Chapter 5

Summer's sword met Neo's body again, and the match was over. The normally cocky spectator was now the one lying on the ground, looking disgruntled, as Kojiro shook his head slightly in the background.

"Your strikes were swift, but they lacked momentum." Kojiro said. "Part of your limitation is-"

Neo glared at Kojiro, who continued on anyway.

"-Your body weight, so I advise you not to copy me and continue to rely on precise yet hard hitting strikes."

Neo sullenly nodded, before standing up, holding her back in a way that suggested an ache, and walked off the roof.

"…You're working her awfully hard." Summer said, wiping some sweat off her brow. Despite Neo's unwieldy fighting style, it was still challenging to defend against, and the glass illusions were difficult to work around with her deceptions.

Kojiro shook his head. "This was how hard I trained myself."

"Who trained you?" Summer said, slightly confused.

"I had a teacher, but I wasn't very talented."

Summer gave him a very odd look. One that looked both akin to frustration and anger. Neo poked a head out of the stairwell and raised a hand to object, before realizing that her aura was really low and that casual semblance use was impossible.

How was this guy not talented?

"And while you aren't using the roof, I shall continue practicing." Kojiro said, already slinging the sword off of his back. His horrible fashion sense was made for all to see as he stood on the edge of a very visible roof and began swinging his sword in motions Summer realized were just basic sword strikes.

Neo stomped her way down the stairs, making her best attempt to communicate her frustration.

"Where are your team members, by the way?" Kojiro said, sword whistling through the air as he once again completed a basic maneuver.

"They're around Vale. Qrow and Raven went out doing… whatever they do, and Taiyang went to watch a movie with some of his other friends." Summer sighed.

"Since you are here, thank you for your aid in training Neo. I find myself as too much of an intense opponent to be a good training partner." Kojiro said, pausing and looking back at Summer, who was idly fidgeting with the hilt of her sword.

"Since you're so good… couldn't you help us out? We have a mission in school coming up, and we don't exactly want to perform poorly."

"And what makes you think that I'm going to be helpful in training you for these missions?" Kojiro asked. "I have not defeated any Grimm in the years that I have been attempting to train my swordsmanship, and if what the huntsman textbooks about Grimm say are correct, then I won't exactly excel at fighting them."

Memories of combating demonic boars and dragons came to mind, but Kojiro suppressed them immediately.

His legend consisted of the tales of his skill, not his proficiency with killing monsters, except for that one, where he was called the 'Savior of France' for defeating dragons, not that he knew what a 'France' was anyways, being a Japanese man from the medieval era.

The books did not mention dragons in any shape or form.

But there was one type of Grimm that piqued his interest: The Nevermore. Described as a flying scourge in the shape of a bird that shot feathers as hard as metal out from its wings, it would certainly be an experience to combat one.

"Say… Wouldn't you know where I could fight one of those… Nevermore, by any chance?"

Summer slowly grinned.

…

Kojiro was not having a good time.

He already had to deal with one brat all the time, and now, there was a second one.

Said second brat began dragging him down the visitor registration center's waiting line. Neo followed, grinning. A clever use of her semblance had made their hair color change to black tipped with red, and their eye color to silver. Kojiro's purple robes had been recolored to red and black (much to his chagrin) and Neo just looked like a smaller version of Summer.

"Family visitors?" the guard said, already noting the example.

Summer just nodded, smiling nervously.

"They your siblings?" The guard said, scrolling down the screen of his holographic device. Some articles about rising police activity were on display, and Kojiro quickly read through their summaries before shaking his head.

"U-uh, cousins." Summer said, her cloak a tight bunch in her fist.

Neo nodded cheerfully and reached up to try and pat Summer's head, but failed. The guard snorted.

"Well, alright then. Keep the tags on, and remember to write your names on them."

Two tickets stamped with seals guaranteeing security were thrown at them, and Summer caught them deftly.

The guard noted the sword on Kojiro's back, and shouted a question.

"You a huntsman in training?"

"Merely a wandering swordsman. Our family was in town." Kojiro said, walking forward. Neo looked at Kojiro nervously, but he shook his head imperceptibly, still walking forward.

…

Ozpin sat in his chair in a rare moment of peace amidst these rather concerning times.

A cup of cold coffee remained untouched, the news of troubling manners reaching his ears once again. An insurrectionist group known as the Monarchist had risen in the underworld, and had slowly crept along the city's slums, motivating the population into supporting a fictitious son of the last king of Vale.

(He was the last king of Vale, after all, and he would know if he had ever fathered anybody.)

The city council, however, had begun mobilizing more policemen and huntsmen to track down the gangs that still held pockets of territory.

The violence was concerning, and Grimm activity was already increasing near the natural borders that separated Vale from the hordes of Grimm. Already, increased Nevermore sightings were an indication of the negativity rising.

Idly, he looked at a notification that had just popped up. A guard had just approved the entry of Summer Rose's… cousins?

Ozpin took a look at the camera footage and froze.

The three together looked like a perfect trio of relatives. All with black and red hair, and most importantly…

Silver eyes.

