"Doesn't moss point north? Or wait, is it the other way around? Cold winds blow from there, so it points south?" Egrer walked a full circle around the oak tree. The moss was growing in roughly equal amounts on every single side. "Screw the moss, I need to find an anthill."
Two swings of his Needlestick, and a nice little 'X' mark adorned the tree, just in case he got lost. Which he absolutely would.
One of the many pearls of wisdom his adoptive dad had hammered into his head went like this: any big goal is made up of several smaller ones, and knocking them out one by one guarantees victory. But what are you supposed to do when one of those smaller goals presents an insurmountable roadblock?
Egrer had a terrible sense of direction in forests and hated them with every fiber of his being. There were no cafes with catchy neon signs, no high-rises, billboards, or kiosks. Navigating a place like this was practically impossible, at least for him. Just trees, and maybe the occasional stream. How the hell are you supposed to find the right path in this mess?
Every now and then, he climbed up a tall tree to scout the area. Since Egrer had no clue which way to actually go, he just kept walking away from the cliff they'd been dropped from. He was also howling while at it; from that height, a good chunk of the forest could definitely hear him. But so far, no one from his pack had tracked him down, let alone howled back.
After half an hour of non-stop wandering, he stumbled upon that exact same oak tree again. The little 'X' on the bark seemed to mock him.
"Fuck anthills, I need to use the sun to navigate. Why didn't I think of that in the first place?" It was morning, which meant the giant fireball was in the east. If he faced it, north would be to his left. Well, that was one less problem to worry about. Roadblock cleared, time to move on.
Out of the corner of his ear, Egrer caught a quiet growl. The second he stopped to listen and look around, it ceased entirely. As if the unknown stalker realized it had made too much noise. There were no predators in this forest besides Grimm, so Egrer activated his Needlestick and backed up against the nearest tree. Until he knew the exact number and location of his enemies, it was best not to leave his back exposed.
The growl echoed again; the disappointed Grimm clearly saw no more point in an ambush. There was a loud crack of branches, like a race car was tearing through them, and the beast leaped out of the bushes straight at Egrer. He combat-rolled to the side, and the Beowolf smashed headfirst into the tree with a sickening crunch. Before the monster could even recover, a gaping hole was punched straight through its neck. The twisted hybrid of a man and a wolf began to melt. Its black fur blew away in the wind like ash, the blood evaporated, and its bone mask and spikes crumbled. In about five minutes, there wouldn't be a trace of it left.
"Phew." Egrer had only fought Grimm a couple of times in his life; honestly, he'd barely even seen them properly. His last encounter was a few years ago, when he and his family were taking a flight between Vacuo and Atlas.
The bushes rustled again. If the former thief had actually gone to a Huntsman prep school, he would have known that Beowolves never travel alone. Several pairs of glowing red eyes stared at him from the shadows, slowly closing in.
Beating one was doable, but taking on this many at once... It was time to tap into his favela youth and pull off an epic, tactical retreat from superior enemy forces. Egrer had always done it this way, and the method had never failed him. Besides, his weapon wasn't particularly effective against Grimm; it was designed for fighting other Aura users.
Collapsing the Needlestick so it wouldn't get in the way, he unceremoniously hauled ass in what he hoped was north. "Hoped," because he didn't exactly have the luxury of time to peer through the foliage, locate the sun, and correct his course.
The pack of Beowolves launched into pursuit with triumphant roars, but they were sorely mistaken if they thought catching Egrer would be easy. He had been running his entire life, even before unlocking his Aura, and no one had ever managed to catch him yet. But Egrer had also underestimated the Grimm, writing them off as mindless monsters like any normal civilian would. Which is why he easily walked right into a trap.
Mid-jump over a fallen log, a Beowolf lurking underneath snatched his leg. Egrer yelled in surprise, but didn't lose his cool, instantly kicking the beast in the snout with his free foot. The bone mask didn't even crack, but the hit pissed the Grimm off—its grip tightened painfully. It hoisted Egrer upside down and slammed him into the dirt with all its might.
