The place that makes hell feel lukewarm

|Jaune's P.O.V|

Honestly, I had many expectations for the trip, some good and some bad, but it managed to exceed all of those expectations to a greater degree than I thought possible.

The trip to Vacuo was truly a unique experience.

But going back to the begining, the trip started when we boarded the ship leaving Argus. Where we would stay for the next few weeks.

The trip was very comfortable, as the ship we boarded, though not a luxury one, was a pretty nice one overall. But other than that, there was not much else of importance that happened on the boat itself.

But what was of interest during the trip was the calls he received via Scroll, mostly from my family and only revolved around my current situation but one of those calls came from Ozpin.And the purpose of it was about my previous deal with him.

It was relayed that though not perfect, my efforts to prevent the disaster a Kuroyuri did result in many survivors and so, I gave Ozpin some information in regards to Salem's agents and some extra tidbit about the situation on Mistral as a bonus.

But that wasn't the only exchange we made during this time, later I once again entered in contact with the wizard, this time related to the topic of magic.

Not about the maidens or how to wield magic, since I know that no amount of theoretical knowledge could make up for the fact that I simply lack the raw magic energy or mana to use the very much tempting power.But instead I sought to learn more in the effort to be more capable of identifying and resisting its effects.

This came due to a sudden worry of magic being used to target me and my family.

This wasn't something I was too worried about before due to the scarcity of magic in the four kingdoms, or at least I didn't expect to come to face with it so soon.

But as I foiled Salem's plans and will continue to do so in the future, unless she's a big optimist, she'll undoubtedly change her plans and start adding insurances in them, so there's the risk I'll have to deal with a problem born of that magic.

And despite me planning to keep the power of the maidens out of Salem's grasp, there's always the chance I'll have to face them later on, so having knowledge on the subject could prove to be invaluable for the future.

But of course, Ozpin has held this information a secret for centuries and it's safe to assume that he won't hand over the information so easily.

So far, our relationship has been held on the basis of deals and equivalent exchange. So I would need to pay an appropriate price in order to gain that information.

I Knew that the identity of a few agents would be far from enough to make this transaction. For as starved for information as Ozpin is, he wouldn't be so gullible as to give away his greatest ace.

So, considering that this relationship has already endured for some years, I thought that it was already time to deepen the relationship, start discussing bigger plans and treating each other as allies instead of just acquaintances.

But everything is going very slow, trust is very hard to come by, especially for a thousands of years old person, so this process have to be done slowly.

For now, I've shared a bit of Salem's current standing plan to capture the maidens, how she intends to divide and conquer the kingdoms one by one using sabotage. Or at least the basics of it.

And Ozpin, to my surprise wasn't as apposed to sharing the basics of magic and how it works. Maybe it's because he knows that no one other than himself, Salem and the maidens can use magic. Or at least no one else inside the four kingdoms, so he wasn't worried about what I could do with it.

He actually seemed quite in favor of me learning how to defend against magic, at least on the most basic level and after a bit of thought, I had a few hypothesis why.

My existence is probably one of the most unstable factors in his eyes, especially considering all the information I hold. So since he can't personally protect me from Salem, he would rather teach me about magic in the hopes I won't fall into Salem's hands.

If she were to obtain all the information I have in my brain, Oum knows what she could do with it.

So he sent me the name of a few books, fairytales, of course...

Honestly, I was expecting to have to read some sort of ancient book or some very old scroll where it might be written on, or at least receive photos of the pages so I can read without having to meet him personally.

But I didn't expect to find it in books that can be easily accessed by the public.

Well, I already knew that some of those books were real like the story of the maidens and I have read plenty in my infancy in order to find any other useful information.

But most of the books I'm being recommended now are ones I've read before and classifies as not being useful since most of the books doesn't present magic at all in their stories.

So unlike the story of the four season maidens, the real content of the book couldn't be read without some external factor, which came in the form of alphabet cyphers, (what a coincidence), which when used on the books would reveal the real content, much like letters carrying important information would be codified and could only be read with the right decoding method.

And why keep all this information in the form of children's fairytale books? Or why keep it at all when no one could use magic outside of a select few?I don't have the slightest clue, I just attributed it as being one of the ancient wizard's eccentricities.

