"Pyrrha!" Jaune and the rest of her team practically swarmed her the moment she stepped out from the tower in the center of Beacon. "It wasn't anything serious, was it?"

Pyrrha smiled and waved it off. It was fake, but the other three didn't seem to notice it. "Oh nothing, nothing! The headmaster was just making sure that I was ready for the fights tomorrow."

"That sure did take a long time for something like that." Nora squinted and zipped closer to Pyrrha, leaning in only an inch away.

"Um... sorry?" Pyrrha offered.

Nora appraised her for a couple seconds longer, then grinned and hopped back. "Apology accepted: you almost missed it!"

She blinked. "Missed... what, exactly?"

"To make up for the tournament getting delayed for a day, they were going to set up a big fireworks event," Jaune explained with a grin. "With all the Atlas ships around, there's even going to be a nighttime air show with it! Oh, it's going to be so cool! They used to do that in Argus all the time when I was a kid!"

"And I've got us the best seats in the house!" Nora announced with a chipper hop in the air.

"She wants us to sneak to the cliff behind the campus," Ren said, shooting a glance in Nora's direction.

"The one from initiation?" Pyrrha raised an eyebrow.

"Come on, come on! It's starting in thirty minutes: we could get there if we book it!" She'd already bolted off before anyone else could get a word in edgewise.

"It's in an hour," Ren less called to Nora and more 'slightly raised his voice in her general direction', then trudged off off after her.

Jaune and Pyrrha shared a look and a small chuckle, then started following behind. High above, Ozpin and his group of associates gathered yet again in their office, barely visible to the naked eye. Even higher above, almost invisible against the night sky, a lone bird watched them both. Watched and listened. So, this was the new one they'd pressured into accepting the offer to be a Maiden? They were only getting younger. No matter how much she focused, however, she couldn't sense the power of the Maiden within her. There was still time.

Good.

Quoth The Raven

Nora wasn't joking, Pyrrha thought to herself: the view here truly was beautiful. Great floodlights shone deep in the forest, whisking across the gargantuan Amity Coliseum that only looked larger from where they stood. Metal polished to a typically Atlesian sheen shone bright in the light from both above and below, and the Dust crystal keeping it afloat sparkled like one grand diamond. The band of swirling hard light that cradled the arena proper slowly shifted between every color of the rainbow, holographic banners and insignias of the four nations displayed on various levels doing the same. Atop the cliff, it was impossible to imagine that she'd ever stepped foot in it, let alone was the center of attention inside.

"Kinda crazy, isn't it?" Jaune asked her as Nora scrambled atop a broken pillar for an even higher view—whatever good that could do. "Down there's where we started, and up there's where we're headed... I mean, I hope that's where we started: I haven't looked and have no plans to."

Pyrrha sat down on the comforter Nora had snatched from their room so they wouldn't have to sit on the ground. By which she meant Jaune since the rest of them were used to dirt, but Pyrrha appreciated her being nice about it. "I thought you had motion sickness, though."

Jaune stared out at the levitating arena, then let out a deep sigh. "I learned a lot of things about myself when I looked over the edge of that thing." He shuddered. "A lot of things."

The two shared another quiet chuckle and watched the silhouettes of the vast dreadnoughts of Atlas moving across the sky into position, holographic banners of Atlas' flag casting sky-blue light across the airships. Light flashed behind them from the forest they stepped out from, and four streaks of bright light raced overhead, cutting white through the sky with the hissing of sparks. As Nora cheered the beginning of the air show on display, even Pyrrha couldn't fight back a grin. Mistral could do fireworks, sure, but she'd always heard rumors of how Atlas would go one step beyond.

Her thoughts were dashed when she felt a hand over her own.

"I know I might've said it before, Pyrrha but... thanks again for helping me," Jaune said with that honest smile that never failed to make her feel just a little bit happier. "I couldn't have made it here without you."

She smiled depended only on the night to hide the color in her cheeks. "And I could've never found such good friends without you to help me, Jaune." The bursts of colorful light overhead no doubt made her blush clear, Pyrrha was certain. But she could see Jaune was blushing, just as she was. And suddenly, Atlas' air shows weren't so interesting, anymore. The Four Maidens weren't so interesting, anymore. For just a moment, she put all that behind her, and put all that will into one thing: leaning in closer.

Pyrrha didn't know why she even noticed the raven perched in the trees over Jaune's shoulder, watching and visible only in the flashes of the fireworks above. She blinked.

