Chapter 9 - Two Wrongs Are Still Wrong

I didn't wake peacefully. There might've been a time when I wasn't paying so close of attention to my surroundings as I slept, but my living situation now didn't lend itself to safety if I got careless. With me trying to wage a hidden war against all the gangs and crime lords in Vale, I needed to be watching my back even in my own home. Especially because I have been shown twice that my place isn't as secret as I thought.

As such, it was no surprise that that very same paranoia drove me to complete wakefulness when I heard soft sounds of breathing nearby. The suddenness of my jolt came as if I had been struck by a bolt of lightning as jumped up, sending the thin covers flying into the air. My hands grasped for Vengeance or Mercy, but they found only plush pillows where I normally hid them.

With sleep still clinging to my blurry eyes, I sensed several warm presences of Auras nearby, and pulled on the ones closest to me. My muscles tensed and body wamed subconsciously for any oncoming fight or struggle.

[Tactile gravitational manipulation. Biologically augmented internal gravity.]

[Static range ultrasonic echolocation. Minor sound manipulation.]

'Right, Yatsuhashi and Fox…' My tired mind finally caught up to my surroundings as a headache bagan to pound behind my eyes. I quickly let Fox's power go as the world pulsing in shades of blue ultrasound was not helping my throbbing mind. 'Ow, I didn't think I drank that much…'

Smoothly, I let myself fall into a relaxed calm as there was no one currently attacking me. Clenched muscles soon loosened, and I was able to remove the sleep still holding my vision back.

"Ah, good morning, Jaune." Fox blinked my way from the kitchen. "Would you like some pancakes?"

I had a question on my tongue as I turned to the copper-haired teen, but I paused when I took in the Beacon first-year who was completely at home in my apartment despite having met me only once. Somehow Fox had found the time to get several cartons of eggs, bags of flour and milk from the store, and then he was quiet enough to make pancakes without waking anyone. I was almost certain that sound manipulation was the cause here.

However, the thing that gave me the most confusion was the fact that he was wearing a frilly, white apron, pristine as the day that I never had it. The whole situation took me by such surprise that I didn't really know how to react, and fell silent for a few seconds before I responded.

"Ah, um, good morning." I stammered, standing up as several joints in my body popped from sleeping on the hard floor.

Fox smiled, his pure white eyes somehow expressing mirth. "I hope you don't mind me using your kitchen; though, I did take the liberty to buy some extra ingredients in advance."

"It's fine. I don't mind." I waved, moving over to the kitchen counter. There wasn't even a stain or anything that proved Fox had mixed anything, but a cleaned bowl in the sink gave evidence towards him making the pancake batter. "I do have to ask why you're up so early? We did stay out late last night."

"Oh, sorry, I'm a light sleeper, and my Semblance doesn't really let me get very far into regular sleep cycles." I frowned at the word 'Semblance' as Fox rubbed the back of his head. "Don't worry, though, I'm used to it. Besides, I've gotten into the habit of training in the mornings as well."

"That doesn't…" I found myself not really knowing what to say. However, I was able to cobble together something in the seconds that I paused. "Sound good... Or, uh, what exactly is a Semblance?"

"You don't know?" If anything my question startled Fox enough that the pancake he was currently making was smoking. It was only when I nodded firmly that he noticed and quickly brought the blackened breakfast off the pan.

He quickly schooled his features, coughing lightly into a free hand before facing me again. "Sorry for staring to long, I hadn't really expected you to not know. Yatsuhashi said you're a prospective Beacon student, so I had assumed you would already know most of the ins and outs of being a Huntsman. I had thought you were one of those guys who got in through knowledge because you don't really strike me as a, uh… physically gifted student. No offense, of course!"

I hid my wince behind a laugh and smile. 'Thanks, Fox… but it's not like I can tell you that my parents never taught me a thing about being a Huntsman, and that libraries are unusually tight-lipped about any books other than hero stories when talking about Huntsmen and women.'

"Yeah, no offense taken." I chimed in. "Though, my puny muscles aside, can we talk about Semblances?"

