SNST

by Jninja15

Initiation 1.4

Sunset was standing in line with other first-year students near a cliff. She was flexing her fingers nervously as Professors Ozpin, Glynda Goodwitch, and Shota Aizawa stood in front of her and the other students with his cane and a ceramic mug.

“For years, you have trained to become warriors,” Ozpin started, “And today, your training will be evaluated in the Emerald Forest.”

Sunset nervously tapped her thumb and her pinkie fingers against her thigh.

“Now I know many of you have heard rumors of the assignment of teams.” Glynda said, “Let me put your confusions to rest. Each of you will be given teams. Today.”

Sunset let out a quiet nervous chuckle.

“These teammates will be with you for the rest of your time here at Beacon.” Ozpin continued. “So it is in your best interest to be partnered with someone you can work well with. That being said, the first person you make eye contact with after landing will be your partner for the next four years.”

Sunset could faintly hear Ruby whine, “What?”

“After you’ve partnered up, you will make your way to the northern part of the forest. You will meet opposition along the way. Do not hesitate to kill everything in your path... or you will die.”

Sunset swallowed a lump in her throat.

“You will be monitored and graded for the duration of your initiation,” Aizawa started, “but the other instructors and I will not intervene.”

“You will find a ruin at the end of a path containing several relics,” Ozpin continued. “each pair will choose one and return to the top of the cliff. You will guard that item as well as your standing and will grade you appropriately.”

‘Ok.’ Sunset thought to herself, her heart pounding in her ears, ‘Sounds simple enough. I haven’t tried out One For All yet, but it sounds like I might not have to here. Even if I do, I hope all of my training will prevent me from being ripped apart from the power.’

“Are there any questions?” Ozpin asked.

“Actually, Sir.” Jaune, standing next to Sunset, spoke up. “I have a-”

“Good.” Ozpin interrupted. Mechanical whirring and snapping could be heard as student after student began flying into the forest. Very quickly, it came to Jaune launching into the air, pleading for a landing strategy.

Sunset readied herself to be catapulted into the air.

Ozpin came by and whispered to her, “Celestia wishes you luck, Sunset.”

Sunset looked at Ozpin with shock before the mechanisms sprung loose and sent her flying through the air.

Ozpin took a sip of his mug as he observed his freshmen students fly through the air into the Emerald Forest.

“So, I see initiation has started off without a hitch.” came a gentle, feminine voice, hiding just out of sight.

Ozpin turned his attention to the voice to find Celestia in her true form. She was wearing a loose-fitting business suit and was followed shortly by a scholarly man. His long, raven black hair was partially tied back in a ponytail, and two locks framing both sides of his face. He wore an almost ostentatiously fancy hooded cloak over an embroidered brown vest and white shirt with puffy sleeves.

“Celestia,” Ozpin said, “glad you could join us.” he turned to the other man. “Professor Albright, I’m surprised to see you here.”

“Yes, well, I may disagree with your... admissions style. However, I’ve decided that I can still assist with keeping the students alive while they perform this...” he hesitated.

“Impractical exam?” Aizawa offered.

“I wouldn’t go that far, but yes. Not all huntsmen need to be monster hunters.”

“Agreed,” Aizawa responded. “This test is incapable of testing for all potential skills needed to be a good huntsman in other fields.”

“Yes,” Ozpin stated. “However, this test does allow us the opportunity to see how our prospective students will handle themselves under stressful situations. Then we can improve upon that with their time here.” he takes a sip from his mug. “With that said, I do believe the two of you should be on your way to the forest to watch over said students.”

The two men nodded. “Cyrus,” Aizawa said, “since this is your first year here, allow me to show you the ruins intended to be the student’s finish line.” The ninja professor sprinted off into the forest as the more scholarly man struggled to keep up at full sprint.

Ozpin watched the two disappear into the forest and sighed with a subtle groan as he turned his attention to his tablet scroll.

“You don’t like Professor Albright, do you?” Celestia said.

“It’s not so much him that I dislike,” Ozpin responded, not taking his eyes off the tablet. “It’s the reason he’s here that bothers me.”

“The Warehouse.” Glynda said simply, with minor disdain.

Ozpin glanced at Glynda from the corner of his eye. “Yes, they have sent one of their agents to keep an eye on me.”

Celestia gave a hearty chuckle. “Well, you yourself are quite the artifact they’d love to have in their collection. The ultimate prize, if you will.”

