Chapter 234: Ninth Interlude - Raven Branwen

Chapter 234: Ninth Interlude - Raven Branwen

DISCLAIMER: This story is NOT MINE IN ANY WAY. That honor has gone to the beautiful bastard Ryuugi. This has been pulled from his Spacebattles publishment at threads/rwby-the-gamer-the-games-we-play-disk-five.341621/. Anyway on with the show...err read.

Ninth Interlude - Raven Branwen

Even with prior experience, the suddenness of it all still caught her by surprise. It wasn't a gradual thing, something that built up and allowed her to grow used to it and adaptit was like a switch being flipped, an instantaneous change that came without warning.

And the moment it did, she felt everything change. It was like a portal had opened into her heart, flooding it with liquid fireenough that for a moment, she honestly believed she might spontaneously combust and burn to ash. Instead, it flowed through her veins, spreading its increasing warmth to her limbs. If her veins had started to glow through her skin, it wouldn't have come as a surprise.

Then it began to solidify, taking shape as a network of power and light inside of her, pulsating in tune with her heartand she began to change. She felt her skin harden into something besides human flesh, steady waves of energy rewriting the very fabric of her being. Energy, untold and absurd amounts of energy, gathered in her muscles, giving her strength and speed. At the same time, the world began to slow to a crawl, moments beginning to drag and stretch around her.

And then the world began to open up, as if a veil had been lifted. Where there had once been darkness, now there was a riotous calamity of light, expanding across her field of vision. For a moment, she felt like she'd been blindedwhile at the same time, like she was seeing the world for the first time. Things fell away and became meaningless as visible light was revealed to be nothing but a fraction of the much broader spectrum. Colors flashed before her eyes that she had no reference for, because they were a mixture of more than just three primary colors, while the illusion of solidity was dispelled throughout the world around her as matter was broken into a billion tiny parts by her gave. The blue sky vanished, replaced by remnants of cosmic phenomena that painted broad stokes of light upon it.

It wasn't just her eyesor rather, her eyes became an almost meaningless part of it all. She could feel the brush of air against her skin and the very touch of light, and it was enough for her to 'see' by. Her senses combined and expanded until there was no practical difference between what she could hear or see or feel. It was an onslaught of sensory information, even before taking into account the fact that time had been slowed tremendously, giving her ample opportunity to take in everything.

And then there were the things that went above the normal senses, beyond them. As she cast her gaze over the battlefield, she could see traces of things left behind long ago, blurred images of men and women dying at the hands of the Grimm, of carnage and bloodshed and terror. She could see traces of Aura seared into the world around her, something at once blindingly pure and terrifyingly infectious. The lesser powers that had been unleashed throughout the battle had left its mark as well, in vague flickers and flashes, but they were nothing compared to the volcanic eruptions of light that marked traces of what had been left elsewhere.

But all that was dwarfed, literally and figuratively, by the figures that stood above it all, revealed for what they were. She saw Jaune as a towering figure, similar to the form he sometimes adopted but made distinct by his sheer size as he towered to the heavens and covered the sky with his thirty-twofold wings. Countless eyes burned like stars, brilliant even against a background of pure white, and even knowing it was just an image, she was surprised his gaze didn't incinerate everything it touched.

Beside him was another figure, expect beside him wasn't the right word. Adjacent to him, within him, reflecting himit had elements of all these things, but none of them fit quite right either. Regardless, the figure that stood with him seemed like an inversion of him; made of darkness where he burned with light, gaze literally frigid, and seeming to cover the sky above and below Jaune's wings with darkness. That must have been Jaune's second soul, his twin and partner. Seen this way, they seemed like an angel and a devil, but also seemed united, allied despite how they appearedand they stood in opposition to the same foe.

The final figurewho could only have been Malkuthwas a giant as well, every bit as tall as either of the twins, but distinct. The twins, though opposite to each other, were similar in that their presence was like a brand upon the world, like divinity trespassing upon the mundane. Their presence was impossible not to notice and she was sure that had anyone else possessed the senses she'd no gained, they'd have been able to spoke either of them from miles awayhundreds of miles, possible.

Malkuth was different. His true appearance was a subtle thing, seeming to bend into the patterns of the world around him. Even as colossal as he was, he seemed like a nature part of the worlda mountain that pierced the sky, perhaps, but still a mountain, a natural aspect of the world, however remarkable. Looking at him more closely than that only furthered that impression, because his form was almost like a window or, perhaps, a mirror. Looking into him, she saw the world and saw it fill with life over what must have been eons, even as she also saw the here and now, the world she was faced with and lived in.

Seeing him like thatseeing them like thatleft her feeling very, very small.

Taking it all in, on top of what her own Semblance providedher brain felt like it was overheating. Almost literally, in factlike something was slowly breaking inside of her. But it never quite came to pain, though the sensation stopped only just short of it; as soon as it appeared like it might cross that line, the feeling dulled slightly, as if the feeling was escaping her mind. That would be Jaune's work, she imaginedhealing her before she was even harmed or something to that effect.

