Lord of Gifts in the Forgotten Realm

by Djoklecjan

After his defeat, as the last act of defiance, Sauron strikes a deal with his former Master, and finds himself in the Forsaken World, which is set for a downfall. Will Annatar change Remnant's future for the better? Or Sauron will make it even worse? Or, perhaps, Mairon will change some of his views?

12. Chapter 8: Truth, Lie, Temptation

„I am really sorry for all of this." Police officer gave Annatar an apologetic look while his men performed yet another inspection, looking everywhere where they could while the Smith simply worked on his anvil. "In the department we know your reputation, but…"

"Philp, friend, I already told you I understand." Annatar remarked, his gentle hands shaping the metal. "You follow your orders even though you disagree with them." He looked at the Police officer. "Being dutiful is a virtue I can only commend."

"But it is still wrong." Police officer grumbled, feeling gaze of all the guests inside the forge glaring at him and his men. "I joined to fight crime, not harass good people."

Sauron chuckled upon hearing this. "I am glad you assumed I am a good person." He lifted what appeared to be a toy robot, and put in the officer's hand. "That's for your son."

"What?... How?" Officer looked at the toy in confusion and disbelief, for it looked exactly like…

"For 'what' – this toy is made to mirror one of the Oliver's drawings, displaying his favorite cartoon character called "Idealus Secundus*." Sauron explained with innocent smile, looking into officer's eyes. "As for 'how' I am not sure – you meant 'How do I know what your son draws?' or 'How do I know what cartoons Oliver loves?'"

In other circumstances, Philip would think that the man speaking to him is a stalker, but that was just Annatar! Your neighbor smith, a good, helpful man, and an extraordinary person. He treats everyone around him in friendly manner, listens to their troubles and gives them solutions without expecting the payment in return. He simply knows about these things.

Like a good friend he is.

"You really are some sort of magician, aren't you?" Philip asked in friendly manner, and Annatar laughed.

"I am just a Humble Smith." He simply replied. "And as a smith, I hope Oliver will love this craft."

"Oh, He certainly will." Philip picked up his radio. "Everything is clear, we are moving out." He put his cap back on his head. "Yet again, nothing out of ordinary." He left a sigh. "Gotta write the same report again."

"How about you take your time with it?" Sauron winked to him. "As much as you need."

Philip nodded in silent agreement, and left with his men, followed all the way by stares from forge's guests.

"Who is next?" Annatar asked, and Yowwick thought for a moment.

"Guys from Sanitation were here like seven times already, Fire Department too…" Yowwick counted on his fingers. "I think we are free to go." And Annatar clapped his hands.

"Splendid! Let us not waste time any longer."

"I still can't get how you can remain in such good mood." Yowwick grumbled, already tired under the unending wave of inspections, allegations and all that stuff he couldn't remember.

"I worked through worse." Annatar simply replied and looked at the crowd. "I sincerely apologize for this inconvenience, seems some men are not able to face a critique with dignity. But now, I am more than ready to shower you with crafts and gifts!" He walked to his sofa and sat on it, awaiting the next guest.

"Salutations!" Penny greeted him while eagerly taking her seat, startling Annatar for a moment.

"Don't tell me you waited in the line this whole time?" He said, slowly uttering each word.

"Indeed I did." Penny confirmed, then blacked out for a moment. "Wait, you wanted me to not confirm that, right?"

"As a friend, all of my doors are open to you." Sauron remarked. "You don't have to wait with the others."

"Really?" She replied, confused a little bit. "But there was no such rule…"

"It is an unwritten rule of friendship."

"Ooohhh." Sauron chuckled upon seeing her reaction.

"With that resolved, what brings you here today my friend?"

"I wanted to check how are you doing." Penny explained. "I heard you are in some kind of trouble, so I want to help. If I can of course." She added little sheepishly, while Sauron just left a annoyed grunt.

"This 'trouble' is nothing more than an inconvenience to me." Sauron waved the hand dismissively. "Just a petty man desperately clinging to his petty titles. But I appreciate your concerns over my well-being."

"That's what friends are for!" Penny replied, and Annatar once again chuckled.

Her arrival was an unexpected surprise for Sauron, but a welcome one. This combination of machine and soul was on par with achievements of other Valar's, such as Aule, who created dwarfs, or Yavanna, who created plants and ents. And to think a human was able to do such a marvel?

That being said, he wanted to see of what she is truly capable off. Wha kind of mind she possess?

"Do you want me to do anything for you? You will be free of charge." But Penny shook her head in denial.

"I came to help as much as I can." She repeated, and Annatar nodded in understanding.

"Then how about this: There are still so many people waiting for their audience with me, so, would you kindly leave the armchair?"

"Oh, sorry!" She immediately rose up from her seat.

"Do not apologize for doing nothing wrong." Annatar said. "If you want, roam my forge freely while I will work."

"Can I?" She asked to receive formal confirmation, and Annatar nodded.

"As I said at the beginning, all of my doors are always open for you." He looked at Nathan clearing a glass behind the counter. "Yowwick shall accompany you while I work."

"Of course Chief!" His subordinate put the glass away and approached Penny.

"Salutations! My name is Penny Polendina! Nice to meet you!" She reached with her hand, and at first, Yowwick slightly hesitated, then shook her hand.

"Nathan Yowwick, friendly folk calls me simply Nat. Or by the surname like Chief." He said. "So, what do you want to see first?"

Penny looked past the man and scanned the area with her eyes.

"There!" She walked past the goon, towards the wall with all the various hammers were displayed on. Annatar followed her with his gaze for a moment before he seemingly turned his attention to the new guest.

"I always wanted an animal companion, but I am allergic to fur and feathers." Woman explained while Annatar listened carefully. "My friends advised to buy a robot, but…"

"That's a really interesting design." Penny commented, holding one of the small hammers in her hands. She looked at Yowwick. "Where did he buy them?"

"He made them." Nathan replied. "Every single one."

"Why?"

"Something about 'Having a tool for every possible task' and all that stuff." Yowwick answered. "And believe me, he use them all, some more often than another but still."

Penny again looked at all the hammers displayed on the wall, and started to notice the pattern: Each tool appeared to be categorized not by its shape or its weight, but frequency of use – smallest ones were set high but still within arm's reach, while the heaviest tools were set as low as possible, so the display took a form of a pyramid. Some tools in the middle were missing, since Annatar was currently using them.

But among these tools, there was one hammer standing from the rest – right in the center of this pyramid was one made of steel, so polished that it reflected light like silver. When Penny scanned it, she found that it contains a tungsten core within the hammer's head. It was covered in marks, which looked like some kind of writing, yet she couldn't decipher it. Each letter was meticulously sculptured, and glittered with gold. No, it was brass, but polished in such a way that it looked like pure gold. The handle looked like it was a branch from a tree, but Penny could recognize that it was carved from the larger block of oak wood.

The handle was not straight it had more "branchy", natural shape, but it was still perfectly balanced. She reached for the hammer with her right hand, wanting to examine it further.

"Don't touch it." Yowwick said, and she retracted her hand. "It's Chief's favorite. He uses it only for special occasions and only he can touch it."

"Special occasions? What exactly?" Penny asked, genuinely curious, but Yowwick shrug his arms.

"At first I thought it is for gifts, but he seems to take it when he is in a really good mood. And only for working with gems and gold for some reason."

"And he also made it by himself?" She asked looking curiously at the tool. "It is really pretty."

"Yeah, it was the third thing he made when we started working here." Yowwick added, and smiled at the memories of those first, 'chaotic' days.

"What were the first two?"

"He tore down the wall and then repaired a porcelain elephant for little Emily."

"Emily?" Penny asked, and searched her memories while Yowwick chuckled.

"Such a nice kid, she often comes by and offers fresh apple pie." Nathan explained. "And then he made this hammer, working on it for two whole days. I thought that it may be special in some way, like all those "gifts" he was making all this time. But I never saw this hammer doing anything magical at all."

In Penny's head, a short video played itself – A moment when Annatar gave a faunus child a porcelain elephant.

"Your friend is fine again." He announced for everyone to hear. "And he wants to thank you for bringing him to me."

And the elephant moved in his hands, much to gathered people surprise. And although video went viral, there were many comments doubting what happened in it.

Penny looked at Annatar, who just finished his new creation.

"You wanted a trustworthy companion, who will by your side and won't cause you 'allergic reaction'." A Raven made of carved, white wood, flew to the woman and landed on her arm, and after a short moment of hesitation, she pat the bird.

"It feels so soft…" She noted out loud with admiration. "like real feathers."

"It appears to be alive, yes." Annatar agreed. "Like you wanted a companion, not a robot shaped like one."

Now Penny knew for sure that the video didn't exaggerate anything.

"How is he able to do this?" Penny asked as they were walking away from the tools. "Is he using his semblance?" But Yowwick shook his head in denial.

"He says all the time that he is a Master Smith." Yowwick shrugged his arms as he watched how another client sits on the chair while the woman with white raven paid and left the forge with wide smile on her face. "But to be frank, it must be something more than skill."

Before Penny could ask another question, she bumped into something. She looked up, right under the spiked helmet of the armor.

"You alright?" Yowwick asked, and Penny waked few steps back and looked at the armor.

Unlike other things on the display, this armor made of black iron was far from being called "pretty", in fact, if "edginess " is a term to describe appearance, then this armor would serve as a prime example of that.

"Hi." Penny waved to it, then looked at her guide. "This armor looks scary."

"Tell me about it." Yowwick left a sigh. "It gives me creeps whenever I look at it, and I am not sure why." Penny blacked out for a moment.

"Shivers, which is a slight but uncontrollable shaking of the body, occurs as a result of being cold , frightened or excited." She looked at her companion with a smile. "What do you feel when you look at it?"

"Certainly not excitement." Yowwick said, staring at the spiked armor, in his mind swearing on his mother's name that this thing stares back at him. "But certainly scares the thieves away. And as long as I don't have to clean it, I am fine with it." He looked at Penny. "But let's move on, okay?"

"Mhm!" As they went to another part of the forge, iron helmet looked after them for a moment before it returned back to its previous position.

"You said that 'he made every tool'" Penny spoke up as she watched the furnaces, now cold without the flame within. "Did he also made these furnaces?" She touched one of the steel constructions.

"Yep, he made these as well." Yowwick chuckled as she looked at him with disbelief. "Before you ask yes, he also made every chair, table, plate, sofa…" He counted on his fingers after he realized how pointless it will be. "It will be easier to list you what he didn't make."

"Wow…" She looked again at Annatar, who was working on another creation on his anvil. He looked back at her, gave her a smile and waved to her. "…He doesn't look tired at all." She commented.

"Tired?" Yowwick smirked. "Girl, when Chief arrived here three months ago, he worked twenty hours a day non-stop, and only after more than a week, we were able to persuade him to chill out."

"…How?" Something in Penny's head wasn't adding up.

"Mama always said 'Find yourself a job ya love, and you won't work a day in ya life' and as much I love my mom, I always thought this advice is bull…" He took her young age into consideration. "…crap. But maybe it works in Chief's case? He seems to enjoy it."

"Yowwick! I need you over here!" Annatar suddenly called for him.

"Right away boss!" Nathan looked and gave her apologetic stare, then run to the Smith, leaving Penny alone with her thoughts.

In her head, she gathered all the information she got about her friend - how his neighbors praised him for helping them in need, how he changed people's lives for the better without expecting anything in return, and how he tirelessly and diligently worked in his forge to make wonders for the people of Vale. From this, the image of a good, selfless person appeared, maybe someone would even call him an angel at this point.

But it was not the Annatar she encountered few days ago.

"He is kind to this people, but if he thinks kindness is a tool to gain from, then what he gets from it?" She thought, staring at Annatar, who gave a smile to the elder man and handed him a pair of beautiful glasses. "Why is he doing all of this?"

These questions fascinated her, for there were now two possibilities: One – He is a hypocrite for he criticize the said behavior only to later do it himself.

Second – there is a goal she can't see right now.

Annatar titled his head to look at her, and his hand twitched slightly.

Suddenly, Penny heard something creek near her, and she turned to see the wooden doors to the back of the forge opened slowly on their own, like they invite her in. Most humans would find this phenomenon creepy and strange, and probably run as far away as possible**, but as an android, she quickly came up with logical solution.

"He must have an open window somewhere." She noted to herself. "Should I walk in? It is rude to go around someone's house without permission…"

"Counter point:" Image of Annatar appeared in her head, and his voice replayed." …all of my doors are open to you."

"…Technically yes, he gave me a permission." She agreed. "But it still raises moral questions regarding…"

"Counter-argument: How else am I going to learn something about him?" Penny weighed her options for few more nanoseconds before her curiosity finally won.

She stepped through the doorway, and after seeing that in corner of his eye, Annatar smiled with pride, then returned to work.

---

Glynda Goodwitch fixed her glasses as team fight between the Team RWBY and JNPR took place on the arena, while remaining teams cheered from their favorites from the benches.

Yang blocked Nora's hammer with her right fist and tried to counter, but her strike was sluggish, and Nora used that time to swing her hammer again and hit her square in the stomach, pushing her back few meters.

"Something wrong Yang?" Nora asked with concern.

"Just little lack of sleep." Yang brushed her off, and charged right back at her, but Nora easily dodged that and used her hammer to throw her out from her feet.

"What are you doing that late in the night?" Nora leant to her. "You study late at night like Ruby?" She asked as she pointed at Ruby, who fought one on one against Jaune, who held really well only thanks to that Ruby was sleepy.

"Nope." Yang swop Nora from her feet with her right leg. "Just searching for someone after school, that's all." Nora gasped from the ground.

"Is this someone a boy?" Yang laughed as she reached her hand to help Nora get up.

"Wrong again. But close." She replied, and image of Cartez appeared in her mind. This guy has answers, and she will paunch them out of him if necessary. Who gives a damn about few restless nights?

"Student Valkyrie, Student Long, time for chat is after a fight." Glynda reminded them, and after a short while, Yang and Nora resumed their duel.

In the meantime, fight between Blake and Ren was hard to keep track of – Both combatants fought similarly, engaging in close quarters for a moment before jumping away from each other and attacking from afar.

Ren was highly skilled in martial arts and each time when Blake engaged him in melee, he was more than capable of blocking her attacks with well-aimed kicks or punches, and then swing the fight in his favor. However, he could not lock Blake in such favorable fight for long, as Blake swiftly disengaged each time Ren wanted to start his counterattack.

