Chapter 13

The shattered moon shone through the old fashioned windows in a tea shop in the street corner. The clay roof tiles contrasted greatly with the grey, industrial surroundings. With a Mistralian sliding door, bamboo mats underneath the overhang, and small, supposedly lucky bamboo plants lining the shop, it seemed every bit the little patch of the world undisturbed by the external world.

Inside the shop, a man with orange hair and a little girl knelt next to a low-hanging table. The little girl was uncharacteristically drinking the warmed rice wine, face already red, yet still determinedly downing small cup after cup as if to outdo the others at the table.

A blonde man and another sat with the duo at the table. A flask was casually put on the neat table, staining the tablecloth with alcohol. In an altar near the counter of the shop, a long odachi lay undisturbed. However, a rather broad mechashift sword was also put haphazardly next to the rack.

"How long has it been since then?" the blond man said, a comically small cup resting inside a calloused, large hand.

"It's been a long two decades." The words slurred in the drunk man's mouth.

"Actually, it's been longer than two decades. It's more of two and a half." The orange-haired man said, looking with an amused expression on the girl's extremely red face.

"Still can't drink, Neo?" Qrow said, his nostalgic expression finally turning into a jeering one. "You know, we've been having these gatherings here for a while now, but you still can't drink more than when you first started."

Neo's face, impossibly, got redder. Scratching at the neck of her kimono, she made vaguely threatening gestures at Qrow before putting down her cup, hunching over the table, and pouting. Kojiro chuckled and began patting the munchkin on the shoulder.

"It's been fifteen years since she's been gone." Taiyang said, not listening to much of the conversation. "I can't believe it's been fifteen."

"I-I'm sorry, Tai." Qrow said.

"You've been saying that for the past fifteen years too." Taiyang said, an empty smile appearing on the usually cheerful man's face. "And remember. I don't blame you."

Qrow sighed. Taking the porcelain wine vessel, he began to drink straight from the spout instead of indulging in his usual whisky.

The conversation slowly petered out, the previously cheerful group sinking deeper and deeper into nostalgia.

"Hey, you remember that Vytal festival?" Taiyang said, a glaze of fogginess floating over his blue eyes.

"Which one?"

"Well, which other one was there?"

…

"No, Raven. We are not buying information on the opposing teams in the festival." Summer said, crossing her arms.

"It would give us an undeniable tactical advantage. Besides, there's no guarantee that they even know anything about them! There's no harm in asking! Besides, a lot of lien is on the line…"

"The spirit of competitions is to be sportsmanlike and fair!" Summer exclaimed, arms raised in the air as if to surrender to her own exasperation.

"Yeah, sis. I mean, we don't have to win this. It's just a festival thing. Besides, the more important things are the hotties that'll be coming over. Think about all those Vacuan-"

Taiyang smacked the young drunkard on the back of the head.

"Hey! You almost made me spill my boose!"

"Well, you shouldn't be drinking it anyways! Neo is right here!"

"I don't think I can be much worse of an influence on her than Kojiro."

Neo acted totally offended, her eyes widening dramatically. Kojiro shook his head at their antics, his arms still tucked into his robes.

"Stop arguing, guys! Taiyaing, stop hitting Qrow! Qrow, stop drinking! I swear, I don't know why you started this month, but you'd better quit it now!"

"Fine, fine." Raven said, "I definitely won't do it. Still, it's only been a little while since… the tunnel. Beacon can't win with so many incomplete teams."

"W-well, that's still no excuse for us to cheat!"

A short silence fell across the group. The scent of the earth, the ominous screams that echoed down the hallways, and the all-encompassing darkness had been stamped into their young souls.

"Well, we should get on with shopping!" Summer said, dragging Qrow and Tai out of the little store that Kojiro and Neo were now living in. "It was nice talking to you! See you guys around!"

Neo waved enthusiastically, and almost… way to innocently. Summer paid no attention to it. Raven, however, caught the wink sent her way.

"The prize money is half a million lien." Raven whispered. "If we win, and you help me get info on those other teams, I'll give you ten percent of it."