None of which really changed how striking the experience was. This was how he viewed the world, every daybut even just a glimpse of it was terrifying. That was the best way to describe it; the breadth of the world seen through his eyes was horrific. Seeing it this way could haveperhaps should havedriven her mad.

But she was a Huntress. She managed.

Besideseven if it wasn't in quite the same way, having a broad view of things was something she was used to.

Taking a moment, she forced herself to calm down and focus came to her even more quickly than it usual did. Once she found that center, it was a simple matter to tap into her powerin fact, it was hard not to, especially at a time like this. Truthfully, she felt as if someone had torn the heart out of her chest and replaced it with a burning star, such was the power flowing through herlike it would incinerate her if she didn't shed it all, though she couldn't possible get rid of even a fraction of it.

But there was one place for her to start.

Taking a slow breath, she channeled that power, gathering it behind her right eyeand felt the world start to break.

It was like walls falling away again, the background information she had struggled for so long to master and control rushing back in through the cracks. As it had since she was a young girl, the broadening of her awareness both gave her a way out and trapped her further. With a thought, her view of the world warped and shifted elsewhere, showing her places far distant. Any place, coming upon her in a chaotic, uncontrolled rushed of images.

When she'd been younger and less experienced, it had been hard to even function after her Semblance first developed. She'd never forget that first month, when she'd been bedridden, where even a stray thought could tear her from the present and draw her mind round the world. At first, she'd tried to just blot it out and ignore it, but that had proven unfeasible in short orderit wasn't something she could stop thinking about and it wouldn't go away. There had been times when it almost seemed like she was in control of it, but then a single word or the sight of something unfamiliar would shatter her grip on it and she'd feel like she was somewhere else.

In a way, it had been similar to what she was feeling now, though nowhere near as bad, because the issues built upon each other, worsening matters. Where before, she could only focus on a few specific places and things, flipping back and forth routinely, now things began to flood her vision. A thousand different images, a thousand different places, a thousand different peopleand she could see them all clearly, at the same time. But whatever the breadth of the problem, the solution remained the same.

Before her power could fly away with her, she tied herself down with what she could see.

Her brother had been the first, in no small part because he had been the only at that point in time. Back when she had been plagued by her power, he'd been the one to take care of her, even feeding her on the days when a particularly jarring image would make her drop dishes or shatter glasses. He'd beenhimself, but that had been reassuring in its own way. She'd thought that whatever happened, at least her brother would never changeand that had been what anchored her. Whenever something happened or her power started to infringe upon her thoughts, she'd look to him as a way of self-assurance. He was still there by her side, so she was still here, not in the snowy mountains of scorching deserts or whatever else happened to spring to mind.

But she'd been young and, before she knew it, things had changedfor the better, mostly. They'd gone to Beacon and she'd been place upon a team. She'd found friendships, really friendships, and two more anchors in the process.

For a long time, it had been just her, Qrow, Taiyang, and Summerand the rest of Beacon, of course, but she'd never been good at tying herself to places, not when she could be anywhere. People were different; she could cross from Vale to Vacuo in a second, from Atlas to Mistral in a step, but who she was with, who she stood beside? They were how she determined 'here' and 'there.' Qrow had always understood that and the others had come to as well.

Other things, it had taken them longer to realize, for which she was someone glad. Her innocence, optimism, and nativity had been short-lived after she acquired her Semblancean unfortunate downside of being able to see what was happening behind the scenes. She couldn't even remember when it had first started, but all it had taken was some idle musings about what the Council was doing, or some famous Hunter, or whoever else. What people did when they thought nobody was lookingwell, she'd learned various things, quite a few of them things people wouldn't have liked.

Some of them, things she herself hated. She'd dreamed of being a Huntress since she was a girl, same as most young childrenbut that dream began to tarnish as she grew older and learned more and more about what went on behind the scenes. Some of it had to do with the darker choices Hunters sometimes had to make and the things that were carefully edited out of the tales told to childrenbut mostly, it was the people who pulled the strings. So many decisions, so many plans, so many 'necessary sacrifices.' She'd been watching heroes die since she was a child because of what they deemed 'necessary,' and so much of it had seemed pointless. What purpose did it serve but to deep the lies she couldn't help but see through? And knowing that in becoming a Huntress, she might become a sacrifice herselfthat her friends might bleed and die for the wishes of some distant council

She'd told Qrow about it, on one of the nights she'd been unable to sleep and had been completely unsurprised by his reactionhe'd decided on the spot to rise to the top, until he was the one holding the strings and could make things 'right.' It had made her smile, because he was always like that and always serious about what he said, but she'd wondered even thenhow could they fix anything? They were Hunters; powerful, yes, but that power leant itself primarily to killing things and there were only so many ways to cause wide-spread political change with a sword. Her brother wouldn't even consider any of them, even knowing the truth.