A crimson katana was halfway to Jaune's neck. Pyrrha shrieked and, her aura activating so swiftly that it was a bright-red firework of its own, swung Jaune into the pillar Nora sat atop, the blade always less than an inch behind until he was completely safe. She rolled to her feet and, as Ren's reflexes left him firing a spray of bullets towards their assailant, reached for her own weapons... only to realize that she hadn't brought them with her.

Nora might not have noticed the impact, but she did notice when Ren had started firing. Jaune scrambled to his feet and Nora twisted around, grenade launcher at the ready.

Their attacker was gone.

Jaune stumbled back towards her, groaning and reaching for his longsword. "What's happeni—"

Pyrrha had just a split-second to see their assailant all but appear in front of him, boot driven so hard into his chest that his breastplate crumpled through his aura. The attacker was turned away from her. She caught long, black hair. Pale skin only visible between stockings and a skirt. Wide sheathe at her hip.

The split-second passed, and time caught up to her: Jaune was launched past not just the pillars but the cliff.

"Jaune!" Pyrrha shouted and reached out her hand, but before her Semblance could catch him, he'd thrown his sheathed sword ahead instead, leaving it to be caught in her magnetic pull and for him to fall from view. She hadn't the time to say anything else: her fingers had barely even grazed Jaune's Crocea Mors before the blade of her foe was screaming down for her.

She twisted and raised Jaune's sheathed sword up. Her feet were forced an inch into the earth, and her aura flared. Pyrrha's eyes widened as the light illuminated one other significant trait of her attacker: a Grimm bone helmet that covered her head with countless plates. The White Fang? No time to think: she pushed back with all her might, but it was the woman who allowed her free from their clash, leaping back as Ren emptied another barrage at her.

Flickers of a red sword snapped every bullet from the sky before her foot hit the ground.

"Ren! Check if Jaune's okay!" Pyrrha called as she deployed and slipped Jaune's shield on: there were slight differences, but it'd have to do.

Nora took over for Ren, coming down from her pillar swinging her warhammer with all her might. The assailant caught it on her arm without budging, even as the earth rumbled. The next thing Pyrrha knew, Nora was being flung towards her like hard enough to send them both skidding back. Fireworks of all sizes and colors detonated overhead, finally casting a more constant light on the attacker slowly walking towards them.

Her black dress was styled like a kimono, cut short into a black skirt but with a crimson sash tied around her stomach: she was from Mistral, then. Even the grieves were in the angular, overlapping plate design of her home country, the same color as blood. Beyond the intricate helmet, there was no way of telling her identity, but the massive sheath she carried... Pyrrha could spot glimmers of color within it. Various types of Dust. If her skill hadn't already made it clear, she was a Huntress.

"Branwen?" Nora breathed out, but Pyrrha hadn't the time to ask: this 'Branwen' flicked the comforter up with her foot to obscure herself.

Pyrrha hunkered down, waiting for her to be gone by the time it fell. Instead, in the blink of an eye, a wave of cyan energy slashed through it and swept Nora away into the forest. She couldn't even turn her head before she caught a rush of white at her side. Like in slow motion, Pyrrha saw their attacker's crimson blade coming in towards her. Its speed compressed the air around its tip to the point to leave a trail behind it.

But even that wasn't faster than her Semblance, and combined with her strength, she raised her shield up. With a thunderous crack, she was still blasted into the air.

Branwen beat her to the peak. There was a flash of light behind her, a searing pain, and then she was bouncing off the ground hard enough to crater it. She rolled up to one knee just in time to parry another blow and force the assailant back with her shield.

"Ren says Jaune's fine!" Nora came racing out of the forest, grenade launcher blasting all the while. Pyrrha could barely keep track of Branwen's movements as she sidestepped each one, letting them harmlessly detonate near her. The last she simply flicked her wrist at to blast it to pieces. Were it not for the distortion of the air, she wouldn't have even known she'd used her sword. She was just as fast as Ruby with her Semblance. She could move as fast as Ruby, block as quickly as she could, and attack as swiftly as Adam. Pyrrha's heart sank.

Their enemy made no attempt to move after, even as Ren flipped himself over the cliff's edge, panting and aiming his pistols at her. The three circled her yet kept their distance, looking for any sign of weakness illuminated by the detonating lights above.

"Where's Jaune?" Pyrrha asked Ren.

"He can't get up here as fast as I can: he's safe down there." Ren didn't take his eyes off of her.

They all tensed when Branwen's hand twitched on her hilt.

"What are you doing here, Raven!" Nora demanded to know.

