149

Chapter 149:

Raven and Amber charged each other. Orange flames spilled from the corners of Amber's eyes, while blood-red flames spread from Raven's. As they approached, Raven drew forth a blue blade from her sheath, the blade's length doubling as it fully emerged into the air. Amber met it with a swing from her staff, leading with the red crystal on one end.

Ice and flames vied against each other, the two women straining, not just with the Dust they were wielding, but putting their magic into their attacks as well. The sound of something breaking echoed through the air, accompanied by the roar of an explosion. The pair were forced apart, while a hail of icy shrapnel flew in every direction. Those dagger-like shards of ice exploded against flickering barriers of energy that surrounded their bodies. More than their Auras, both Maidens were protected by a barrier of magic, ensuring that no ordinary attack could even touch them.

Of course, given that the attacks that both of them were using were anything but ordinary, it wouldn't have been much of a surprise if one or both their attacks had punched through. But the mere aftereffects of an attack wasn't enough to inflict harm.

Their surroundings were a different matter though. Clashing on the walkway had seen angry flames and icy shrapnel burning and ripping through the seats around them, both above and below. Metal railings shrieked as they twisted under the force of impact, or straight-up melted from the heat.

Raven skidded to a stop, the blade of her sword now reduced to a shattered stump. Quickly, she returned the weapon to its sheath, Omen's rotary system quickly selecting a new blade for her to wield.

A flickering figure appeared behind Raven, and she spun about, attacking straight off the draw, her slash flying at Natsuki, who brought the blade of her shorter kodachi, which she held in her left hand, across her body, deflecting Raven's swing up and over her head. The blood-red blade continued on its arc, while Natsuki lunged in with the longer kodachi in her right hand, orange and red light sparking along the edge of her blade as she swung it at Raven.

Dodging back, Raven found herself confronted with a wave of roiling flame that threatened to wash over her. With a growl, Raven released her hold on the handle of Omen's sheath, holding it out in front of her. Natsuki's flames crashed against the blood-red barrier that appeared, breaking across it.

Amber, now that Raven had turned to face Natsuki, was behind Raven, also lunging in, the pale-green crystal on the other end of her staff upraised. With an angry crack, a bolt of lightning descended down to strike the tip of that crystal, before the arc of Amber's swing sent the bolt flying at Raven. Simply continuing the movement of her sword, Raven spun around in a near-complete circle, swinging her own blade, which flashed with the crimson energy of her magic, using the movement to deflect Amber's lightning away.

However, Natsuki wasn't giving up either. She plowed through the cover afforded by her flames, charging for Raven's unguarded left side. Or, at least it appeared unguarded. Closing her left hand, Raven curled her fingers around the handle of a new sword, this one formed from what looked like icy glass, which she held in a reverse-grip as she swung it to meet the attacking blade of Natsuki's kodachi. Raven's second sword was about half the length of Omen, which made it better-suited for defense. Even though it appeared to be made of ice or glass, it didn't shatter in the face of Natsuki's attack, even as more fire exploded out from Natsuki's own sword.

Rather than try to use her barrier to deflect the attack, Raven growled and forced her sword back against Natsuki, who found herself thrown back as a pillar of ice suddenly erupted out from the floor between her and Raven. The sudden impediment gave Raven some time to turn her full attention back to Amber. Switching her grip on her second sword, Raven now rushed Amber with a weapon in each hand, her movement a blur as her magic lent her speed. She unleashed a flurry of attacks, while Amber countered by spinning her staff, trying to keep Raven's strikes at bay.

Amber found herself driven back, which gave Raven enough time to return Omen to its sheath. Amber lunged forward, aiming to strike before Raven could draw again. However, Raven simply hurled the sword in her left hand, sending it flying at Amber. The blade flared with blue light, then shattered into an explosion of more ice. This time, the fragments were the size of spears, and accompanied by a wave of pure cold that left an icy rime clinging to every surface it washed over along its path towards Amber. Sweeping the green crystal on the end of her staff in a circular motion, Amber called forth a whirlwind that deflected the ice spears and scattered the wave of cold coming at her.