But sheshe had. More often then she'd like to admit, she'd considered just appearing from the darkness and slipping a blade between the ribs of a few politicians.

Instead, she'd waited, allowing herself to be tied down further and further. She'd fallen in love, in timeTaiyang had been charming, kind, optimistic, and a part of her team. She'd trust her back to him without a thought and knew she wouldn't be let down. Why not other things? It was common, perhaps even expected, for such a thing to happen, and he was one of the few people she truly trusted. They'd dated and had fun and everyone had smiled, saying they'd expected it for years.Updated from novelb(i)n.c(o)m

Perhaps they had, but probably not for the real reasons. She's been looking for something desperately, something she still couldn't pin down preciselysomething that was wholly hers, something that would change things and make it so she never wanted to fly away again. She'd found a husband, a house, romance, a career, and, in time, even a daughter.

But not what she'd been looking for.

She'd always remember the day her daughter was born, the day she'd first held Yang in her arms. She'd been beautiful, even thenprecious and innocent as a only an infant could be, with her father's hair and what she thought might have been her own features. Labor had been uncomfortable, but looking at her daughter had made it worth it, and she'd loved her from the moment she saw her. Taiyang had been on one side of her, smiling as brightly as the sun at their daughter, while Qrow had waited at the other, smile making it clear that there would be celebrations in short order. Even Summer, always so shy and afraid that fragile things might break apart at her touch, and pressed in with a smile. She'd been happy, at home among friends and family.

Meanwhile, the Right's Revolution had been building. Atrocities were occurring throughout the Kingdoms and Menagerie, tensions bringing the beasts out of men. She's seen it all, unable to stop thinking about it even while giving birth, while holding her daughter, while laughing with her friends. It didn't leave her during the night, didn't leave her in the morning, and it plagued her constantly.

Since the day she'd gotten her Semblance, she had always felt as though she should be elsewhere and it had never been stronger than when she looked at what was happening then. Even her own daughter hadn't been enough to banish itif anything, the feeling only grew stronger for enduring. What kind of mother would look at her daughters face and want to be somewhere else more than she wanted to stay? A bad one, no doubt.

But she had. She had never been good at ignoring what happened before her eyes, which was complicated by how she saw most things, and in the end

She'd left. And knowing what she intended to do, the methods she intended to useshe hadn't come back. A part of that was for their sake, to keep from drawing trouble onto them. She'd never allowed the full truth of her powers to become known outside her team, but people suspects suspected and once she began, they'd know.

The other part, perhaps the larger part, simple didn't want to look them in the eye and admit the truth or explain it. To tell them she'd valued her self-appointed duty more than them.

Funny where that had led her.

Menagerie had only been the beginningbut she knew better than most how important beginnings were to endings. It had been a chaotic place, where the pieces of a thousand broken lives had been left to stew and stir until they boiled over. She'd known from the beginning how things would probably go, and hadn't been surprisedbut one didn't need to be surprised to be appalled.

Most peopleand, surprisingly, even most Faunustended to think of the Faunus race as a united whole. She had no idea why; being members of the same 'species' certainly hadn't united Mankind, after all, and it hadn't done much to historically aid the Faunus, either. While commonly considered a single species, the Faunus were composed of thousands of different groups, who'd made their homes in vastly different locals and shared very different histories. The Faunus had fought with each other as often as they had mankind, for countless different reasons; though some fight be surprised by it now, at the end of the day, a man with scales isn't necessarily any more like a woman with cat ears than he is like a plain human, and for a long, long time those differences had mattered. Being a Faunus, or being the wrong kind of Faunus, could see you shunned just about anywhere.

Then there were thepolitical issues, the facts that now went unspoken. Slavery and effective slavery had been hallmarks of Faunus history, but where did those slaves come from? The modern train of thought seemed to be of humans hunting Faunus down in fields and strapping chains upon them, but such things were raresomething she'd always thought obvious, honestly. If the purpose of owning a slave was to make them work in one's stead, could you really expect someone who owned a slave to go through all the effort of capturing and training one themselves? More often, slaves had come from wars between groups of Faunus, with the defeated being conquered and enslaved by the victors and later sold to human settlements for profit. When people think of the historical treatment of the Faunus, they tended to brush over that or assume that every group was treated the same by mankind, when the so-called Slave Kings had been seen as nobles by the men of their time.

People always seemed to forget that peopleFaunus or otherwiseare more than just one thing. There had been slaves and slaves, Kings and Kingdoms, wars and sacrifices and defeats. Boundaries based on homeland, on culture, on appearance, on blood, or on 'history.' For all that people thought of them as being one, the Faunus were just people; varied and complicated and fractured along a million lines.