By letting go of its prey, the Grimm made a terrible mistake. The prey immediately started running again.
"Loser!" he yelled, leaping over a ditch, deliberately choosing the most difficult path possible. Egrer was an agile, high-energy parkour pro who could climb over anything, which would severely slow down the bulky Beowolves.
The forest blurred into an incomprehensible brownish-green streak. Poplars, oaks, and whatever other trees were there flashed by for a fraction of a second, while ravines and streams zipped past under his feet. But the Grimm were catching up. They managed to corner Egrer two more times, and with every passing minute, his genius plan felt decidedly less genius. As always, the Dark God is in the details—he completely forgot that Grimm don't experience fatigue. They don't sleep, don't eat, don't bask in the sun; they just kill every human and Faunus that catches their eye. Perfect killing machines.
Which meant Egrer would eventually just run out of gas and fail to lose them. He needed a Plan B.
The moment he leaped up into a tree, the base was swarmed by a pack of Beowolves within seconds. They growled, shoved each other, and tried to jump higher, but Egrer just chuckled at their futile attempts to gnaw through the massive trunk of the century-old oak.
"Alright. Objective: reach the abandoned temple. Problem: a dozen Beowolves. Solution? Answer: kill them all. Method: ...how exactly?"
His Needlestick could turn into a Needle-shooter with the press of a single button, but it only held two rounds, after which he'd be left holding a useless handle. So that was a no-go. Besides, Egrer was a terrible shot; hitting things in melee combat was way easier.
One particularly stubborn Grimm bear-hugged the tree and started clumsily shimmying its way up. When it climbed high enough, it took a needle straight to the eye and tumbled down onto its buddies. They roared; clearly, they didn't appreciate that.
"Problem update: nine Beowolves. Should I just wait?" The Grimm weren't idiots; they learned from the mistakes of their less fortunate brethren, and none of them tried to climb up that stupidly again. So Egrer climbed down a few branches himself, but he couldn't land a hit on any weak spots. Trying to brute-force a needle through bone masks with this specific weapon from such an awkward angle was a tall order.
Only one option left: hope for backup. Scrambling to the very top of the oak, Egrer let out the loudest howl he could muster.
The Beowolves down below instantly echoed his call.
"Bring it on, bring it on!" he shouted down. "Hasten your own demise, you morons! Awoooooooo!"
"AWOOOOOOO!"
If Illmond showed up, he'd slice them into ribbons single-handedly. If Magenta arrived, the forest would be filled with the sweet scent of burning fur. And if Jaune happened to drop by... well, together they'd figure something out. He just needed to wait.
Hold up... if the Beowolves can howl too, the whole plan is shot! They'll just confuse everyone!
"Why does every single plan of mine always crash and burn!?"
***
"Not here," Illmond said, slicing off a Beowolf's head with a razor-thin wire. A couple of other Grimm were already dissolving into the air behind him.
He was trekking from one source of howling to the next, but he still hadn't stumbled upon his friends. A couple of times he even saved other students, but Illmond made sure to do it from the shadows so the rescued kids never saw him. He felt like a comic book hero—an invisible shadow slicing Grimm left and right, never speaking a word, never accepting gratitude. The thought amused him.
"And not here either," he repeated after a few more minutes of searching. "Eg, you are so typical..."
***
Jaune was dangling from a tree. Sure, it was vastly preferable to pancaking against the ground or getting impaled on a branch, but it still sucked. Time was ticking; it felt like he'd been hanging there for a whole day, and he still had to pass Initiation somehow. A red-and-gold spear had pinned him up there, hooked securely through his hood. He was terrified to even touch it—what if it came loose and he dropped? It was a pretty steep fall.
He had already been pinned to a wall once by this exact same spear earlier, back when he had leaned a little too hard into the "macho man" routine and finally pushed Weiss over the edge. But she didn't want to dirty her own hands, so she just asked Pyrrha to help her out. So the question of "who pinned me here?" was effectively answered.
The bushes rustled. Jaune looked over with hope, and a second later, his white-haired Goddess emerged from the foliage.