Ozpin smirked as he gave an audible chuckle. “They are not in the habit of collecting people as part of their collection of artifacts.” his smile fell. “Except under... dire circumstances.”

Celestia looked up towards the forest, futility scanning for the new professor. “Yes, that is true.”

A chirp from the tablet interrupted the somber mood.

“Ah, we have our first pairing already,” Ozpin said. “Peter Parker and Pit Athena.”

“Oh, goodness,” Glynda said exasperatedly. “Why did you even allow that Pit child to come here? I’ve seen his transcript. That boy can barely even read.”

Sunset was caught off-guard by Ozpin’s parting comment but couldn’t let that linger in her mind for too long. She had to come up with a landing strategy that Ozpin mentioned earlier. Seeing as she was headed into a forest, the most straightforward approach would be to catch her scythe onto a tree branch or on the trunk and spiral around it.

With a strategy in mind, she changed her train of thought to who she would hope to see first to pair up with. “Yang or Ruby would be great,” Sunset thought to herself as she unsheathed her weapon and put it into scythe form. “but there’s no guarantee I’d get either of them. Especially since I’m sure Ruby would much rather be with her sister. Which is ok, but then there’s Peter, he seems nice, or how about Jaune? Mm, Jaune doesn’t seem like he would be very good in a fight.”

She was rapidly approaching a tree. Sunset readied herself and caught her scythe onto the trunk of the tree. Unfortunately, she misjudged how deep she was going to cut into the tree. She cut into the tree at the right angle to begin decelerating as she spun around it but cut too deep for it to be a gentle stop. The scythe logged itself into the tree, and its handle slammed itself into her stomach. She tumbled over the now stationary scythe and nearly lost her grip as she hung high in the air above solid ground. Sunset reestablished her grip and made sure she wasn’t going to lose it completely.

“Well,” Sunset said out loud, “That didn’t go exactly as planned. Glad I have my aura now, or I surely would have broken a few bones from that.” She looked up at where her scythe logged itself into the tree and sucked in a hissing breath. “That looks like it cut deep. It’s going to be difficult to get out.” She looked down at the ground, “I’m too high up to make this any easier by just going down and reassessing the situation.” She looked around in the hopes of finding a nice thick branch nearby that she could stand on instead. There were none. “Welp, looks like my only option is to dislodge myself from here and catch myself on the way down.” She began to swing back and forth to remove the scythe from the tree, but there was barely any budging.

After a few swings, she stopped for a second to catch her breath. She saw someone standing on the ground in front of her. It was Twilight, staring up at her like she was a monkey in a zoo.

Sunset gave a sheepish chuckle as she waved hello with her foot.

Twilight seemed to not find that amusing as she turned around and walked away without a word.

“Wait! Come back! We’re supposed to be partners now!” Sunset shouted. Then she whimpered, “Please help me.”

Twilight Sparkle walked away from the pathetic display of a wannabe huntress, stumbled through some bushes, and looked up. She saw a blonde boy in armor plates over a black hoodie pinned high up in the tree by a red and brass spear, hanging by his hoodie. He struggled to extricate himself from the tree when he noticed Twilight down below. He smiled and laughed nervously, waving hi at Twilight. Twilight walked back the way she came.

Jaune deflated at this rejection of help.

“Jaune?” came the voice of Pyrrha at his feet. “I hope I didn’t leave you up there for long?”

“You know?” Jaune responded nonchalantly. “If I had a nickel for every time a girl refused to help me down from hanging in a tree by my hoodie, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s strange that it happened twice. And in one day no less.”

Sunset switched her strategy to short, quick swings to dislodge herself. She then suddenly felt solid ground softly touch her feet, lifting her up to where the scythe was a waist height. Sunset glanced down at her feet, and a short distance away, saw Twilight using her semblance of telekinesis to hold up the chunk of earth Sunset was standing on. Sunset quickly planted her feet on the floating ground, wrenched the scythe from the tree, and sheathed it.

Twilight slowly brought the tiny floating island straight down, leaving only a small ring of disturbed grass as a symbol for what happened.

“Thank you for-”

“By no means does this make us friends.” Twilight interrupted coldly as she walked past Sunset at a brisk pace.

Sunset was taken aback by the brusk attitude from the person who just helped her.

“Keep up, slowpoke!” Twilight verbally jabbed at Sunset, jarring her out of her confused stupor.