Her mother had been a slave. Perhaps not called such, but the fact remained that she hadn't belonged to herselfshe had always been another's, for as long as she had known her. Perhaps one of those owners was her father, though all the ones she remembered had been noblewomen, keen to sell and trade the body of another; quite frankly, she'd never asked or wanted to know and she'd left before it could ever matter. When they were still children, too young to work or do much else but take up space and food, they'd been cast out and left to fend for themselves.

Neither of them had found much sympathy on the streets, not even from their own kindthey were Faunus, yes, but with traits so muted it hardly seemed to mean anything unless attention was drawn to it. When there were young, it had seen them shunned by everyone around them, caught between two sides. It had always amused her how people had cared then and never even noticed later on, but she supposed that had been for the best. After a few years, no one even knew who or what she was and so no one had sought to discriminate against her, oppress her, or force her to do anything. Not that it would have worked out for them if they had, of course, but they hadn't even thought to try.

And no one had so much as looked her way when the Faunus were being gathered and locked up in Menagerie. People had even come up and talked to her about it, asking her to take a side on the issue or chime in for or against the Faunus. It had been laughable in its absurdity, but she'd never been able to come up with an answer or decide how she felt. It would have been a lie to say that her race was a matter of pride to her. That wasn't to imply that it was something she felt ashamed of, so much as it was something she felt absolutely nothing at all for. She was a Faunus and she considered that fact pretty much irrelevant to who she was.

But at the same time, Menagerie had meant something to her, even before she stepped onto its shore. Why, she wasn't sureperhaps it was simply the implication, the opportunity. Menagerie was the first time in recorded history that the Faunus could truly be said to be one, united in one place and, presumably, with the desire to escape. In such a situation, it should have been possible for them to work together, to change things as a group, to finally see.

She wanted to say she was surprised when instead they turned upon each other, but she really hadn't been. It was inevitable, however disappointing it may have been; there were too many differences to be put aside, too much history to simply forget, and while Mankind may have been an enemy in a distant sense, they were trapped in a prison with a million other foes. You didn't need to be of different races to do something horrible to one another, after all.

If it had just been that, she'd have left them all rotting there and forgotten about themwhat had 'the Faunus' ever done for her, after all? Nothing to help her when she'd been a child on the streets. Why should she feel any loyalty to 'her kind.' She was loyal to her friends, to those that were loyal to her, not to groups of people she'd never met.

But even despite that, there had been a reason why she'd chosen to actto leave her friends and home behind and enter the Menagerie. The organization that would one day become the White Fang, the dream that went with it, and the people who, despite everyone and everything, were still worth fighting for. Though no one had ever done anything for her, she was a Huntress and she had to be better than those who'd stand back and do nothing while people suffered right in front of their eyes.

With her strength and her Semblance, she'd connected the scattered pieces of her kind, giving them the purpose, focus, and power they needed to act, to change things, and too make things right. She'd found allies and they brought with them others, building upon one another to create something powerful, great. A beast of such power that even the Kingdoms had been forced to stop and take heedand they had.

It just hadn't mattered, in the end.

Once the walls came down and the common enemy vanished, everything she'd built faded away. For a while, she thought that might have been for the bestafter the Revolution ended, things improved. The Faunus were given legal protection and things that had been common where outlawed. After the example Menagerie had created, things changed as people realized that the Faunus as a whole could resist and reject. The organization she'd created changed and refocused on bridging the ancient gap between man and Faunus, and for a time all had seemed well.

She hadn't believed it. Unfortunately, because of how much she'd always known of the truth of things, she'd become a cynic. Even more unfortunately, Remnant was itself and cynicism usually proved itself right. While the Faunus as a whole could resist and execute change, once Menagerie was escaped there was no driving need to remain unified and centuries of history working against it. People went back to their homes and their lives and for a while, there was a hush of sortspeople's feelings towards the Faunus hadn't changed overnight, of course, but with a war having only just ended, they were hesitant to act.

Slowly, however, people began to test the boundaries. Minor snubs aimed towards Faunus, skipping over them when it came to opportunities, and so on. While discriminating against Faunus itself was outlawed, it was a simple thing to come up with explanations and excuses; to say they weren't as qualified, perhaps, or to shore up the quality of another worker. If it came to trial, the court might feel inclined to lean one way, to be more excepting of a story. Laws were important, but in and of themselves they couldn't change everything.

In short order, dissatisfaction began to grow among the Faunus, or at least groups of them. Most were still content with the change, seeing it as a huge step up from where they'd been previously, however short it may have fallen from the ideal. Some refused to accept that, fighting against itpeacefully, at first, but the Kingdoms of Remnant had always been good at brushing uncomfortable truths under the rug. There were rallies and protests and marches, and all too often they came to naught. Those who believed in the cause needed no swaying, after all, while those who laughed at it could ignore it with ease. Things grew from there and the organization she'd helped build quickly returned to its militant roots.