"Right…" Fox flinched lightly, having apparently seen through my facade of calm. I made a note that I might want to practice faking it just in case my vigilantism ever caught up with me. "Sorry, everyone has a story… Anyways -and I'm not the best at explaining this- Semblances are basically the special abilities each Aura comes with. It was explained to me as a power that reflects the user in some way, but my teacher didn't really like getting into the theoretical side of things." A sort of reminiscing smile appeared over the scarred teen's face. "I was forced to be constantly on guard as she wouldn't allow even a moment of calm for me…"

I nodded, taking a mental reminder that Aura and powers, or Semblances, were related just like I had assumed. What that meant for my being able to somehow sense Aura, and copy other's Semblances, I had no idea. However, worrying about it now wasn't that important.

Instead, I focused on the conversation, remembering my own current teacher's way of making sure that every opening was exploited. "Yeah, I can understand where you're coming from."

"I bet, Yatsuhashi and I saw you limping a bit yesterday; your teacher must be a like those Schnee slave drivers up in Atlas."

"Slave drivers?" My scowl was deepening by the moment. "I thought they abolished those laws after the war?"

"Oh… my bad. It's a figure of speech. Velvet was telling us about some of her times before she moved to Vale, and, uh… actually, can we drop the topic?" Fox was frowning as well, and an awkward silence fell over us until a deep rumble sounded out from behind us.

"Are those pancakes?" Yatsuhashi asked, not even looking the least bit tired as he climbed off his place on the floor.

Latching onto the escape from the awkwardness we had descended into, both Fox and I presented our mountain of a friend as many pancakes as he desires. The three of us hurriedly found quite a few topics to draw from, and the talks of Atlas' Faunus repression was put at the back of my head. However, even as we laughed about how some of the professors of Beacon's antics, my heroic tendencies made it so that I was worrying about my bunny-eared friend.

Faunus discrimination was something that was as widespread as bread, and it only got worse the closer one got to the frozen lands of Atlas. The once monarchy was in its transition phase to become less centralized in terms of crowns. There was only one downside to the collapse of the already established system, and that was the use of Faunus as a low-paid, high-risk workforce that only served to make them even less in the eyes of the massive companies that had decided to worm their ways into the new Atlas.

There was quite a bit of propaganda that supported these claims, and there was even a Faunus group that worked to better their fellow race's standing in the repressed societies. However, I had already looked at some of the things that said group had done in their goal for equality. I was less than pleased at some of the public executions that they carried out in the name of their honorable goals.

While I was sympathetic to the Faunus in their predicament, I held no love for the terrorist organization known as the White Fang.

"Good morning, boys..." A tired voice stumbled out of my room. The owner trotting over to an open seat and motioning for Fox to give her pancakes.

My gaze followed over to Coco who had shambled, a head full of frizzy hair, and began to shovel the food she had been given into her open mouth. Her eyes were glossy and rather dark bags gathered under her eyes as she grumbled something halfway between a yawn and a groan as she stretched.

"Coco, your hair…" Velvet came stammering out of the room a couple seconds later, a brush clenched tight in her hands. Her appearance was as pristine as the last I had seen her, and seemed to be refusing to meet my eyes.

"You're not a morning person, I'm guessing?" I smirked to who I had learned was the leader of their little team of four.

Coco just glared at me. "I need a shower…"

"Just down the hall." I pointed over the the door close to my room, still amused at the strangely demure girl who was completely at odd with her image of yesterday. "Should be that one, but please go easy on the hot water."

The tired girl nodded with a small thanks before wandering off. With Velvet joining us for the breakfast ceremony of Jaune's apartment, I was allowed to forget the hardships that were presenting themselves in the back of my head. Just for now I indulged myself in the laughs and talks that happened peacefully at the moment.

Still, for some reason that eluded me, I couldn't quite stop myself from feeling a bit restless in the peace presented to me. There was something fundamentally wrong when I realized that I had been wanting my new friends to leave faster, so I could walk over to my next door neighbors and maybe start a fight.

