5,083The spark of magic crackled as Salem broke off the connection she had with the Grimm Shadow and focused her full attention on Ozpin. Archer had used the Grimm Shadow long enough to have an in-depth understanding of its mechanics, and she trusted his competence to the point that she felt that she didn't need to supervise him.
The two were collaborators, not subordinates of the other. That was the distinction.
With the entirety of her attention focused back on Ozpin, it wasn't long before there was a noticeable difference in their duel.
Bang!
Ozpin's brow twitched as fringes of his bangs were seared by a beam of magic energy he narrowly avoided.
Salem hovered under a platform of her magic while slowly pulling back the hand she'd used to aim an attack at Ozpin's head.
"I won't miss a second time, dear Ozma." Salem murmured with loathing.
Ozpin clicked his tongue and readjusted the grip he had on his sword. "Then work on your aim. We've had years to practice."
Salem sneered, but didn't rise to the jab as she noted Ozpin tensing his legs to narrow the distance between them.
She had always been the one better in the arts of sorcery and magic. Ozma had started a warrior, a gallant knight that had primarily used his magic to augment his sword and physical abilities.
Salem was the one who taught Ozma to be more adept in the arcane.
Memories flickered in both Salem and Ozpin's minds as they stood across from each other, knowing that they were the root of all problems Remnant faced to this date. It was their decisions and actions that had contributed to the misfortune of everyone.
And while Ozpin sought to rectify past mistakes, Salem wanted an end.
An end to this immortality, to this bastardization of the love and happy ending she'd always wanted, but was stripped of her.
She'd lived too long, grown too jaded, and most of all, she just couldn't let go of the past.
Salem balled her hands into fists.
She knew.
She knew it all along. The hatred within her, and the fury.
As much as she loathed Ozma for his past actions, much of that hate was also on herself. In her rage, she had killed both her husband and daughters without ever asking the reason for their betrayal.
The secrets and history both she and Ozma shared were many, as they were the closest to understanding the other's hardship, but one mistake between them led to another.
Ozma had already tried to tell her the reason of his betrayal, and if she were off sounder mind and reasoning, she may have been able to see and understand. Yet she couldn't.
Not when there was no longer any reason to listen.
Listening would not bring her daughters back.
"You haven't changed, Ozpin." Salem whispered, magic energy swelling around her in a manner that far outstripped her earlier output. "It was your mistake to divide your power by four. Even if you did it in their memory."
Ozpin hardened his resolve, knowing what was to come.
Raising his arm, he shielded his face from a torrent of buffeting wind as Salem condensed her magic energy around her. A thin film formed, hardening into a glass-like substance that constantly floated and revolved around her waist. Meanwhile, magic danced on the tips of her fingers, crackling and arcing like lightning.
With Vale as the battlefield, Salem and Ozpin's figure's blurred, creating a shockwave as they met in the center and rebuffed themselves further into the city.
Clang!
Ozpin erased the distance between himself and Salem in a single step. Aiming at Salem's neck, his sword drew a vertical arc as green Aura coated the blade.
However, Ozpin and Salem's expressions remained neutral as the rotating glass-like substance placed itself between Salem and Ozpin's sword.
"Tch," Ozpin clicked his tongue as sparks grated from the edge of his blade.
Lightning crackled as Salem pointed her palms towards Ozpin.
Reacting quickly, verdant light engulfed Ozpin's arms and formed a small wall of rock that blocked Salem's attack.
The impact however, blew Ozpin back, sending him crashing through numerous buildings and towering swords. His suit tore, bruises forming on his back despite his Aura tanking most of the damage.
Pupils dilating, Ozpin only had time to glance up before a wave of fire was engulfing the entire area around him.
Harnessing his magic and Aura, Ozpin swung his sword and cleaved a path through the flame. A blade of wind extended further up towards the source of the fire, and Salem side stepped, a cut opening on her cheek as a droplet of blood trickled down to her chin.
Ozpin steadied himself, his gaze glancing around him at the ruin Vale had become and the world of swords that now spanned across the horizon.
Grimm were flooding through the streets. Humans and Faunus alike were being slaughtered and eaten away in a darkness that crept from the shadows.