Pyrrha looked to her, astounded. "You know her?!"

"I rescued them from being killed after their town was destroyed," the woman explained as if they were having a casual chat over tea. " 'Kuroyuri,' wasn't it?" Raven scoffed. "Shows how grateful you were."

"You're a bandit. A killer," Ren snarled out. "Why are you in Vale?"

Raven looked to Pyrrha, only darkness beyond her heavy mask. Ren didn't give her time to answer: she had her back to him. He sprinted ahead and drew the daggers beneath his pistols across her in a flurry of emerald slashes. At once, Pyrrha and Nora rushed for her. Raven weaved around each and every one of Ren's strikes, not moving from her spot or so much as glancing towards him. Not until she turned and elbowed him aside.

Nora flanked around to her back in that brief gap and swung for her side. Raven leaned forward and tilted her sheath up behind her back to take the blow for her, sending her spinning with enough momentum to surprise Nora by latching on and flipping over her for leverage, having eyes for one person: Pyrrha. One strike to her shield halted her approach. The next was fast enough for Pyrrha to need to use her Semblance. As was the next. Then the next. Then, all at once, Raven stopped trying to get around it, instead striking at the rate of a machine gun but with the force of a sledgehammer.

Pyrrha started to slide back, but a pulse of her Semblance left a strike gliding off of her shield and flying completely off-mark. Pyrrha thrust forward just as Nora and Ren leaped in from behind Raven.

Raven twisted with the momentum to slash out at the two, and not Raven but a pair of shadows in her image burst forth from her to throw every one of their strikes aside at once. Just as quickly as they came, they faded back into Raven, her blade was sheathed, and she had sprung forward for Ren in a single step. Pyrrha followed in hot pursuit and watched as in the time it took to push her foot off of the ground, Raven pivoted in a snap to face her. Her hand dropped to her sheath.

Pyrrha's instinct to raise her shield came at the same time her head snapped back from the hilt of Raven's sword crashing into her head. Pyrrha's surprise at her wielding a gun-sheath came at the same time Raven had followed up by tearing the electrified blade across chest. As Pyrrha stared in shock into Raven's mask, she finally caught a glimpse of the gaze beyond. An impassive, uncaring, bright-red gaze.

It was in that split second, where her muscles spasmed and the pain finally hit her, that Pyrrha realized that she wasn't fighting to force them into submission. It was kill. She was going to kill each and every last one of them.

And yet, that only left her more determined than ever.

In a fraction of a second, Raven could have sheathed her blade. As such, it only took a fraction of a second where her arm refused to budge for her to know something was wrong. She could feel it: a hostile aura gripping onto not just her blade but the armor across her arm. Without hesitation, she disconnected her blade from the hilt and forced herself back as Pyrrha's blade cut through the space her head was at a moment prior.

Then, launched ahead by a grenade-propelled swing from Nora, Ren crashed foot-first into Raven's back. He flipped off of her at the same time Pyrrha slammed her back with her shield. Before even she could react, Nora swept her legs out from under her with a second swing, sending her spiraling. In a fraction of a second, Pyrrha was coming down with another slash.

But it was all the time Raven needed: the trio of students were forced to retreat as Raven turned that momentum into a whirling set of slashes. Not a moment passed between the time her foot touched the ground and Ren pressuring her with kicks and pistol shots. The clash of blade against bullet was obscured by the roar of the air show, even as Pyrrha joined in. All as planned.

Yet, their assailant was more than used to unfair battles. When they struck as one, she could whirl her blade around her with enough speed and accuracy to deflect every blow. When her weapon was caught in Pyrrha's magnetic grip, she abandoned it to palm thrust Ren away. When Nora retaliated with her grenade launcher, she snatched a grenade from the air to toss and blow Pyrrha back. Once her blade and arm were freed from Pyrrha's Semblance, Raven snatched her katana, rolled beneath a swing of Nora's hammer, leaped off of Pyrrha's shield and snapped a wave of aura back strong enough to rip the ground apart and send Ren flying from air pressure alone.

Raven rolled to her feet, the gouged-out ground carving a line both sides did not cross. Gunfire from Ren, however, freely flowed across the boundary. Raven spun her blade fast enough for it to become only a spinning blur of warping wind and faint red, bullets vanishing into it with only small sparks. Nora joined Ren, yet her grenades were simply batted aside. Finally, however, one struck, blasting up pink smoke and dark dust. This was Pyrrha's chance: before Raven could take advantage of being out of sight, she rushed ahead and leaped over the shattered ground.

