203Red like Roses
Disclaimer: I do not own RWBY, Kingdom Hearts, or the characters associated with them as they are the property of Monty Oum, Rooster Teeth, Tetsuya Nomura, and Square Enix in respect to who they are associated with.
"Talking"
Thoughts
Ch. 15
Ozpin watched the screen with interest as the tournament was in full swing. So far team RWBY has been performing exactly as he expected.
They have won their matches with little difficulty. Yet they were taking care to limit their power as not to go overboard.
Seeing their performance, he couldn't help but feel nostalgic as he remembered when humanity use to have magic. But shaking his head, there was no point in dwelling on the past as he needed to focus on the here and now. Shifting his attention, there on his desk was the necklace that contained the power of the Fall maiden.
Whoever wore it next would not only inherit the power but the responsibility that came with it.
A responsibility that has lasted for centuries with the safeguarding of the relics.
For the several lifetimes he had lived, there have been far too many close calls with cataclysmic to possible extinction level events. As powerful as the relics were only equaled their danger. With his promise to the gods of light and darkness, should the relics ever be reassembled they will be summoned. As per his deal with them, it would not end well for life here on Remnant if they were displeased with what they saw.
For the centuries long battle he had with Salem, he was in a considerable disadvantage. If anything in a very pessimistic view, the war was already lost as all he was doing was delaying the inevitable.
But if there was even one spark of hope for the future it was possible to discover it if given more time. Thus time he could buy this world so long as he could keep the relics separated and away from Salem's reach. Hence the purpose of the maidens of not only acting as the relics guardians but also as their lock and key.
However he was not blind to the current world's situation as Salem was making her move against him as he was steadily losing ground.
Yet looking back at the screen, perhaps he could allow himself to feel hope again as team RWBY might be what Remnant needs right now.
But then it now begged the question, what to do with the Fall maiden's power? Should he simply lock it away or entrust it to another? Both had it's pros and cons. He just needed to decide which idea seemed better in the long run. If he locked away the power then he could buy this world all the time it needed. However he couldn't deny the relics necessity in the event of their darkest hour.
On a separate computer screen, he had a list of potential candidates to become the Fall maiden. Depending on the candidate, he would have to choose very carefully or else another situation like Amber may occur again.
But for the time being, he took the elevator down as he placed the necklace away in the vault when he was ready to make that decision.
As Ozpin returned to his other work, he failed to notice just how far Salem's forces had infiltrated. For her agents were already in Beacon academy and had eyes and ears on everything that was happening there. Including information he had stored on his private server. An easy task for an agent who knew the system inside and out.
At the simple push of a button, all of Beacon would fall into chaos as all the pieces were still in place for Salem's agents to take what they came for.
Disruption of communication.
Reduction of security protocols.
Overriding Atlas robots.
The thinning supply chain of dust.
White Fang rallying their forces when the time comes.
Grimm gathering around the outskirts.
And the final piece in reacquiring the Fall Maiden's power to gain access to the vault where the relic was contained.
The fuse was ready. They just needed to light the match when the time came.
~ Beacon academy ~
But for everyone else, this was just a festival for laughs and memories to be cherished.
The first rounds of the tournament has been completed as things were now ready to progress to the second round with two versus two.
Each team needed to consider very carefully who would participate based on skill and synergy. Furthermore, one of the two if they won would go on to participate in the final third round in a one versus one bout. If they were to reach that far they would bring great honor and pride for their achievement.
For team RWBY, they planned to go all the way.
However they needed to consider carefully who would represent them.
Yang was easily the powerhouse of the group who excelled at excellent offensive and defensive ability.
Blake was a trickster as her abilities allowed her to adapt to any situation as it continued to evolve.
Weiss use of magic made her both Yang's equal and opposite with her large and growing repertoire of spells at her finger tips.
Ruby having her keyblade the longest along with the inherited legacy made her the most experienced and balanced on the team.
Having trained together, they knew each others strengths and weaknesses and how to best optimize for the greatest results.
As great as overwhelming fire power was, adaptation was a better trait as the other teams might possess semblances they had not seen yet.
Much to the chagrin of Yang and Weiss who wanted to show off some more, ultimately it was the better strategy for Ruby and Blake to take the lead in the event of an unforeseen situation.
Facing them in the second round would be team FNKI as Flynt and Neon would be representing them.
"You better take first place!" huffed Weiss. "I won't let us tolerate anything else but the best!"
"That's a funny way to say good luck" Yang chuckled as Weiss turned red in embarrassment. Then turning back to Blake and Ruby as she placed her hands on their shoulders. "Blow them away out there" as she then looked to her little sister. "Don't be afraid to go all out. Opportunities like these don't happen everyday you know".