However, countering Raven's attack slowed Amber just enough that Raven was able to draw her sword again. This time, the blade was bright-yellow, crackling with electricity. Both women closed with one another, a single bolt of lightning lancing down from above, forking to meet both their weapons as they struck. Their weapons crossed, and the two women strained against one another, flames streaming from their eyes, teeth bared as they found themselves in a deadlock. The powerful electrical energy they had summoned built between them, bolts arcing out to strike against any nearby surface, melting through metal, setting the cushions of nearby seats on fire.

Then, with another, much deeper, thunderclap, the energy building between them exploded outwards. Raven was sent skidding back, smacking back into the ice pillar she had created. Amber, on the other hand, was knocked back off her feet with a cry of surprise, which became one of pain as she slammed hard against the railing behind her, by virtue of the coliseum's circular curve. She struck it at an angle, bouncing off, then hitting the floor to bounce again. The barrier Maidens possessed was powerful, but needed to be consciously activated. When a Maiden took an unexpected hit, as Amber just had, she wound up taking the blow with her Aura and body instead.

Raven pushed herself away from the ice pillar, getting ready to throw herself after Amber, only for a shadow to come over her. Looking up, she saw Natsuki in the air above her head, the girl having gone into a leap, while turning her body around sweeping her sword at Raven again.

"Maouen!" A roaring jet of flame surged down at Raven. With her path of retreat blocked by the ice she'd created, Raven dove forward instead, Natsuki's fire melting the ice immediately, and then melting the metal beneath it. The fact that Raven's dodge brought her closer to Amber worked to her advantage as well. Natsuki wouldn't be willing to resort to bigger attacks like that one, if she was worried about hitting her ally at the same time.

However, that didn't seem to be on Natsuki's mind. She dropped down near where Raven was now standing, then charged in, launching into a series of rapid attacks with both her swords. Raven worked Omen's blade furiously, parrying Natsuki's attacks. However, Omen's length made it somewhat difficult to use defensively. Even though the yellow blade was charged with lightning, it didn't seem to affect Natsuki, the sparks and arcs of electricity seeming to simply bounce off her own swords as she struck.

With an angry shout, Raven called down another bolt of lightning in conjunction with her swing. Natsuki met the incoming attack with the shorter of her two swords, easily knocking the attacking energy aside, not even breaking her own offensive, her right-hand kodachi swinging in to strike Raven's sword from the side, the yellow blade shattering before the attack.

With an angry snarl, Raven jumped back, returning the handle to the sheath once again. As she did, she felt a pressure building from behind her. Natsuki's offensive had given Amber enough time to recover from the hits she'd just taken, and now Amber was lunging towards Raven's back, thrusting with the red crystal on the end of her staff as though it were a spear. Raven barely had enough warning to kick off the floor, jumping over the line of Amber's thrust, and the jet of flame that she launched off the end of her staff, flames which rushed right for Natsuki.

However, Natsuki jumped as well. Instead of trying to avoid Amber's attack though, Natsuki instead used her jump to clear her feet off the floor so that she could turn her body sideways, while going into a spin that had her swords sweeping around her. Her kodachi met the flames of Amber's attack, then swept them up into a burning ring around her body, to which Natsuki added the heat and power of her own flames.

"Wanyudo!" Natsuki launched the accumulated flames in a wheel, which rolled past Amber, who had thrown herself aside in anticipation of what Natsuki was doing. The wheel rolled right at Raven, who'd only just touched down after her previous evasion. With an angry yell, Raven drew Omen once more, unleashing a blue blade impregnated with ice-Dust, to which she added her magic. Her slash met Natsuki's wheel of fire head-on, ice and flames clashing with a combination of roaring and cracking, the flames exploding in a brilliant flare of light, before scattering, along with icy motes, almost like snow, from Raven's attack.

Following through, Raven launched a barrage of slashes, each one sending a wave of ice flying at the other two. Amber and Natsuki fell back as ridges of ice erupted from the floor, lances of ice leapt from nearby railings, and spikes of ice stabbed down from above. Amber spun her staff and Natsuki wove her kodachi through defensive patterns, the two blocking and parrying even as they dodged.