At longer ranges Ren technically had an advantage in the firepower – Stormflower laid down far more bullets than Gambol Shroud, and Ren was skillful enough to reload one of the twin pistol-knives while firing the second one.

He tried to pin her down in place with this rapid fire, but Blake was fast enough to dodge most of the bullets, and if unable to do so, she was more than capable of slicing some of them in half using Gambol.

Blake tossed her pistol towards Ren, he blocked the attack, then barely avoided the bullet when Blake used her ribbon to pull the trigger. Before he could regain his balance, Blake appeared right before him, leaving a shadow clone in her previous position, and attacked mercilessly.

A moment later Ren regained his footing, and after getting few hits from Blake, he was able to push her back. And their fight continued in that pattern.

Glynda noted that, then switched to fight between Jaune and Ruby, far less eventful than fight between Ren and Blake.

As She expected, Arc was on a backfoot, barely dodging Ruby's attacks, but Ruby moved far slower than usual, and constantly had to stop in place.

"Are you… okay Ruby?" Jaune asked, and Ruby left a yawn.

"Yeah, yeah, I just…" She rubbed her eyes. "…Need some sleep." She reloaded Crescent Rose and charged again, and Juane was barely able to dodge that.

Glynda shook her head in disappointment. If Arc only could, he would seize the initiative and swing the fight against student Rose in his favor, but even with an advantage, Arc was unable to land even a single hit.

What Glynda didn't know is that Jaune had his own problem, growing in his right pocket.

Jaune felt the ever-growing urge to put the ring on his finger and show everyone how capable he is, but during this week, he really didn't have an occasion to use it, especially after Annatar gave him a warning. At the same time, he couldn't force himself to put the ring under his bed or hide it in his desk, so he just kept it in his pocket. But the urge to take it was becoming unbearable, and he had to force himself to not take it.

If it was Cardin or other of his cronies, he would do this without hesitation. But against Ruby? She was the one to whom he first spoke to, both share their struggles at being chosen to be a team leaders. Using his ring against his friend felt scummy.

And now, for some unknown reason, he felt like the ring now weighs more than a ton, and he was barely able to move his right leg thanks to that.

"Ruby just finish your fight and come here!" Weiss shouted before deflecting the thrown shield.

Pyrrha caught Milio and jumped at Weiss, her xiphos matched blow for blow with the rapier, Weiss countered low, but shield foiled that attempt. Pyrrha pressed her attack, pushing Myrtenaster aside and then delivering the kick into Weiss's torso.

Heiress landed few meters behind, carousel inside her rapier spun, and vial of yellow dust activated, and idea came to Jaune's mind.

"Pyrrha, Nora switch!" Jaune yelled as he parried attack from Ruby's scythe, and both girls locked eyes with one another.

Nora jumped away from Yang, turned Magnhild into grenade launcher and fired three grenades in Weiss's direction, then run towards Pyrrha while the Champion hurled her shield in wide arc and run at Nora.

"Hey, get back here!" Yang run after Nora, while Weiss fired a globe lightning at running Pyrrha. Ruby stopped her attack against Jaune, rubbed her eyes again and realized what is going on.

"Yang wait!" Ruby shouted but she was too late while Weiss fired a globe lightning at running Pyrrha.

Pyrrha jumped into the air, and Nora slide on her knees, Milio passing just above her head, and both girls smiled to each other in this moment.

Yang got struck in the head by Milio, knocking her back few steps, and before she could recover, Pyrrha landed right before her and unceremoniously kicked her from the arena.

Nora rose on her two feet and took the globe lightning head on.

"Oh no." Weiss realized her mistake.

"Oh YES!" With a mischievous grin, Nora charged at Weiss, and trail of lightning followed after her. Weiss spun the carousel to activate the red dust to match Nora's strength, but she noticed the vial is empty.

She dodged the strike for the hammer, part of the arena cracked upon the impact, but Nora quickly tore her hammer out from the ground, and swung it again at Weiss.

Weiss summoned the glyph and created an ice wall to stop the blow, but Nora struck with such strength that she broke the ice with no effort, and was still able to strike Weiss, sending her flying off the arena and knocking off the vial of red dust from her hand.

"Yes!" Jaune cheered, allowing himself for a moment of distraction.

A moment Ruby used to swoop him off his feet with her Scythe, launch him in the air, and then with one spin around, she hit him with hilt of her weapon and threw him away from the arena.

"Nice show Jauney boy!" Cardin laughed out loud while Arc landed on his back. Jaune just gave him an angry stare as Cardin and his team mockingly laughed at him, until Professor Goodwitch silenced them with her gaze, but they still grinned towards him.

"I hate them so much…" he thought, feeling more angry than usual, for the second shadow hiding in Jaune's own cackled with delight.

Before Ruby could cheer for her victory or come to Blake's aid, uber charged Nora slammed her hammer against her and threw Rose from the arena.

"Nora two, Pyrrha one!" Nora yelled towards her friend. "I will beat you this time, like I beat Ren yesterday in Grimm attack!"

"You won fair and square, I give you that!" Ren replied after blocking the faint from Blake. "But are you ready for a second round?"

"You bet I am!"

While this was happening, vial full of the Red Dust nearly reached the ceiling, and started to fall back to the arena.

Blake again disengaged from the close quarters with Ren, but not far enough and Lie noticed his chance to end the fight.

While he was quickly closing the gap and Blake prepared to meet him there, her sixth sense kicked in and caught the vial with her left hand before it hit her head. The dust shimmered in her hand.

Ren jumped at her, wanting to kick her in the head, but Blake again created a shadow clone, appeared few feet away and prepared to attack him.

But to both Ren's and Blake's surprise, his feet stuck itself deep in the red clone, and not even after few seconds, clone exploded into a large fireball, which threw Ren away from the arena, and forced Blake to cover her eyes.

"Ren!" Nora shouted, as Lie crash landed on the floor. After short pause, he gave a thumbs up that he is alright.

Confused, Blake looked at the dust vial in her hand and noticed that it is entirely empty, all dust powder spent on the explosive clone.

"Wait, I can do that?" She asked no one in particular, and this moment of distraction was used by Pyrrha, who threw her shield and threw Blake from the arena.

"That concludes the fight." Lights around the arena brightened. "Team JNPR won against Team RWBY losing two members."

"Heck yeah!" Nora jumped from the arena and run towards Jaune. "High-five!" and thinking little, Arc reached with his hand.

"Nora wait!" Ren tried to warn her, but when both Nora and Jaune exchanged the high-five, she threw him against the wall.

"Oh gosh sorry!" She covered her mouth.

"No problem…" Jaune said after he stood up in pain, his aura now in the red. "Are you still charged up?"

Nora nodded, then with mischievous smile, she turned to Yang.

"Hey Yang, you, me, arm's wrestling contest, right now!"

"Not that easy you maniac!" Yang wag her finger at Nora.

"I am proud of your performance today." Professor Goodwitch approached them, and first looked at Jaune. "Student Arc, could give me an explanation about the tactic you used?"

"Well, it was in a heat of the moment." Jaune said little sheepishly under Goodwitch's gaze. "But I noticed that Weiss wants to use yellow Dust, and I remembered that Nora can absorb electricity, so I thought 'Maybe if it hit Nora instead of Pyrrha, it will charge her up?'" Goodwitch looked at her scroll, and nodded with the approval.

"Knowing your team members abilities is a display of a good leader qualities." She gave him a smile, and Jaune left a sigh of relief. "Although you still have to work on your combat skills."

"Nikos won't carry you forever, weak link!" Cardin yelled from the bench, and Jaune's spirit dropped again, while Professor Goodwitch looked at Winchester with disapproval.

Cardin became a scourge of Jaune's life, always here to turn his every mistake into crushing failure, and mitigate even his tiniest accomplishments.

"Don't listen to him." Pyrrha said, trying to cheer him up. "You were great back there."

He shook his head. As much as he appreciated Pyrrha's kind words, she could do little to help his inner turmoil, for deep down, he knew that Cardin is right. "I am talentless, unlike Pyrrha, far weaker than Nora, and less-skilled than Ren." His thoughts rung inside his head like a church bell.

"Team RWBY." Glynda walked over to team of four girls, and all tried to stand straight, but clearly both Ruby and Yang struggled to do so. Goodwitch looked at them both with great displeasure. "Team leader Rose, may I know the reason of your unpreparedness today?"

"I…" Ruby covered her mouth and yawned. "…didn't sleep that night. And previous night. Aaand…"

"She studies for the upcoming test Professor." Weiss jumped into the conversation, and Goodwitch's gaze still lingered on Ruby, it changed into more compassionate one.

"Understandable, we all had to go through this stage." She said. "But I advise you to learn during a day, because as we saw, it will impact your performance in the other classes. Not to mention that as a Team Leader, you have responsibilities." When Ruby heard that, she slightly lowered her head to hide her face, and then Glynda looked at Yang. "And you, student Long? What is your excuse?"

"I lost the track of time." Yang bluntly replied, and both she and Goodwitch stared at each other for few more seconds, Glynda's gaze saying "It is not a satisfactory answer." While Yang's could be interpreted as "That is the only answer you will get".

"Student Belladonna." Glynda switched her attention from Yang. "I commend your use of an unusual tactic to win your fight." Blake nodded, still thinking about it. She only knew that she can use shadow clones, but now, with this new knowledge. Many more possibilities appeared in her head.

"Everything about today's fight will be sent to your team leader's scrolls tonight." Professor said to both teams. "And considering your conditions…" She looked at Nora, who desperately tried to not accidently crush something under her feet, then at barely standing Yang and Ruby. "…You are allowed to go to your dorms ealier."

"Yes!" Both teams exclaimed with joy.

"Now, Team SABER against Team CRDL." Goodwitch ordered, and said teams walked past team RWBY and JNPR.

"You should stay and watch how a REAL team leader wins his fights." Cardin whispered to Jaune as he passed by, and when Jaune looked away, Cardin laughed and walked into the arena.

"Thanks Weiss." Ruby said after they left the classroom.

"Don't mention it." Heiress replied. "But when we get to our dorm, you go straight to bed. You need to rest."

"But I don't wanna…" She put her head on Weiss's shoulder, and after feeling a soft surface underneath her cheek, she immediately fell asleep. Weiss frowned, something like this never happened to her before.

"Umm Ruby? Could you… wake up?" Weiss tried to push Ruby's head from her shoulder, and Ruby smiled and then giggled.

"It's so comfy…" She murmured in her sleep, not reacting to her partner's hand or voice.

"I got this." Yang left a sigh, picked up Ruby into a princess carry.

"Thanks." Weiss said dryly, still flabbergasted by the situation.

"You're welcome." Yang replied, trying to not sound hostile at all, since Weiss decided to finally hide her pride for a bit.

"You sure you want to do this? What if you fall asleep too?" Blake asked after noticing Yang's tired stare, but Blonde looked back at her, and gave her a playful smile.

"Oh, if I ever fall asleep like Rubes here, you have my permission to carry me like this." Blake blinked few times in response. "If you want of course." Yang winked to her.

"Oh, you are messing me with me again?" Blake asked, now realizing that it must be another of Yang's teasing comments, and Yang giggled.

"You are finally starting to get it!" Yang replied and resumed her walk towards the dorm.

"She looks so cute when she is sleeping." Nora said while looking at leaving team RWBY, then looked at Ren. "You should carry me like this once!"

"I don't think it is a good idea…"

"Pleaseeee." Ren just shook his head in defeat.

"When we graduate, I will carry you from the top of the Beacon tower." He said, and Nora's eyes brightened.

"Promise?" Nora reached with her right hand. "Pinky promise!" Ren chuckled and answered the gesture.

"Pinky promise." He said, and Nora hugged him tightly with happy smile, while Pyrrha's mind visualized image of Ren carrying Nora from the Beacon tower, and looked away to hide her embarrassment.

"How can they speak about it so casually?" She thought, at the same time feeling happy for them, and also little envious. Then she looked at Jaune, and image in her head shifted…

She frantically shook her head to push that thought away. There is no way he would do it, even thought about asking him about it sounds embarrassing! But she wouldn't have anything against it… but how to ask him in a way that doesn't sound obnoxious or pretentious?

Jaune, on the other hand, was detached from the events around him and still looked back through the open door to the classroom, staring directly at Cardin and his cronies. He clenched his right fist in anger.

He hated being treated by him in such a way, even though Jaune couldn't deny that Cardin was right. He hated how bully treats everyone weaker than him like shit under his boot. But most importantly, he hated how he goes unpunished.

Ring in his right pocket became even heavier, prospect of using it tempting him more and more.

"Jaune?" Pyrrha finally picked up enough courage, and unknowingly snapping Jaune out of his trance. "May we…"

"Damn, Cardin really step on your toe recently." Nora jumped into conversation after following Jaune's gaze, and Pyrrha lost all the courage and stepped back, murmuring quiet 'sorry'.

"Yeah." Jaune dryly replied, and idea lightened like a lightbulb in Nora's mind.

"Hey, How about you hit a gym with me?" Jaune looked at her with confusion. "You and I need to lose some steam, and there is no better way to do it than to pump these!" Nora touched muscles on her arms. "And yours certainly needs some too!" She grabbed Jaune's right arm, and his face turned entirely red because of pain. "Give me three or four months and you will look better than that jerk!"

"Nora, you are still charged up." Ren reminded, and Nora finally noticed that Arc's face now changed its color into blueberry violet, and immediately let go of his hand.

"My bad, sorry." Nora giggled as Jaune massaged his aching arm.

"No problem…" He said, clenching his teeth in pain, but idea of going into a gym… Not that bad. And just thinking of it made the ring weight way less. "…But you know what? Why not?"

"Hell yeah!" Nora wanted to pat Jaune's shoulder, but before she could, Ren grabbed her hand just in time.

"Do you want to join us?" Jaune asked Pyrrha out of courtesy, and Pyrrha lowered her head a little.

"I have a call with my parents. Sorry."

"You really want to miss Jaune lifting weights?" Nora teased. "You will finally see him in his gym clothes…."

"Why does it matter?" Jaune asked while Pyrrha looked away in embarrassment, and Nora just shrugged her arms and gave Pyrrha a knowing smile.

"We should get going if we want to take the best spots." Ren added. "Second years will end their classes in next two hours."

"Then what are we waiting for!? To the dorm quickly! Last in a dorm washes all the dishes!" Both Ren and Jaune started to run, leaving Pyrrha and Nora behind.