Even as Velvet, Yatsuhashi and Fox each separately took went and took a shower of their own I could barely contain myself. I knew that those twins were antsy around me, and there was a reasonable chance that a fight could break out at any moment, but something in me was roaring for a fight. However, as quickly as that thought came, I snuffed it to a mewling whisper after a bit of reflection.

I wasn't going over there to fight them; I needed them to be calmer if I wanted to be neighbors. And maybe ask why they had decided to live right next to me.

As such, when it was finally time for team CFVY to leave my humble abode, I bid them farewell with the promise of hanging out again. As, even under the adrenaline of a prospective fight, I still quite enjoyed their presence. They were a calm that I perhaps needed in the mess that I had been getting into.

"Seeya later," I waved to my new band of friends as they left. "Oh and Yatsuhashi, I'll try that exercise routine that you sent me when I get the time. Though, I doubt I'll always have the time to meet you at the gym whenever you get off of classes."

"It's no problem, Jaune; don't tire yourself out." The gentle giant smiled, making way for his teammates as he left.

Fox came up and patted me on the shoulder, velvet trailing softly behind him. "It was nice meeting you, Jaune."

"B, bye, Jaune." Velvet stuttered, her floppy bunny ears drooping slightly. Her eyes found the scar on my face again, but she didn't really say anything other than give a softer 'see you again' before leaving.

With her finally leaving with her team came the final boss. Coco roughly brushed past me, down cleaned up so much that her frizzy morning hair was a thing of the past. Her face was even carrying a light dusting of makeup.

Her dark eyes found mine, and she gave something of a glare before leaning in close, bringing her lips close to my ear. "I have no idea where you got that scar, but I know for a fact that you didn't have it when I saw you for the first time. Now I wouldn't really care what happened to you in order to get that, however, Velvet and the guys would be pretty sad if something happened to you. So, this is an order from me to you: be careful, Jaune."

Then she leaned back, ignoring the scandalized looks of her teammates. Blearily, I realized that from their point of view all that saw was Coco leaning in closer to my face; whatever conclusion they reached was probably the work of her annoyingly useful Semblance. Coco, on the other hand, just smiled knowingly as she slugged my shoulder with enough force to force me back into my door frame.

"You know, you're growing on me too, Blondie." Mercifully, she and her team left me to rubbing the pain from her playful punch away.

And with my friends finally gone, I immediately walked over to the the door next to mine and knocked twice. A series of clicks greeted my ears as the black door carefully swung open.

I was greeted with the scowling face of one of the twins. Her black hair tied into a tight ponytail, and a white skirt fitted with a light blue shirt thrown over her form.

'A frown full of hate and anger with a white coloring… probably that Mel girl.' I thought, following the scowling Melanie who led me through into their apartment.

Instantly, I noticed the boxes that had been piled up around the rather paltry amount of furniture. There were only two chairs set up in the living room, and the kitchen barely had the essentials. To my displeasure, and subsequent fit of coughs, I also found a heavy layer of dust coating some edges of the room.

"You really need to clean up this place." I said on reflex, finding that Mel was glaring at me again.

"Yeah, and who was the asshole that blew up our last place, huh?" She spat back right as the other twin came in.

Mil, or whatever her name was, walked out of what I assumed was her bedroom in black shorts and a red shirt. Idly, I hid a laugh at how color coordinated they were in pretty much everything they did. However, the fact that she was currently trembling with each step made me focus on not laughing and giving another reason to spook the girl.

"I'm sorry for our home." She said as calm as possible. "It was the fastest residence that we could get after the police released us."

I frowned. "You were arrested?"

"Yeah genius, what do you expect when you bring down the place of a known crime lord? You think they just let everyone go after you blew it all to hell?" The white themed twin snarled again, but flinched as her sister placed a hand on her shoulder. I noticed both of them were shaking now.

Sighing, I chose to stand further away from the two. "Look, I didn't want it to turn out the way it did, and I feel like this would take a lot longer if we don't just be more upfront with each other. My name is Jaune Arc… but you already knew that, didn't you?"

My declaration and introduction was met with expected silence. The twins weren't really reacting towards my words, but I felt that they were communicating through their eyes. The sort of awkward conversation that didn't really allow for more than two people to partake in.