"My snow angel, have you come to save me?" Weiss jerked her head up in shock, not believing her own eyes or ears. "Well, I'm willing to play the damsel in distress just this once, for you." He blew her a kiss, but Weiss just took a step back and vanished behind the bushes.
"Fine," she said to someone on the other side. "I'll be on your team. But that doesn't mean we're friends!"
"Yay! You won't regret it!"
"Hey! Girls! Get me down from here, please!" Their voices faded into the distance; no one had heard him. He was left alone again, with zero hope of rescue. And then, somewhere far off, Jaune heard a howl.
Right! They'd agreed to use a howl as a signal!
"AWOOOOOO!!!"
"Hello, Jaune. What are you doing?" a familiar female voice called out from behind. Jaune whipped his head around but couldn't spot the source.
"Pyrrha!" Judging by the sounds, she had just jumped into the tree, but was still in his blind spot. "I'm, uh, howling... Don't mind me. You literally saved my life, I don't even know how to thank you. Why are you hiding?"
"You already made an agreement with the others to form a team. If we make eye contact, I'll ruin all your plans."
"Aaah..." Jaune drawled. "Clever."
"Tell me, do you... um..." she struggled to find the right words, "know what Aura is? It's just... it's a pretty far drop..."
***
Yort heard a howl. Fake, completely unnatural. That wasn't a wolf, and it definitely wasn't a Beowolf. A signal? If so, it wasn't hard to guess whose it was.
Odds that it's one of Eg's buddies howling?
An exact number materialized in his head out of nowhere: eighty-nine percent. Yort's eyes widened. That feeling of epiphany always caught him off guard; it was impossible to get used to or prepare for. It felt exactly like jolting awake in the middle of the night because you finally figured out what you should have done years ago to avoid a humiliating or awkward situation. It felt like you had always known it, because it was just that obvious.
Yort simply turned around and walked in the exact opposite direction.
***
If Grimm were capable of feeling emotions, they would be experiencing nothing but all-consuming terror right now. Fire in every color of the rainbow, fueled by every known type of Dust, roared out of the nozzle of a massive flamethrower wielded by a not-so-massive girl. Sometimes she switched to a specific type of Dust to instantly freeze or incinerate a target in a split second. But usually, Magenta just blasted everything at once because she liked watching the "living rainbow." The forest behind her was burning, but in a mundane, orange color. Dust-fire couldn't maintain its state forever, and sooner or later, it was replaced by boring, normal fire.
When the last Grimm collapsed into a heap of scorched flesh, Magenta froze. A beautiful, man-made rainbow reflected in the eyepieces of her gas mask. She covered her ears to block out the roar of the flames so she could listen to her inner voice. What was her next step?
No more burning. Must be quiet. Sneak over there. Magenta looked to her left.
She always obeyed her intuition, unquestioningly doing whatever her soul deemed right. Usually, Egrer scolded her after stunts like this, but not this time. This time, he was going to praise her.
The Grimm weren't catching fire anymore, but they still didn't survive getting bashed over the head with a massive, spiked flamethrower.
***
Egrer was already sick and tired of sitting in this goddamn tree, in this goddamn forest, surrounded by goddamn Grimm. Were they really not hearing him? He was positive he'd heard howling in the distance a couple of times, but it sounded way too much like an actual wolf. No one in the pack besides Egrer could howl like that—so, definitely Beowolves.
The buzzing roar of a passing Bullhead tore through the air above him. It banked sharply and hovered right over his head. The downwash of hot air whipped the leaves and his hair around; Egrer had to shield his face with his arm. With a muffled thump, the side ramp slid open.
"Heeey there!" a voice boomed—part battle cry, part greeting. "Looks like you're stuck, boy! Lose your flare gun?"
"Nah, got it right here, sir." The only people flying around in Bullheads were the professors. "I'll manage somehow, no need to worry."
"Ha-ha-ha!" the portly professor with a battleaxe laughed for no apparent reason. "That's the spirit! You've got potential, but remember—overestimating your abilities can be dangerous. Even I made such mistakes in my youth. I remember, when I was about your age, I stood alone against a thousand-strong arm—"
"Sir!" the pilot's voice called from the cockpit. "Signal flare spotted!"