In the midst of it all, Ozpin's fight against Salem, and The Huntsman of Red's performance were the most eye-catching displays.
Ozpin could not lose here.
Not when that loss would be a direct blow to morale.
What was worse, was that Ozpin had lost sight of Summer and the others fighting against Cursed Arm who was arguably an equal or greater threat than Salem herself.
Cursed Arm was a new player on the board, and someone Ozpin was taking great caution towards.
"You are weak, Ozma," Salem sneered, floating down to Ozpin's level while assessing the small valley carved out into the area from Ozpin's wind blade. "The sword of the old you, was never this shallow."
"What I've lost in strength, I've gained in comrades and bonds," Ozpin straightened his posture, eyes gleaming with strength of will. "I do not stand alone in my pursuit to end things once and for all."
"To that, we agree," Salem mused with a faint nostalgia behind her marred features. "However, who you consider your comrades are merely pawns on a board. Why couldn't you have seen it that way from the start? Instead, you let them cloud your judgment- you let them convince you to drag our daughters to their deaths."
"…" Ozpin hardened his expression as old wounds still lingered in his soul.
"Vale will fall today, my Ozma." Salem said idly, watching the way Ozpin's lips twitched. "And you will get to see it first hand. The Gods have cursed us, and what I desire is the end."
"But that end is not one that coincides with mine. I'm sorry, Salem," Ozpin vanished and appeared next to Salem, sword aimed at her throat. "I will not let you get away with this!"
The automatic defensive spell Salem had invoked immediately intervened, but this time, the sharpness of Ozpin's strike cleaved through it.
Eyes widening, Salem raised her arm to block, and hissed as Ozpin's blade bit into her flesh and tore into her waist. It was only through a hasty spell that Salem resisted being cut down entirely. However, she didn't put much regard to the injury.
If death were so easy, immortality would not have been a curse.
At a visible rate, Salem's wounds healed. Rather than defend herself further, Salem was instead charging an attack spell aimed at Ozpin's head.
Light flashed before Ozpin's eyes before he went weightless, tumbling backwards until his back smashed into a broken building and killed his momentum.
Feeling his bones crack, Ozpin glanced up to stare at Salem as her body fully healed.
Just like back in the day, a feeling of helplessness assailed him. The only way to kill someone that doesn't die is to contain them, but that alone was not a solution that would last.
Shakily getting up onto his feet, Ozpin glanced in the direction of the Huntsman of Red and affirmed his resolve. If Ozpin had no way to win, that didn't mean his fellow Champion of Light would not have a means.
But what now?
Salem drew closer to Ozpin, her features twisting into a gloat as she pictured the next body Ozpin would inhabit after his current one's death. The man had grown pitifully weak in their shadow war.
The man she remembered, and the man she saw now were no longer comparable in strength. All that remained was the same will and fervor that had captivated her in her youth.
Ozma the Knight.
Her gallant hero.
The happy future she'd envisioned ended the first time Ozma died, and any hopes of bringing it all back also died when their daughters were killed.
This Remnant of a world and the new generation of humans and Faunus that inhabited it was one that no longer knew of the old ways.
What was there that was worth protecting anymore?
What was there that was worth saving?
The irony of the entire situation was that Salem never considered that the day she met Archer, was the day that someone would even dare consider trying to save her from her own darkness and hatred.
But that was what a hero was, someone who did what others could not.
One moment Salem was standing in place, ready to kill Ozpin and reset Ozpin's cycle of reincarnation, and in the next, she was rooted in place as a bizarrely curved ritual blade protruded through her chest from the back.
W-What?
Both Salem and Ozpin froze at the sudden shift in dynamic.
Craning her neck in the direction of the attacker, Salem widened her eyes as she stared at her own Grimm Shadow stabbing her through the chest.
In that case, it wasn't the Grimm Shadow's own doing, but…Archer's?
The last she could recall, she'd stopped paying attention to Archer's side of things when she'd stopped remotely controlling the Grimm Shadow.
Archer was now currently wearing it, and putting on a display with a bullet wound to the head and the Grimm Shadow shrouded around him.