It would be a lie to say that displeased her, but an exaggeration to say it made her happy. As far as she was concerned, violence was just another way to accomplish ones goalsbut it wasn't the only way nor the best in every situation, and like any other method, there were limits and conditions to its use. Violence, or even the threat of violence, could change hearts and minds, but it was somewhat difficult to use it too its full effect from a position of weakness. The White Fang was a shadow of the beast that had formed during the Revolution; a vocal minority, but still a minority. Most of the soldiers who had cut their teeth in the war had found work in the Kingdoms, partially because ones race or species didn't matter to the Grimm and partially because the Kingdoms were wise enough not to antagonize the group most likely to be able to oppose them. Those who could fight had been accepted with relative ease.

It was those who couldn't who had the most reason to protest, but, of course, they had very few means to do so. That was the White Fang that had sprung up in the aftermath of the Revolution; those who'd been angered enough to turn to violence but lacking any means to be a true threat. By her reckoning, it was better to resist than to not, but the Kingdoms wouldn't even notice such a thing.

In time, it had been possible to change that, but it had been harder than during the warand, truth be told, her heart wasn't really in it any more. She had felt committed to the path she had set out on, but seeing where it had led and knowing what had come of it wasdiscouraging. She aided the budding White Fang where she could, calling in a few favors and reminding several allies she'd made of their past loyalties. Though the new members were non-combatants, they could be trained and, given time, become fighters in their own right. She wasn't convinced it would much matter, given their size relative to the power of the Kingdoms, but it had been something. But with limited enthusiasm and nothing to do but wait, she had focused on other things.

She stepped forward, leaping into a portal with all the speed she could musterand as she was now, that was more than enough to set the air aflame and worse around her. She didn't move in a straight line, either, flashing between points and moving from one portal to the next; a shadow that appeared briefly and skipped to another position in space. She could feel the attention on her with her Aura, keep track of when and where Malkuth lost sight of her, but knew that Jaune would be able to sense her through their connection and figure out what she was doing. Could Malkuth? She'd arranged it so that there were thousands upon thousands of possible paths for her to take, countless ways to approach him, and portals opened and closed with every second. One second she was far away, the next at mid-range, then far, close, near, far, and close again. To her, it was no different than moving in a straight line, but could he understand the route she was taking? Could he react to it?

Only one way to be sure.

In a step, she went from mid-range to right behind Malkuth's back, and he was looking in entirely the wrong direction. His gaze flickered to the upper left, towards the entrance to a pathway she'd switched from at the last moment, and found nothing. Whatever he was doing to track her, it wasn't perfect.

To his credit, however, he reacted fast, whirling around the instant she began drawing her blade. When it came to Iaido, she was one of the best, and with her current enhancements she could draw her sword at an absurd speed, but he still managed to turn half-way around and lift a glowing hand towards her face before firing what looked like a blood red lightning bolt at her.

But before he did, before he even moved to attack, something trembled in her like the vibration of a spider's web. A warning of what to expect, what was to come, and at the same time a reminder that whatever physical enhancements Jaune called forth, they were but a shadow of the mental ones. A portal opened in front of her, swallowing the blast and releasing it from on positioned behind her, skipping the space she occupied. It was an almost unconscious reflex, a nearly instinctive defense for all that she'd never practiced it, and instead of striking her, the blast careened to strike a patch of ground that she briefly cleared of portals.

The earth erupted in a sudden explosion that expanded to about the size of a person and then froze for an instant. Then, the explosion seemed to reverse, sucked towards the center by some force, dust and smoke gathering into a piece of extremely dense matter no larger than a marble. It began to fall the second it form, dropping towards the perfectly smooth crater that the blast had created.

It simplified things, she mused, to simply assume anything he sent her way defaulted to absurdly lethal. If it hit her, she'd briefly regret it; ergo, she should make sure not to get hit. Simple enough.

Instead of giving it any more thought than that, she finished drawing her sword and swept it cleanly through his outstretched arm, energy gathering to help put on a sudden burst of speed as she did. The moment the blade struck his flesh, the spacial Dust activated, creating a kind of sticking effectinstead of 'cutting' his arm off, which she assumed would be exceedingly difficult, she separated them, an altered portal clinging to either stump. They didn't bleed as they came apart, but the hand fell to the ground, caught in gravity's hold, and she positioned a portal such that it ended up a fair distance away. Not a wound, technically speaking, but removing the limb all the same. Against a regenerating opponent, it tended to have more effect regardless.

Unfortunately, Malkuth seemed familiar with such effects, because instead of wasting even a moment waiting for it to grow back, he made the limb glow an off-yellow color. A moment later, it simply evaporated, coming apart into a chemical cloud that she didn't recognize but which was probably meant to do horrible things to her. She swept her sword through it, leveraging the same blade to a different effect, and what looked like a glass lens briefly formed in midair before banishing the toxic gas, switching it with a similarly-sized patch of air elsewhere. Still a portal, but meant to replace instead of move. Just in case, she moved it somewhere near enough for Jaune to deal with it and focused again on stabbing Malkuth in the face.