Raven wasn't done yet. Taking her sword in both hands, she raised it overhead. A radiant aura of shining blue shimmered around her, merging with her sword, making its blade swell in length and width, while jagged crystals jutted back from the guard, the sword becoming even longer than Raven was tall. With a furious roar, Raven charged forward, the ice she'd produced before shattering, then being drawn into the sword, making it heavier still. Raven brought it straight down straight at Natsuki and Amber.

Natsuki seemed to stop. At first, it looked as though she wouldn't be in time to respond to Raven's attack. However, not even bothering to try and close in herself, Natsuki simply began to spin. In fact, it looked as though her body was spinning in two directions simultaneously. "Kaitenju Kenbu!" Her kodachi etched bright-orange and red lines in the air, six slashes, three converging from either side, meeting together to form a grid-like pattern to meet the descending blade of Raven's massive sword. At the same time, six spinning orbs of fire, like miniature suns, also formed, dancing outside the pattern, just above the line of each of the six slashes that Natsuki had made. Even as the her swords met Raven's with a rapid series of clangs that partially ablated the force of Raven's heavy slash, those miniature suns surged forward, converging on Raven's sword as well.

The resulting explosion shattered the giant blue blade, while also sending Raven skidding back. Natsuki was sent sliding back too. As she did, she turned her body, bracing the pommel of her right-handed kodachi against the tip of her left, before reversing the course of her turn, releasing her right-handed blade, propelling it with the thrusting movement of her left, then releasing that one as well, using the move to throw both swords at Raven, the smaller left-handed kodachi perfectly hidden behind the larger one, the leading sword's blade shining with fiery energy. "Onmyo Enya!"

Raven quickly moved to defend herself. Omen's blade had snapped again, but there was no time for her to get a new one from her sheath. Natsuki's fluid followthrough had been just that fast. Instead, she countered with the remnants of her broken blade, knocking the leading kodachi aside, only for Raven's eyes to widen as she saw its partner-blade following in its wake, shining with the accumulated energy imparted by Natsuki's Aura. Quickly, Raven brought up her left hand, a shield of ice blossoming between her and the incoming sword. Natsuki's sword exploded on contact with Raven's shield, blasting her backwards with an angry scream.

Turning her backwards flight into a flip allowed Raven to get her feet back beneath her. She landed in a crouch, planting her left hand, using that to help absorb her momentum and terminate her backwards slide. As she did, Raven heard the sound of rushing wind coming from somewhere above her. Looking up, Raven saw Amber hovering in the air, orange flames streaming from her eyes as Amber held her arms out to the side of her, her staff held in her right hand, but not presently in use.

Instead, Amber was using her magic to completely subjugate the air around her to her will. The wind stretched down, spreading about to sweep up the metal debris left in the wake of the swath of destruction that the three Maidens' power had ripped along the perimeter of the arena. Chunks of metal debris and pieces of torn seats whirled around Amber, as though being carried about by a tornado. The Amber brought everything she'd picked up to hover in a loose cloud around her.

In her battle against Cinder and her cohorts, Amber had used a trick similar to this, using the wind to pick up leaves, then freezing them to turn them into blades. This time, Amber didn't bother with ice, not needing to harden most of the object in her vicinity. Instead, she used her magic to superheat the metal, turning it molten. The fabric chunks of torn seats ignited, and Amber sent all of that flying down at Raven like a rain of fiery comets.

Raven reversed her grip on Omen, driving what remained of the broken blade into the floor at her feet. As she did, a dome of crackling red energy rose up around her, solidifying just in time to withstand the impact of the countless pieces of molten and flaming debris that Amber pummeled her with.

Amber's attack ended, leaving the floor around where Raven crouched scorched and smoking. Raven was surrounded by a perfect circle of untouched metal. But she was breathing hard, sweat streaming down her face.

"Dammit!" she snapped, forcing herself up, using her sword to aid her efforts to stand. "I'm not going to lose to a pair of brats who barely know the first thing about using their magic."

"Why are you even fighting us anyway?" asked Amber. "You want revenge on Ruby so badly you'd help Salem destroy Vale and Beacon?"