This wasn't part of the plan.
More importantly, she groaned, a shrill cry escaping her mouth as the very foundations of her magic and the blessing of the God of Darkness grew twisted within her. It was as if they were being forcibly stripped from her, and returning her to her natural state before falling into a Grimm pool.
She coughed, black blood escaping her lips.
"It may not seem like it, but I'm filling my end of the bargain." Archer whispered, pulling out the ritual dagger and letting Salem stagger back, black Aura exuding off of her like a popped water balloon. "You're a smart woman, now leave the rest to me."
Salem opened her mouth to speak, but found her senses quickly slowing as her vision blurred black. The release of the black Aura contained within her was rising exponentially, the sudden decrease in strength taking its toll on her body.
"That's why you should have chosen your collaborators better, Salem," Ozpin murmured in the distance, his resolve hardening on his face.
Salem would heal.
She always did.
But something wasn't quite right in this instance.
The dynamic of Ozpin's expression quickly changed as a dramatic transformation underwent Salem's body.
Archer had severed the Grimm energy cursed onto Salem by the God of Darkness and was taking it upon himself.
More specifically, he was funneling that energy into the Grimm Shadow he had attached over him.
Salem had been right in one of her earlier conjectures pertaining to Archer.
Having adjusted to the Grimm Shadow, Archer understood its mechanics and quirks. It was a seamless Grimm that molded into the shape of its user. In that case, all he had to do was alter and morph it into something suitable.
As Archer funneled the dark energy severed from Salem through Rule Breaker, the amassed shadow began to change shape.
Meanwhile, color was bleeding back into Salem, revealing her original blond hair and fair complexion. It was a sight that utterly dazed Ozpin into speechlessness, followed by grim foreboding at the shape the shadow was taking.
As the blessing of the God of Darkness left Salem's body and reverted her to her original appearance and mortal stature, Archer morphed the Grimm shadow into Salem's former likeness as the Queen of Grimm.
"What…have you done?" Ozpin's voice cracked with uncertainty and confusion.
The Grimm Shadow had taken Salem's former Grimm form, creating a stark contrast between the original Salem, and the shadow over Archer.
There was no answer to Ozpin's question.
Rather, the Grimm Shadow raised a hand as if to kill the unconscious Salem.
Whether by instinct or memory, Ozpin intervened as he dashed forward and deflected the attack from the Grimm Shadow.
It gave Archer in the Grimm Queen's guise, all the time he needed to retreat towards his true target, leaving Ozpin alone with an unconscious Salem in his arms.
"Mmh, ugh?"
Ozpin stared down as Salem began to stir from beneath him, causing a sinking feeling in his stomach as he was still trying to connect the dots as to what had happened.
But his mind fell utterly blank in trepidation as he beheld the woman in his arms.
The blue of her eyes had never been so clear since the day he had first met her.
"What?" Salem rasped as she stared at Ozpin and took account of the current feeling in her body.
She was…mortal? No, more than that. The curse that had been plaguing her was broken.
No. Now wasn't the time to dwell on it.
Her current appearance, the lack of a curse, and everything that would point towards corruption, were gone.
She could be killed?
Mortal?
Given what she'd done, her wit told her that she couldn't trust Ozpin not to do anything towards her. There was only one way to curb Ozpin's actions, and Archer likely knew it before he pulled this off.
Salem shuddered, the feeling of being mortal again causing her to choke back a cry and hold back tears.
Ozpin flinched at Salem's moistened eyes.
Oh Ozma, you naive naïve knight.
The facts were on Salem's side, and the shaking of Ozpin's expression was the honey at the top of the cake.
Archer, that man…?
Salem was a quick-witted woman.
"…Where is this? W-Who are you?" She asked, watching Ozpin's expression fall. Low as it was, she wanted to see the face he'd make and how he'd treat her. "Where's Ozma? Where are my daughters?"
Ozpin's face, crumpled, his ability and reason to chase the Grimm Shadow and Archer hindered by this unexpected result.
However, the people chasing Archer weren't far.
Within the span of a blink of an eye, Qrow, Raven, Tai, and James passed by with panicked expressions.