The cogs in his head turned, and he would make it a point to approach the two. Besides, the older cousin had a sword on his back. Why not convince him to become a huntsman?

…

After making it to Beacon and walking through the school to some odd looks by students lounging about in the library, they made it to the locker rooms and then to the launch pads.

Kojiro overlooked the cliff, wind tousling through his hair. The black and red locks still felt wrong as they whipped across his eyes, but at least it was better than having orange hair.

Maybe Kojiro would ask Neo to turn his hair purple as permanently as she could manage, but then again, there were such things as limits to the amount of aura that one has.

"You uh… don't have Aura." Summer said, looking at the launch pad awkwardly. "I don't think you can survive that."

Kojiro sighed and went over his options. A very long sword, a century's worth of experience and one decade of training with said sword, and some loose robes.

"Sometimes, people are defeated by the simplest of things." Kojiro sighed.

"There should be stairs somewhere around the corner." Summer said, looking around the curve of the cliff.

Neo began laughing and jumped off the cliff, parasol open and glimmering with the color of her aura.

Kojiro looked at Neo's slowly descending form wistfully, and then went to look for the stairs.

…

Twenty minutes later, Kojiro had leisurely strolled down the staircase spiraling down the mountain, carved into one side of the cliff and forming a terrace like formation. Even if, in the harsh sun, a trickle of sweat could be seen to distort the shimmering illusion that was his hair, he still cut a picture of calm.

Not at all like somebody about to enter a forest full of monsters.

He heard some rustling of leaves, and the flap of fabric, and turned to see Neo sneakily trying to tap him on the back.

Gently shaking his head, Neo pouted.

"I never get to sneak up on you." Neo projected in the air, the words of glass reflecting the color of the green forest around them.

"Took you long enough." Summer said, leaning against a tree and watching Neo make silly faces behind Kojiro's stoic one.

"Even if I consider myself to be physically fit, not everybody has a power that gives themselves speed."

Kojiro looked back at Neo's 'subtle' attempts at annoying him, and a flash of slight irritation flashed across his face.

That was enough to attract… it.

…

The creature shifted its feathers aimlessly, rustling idly in the trees of the emerald forest. Baleful red eyes remained closed, until what seemed like a ping of sound echoed throughout the forest on their metaphysical emotional radar.\

The Nevermore was not complicated enough to know about the inner machinations of how they found their prey. However, what mattered was that they could find their prey.

Even through their mindless haze of rage and hatred towards anything that moved (except for their fellow brethren), they still had learned to avoid Beacon Academy.

But those in the Emerald Forest were fair game.

With a loud caw, a rather large Nevermore took flight and flew towards its target. It froze when it saw the cursed silver color that graced the irises of its target, but then, it realized that the coloration was a mere imitation. The sense of the forces of light were near the tall human, but not emanating from him.

A couple of wingbeats later, it began circling the area that the humans were in.

Visitors to the Emerald Forest were rare, and it wanted to make the most of its new prey.

…

Kojiro raised an eyebrow at the monstrosity flying in the air.

Summer pointed her sword at it, and sat down cross legged under a particularly shady tree. Neo joined her besides it, leaning on the larger teen lazily.

"If you wanted a Nevermore to fight, this is as good as any."

Kojiro merely drew his sword, took a deep breath, and looked at the bird in its scarlet eyes.

Then, the bird flew closer…. And closer…

Summer hid behind the tree.

"Uh… Kojiro? I don't think that's any regular Grimm."

The shadow grew slowly in sight like a gigantic storm cloud, rolling over the horizon. Its size easily dwarfed the breadth of the tree that Summer and Neo were currently hiding behind.

"Don't worry." Kojiro's voice said, soft and whimsically. It was almost as if he wasn't staring down a six hundred pound Alpha Nevermore.

"After all, Nevermores are just bigger swallows."

"What the hell is a swallow?" Summer whispered loudly, which kind of defeated the point of whispering.

Neo shrugged.

The bird swung its wings, and its sharp feathers shot forward like javelins. The dark quills whistled through the sky and approached Kojiro's figure, who just… stood there.

"Dodge, you idiot!" Summer shouted, almost rushing out there with her semblance. Neo, however, held onto the edge of her cloak, and pointed.

In several flashes of steel, Kojiro executed four sword slashes in rapid succession, striking each feather on the shaft. The sound of metal on metal echoed throughout the forest, but impossibly, the thin sword managed to survive the contact and deflected the razor sharp feathers elsewhere, around Kojiro. Others were simply ignored as they soared inches away from Kojiro's ear. One particularly well aimed one cut some strands of Kojiro's swaying ponytail off.

The feathers that fell off the mark sank into the earth like pins getting stabbed into clay, making an impression and making the ground curve soundlessly. The only indication of their impact was a soft whump and a dust cloud that bloomed from each one.

When the volley had finally concluded, Kojiro stood amidst a fortress made of Nevermore feathers. His clothes were dusty but still pristine, unscathed by the barrage.

Kojiro allowed himself a smirk, and leveled his sword at the Nevermore, which took it as a challenge.

