Chương 5: A Knight and a hunter
Jaune Arc smiled as he took a graceful sip from his cup of tea.
"Fearless leader, what are you doing?" Nora Valkyrie asked as she looked at her team leader in peaceful silence on one of the benches around Beacon Academy, dressed in the school uniform with some adjustments. He proudly wore a red shirt and a black version of the vest and tie with a red diamond Tie holder pinned over his chest above his heart.
He held a scroll in his hand filled with depictions of numerous stances. Where Jaune got them was a mystery to Nora, but she didn't mind. Her fearless leader is a good person and he wouldn't steal.
"Just brushing up on my Martial arts skills, Nora," Jaune answered as he lowered his cup of tea. "And thinking of which styles I can share with the rest of the team,"
Now, Nora was stunned. As orphans, Nora knew how knowing martial arts could make a difference in survival and how long she and Ren proved themselves worthy to be trained by a certain individual from Mistral. While she was not as good as Ren in Hand-to-hand combat, she knew that the knowledge in those scrolls and books could go for a fortune in Mistral.
"Wait, Martial arts? You know Martial Arts?"
"Yes, Several actually," Jaune said with a fond smile as he remembered how the Archmage of the Mages guild supplemented his magical education with hand-to-hand combat in the form of claw-dances. "My main combat style is similar to Pyrrha's, but mine is more refined for combat."
Nora blinked as she looked at her fearless leader. She had seen Pyrrha's fights after Jaune had spent an hour or two forcing the team to dissect the champion's fighting style an she knew that Pyrrha could easily match Yang in unarmed combat.
"I already found a style for Ren and I can hopefully remove some of Pyrrha's flashier habits," Jaune said to himself as he looked at Nora. "For you, I guess I can teach you the tried and tested style of my friend, Mazoga, and some bits of an Akaviri-style Martial art."
"Will you really do that, Fearless leader?" Nora asked, looking at the sitting Blonde who smiled at her.
"Why wouldn't I?" Jaune asked with complete seriousness. "We're a team, Nora. A family from now on. I will do everything in my power to provide the right tools for my family to survive, live, and be better than before." The young man said with a sincere look in his blue eyes.
'Granted, I killed my last 'family' in cold blood,' Jaune thought to himself.
"It'll take a day for me to write the instructions and," A face filled with falling tears stunned the young Crusader as he looked at his teammate.
Tears of joy fell from Nora's eyes as she repeated the word family Jaune told her. The thing she wanted the most...
Jaune looked at his teammate then closed the scroll in his hand and gently wrapped the crying girl in a loving embrace. 'This time, I will protect my family... and those who harm them will belong to the Dread Father,'
-=-=-=-=-
Eula Lawrence looked at the mystery of the century for her as she stood with her distant relative, Weiss Schnee. The Lawrence family was one of the oldest families from Vale, rivaling even Gunnhildr and Ragnvindr. At first, her family fought for freedom and independence but as times went easier, house Lawrence fell to decadence over a century ago when a man named Gato Gele married into the Lawrence family and enslaved weaker humans and Faunus.
Humans and Faunus, enslaved and beaten, weren't broken. With the help of the Gunnhildr and Ragnvindr families, the chains of slavery were broken. The result ended up with the loss of pride and respect for the Lawrence name but it never broke their wealth.
Gato was evil but also a shrewd businessman and while he was heartless, he held love for the Lawrence family that fostered him and prepared failsafes. The family he destroyed was saved from economic ruin thanks to him.
The mystery in front of her is one person named Jaune Arc. The young Blonde was in the process of meditating in one of the recreational rooms with several candles circularly surrounding him. The dark room illuminated the form of the knight as Jaune breathed in the same rhythm as the candle flames danced.
"Eula, Weiss," Jaune greeted as he sat in place.
"Arc," Weiss greeted as she looked at Jaune.
"Sir Arc," Eula greeted, earning a look from Weiss while Jaune smiled at her.
"How are you two?" Jaune asked, standing in place as he looked at them. Eula noted how he wore his combat clothes and he moved in them with ease and grace that made Eula wary of him.
"I'm fine," Weiss frostily replied as she looked at the Blonde. The way the shadows lovingly embraced the Blonde made her a bit annoyed. This... doofus was acting odd. Not as odd as Ruby, but odd.
"For impending our time with each other, Jaune Arc. Mark my words, Vengeance will be mine," Eula said as she looked at the blonde.
Chuckling at the verbal tic, The blonde smiled as he lowered the hood he wore and the candlelight danced, revealing his dimly lit face. "That's quite an adorable verbal tic," The blonde replied in a soft, smooth, and sincere tone, showing fondness.
Hearing this, Eula froze and felt her heart stop. This weird blonde said what? She felt the temperature rise a bit as she processed the words. Adorable?