Neo glared at Raven, then shoved five fingers in front of her eyes.

"You guys won't be fighting! You won't even have the opportunity to get the money if I didn't offer."

Neo's fingers went down one by one, until it settled on two.

"Really? Twenty percent? That's a little too much, isn't it?"

Neo pointed at the ruined, smoking bar, and the abandoned convenience store that she and Kojiro were currently camping out in.

"…Fine. But you better give me specific info."

Neo nodded, before waving her hand in the air and making words appear with her semblance. "Tell me where they train, and when they train. I can take recordings for you all."

"You sure the gang doesn't have info on them?" Raven said, sighing.

Neo shook her head.

"Actually?" Raven asked, looking at Kojiro. "Well, you wouldn't know any-"

"We mostly work on protection brackets." Kojiro said. "Besides, many of the weaker gangs had been taken out, so there aren't that many info dealers left in town."

"Damn. I guess you really are my best option, Neo."

Neo grinned.

"Raven! You better not be negociating anything shady!" Summer's voice came from outside the little room.

Raven raised a finger to her lips. Neo just… glared at her.

"Oh, right." Raven said, slightly bashful. "Well, you better not back out."

Neo nodded enthusiastically, before making a little shooing gesture with her hands.

As Raven left the shop, Kojiro just raised an eyebrow at Neo.

"Why the sudden need for money? And don't say it's for renovations. You never cared about that stuff anyways."

Neo pointed at the empty fridge.

"Where would we even put that much ice cream?" Kojiro said. "Besides, if you eat too much of that stuff, you'll get-"

An umbrella was pointed at his throat.

…

100,000 Lien was delivered to Kojiro's doorstep one day. Neo looked left and right, snatched up the paper bag, went into her and Kojiro's room, and began to count.

Kojiro was already making a phone call Junior, asking him to buy another fridge.

…

The same year that Raven and Tai got married, Old man Xiong finally passed on.

It was a sad affair for the gang. After the great battle against the Monarchs, he had already began withering away. One day, he simply didn't wake up.

Junior was left in the room alone, and after a couple of minutes, he walked out. The young man had never looked more nervous and lost, but most of the veterans in the gang were behind the new leader. He had done a lot in the reconstruction, and had managed to buy up the rest of the establishments in their building after they had moved out at a cheap price.

They trusted him in business affairs, at least.

Eyes turned to Kojiro. Being the enforcer and muscle, he was also a key part of the smooth power transition. Usually, rumors were that enforcers would take over gangs after the leader died, but Kojiro did no such thing.

Instead, his head was bowed in politeness, his horrible fashion sense somehow not dampening the atmosphere.

Neo was nowhere to be seen, no doubt not wanting to intrude in this somber situation.

…

"Why did you make the bar into a techno dance club?" Kojiro said.

"You… uh… don't like it?" Junior said, his eyes looking at Kojiro like he was looking at an alien. "We're basically the same age! How do you have the… tastes of an old man?"

Neo was already fooling around now, joining in on the opening party, looking for Mizu in the crowd and immediately starting to bother him. Said grunt started shouting about the demon looking for him, before running around, sending the party into chaos.

"…I'm living at that convenience store now." Kojiro said

…

"Why are we in Mistral, you ask?" Kojiro said, leaning against a rather tall tree. It was fall, and leaves cascaded on the duo. In the distance, a gate stood in front of a monastery, with visitors coming and entering the building. In the distance, incense floated out of the temple without

"There you are, my brother." Kojiro whispered, looking longingly at the tiled roofs of the temple. The gold-bordered sign, the steps leading up to the… magnificent structure, and the painted pillars that supported the building… all of it was so familiar. It was almost exactly the same.

Too similar to be a coincidence. Kojiro stretched a hand towards the gate, a smile slowly blossoming on his face. Then, his hands fell and his gaze grew colder. He looked to the side, upwards at the shining sun, and sighed.

"I'm sorry we had to be separated so long."

