Standing in front of a window in a white castle built onto the side of a mountain was the Princess of the Sun, Celestia. She is six feet tall and her her coat is as white as a cloud while her mane and tail are reminiscent of a pale rainbow in the summer and seemed to blow in an ethereal wind. She also had large white wings on her back and a long horn on her forehead. On Celestia flanks was a symbol that looked like the sun. She was waiting for her sister Princess Luna who was bringing their friends and the greatest defenders of the realm, Celestia’s apprentice Twilight Sparkle and her friends.
Slowly the doors at the end of the hall opened and the ponies she had been waiting for walked the hall. “You called for us Princess?” Twilight asked. Twilight was smaller than Celestia only coming up to her shoulder. Twilight was a lavender colored Unicorn with the symbol of five small stars around one bigger star on her flank. Twilight’s friends are Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie.
Applejack has an orange coat with a straw-yellow mane and tail and always wore a Stetson cowboy hat, her symbol is three red apples. Rainbow Dash is a sky-blue coat pegasus, and a rainbow-colored mane and tail, her symbol is a dark grey cloud with a rainbow lightning bolt. Rarity is a snow-white unicorn with a purple mane and tail her symbol is three diamonds.
Fluttershy is a soft yellow pegasus with a pink mane and tail, her symbol is three blue butterflies with blue wings. Pinkie Pie is bright pink with a slightly darker pink main and tail her symbol is two blue balloons and one yellow balloon. “Yes, I did, thank you all for coming so quickly, and thank you for bringing them Luna.” Celestia said.
“It’s not a problem Sister.” Luna said as she walked over to stand next to Celestia. Princess Luna was slightly shorter then Princess Celestia, she was a dark blue coat and her mane and tail are reminiscent of the night sky, and her symbol was a crescent moon against the black sky.
“The reason I called for all of you is I sensed a small disturbance near the Tree of Harmony a few days ago. I don’t know exactly it is but I feel that we should all go just in case. I would have called you all sooner but Luna and I were dealing with a very delicate situation with the Sphinx Kingdom.” Celestia said. “If you we are all, ready I will teleport us to Luna’s and my old castle.” When everyone nodded signaling they were ready Celestia’s horn lit up and in a flash the eight of them disappeared. They reappeared in the main hall of the ruined castle. When they walked outside they saw a creature they had never seen before strumming a guitar as they sat on the edge of the ravine next to the old rope bridge.
They couldn’t see what exactly what the person was wearing apart from a red hooded cape. Before Celestia and her companions could approach the stranger, they began playing a song that pulled at the groups hearts. While it didn't have any lyrics it spoke volumes of what the person had lost, family, friends, and everything they knew and loved. As they played the image of a woman sitting with her back against his appeared in a flurry of rose petals. She’s shorter that the man and has fair skin, short raven-black hair and when she opened her eyes they could see she has silver eyes, she also had wolf like ears on the top of her head. She wore white high-neck blouse covered by a black corset and a red and black skirt. She was also wearing a belt with strange metal containers and black boots that went half way to her knees. One thing that confused them was she appeared to be wearing the same hooded cape the man had on, and had a metal rose attached on the left side. As they tried to understand what they saw the image of the woman began to hum finding a perfect harmony music.
Tears flowed freely form Celestia’s eyes. As she looked at her sister and her friends she found that she wasn’t the only one crying. As the song finished a gust of wind blew past and more rose petals enveloped the image of the woman as she said. "Yang, I know we've had a hard life but you shouldn't let my what happened stop you from being who are. Remember that your family is always with you." As soon as she finished the petals scattered and she was gone.
As the music died down the person playing the guitar noticed the presence of those behind them and asked in a young and obviously male voice. “Who are you?” Hearing his voice Celestia guess he was around twenty one years old.
Luna stepped forwards, even though there still tears in her eyes her voice was steady as she said. “I am Luna, Princess of the Moon and this is my sister Celestia, Princess of the Sun. We are the rulers of Equestria. With us are our friends Twilight Sparkle who is Celestia’s apprentice. The others are Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy and Pinkie pie. Who are you and who was that we just saw singing with you?”
After Luna spoke the man sighed and got to his feet, “I thought that I was just hearing things, but if you saw my her then this world is stranger than I thought. That was my sister Ruby Rose, I am Yang Xiao Long although I’m thinking of changing my first name to Ruby or adding it to my name in some way, in honor of my sister.”
“What do you mean ‘this world’?” Twilight asked.
“Ruby and I are from a world called Remnant.” Yang said.
“The first part of your song mentioned the colors red, white, black and yellow. Judging from Ruby’s outfit it’s easy to guess, red represented her in the first part but who do the others represent?” Rarity asked.