A lull in the light show above was the only thing that let her see a fading, pearl-pink within the cloud of Dust: Ren's own bullets, laid out into a line on the ground and still faintly glowing with his aura. Pyrrha pulled her shield in front of her. Raven slashed out, and Ren's bullets were sent right back with many times the force, throwing Pyrrha back between Ren and Nora and dispelling the cloud of Dust.

As Pyrrha recovered and rolled to her feet, darkness had finally returned to the cliff. Their eyes took time to adjust. Raven was barely visible, and the Pyrrha was already catching onto her tendency to vanish... yet she only sheathed her blade. Ren and Nora took the time to reload.

"Are we finished playing around?" she asked.

"Looks like we're doing pretty good to me, chief," Nora growled back.

She turned her mask slightly towards the cliff. Jaune had finally crawled his way back up the cliff, panting and not yet even aware that Raven had seen him. Further ahead, countless little comets were soaring into the air from even deeper in the Emerald Forest, streaks of white and bright-blue being cut into the sky by countless fighters. The grand finale approached. Time was running out.

"You're certainly better than when you were sniveling brats in my tribe, but not by much." Raven turned back to them. "Let me remind you of why you weren't even worthy to be trained by me."

Pyrrha's gaze flicked to Nora, lips parting to inquire. The first of countless bursts of sparkling light painted the sky in a rosy-pink. And, to Nora, Raven was gone with the flash.

To Ren, the blur that rushed past them and lines of red that came in her wake signaled only death, but he was too slow to even react.

Only Pyrrha could make out Raven's full barrage of swings and whirls of her blade as she passed between them. Even something as small as looking at Nora was a large enough distraction: a tenth of a second was an eon when you had only a quarter of a second to respond. She couldn't raise her shield in time. She had to think outside the box.

Channeling everything she could into a single pulse of her Semblance worked. Raven didn't slow down in the least, but her blade flew past Pyrrha's shield. Nora, outfitted with such a heavy hammer and outfitted in an armored corset, was flung aside.

Behind them, Raven clicked her blade back into her sheath. The air around the leaderless Team JNPR sparkled a faint red, then in a blast of pink, Ren's aura shattered. Not wearing enough metal to be pushed back, he collapsed to his knees, then fell forward. The halves of every stone pillar near him followed suit, neatly sliced in twain.

Pyrrha, horrified and enraged, turned and lunged for Raven. With a flick of her wrist, Raven deflected the first swing with a blade glowing a heated red. The trees near them were not so much set on fire as much as they were incinerated from the flames that followed her strike. They traded blows, and what once felt like sledgehammers against Pyrrha's shields were now bombs, yet she held her ground. The air warped and ground cratered from each of Raven's attacks, but Pyrrha brought her blade up to bear. Behind her mask, Raven scowled.

Screaming in rage, Nora blasted herself forward, turning herself and her warhammer into a deadly, spinning meteor. Raven sheathed and redrew her blade in an instant. The blade snapped out even further, extending into an odachi. She thrust it forward.

The golden blade pierced straight through Nora's stomach. Pale red aura bordering on pink gathered on her blade and dripped away, fading in color until they were like black feathers. Nora's aura tried and failed to surround and fend off the wound.

Pyrrha was caught off guard, shocked. Nora's scream was caught in her throat, eyes wide in horror. Raven flooded her aura through the blade, and the electricity rushing through it freed that scream. Enough power coursed through it to leave bolts of lightning racing not just through Nora but searing and tearing through the grass surrounding them. After only a second, where the scent of ozone and charred and flesh alike filled the air, the blade snapped just at the hilt.

Raven was launched through the air and far across the forest in the next moment, dragged along by her arms through an unseen force: Pyrrha's Semblance pushed to its limits. Yet Raven vanished from view in a burst of black feathers: her Semblance couldn't pull on metal not there. A 'simple raven' dove out of sight, then reformed into Raven just beside Ren. He was still unconscious. He'd also serve a good message. Raven drew her blade.

Ren and the ground he lay on plummeted out of view—no, she was rising. The very earth beneath her feet was tilting like a sinking ship. Falling back from the sudden shift in balance, she caught the source: Nora, even with the still-sparking blade in her stomach, had all but curled the earth towards her in a single strike of her hammer.

"Stay away from him!" Like lightning itself, Nora was before her. Her hammer dropped with the tell-tale explosion of the sound barrier being smashed.

But such misfortune did not come to pass.