"I won't let you down" Ruby smiled as Blake gave a simple nod. The field they would be fighting on would encompass for different biomes from a lava landscape to a war torn ruins. Depending on strategy it could be anyone's game. But looking around, "any idea what we might be in for?"
"They are Atlas students" Blake answered as a matter of fact. "According to Weiss, we should expect well dressed, highly disciplined, and well choreographed opponents". But contrary to what they were expecting, they got almost quite the opposite. Flynt and Neon were dressed rather loose and colorfully. Before the match had a chance to start, they were already smack talking them.
"How does it feel to be teammates with a Schnee?" Flynt questioned. "Got to be a pain in the rear needing to deal with her as vanity runs in the family".
"Why bother mincing words with them?" Neon questioned as she continued to roll around on her skates. "And I thought this was supposed to be an official match. Not baby sitting for some kid barely out of her diapers".
Now whether or not this was actual smack talk or them playing mind games, Ruby and Blake just looked at each other and shrugged. They were just words after all and they didn't care to play along. For little red, she was a little too pure for that and would probably mess up trying. For her fanus teammate, far too reserved to bother.
Once the green light was lit, team FNKI made the first move as their opening was a surprise attack followed by separating them as they were confident in their skills to take them on their own. Blowing his trumpet created a blast of sound propelling his teammate forward in a burst of speed.
However Blake and Ruby were already a step ahead. Courtesy of Fox's telepathy semblance, they were able to read their actions as they were planning accordingly.
"I'll take on Neon and . . . ."
"Nah, I got her" Ruby quipped in.
"You sure?"
"Well we'll see how this plays out. Otherwise I don't get many chances to have someone to skate with".
Blake internally chuckled at this. "Alright, let's see how this goes".
Thus they gave them what they wanted with a one on one match as Blake went after Flynt while Ruby chased after Neon.
"You're going to have to be a lot faster if you plan to catch me!" Neon trolled trying to provoke her opponent.
Ruby then gave a small grin as Crescent Rose form changed into roller blades as she gave chase after her.
"What the?!" as the colorful fanus had no idea how she did that as now the chase was on. Choosing the proper terrain, their duel would take place in the ruins biome with plenty of cover and places to maneuver.
Skating and jumping from different floors, little red kept pace with her. Closing the distance between them, Ruby moved alongside her matching her speed. Now neck and neck, she briefly looked to her giving a wink and smile.
To say the least Neon was surprised someone was able to keep up with her let alone this kid. But instead of unease, she felt elation as she now had someone to play with as she responded back with a wide smile. "Looks like this might be fun after all"
Racing next to each other, Neon left behind a rainbow light as Ruby with her signature red.
However this wasn't a race. This was a fight.
Taking out her nunchuks, she made the first pass.
Exchanging spots, Ruby ducked under the attack as she saw shards of ice form from where Neon hit. Chuckling while whipping her head she added two pistols to her hands as she began her counter attack shooting out fire bullets.
Noticing the weapons, Neon increased her speed taking cover behind some walls as the barrage followed right behind her. Preparing her own counter, she created ice road blocks to slow down her opponents pursuit.
Meanwhile Flynt may have bitten off more then he could chew. He figured he would have won through attrition by wearing down his opponent with his semblance making it four on one while maintaining his distance.
However Blake was only being careful gauging the situation before committing anymore then she should. The basic strategy was to make him reveal more of his hand and go from there. Thus she increased the pressure as it was raining shurikens and kunais. All of them created from her shadow semblance as they were disposable weapons.
Though Flynt was able to knock most of them down with his sound based attacks. Some were still getting through as his aura was taking damage. At this rate he was going to lose if he didn't take decisive action. He couldn't exactly pinpoint where his opponent was as projectiles were coming at him from all angles.
Thus if he couldn't find her, he'd just flush her out. So creating his duplicates and combining their attacks, Flynt leveled the area forcing Blake to come out from her hiding spot.
Though he thought once he got her out in the open it would be an easy win, it would not be so simple. Attacking her at max volume, he was certain he had dealt her critical damage only to see her dissolve into black mist. Stunned for a moment, he saw her running at him from the corner of his eye. Quickly turning to attack only yielded the same result for this one to disappear and another come running in.
"You didn't think it would be that easy did you?" Blake asked playfully as her shadow soon stretched a circle around Flynt as several copies of her spawned up from it.
"Clever girl" as cold sweat ran down his face. Reforming his quartet, they went back to back blasting any shadow clone that came running at them.
"Oh come on! That is not fair!" Neon shouted as Ruby was pulling out more tricks then she knew how to deal with. Little red was steadily increasing the difficulty of this fight from altering the terrain to increasing her fire power. Thus it forced Neon to constantly think on her feet as she didn't have the time to slow down.