“White and black represented our teammates when Ruby and I went to Beacon Academy, Weiss Schnee and Blake Belladonna. Yellow represents me. Although I have no idea where I learned that song, not that it really matters where I learned it I guess.” Yang said.
“Did your team have some kind of super cool code name?” Pinkie asked.
“We were team RWBY.” Yang replied.
“Team Ruby? Isn’t it a bit odd that it was named after your sister?” Rainbow asked.
“I guess but it was spelled, R, W, B, Y. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Yang. It’s been a long-standing tradition that the team name for Hunters was an acronym using the first letter of each person’s name and the team name represents a color. Much like everybody’s name on Remnant” Yang explained.
“What happened to Weiss and Blake?” Celestia asked.
“Ruby I got separated from them almost three years ago thanks to that bitch Cinder and her forces attacking Beacon Academy. After we recovered Ruby and I searched for them but found no trace of them. For all I know they could be dead, but I doubt that they are.” Yang said as his voice went from having hints of anger when he mentioned Cinder to practically being emotionless.
“How could a female dog have done that?” Fluttershy asked.
“Where I’m from the term ‘bitch’ can be used as an insult or a term for a female dog, no idea how that happened.” Yang explained his voice still void of almost all emotion.
“Oh,” Fluttershy said.
“Umm… wow there is no good way to say this, but what happened to Ruby?” Applejack asked not looking at Yang.
“Two months ago, Ruby and I got separated after a tunnel we were in caved in, we were escorting civilians away from their village which was attack by Grimm but got ambushed by more Grimm. When there was a cave in Ruby stayed behind to give me time to get the civilians to safety. I’ve been looking for her since then and when Cinder sent me here after I had been fighting Grimm for an entire day…and for some reason she also threw in this guitar. When I got here I arrived in a cave at the bottom of this ravine.” Yang explained. “To my surprise, I found Ruby heavily injured and on death's door. Two months of searching only to have her die in my arms right after I find her, moments after she died the tree glowed and her body dispersed as rose petals. When the tree’s glow died down nothing was left save her weapon, cape, and belt. That was three days ago.”
“Do you have any other family?” Twilight asked barely holding back the sorrow from her voice.
“That's a somewhat complicated question, ten months after Beacon fell, we lost our farther and our uncle was always busy with missions even before Beacon fell. He did drop by occasionally but I haven’t seen him since Beacon fell, and to me Ruby’s mom Summer IS my mom, she died almost four years ago, one day she left on a mission and never returned. My birth mother on the other hand… according to uncle Qrow, she has a survival of the fittest mentality. While I do agree that being strong is important I don’t agree that only the strong should survive.” Yang said and what little emotion was left in his voice had disappeared by the time he finished.
Celestia felt new tears form in her eyes. Yang was clearly a young adult but he had already lost so much. “How do you know this and where did you learn to fight?” Celestia asked.
“Dad taught me when I went to Signal Academy since he was a teacher there, he was a master of hand to hand combat, our uncle Qrow used to teach there as well and taught Ruby how to use her weapon since they use the same kind but at one point he got really busy with missions and had to stop teaching. The last time I saw him was... not the happiest occasion, at the beginning at least but it did get better. As for my birth mother… that’s not something I want to go into right now.” Yang said.
“What exactly kind of place, was Beacon Academy like?” Luna asked trying to change the subject.
“It was a school where people learned how to become a Hunter or Huntress. Hunters and Huntresses are people who learn how to fight and kill Grimm. Anyone who is at least seventeen can send an application to join Beacon if they’ve gone to one of the combat schools, Signal for example. Think of Beacon like high school and you get the idea for why there’s and age restriction. Normally sis wouldn’t have been able to enroll so early since she was fifteen but when Ruby stopped a robbery, the headmaster of Beacon, Professor Ozpin decide to enroll her in Beacon.” Yang explained. “While at beacon or any or the schools like it teams who are advanced enough can be assigned missions to travel to different locations to exterminate Grimm or investigate disturbances and criminal organizations. Because of this being a Huntsmen can be extremely dangerous, and difficult because negative emotions attract Grimm. It draws them like a moth to a flame.”
Everyone paused not sure about how to feel about this. On one hoof, everyone who join Beacon volunteered to fight but on the other hoof many young adults were being sent off to fight dangerous monsters. “Your Sister said the two of lived a 'hard life', can you let us know what that means?” Twilight asked.
Yang was silent for a while before he said, “Ruby and I are Faunus, Humans with animal like characteristics, Ruby’s a Wolf Faunus and has wolf like ears while I’m a Dragon Faunus and have slightly pointed ears with scales around them plus I gain more scales when I activate my Semblance along with a boost to my physical strength. Faunus’s like us have been discriminated against for all of recorded history.”