"Bitch, I just grew that back," He said, sounding annoyed as he evaded her next strike. However he was communicating, it wasn't reliant on sound, because she didn't slow down. Telepathy? No, this didn't have the feel of a mental effect. Some kind of energy- or Aura-based transmission that her brain interpreted as words.

It didn't matter, truthfully, but it meant that she might have to listen to him talk as she tore him apart. Thankfully, before she had to do any more of that, she felt a shift come from Jaune's direction and was reacting even before he fired. Portals opened all around Malkuth, moments before an extremely narrow beam of light flashed from an open space at his feet. It pierced straight through his chest and feed into another portal behind his, releasing it from another for it to tear through the elbow of Malkuth's remaining arm and fly into another portal. In an instant, there was a cage of piercing light weaving in and out of Malkuth's body, and the world darkened until it was the only thing visible.

Taking advantage of the opening, she sheathed her blade once more.

Exceptthat wasn't quite it. It was a trick she'd used before in a pinch, now no more than an afterthought. Her revolving sheath contained dozens of different Dust blades, each designed for a specific task, and now she was creating a tiny portal at the entrance of her sheath with the other side positioned within the case itself. Putting her current sword back where it belonged was simple enough; she didn't even really need her power for that, seeing as it was currently on the empty place. Remembering the precise location of the exact blade she needed relative to that empty space was usually a bit trickier, which was why she'd used several tricks when it came to their precise arrangement. Mnemonic things, to make it simpler; batching similar types together, ordering by color, numbering them, and more. There were several different methods, because in a battle there wasn't always time to think through or get trickyin those cases, she went with whatever she thought of first and made due.

Now, however, there was no need for tricks. She could literally see inside the case without even looking at it; she disconnected her current blade, reassigned the portal to what she wanted, and attached the new one in a process that took no more time than it had taken to sheath and draw her sword.

If space didn't work, what of time?

She swung her new blade, her Aura causing the Dust to glow, and a wave of twisting power leapt from the edge to sweep across the battlefield.

The secret of using Dust is that there is no predefined way of using it. It was something that reacted to a person's Aura and could be used as a catalyst to create something new, beyond the user's normal ability. At the most basic level, it was easy to draw parallels between one person's use and another's, because Dust could simply be used to align the user's Aura with the corresponding element. Similarly, an experienced or reckless person could simply draw the power out of the Dust, unleashing it upon the world with no restraint but their own power and will. Even then, however, there were countless possibilities hidden within Dust and just as many ways to use it. There wereand had been for as long as their records now went backmany schools of thought and practice when it came to wielding the power of Nature's Fury. Martial arts styles, sword styles, long and short-range methods; there were even styles meant entirely for show, practiced by high-end entertainers. Once, she'd listened to a musician who used their instrument to weave a song into a story, illustrated by mobile figures of ice and fire. Those were all things that could be taught, given a willing enough student.

And then there were things that were as personal as one's Semblance. Specifically, the ways Dust interacted with a person's Semblance. It was, after all, a personal expressionperhaps even manifestationof the user's Aura. While generally static and unchanging barringspecial circumstances, there was always the option of aspecting or redefining one's power through the lens of Dust. Not all Semblances allowed that; for some, there was just no meaning to aligning their power with an element, while others were just entirely unaffected. A precog she'd once known could use Dust to sense the presence of only a specific element in the near future, but outside of rare situations, that did nothing but limit her sight. Jaune's was like that, too, and was perhaps the most thorough example she'd ever seen, with the most basic aspects of his power left completely untouched no matter what he drew upon. He could use Dust to change the nature of some of his skills, but the Gamer itself? No.

But that was too be expected. Not all Semblances lent themselves easily to such modifications after all, nor to violence itself. Worse, because of the personal nature of it, it wasn't necessarily something that could be taught, but which had to be discovered. A dozen different crystals might prove themselves utterly worthless to a person, while using a specific kind of Dust might yield unexpected results.

In many ways, that had been the case for her. She'd first learned how to use Dust by observation, peaking into classes and watching practices while she was just a little girl. Like most talents, Dust was something that took time and effect to masterand even more time and effort to remain a master of. Once she'd figured that out, it had become simple to find unknowing teachers and, with her power, easy to find opportunities to practice. Many of them had ended explosively, in one way or another, but in time she'd gotten a feel for it and explored the possibilities. Due to the nature of her Semblance, spacial Dust had been one of the first she'd put serious effort into learning to use and she'd found a variety of ways to do so. A 'sticky' portal that seemed to separate things she cut through. A sharp portal that she could use to intersect things, dividing them in truth. Portals of different sizes that could cause temporary alterations to any who moved through them, briefly turning pebbles into boulders and monsters into kittens. She'd even figured out a way to make a portal within a portal, such that anything that tried to pass through appeared to be reflected.

