally spoke. "No. It's intentional."
Everyone turned toward him.
Ren's expression was unreadable. "He's doing this on purpose."
Pyrrha's breath caught.
Ruby frowned. "What do you mean?"
Ren's gaze didn't leave Jaune. "I've seen this before. The way soldiers act when they know something we don't." He narrowed his eyes. "It's like he's already accepted something. Something he's not telling us."
Silence fell over the group.
Jaune continued sitting there, holding his sword in his hands, unmoving.
Pyrrha swallowed. "Jaune," she tried one more time, softer now. "Please. Whatever it is, we'll face it together."
Jaune finally looked at her.
And for the first time in weeks, he truly focused.
His gaze lingered, as if memorizing every detail of her face.
Then, softly—so softly that it was barely above a whisper—he spoke.
"No," he said. "You won't."
His eyes turned to a place that was far away.
It then held fear despite what he was.
For in a place far from Remnant, two beings woke.
The void between worlds was silent.
Not the silence of emptiness, nor the silence of absence.
This was the kind of silence that came before a storm, the heavy, breathless anticipation of something that had been waiting far too long.
And then, from within that stillness, a glow emerged.
Brilliant, radiant light spiraled outward, golden and pure, illuminating the darkness with a presence both serene and undeniable. The light twisted and coiled, forming the shape of a great dragon, his horns white as ivory, his serpentine body draped in a mane of golden hair that ran the entire length of his form. It pooled at the tip of his tail, forming a plume of celestial brilliance.
His face bore an expression of deep contemplation, his feathered whiskers swaying as unseen forces called to him.
His eyes, however, were the most striking of all were two pure orbs of white light, devoid of pupils, radiating an ancient and immeasurable power.
And beside him, emerging from the depths of the void, came another.
A presence just as immense.
Just as powerful.
But where the first dragon carried the warmth of creation, this one carried the weight of decay.
A four-legged dragon stepped forward, his wings vast and tattered, their membranes frayed and dotted with holes that whispered of forgotten ages. His horns curled in intricate spirals, ornate and twisted, and his body was skeletal—as if time itself had carved him down to his very essence.
His face was a skull. Empty sockets where eyes should have been. A maw lined with jagged, exposed teeth, never opening yet somehow filled with an ever-present growl. Along his back, a row of bone-like spines jutted outward, forming an uneven ridge that stretched the length of his form.
Despite his decayed appearance, the weight of his existence was undeniable.
Together, the two great beings stood, one bathed in celestial radiance, the other shadowed in the remnants of what once was.
The God of Light turned his head, his glowing gaze shifting toward the distance. He felt it. A disturbance. A change.
Someone had gathered the relics.
The four fragments of divinity, artifacts of their own creation, were no longer where they had been left.
They were together again.
Or extinguished
And now… they called to them.
As if they were challenged.
The God of Darkness, his skeletal body motionless, spoke, though his maw did not move.
"It is time."
A low hum echoed through the void as the God of Light closed his glowing eyes for a moment. When he reopened them, they burned brighter.
"We shall come," the Brothers declared in unison.
And with that, they moved.
The void that had held them for countless millennia shattered around them.
The fabric of reality trembled, bending to their will.
For the first time since they had abandoned Remnant, since they had left their creations to struggle and fight alone…
The Brothers were returning.