Before anyone could ask was a Semblance was a growling could be heard. Walking out of the forest on the other side of the ravine came a large black bear with bone like spikes coming out of its back and a bone like mask with red markings. “An Ursa Minor? Weird, I was expecting the Grimm to turn up sooner. Say what you want though, fighting Grimm is always one of my favorite ways to relieve stress.” Yang said as a cracking sound could be heard before he got into a combat stance after placing his guitar on the ground. When the Grimm put a paw on the rope bridge the old weathered ropes snapped and the bridge collapsed.
“I told y'all we should have fixed that bridge. Guess there’s no way across now.” Applejack said, before her jaw dropped as Yang easily jumped across the ravine and landed on the Grimm. The Ursa roared and three more charged through the forest edge. Everyone watched in awe as Yang was easily handling the four monstrous bears using nothing but punches and kicks. However, a fifth Ursa came into view this one much larger and had more bony spikes than the others. The new Ursa managed to hit Yang who had been dodging most of the other Ursa’s attacks and launched him over the ravine and past the watchers.
“Wasn’t expecting an Ursa Major to join in, but then again I didn’t think fighting Grimm without my weapon would take so long. Oh well, guess it’s time for me to stop playing around and get serious.” Yang said before he smiled, “This is going to be fun!” Then the bracelets on Yang’s arms transformed into golden gauntlets.
“What the?” Celestia gasped.
“These are my weapon, The Ember Celica. Now let’s see if the five of you can keep up with me!” Yang said as he slammed his fists together. When he did, his hair flared up and the ends seemed to catch on fire as dark yellow scales appeared on his face and the rest of his bare skin. Yang charged and jumped over the ravine but instead of landing on one of the Ursa’s this time he punched one and sent it crashing into the Ursa Major. One thing that puzzled the onlookers is, when Yang punched the Ursa there was a small explosion.
“Where are all of those explosions coming from?” Luna asked.
“I don’t know sister but they only happens when Yang punches so they must have something to do with his weapon.” Celestia said as she watched Yang punch one of the smaller Ursa’s arm clean off before using it like a club on one of the other Grimm.
“Is it just me or does he seem to be getting stronger every time one of the Grimm manages to hit him?” Pinkie asked still crying after hearing Yang’s song and story, while one of the Ursa Minors brought its two front paws down onto Yang who blocked by crossing his arms but got sent flying into a tree as another one hit him.
“As much as I want to say that’s impossible, I think your right Pinkie.” Twilight gasped unable to fully understand what she was watching. Yang had made quick work of the four original Ursa’s leaving only the Ursa Major.
“Oh, come on, I thought Ursa’s were supposed to be tough, I was more worried last time I fought a Boarbatusk then I am fighting you.” Yang taunted, and for the first time since they’ve known him they could him laugh. In contrast the Ursa Major roared in fury, before charging at Yang who jumped over the Ursa and kicked it in the back of its head causing it stumble and fall into the ravine. “Have a nice trip and I’ll see you never.” Yang said giving the falling Ursa a mock salute before he started to laugh. “I feel much better after beating some my stress and sorrow into those Grimm! There is nothing quite like beating some Grimm to make a Hunter feel like himself again.”
“…If that’s how he’s normally like, he bounced back to normal almost as fast as Pinkie can.” Rainbow muttered.
“HEY! I represent that remark!” Pinkie said as she went from crying with here mane completely strait and her coat was a darker tone of pink to looking like her normal self with here mane puffing up again in a split second. When they looked towards Yang again they saw the corpses of the Ursa Minor’s disintegrating into red and yellow rose petals.
“Are they disintegrating?” Luna asked.
“Grimm corpses always do that. No one knows why though, it’s just another question about these soulless monsters.” Yang said after he jumped over the ravine again not even bothering to look at the Grimm. He paused for a moment before he picked up the guitar. “Might as well keep this since it’s not like I can return it to its original owner.” Now that he was closer they could see Yang vibrant purple eyes had changed to bright red before they changed back to purple and the scales seemed to melt back into his skin.
When Yang looked at everyone he asked. “I don’t mean to be rude but what kind of people are you? I’ve never seen anyone like you on Remnant.”
“We are Ponies. My sister and I are Alicorns, Twilight and Rarity are Unicorns, Fluttershy and Rainbow are Pegusai while Pinkie and Applejack are Earth Ponies. Unicorns can use magic, Pegusai can fly and manipulate the weather, Earth Ponies are physically strongest of the three races and have the closest ties with the earth, while Alicorns have the best aspects of Pegusai, Unicorns and Earth Ponies.” Luna explained.