Joke's on them, though; I already was used to awkward silences by now. Which, depressingly, was what most of my recent conversations were having a tendency to lean towards. Still, I left it up to the two of them to introduce themselves.

Finally, after what was only a minute or two, but seemed like an hour in my mind, the light color-wearing twin postured up. Her back straightened to make herself look taller, and her shoulders turned in a way that slightly blocked her sister from view. "Melanie Malachite… That's my name, I mean." Melanie frowned, gesturing over to the silent twin. "This is Miltia, but don't get any funny ideas. So, what do you want? If it's company for the night then leave my sister out of it."

"What?" I asked first, registering only what I actually heard a couple seconds after I spoke. Then with embarrassment came a tad bit of anger. "What?! No! No, I… I don't have those motives. Just…" I felt something inside me feel a little pity for how this girl even reached that conclusion. "Why would you even think that?"

Melanie snarled, her lips peeling back to expose barred teeth. "Then what the hell do you want?! Is this some sick game to you? You think you can just blow up someone's home, send their employer running for his life to Vacuo and just act like we weren't trying to rip each other's throats out a couple days ago? Are all the Reds as screwed up as you, or are you just some special kind of asshole?"

"No, I…" My tongue tasted like ash in my mouth. "I just wanted to help…"

"Help?" Melanie looked like she had swallowed a couple lemons. The sheer anger in her actions and words was nearly palpable. "Do you not see what you have done to us? We had a good thing going for us in that place, you know. Do you have any idea how hard it is for us to find jobs without resorting to things we wouldn't be proud of? Junior was actually one of the more reasonable guys in the underworld of Vale. What do you have to say for yourself, you, you…"

The girl slowed down in her words as her anger abated from her yelling. Miltia played a role in keeping a hand on Melanie's trembling hands, and while I understood a little where she was coming from, I still felt a tiny amount of fury from her words.

They were mad at me for ruining their lives, but what happened if things went their way? Should I have let them just drag me off to their whims, carrying the threat of harming my family to make me bend to their bidding? Their arguments were as selfish as my own, and that only meant that neither one won out over the other in the grand scheme of things.

So, with those thoughts, I bottled my anger and hid my righteous retorts. If all it took for them to calm down was to yell at me, then I had to be ready for their criticisms. Because going down this path meant that there would be more people whose lives I had burdened accidentally by my actions. It was a sour pill to swallow that I couldn't save everyone.

However, just because they threw hate my way when I messed something up didn't mean that I shouldn't lend them a hand. I was going to be a hero, and I had already knew that I was going to make mistakes. That didn't mean I couldn't fix those mistakes, though.

In the tense silence, I locked eyes with the angrily huffing Melanie. Just before she flinched I spoke up, "Are you done?"

The girl bristled in rage, attempting to rise up but froze as I took a step forwards. I decided that that fear was the first thing that needed to go. "I am not part of the Reds if that's what you assumed earlier."

"Then you're an as-"

I cut her off, stepping forwards again. "I am a man who worried deeply for his family, and then Junior, and by association you," I felt my lips twist in disgust as I continued, "You all threatened my family. There is no one to blame for your actions but yourself, so don't begin to spout how there lay no blame in you."

The twins flinched at my tone, and I felt Melanie's insults die in her throat. Miltia hadn't stopped shivering since I stepped towards them, her face pointing to the floor to avoid my eyes. Frowning for a second, I knelt down to meet her downward eyes. She had been about to rush away from looking at me, but she had just a moment of pause when instead of hard face of anger I wore my features soft, smiling all the while.

"I am no one special, either. Merely just a teen who found himself in a horrible situation, and then tried to make the best of it. I admit, my actions had harmed the two of you a great deal, so I will seek to rectify my mistakes." I straightened out my legs, finally drawing Miltia's eyes away from the floor. "Meet me in front of my door tomorrow morning, and I will get you jobs that don't require to be sexualized in any way. If you were with Junior for protection, then I shall help you when I am needed. However, I want the both of you to stay away from joining up with any gang, and to try and work with me, okay?"