Memories of the truck came flashing back. The race against the Saber and Archer servant. Their moment of glory together, speeding past their competitors and defeating that saber servant driving on the lion. Then, their heartbreaking end together. The… treacherous tank that the berserker had turned into… had injured his brother!

Falling off of the cliff together, Kojiro jumped from the cockpit, his bones, the pottery fragments, and the wooden splinters smashed into an indistinguishable paste. His last thought, caressing the smooth pillars, were that of regret, but also of fulfillment and peace.

Neo looked at him strangely.

"Ahem." Kojiro coughed, an oddly flustered look flashing across his face. "We are here to practice your semblance."

Neo raised an eyebrow.

"You are to construct illusions that can perfectly replicate the temple. Every day, I will be taking a certain amount of the temple gate. You will be building the parts back with your semblance, and maintain the illusion until we are complete.

Neo raised a hand, confusion clearly shining in her eyes.

"This is also to test your aura capacity." Kojrio said, nodding to himself.

Neo shrugged, and then looked at Kojiro's hopeful expression and his grasping hands. Rarely had Kojiro ever gotten so excited about anything, and even if his desire was something as outlandish as obtaining a temple gate, Neo would aid him.

She would help him, as he had when he saved her all those years ago.

…

As Neo sweated on the bed, her brow gritted in concentration, Kojiro was in the other room, painstakingly recreating the temple from the stolen partsG.

A neat array of roof tiles lay in the corner of one of their rented rooms. In the center of the room, two pillars stood proudly in the center, with the golden sign sitting on a table.

Using a cloth and gently caressing the wooden sign, Kojiro was muttering.

"They've neglected you, haven't they? No good cleanings for so long. Shh, shhh. You needn't suffer any longer, my brother."

Neo wanted to shout at Kojiro to shut up, and kept on imagining the image of that accursed temple in her head.

If the illusion shattered now, all of their efforts would go to waste.

…

"A temple gate in Mistral has mysteriously disappeared overnight. It has been reported that infamous escape artist Sasaki Kojiro, who had been cleared of all charges during the Vale Affairs five years ago, was allegedly spotted near the temple three days before its disappearance, but nothing has been confirmed yet by the-"

"So that's why Kojiro wanted me to say that he was in town." Qrow said. Summer and him were currently awkwardly sitting at Qrow's apartment, while Tai and Raven…

It's best that they didn't think of it.

"I don't think I can look at their dining table the same way." Qrow shuddered.

As Summer blushed herself scarlet, she looked at the missing temple gate and scratched her chin.

"Do you really think that Kojiro would steal a whole temple?"

Qrow's scroll made an obnoxious ding, and he put down his flask to retrieve the newer and more compact model of scroll from his pocket.

He instantly began wheezing.

"What? What's so funny?" Summer asked, sidling up to Qrow and taking a look at his scroll screen.

The picture was one of Kojiro was hugging a pillar of the temple gate.

'He hasn't lets go of the temple for a day now, ever since it arrived by boat' .The text message read. ' Send help.'

The expression on his face reminded Qrow of Tai looking at-

He shuddered, getting the thought of his sister performing… those acts… out of his head.

"Should we contact a psychologist?" Summer said, slightly concerned.

"I don't think anyone in the world can really understand that man." Qrow said, putting down his scroll and switching the channel.

"Famous author, Dr. Crystal Anderson, has announced a new mystery novel: The Disappearing T-"

Qrow shut off the TV.

…

"There are way too many Nevermores!" Summer shouted, raising her weapon to deflect the feathers that rained down on them. Qrow was a distance away from them, struggling with his own bad luck with the projectiles, while Taiyang channeled his semblance into a wooden board and tried to shield Summer from one side.

Raven was focusing on offense, using her dust blade to send elemental waves to the skies above.

Still, the birds were relentless. The small Nevermores swarmed around the trees, occasionally flying up and attacking the group. Meanwhile, a couple hundred meters away from them, a whole village cowered inside their homes.

Their guide was currently hiding under one of those trees, their head under their fragile clipboard.