Ruby strained her eyes as she stared down the scope of her weapon.
Smoke wafted up from burning fires, glowing orange in wake of ruined buildings toppled by Grimm and explosions. The degree of chaos was only spiraling further and further out of control.
Grimm were running through the streets, people were screaming and huddling together, and in the midst of it all, the Huntsman and Huntresses that had arrived to attend the Vytal Festival were fighting for their lives.
They were all rallying to where Jaune was deploying a barrier of white light that healed all within its vicinity.
Ruby swallowed, her tension causing her grip on the trigger of her gun to stiffen.
She had to believe in her friends, and that they were all alive in this hell.
"On your twelve."
Shirou warned, proving that even if he wasn't by her side, he was paying attention to her.
Ruby rounded her scope in the northern direction, aimed, and fired with a short 'roger.'
With the pulling of her trigger, the casing of a high-calibre round fell from the sky, a bullet flying at mach speed, penetrating into the head of a Nevermore.
"Watch the feathers, and hold tight," Shirou said. "I'll be right there."
"Right," Ruby muttered, wrapping her arms around herself to stop the trembling of her body.
Across from her, Cardin lay unmoving along with Cinder whose blood was starting to run cold.
"Cardin," Ruby whispered with mixed feelings.
The bully Cardin had always been, and the man he decided to be in the end were running in parallel. There was never such a case written in her future diary, meaning that both in the present and future, Ruby had never thought Cardin had it in him.
To be a hero…
"Cardin!" Ruby ran over, quickly coming to her senses.
By the time she reached her classmate, part of her could already tell what she would see.
Cardin's eyes were closed, his body sprawled and unmoving. His chest did not rise or fall, nor did he show signs of any movement.
Cinder's attack, the potent fire it contained within, it had pierced through Cardin's Aura and vaporized his insides.
It was a miracle in itself that Cardin's body was still in one piece.
By all accounts, Cardin was dead.
Ruby retched, feeling bile forming in her throat as the realization dawned on her that Cardin had died in order to save her and defeat Cinder. Still held in Cardin's hand was the magic artifact Archer had given Team CRDL for winning the class tournament all those weeks ago.
Ruby's steps slowed to a crawl just before she could reach Cardin, her stomach sinking as her complexion paled.
Everything she had seen and described were based on her observations, but the moment she reached him, she'd have to come to terms and verify that Cardin was truly dead.
That thought was daunting.
She didn't know what she would feel, but in the end, even that was denied to her.
A creeping Grimm shadow, one that Ruby was familiar with rose up from the ground and swallowed Cardin whole.
"Let him go!" Ruby screamed, her voice growing shrill as she fired into the darkness.
But like magic, her bullets seemed to be swept into a bottomless mire.
From that mire, the Grimm Shadow formed into a woman, a pale woman with long hair, deathly white skin, and red eyes.
"Salem." Ruby said, the hairs rising on the back of her neck.
SALEM, the name written with such loathing and fury that Ruby could feel her future self's hatred.
There was no way Ruby would fail to recognize the appearance of the one villain that was constantly at the root of all her future self's misery.
-And the fact that she was now standing before Salem on her own.
Ruby felt her breath hitch, her eyes darting back and forth for an escape, but finding none.
There was something about this 'Salem,' that was different from the one Ruby had seen from the moment the attack on Vale had started.
The feeling Ruby could get from this Salem now was stronger, purer in its feeling of darkness.
Why wouldn't it be?
After all, little did Ruby know; the person in front of her was Archer who had funneled the extracted blessing from the God of Darkness and condensed it into the Grimm Shadow that took the former Salem's guise.
Raising her weapon, Ruby felt beads of sweat form on her brow as Salem didn't even appear to be looking at her. No, Salem was looking beyond her at Shirou's rapidly approaching figure.
From all around Shirou, swords formed in a ring that constantly launched out at the Grimm around them, keeping them at bay until he descended directly in front of Ruby.
"Stay back," Shirou advised Ruby directly. "This isn't a battle you should involve yourself in with your current skill level."
"But-"
"No buts, Ruby," Shirou said, feigning tension as he flexed his muscles and made eye contact with Archer in Salem's guise.