"Onward to the rescue!" The ramp slid shut, and the Bullhead's thrusters rotated horizontally. They were so close right now they could literally blow him away... This was a golden opportunity!
Without wasting another second on second thoughts, Egrer sprinted down the thick branch and leaped with all his might. His Aura flowed into the Needlestick in a pale cream hue, sharpening it exponentially and allowing him to effortlessly pierce the flap of the right engine. It was an incredibly precarious position; if the Bullhead banked even slightly, Egrer would just slip right off.
The rules hadn't said anything about brazen stunts like this, so he just hoped they wouldn't disqualify him for it.
"Woo-hoo! You ain't getting me, you pieces of shit!" The Bullhead accelerated, and the Grimm below roared, howled, and whined in frustration. A couple of them even broke into a hopeless sprint to chase it, and Egrer threw them the middle finger.
They weren't flying too high, but it was still enough to see almost the entire forest. Fires were raging in a couple of spots, but one continuous, zigzagging trail of scorched trees led straight from the cliffside. That was definitely Magenta's handiwork. The Bullhead was flying roughly in that direction; if he dropped down along the way, walking to her would be a breeze.
And there was the temple! No guarantees, of course, but a semi-circular, half-crumbled wall standing in the middle of a clearing stood out a bit too much against the backdrop of the Emerald Forest. The space around it looked like it had been deliberately cleared out before Initiation, making it glaringly obvious what to look for. Tiny silhouettes were flashing around it; someone had already managed to get there and grab a relic.
Before dropping in, Egrer decided to let out a soul-shaking howl, loud enough to be heard all the way back at Beacon. That way, the pack would converge roughly around this area, and they could push north together.
"AWOOOOOOOOOO!" Trying to listen for a response was pointless; the roar of the engines would drown it out entirely. All he could do was pray nobody had seen him hitching a ride on the Bullhead. "Well, here goes nothing."
The Needlestick retracted, and Egrer dropped into freefall. Compared to what he went through getting yeeted into the forest, this wasn't even scary.
Sticking the landing, he dusted himself off and started a light jog toward the scorched zone. Along the way, Egrer passed a couple of squirrels fleeing the flames, but spotted no signs of people. High temperatures aren't a huge threat to someone with Aura, but burning still hurts like a bitch, so Egrer sprinted through the wall of fire as fast as he could. Covering his nose with his sleeve, he reached a section of the forest that was already burnt out and had mostly stopped smoking.
Craters, frozen trees, patches of earth stripped clean of turf, electrified puddles of water—Magenta never did things by halves and she certainly never conserved her ammo, reducing everything to Dust. (He gave himself a mental high-five for that excellent pun).
Egrer froze; a person was flashing through the haze up ahead, but it definitely wasn't Magenta. Hiding behind a charred trunk, he squinted, trying to get a better look, but the smoke obscured the details. However, that shambling gait and perpetually slouched back were a dead giveaway. It was Illmond. Egrer bolted toward him at full speed.
"Ill!"
"Eg? Eg!" Illmond did the exact same thing. A smile was a rare guest on his face, which made it incredibly heartwarming to realize just how genuinely thrilled he was right now. Probably even more thrilled than Egrer, considering the guy had absolutely zero desire to meet new people and socialize. He was perfectly fine sticking with his small circle of friends.
They officially became partners standing next to a blasted-out tree. Egrer wanted to go in for a hug, but figured that was pushing it. They settled for a fist bump.
"I was starting to think I wouldn't run into anyone from the pack," Illmond admitted. "I only heard your howl about five minutes ago."
"Speaking of which." Egrer took a deep breath. "Why didn't you mention that Beowolves also howl?! The whole plan went to shit!"
"Was I supposed to?" He raised an eyebrow and put his hands on his hips.
"You're the only one of us who actually went to prep school! You could have corrected me! But instead, you were just being a snarky prick the whole time."
"Well, actually, yeah," Illmond pondered it, though he didn't look particularly guilty. "Sorry, it didn't cross my mind that it would be a problem."