After tampering with space had provided so many useful results, however, she'd inevitably started to wonder about its counterpartso, of course, she'd tried.

As it turned out, it was tricky, meddling with time. Playing with time Dust was much the same. It was costly, with even sizable chunks of the material potentially lasting only an instant, and the uses almost always short-lived in an absolute sense.

But sometimes, all you really needed was a little time.

Malkuth lifted his remaining hand even as the other began to regrow. Violently colored light wreathed it, bright enough that had she been relying on her normal senses, she might have had to avert her eyes. Instead, she stared at him silently, waiting without fear. Malkuth prepared to fire

And abruptly staggered, a gleaming blade emerging from the center of his chest. Sparing it a brief glance, she trust her sword forward where it seemed to vanish into the airconsumed by time and space even as the blade that had stuck Malkuth disappeared.

Without hesitation, she rushed towards Malkuth, feeling a change come over her even as she did. She'd only experienced this once before, during the single trial run she and Jaune had managed to engineer, but it was as exhilarating as it was terrifying. Her flesh began to peel away, revealing something underneath as if it had always been there. She felt the mask come over her face, become her face, even as her clothes turned black as night, becoming something in-between armor, flesh, and skin. Her arms became vaguely wing-like, feathers sharp as steel. But more than any of that, she felt her gaze sharpen. Not her sight, but the view she had of the world, now coming into even clearer focus before her.

This was Sahasrara, if she remembered correctly. The skill Jaune used to bear his literal soul and draw power from it. It was good timing, though she wasn't sure if that was because of the Dust or just Jaune. Either way, she'd happily take advantage of it while she could.

She approached Malkuth through another series of portals, flickering from place to place in moments and letting minute adjustments of time confuse the process. Even so, as she drew near her opponent, he once again reacted fast, gathering sickly green light in the center of his chest instead of his hands. It spilled forth as something between a whip, a laser, and a lightning bolt, carving a line of destruction straight for herand then vanishing into another circular ripple of space. It didn't reappear instantly, but she flicked her blade down and it reopened, the blast slipping through time to strike at Malkuth at her command.

It did nothing but splash over himobviously, he'd known better then to dish out more than he could take while fighting a portal-userbut it was a distraction and that was all she really needed. She flicked the tip of her sword to the left and a silver portal opened to the left of Malkuth. Another twitch and it's opposite point opened a moment later. Two portals, bridging not just separate points but separate times. Even with all her power, she could only cross a matter of moments, buta moment was enough.

A solitary portal opened in the midst of it all, the other end of it right in front of Jaune, and he didn't need any more of any invitation to give his best shot.

What came forth was very nearly blinding to look at. It wasn't Longinus, the space-piercing spear bound to interfere with her portals, but instead a torrent of pure lightLux Aeterna, most likely.

Good. That served her purposes better than Longinus would have, anyway.

Malkuth lifted his arms in defense, leaning into the blow as if anticipating itbut it was pointless. The initial strike was all but meaningless in this case, at least compared to what was to come. The light washed over him, searing his flesh and pushing him back, before reaching it's true destination and flowing into the time portal.

The moment it didor rather, several moments before it didthe same amount of light came streaming from the opposite portal, rushing back through the intervening space and adding onto itself. She managed to close the portal at the center just in time, before that power had a chance to splash back through, and so it continued onwards, crashing over Malkuth and flowing into the time portal yet again.

And so the process repeated. Whatever entered the first portal exited the second several moments before it enteredin this case causing Lux Aeterna to retread the same path, creating a line of still-brightening light as it overlapped with its past and future self in a strange manner. The nature of entropy saw to it that the attack itself constantly lost energy, but that was nothing compared to the energy being funneled into it through the quirk in time, and so its net energy was increased by its previous iteration with each lap it took through the connected points in time and space. And being an attack made of lightwell. It should go without saying that it took many, many laps.

In a way, Lux Aeterna may have been the best possible choice for this combinationenough so that she assumed Jaune had understood the nature of her attack in the moment or so of thought he'd been allowed. From what see understood, the nature of the attack was to draw in energy, condensing further as it grew more powerful. Jaune had once described it as endothermic light, and as it devoured itself endlessly and grew further and further, it stayed neatly within the pathway allowed by her portals. And as that pathway intersected Malkuth quite nicely, he got to enjoy every moment of the process.

Against anyone else, she'd say that was enough. The power gathered in that stream of light, the power being added to it every secondit was something awesome in a literal sense. Awe-inspiring, terrifyingit was one of the reasons she didn't use this application of her powers very often. For all the potential it held, the risks should it be unleashed or go out of control way phenomenal. Under normal circumstances, with far weaker attacks in use, it was possible to cause extreme collateral damage; added onto itself enough times, practically anything could be weaponized. A flash light, a laser pointer, or any variety of weaponsonce, she'd even combined it with her secret weapon and the results had nearly been disastrous. The 'wipe nations clean of life' kind of disastrousand Lux Aeterna was significantly more powerful than a laser pointer. Under normal circumstances, she'd hold it in place over the target for a second and let nature take its course.