But for Ruby, it was just like playing a game of tag. Of course she wasn't doing any of this out of maliciousness or disrespect for her opponent. Rather, it was also to test herself. By exposing herself to different kinds of opponents it allowed her to grow developing new strategies and skill sets which would ultimately lead you to becoming a greater warrior. Having gained enough experience in high speed mobile combat, she wanted to switch things up a bit by playing defensive.
Finding herself cornered and immobile, Neon clenched bracing herself for the hit she was about to take.
Yet contrary to what she thought, Ruby smiled as she gently tapped her on the forehead. "You're it".
". . . . What?" as Neon was dumbfounded at the abruptness of it all.
"You're it" little red answered.
"What the hell?!" as she was getting a little annoyed by her demeanor. "This is supposed to be a serious match! Are you making fun of me?!"
Seeing an opportunity to troll her back from earlier, "are you making fun of me?" Ruby mockingly repeated which irked Neon. "If you're going to do something you better do it soon. Time is running short and your aura is significantly less then mine". With her back faced to the ledge, "catch me if you can" as she dropped off to the floors below.
"Why that little!" Neon growled as their roles had been reversed.
Elsewhere, Flynt was burning through his stamina to maintain his semblance while fighting off the army of clones that were running at him. "How is she able to keep this up?! What is her secret?!" With the way she was using her semblance, she should have already been drained by now. Yet here she was still going strong. With how preoccupied he was, he had no time to find where the main body was.
But in truth during the course of this entire match, Blake had not actually been fighting or rather her main body hasn't. The moment her opponent lost sight of her was when she created a shadow clone as said entity was the one Flynt has been seeing all this time.
Perhaps she was being overly cautious. Although her keyblade made her quite powerful, arrogant thinking like that was what could get you into a lot of trouble in the long run.
How she was able to maintain her clone army was rather simple. The answer was substance. These clones were just very impressive illusions as Flynt was blasting things that were akin to empty space. Due to the lack of substance it didn't put much drain on her magic as she could keep this up for quite a while. Thus she was forcing her opponent to waste a significant amount of his time and energy practically fighting air.
Speaking of air, it was time to end this. Summoning Gambol Shroud, Blake pointed her key up as she drew a circle. Soon a torrent of wind started to form as it spun faster with each passing moment.
Although the audience and commentators could see the phenomenon forming, Flynt was too distracted to notice it. However once it's shadow eclipsed him, it was far too late for him to do anything about it.
"Aerora" the cat fanus softly chanted as a twister had shot down dead center within Flynt's killer quartet formation. Sucked up into it's current, he was like a leaf to the wind. Completely at it's mercy as the Atlas student and his clones were on the worse ride ever. Upon being slammed into each other, they became one person again as Blake canceled her spell causing her foe to fly off hitting the ground below as he just rolled to a stop.
". . . . Ugh, what the hell" as Flynt was still rattled from the attack. However the match was still ongoing. Though he was still wobbly on his feet, he forced himself to stand as he looked around. "Where is she?" as his eyes carefully surveyed the area.
"Right here" Blake whispered next to his ear as she was right behind him. Forming a shadow dagger in her hand, she gave him a good stab on the side depleting the last of his aura removing him from the battle.
Sitting in a window opening, Ruby had just watched her teammate finish things on her end. Giving a wide smile, she was happy for her.
"Whatever you're doing, make it stop!" Neon shouted as random events just kept on happening to her.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Where are my manners". Sensing Blake's magic, she wanted to watch the last moments of her match. So she equipped her uncle's keychain to her key and let probability take care of things from there.
Being in a dilapidated building on roller skates, Neon just couldn't catch a break with how much bad luck kept stacking up. Raining debris, uneven ground, lots of ground hazards, and whatever random thing decided to happen next.
Sending her key away, Ruby ended the effects of her uncle's semblance. But it didn't change the current situation as the colorful kitty was completely stuck. But irregardless, it didn't matter as time had run out. The results spoke for itself with team RWBY's victory. Walking up to her, Ruby extended her hand while giving her a calm smile. "Thanks for the fun match. I learned a lot from it. If it's alright with you, I'd love to go skating again some time".
Although slightly frustrated, Neon couldn't help but chuckle which soon grew into a hearty laugh. "Sure, I'd love that. I know a few awesome places which ought to be fun!"
"Cool!"
"You sure are tough as nails" as Flynt patted himself off. "Gotta be with a Schnee on your team".
"She's a little rough around the edges" Blake answered honestly. "But her heart is always in the right place when it matters. Just needs a little more thawing is all".