Miltia paused to look a Melanie, and a silent confirmation passed between the two of them. "Fine… we'll play along with you, but I'll hold you to your words." Melanie groused.

I smiled, finding that they finally looked me in the eyes. "So… do we have a deal?"

When Miltia gave me a weak smile of her own, I don't think that there was more to be said.

-x-

Despite all my bravado in my speeches towards the twins, in all honesty, I had very little ideas on how to help them. The couple shops that I knew were hiring around my own place of selling ice cream were rather sparse, and I had no idea if they would even accept two girls who looked to be in their late teens with the only job to their name being a crime lord's bouncers. Still, I had promised, and an Arc never breaks their promise.

Though, Arc's do feel some sense of stress. The various strenuous talks from my morning rang back and forth in my head like a record player on repeat. I felt a headache even begin to form as a sort of constant, annoying throb.

And I knew that there were many ways of getting rid of one's stress. My mom liked to check up on my sisters and I while my dad liked to take up a good place on the couch and watch Lisa Lavender report the news -much to the distinct displeasure of his wife. I found that I liked bury my stress under work.

However, it was currently nighttime and there was no way of selling any ice cream at this time, so I busied myself in a different sort of work. I had donned my costume, fit with a completely new mask that mister Rouge had recommended to me. Vengeance and Mercy hung at my sides like watchful companions as I crouched in the shadows of a stack of crates in the middle of a warehouse.

Now, I wasn't saying anything bad about the various gangs or evildoers in the good city of Vale, but there was an annoyingly stupid amount of criminals that used warehouses. I found it rather sad that I had tailed several different members of the Union to their hideouts only to find that they were using abandoned warehouses by the dozen for almost everything. I get that there is quite a bit of them just sitting around Vale, but the police should be able to put two and two together, right?

I mean, if I, a teenager who barely has any experience in espionage, can find, tail and accurately notice patterns in one of the largest criminal organization in Vale, then surely the good police of this city should be able to do better. For them to not even be busting down warehouses everyday meant that they were either more incompetent than a teenager.

Or they were corrupt.

That thought just brought more sickening thoughts to the front of my mind. The very people who were suppose to protect the innocent civilians of Vale were those that allowed these crimes to happen.

Of course, the Union just so happened to be the biggest of all the criminals of Vale, and the police could be fearing the backlash should such a gang ever turn completely over to causing chaos. It was the sort of balance that I was not used to paying attention to. As such, what I was doing now wasn't anything more than a simply robbery of one of the Union's many Dust storages.

I wasn't going to steal that much, either. Just enough to make things explode and then some. After my stint in blowing up Junior's workplace, I found that buying all that Dust again was going to get the police on my tail faster than I could go around and buy enough to support my efforts. That meant I had to gather the helpful material through less scrupulous means, and it just so happens that the Union has quite the hefty amount of Dust lying around.

Still, stealing from criminals was all good and fun, but there came the annoyances such as guards. I knew that steal from one of the Dust stores around Vale would probably be much, much easier, however, I refused to do that. Stealing from criminals was no different from stealing from those stores, but it did help assuage my guilt so long as I have the help of the explosives while they didn't.

All that being a long explanation for the fact that I was currently waiting for an opening to start carting Dust out of the crate that they stuffed it in. However, the Union were nothing if not cautious, and had set up a bunch of their minions, armed with automatic rifles, to guard the crates filled with explosives. Luckily, it was late enough for some to get bored from doing what they were paid to do, igniting the air with laughter as some sat in an illuminated area playing cards on a stalwart, fuzzy table. Cigarette smoke clung to the air as they jovial clinked their beer bottles, unaware that I watched them.

I definitely counted over twenty of them after watching them mull around for awhile, but it was possible that I missed some. While I would have erred on the side of caution, I had recently found a rather tantalizing Semblance nearby that basically spoke for this mission of mine.

[Single wavelength phase transformation. Thermal augmented visual perception.]