But Malkuth wasn't a normal enemy and she knew it. She'd gone into this knowing she'd need to start with her best tricks and scale up and so that was exactly what she was going to do.

Unfortunately, while the twist in time she'd created could shatter any number of physical laws, in truth or in seeming, it remained an application of Dustand it's time was ironically running out. Perhaps it was the stress caused by sustaining Lux Aeterna, something Malkuth had done, or the other uses she had put it to before this, but what should have been enough to last a second or two looked like it wouldn't even last one. Once it ran out, the portals would fade and the power gathered would take its natural course. And given the power in question, If it did thatit was entirely possible they'd lose something they couldn't live without.

They being Mankind. And that may well be lowballing it; even with the senses granted to her by her connection with Jaune, it was hard to keep track of the precise magnitude of something that was overwriting itself at the speed of light and she'd given up before even trying.

Normally, this would be when she'd create a portal in time and space, banishing the attack utterly before it could cause too much damagebut she was reluctant to throw such a weapon away so easily, considering their foe.

Besides. There might be a better use for it that simply getting rid of it.

Sheathing her sword again, she cast it aside but kept her power flowing through itit would waste away entirely in a few more moments, but she needed those moments.

And in its place, she brought out her trump carda blade of purest white, the only one of its kind she had. While she could afford to carry duplicates of most kinds of Dust, there were several varieties that were too hard to come by to allow that. Thanks to her power, she had other ways of getting what she wanted, but even then, finding enough of certain kinds of dust to make an entire blade could be a challenge. White Dust in particular was a severe chore to acquire in such quantities, especially with the limits to its use. But every now and then, it proved itself worth having. In her lifetime, this was the third such blade she'd owned and the previous two had saved her life.

Hopefully, this one would live up to their standard.

Taking a deep breath, she lifted her sword and called to the power contained within it.

In an instant, there was nothing left in the world but her. Everything around her flickered once and then went black, fading utterly from her sight. The light of the portals, the sky, everythingit all just seemed to cease to be. The only thing she could see, the only thing she could sense, was herself and the blade she held in her handand even that was changing. The white Dust of the blade seemed to corrode, shattering and breaking apart in a matter of moments as if it were falling towell, to dust. The physical matter that had composed her blade was gone, completely and utterly.

But in its place was something else, like a light in the darkness. It embodied the same space, held the same shape, still looked like a swords edgebut it wasn't. Instead, this was the state her Semblance took when exposed to white Dust.

It was a portal in the shape of a sword. For a long time, she'd though that it was nothing but an opening, that there was no other side of it, but her time with Jaune had changed that. Where the portal led to, she still wasn't certain, but it had something to do with the Light Jaune drew several of his own skills from. And now that she held that power in her hands, the only question was how to use it.

White Dust was strange. For all that it seemed to embody the element of light, it was more than thator rather, the Light was more than that. It wasn't just a matter of photons and illumination; it held ties to the very soul, to the core of a person. The first time she'd used it, she'd broken through limits that should have been untouchable, bisecting her opponent with a portal. The second time, she'd created a portal that drew in everything around it and another that emitted it as raw power. Two completely different uses, with the only connecting point being her.

This time, she used it differently once more. As the world came back to her, she ignored the light, though it now seemed to draw her towards it. She ignored the ignored she could sense within it as well, though she considered leveling this power towards him. Instead, she focused her light on the swirling darkness she could feel at the edge of her sensesand cut.

The still black pit that had hovered over the battlefield tried to resist that power, but it couldn't, nor could its master. It came apart at the seams and released its prisonerand the light assailing Malkuth gained a mind of its own.

"Thank you, Raven," Jaune said as he strode past her, abruptly by her side. He'd probably teleported when he sensed the situation changeand change it had. Of all the possible uses for the one shot the Dust gave her, this had seemed like the safest best, even if it was also the least certain. She couldn't be certain what would result from this, because it wasn't her power she'd chosen to rely on this time. Instead, it was someone else's.

She'd chosen to trust Jaune's plan.

He stopped and looked back at her, smiling for a moment.

"Do you mind if I handle it from here?" He asked.

Already, she could feel her power and control fadingso instead of answering aloud, she simply nodded.

She smiled a bit wider and then looked at the torrent of light, now writhing as if fighting to take shape or to retain one.

"I figured none of the skills I'd learned would be enough to stop youif it was that easy, you wouldn't still be here. You've probably seen it all before, anyway. Sohere's a new trick, Malkuth," He said. "Something I made just for you."

His form fractured, splitting in twoand then there was light between his halves, drawn from the power gathered before him; Keter, briefly visible between the twins. Then the two sides of him came together with an explosion of force, trapping that light and energy between their reunifying mass and collapsing into itself.

But what was left was something greater than the sum of its parts.