"So, see you later…?" Nora grabbed Pyrrha arm and leant her closer.

"You need to work on your timing girl." She whispered into Pyrrha's ear. "You really have no experience with boys, do you?"

"N-no?" Nora giggled hearing her response.

"I will keep him long enough in the gym for you to come, then, when he is a better mood, you ask him out, oki?"

"Okay…" Nora let go of Pyrrha's hand and winked to her.

"Don't miss it!" And Valkyrie run after two boys.

Pyrrha just stood there, and processed the entire conversation, then hid her face with her hands.

"Is this THAT obvious!?"***

---

Pack of six Beowolves run through the forest, their mouths and fur bearing marks of fiery fury from that strange human.

Grimm are well-known for their resilience, often being able to take on shots from heavy weapons and, if left alone, being able to heal from even deepest wounds. However, even after months, marks of fire didn't heal properly, which left the six Grimm aching in pain.

Alpha growled, and small pack came to a halt. It started to sniff the air, sensing something nearby.

It looked at its four packmates and warned them about a potential danger, but when it wanted to start running again, something clicked in its beastly brain.

It looked back and counted it's packmates.

There should be six including it, but behind it, only three beasts stood.

It growled, demanding to know what happened to the two missing beowolves, and only now pack realized that something is off.

Suddenly, nearby bush shook, and four beasts looked at it and growled, expecting an attack. Bush kept shaking, it's leaves falling off, yet nothing jumped out from its hiding spot, which irritated an alpha even further.

It commanded three remaining beowolves to stay behind and it slowly approached the bush. It knew it was trap, and if it sent it's packmates there, none of them would return, but it was a leader of the pack - although still young, it's bone-hide not well developed yet, it was far stronger than any of its packmates.

Like a tiger, it approached the supposed trap slowly, while two remaining beowolves looked at the shaking bush, ready to join.

When it got close enough, it pounced, it's claws first, and tore down the bush, simultaneously snapped it's jaw against the branches, but instead of sweet-tasting blood, jaws closed around a metal pipe.

Before it could make any sense of it, a net ensnared itself around it's jaw, and a sturdy rope wrapped around it's front limbs.

Few seconds later Beowolf hanged high on the tree.

Caught in a trap, it tried to call the pack for help, but when it looked back, instead of its kind, a grinning human welcomed it.

"Sup?" Qrow greeted it while he tied the rope on its two remaining free legs.

Alpha growled in rage, it's instinct demanding the immediate demise of the human. It tried to wiggle, but to no avail.

"So, what do we have here..." Qrow examined the beast carefully, touching the black fur "You really were an Alpha? your fur is too soft." Qrow sliced the bone on the alpha's jaw, and his weapon tore through the white bone without issue. "And your armor is a joke." He looked into beast's bloodthirsty eye. "You are two-three, max four months old, ain't ya?"

Grimm growled, still trying to free itself.

"Which means that something killed your previous Alpha." Qrow scratched his chin. "Perhaps this Shapeshifter did that, am I right?"

Again, a deep growl came from the beast's throat.

Qrow returned to his examination, searching for any signs of scars or other battle markings. If that Shapeshifter was able to kill an alpha, then it was able to fight or scatter the entire pack of Beowolves all on its own. If he finds the wounds dealt by the Beast, he might be able to learn something about it.

Of course, some might think that searching for wounds dealt by the creature which can change its form and size will bring a conflicting results, but just as Qrow taught his students in Signal Academy "Every Hunter has it's favorite method of the hunt". Even in Animal Kingdom predators develop their own, more 'personal' ways of hunting and fighting. And if this Shapeshifter is intelligent and old, it certainly has one as well.

"There it is." He announced with a smirk upon noticing a large patches of poorly regrown fur. He pushed them a little to see the beast's skin, and frowned.

"Did it spit acid on ya?" Qrow remarked and touched the black skin. "No, it is like you were struck here with fire." And, much to Hunter's surprise, beowolf yelped in fear.

In Beowolf's mind, the image of the Flaming Eye emerging from the birthing pool appeared once more, and with it - excruciating pain, flames scorching it's hide and skin...

Qrow looked at the creature with clear concern. Grimm rarely show emotions other than rage and hatred, and they are naturally attracted to negative emotions expressed by men and Faunus, often dwelling in places where great amounts of pain and suffering were inflicted, like in the past battlefields. Decades after the Great war, places like Gorgan hills in Northern parts of Mistral are still infested with countless creatures of Grimm, despite the best efforts of the Hunters to eradicate them.

If that Shapeshifter is able to scare the Grimm...

"So, not only it can change into another Animals, but also can use fire too?" Qrow thought out-loud. "It either unlocked it's aura and then discovered it's semblance, or it can change into a dragon." He looked at the Alpha. "What do you say?"

Deep growl in response.

"You ain't very talkative." Qrow remarked, then drew the Harbinger. "But from what I get, you encountered the Shapeshifter early, it killed your alpha and you followed it for some time, hoping to take revenge, but then you encountered something else and run away. Correct?"

Again, deep growl.

"That's what I thought." Qrow said with a smirk.

Finding traces of the Shapeshifter were easy at first, thanks to all the footage provided by the Headmaster. He quickly found them in the ruins, and followed them until he reached path of destruction left by a Death Stalker.

This was another proof of the creature's intelligence - it followed right after the Grimm to hide its own movements, making it harder to track down.

At first, Qrow followed the path left by the Death Stalker, but as predicted, he reached the cave with clear warning about the beast dwelling inside painted at the entrance, but in that cave there were no signs of his target.

This meant that the beast at some point started to follow the Grimm while it chased after Pyrrha Nikos. Problem lied in finding that place, especially after two weeks, when forest starts to slowly rebuilt itself from the damage, and when the animals migrate to find food, stamping on potential answers.

He had to follow numerous traces left by the animals and the Grimm, investigating those made roughly around the same time as the Deathstalker. For nearly two months now, he felt like chasing after the second end of the rainbow, which, much to his frustration, didn't lead to even a pot full of gold. But he persisted like always.

Looks like being stubborn as a donkey has its benefits.

"You were one, maybe two months old back when you meet the Shapeshifter and your packs trace looks like it came from the mountains." He tipped his blade at the far mountain range. "You have a Pool there back, right?"

Grimm growled longer in response.

Grimm pools were not a common knowledge in the society, in fact, only experienced hunters were aware of them. But Headmasters of Beacon, Heaven, Atlas and Shade agreed to keep this information away from the public and forbade Hunters from speaking about the subject until the solution is found. Because what would they say to the Councils? 'Creatures of the Grimm are actually spawning from the pools of Black Goo which spread around the world, and we have no frickin idea how to destroy them?'

"So bud, thanks for chat but I have to find a Skinchanger." Qrow swinged his blade and jumped away. "Let's make it quick."

Alpha fell to the ground, and tore down a rope tying it's front paws, then freed it's jaw, and his back paws. It looked at Qrow with hatred, and maybe, a slight hint of amusement.

"I ain't a bandit anymore, I don't kill tied up enemies. Even Grimm." He pointed the Harbringer at the Grimm. "I would give you a chance to run, but you won't use it." He assumed a combat stance, Harbringer low to swing upward. "So, give me your best shot."

Grimm didn't keep him waiting for long. It roared and charged at the Hunter, and pounced at him.

One swift strike later, roars of the beast abruptly silenced, and after few seconds, forest seemed to return back to life.

Qrow sheeted his weapon and started to follow the trace left by the Grimm, towards the mountains on the horizon.

---

Penny walked deeper into the building and looked around curiously. The interior was unlike her home in Atlas or her temporary house in Vale, it combined both elements of the modern houses, and some old-fashioned mansions – hand-made silver chandeliers enlightened her way forward, and thanks to the red carpet under her feet, her steps made little to no noise.

"I wonder if he made that as well." She thought and scanned the carpet and indeed, it seemed to be handmade too. "How long it took him? And why he did that?" Many possible answers circled in her mind, jumping to the one most probable – that he enjoys all kinds of crafting, not only smithing. But one of Annatar's quotes rung in her head:

"Being genuinely kind is like hitting an empty anvil with a hammer. You can, but what's the point?"

Although it at first sounds unrelated, but when she thought of it more, it sounded more like his philosophy – that everything he does has to have a purpose.

"So maybe he made this carpet to impress his guests?" Penny thought. "Or maybe to…" She reached an end of the carpet, and now stood before the staircase – one set of stairs leading upper floor, and the second leading to the basement "…Lead them where he wants them."

She looked up and down, down and up, and her mind again started to calculate again.

"On the upper floor is 89% chance that it is Annatar's bedroom, and people usually hold secrets hidden in there. But on the other hand…"

"Oh man, this is going to be great!" She heard from other direction, and at the end of the other hallway, leading to Annatar's saloon, and with quick scan she counted four people – three were sitting on the sofa while the fourth worked connecting the black box to the large TV screen.

Curious, she walked away from the staircase, and lights flickered few times with great annoyance.

"I can't believe we are actually doing this." One of the workers in the saloon exclaimed while fourth one connected all of the wires to the TV screen. "It was a great idea Paul!"

"That's why I am a brain." Worker smugly replied. "But give Richie a credit, he brought his Vbox after all."

"Only because you losers have outdated versions. At least you had some decent pads." Richie lifted his gamepad. "Alright, let's get…" He looked at the doorway and finally noticed Penny staring at them curiously.

"Salutations!" She greeted them after they finally noticed her.

"Hi." One of the workers waved to her nervously, for some reason merely staring at her made him nervous. "You are Boss's friend, yes?"

"Indeed I am! And he gave me permission to walk around freely. Could you tell me what is upstairs and downstairs?" She asked and pointed at the staircase.

"If we do, you won't snitch on us?" Richie asked with suspicion.

"Are you doing something bad?"

"Heavens no!" Paul replied, trying to ease the situation. "We just wanted to have some fun during our break!"

"And we learnt that Boss has this big ass TV, so Richie brought today his Vbox and…"

"We want to play some games." Another worker added. "Except Ralph, he just wants to watch."

"I brought chips and soda!"

Penny froze in place, analyzing the data provided to her, while goons looked at each other.

"Is she… okay?" One of the goons approached her and waved his hand before her eyes.

"I am 100% operational!" She replied while the worker jumped away from her. "And we have an agreement!"

Paul left a sigh of relief. "Alright kid, then listen – upstairs is Chief's bedroom, no-go zone, and downstairs there is Chief's private workshop, ABSOLUTE no-go zone."

"What's the difference?"

"Sometimes he allows us to go to his bedroom to clean the dust up, but only he can go to his basement, and what he does there?" Paul shrugged his arms. "I dunno, but from what Yowwick said, he probably keeps his experiments there."

"I heard that in his basement he has a workbench, on which he cracks open machines to figure out their inner workings." Ralph whispered to Richie's ear, only to receive a smack on a head.

"You know it is bullcrap, stop spooking the kid." Paul shouted, and looked at Penny. "He probably has there some stuff he is not ready to show everyone, nothing to be worry about."

"Thank you!" Penny saluted to them and turned on her heel.

"Close the door behind you if you please!" Penny closed the door. "Thank you!" Richie lifted his gamepad again. "Alright where were we?"

"Maybe we should watch over her?" Ralph said, little worried. "You know, she might actually go in there." But Paul shook his head.

"Boss told everyone to not bother her, no matter what she does or where she goes. Do you really want to try and go against his orders?" Paul asked, and Ralph shook his head. "That's what I thought."

"But if you ask me, she was a really strange kid."

"Maybe that's why Boss made an exception for her?" Paul shrugged his arms. "Who knows?"

Penny walked to the staircase armed with new knowledge, and chandeliers once again lighted up, like they greeted her.

"Technically, it is 'ABSOLUTE no-go zone'" Penny looked downstairs. "But he also told me that all doors are open for me, so technically, there should be no problem, as long as I don't break anything."

Without further ado, she walked into the basement.

---

"Fourhundredeightyfive, Fourhundredeightysix…" Ren counted while sitting on the barbell Nora repeatedly lifted up and down, with all of the weights from the Academy's gym put on it.

"I never thought you are that strong Nora." Jaune commented, still dumbfounded by his teammate's strength, and Nora just chuckled.

"I could do more, but barbell would break." She replied with a smile while Jaune just nodded. Nora was ridiculously strong, he still remembered how with one strike of her hammer she broke the bridge in half, and then cracked Deathstalker's armor. She was probably capable of lifting a train all on her own, even without the 'electrical boost'.

And it was not his sole opinion, as group of second year students stood beside the training gate also watched the scene with astonishment.

"Damn, these first years are just built different." One of them, a short blonde boy remarked, his cat ears twitched with amusement. "What do you think Yatsu? Would you be able to lift as much?" He said to over two meters tall mistrealian with short black hair.

"Without a doubt I would lift it once Odd." He replied. "But not three-hundred times."

"Ah Yatsuhashi, humble as ever." Odd exclaimed, and showed his muscles. "Because those guns would do it with no effort!"

"Then do it right now." Another second year student with dark skin and messy cooper hair joined the conversation.

"Well Foxy, I have to warm up first…"

"There is only one girl here, you don't have to chicken out." Tall student with brown hair added with a smirk.

"Screw you Ulrich!" Odd shouted and both Ulrich and Fox fist bumped. "Why you two always try to cut off my wings?"

"Because it's easy and does a lot of damage." Fox commented, and even stoic Yatsu smiled.

"You two are unbearable." Odd shook his head admitting defeat in this conversation. "But you are right with one thing."

"Which is?" Ulrich asked, already suspecting the answer.

"From what I heard, these first years students are just magnifico." Odd explained, and Ulrich just rolled his brown eyes. "I already heard rumors about a Snow Angel, a girl called a Golden Dragon, the Invincible Girl and so on!" He looked at Ulrich. "We need to ask Jeremy to negotiate a break from the missions and check these rumors ourselves."

"Oh-ho, Casanova mode activated." Fox commented with a smirk.

"Can't be helped dear Al, Girls just looove Odd Della Robia!"

"Do I need to remind you how it went with Coco?" Yatsu inquired, and all four laughed, and Jaune who heard the whole conversation turned away to not show them that he is listening to them

"She wouldn't even look in your general direction for a week." Ulrich added, and Odd dismissively waved his hand.

"Sheesh, I am just a good friend and didn't want to steal Fox's girlfriend." Fox at first laughed, then frowned.