Screaming in rage, Nora blasted herself forward, turning herself and her warhammer into a deadly, spinning meteor. Raven sheathed her blade. The mechanism of her weapon twisted it to gold, yet she felt it: the omen. She drew in a flash. The blade snapped out even further, extending into an odachi. She thrust it forward.

A cyan blade pierced straight through Nora's stomach. Pale red aura bordering on pink gathered on Raven's odachi and dripped away, fading in color until they were like black feathers. Nora's aura tried and failed to surround and fend off the wound.

Pyrrha was caught off guard, shocked. Nora's scream was caught in her throat, eyes wide in horror. With a rush of aura and a flash of sparkling, white light, Nora was frozen in one half of a second, and flung to bowl Pyrrha over in the next half. Pyrrha's borrowed sword and shield went tumbling across the ground, and Raven felt the now-telltale pressure of Pyrrha's Semblance around her sword leave just as quickly as it began to form.

Aura would likely shatter the ice in time, but those precious few seconds were ones where Pyrrha was utterly alone.

Until Jaune dove between the two, grabbing onto his shield and raising it up. He was trembling, face pale and sweat pouring down his face. But he held his ground. With Ren knocked out and Nora frozen behind him, he had no choice. "L-leave my friends alone!"

Raven's sheath began to spin. Pyrrha's eyes widened. "Jaune, don't—"

"I don't have time for sideshows." A wave of aura launched from a deep, violet blade crashed into Jaune's shield, and he dropped to his knees. Trembling turned to shaking as Gravity Dust left him incapable of standing back up.

"You wanted to know why I am doing this, didn't you?" Raven called out over the rippling fireworks above as Pyrrha pushed herself back onto her feet. "It's simple. Every time you so much as think about taking Ozpin's offer, I want you to remember this moment. Because there's only one thing ahead of you with him: a war you will never win. War where the people you have to fight will be like me." Raven dropped into a lower stance and sheathed her blade a last time. Her aura spiked, crashing over them like a wave and leaving Pyrrha dropping back to the ground. Even Raven's own ice covering Nora splintered under the pressure.

The fireworks stopped. Their light slowly faded away.

"Consider this your only warning." Raven was in front of her. She swung. Pyrrha closed her eyes, but she could still see the eruption of emerald light and feel the space around them all be ripped away. Her ears rung from the explosion of air and aura... but she felt no pain.

Pyrrha opened her eyes to find someone between her and Raven.

"So, how much did you need from your precious cane for that?" Even behind her mask, the sneer was clear in Raven's voice. Around JNPR was a wasteland, where entire chunks of earth well over the size of a person were forced up into jagged spears for yards.

In front of them was Ozpin with Raven's blade caught cleanly in one hand, his other gripping his cane like a rapier.

"Thank you for the warning, Mister Arc." Ozpin ignored Raven's question, yet didn't turn his gaze away from her. "Leave the rest to us." What looked like just one of many of the Bullheads in the air show came soaring down beside them, and before Raven could respond, she was forced to leap away. Qrow's greatsword landed where she once stood a split-second later, Qrow himself already turning to press the offensive.

The airship swung side-on and the door was flung open. "Students, get on!" Ironwood shouted. Goodwitch stood at his side, raising Ren and Nora up with telekinesis into the ship.

Both Pyrrha and Jaune looked back, yet while they could hear the claps of thunder and flashes of metal against metal, they could barely make out the combatants. When they rose, it was with raised shoulders and sharp frowns, yet the thoughts in their mind couldn't be any more different. They rushed for the airship and watched behind them as, amidst great bursts of green and red, the cliff began to crumble.

The short flight back to Beacon was somehow silent yet deafening all at once. The engines filled the interior with a constant hum and the side door was left open for fresh air to come rushing in. Goodwitch looked over Ren and Nora, the former trying and failing to brush off her assistance, the latter groaning about if anyone got the license plate of that ice cream truck that hit her. Yet none of these truly mattered to the leader of JNPR and his partner.

Jaune sat hunched over, unable to meet anyone's eye. Try as he might to justify it through their opponent's strength or how they all had lost, he'd never felt so helpless.

Yet Pyrrha's blood was pumping even after the fight had passed. This was no destiny handed over on a silver platter, nor was it some sign of inexorable fate pushing her along. No, this was real. This was consequence. Obstacles. Challenge. Across from her, General Ironwood sat, impassive, eyes scanning for any threats that may capitalize on them in the skies. Their eyes met. An unspoken question lay in Ironwood's gaze.

In Pyrrha's lay an answer, free of doubt.