"Whatever, too late now. We need to figure out how to find the others. Were you tracking Madge here? Any luck?"
"It's like she fell off the face of Remnant." He was clearly glad to change the subject, launching enthusiastically into his observations. "She vanished somewhere in that direction. Looks like she decided to stop burning things down. There's no active Dust-fire there, it's already transitioned to normal flames, meaning Madge was here at least twenty minutes ago. Judging by how far the fire has spread, forty minutes max."
"That's a pretty wide window. She could be anywhere by now."
"Or maybe..." Illmond gulped. "She got eaten?" Even suggesting it physically hurt. Egrer hurried to reassure his old friend; the guy was clearly spiraling.
"If she did, there'd be blood. I highly doubt there are any Grimm around here big enough to swallow her whole."
"There are King Taijitus in this forest. I ran into one on my way here."
"Wow, I haven't seen anything but Beowolves." Egrer had no idea how dangerous the local wildlife really was, but he quickly recovered from the shock. "Even so, in this layer of ash, they definitely would've left a trail. And I don't see any signs of a giant snake slithering through here."
Illmond seemed to calm down; at the very least, he stopped shaking.
"Yeah, you're right. Maybe she just ran out of Dust for her flamethrower."
"I saw from the air that this burn zone leads straight toward the temple," Egrer pointed in the right direction from memory, "so she definitely headed that way."
"Wait, you were the one hitched to that Bullhead?" Illmond asked, causing his leader to flash a goofy, nervous grin. That smile gave him away immediately. "You were extremely visible. And audible." He added with a smirk. "I see you have a thing for hitching rides on aircraft."
"No. It just kinda happened."
"A double coincidence, huh?"
"We back to being snarky, are we? Alright, let's keep moving. I have zero desire to stick around this place."
They left the scorched wasteland, where even the grass had turned to ash, and soon pushed through the barrier of burning trees. Both set a brisk but sustainable pace, conserving their energy.
"You know, I've noticed you're a lot more talkative without your scroll. Before you inevitably bury your face in it again, I want to ask you something you always dodge. Why did you enroll in Beacon? I thought you were sick of the whole Huntsman gig."
Illmond remained tensely silent for a while.
"I don't really know myself. Probably just tagging along with you guys. Or maybe I decided to give this profession a second chance."
"Childhood dream?" Egrer himself, had he grown up in a normal family, would have absolutely wanted to be a Huntsman, just like any normal person. Having superpowers, killer style, badass weapons, and going on crazy adventures—what kid doesn't dream of that? But he hadn't grown up in a normal family, and his dad took a sadistic pleasure in shattering the halo of greatness surrounding Huntsmen.
Plus, as Headmaster Ozpin had pointed out during his interview, Huntsmen have to look like heroes, not actually be them. Heroes don't live long.
"A dream?" Illmond pondered. "Doubt it. I was just faced with a complex puzzle and wanted to solve it. It was like that with playing the guitar, with programming, and now with drawing."
"So since you got bored of Huntsmen stuff, does that mean you solved the puzzle?"
"No." Illmond's voice and expression didn't change a bit, but Egrer realized he had accidentally touched a raw nerve. "I didn't quit because I got bored. I quit because I couldn't be the best."
"But you said you were top of your class at Sanctum. Is being literally number one that important to you? If you enjoy the process, why not just do it for yourself?"
"If I'm not number one, I don't enjoy it. Nothing matters if I'm not the absolute best. Consolation prizes aren't for me." Egrer had noticed before that Illmond treated life like a video game, one he grinded day and night just to 100% all the achievements. Getting into different hobbies, even if he dropped them a year later, was commendable, but not in this context. He didn't care about the "deep lore" or "engaging gameplay"; he only played for the victory screen. But life isn't a game, and everyone gets the exact same ending anyway. If only he could get that through to Illmond...
"Listen, what else is on your bucket list to try?"
"After drawing, the list goes: surfing, writing, sculpting, archaeology, physics, and architecture. Haven't thought past that yet."