Archer had pulled off his end of the plan seamlessly. Now it was Shirou's turn.
By deploying his inner world, Shirou had had an accurate grasp of all who were within it.
This included the Grimm which Shirou defeated before they could kill anyone for real. The most valuable player of the show had actually been the Grimm Shadow's aspect to swallow everyone quietly into a safe storage space made of Salem's magic.
Nonetheless, for all those not in the know, being swallowed by the Shadow was death.
Nodding at Ruby, Shirou urged her back.
Ruby was already tired and exhausted both mentally and physically.
Shirou felt guilty, but his actions were pushing Ruby to mature more quickly.
"No, I wont." Ruby did not listen to Shirou for the first time. "I'm fighting with you."
"Is that all?" Archer spoke in Salem's voice using the magic Salem had imbued into the Grimm Shadow.
Ruby clenched her jaw, feeling a chill at the emotionless tone of the voice.
"Ruby," Shirou hissed, but Ruby did not flinch.
Ruby would not leave.
When that fact solidified in both Shirou and Archer's minds, there was nothing left to be done but to continue.
Within the blink of an eye, Archer appeared in front of Ruby, hand ready to grasp her frail neck.
All Ruby could see was a blur, but in the next moment as Archer was about to grab her, Shirou pushed her aside and dodged. However, his forearm was grazed by Archer's finger tips.
The reaction was immediate.
Right before Ruby's eyes, the area that made contact with 'Salem's' touch blackened and crawled up Shirou's arm.
In truth, the sheer number of Grimm Shirou had been killing in his inner world was already amassing into an overwhelming amount of taint that was rubbing off on him.
That darkness converged into Shirou's body in the same way as it had done for every Grimm he'd killed prior.
The only difference now was that Shirou wasn't hiding it anymore, but was instead using it to his advantage.
For all intents and purposes, it looked like Shirou was getting corrupted.
"Tch," Shirou clicked his tongue and swiftly bound the area with his red mantle, a holy fabric known as the Shroud of Martin.
Shirou's left arm remained limp as he feigned immobility in the limb.
"Shirou!" Ruby's eyes widened in horror at the display.
Then Ruby froze as everything she'd read in the future diary came coming back to her.
The sudden change in her future self's demeanor as she grew more jaded and resentful of the woman known as 'Salem.'
She was the woman who would take Shirou away.
Ruby shivered, hairs rising on the back of her neck.
She backed away, one step, then two, as she looked at the darkness trying to corrupt Shirou, and the source of that darkness in 'Salem.'
"…R-Run," Ruby whispered, grabbing Shirou's hand.
They could do this another time. In a situation of their own making.
Vale could fall, people could get hurt, but all that combined with losing Shirou was something Ruby couldn't let happen.
Never.
The sight of seeing Shirou get corrupted by darkness had sapped away Ruby's determination and naive optimism, and replaced it with fear and caution.
The thought that she could really lose Shirou, and the reality of it sapped away at her current resolve.
There could always be next time, but there would be no next time if she lost Shirou here. At least, no way to achieve the ending she desired.
"What?" Shirou said before Ruby snapped.
"RUN AWAY!" Panick was quickly filling Ruby's mind.
After all, she already knew the result of this day.
Urging Shirou to leave, Ruby could not get her hero to budge, rather, he stared at her with growing resolve before shaking his head.
"We can't." Shirou said.
"Why?!" Ruby screamed.
"Because I do not have enough hands, and you'd hate yourself if we left now." Shirou loosened his muscles and got into a fighting stance.
For a second, Ruby could not process what Shirou was saying, but it soon became evident.
"Ruby!"
Voices, familiar ones that Ruby did not wish to hear at this time were calling out to her.
Ector, Jaune, Pyrrha, Blake, Emerald, Ren, Nora, and many others were running to join the fight not knowing who they were up against. Hell, Ruby even spotted traces of Neo and Roman assessing the situation from afar.
It was no wonder Shirou did not leave, for he didn't have enough arms to carry everyone to safety.
And Ruby could not abandon her friends to die.
Thanks for reading!
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