But what matters is that this information will be useful and I managed to obtain it for a much lower price than I thought.

So despite Neo's and many onlookers confused gazes, I spent a good portion of the trip reading children's fairy tales one after the other.

And though I'm still completely incapable of using magic, the information about the duration, requirements and effects of many spells was already enough to satisfy me.

Of course, I didn't embark on this trip to read books, that's just one thing that got added to my 'to-do list', my focus was still on the real purpose of the trip.

But that didn't mean that I couldn't enjoy it alongside Neo, it would be an enormous waste to travel this far and not make some good memories while I'm at it.

So in the free time, I decided to enjoy whatever this travel had in store. This could also be considered to be the rest my body desperately needed after spending years of incessant training, especially considering that what awaits me once I arrives at my destination is even more training.

So going back to the trip, after our travel by boat we finally arrived in Sanus, more specifically in the coastal small town named Prospero at the north of Vacuo.

There, we came upon the first surprise:

There was more to Vacuo then just deserts.

This may sound a redundant statement, but when referring to the Kingdom, most people immediately think of the enormous desert, the biggest in remnant if you'd go for its most common definition, where the capital of the Kingdom stands on, so other aspects or features are often overlooked.

But the scenery in Prospero was actually very different from what we imagined, the town was surrounded by dense tropical forest and the only sand I saw was on the beaches, the air was humid and though hot, the climate was still very much bearable.

That's mostly thanks to the humidity of the sea, so only if I went inland would I find any desert.

But it was not just tropical forests, there was also mountains, plains and savanahs. Showing a great variety in not only culture but also in natural landmarks.

And speaking of culture, if Mistral, the Kingdom where I was born in can be said to be a mix of many Asian countries back on Earth in regards to its culture, then Vacuo would be very similar to many middle eastern and Northern African countries in that same aspect.

From the aesthetics, to the habits and even the food, it's hard not to draw parallels between those places, but there was also just as much things that were exclusive to Vacuo and wasn't present in any country back on earth, at least as far as I know.

Remnant is very different from Earth and it requires a much different aproach to the problems that plague it afterall.

But returning to the main topic, after spending a few days in Prospero, we took a airplane heading south and further inland. Something that I would later learn that it wouldn't become an option as we travelled further inland.

And that brings the next surprise of this trip.

The new threats that lurked in the wilderness.

That's something that I didn't give much attention to until now considering how many things he had to juggle between training, hacking and learning, but here it became quite clear that this place had many new faces that wanted nothing more than to make my day worse and I would need to deal with them.

Because clearly, the roster of monsters stalking people in the wilderness that was introduced in the show just wasn't big enough, so in this alternate reality of the show I currently find myself in, there's a few new friends that joined in the fun.

One of them is the 'carrion', a Grimm that resembles the Nevermore in its avian appearance, more specifically a vulture. But their behavior resembles ravagers in their tendency to swarm targets and use their agility and numbers to their advantage. They also have the ability to spit a strong corrosive acid.

Though none of their traits is exclusive to themselves, this particular combination was responsible for making travel with airships risky further inland. You wouldn't want to be inside a giant flying metal coffin when a group of birds that spit acid that can easily melt through steel is on the loose.

But aside from their tendency to bring down airships, their behavior is that of an opportunist, they rarely attack caravans directly, but instead wait for them to be weakened by some conflict before swooping in and dealing with any survivors.

There is also gigantic sand burrowing worms that are somewhat similar to the already existing blind worms but much bigger, I mean can eat an entire caravan in a single gulp bigger, but those are quite rare and not overly aggressive if you know how to avoid them.

They use vibrations to detect beings above the sand, but the range is quite limited. So that's why caravans have for the most part regressed to using animal propulsion for locomotion, the motors of vehicles generate too many vibrations that attract the burrowed grimm, so vehicles can only be used in a small number within the caravans.

But that's not to say that the 'originals' are any less of a threat, Deathstalkers, a variation of King Taijitu that resembles a king cobra with its hood, Nevermores and more, can also be seen on these parts and are massive threats to any careless travelers.