"If you want to use the room, I can move into another place. I know my... antics can be disturbing," Jaune said as he looked at them.
"It's fine!" Suddenly, Eula turned around to try and calm herself. "As payment for your earlier transgression to me, you shall stay here and tell us about yourself,"
"Eula? Are you okay?" Weiss asked her distant relative while Jaune blinked as he looked at the two.
"Well, It's fine," Jaune said with a smile as he looked at the. "I was already finished with my meditation,"
Hearing this, Eula raised a brow as she looked at the Blonde. The hoodie and jeans allowed him to get their attention while seemingly allowing him to slip out of their senses easily.
"Where did you learn to fight like that, Arc?" Weiss asked, looking at Jaune. She was curious about his skill with his sword and shield. At first, she thought that he was just an unskilled flailing idiot but seeing how he dominated the battlefield made her curious.
"Well, I mostly learned from several adventurers before learning some martial arts," Jaune said as he looked at them. His fighting style was a mix-match of what he learned from the members of the Fighters and Thieves guilds before he learned the style of the Imperial Legion after fighting with the Kvatch guard. He then learned Ancient Akaviri martial arts along with the battlemage style of the Knights of the Lamp and the Mages Guild. Out of all the fighting styles he has learned or inherited, he prospered in the assassination style of combat from the Dark Brotherhood, focused on killing the opponent as quickly as possible, and the fighting style of his predecessor, Pelinal Whitestrake. "Your fighting style is more of a textbook fencing style while Eula's fighting style is more of a fluid and dance-like version of Lucia's,"
Hearing the breakdown of their fighting styles, the distant relatives looked at the Blonde. Jaune fought Lucia in a spar and soundly defeated the redhead, allowing Eula to know that Jaune has an idea of how Lucia fights but her style.
"The way you move, you move like a dancer and when we fought, I noticed how you spun around and moved as if you were dancing," Jaune said as he looked at her. "For Weiss, her personality and skills are too textbook to be anything else,"
"Excuse me?!" Unlike her cousin, Weiss looked insulted as she looked at Jaune.
"Snow Angel, no, Weiss, I saw how you took care of that Boarbatusk and I know you don't have too much real-life experience against Grimm, only sparring or simulations. Not only that, you tried to settle on your stance every time even if not using one would make you kill the Grimm faster." Jaune counted as he looked at her, stopping Weiss and making her pale. "You also have a short temper and Ruby giving you hints caused you to get angry. If you fought an older and smarter Grimm at that time, then you would be dead,"
The heiress of the Schnee Dust Company took a step back at how the Blonde Doofus broke down her fighting style and personality.
"Not only that, your semblance is versatile but you hold it back by being too formal. I advise you to open your mind for new tactics to use and to broaden your skillset."
"What would you know?!" Weiss angrily shouted but deep down, she knew he was right. Unlike the rest of her team, she was taught by the best tutors and had the best quality of equipment yet they managed to outpace her. "I worked hard for this and yet," why? Why was she talking about herself to the Blonde Doofus?
"It feels like it's not enough?" Jaune asked, looking at Weiss and Eula.
"Yes," Eula replied. While she befriended Amber, the stigma of the Lawrence name made her an outcast from her fellow knights. Luckily for her, she managed to find a friend in Amber while her distant cousin was alone.
"Like you could do more?" Jaune asked once more as he looked at his hand. "That you could be better them," The face of his friend, brother, and emperor, Martin Septim, appeared in his mind.
"Yes..." Weiss whispered as she looked at the melancholic look on the Blonde's face.
"I know that feeling all too well," Jaune revealed as he looked at them. Blue eyes filled with wisdom gazed at the eyes of the distant relatives.
-==-==-==-==-
Jaune Arc hummed as he found himself in an unknown location.
"This place is," The Blonde whispered as he saw nothingness around him. A void, an endless void with countless corpses with their mouths open, singing a song of silence.
In front of him stood his family. The members of the Cheydinhal sanctuary, smiled at him before they all bowed to him. No, not him, someone else.
Turning around, the Blonde's eyes widened as he saw a wraith in front of him with his mentor, Lucien Lachance, dutifully standing by the side of the wraith.
"Welcome home, My child," Looking at his body, Jaune saw the Armor of Pelinal Whitestrake over his body, drenched in the colors of the Dark Brotherhood.
In his dorm room, Jaune Arc sat awake as he looked around. What was that dream? Feeling a weight on his body, the Blonde looked at the blade of Woe in his lap. The same dagger he had sealed away and it was now with him. Not only that, the rewards he had been given as a reward for his contacts were all neatly placed on the edge of his blade along with a note.
Dear Brother, the dread father heard your prayers. This is our gift to you, show them the might of our dear Listener.
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