It was an ability that let me pass through anything, but came with the demerit of not being able to see any color whilst being a pseudo-ghost. The specifics of it were something painful to explain as they dealt with making my physical body vibrate at a frequency that seemed to be the perfect one to pass through things. With such a powerful Semblance that let me ignore anything, it wouldn't have been impossible for me to just waltz in there, grab the stuff I needed and go. However, I didn't want to allow the Union to realize just who was robbing them before I was ready.

As such, this was a strictly stealth mission.

So, I hid in the shadows of one side of the large warehouse. There weren't that many places where I could effectively get the drop on the random guards, and to even hit them I needed to make myself tangible before doing so. Popping out without a plan while relying on the phasing Semblance was just a recipe for getting riddled with holes the second that I mistimed my hits.

It was rather lucky that they had so many crates in their warehouse that it created a sort of labyrinth of wooden storage. There were a plethora of nooks and crannies of which I could hide myself in, and I took it upon myself to hide atop a particularly high crate for the vantage point.

Below me was a rather dark pathway between two isles of crates. I had watched as one of the grunts usually took to wandering around the pathways to make sure there were no robbers seeking to steal their Dust. They all were outfitted in a sort of body armor that promised some sort of ballistic protection, and all were armed with a rifle with flashlight to illuminate anyone suspicious before they were riddled with holes. However, they all had one thing in common. None of them looked up.

Whether it was out of some hidden competence or blatant carelessness, I cared not to figure out. All that I knew was that when one unfortunate grunt paced near my crates I phased through the material below me and passed straight to the floor.

Heart hammering through my chest, I let my eyes find the thermal signature of the unfortunate grunt, and went physical for a second to allow myself to push off the ground before charging through the solid wooden wall. Vengeance sung through the air, blunted tip smashing into the man's diaphragm in the exact moment that I found myself solid again.

Air rushed from his startled lips before he could utter a sound, and I recovered my posture fast enough to bury a foot into his thigh that sent him tumbling to the ground. A well placed kick then followed through with a soft thud. The whole fight barely lasted two seconds, and it was only Rouge's training that allowed me to even reach this level of brutality. However, the grunt was truly down and out for the count, so it allowed me to breathe easier knowing that there was one less enemy that I had to deal with.

Just in case though, I fumbled around in one of the many pockets of my jacket before finding a bag of zipties. There was only a moment of checking to make sure the man was still breathing well as I secured both his arms and legs with the tight rings of plastic. Then I was phasing through another series of crates, following the heat trails of other unfortunate men in the dark.

The thing that I hadn't known ever since I got the ability to see thermal wavelength was that people bled off heat into the air and ground by just passing through. While it was very faint, and barely something that was worth mentioning, it led me directly towards another pair of grunts.

I was a little apprehensive about fighting two on one while trying to stay as silent as possible, but the slower I dealt with everyone the sooner someone might discover the grunts I had taken care of. As such, I rushed parallel by them by passing through the nearby crates, placing Vengeance on my back for the moment. It was kind of hard to get a good deal of traction while phasing, but after playing around with the Semblance for a bit, I got a little better at managing to switch between physical and intangible fast enough to basically jump through each crate's wall.

When I reached the backmost grunt, I burst out of the nearby crate as silently as possible, reaching around him to force his finger away from the rifle's trigger while slamming a hand over his mouth as my knees collided with his back a second later. I felt him convulse with the suddenness of my appearance and subsequent attack, but I didn't give him much warning before I sandwiched him headfirst into a nearby crate, eliciting a heavy smack before he slumped to the ground.

His partner, however, turned fast enough after hearing my takedown his friend, but he moved too slow as I had already grabbed his hand before his pulled the trigger. My muscles ached and groaned as I pulled the grown man closer, wrapping my last free hand over his lips.

Rouge's training taught me well enough to know that just because my hands were occupied didn't mean that I was done for. With nary a second thought, I was already wrapping one free leg between the grunt's wide stance.

The man grunted, finding the strength to deny me throwing him to the floor, and pushed against me. Rubber sneakers squealed on the rough ground as I lost in the contest of strength, and he rushed the two of us to the nearest wall with the intent of smashing me against the hardest surface.