“Are you sure we’re heading in the right direction?” Sunset asked Twilight after wandering through the forest for several minutes.

“Of course I know where we’re going!” Twilight snapped.

“I know you know where we’re going. What I was asking was if this was the right direction.” Sunset groused.

Twilight turned on her heels to stare down Sunset, their faces inches away from each other. Sunset wilted under Twilight’s intense glare, her pony ears flattening against her head. Twilight’s silver eyes were burning intense like pieces of white-hot metal. “Now listen here- Sunset, was it?”

Sunset silently and rapidly nodded her head.

“I don’t know how someone as spineless as you weaseled her way into Beacon, but I earned my spot here with a recommendation from Celestia herself...”

Sunset’s fear turned to awe. She opened her mouth to say something but was unsure of what to say. If Sunset were to express her awe and tell her she got here the same way- well, almost- Twilight might take offense to that and berate her even more. What if she played it cool, pretend like she didn’t believe her? No, she would likely just call her stupid or something for not taking her at her word. How about a mix of both awe and disbelief? Yeah, that’ll work, but how much awe, though? Sunset definitely wouldn’t tell Twilight how involved Celestia was in getting her into Beacon.

“... So just stay out of my way and-” Twilight was unable to finish her tirade as she and Sunset heard a low, guttural growl. They turned aside to see a muscular, bipedal mass of roiling shadow step out of the bushes. Its red eyes glowing in the eye sockets of its white, skeletal face, its fangs bared. The beowolf was followed by several more, quickly surrounding Sunset and Twilight. The two huntresses instinctively took a defensive stance, standing back-to-back and drawing their weapons as they were taught. Sunset drew her weapon in shield form, while Twilight drew a spear with an eight-pointed star as the spearhead. The spearhead’s metal was dark purple, and the staff a lavender color with raspberry-colored leather at the grips.

‘This is bad.’ Sunset thought. ‘We’re surrounded by... at least 8 beowolves, and there’s only two of us. I also don’t know what my partner’s strengths and weaknesses are. I don’t have a good grasp on my own strengths and weaknesses, especially after being gifted One-for-All only recently.’

Sunset continued to think and process information to formulate a strategy as the grimm circled the two initiate huntresses. “Ok, Twilight? I think I have a plan.”

“Mine’s better,” Twilight responded as she lifted her spear to eye level, pointing the tip at the ground. “Just keep your little shield up and stay. Out. Of my way.” And she lunges forward at the beowolf in front of her.

“What?!” Sunset shrieked as she saw Twilight dash away into the line of beowolves, turning back just in time to catch a wolf’s claws with her shield.

The grimm kept a hold on the shield as it pressed down, threatening to pancake Sunset underneath her weapon. Sunset could see out of the corner of her eye that others were closing the circle around her, their breathing and barking sounding like sadistic laughter. In a burst of motion, she stopped pushing against the grimm. She fell flat to her back and added more force to the wolf’s momentum to send it flying into the one that had moved directly behind her. She rolled up from the ground in a backward somersault, transformed her weapon into its scythe form, and slashed at two standing grimm, cutting a deep gash into both of their chests. They were staggered, but they weren’t dead yet. Sunset yelped as she rolled out of the way of an incoming strike from another beowolf, slashing one of its legs off on her way back to her feet.

‘Don’t let them surround you.’ Sunset remembered from her training. ‘Getting them to line up in a single file would be ideal, but-’ She didn’t finish her thought before she heard the roar of another grimm entering the fray. It was an ursa, a giant black bear creature with an exposed skeletal face with red eyes and large, bony spikes protruding from its back. And it was charging directly at her. Sunset pulled up her shield to block the incoming strike from the ursa. It knocked her off her feet and sent her careening into Twilight, knocking them both to the ground.

“Watch where you’re going!” Twilight barked at Sunset as she got up, then saw the Ursa coming for them and took a battle stance.

Sunset grabbed Twilight by her sleeve. “Twilight, we need to leave, now!”

Twilight shook her off. “You can’t expect us to outrun an ursa, can you?”

Sunset looked out to the downhill slope behind them, then to her shield. “I think the both of us can fit.”

Comments

[Aleck_Ultimate]

Ah, I was so desperate for RWBY content, I didn't think I'd see any here, and as a main storyline at that. Yay!

I await the sequel with impatience.