Volley after volley of feathers were cast onto Kojiro, and throughout the minutes that Kojiro's sword rang true against the metallic feathers, Summer realized something.

His sword style wasn't some elaborate maneuver or planned move. It wasn't some tactic that formed an impenetrable wall of sword strikes.

It was just the few basic strikes that Kojiro practiced every day linked together in an elegant show of skill. The moves were weaved together with such ease and familiarity that they were practically one tapestry, one silver line of a sword painting through the air, conducting the fallen Nevermore feathers.

Every move was done in response to a single feather, and no mistakes were made. Kojiro's eyes sharply danced from volley to volley, subtly leaning forwards or backwards to better put his back into his sword strikes.

After a good ten minutes, the ground where Kojiro had been standing was long since pulverized, but within half a meter of where Kojiro was standing, the earth remained untouched save for a couple patches of bruised grass, for when Kojiro shifted his footing.

The volleys of feathers that the Nevermore was firing had also slowed down, the bird visibly struggling to keep itself in the air as feathers slowly grew back out of its wings.

Slowly but surely, the bird spiraled lower and lower, the barrages of feathers dwindling to one or two that were occasionally flung at Kojiro, who batted them aside with the same nonchalance.

The suspicions that Kojiro didn't have aura were proved to be true when it was revealed that his sword was severely scratched up, and slightly bent. Any huntsman worth their salt would reinforce their weapons with aura, but Kojiro clearly didn't.

The Nevermore finally descended onto Kojiro, deciding to capitalize on its own momentum to go down on a swooping attack.

It was just now that Summer finally realized that Kojiro had outlasted an Alpha Nevermore.

And then, she realized that the sharp beak of the Nevermore was pointed straight at Kojiro during the dive.

"Kojiro! Dodge!" Summer shouted. There was no feasible way that Kojiro could block the dive of a Nevermore, and his only real hope was dodging.

Kojiro, however stood his ground save for a small shift in footwork. Ducking downwards underneath the dive of the Nevermore, he swung his battered sword at the underbelly of the Nevermore.

It was completely reactionary and risky. It was downright asinine in the way that it avoided the blow, but failed to account for any more movement from the Nevermore.

It was also the most elegant way that Summer had seen as to finishing off a Nevermore. Usually, some huntsman or city wall defense unit would just shoot it down with high powered dust cannons.

Kojiro's sword held firm first under the bony mask that scraped past the edge, and then sank into the soft underbelly of the bird like a fish taking to water. Black blood poured out of the bird, but it sprayed forward, leaving Kojiro's robes unstained.

The bird's bypass had finished, and its wings fell limp, making the beast fall to the ground. It turned around, legs shaking and black blood leaking, before giving one last defiant caw.

Kojiro turned and walked forward on the grass, his sandals making the already fading grimm blood splatter across the ground.

"A swallow would have been able to turn out of the way of my strike, but you are but a mere demonic beast." Kojiro said, sighing as he moved out of the way of one last wing swipe.

"Still, you were a worthy adversary, and with this, I shall finish our duel."

A flick of the wrist was all it took to gouge a deep cut into the Nevermore, which slowly began fading into black dust. Kojiro walked backwards, still wary of the fallen Nevermore, whose eyes slowly faded to grey. Its bony mask flaked into white shards before blowing away in a slight wind, and soon enough, the rest of its body followed suit.

Taking a few deep breaths, Kojiro finally slowed his breathing. Summer ran out to congratulate Kojiro, and Neo looked on with the same expression that she had when the confrontation had began.

In her mind, there was no way that Kojiro was losing to a mindless bird.

"That was so awesome!" Summer squealed, flitting around and scattering white rose petals around the green grass. "How did you deflect all of those feathers without even moving your feet? How could you just stand there and strike at the Nevermore when it dived at you? How-"

Summer rambled on as Kojiro's gentle smile slowly grew more strained. A hand reached for his forehead slowly out of irritation, but then, Summer noticed his weapon.

"Oh no! Your sword! It's…. so broken."

Kojiro traced a finger across the monohoshizao, whose state was but a mere shadow of its former glory. Nicks and scratches marred its once pristine surface.

It brought back memories of his last loss in the Holy Grail War… when his sword was bent, leaving an opening in his Tsubame Gaeshi for Saber to exploit.

But it was oddly humbling. This time, there was no Valkyrie that dwelled in his blade and allowed for it to split into two. This time, his sword wasn't damaged by the attack of a noble phantasm.

It was dented by the feathers on a bird. A demonic bird, but nonetheless, a bird.

"I can take you to reforge it, if you want. Beacon has forges that are free to use for students." Summer said.

Kojiro thought about it. Even if he could just commission another one, to fight truly strong opponents, it was imperative that one's blade did not give out.

"..Yes, that would be helpful."

Neo then walked up and tugged on Kojiro's sleeve, gesturing to her umbrella.

"Oh, and can you work on a weaponized umbrella at the same time?"

Summer blinked owlishly.

"A… what?"

…

Meanwhile, Ozpin was browsing Summer's family tree.

"Where did these "cousins" come from?" he thought.