My eyes widened beneath my mask as my muscles screamed to try and fight back. I felt the man pause briefly in my resistance before picking up his pace. With my sneakers no longer gaining enough traction and my lungs burning to desperate air, I could only allow myself to be slammed into the wall.

However, what he never expected was for me to pass through the wall he wanted to slam me into, and crash headfirst into the very same one with all the momentum he had been building up. Safe to say, the grunt was going to have a particularly nasty bruise covering his right eye when he ever came to.

"Totally… planned." I rasped quietly, taking a moment to calm the rapid pace of my breathing. There hadn't been any grunts capable of matching me physically lately, and I might have been getting arrogant, but that last encounter had let me know that there were always going to be strong people with or without Aura.

Still, realizations or not, I took the time to ziptie the two of my newest victims -maybe an extra two or three for the man who caught me off guard. When they were both well and secured, I continued on my silent conquest of the warehouse.

After my run in with the last troublesome grunt, I learned my lesson of being overconfident. However, this also meant that the last various grunts were much more painfully dispatched as I wanted them down as fast as possible. In the end, there were only the four complacent guards still playing cards in one section of the warehouse.

This meant that I had free reign in the parts that I had already taken out the guards, and with that reign came an easy way out with my well stolen Dust. I practically skipped out of there with a few extra bags all full of the explosive material.

It wasn't even that much compared to the huge amounts that they had stored there, but it was certainly a couple times less than the amount I had gotten to take down Junior's building. Still, for a single night out, it was enough to continue my operations as a vigilante.

And as I walked away from the warehouse on darkened roads, I turned back one last time to gaze at my accomplishment. I couldn't help being a little ecstatic since this was the first time I had gone out, and nothing had gone awry despite some small setbacks.

Of course, I should've kept my thoughts to myself. Jaune Arc knew better than to tempt fate. Still, we all make mistakes.

However, I don't think anyone expected for the warehouse to explode in a huge ball of fire and various elements. Heat washed over me as the flames licked high into the night sky, and the force of the blast punched me hard in the gut as if a sledgehammer had been introduced intimately with my sternum.

My ears rang and everything swirled as my eyes dilated from the bright lines of flame. It felt as if the air had stopped working and I was left with kneeling, coughing and sputtering in front of the massive fireball.

'What...' My mind was a mess as I stared at the growing flames. 'Did I accidentally hit something?'

Then, through my muffled hearing, I heard footsteps. My blue eyes lolled in my head to find someone who looked completely out of place in the giant wreckage that had formed before me.

A man who looked barely in his twenties plodded onwards, bare foot. Deep, dark skin blended with the night, and smooth, silky snow locks were wrapped in a ponytail that reached all the way to his shoulder blades. He didn't look too big, though; barely reaching up to my eye level when I shambled up to my feet.

Oddly enough, he wore a loose pair of floral robes that exposed his chest and concealed his lean arms. The robes themselves were only hanging over his shoulders, flapping uselessly in the nighttime winds with a small strip of cloth, equally embroidered with various flowers, tying the long robes to his waist. Dark pants plumed around his legs -to hide his stance- flared with each step towards me, and I felt a small bit of terror as my eyes found his face.

His features were sharp, almost sword-like in how they were sculpted. Small scars dotting his figure, barely visible through his thin robes that hung placidly on his shoulders. However, the most prominent thing about him was the pair of numbers that were branded over his eyes.

Two fours each took up their own eye, raising burnt flesh to accentuate their characters. The skin around each scar was tough and weary.

"It seems Lily missed one." The man spoke smoothly, his voice deep and sharp. In the midst of analyzing the presence the man brought with him, I realized that maybe he was responsible for the bombing.

I tensed, feeling every part of my body sore from weathering through that explosion, and this weird man's words weren't helping ease me worries. The only thing that helped me thing was the fact that we were still a few meters apart while he was also blind.

As I sensed the warmth of his Aura past the heat of the burning warehouse, I blearily reached for it to know what I was dealing with. At the same time, the blind man took a single, small step forwards. Barely covering a meter with the movement.

And a dark hand buried into my chest.