"Why can't you guys do anything right? You're basically fresh out of the academy. I knew I should never have hired you guys!"

"Should we call Kojiro in?" Summer said, narrowly dodging another feather.

"…Fine." Raven said, sighing and channeling her semblance.

Raven then vanished through her portal.

"Where did she go? Are you all ditching us?" the guide screamed desperately, almost jumping out of the cover of the trees to confront the fresh graduates, but more attacks discouraged her from comming out of relative safety.

A couple moments later, Raven returned with Kojiro, who looked at the sky and… smiled.

"Oh good, she's back. You better have some sort of long range weapon to take down those birds, new guy-"

Kojiro drew his katana and stepped into the clearing. The swarm of birds hovered in the air for a moment, looking at the strange orange haired man wearing purple robes

"Of course he uses a long katana." The guide sighed, her hand pinching the bridge of her nose. "We're all dead."

The birds began to ignore everybody else and attack Kojiro. It was most like he was some sort of natural enemy to the birds.

Coating his sword in an orange glow, Kojiro proceeded to deflect and sidestep most of the nevermore feathers, before sending the signature attack of the saber class at the crowd of birds.

Sword beams. Borne of countless sessions of practice with aura, Kojiro had finally managed to gain the credencials to enter the saber class… in another world.

"Are you really attacking a nevermore swarm with a sword? And this is the guy you called to help?"

"He's a bit of a… flying grimm expert." Qrow said, taking out his flask and taking a casual swig.

The guide gaped as Kojiro's sword beam went through the swarm of birds, and many small dots in the distance fell from the sky.

"You… hit something? How did you kill something with a sword at that range?" the guide shouted.

"Do you wish for an explanation? You see, in my supposed life, I was plagued by a troublesome bird…" Kojiro said, flicking his sword to deflect three feathers at once.

"It would come to me when I ate and steal my rice."

"…You live indoors. In vale. There are no birds that steal rice." Summer said, almost as confused as the guide now.

"Being a Ja-Mistralian man, I couldn't let this theft stand. It only became worse when the raw rice inside the birds began expanding, and they began exploding."

"Birds explode when they eat raw rice?" Raven said, looking slightly sick to the stomach. "I am never having sushi again." She said, shivering.

Another two sword beams delivered in smooth succession felled many more nevermores, thinning out the flock.

"With the fallen birds' corpses and feathers littered across the rooftop where I trained, I knew that I had to kill those birds. Tradition dictated that I duel them to the death, but they are fast little devils."

Kojiro grabbed a feather streaking towards him out of the air, before bisecting an nevermore that decided to swoop down to attack him.

"I needed to kill them without them creating more work for Neo to do, so I tried to develop a technique. The-"

"Yeah, we know. Tsubame Gaeshi. I swear, your made up backstories for that three hit thing get weirder and weirder every time." Qrow said, finally putting away his empty flask and looking mournfully at the empty bottle.

"It was just an explanation the first time." Tai said, his arms crossed.

"Then, you talked about a waterfall and the corpse floating in the river, and your nonexistent wife calling you to dinner." Raven deadpanned.

"And then it was practicing so much until reality gave up…?" Summer finished, idly scratching at a tree's trunk.

"Do you want to hear the story or not?" Kojiro said, an amused look of irritation on his face. "Anyways, since that didn't work out, I needed to kill them at a distance. Drawing inspiration from a… class… of sabers that worked at my… previous organization…"

"Which also doesn't exist." Taiyang said. "You just worked with that bar! And that's it!"

"Are these the people that you said you worked with to try to save the world with back when Professor Ozpin was trying to talk to you?" Summer said, suddenly remembering something.

"Yes." Kojiro confirmed, jumping out of the way of a feather aimed at his leg before doing a flip midair to avoid a second. "The technique was a sword beam, something that was a gateway between the other classes and the prestigious rank of saber. Being an assassin myself, I couldn't perform such a feat, and was implicitly rejected."

"So they rejected you… just because you couldn't make a… sword beam?"