But in the end, the inhabitants adapted to it and developed tactics and equipment that can allow them to make the trip through the desert despite the dangers.

Ironically enough, from what I've learned reading history books, those awful conditions that those that live here have to contend with daily are also the reason that the Kingdom is still standing to this day, many invasions were repelled during the great War due to the many adverse conditions wearing the invaders down.

And that leaves the third thing I noticed, the climate.

Even as far as when I took my first step into the desert, the conditions had exceeded what I could've accounted for.

Maybe its because we wouldn't be inside a vehicle with access to air conditioner like I was hoping for, but we really got to 'feel' the desert.

The arid air, scalding heat during the days and it can't be forgotten that the nights in the desert are bone-chilling cold. The worst of everything was the sand which would be a constant annoyance during the trip.

So as we traveled deeper into the desert, we would hop from one caravan to another, slowly approaching our destination. At some point Neo got fed up with the uncomfortable carriages and insisted we buy one of our own.

I was initially opposed to the idea since we could end up attracting some unwanted attention, but it would seem that the designers had already taken this into consideration and made minimalistic exteriors that don't reveal its true quality.

And considering that I'm not hurting for cash at the moment, I must admit that it was a good purchase, even if we're only going to use it for a while.

And so, that's how we spent the next few weeks.

...

From outside the carriage, many voices along with sounds of bumping and smashing could be heard.

*Bang*

"Come on! Get this thing open!"

"The boss will have our heads if we delay this, we can't stay here much longer."

*Bang* *Bang*

"You hear me tourists? If you come out now, things won't have to get bloody!"

And the culmination of all my previous decisions is the situation we're currently in.

'Honestly, I can only blame my curiosity for this.'

The decision to join this caravan wasn't one made by coincidence, in our last stop, I was able to notice the strangeness in the caravan master and after hacking to take a peek at his Scroll, became quite curious about whatever dangerous contraband he was carrying.

And that is saying something considering that looking into past deals, this caravan has traded in all one can imagine, including slaves. So this people don't exactly have clean hands and letting them handle the bandits on their own can only be said to be their own karma.

So standing by while they're slaughtered doesn't weight on my mind at all. I've already seen too many things to hold an idealistic view that I must save everyone.

So Knowing this, I decided to join the caravan to look for an opportunity to look into whatever it was, but it seemed that he wasn't the only one that was interested.

'Well, this can be said to be the perfect opportunity to look into it, it just didn't come in the way I would hope for.'

So that's what lead me to where I am now, in the middle of the desert and surrounded by bandits.

There were a dozen bandits that came on horses and about 30 turncoats, a very respectable number.

"*Sigh* Neo, remember what I told you about not finding trouble, well, it seems that trouble has just found us."

Hearing this, Neo shows a wicked smile. Not concealing how much she's been expecting to have an opportunity to 'stretch' after being confined in the carriage for so long.

But I can't say much about it, since I would be lying if if I said that I'm not looking forward to some action after a, so far, very dull trip.

"Get into position and prepare to strike them from where they least expect it, I'll get their attention in the meanwhile." I start giving instructions regarding the inevitable fight, but it is mostly out of habit since over the years, our mutual understanding has increased and such coordination does not need to be verbalized.

"And try to keep some for questioning, I want to know who is behind this." At this last request, she nods affirmatively.

{I'll try to leave some for you} She writes in the air using her aura, before picking her weapon, a pink paper umbrella and using her semblance to hide her figure.

Meanwhile I just touch the handle Crocea Mors and firmly grasp it, a habit I developed whenever I'm preparing myself for a fight.

Though using aura detection has confirmed that none of the bandits possess aura, I've made a point to never take any enemy lightly, especially when I'm fighting in a new terrain.

Though completely serious, I'm not in the least worried about this fight, I'm very confident in mine and Neo's ability to escape if something goes south, even if the enemy has horses.

Like a horde of Grimm suddenly appearing in the middle of the fight or there being more bandits than just these ones

So without further ado, he moved on to the door.

"I've seldom fought humans seriously before, let's get some practice while we have have the opportunity."

Unluckily for these bandits, they've landed themselves as perfect warm-up for two combat starved fighters.