"Wait what?"

"Nothing!" Odd's elbow pat Yatsu's arm. "Speaking of, how is the thing between you and Velvet hmmm?"

Nora meanwhile now started to do double dumbbell rows with each dumbbell weighing 100kg with such a speed that Ulrich rose an eyebrow with respect, but despite that, Ren didn't miss his count.

"Bad." Yatsu bluntly replied, and Odd looked at him with concern.

"Oh I'm sorry buddy, I didn't know…"

"Cardin bullies her." Yatsu left a sigh, his fists clenched for a moment in anger before he calmed himself down, while Jaune zoned out at mere mention of his bully.

"Who?" Odd asked, unaware of Winchester's deeds.

"A dipshit." Ulrich cracked his knuckles with stern look on his face. "He acts all high and mighty because he is strong and has a rich father."

"Huh, I think I saw that once already."

"Nickolaus is bearable to some degree." Fox shook his head in denial. "But Cardin is far different story."

Jaune clenched his teeth in growing anger. Cardin not only bullies him, but also others, even the second year students? Why is he allowed to do that? Why is nobody stopping him?

"Oh, Nobody abuses our adorable bunny without consequences!" Odd raised his fists. "We need to teach him some respect!"

"Yes!" Glimmer of hope appeared in Jaune's eyes as he heard that. Who else can put Cardin in his place other than second year students? But Jaune's hopes were shattered shortly after.

"No, we can't lower ourselves to his level." Yatsu said calmly. "Velvet would not want that." Ulrich left a sigh.

"But we have to do something, don't we?"

"We can challenge him in the arena." Fox pointed out, and Yatsu nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, I can't wait when Professor Goodwitch finally allows us to duel the first years." Odd said with a happy grin. "I want to see if all of the rumors are true."

"About how they are so proficient in fighting?" Fox asked, and Odd gave him a wink.

"That too."

Jaune's mind created an image of Cardin getting smacked around in the arena by Yatsu, finally getting what he deserve. He zoned out, imagining how defeated Cardin finally stops bullying him, Velvet, other students…

He didn't even notice when image of Yatsu turned into his own. Now his head entertained him with Cardin laying defeated before him…

He shook his head, no, not possible, he is not strong enough to win against Winchester. His first attempts were less than unsuccessful.

He clenched his fists again. He felt so useless again, powerless.

Why the ring is so heavy?

"Sevenhundredsixtyfour, Sevenhundredsixtyfive…" Ren continued his counting, but then noticed Nora starts to struggle. "Alright, enough for today."

"I can do some more!" She protested.

"I know you can, but I don't want you push yourself too much." With disappointed huff, Nora put the dumbbells away, and started to pull most of the weights from the barbell.

"Hey Jaune, what weight are you confident with?" Ren asked, and finally noticed that Jaune zoned out again. "Jaune? Jaune!"

"Oh crap, sorry I completely…!" Jaune turned to Ren, wanting to apologize, but Ren put hand on his shoulder.

"Jaune, what's really going on?" Arc looked away.

"I'm just not in a great mood lately, that's it." But Ren didn't buy this explanation.

"It is not about Cardin, is it?"

"Of course not! It's… nothing really." Ren rose his eyebrow while the Ring in Jaune's pocket became even heavier.

"If you have a problem with something, you can tell us." Ren spoke calmly while Nora nodded in agreement as she put another 50 kg weight back in its place, but Jaune scoffed in response to Ren's statement.

"Ren I'm really fine, it is nothing I can't deal with." He looked at his teammate, his eyes pleading to end this discussion.

He didn't want to tell them that how he feels, because if he does, what is going to happen? They will pity him like a loser he is, tell him that it is okay to be weak? That it's fine to be the most useless team leader?

Seeing his expression, Ren gave him compassionate stare.

"It's not that I think you can't do something on your own, but as your friend, I wish to help you in the best way I can."

"Yeah!" Nora pat Jaune's back, and without the overcharge, she didn't throw him to the wall. "We don't doubt that you can manage yourself dum-dum, you just don't need to!" She showed him her biceps. "You can count on us at all times!"

This startled Jaune for a bit. They believe in him? Not even his family believed in him that way, after all, his father literally said that 'he shouldn't get upset if he fails at Beacon'. But the sheer amount of trust they give him…

"Thanks." He rose up and approached the barbell, and looked at the remaining weights on it. "That will be enough."

"I will spot for you." Nora said as Jaune laid down in the position.

"Ready?" Ren asked, and without saying anything, he started to lift the heavy barbell.

"You really faced of a Goliath?" Odd asked with disbelief. "Those things are tough nuts to crack."

"It wasn't easy, but we stopped them before the stampede entered the village." Fox confirmed.

"And all we face recently are megatanks." Odd grumbled, and Ulrich's eyes widened.

"mega-what?" Fox rose his eyebrow, and Ulrich elbow struck Odd's stomach.

"Oh, that's how we call the Deathstalkers!" Odd quickly came up with an explanation. "You know, they are mega tanky as hell!"

Yatsu looked at Fox, and Alistair just chuckled with amusement.

"Speaking of which…" Ulrich, trying to shift the conversation, 'discreetly' pointed at the Team JNPR. "I heard they faced an Old Deathstalker during the initiation."

"Wait really?" Odd asked with surprise and looked at them, and Nora waved to him with a cheeky smile. "And they won? Now that's impressive."

Jaune felt how they looked at him and his teammates with genuine respect, and with slightly lifted spirit, he felt like the heavy barbell weigh nothing at all. Ren gave him a thumb up as he started to pick up the pace.

"Now I wonder what they will achieve after five years."

"Something great, that's for sure."

Even the urge to put on the ring started to fade away, which annoyed the hiding shadow.

"Oh please, they were just carried by Nikos!" Cardin's voice burst into the scene, and Jaune nearly dropped the barbell in shock.

Cardin and his team walked into the gym, and like always, Cardin gave everyone an arrogant look.

"Make way for the best Team leader in Beacon!" He announced and walked past Yatsu and Odd, and his team followed closely behind him.

"That's him? The dipshit?" Odd whispered to Ulrich, and his teammate nodded. "Not gonna lie, he is looks like smaller Nickolaus."

"He even has a personal pack of lapdogs." Ulrich remarked, and Russel gave him an angry stare.

"What did you just say? I think I misheard" He tried to intimidate him, but Stern just rose his eyebrow with amusement.

"I called you a lapdog, but forgot to add 'miserable'. Go bark somewhere else" Stern added with clear threat in his voice, not backing down even a bit. Seeing lack of desired response, Russel backed off and walked to Cardin.

"All bark, no bite." Fox remarked while Odd chuckled and Yatsu just took a deep breath and remained calm.

"Forget them Rus, at least you are not as pathetic as Arc!" Cardin bellowed while picking up twice the amount of weight as Jaune with his left hand.

"That low?" Russel smirked, but with clear note of discouragement, but he was not as discouraged as Jaune, who now started to feel the weight of the barbell.

"Don't listen to them." Ren said.

"Yeah, don't listen to us Jauney-boy." Cardin mocked. "Make stand and defend you while you hide behind Nikos's skirt."

"Cut your trap!" Odd shouted to him. "Nobody cares about your yapping!"

Shadow grinned with delight and leant to Jaune's ear.

"Do I really allow him to treat me like this?" Jaune thought while his blood started to boil. From the beginning he disliked Cardin, but recently, this feeling started to turn into hatred.

He dropped the barbell and sat on the bench, trying to hide his expression, which Cardin interpreted as a sign of weakness.

"He is a Team Leader, so he should take criticism on his chest, but he is too scrawny to even do that!" Cardin laughed while lifting second barbell with his left hand. "The weakest student in Beacon's history everybody!"

Before Odd could comment on that, both his and Ulrich's scrolls rang and they shared the look.

"Active Bastion?"

"Active Bastion." Ulrich confirmed and looked at Fox and Yatsu. "Sorry, but we have to go to the bathroom, see you later!" Both students run from the gym.

"I wonder why they run to the bathroom so often?" Alistair said to Yatsu, and Mistrelian shrugged his arms.

"I'm gonna shove this right through your butt!" Nora picked up another barbell like a hammer and approached grinning Cardin.

"Nora no!" Ren stood between her and Cardin. "That's what he wants!"

"That's what he deserves!" Nora tried to walk past Ren and get to laughing Cardin.

"You should control your teammates better Arcy!" Cardin continued. "Or you are unable to!?"

"I have a power, right within my reach, to put Cardin in his place, why am I not using it?"

"Cardin, I think it's too much." Sky Lark inquired, feeling all the glares on him and his teammates, and Winchester just gave him a sideye.

"Are you questioning your Team leader?"

"N-no!" He shared look with Dove, and he just shook his head. Arguing with Cardin was pointless at this point.

"See? That's how you lead your team!" Cardin announced.

"That's not a leadership at all." Ren commented, but Cardin straight up ignored him.

"Team leader must be the strongest member of it! Capable of leading from the front. And you Jaune-boy? You got yourself a carrier."

"I could make him bark those words again with a different tone." Jaune clenched his teeth, and he felt his right hand slipping into his pocket, fingers looking for the ring. "All I have to dois put it on my fingerand let me loose."

Jaune looked at the laughing bully, every fiber of his being demanding retaliation. But right before the ring could find its rightful place on his index finger, Jaune looked at his teammates and hesitated.

He remembered the feeling when he put the Ring in the Forge. He felt powerful and confident, but also detached, indifferent to others, callous.

What if he does something he will forever regret, right before his friends eyes? Or worse , what if he hurts them too in the process? He doesn't know the true extent of powers his Ring displays, what if he 'lose control' like Annatar warned?

He can't and won't take this risk, even though Cardin deserve this.

Jaune rose from the bench and looked at his teammates.

"Nora, Ren, go back to dorm." He said, trying to retain his composure. "I will join you later."

"We can…"

"No." Jaune walked past his friend. "I wish to be alone."

He opened the door and left the gym, and Cardin made himself comfortable on his seat, put his hands behind his head while Nora and Ren put themselves between team CRDL and the door, so they want go after Jaune.

"Are you proud of yourself?" Ren asked, barely able to remain calm.

"Pretty much, thanks for asking." Cardin replied with a smirk.

Nora slammed the barbell before Cardin's feet, but he didn't even flinch.

"He didn't do anything to you!" She shouted into his face, and he gave her an amused look. "Yet you come daily just to harass him out of spite!"

"I have fun with others." He replied with a smirk, Russel giggled but Dove and Sky looked at each other with rather sad looks.

"But he is clearly an exception." Ren pointed out and scratched his chin. "Like you are… envying him."

"Envying!?" Cardin's face grimaced, and his arrogant mask fell off. "Why should I envy this scrawny shit, pathetic baby, who for some godsdamn reason has all of her…" He stopped talking, like he didn't want to spill the beans on something. He blinked few times, then spat on the ground. "The hell you know chin-chin."

Ren remained stoic, not responding to the insult at all, but Nora grabbed Cardin's hand and squeezed it hard, and Winchester briefly scowled in sudden pain.

"Don't you EVER call him that again." Nora's eyes darkened as she whispered the threat, her cheery attitude completely vanished. She let go of his hand and Cardin waved his fingers, shaking off the pain. "Or next time, I will break your legs."

Cardin first looked at his hand, then glanced at fuming Nora with newfound respect, but still prepared for the confrontation.

Only for Yatsu to step between them.

"That's enough of you." He towered over Cardin, his posture calm and collected, but his voice gave Winchester a clear threat. "Go to your dorm. Now."

Cardin looked over Yatsu, quickly calculated his chances, and gave him an arrogant smirk.

"I didn't plan to deal with bunch of sidekicks today anyway." He rose up from the bench. "Let's go, we are done for today." He walked to the door, his teammates following closely behind.

When they left the gym, Ren looked at fuming Nora with concern.

"Nora…"

"Don't tell me to calm down." Her face tightened, but she didn't answer his stare. "I will never let anyone like him insult you. NEVER" She announced.

Ren thought briefly, and took her hand into a hold.

"I know you always have my back." He said. "And I will always be here for you."

He felt how Nora gradually calms down, his touch giving her much needed comfort.

"I know." She said and finally looked at him, her smile returning. "Ren and Nora, always together."

"Nora and Ren, against the world." Ren replied

For years, they had only each other, wholly understood one another and grew protective for one another, their bond stronger than iron. Without doubt if Cardin jumped at Nora, Ren would be the one threatening Winchester.

They were inseparable, bonded together by the shared pain.

"We will follow Cardin to ensure that he went to his dorm and not after your teammate." Fox said to them while Yatsu already approached the door. "But you should go after your friend, I think he needs you."

"Right." Ren took away his hand and all four approached the door. "And we should call Pyrrha and tell her what happened."

"And she is not going to be happy about it."

---

Penny stepped into the basement and looked around, scanning the whole room in the process.

There were many workbenches of all sizes, on which leftovers of metal and wood remained, probably left after Annatar's experiments.

She walked between the tables covered with all kinds of different things, from small piles of metals to contained dust crystals. She was looking for something, which will shed some light on who Annatar is.

"There are so many." She thought, noticing that some tables were made of metal to survive the heat, on other Annatar put carefully sealed jar's full of some chemicals. When she walked past one of the tables she noticed the remains of the scroll scattered across its surface, not smashed by a hammer, but carefully dismantled, piece by piece, and carefully categorized by its shape, size and function.

"He wants to understand how it works." An stray thought crossed her mind. "But he could just search it on the net."

She then noticed large table full of crystals of every kind - diamonds, rubies, every gem she had in her memory, surrounding the frame made of gold. But among those precious stones, there was a piece of paper. She picked it up and unraveled it.

She saw a picture of a three immensely beautiful jewels, each painted with such detail that Penny could swear that she could touch each of them. It looked like the crystals on the picture emanates with their own light, like three miniature suns.

"No, not suns." She thought. "The Sun, the Moon and… something like the moon and sun at the same time?"

She tried to search for something similar to this gems, and much to her shock, there were no results. This picture depicted something, which does not exist.

She noticed a short note under the picture, and quickly read:

"Feanor's greatest creations, I both admire and resent.

To think such pure beauty could be made by the hands of a wicked and blind?

Me, student of the Great Smith Aule,

Upstaged by the fool with blackened heart?"

She searched for 'Feanor', but again, no results. Who was he? Did 'Feanor' created these gems? Why Annatar called this 'Feanor' wicked? Why he 'admires' and 'resents' these jewels?