"Well, not really." Kojrio said. He turned send another attack at the flock. "Damn witch, tearing out my heart like this." Kojiro muttered.

"This has devolved into something… less than explanatory." Raven said impatiently. "So what the fuck is this?"

"Haven't I said it already?" Kojiro said, "It is the sword beam. An alternative to the Tsubame Gaeshi that utilizes my aura and the sword to send out an attack at a distance. I have to time it so that it hits the bird from far away… and hit it so that it minimizes bird carnage."

"Can you just stop bullshitting and get on with killing the nevermores?" the guide shouted, almost looking like she was tearing her hair out in frustration.

"Oh, of course." Kojiro said. "Why didn't you say that sooner? I had no idea we were in such a rush."

Kojiro then blurred into motion. His figure created afterimages as he swung his sword from pose to pose, his purple robes and his orange hair seemingly spinning like a top. In front of him, volleys after volleys of sword beams were created and shot at the birds, killing a few of the grimm but scattering the rest. Still, not even stopping to aim, Kojiro managed to get rid of the stragglers.

Finally, the dizzying dance was over, and Kojiro stood, odachi in sheath and hands tucked into robes, as the remains of the nevermore feathers slowly floated back into the treetops.

Then, his scroll began to beep.

"Neo is angry for not coming along." Kojrio said, sighing. "Can you send me back now?"

"O-of course." Raven said. Activating her semblance, Kojiro stepped through, brushing one stray black plume off of his sleeve.

…

"After all this time, you're finally challenging me?" Kojiro said, odachi unsheathed but slung across his back. "I'll be holding back, but still, do your best to attack me."

Neo nodded, before she unfolded her umbrella, smiled, and stood there in a vaguely threatening stance.

Kojiro raised his sword, narrowing his eyes at the unmoving Neo. Then, he turned and attacked at his back. It didn't seem like he hit anything, but his sword was stopped by a wooden clack.

"That trick would have worked on anybody but me." Kojiro said, using a stronger swing to knock the umprella out of Neo's hand. To her credit, she did hold onto the weapon, but she was still sent stumbling.

"Good. You didn't fall down." Kojiro said. "Footwork is always important."

Neo looked like she had never heard of the term.

"Anyways, use your semblance only sparingly in the future. If others think you can only make small illusions, you can disorient them with a big one. Now, let's have a relatively fair match." Kojiro said, katana held at his side and hand making a beckoning gesture.

Abruptly, both their auras shattered.

For a moment, they stood in silence, as their minds wondered what had just happened.

"I actually haven't really either said "have a fair match" or done that hand gesture since I unlocked my aura." Kojiro said, sheathing his sword and rubbing his neck. "I guess that's my semblance."

Neo facepalmed. That had to be the most boring semblance ever.

…

Summer's death came as a surprise for everybody. She was one of the best in her generation, with a speed semblance that doubled as an intangibility semblance. So how did she supposedly die on a grimm extermination mission?

Kojiro didn't know, but Summer was an opponent that even he would have trouble with if he didn't use his semblance to break her aura, limiting her semblance use and eliminating her greatest advantage.

It must have been a powerful grimm.

There were many people present. Huntsmen of all shapes and outfits came to pay their respects, bringing white roses along. Taiyang quietly sobbed near one of the trees as Qrow patted him on the back, flask suspiciously absent.

Her two children were nowhere to be seen, their father no doubt not wanting them to experience the pain of loss.

Kojiro merely sighed and laid the katana that she had fixed for him in front of her grave. It had broken in the fight with Chrysos, but the little print on the side of the blade with a rose symbol was unmistakable. He hadn't noticed it when Summer gave it to him, but it was noticed when he was polishing the broken sword when he was recovering from that fight.

Neo was looking at the procession with tears in her eyes. Despite normally being "slightly" psychopathic, Summer was one person that hadn't exactly treated her like she was a living demon.

"Death is a part of life, Neo." Kojiro said, thinking back on the times that he had been subdued as a side character in many other stories. "It's best that we just… accept it."

Neo sent a halfhearted glare at Kojiro.