"You know there isn't enough time in one lifetime to become the best at all of that, right?" Egrer gently pointed out. "Maybe it's better to focus on a couple of things you actually enjoy the most?"
"You don't get it. I don't like any of those things. I like being the best. The feeling... it's like a high-grade drug. You get a taste of it once, and you're an addict for the rest of your life." Illmond smiled, clearly reminiscing about his "hits," but a second later he nervously turned away. Egrer remembered him saying his mom was an addict. Well, she definitely left an indelible mark on his worldview.
"Yikes, rough situation. Well, at least you recognize you have a problem," Egrer noted encouragingly. "That's the first step to fixing it."
"I don't want to get clean." The smile wiped right off the leader's face. "I'm perfectly fine with how things are."
Egrer wanted to retaliate by reminding him of their very first meeting, but couldn't muster the resolve. That was crossing a line; pushing too hard was pointless. He needed to find a more delicate approach, but later. Illmond had already shared way too much and was clearly regretting his decision to open up. He knew better than anyone that Egrer would absolutely try to "help" him and dig even deeper into his soul. For an introvert like him, it was totally normal to hide his problems even from his closest—and let's be real, his only—friend.
They ran the rest of the way in uncomfortable silence. Egrer was itching to crack a dumb joke or just say something, but he held himself back. Right now, silence was exactly what was needed.
The forest broke, giving way to a clearing with the temple in the center. A fight had definitely gone down here: a couple of craters gouged the earth, a massive, unnatural chunk of ice was clearly the result of Ice Dust, and the abandoned temple itself looked even more ruined than before. Like something colossal had just trampled right over it.
"Deathstalker tracks. And humans." Illmond dropped to one knee, examining the ground. "About six of them, maybe more."
"Six Deathstalkers!?"
"Six humans," he clarified, not looking up from tracking. "Most of them were running around like headless chickens, but a couple definitely knew what they were doing. They retreated into the forest, over there."
Even Egrer, with zero Huntsman education, could tell which way they went. Trees in that direction didn't just casually snap in half on their own, and the furious screeching of the overgrown scorpion was still echoing from over there. It sounded like grinding metal and glass dragging across a chalkboard. An absolutely horrific noise. In some twisted way, Egrer was actually glad the most dangerous Grimm in the area was currently over there, far away from him.
While Illmond was analyzing the tracks, he walked into the temple. Well, "walked in" is a stretch; he basically just stepped onto an overgrown stone platform that used to be the floor. Out of four walls, only half of one was still standing. Does it even count as "going inside" at that point?
The toppled marble pedestals had definitely been brought in specifically for Initiation; they looked way too new. Scattered around them were palm-sized chess pieces—obviously the relics the Headmaster had mentioned back on the cliff. Giving in to a wave of nostalgia, Egrer picked up a black king.
He used to know a smuggler who called himself the "Black King." The guy's ego was off the charts, and he was just an all-around nasty piece of work. He also didn't play by the rules and tried to scam Egrer's family. That didn't end well for him.
Shaking his head to clear the thoughts, he stepped out of the ruins.
"Find anything else?"
"There was a Nevermore here." Illmond was crouching next to a hole in the ground, running his hand along its edges.
"Aren't those Deathstalker tracks?" Holes were holes; Egrer didn't see any difference.
"Look at the spacing between them. The spread is too chaotic, and the impact marks are too deep. A Nevermore shot its feathers here. A fully grown one." He paused, digging a sort of spike out of the hole with his finger. "Hasn't fully melted yet. It was here about five minutes ago. Maybe ten, if it's grown to a massive size."
"Oh, no." Egrer grabbed his head. "Madge couldn't have walked right into the middle of this meat grinder, right?"
"The time window fits perfectly. She should have arrived right about then."
"Dammit, we have to help her! Have you ever fought Deathstalkers?"
"No, that's a job for veteran Huntsmen. But with enough people, you can even beat a Goliath to death." Illmond brushed off his coat and pulled his hood over his head. Hand him a cigarette and a glass of whiskey, and he'd look exactly like a noir detective, that's how dead serious he was right now.
"Let's move."