It was no secret concerning the controversy surrounding the Schnee company with it's bad business practices. Even his own personal history which left a bitter after taste. But if these words were coming directly from a fanus, that was worth something. Scoffing to himself, "fair enough. I dig it" as he was hasty in judging her without knowing her.
With the match finished, Ruby and Blake returned to their teammates and friends to be met with praise and applause.
Yet the day was from over as the matches continued.
Team JNPR and team SSSN made it through without issue.
Penny's team was quite something as the mysterious and awkwardly friendly girl packed a hell of a punch.
Being a part of school spirit, they were rooting for team CFVY to win. Yet it would not come to be as Mercury and Emerald were just far too skilled and over took them.
With matches concluded for the second round, the finale was ready to take place to decide a winner takes all to see which school was truly the best.
~ Beacon Academy ~ (late night)
As folks were calming down from the festivities, contestants in the tournament were taking their well deserved rest as tomorrow was the finals.
Some were already out like a light.
Others were planning their strategy.
A few were checking their equipment to make sure nothing was amiss.
But gathered in a room were Salem's agents as they discussed the events to come.
"So the big show is happening tomorrow huh?" said Mercury as he gave a half-hearted shrug. "Sucks I got to take a fall though".
"What does it matter?" as Emerald looked to him. "All you have to do is make it look good".
Neo continued to smile as her teammates continued to bicker.
"All the pieces are in place" said Cinder. Aside from a few hiccups here and there, the objective was still within reach. They just needed one big burst of negative emotion and that would be enough to get things started as grimm would start flooding into Vale. Although on duty hunters and huntresses can stop the initial wave if they respond to it fast enough, they were going to be too busy dealing with the hijacked Atlas robots and White Fang cells to mount a proper counter attack. Once things start getting bad enough, Vale will completely fall to the grimm. It was quite the vicious cycle once it starts snow balling.
The casualties will be incalculable. Yet it hardly mattered considering the prize that awaited them.
Although this was not part of their orders, this was something personal she wanted to handle. Just remembering the defeat Ruby gave her made her absolutely livid. Equally so, how dare the keyblade deem her unworthy! After everything she's done! After everything she's been through! How was she not worthy of that power!
But she would not suffer a defeat to her. Not a second time. Once she attained the full power of the maiden then she would then be more then a match to crush that undeserving child. Perhaps then the keyblade will see it chose poorly in who it served.
A grin then etched on her cold face as Cinder was ecstatic. "Tomorrow . . . . Tomorrow I will take back what you took from me. You will learn to regret crossing me Ruby Rose".
To be continued . . . .
Author's notes: Sorry, I know it's been about a year since the last update. But I've been biding my time as I ended up stepping into a pitfall a lot of fanfic writers find themselves in when the canon material does something that makes your story take a curve ball. However it's not beyond saving as it just needs a few adjustments to make sense of the lore. Anyways from this point is where I'll start completely deviating away from the canon series. Not to mention they are now making an anime. From what I hear, the story will be very different which will make a few course corrections that should supposedly improve the canon story. The only thing I'm worried about is stepping on anymore unforeseen landmines. But hopefully no retcons will be needed. Now onto some commentary.
This is one of those landmines I was talking about. According to the lore, the four season maidens who were sisters were gifted magic by an old recluse after helping him. Now we know in their history that something like this happened as the old recluse was definitely Ozma. Probably when he was still grieving after breaking up with Salem and the loss of their four daughters. Now here is the landmine. The only person who knows the real history behind this tale is Ozma and due to his very long life only telling half truths as he's never quite sure who to trust as noted by the canon story so far. There have been a few interesting theories. But nothing concrete as I don't want to over invest if it's not actually the case. Let's say we take the story at face value, it then makes we wonder why he didn't put any fail safes in place in the event of someone like Cinder coming along as that puts the relics and all of life in danger. If it was really his magic to begin with, why doesn't he just take it back? This then lends to the possible theory that the four sisters might have some connection to his four daughters all those years ago. But who knows till Ozma gives us the straight facts.
Based on the teams stats, their roles still pretty much apply in a classic RPG format. Ruby is the all rounder, Weiss is the mage, Blake is the ranger/scout, and Yang is the tank. In a fight in which you don't know what you're up against, the all rounder or the ranger/scout is generally the better idea to send in. Plus as I said, I'm moving away from canon events as the only thing I want to be certain about is the lore and why they are they way they are.
Salem's plan is still in play as they have been successful in increasing tension in Vale. However their plans will not go accordingly as they will have to improvise what comes next as team RWBY will be there to stop them this time. But since Ozma had a trick up his sleeve in protecting the relic at his vault, I won't go anywhere near that till more of itis revealed as well as the rules behind that relic.
If there are any questions or concerns feel free to ask as I will try to answer them.
So thank you for reading as I further extend my gratitude if you can review as well.