Who is Aule?

Each new question only made her more curious. She turned the paper around and on the other side of the paper there was one word.

"Silmarils" She read out loud. She turned the paper again and looked at the crystals. "So these are called Silmarils." She again searched for any mention of Silmarils in the internet, and as she expected, there was no result.

"Did he brought all these gems searching for Silmarils?" She thought about one of many possibilities.

"Objection: Annatar used the word "creations", which implies that Silmarils are artificial constructs."

"Then maybe he gathers gems to use them in possible replication of Silmarils?" She again looked at the piles of crystals.

"Probablity: 85%"

She put the paper back and looked at the golden frame on the workbench, and noticed the inscriptions carved into gold. She scanned it quickly and compared them to those on a hammer she previously saw, which confirmed that it is indeed, the same unknown language. But the scan revealed something else, right under the frame.

She carefully lifted the frame, and retrieved sheet of paper hidden under it.

It was the list of every gem in world, with a comment written beside each name:

Diamond - too fragile

Lapis - Unable to keep the light...

Emerald - too soft...

Ruby - too incapable...

And at the very bottom of the list was again one word:

Dust -

Thinking that she finally found another lead, she scanned the room again, and in the far corner of the basement she detected large quantities of Dust Crystals and Powder. She put the note back on a table and walked there, passing by few paintings, which unbeknownst to her, watched her every move from the moment she stepped into the workshop.

She approached the corner, and on the wall above the table were five containers - one red, second blue, third brown, fourth Gray, fifth yellow and sixth Black.

"Fire, Water, Earth, Wind, Electricity and Gravity." Penny scanned to confirm that each contained this specific kind of Dust powder.

On the table there was a black notebook, and Penny thought about reading.

"I shouldn't read his notes..." She thought.

"Counterpoint: these are 99% scientific notes, not a personal diary."

She thought and opened the notebook and jumped at page 1

"Experiment: 001,

Dust transmutation

Resources used: blue dust crystals, empty bucket, bottle of water

Description: Dust, also known as "Nature's wrath", is apparently capable of "creating" nature's elements, such as water, fire or wind (depending on Dust used) in reaction to human's 'aura' (subject for further studies) or by vast use of energy.

Goals: Observation of the reaction, diagnose if Water created by Dust is in any way different than "standard' H2O.

The test: Without any major complications 'water dust' turned into H2O. Miniscule particles of Dust were detected in the liquid (Not enough to put a human life in danger, look experiment 007H)

Conclusion: Water created by Dust is no different from Water found in Arda aside from few particles of dust left in the water, which means that transmutation process is less than 100% efficient. Further tests required to determine transformation efficiency."

She jumped few pages forward and read:

"Experiment: 034

Dust Fusion.

Description: Humans are capable of fusing dust crystals with one another in order to create new kinds of dust with whole new array of effects. However, some fusions are easier than other.

Resources used:

Fire dust crystals (Color: Red)

Earth (or rock) dust crystals (Color: Brown)

Water dust crystals (Color: Blue)

The test:

1) Fusion of the Fire Dust and the Earth Dust created a deep orange crystal, which upon activation turned into magma.

Might prove to be useful in the future.

2) Fusion of the Fire Dust and the Water Dust created a pale white crystal, which upon activation turned into the cloud of steam.

Sidenote: Installment of the chimney is more than necessary in order to conduct more experiments on the "Steam Dust".

Penny paused for a moment, and in her head she played a memory of her father experimenting with the Steam Dust, and accidently engulfing the whole laboratory in white fog. She giggled and returned to reading:

3) Violent Fusion of Water Dust and the Earth Dust created a deep green dust, which upon activations, turned entire workshop into a garden.

Conclusion: Results of two out of three fusions were predicted, but the last one proved to be the most interesting.

Dust is capable of creating life out of seemingly nothing, which means, it must be connected to the FI element in some way.

Further experiments are required."

Now this meant even less for her. What is FI element? Is this some kind of resource?

She skipped all other pages and jumped to the last page:

Experiment: 099

Description: Both humans and animals may possess an aura, which can directly interact with Dust. I want to observe these reactions on animals.

Resources used: Ice Dust Crystals

Test Subjects:

Adult possum without unlocked aura

Dog cub with unlocked aura

100 year turtle with developed semblance (Name: Franklin)

The Test: One at the time, animals were exposed to ice dust crystal.

1) Crystal shimmered in presence of the possum, which signified that it reacts to the animal, but didn't activate upon contact.

2) Crystal shimmered, and upon physical contact, it erupted and turned the test area into ice. Dog was scared, but unharmed.

3) According to Miss Paulette (Owner of Franklin), turtle's semblance allows the animal to weaken the assailant until Franklin's attacker falls asleep. After exposure to the ice dust, turtle's semblance created an icy fog around it's shell, which quickly froze all objects and items thrown at it.

Conclusions

Results are promising, Dust is capable to directly interact with animal spirits, while remains deaf to inanimate objects.

Side note:

Is it possible, that after all these years, I found what HE searched for all this time?

I can't allow myself a misjudgment due all this excitement, more tests are required in order to either confirm, or abolish FI theory."

She put away the notebook and sat on a chair, trying to process everything she read. All the experiments he mentioned were conducted by scientist years ago, and their results are publicly available, and not to mention that Hunters Academies, Schnee Dust Research Group, Atleasian Military – these institutions still experiment on Dust and publicize their findings and conclusions.

"What is the cause for him to conduct all these experiments?" She thought, and processed set of few potential answers: One, more likely, he conducts them in search of something, perhaps he searches if he can use them in his plan to rebuild Silmarils. Or second, less probable – he has no prior knowledge of dust.

However, when she thought about it more, she realized that both the first experiment starts at the exactly same date as the opening of the forge. Like he just started his research when he arrived to Vale.

"Dad also use a notebook, and when we arrived to Vale, he started to research Dust further, not repeated the already established knowledge." She thought. "If Annatar arrived to Vale few months ago, he should have his prior research with him."

Unless he really doesn't have any prior knowladge.

The second theory started to grow more and more probable. She tried searching for Annatar before his arrival to Vale, but there was nothing.

He knows and use unknown language, reference people and places she never heard about, and displays abilities far beyond human.

Just when conclusion started to form in her head, she heard someone upstairs. She looked up and changed her vision to see through the floor.

It was Nathan and unknown man walking to Annatar's bedroom, talking about something. She adjusted her ears and listened.

"…send boss my thanks in Annatar's name." Yowwick said to the man.

"Pleasure is all mine." Man replied as he handed Yowwick a pendrive. "Junior was surprisingly keen on giving me this info."

"They are partners after all." Yowwick opened a safe in Annatar's bedroom, took the pendrive from the man's hand. "But I wouldn't be surprised if boss too had a beef with that midget."

"Probably." Said the man as Yowwick closed the safe.

"So Pete, wanna stay for some time?" Both men left Annatar's bedroom.

"I don't know." Mand replied. "Is he really that great?"

"Oh, you have no idea…"

When both Yowwick and Pete went far enough, Penny rose up from the chair and went to the stairs with the intention to go into Annatar's bedroom.

Paintings cried the warning into a the air, and soon after, Annatar halted as he handed another creation to the eager human.

"Pardon me for moment." He said and walked towards the door leading to the inner forge.

---

Black crow flew close to the ground, following the trace left by the Beowolves pack, careful for any sharp turns or changes in direction, and while his body run on pure instinct, his mind thought about the informations he gathered.

"Able to scare Grimm, spew fire and potentially able to shift into any animal it wants." Qrow thought, taking a turn to right. "Not to mention it is intelligent enough to recognize the camera." Qrow looked at the mountains, now really close. "It won't satisfy Oz, that's for sure."

Headmaster was this kind of person, who wants to know everything about any potential scheme or ploy in order to counter them. Even with little time to prepare, Ozpin was capable of ensuring that the shaky peace between the Kingdoms remains intact.

But then, in very short amount of time, crisis after crisis fell on them - first Red Dress attacks Amber while Qrow was away doing Oz's diffrent chores, then Fangs attacked the train full of Dust while "unaligned" bandit bands harras the countryside, Grimm grow more aggresive than they already are, Roman Torchwick allied himself with Red Dress and steals Dust for her, SDC sent it's attack dogs to Vale for unknown purpose, and on top of that, a Shapeshifting creature appears out of nowhere.

To say that both he and Ozpin were getting overwhelmed, was an understatement. Qrow was more than sure that because of all what's happening recently, Oz's hair will soon turn completly grey.

Knowing all of that some people like James or maybe Leo would say that chasing after such creature shouldn't be on top of their priorties, but Qrow worked with Oz long enough to know that he would never sent Qrow on such mission if It wasn't important.

And second reason Qrow wanted to find this beast was more personal.

Bird took a sharp left turn, feeling in his gut telling him that he is getting closer.

He watched the footage more than once, each time watching how this creature stalks Ruby and Yang, observes them for its hiding spot, and follows them to the ruins.

Like a Hunter chasing after its prey.

Qrow couldn't be with his nieces all the time, but he always tried to ensure their well-being and safety, no matter where he was. And if this creature pose any danger to them, it is as good as dead.

He won't arrive late again. Not for them.

He heard the muffled roars nearby, and quickly shifted back to his human form. Watching his steps to make as little noise as possible, he approached the edge of the treelane, and peaked from behind the bushes.

There, right under the large mountain, was a small patch of land filled with rocks and boulders, right before the entrance to the cave, and before it, a small herd of boarbatusks.

Most of the boar-like Grimm growled at the entrance of the cave while few remained on the lookout duty. Leader of the herd, a large and old Boarbatusks with thick and long tusks smashed the ground with it's cloven hooves in clear challenge to something inside the cave. As the response, a deep rumble could be heard from under the mountain.

"Well well, something stole your home while you were away?" Qrow grinned, amused by this sight. "It seems even Grimm suffer from Mistrealian housing scheme."

A deep rumble could be heard again, and smaller Boarbatusks jumped away from the entrance. Whatever it is in that cave, it is massive. And really does not like neighbors.

"Deathstalker maybe?" Qrow thought after taking a gulp from his flask. "Deathstalker's are surprisingly quiet. Maybe an Ursa Major? They like caves and are very territorial."

One of the boarbatusks on the lookout narrowed its tiny red eyes and finally realized that herd is not alone. It left a warning screech, and whole herd looked at Qrow's hiding spot.

"Need someone to exmit the guy?" He put his flask back on his belt and drew his weapon while Grimm screeched at him.

Two closest boarbatusks charged at him right away, their tusks aimed at his torso, but the one closer to him unfortunately stumbled on the large rock, and tumbled towards the Hunter.

Qrow leapt above the beast, while it slammed into the tree, and before it could recover, the second boarbatusk, unable to stop it's charge, accidently impaled it's brethren.

He land behind them, Harbinger slashed against back clovened feet, crippling the remaining Grimm.

While it trashed around in agony, Qrow quickly turned to face the rest of the herd.

Old Boarbatusk eyed out the human, it's instinct ordering it to kill him now, to silence the fire within at once, but his experience advised it to not charge headfirst.

It roared, and three smaller boarbatusks started to do their characteristic spin.

Deep rumble under the mountain grew larger, angrier...

Qrow smiled as one of the creatures charged forward while two other beasts went for a flanking maneuver. His weapon changed, and just when the front boarbatusk was about to smash into him, he side-stepped to the left, and the grimm passed few inches from him.

Close enough to see the end of the shotgun barrel.

Buckshot fired right into the boarbatusks head, and monster's rapidly decomposing body flew through the air, and unluckily for another the charging Grimm, it smashed right into second boarbatusk throwing it off from the spinning.

Rumble grew closer, it's body tore down the walls on the cave, it's rageful eyes focused on the action outside...

The boarbatusk slammed against the large boulder, so unfortunetly that it's back cracked, killing it instantly.

One remianing boarbatusk kept it's attack from the left, thinking it has a chance to crush into the human, and it launched itself at the Hunter's torso.

Qrow ducked as low as possible, and slashed upward, at the exposed underbelly.

Boarbatusk bounced few times from the ground, stopped spinning and landed on its cloven hoof.

It quickly turned back towards the human, and Qrow rose his eyebrow with anticipation.

Beast roared and tried to charge at him, but it now realized that it lacked the lower half of its body. When it tried to make sense of it, Grimm vanished in a cloud of dark ash.

"Ready for this?" Qrow gestured to the leader of the former herd to come and fight, and experienced Grimm growled and started spin in place to pick up speed.

Entrance of the cave exploded in the rain of salt and stone, throwing the suprised Boarbatusk into the air while Qrow covered his eyes from the flying debries. Old Grimm had only a second to yelp before enormous jaw closed around it and sickening crush could be heard from the maw.

"What the hell?" Qrow looked at the Grimm emerging from the cave with disbelief.

It was a Giant Creep, an lizard like Grimm with two front legs and a strong tail, taller than the three store building and bulkier than the oldest trees, in fact, it seemed to be too large to even fit in the cave, as half of its body remained stuck under the rubble. Monster frantically wiggled around in the attempt to free its tail from the trap, it's bulky hinderlegs pulling with all their might.

Qrow took his chance to examine the beast from a safe distance. He didn't expect to fight against some ancient Grimm today, but how this giant even crawled into that cave in the first place?

Something wasn't right with this one - Grimms that size are old as dirt, and this one should be covered in bone, but it was entirely covered in a black scales with scarce bone around its head.

With one final push, Creep freed itself, sending yet another shower of stones, at Qrow and without further ado, it charged madly against the Hunter.

Qrow dodged of the creature's head, it's maw closed around the large boulder and crushed it in one snap, breaking many of it's teeth, but beast seemed to not care about it.

Hunter slashed against the black scales, which much to his suprise, were torn apart like a tissue, but the beast didn't seem to notice the wound, and continued its relentless attack.

Qrow jumped away from the swing of the clawed hindlimb, which tore the rocky ground and then momentarily stuck under the rubble. Using the occasion, with one slash of the blade Qrow left a deep cut on a monster's limb, but Creep pressed forward, still not caring for wounds or pain.

He was taken aback by the ferocity of the Creep's attacks, for Grimm that age are far more clever with their tactics, and rarely madly rush at their opponents like this. Younger Grimm on the other hand...

He looked beast in the eyes, and they were wide open, full of bloodlust and madness, like the creature was drugged on something. But despite the apparent madness, Creep's gaze was fixated on him the entire time.