"Yes, I know. You're not a kid anymore. You're twenty-something, right?" Kojiro asked.

Neo shrugged. She didn't exactly know her precise age.

As the sun set over the gravestone, the visitors slowly trickled out, leaving well-meaning words or consoling gestures.

Taiyang alone was in front of the grave. Though there was no body buried below, he could still almost hear her comforting voice.

He definitely wasn't going insane. Definitely not.

…

…

Adam staggered out of the red forest, looking at the walls of Vale in the distance.

Did Blake really think that she could ditch him? He gritted his teeth, adjusted his mask, and grimaced at the mud clinging to his black pants.

"Are there really none of them here?" A voice said in the distance.

Adam immediately prepared to draw his katana from his gun-sheathe. In his blind rage, he was ready to shred anything that moved. However, what little rationality remained held him back from attacking out of paranoia. Said paranoia was justified, given that he was one of the most wanted White Fang members in this side of Remnant. Following the sound of the voice, he slowly crept into the shadows of a nearby tree.

A whirlwind of emotions poured into Adam, the day's stress, sadness of betrayals, happiness at success of sabotage, exhilaration of tearing apart those robots, and now the paranoia making him dizzier.

In a clearing, a man with orange hair and a katana even longer than Adam's red blade was looking up into the treeline.

"Perhaps we won't find any of those animals around here. Maybe we'll have to go to… Menagerie or something to find them."

Adam's vision went red. The cocktail of emotions exploded.

"You dare threaten the faunus? Die, human scum!"

Charging up his semblance, Adam ran forward, red coating his vision with the rage caused by the sheer unfairness of the day.

A katana caught him straight in the gut, somehow overpowering his charge forward. Then, a pink parasol floated in front of his vision until he went unconscious.

…

The day had been going not so well for Kojiro. Now with the gang not engaging in violent territory wars as often, Kojiro was free to do what he wanted most of the time. For the past couple years, it was either stealing temples, trying to make tea, a lot more training, and aura control techniques.

Now, however, he was looking for swallows. However, the day was already half over. The treetops were filled with chirping birds, but none of them had the signature two-pronged tail possessed by a swallow.

Neo was lying in the shade, eyes closed, though her hand was still on her weaponized umbrella in case of grimm attacks.

"Are there really none of them here?" Kojiro said, sighing. Thinking of the places that he had visited in mistral, the birds were suspiciously absent from the mountaintop forests that he remembered them to be in.

"Perhaps we won't find any of those animals around here."

Where else were animals not as well documented? Atlas and Vacuo were a cold and hot desert respectively, and thus, mostly free of birds. That only left…

Maybe we'll have to go to… Menagerie or something to find them."

Then, an incoherent scream pierced the clearing. Out of the bushes, a teenager wearing a mud-stained black suit jumped, Katana glowing red.

Kojiro absentmindedly parried the haphazard and hasty attack. Neo had sprung to action, and upon seeing the attacker on the ground, proceeded to beat his head in until they fell unconscious.

After a while, Neo prodded the teenager with her foot, turning the body over.

"Do you remember seeing this guy around?" Kojiro said, shaking his head at the edgy fashion getup.

Neo pondered for a moment, before shaking her head.

"Well, let's just leave him here. He's probably a low level bandit or something. And yes, Neo. We're going home."

As the two left the clearing, Kojiro received a message on his scroll. Neo grabbed it out of his pocket, and pouted as she saw that the background was changed from a stocked fridge full of ice cream to another tacky picture of the moon.

"Does Junior have something for us to do?"

Neo merely put the scroll in Kojiro's hand and pointed at a message.

"Adam Taurus has been spotted in Vale. Watch out for him." Kojiro read.

"…Who's this Adam Taurus guy that Junior's telling me to watch out for?"

Neo shrugged, before grabbing the scroll back and typing the guy's name into the search bar. She then immediately began to shake with a bout of silent laughter.

"What?" Kojiro asked, raising an eyebrow at Neo's antics.

Neo shook her head while holding her breath, suppressing a giggle.