But it was not a gaze of old, experienced Grimm.

Little to no bone on its back or forehead, unimaginative tactics...

"You spawned just few months ago!" Qrow concluded with shock after rolling away as the Creep smashed it's thick tail against the ground like an enormous lash, splitting another boulder in half. "How did you get that fat, ugly?"

Monster left an ear-shattering roar in response, and started to burrow itself into the ground, submerging in it, which threw the entire area into violent earthquake.

Qrow fought to maintain his balance as the creature made its way underground towards him, and like crocodile in the river, it wanted to burst out from the ground and swallow him whole.

Hunter waited for the perfect moment, just when the beast was mere moment from digging itself out, Harbinger started to extend, and turn into a different weapon.

Rumble grew under his feet, ground started to rise up like a mole's burrow, and he prepared to jump. Seconds became longer than minutes, and he took a deep breath, knowing he has to choose the right moment.

The burrow exploded, overgrown Grimm sprung into the air like a shark, it's jaw opened wide.

However Qrow leapt even higher thanks to the kinetic energy Grimm gave him, as well as his aura amplifying his jump.

Jaws snapped loudly few meters away from Qrow with such force that some of the broken teeth shattered to pieces, and the enraged Grimm was forced to watch how Hunter's weapon turned fully into the scythe.

Qrow started to fall, fell right past the beast's head, and swung his Scythe against monster's exposed right leg.

Creep finally screeched in pain as his limb was severed from the rest of the body.

But Hunter wasn't done, he landed on the ground, and with quick footwork, he jumped back into the air and slashed Creep's exposed underbelly.

Half of the Grimm's torso collapsed onto the ground, while the other half fell into the hole it dug, where it vanished from existence. But despite that loss, with only one leg remaining, Creep still tried to rise up and continue the fight.

Qrow run towards the monster, his weapon once again turned into the blade, Grimm roared and swinged it's remaining arm at him.

Hunter slide under the arm, in less than a second he shortened distance between himself and the monster's head, and aimed his shotgun directly into Creep's eye.

He allowed himself to look into Grimm's maddened eye for a second before he pulled the trigger.

Buckshot pierced through the eye and tore through the creature's head from the inside, finishing it for good.

Qrow watched the disappearing body with indifference. He would never fight like this against other creeps, and not because creep are not physically capable of reaching that size. He saw many old creeps, few ancient, and none of them grew even close to that one.

And it attacked and killed the Boarbatusk at the start of their fight. Accidently trampling over their brethren? Using them as a cannon fodder? That happens. But deliberately killing one another? That's unusual.

He looked at the entrance to the cave, now partially blocked due to Creep's emergence. Whatever changed that Grimm was inside this cave.

"Let's see what you have in store for me shifty." Qrow commented, took a flashlight from his pouch, and with Harbinger in hand, he walked into darkness.

---

"…so everything is alright dad." Pyrrha said, sitting before one of the terminals in CCTS tower, in which she saw her mom and dad.

Cross Continental Transmit System Towers, or CCTS in short, developed by the Kingdom of Atlas, are one of the most useful innovations in Remnant's recent history, for it allowed for the wireless communication between the Kingdoms and their people without a need of the messengers, who were vulnerable to Grimm attacks. Many potential conflicts and misunderstandings between the Kingdoms were avoided thanks to them, students studying abroad could contact their parents at any given time, and economic cooperation between the countries skyrocketed. Some even compared introduction of this towers to be as significant as discovery of Dust.

"I'm really glad to hear that." Pyrrha's dad smiled to her.

"And how are your teammates?" Her mom asked.

"Oh, they had to hit a gym today because Nora absorbed too much electricity during class, Ren lost his first game of Grimm attack and he was so upset that he demanded a rematch. But I think he lost on purpose to make Nora happy."

Her father chuckled. "Sounds like great guy! Do you know how many times I had to…" He felt his wife's stare piercing his shoulder. "…Nevermind."

Pyrrha giggled. "And Jaune…" She stopped laughing, and her face tightened. Her parents shared a knowing look between each other.

"He struggles with something, right?" Pyrrha nodded in confirmation. "You think it's because of that 'Cardin'?"

"I don't think so." Pyrrha admitted. "It is something more, but when I ask him about it, he just brush it off. But I know he is not well."

"You want to help him." Her dad asked, and when she nodded her head in agreement, he gave her compassionate look. "That's my girl."

"But what can I do? He doesn't want my help."

"Then don't ask him about permission and do your best sweetheart." Her mom said, Pyrrha looked at her confused.

"Some people will insist that they don't need help even though their problems suffocate them. Just ask your dad what happened twenty years ago." Her father lowered his head for moment. "They do to this they are afraid what others will think about them, or maybe because their personal pride doesn't allow them. In such situations, you just have to help, even if they don't ask for it. Of course, if he told you what is going on, then it would be easier, but it is what is it is."

"But what if he starts to hate me because of it?" Pyrrha asked with clear worry in her voice. "He is my first real friend, I don't want to ruin it."

"Darling, he will not hate you for helping him." Her dad said and embraced his wife. "I certainly don't hate you mom for what she did for me." They kissed on screen, and Pyrrha blushed.

"Dad, mom please, it's embarrassing." She asked, and they laughed together.

"Be there for him." Her mom said after a while. "He is your friend, he will understand."

"Thanks mom." Pyrrha said with great relief, and in that moment, her scroll beeped.

"Sorry." She said and pulled it out of her pocket. "Hey Ren, what's going on?"

"We lost Jaune." He said.

"What?" She rose from her seat.

"Cardin decided to show up in the gym, and bullied Jaune out of it." He explained. "But he turned off his scroll and we can't find him."

"Why didn't you leave with him!?" She asked with anger.

"Because Cardin would certainly follow us!" Nora jumped into conversation. "And believe me, I saw in his eyes, he certainly would. So we kept him in gym."

Pyrrha clenched her fist. Cardin made Jaune his prime target of bullying for past months, and in recent week, after what she did in cafeteria, he just got even worse. In hindsight she regrated throwing that plate at him, not because she humiliated Cardin that day, but because he now decided to lash out on Jaune.

"Keep looking for him, I will be there soon." She hung up and looked at her parents in the terminal. "I'm sorry but I must go."

"Don't be sorry, we understand." Her mom smiled to her. "Go and find him."

"We love you!" Dad waved to her.

"I love you too!" She waved back and they ended the call. Without much more thought, she run to the exit, hoping to quickly find Jaune before something bad happens.

Meanwhile Jaune sat on a bench in the Academy's park, reached for his pocket and retrieved the ring from it.

"From the day he gave you to me, I feel worse and worse!" He accused it, but unsurprisingly, the ring remained silent. "I can't sleep, everything is tasteless, and feel the urge to paunch someone over the slightest insult! And don't make start over how you constantly increase your weight!" He pointed at the blue crystal. "Stop it, or I will throw you away!"

"What it can stop?" He thought. "It's an object, a thing, it cannot do anything on its own." He left a heavy sigh and lowered his head. "The truth is that I couldn't sleep even before he gave it to me due all of the stress. Everything already tasted to me like ash, because of fear I feel every day. And I really want to paunch Cardin, but I am too weak to do so. And the weight of the Ring?"

He looked at the ring between his fingers. "It is the illusion of my own head to mask the urge to put it on. I didn't even use it once!"

"It's because he warned me..."

"What does he know? Maybe raw power is exactly what I need? It is my Ring."

His eyes widened, and the ring filled his entire vision, making him unaware of the approaching man.

"I can feel the power inside of it, and when I put it on, I will finally have the strength to change my life, to become the hero I always wanted to be!"

Jaune's mind created an image of him in the future - him wearing a shining white armor vanquishing hordes of Grimm on his own, singlehandedly protecting the villages and towns from terrors of the night.

He entertained himself with this image, until he realized that in each vision, there was no one else. - stoic Ren, who helped with his studies many times, was nowhere to be found, chaotic Nora, who tried her to cheer him up even he felt like a low bottom, was nowhere to be seen. And of course Pyrrha, his first teammate and best friend, who was always beside him even in the worst circumstances, was absent in this vision.

"You got yourself a carrier." Cardin's words rung in his head, and he tried to discard this thought, but Cardin was, sadly, right. Pyrrha helped him numerous times in classes, in fact, she was one of few reasons he is still in Beacon. She not only encouraged him to study and exercise, but also many times stopped her own activities to help him, asking for nothing in return, even when he insisted.

He didn't admit it or said it out loud, but he strive to be as capable as her, which in turn, motivated him to keep studying.

"She takes pity in me." The stray thought appeared in his head, but like in response, Pyrrha's smiling face during Cassim's training appeared before his eyes. She seemed to enjoy spending time with him, and he had a great time too, even though she won all their duels. And then he remembered her happy smile when he finally scored the hit in their duel.

She looked sad when he was defeated by Cardin , but he never made him feel pathetic or pitiful. None of his teammates did, instead they gave him their full support.

He still wants to be a hero, but being a hero doesn't necessarily mean he has to be alone. And if wearing this ring will cause the abandonment of his team, then he does not want to wear it.

Shadow blinked few times in pure shock and disbelief, while Jaune took another look at the ring again, and it felt lighter than a feather.

"What you have here scrawny!?" A large, bulky student pushed him from the bench and snatched the ring from his hand.

"Hey!" He rose back on his feet while the large student studied the ring in his fingers. "Give it back!"

"Or what? You will spit on my shoes?" Blonde-haired bully giggled. "Oh, this one is pretty nice, Sissi will like it for sure!"

"It's not yours!"

"I don't care." Bully rose his right hand high in the air, away from Jaune's grasp. "Come on, jump higher, I know you can! Ohhh, to short this time!"

"You can't treat anyone like this!" Bully pushed Jaune to the ground and laughed.

"Ooh, but I can treat you like this." Bully laughed even heard. "Heard about the weakest student in Beacon and wanted to check by myself, but you are even more pathetic in real life!"

Jaune rose back up on his feet, his fist's clenched and anger growing. But he knew that he has no chance in fight. That is a second year student, he is taller than him and far stronger.

He briefly thought about to go and ask the Professor for help, but he knew that if he turn tail and run now, things will get even worse for him.

But most importantly, he wanted the ring back. Now.

Bully closed his eyes and laughed at him even louder.

"Besides, I start to like this ring." He said with a grin, and the item filled bully's vision entirely. "It's soo..."

Jaune stepped on bully's leg, pinning him in a bad position, and pushed him with all of his strength. If second year student expected the attack, he would be easily able to stand his ground, but because he underestimated his victim, fell on his butt and dropped the ring, and it bounced few times from the path and feel into the bush.

"You shit!" He quickly rose up on his feet while Jaune jumped after the ring and frantically checked for it between the leaves.

Just when he felt the metal in his left hand, bully grabbed him by his shirt and pulled him away.

"Nobody cheap shots Nickolaus shitbag!" Nickolaus punched Jaune in the stomach, sent him flying few feet backwards.

Ring flew into the air, spun few times and started to fall back.

Jaune's back slammed against the fountain, his scroll fell of his pocket. He gasped for air, feeling pain after Nickoluas punched him hard, and then opened his eyes.

Time slowed down for him as the bully approached him with clear intention of kicking him in the stomach, but then he noticed the ring falling directly at him. He reached to grab it, but with a whisper from the hidden shadow, ring instead fell right on his finger.

When Nickolaus kicked him, a loud crunch could be heard.

"AUGHH!" Bully jumped away in pain, his right feet in immense pain. He felt like he kicked the brick wall. "What the hell!?"

All the pain Jaune felt from the paunch evaporated in an instant, and all his fatigue passed away like a fever dream. Instead felt totally fresh, unimaginably strong.

Incomparably Powerful.

He rose up on his two feet and looked with astonishment at his body.

"How did you…" He looked at the ring sitting on his finger.

"You shitbag!" Nickolaus lunged at him, but much to Jaune's surprise, the large bully appeared unimaginably sluggish as the fist traveled towards his face with snail's pace.

He dodged the incoming fist without much effort.

"What's the matter? Not so strong now?" Jaune suddenly taunted, and he wasn't sure why he did that, but felt like it fit the moment.

Another paunch, and Jaune's smile widened. Now bully appeared pathetic in his eyes, his first intimidating size he now compared to the large, obese monkey. He felt like he could run circles around the bully.

And he did.

Jaune's movements felt for him like he floated in the air, faster than the wind and lighter than a bird. In Nickolaus point of view, Jaune became a blur which quickly flew right behind him like a ghost.

"What the…" Nickolaus muttered, only having half of a second to partially turn his head before Jaune struck him his head with such strength that the bully flew through the air and landed in the fountain with large splash.

"Consider it your last chance." Jaune announced as Nickolaus climbed out from the fountain and spit out some water. "Leave, and never bother me again."

Nickolaus looked at the first year, and in his eyes, the scrawny, weak first year student vanished. Now he felt like he stares right into the eye of the storm, ready to be unleashed on him at any moment now and tear him to shreds. Now he felt small, insignificant, pathetic, while Arc appeared to him as large, powerful and fearless.

In those eyes, dark blue as a deep ocean, he recognized his demise.

He climbed out of the fountain and run away, as fast as he could, and Jaune watched as the bully slowly fades in the distance. Then he threw his head back and laughed out loud.

"Oh man, this thing is busted!" He looked at the ring with admiration. "I felt like this… Never!"

Just like Annatar said, he felt confident, capable of lifting the mountains and swimming through the entire oceans. He was sure that he could duel with Weiss on the even terms…

With little sad look, he reached with his left hand to remove the ring.

"It was nice, but I don't need it right now." He said.

"But since I already have it on my finger, why not take it on a small… test drive?" He thought just before he grabbed the ring. "Maybe I can try to do a little lap around Beacon? I wonder how fast I can be." And after moment of hesitation, he retracted his hand.

"You know what?" He looked at the ring again. "That doesn't sound too bad." With that said, he looked forward and started to run with inhuman speed, unknowingly leaving his scroll under the fountain.

---

Penny looked in case if somebody was approaching, then quickly run upstairs to Annatar's bedroom. She quietly opened the door, and walked into the room.

It was surprisingly modest, something you would expect in every house, only bed, a desk and above the desk – a large bookcase filled with all kinds volumes: Remnant's history tomes, Fantasy novels, Science publications.

"He learns about Remnants history." She thought as she now stood before the painting.

On the painting there were four people – An old-looking and tired king wearing an elaborate crown made of gold but also a pajama, holding a longsword above the table like he threatened others, to his right sat a slander and pale queen, wearing simple grey clothes and crown made of simple steel, and above her loomed pair of the red eyes. On the left another king wore mix of lavish crimson and shining gold with the crown made of jade on top of his head, holding a goblet of the same material in his right hand, from which green wine poured on the table, and lastly, a black-skinned queen wearing ivory crown and silk, holding a spear in her left hand, her feet dug in the sand.

And on the table, there was a large sheet of paper with signatures of every kingdom on it.

Penny recognized it as a reproduction of the "The Treaty of Vytal" made by Leon de Margilian, but this copy was clearly painted by Annatar.

Penny wanted to analyze the painting further, but she knew that it is just a cover up, she gently pushed the painting aside and looked at the safe, in which Yowwick store something.

She calculated in her head how long it will take for her to open the safe, and after she received a satisfactory result, she reached for it.

"Wait…" She halted her hand. "That's not right."

She already went into his workshop, read what appeared to be his private notes, and now she wants to break into the safe? What if he holds something valuable there, something she shouldn't see or touch? Wouldn't that be a burglary?

But on the other hand, she was too curious. That pendrive was something important regarding Annatar, something unrelated to the forge but apparently, to a… cow meat? But from a tone of the conversation between the shady man and Nat, it was not anything good.

She reached to the safe and after few quick moments, she opened it.

Inside, there was a book with the black cover, a bullet made of silver, a golden ring, and a pendrive she looked for.

She reached for it, and hesitated once more. What if it really is something she shouldn't see? But on the other hand, what if she will be finally able to gain some insights? She wanted to know about Feanor, Silmarils and Arda.

She accessed the data stored on the drive, and much to her surprise, everything stored on it was in related to the current governor – his hobbies, friends, photos of his family members, past embezzlements, acts of incompetence…

Suddenly, a hand took away the pendrive, drawing her mind out of it.

"I presume you had a busy day." Annatar commented as he looked at the thing between his fingers.

Penny looked at him with disturbed eyes, and Annatar smiled.

"From your stare I guess that Junior truly brought me everything I need." He chuckled and gently pat the pendrive. "Who would have thought that such small object is capable of containing the knowledge worthy of largest libraries?"

"Why do you need that?" Penny asked, and Annatar chuckled..

"To use it of course!" He replied, and put it back in the open safe. "Governor proved to be a nuisance that must be dealt with swiftly, and severely."

"But earlier you said that all he is an inconvenience!"

"And for that he must pay." He sad with such indifference that it would make anyone shiver. "But enough of him, for now, we should talk about you."

Penny took a step back when he looked at her.

"I'm sorry." She lowered her head in apologetic gesture, and Annatar rose his eyebrow.

"For what exactly are you apologizing for?"

"I walked into your workshop in a basement." She said. "And read your notes."

"Truly?"

"I know I shouldn't." She said sincerely. "But I saw how you talk to the people outside and it didn't match with your earlier behavior…" She looked at him. "I wanted to know why are you acting like this."

"And then you broke into my safe." He said. "Why?"

"Because I heard what Nat and that unknown told to each other and I was afraid you want to do something bad." Penny explained.

"Is that truly all?" After a moment of hesitation, Penny shook her head in denial.

"Also… I hoped I will get answers there." She added. "Because right now, I have more questions than answers!"

She jumped towards him.

"Like who is Feanor? Where is Arda? Is Arda an island or a continent? Who was Aule? Or…"

"Slowly Penny Polendina." He said calmly, stopping the barrage of questions before them got truly unleashed. She backed off and lowered her head again.

"Sorry."

"I told you already: Do not apologize for doing nothing wrong." He said, and Penny looked at him with disbelief.

"You are not angry?" Annatar laughed hearing this.

"Angry? You surpassed my expectations, why should I be angry?"

She blinked few times, not understanding his reaction at all. People are usually angry when they find someone searching through their private stuff, but Annatar appears to be joyful?

"You posses a curious mind, Penny Polendina. A mind which seeks the truth, not the easy answers." He waved to her to follow him, and both approached the window, and Annatar gestured at the crowd below. "Do you know how many people outside my forge would cross the first door?"

She shook her head.

"From this crowd, only few." He stated. "But none would venture to my workshop, read notes I left for them or unlock the safe I installed. For them, I am a Smith who gives them wonders, they don't need or want to know more."

"Why?" She finally asked.

"Because people don't seek or want the truth, but instead, they crave for an easy answers, which I provided them. The truth, on the other hand, might be uncomfortable, make their nights restless or question their very being. That's why they don't deserve to know the true goal."

He walked back towards the safe, and covered it back with the replica of "The Treaty of Vytal".

"And what is your goal?" She asked, and Annatar's smile only widened.

"If you really want to know, you should know me better first." He said with a smile. "You may ask me any question now, and I will answer truthfully."

"Any question?" He nodded in response.

Myriad of questions appeared in her head, and she craved answers for all of them. From where he is from, what are the Silmarils, or…

She now remembered all of the disturbing information's she saw on the pendrive regarding the current Governor. For what purpose he needs something like this? She could ask him about his past, but she was afraid that he might do something bad in the future. And as a friend, she should stop him.

"Why you gathered so much information about the governor?" She asked, and Annatar looked at her with astonishment.

"You really ask for something that trivial?"

"I saw what that shady man brought you." She pointed at the safe behind the painting. "And I'm afraid you want to use it for something wrong, like a blackmail." But Sauron just scoffed.

"Oh, for him I prepared something more." He smirked. "In truth, I want to reveal everything slowly, one at the time, and spread it around all sorts of media. Under the barrage of the ever growing controversy, he would lose his position, his reputation and his connections, and I will cease only when he finally turn into the society's pariah."

"But what about his family?" She asked with concern.

"What do you mean?"

"If you do like you say, you will ruin not only his life, but also his parents, his divorced wife, three daughters and a son. His daughters has business's in downtown, and his son, Sky, is studying in the Beacon Academy." But Sauron just shrugged his arms.

"And why should I care?"

"They tried to stay away from their dad as far as possible, and they are not involved in this conflict. But if you do what you say, his children will lose their jobs and Sky will be forced to drop from Beacon even though they have nothing to do with it." She stated. "It's unfair."

"Life is rarely fair, and mostly forces you to make unpleasant decisions." Annatar stated. "As long as Lark remains in the office, he will cause trouble for me, and ruin lives of people in Limestone, Clashtara, Stonecradle and many more. And I won't allow that."

"But in doing so, you will still ruin lives of others."

"Seven people for ten thousand? Logic is on my side in this discussion."

"It is not about math!" Penny argued further. "It is about lives of others."

Annatar left a sigh.

"It is not always about doing what is right." He said after a while. "In a large Kingdom, there was once a county which crops were ravaged by plague. The king could either burn the crops and sentence one county for starvation but prevent the plague from spreading, or do nothing and watch how his entire country falls into chaos and hunger. This situation is exactly the same."

Penny zoned out for a moment, for it reminded her of something, but while she searched for the answer in her memories, Annatar walked past her towards the door.

"Pardon me, but my guests are probably getting impatient. Join me when make up your mind." He said and left the room.

Penny sat down on the chair and searched for the memory. And she found it after some time.

She was back in Atlas, sitting on the table while her dad, elderly man with dark skin and short, balding white hair wearing a lab coat worked on the malfunction in her leg, and to pass time, he kept giving her logic test after logic test.

"You did great with this one!" He said as he worked on the cables within her right leg. "Do you want another test?"

"Affirmative!" She cheerfully replied, and her dad chuckled.

"Alright so, for the next test, I am going to show you a popular choice dilemma, are you ready?

"Yes!" She replied, and soon before her, a short scene played out

On a screen, A trolley was heading towards five people tied to the track, but right beside the lever stood a digital copy of her, allowing her to pull the lever to divert it to the other track, but it will kill one person instead."

"My choice is to either pull the lever or do nothing?" She thought, and looked at her dad with questioning look.

"What do you do?" He asked.

"Pull the lever." She replied in an instant.

"Why?" Pietro asked.

"Because saving five people is objectively better than saving one." She replied. "Is this a correct answer?"

"The test is not over yet." Image on the screen shifted, and this one showed a similar scene, the only difference being that instead of a one person being tied up, there were four people tied to the track.

"I pull the lever again." She said.

"Why?" Pietro asked again.

"Because saving five people is objectively better than saving four." She replied. "Correct?"

"Not yet." Pietro replied, and the image shifted once more. And just like before, there five people tied to the track, while once again, only one person was tied to another track.

But that person was her dad.

She looked at her father in pure shock, and before she could ask him what is the meaning of this one, Pietro looked her in the eyes.

"It's a hypothetical scenario, imagine that I am really there. Would you pull the lever to save five people?"

Penny looked at the image, and found herself in an internal turmoil. Saving five people is objectively better but it's her dad! Even though it is an simulation, she couldn't do it to him. Saving more people should be more moral, but not saving her dad would bring her so much pain.

"Can I stop the trolley!?" She suddenly asked, hoping it is a correct answer. And when she said that, she saw how her image rush before the trolley and stop it in its tracks.

Pietro gave her a wide smile and pat her back.

"You thought out of the box darling, good job!" He commended her.

"But I thought I can only pull the lever or do nothing!" She said replied, and Pietro shook his head.

"I didn't tell you that." He remarked.

"But…" She deadpanned, then lowered her head. "I failed the test." She said with a sad voice.

"Why?"

"Because I could save others in previous tests, could I?" And Pietro nodded.

"The purpose of this test was not to discourage you darling, but to teach you an important lesson."

"What was it?"

"The importance of human life." He reattached the cables in her leg and she could move it again. "Just like for you, a trolley problem is a numbers game for most – 'it's better to save five people over one, it's better to save five over four' - until they are faced with potential personal loss. Only then they start of thinking about other solutions, such as derailing the trolley or untying the person."

"Then, the correct answer is to… cheat?" And Pietro nodded.

"In life, there will be many dilemma's similar to this." He stated. "That at first glance are only a choice between the lesser and the greater evil. But life is rarely that way, and often, there are other solutions which don't require anyone to suffer. And there will be people who will justify their actions just like you did previously. But each life is precious, no matter how small or how old. And when you start turning people into numbers, you will grow blind for other solutions to those dilemma's because it will be easier for you."

"So in choice between the lesser and the greater evil I should look for another path?" And again, Pietro nodded in approval.

"Often the third path requires more effort from you." Her dad admitted. "But doing the right thing is not always easy."

"But it is still a right thing to do." Penny said, and her dad gave her a happy smile.

"That's my girl." He took few steps back. "Alllright, your leg should now be up and running." He wiped out few drops of sweat from his forehead with his hand. "You are ready to go!"

"Dad, I want to this test again." Penny announced, catching her father by surprise, and smiled to him. "I want to show you how much I learnt today."

Penny returned back from her memory trip, blinked few times and looked at the safe again. And started to think.

"What Annatar told me is basically this." She realized when she recounted the story about the county. "But in reality, there are other solutions."

She gathered everything she knew about Annatar, knowledge she acquired from the drive and surfed the net to reinforce her arguments, and started to prepare for the second round of this discussion, and this time, she will prove him wrong.

---

Qrow walked into the cave, flashlight in his left hand enlightened the way forward, while his right hand remained empty, just in case he had to draw Harbinger. He doubted that another Grimm could hide here, but after fighting an overgrown Creep, he could expect everything hiding in the Dark.

Stones and salt rolled away from under his feet as he walked, his flashlight scanning his surroundings.

"It left quite a mess." He thought, looking at the cracked granite walls and ceiling, left after the creature basically dragged it's body through too narrow passage. "But those are the results of it getting out. Which means it was either way smaller before in entered, or it spawned here."

Whatever it was, answer lied in the center of the cave.

Soon, he walked into the large grotto, which was probably the Creep's lair and the location of the Grimm pool. He put his backpack on the ground, took few flares from it and threw them around the cave.

Soon, entire grotto was enlightened by the dim red light, giving him a more clear view of the area. And first thing he noticed was large empty hole in the ground right in the middle of the cave.

"There should be a Grimm pool." He thought to himself, both surprised and alerted by the sudden revelation. He looked around in search for clues, and soon noticed marks of the Creep's claws on the rocky ground leading from the entrance right into the middle of the Grotto.

Qrow cautiously approached the hole in the ground, and with each step he started to feel increasingly ill. He knew that feeling, he got it each time he approached the site of a large battle or great tragedy - this overbearing mixture of grief, anger, hatred and pain.

Ozpin once explained it to him that places like Gorgan hills or the Bloody oasis leave scars or "imprints of pain" as he called it, not only because soldiers fighting there experienced all kinds of negative emotions, but also because these places bring the worst memories in the collective mind of the Kingdoms citizens. To this day, battles like The Decimation on the Ivory Shore still makes families in Mantle mourn their lost family members.

Naturally, places like this attract Grimm like moths to the light or carrions to flesh, which only makes getting over the collective trauma way more difficult. A grim reminder of what happened.

Here, Qrow had the same feeling like on Gorgan hills, but ten times more intense. As he walked closer to the hole he felt like he swum in the cloud of hatred and rage, which grew dense with each step.

When he finally reached the edge of the hole, he knelt down and took a deep breath.

"What happened here?" He thought, feeling like he took a dive in a pool of oil. He took another flare and tossed it into the pit.

As the flare fell deeper and deeper, Qrow noticed briefly a claw marks left by the Creep inside, each one larger and larger

"It was certainly a Grimm pool, but Creep hasn't spawned here." Qrow noted. "It fell into it. And grew rapidly inside."

He once heard a theory in Heaven Academy made by Doctor Carl Ravin, in which he stated that the creatures of Grimm grow in size not only with time, but also after "consuming" negative emotions long enough. He compared it to photosynthesis of plants, but instead of the Sun, Grimm use 'negativity'. But his theory didn't gather sufficient proof to be taken into consideration.

"Maybe he had a point." Qrow thought as he watched marks left by the Creep.

But what was more interesting than scientific proof of Doctor's Ravin's thesis was how the granite walls of the hole looked like - they were smooth with no fractures, which made the climbing out impossible. It almost looked like the volcano erupted inside and somehow destroyed the pool, and dying shortly after.

Flare he threw earlier started to die down so he again put his backpack on the ground and opened it.

"Shit." He only had three more flares, and still didn't find any signs of the Shapeshifter. Although he was more than sure that somehow shifty is responsible for destruction of the pool, something they were trying to do for years, but also is capable of changing the Grimm.

Qrow took two more flares and tossed them to the opposing ends of the grotto, leaving the last flare for the worst case scenario. He briefly thought about turning into a crow and fly into the pit but he quickly discarded the thought - Creep fell inside and turned big and mad, he can't be sure that it won't affect him in some way.

When he picked his backpack, and layer of stones he put it on slide away, revealing something under it. He quickly picked up the flashlight and indeed, there was a shape imprinted into the granite.

He started to clear the layer of pebbles and debries, and when finished the task, his eyes widened in shock.

"No godsdamn way..." He said as he retrieved his scroll to take the picture.

The shape imprinted in the granite was a human feet.

---

"I assure you, these piano keys won't break even if you smash them with a hammer." He handed over set of piano keys to pair of Elderly with a bear on a leash. "Now your… bear can chase his dreams."

"See Stepan? I told you he will be able to do it!" Old lady said to the bear.

"Rawr." Stepan replied.

"Thank you, good sir!" The elder man took the piano keys and they left to pay for it.

"Strange humans." Sauron thought to himself as he waved to them as a farewell, but before he could welcome another guest, he noticed in the corner of his eye that Penny opened the door and is now approaching him.

"Ah, Penny, I am glad you are here!" He said. "I wanted to…"

"It is not a trolley problem." She stated, confusing Annatar a bit.

"Pardon?"

"You think that you can either destroy him or let him destroy you, but in reality, you have other solutions."

"Truly? Do tell."

"You could wait for the upcoming elections, and make sure he will lose." She said and Annatar rolled his eyes. "If he is not elected for another term, he won't be a problem anymore, and you have everything to make him lose his campaign."

"Problem is that the elections are in the next three months, and he is causing ruckus now." Sauron stated, but Penny didn't back down.

"You managed the situation right up this point without, you even called his actions 'a nuisance'"

"A costly nuisance."

"So now it's not about lives of seven people against ten thousand anymore, but life of seven people against money?" She asked, trying to imitate a risen eyebrow, and Annatar scoffed in response, but Penny continued. "You said you are not kind, and I see you weren't lying with that, but following your logic, the thing you want is to make people indebted to you. Wouldn't it be a better outcome for you, if you protected those ten thousand people against Governor's actions?"

"It's not about making people indebted to me, that's just a mean to achieve something much grander."

"Which is?" She tilted her head.

"To make the world Perfect." He replied. "Eventually, certainly not after ten, twenty or even thirty years, but I know that after enough time, I will make this place finally good. And since Lark decided to stand in my way, he must pushed aside in order to make it happen."

"How do you want to build a better world knowing that you ruined lives of others in order to achieve it?" She asked, and Sauron looked at her indifferently.

"Seven people in much grander scheme of things…"

"Every life matters." She interrupted him, much to his surprise at her sudden boldness. "No matter how small or old, you can't claim you want to make a better world by destroying people's lives because they annoy you. Because, can the world be truly perfect if the it doesn't care about the individual?"

"I will have to choose between sacrificing the few for the many." He snarled.

"There is always another option you can take, which does not involve putting others in a harm's way." Penny remarked with confidence. "Just like in this case. You have a good way out of this, but you chose to destroy him because it is easier for you."

Sauron frowned in utter disbelief. "Did you just call me a hypocrite?"

"All I'm saying if now you are deliberately choosing something wrong because it is convenient, then how you can be sure that you won't abandon your goal because it will be undemanding?"

Sauron blinked few times, lacking words to respond. Did she just… pointed that there is a flaw in his logic? No, his logic is without flaws, he just need to think about it more.

If it was any other being in the universe, he would discard their opinion and don't trouble himself any longer, but if he truly tries to consider her a friend, then he should at least take her stand on things into consideration, right?

Of course, in his eyes Penny Polendina is still naïve, but he can't deny that she has a point here. He looked into her eyes and behind them, he saw determination like never before from her. She even tries to mimic his way of speaking! She clearly prepared for this discussion.

And she… won? Much to his pride's dismay, it appeared so, because if he continue this argument, he will gain little and potentially lose everything.

Suddenly, cost of destroying Lark now increased exponentially, for if he push it further, he will prematurely end this 'friendship experiment' with Penny Polendina, just when it started to get fascinating.

His pride battled against his conscious, demanding that he kept going with this discussion to prove her wrong, but his mind quickly calculated the risk and the reward. And it wasn't worth it anymore.

"Listen." Sauron said after a while. "Removing that man from power is the right thing to do…" She kept staring at him, awaiting the famous 'but'. "…However, what you said has some merit to it."

He watched with astonishment how this determined look in her eyes turns back to the one she had when they first met, more innocent. "So, you won't do it?"

"Indeed." Annatar left a sigh, and for the first time in many years, admitted defeat. "But remember, if Lark stops being a nuisance and starts being an actual threat, then I won't hesitate."

A compromise both can agree to, and from Penny's widening smile, Sauron deduced exactly that

"Now, to…" He wanted to say, but much to his shock, Penny hugged him tightly. He subconsciously noted that she is way stronger than she appears to. "What are you doing?" He asked, trying to understand for what purpose she has done it. He held his hands high, not sure how to answer this unknown, strange, and yet intriguing, gesture.

"I knew you are not a bad person." She said with great relief, happy that she was able to stop her friend from making a terrible mistake.

And Mairon chuckled in response. "I'm glad you think that." He replied with a smile. "I'm really glad."

---

"Alright, one two THREE!" Jaune run fast as the wind on top of the CCTS tower, somehow overcoming the gravity while running up the wall. And when he found himself on top, he sat there and started to laugh with joy.

"This is great!" He said as he watched the city looming in the distance. "It's like a dream!"

When he run a full circle around Beacon in less than a minute, he decided to continue this test drive and check how high he can jump, and it turned out he could jump between the Academy's cafeteria and the Headmaster tower without issue. This prompted him to push this test further and further. And he still feel like didn't reach the limit yet.

He pinched the skin on his left hand to really check if it is not a dream and much to his joy, it was a reality.

"I'm not a burden!" He thought and rose up on his feet. "I am not a burden!" He yelled into the air, but he was too high for anyone to actually hear him.

He again sat down and looked at the ring on his finger.

His Ring.

"If the other ring is as good as you, then…" He said, but then, his words clogged in his mouth. "Why do I want another ring?" He thought "This one does everything I wanted to, smith's warnings were an exaggeration. I don't need another one."

"I promised I will bring you back." He said. "And Arc always keeps his promise."

"But I didn't promise anything! He told me to come back after a week, and I didn't agree or disagree. I have no obligation to him!"

Before he could think about it, he heard a familiar voice from afar calling his name.

"Pyrrha?" He approached the edge of the tower and searched for her. And he final noticed her in the distance, quickly approaching the Academy's park, And he also noticed Ren and Nora already there, searching for him.

He reached for his scroll to call them, only to realize now he lost it.

"What do I do? I won't reach them in time!" Part of his mind wanted to panic, but he remained calm, for fear couldn't take hold in him. And he quickly came up with the swiftest solution.

He jumped into the air, in history. And he started to fall directly behind one of the pillars in the park.

In normal circumstances, the landing would be more than a messy affair, but somehow, he landed even without a sound of impact, and then he peeked from behind the pillar, just in time to see Ren picking up his scroll from the ground.

"I have a bad feeling about this." He shared a worried look with Nora.

"Maybe he just dropped it by accident? It happened to me once or twice."

"Four times." Ren pointed out and Nora just rolled her eyes. "But Jaune never dropped his scroll before."

Jaune looked at the ring and thought about showing it to them, but he brushed it off. If he told them that he uses a ring to boost himself, they will look down on him for sure. They are strong because they trained whole their lives to be like this while he decided to take a shortcut, like a cheater.

He is a cheater, but they don't have to know that.

He looked from behind the pillar at them, then at the rapidly approaching Pyrrha. If he just come behind the pillar, it will look suspicious. He looked at the ring on his finger. Now, he needs to make little show.

Without a sound, he run to the path leading to the dorms.

"There is always the first time." Nora said. "But then, maybe he went to our dorm?"

"Ren, Nora!" Pyrrha run to them. "Did you find something?"

"We found his scroll, but we don't know where he went." Ren answered and Pyrrha grew increasingly worried. She run to Ren and looked at the scroll, slightly damaged from hitting the ground, and small cracks on the device made her more anxious. What if he is going to do something horrible to himself?

"We will find him, don't worry." Ren tried to calm her.

"Find who!?" All three turned to see Jaune running towards them from the dorms, huffing and puffing. "Sorry, I decided to walk back to our dorm before I realized I lost my scroll!"

"Jaune!" Pyrrha said with great relief upon seeing him " I heard what happened at the gym…"

"Pffft, that? I don't know why I even listened to him." He waved his left hand dismissively while retrieving his right hand from the pocket, and gave them all a wide, happy smile. For them, he seemed to radiate with positive energy.

"Wow, you seem like a new man." Nora noted, and Jaune started to rub her head.

"That's thanks to you Nora!" He replied, and then looked at Ren. "And you too Ren."

"I'm glad?" Ren replied, slightly taken aback by Jaune's behavior, while Arc looked at Pyrrha.

"How was the call with your parents Pyrrha? Everything good?"

"Ye-yeah." She confirmed, being as confused as Ren. She had never seen Jaune being this happy since the team formation, and his joyful smile made her heart slightly melt. "Nothing unusual."

"That's great!" He took both Nora and Ren under his arms. "Let's head back to our dorm, after all, we still have to beat Nora in the Grimm attack, right Ren?"

"In your dreams!" Nora replied instead and they started to walk back to their dorm now in a better mood.

Although at first worried, Pyrrha now put her doubts aside. It seems that after all, Nora's method actually worked.

She was a little sad that she didn't ask him out or trained together, but seeing him in better emotional state ceased all her concerns.

"Pyrrha, are you coming?" Jaune yelled to her.

"Coming!" She quickly joined them, and now team JNPR headed towards their dorm, followed by five shadows.

The horned shadow looked after the ring bearer with annoyance. It seemed that in case of this second-born, it has to be more subtle. It gnarled at that very idea, it very much preferred to force them into submission. But, much to the shadow's dismay, Jaune Arc proved to be a surprisingly resilient creature.

It looked after the laughing team JNPR and grinned. If it can't break walls of his mind, then he has to find chink in them.

---

*Optimus prime

**Unless you are a main hero of the horror story. Then you jump head first.

***For every girl in Beacon? Indeed. Maybe except Ruby, because she is not that experienced. But for every guy in Beacon? Not so sure. You would be surprised how dense an ordinary male can be. And Jaune Arc is certainly not an exception in fact, he is the embodiment of that.

Authors note

Whaaat, Upload in the middle of the week? Yeah, unusual circumstances call for unusual measures.

To put it simply, I would be unable to upload it this weekend, and since I have finished it, I decided to make an exception. And as you can see, those chapters are getting increasingly longer.

To be honest, even I am suprised how much words it took me to finally done it. But in order to push the story forward, I have to sweat a little, right?

As you saw, during this chapter I allowed myself a creative freedom and added refrences to the Great War. Canoniclly, we only know that this conflict took eighty years before the series, lasted ten years, there were some battles and the final battle in Vacuo brought an end to the war, and after that, the four kingdoms signed the peace treaty on the neutral island. In my personal opinion, conflict of such magnitutude would still impact the Kingdoms culture and politics to this day not to mention all those battlefields overrun with Grimm of every kind and size. So I have decided to add a little more to it.

This section of authors note is specifically targeted towards people who watched Code Lyoko:

Hello fellow caveman! Yes, I included few characters from Code Lyoko as a side characters, with the intention of eventually showing the whole gang.
Why? For one, because I still like the show and wanted to include this guys and gals. In fact, I initially wanted to write Code Lyoko fanfiction, but I scrapped the idea for now.

The second reason is more pragmatic - I wanted to show that there are other second year students in Beacon aside from Team CFVY, and since Team Lyoko matches the aestathics, then why not include them?

I think that's enough of my personal thoughts. Time for the reviews reply!

And I will be honest with you, I am really glad that this story recieved such positive reception so far! Thank you very much!

In response toAnnartlan Reach:

Nice!

In response to Dhestrya

Nice

In response to Zegaman:

I'm not sure how to react so... Thank you? But in reality, thanks for the compliment!

In response to Steelrain66:

Thank you, and working on it.

In response to Ltbutterfly287

By definition, you are right - Sauron wasn't twisted like Balrogs. But I have to have some way to refer to his nature, and to differante him from other maia's, such as Gandalf. For me personally, Balrogs should be refered to as "Corrupted maia's", while Sauron is a fallen maia, like Morgoth is a fallen Valar.

Sauron fell not because he was twisted, but because he put his own goals and ambitions above Eru's.

Of course, I am still a human, so I will probably make misatkes like accidentaly refering to Balrogs as the fallen maia's, or to Sauron as a corrupted maia. But I will do my best to avoid this kind of mistakes.

Thanks for your review.

In response toImagineFoxy

Kinda? As those authors in MCU, I want to explore some ideas. So, thank you

In response to guest number 1 (Who responded to Szymano):

I understand your opinion, and I somewhat agree with it, but not entirely.

Not everyone is capable of writing a good story from a get go, but they want to write something they like. I just hope that these "first grade level writing fics" as you called them, are just the beginning of the writer's journey.

When I was first writing a story, it was cringy at best.

But oficially, "Use Mayo as a hair conditioner" became my new favourite insult.

In response to Guest Number 2

As you can see, I updated this story, so no worries, it is ongoing.

As for spreading word about Sauron's powers... yeah, that's exactly the point of the story. To show Sauron as a character, not a mere plot tool.

In response to RedHood1:

Thank you for kind words good sir!

The funny thing is, Sauron IS hiding his true power, right now he dsipalys abilities which he doesn't even consider magic! for humans, it is magic, but for him it's just skill.

He is not lying with this "Masterfully Crafted" trademark.

As for interactions with the others...

Might be sooner than you think.

On the day of 5 may 2024, Bernard Hill, the actor playing a role of the King Theoden, passed away. Rest in Peace, you will be always remembered as a valiant King, and a Great actor.

That's all from me for today, Have a nice week and see you later!

DJ.