"I'm doing what I need to, to ensure my people survive," growled Raven. "If I can pay that little red brat and her siblings back for what they did in the process, then that's a bonus, as far as I'm concerned." Then she smirked. "Besides, it turns out that doing this has some nice little fringe benefits. If I help Salem's people get the Relics, not only do I protect my people, but I get your powers in the bargain."

"Um...But aren't you too old to get any more Maiden powers?" asked Natsuki, canting her head.

Raven's smile widened, and she sheathed Omen, before reaching into one of the pouches concealed on her person to pull out a pair of white, arm-length gloves. "I'm guessing you recognize this, Fall Maiden."

Amber gasped, her skin paling at the sight of those gloves. Once again, her mind went back to that day, the day Cinder had torn her soul asunder. A cold sweat ran down her face, and her body began to tremble.

"Amber-san...?" Natsuki looked over at Amber worriedly, uneasy at seeing her so rattled.

Raven chuckled, tucking the gloves back away. "I see you remember," she said. "I bet you thought that was behind you, Amber, that you'd never have to experience something so painful ever again. It's too bad. You would have been better off if Cinder had just killed you, don't you think? Once I'm finished beating the pair of you down, you'll both get to experience that agony."

Raven's hand went to Omen's handle again, the rotary system within the sheath cycling a new blade into place. This time, Raven withdrew a blood-red blade, its length doubling as it cleared the sheath. This was no attacking technique, but a slow, deliberate display.

"Remember...just how it felt, Amber?" taunted Raven. "I bet you do. Cinder certainly gave you scars to remember her by. I suppose you won't have to worry about your next set though. Looks don't matter all that much to a corpse."

Amber had been fighting back the urge to whimper. However, the reminder of her scar prompted something to spark within her. The fingers of her left hand went up to trace the weblike mark, centered mainly over her left eye. She gently traced its lines with her fingers, remembering another set of fingers doing the same. She remembered the boy she'd become so attached to, who'd not merely accepted her scars, but embraced them, viewed them as something that made her even more beautiful to his eyes.

On top of that, she remembered facing down one of her attackers. She remembered the bitter, broken girl who'd once helped to hold her down, when Cinder had committed her vile deed. She remembered Emerald's tears, her grief, her helplessness. When their situations had been all but reversed, and it was Amber standing over a helpless Emerald, all Amber could bring herself to do was embrace the broken girl before her.

Emerald had been the wreckage left behind by Cinder's mad ambitions. A woman so driven that she saw even those who should have been closest to her as nothing more than tools to further her ambitions; Cinder had warped Emerald, until the poor girl had simply been broken by the realization that she was no longer there. The memory of that girl, all that was left of the woman who had nearly destroyed Amber, dulled the edge of Amber's fear, allowing her to realize what Raven was doing.

Raven's revelation of what she'd intended to do, and how she planned to do it, hadn't been simple posturing. She clearly knew enough about what had happened to Amber to try and use it against her, to try and play upon the trauma that Amber had suffered at Cinder's hands. It was a strategic move, meant to hamper Amber and reduce her effectiveness in battle.

And it might have worked, had Sasame not anticipated exactly this kind of situation. Just as Sasame had predicted, Amber had come face to face with her trauma. And without the therapy of confronting Emerald, Amber might well have been frozen on the spot at the surge of fear and pain those memories might have brought upon her.

"You won't get a chance to use those," said Amber, taking her staff up in both hands.

"Are you sure?" asked Raven smugly. "You definitely look afraid to me. Just look at you shake."

To her surprise, Amber found her lips spreading in a smirk of her own. "Yeah, I am scared," she admitted. "But...so what?"

"Hmm?" grunted Raven, her own smile faltering.

"Fear is natural...fear is necessary," said Amber. "But I know how to overcome my fear, how to work past it, and not be controlled by it...unlike you."

"What?" growled Raven, her lips now pulling back to bare her teeth.

Amber felt her limbs steadying as she spoke. "You're one to talk about fear, Raven Branwen. Ozpin and the others told me about you, about how you ran away, how you hid, how you use the Maiden's magic as a leader of a pack of bandits. You couldn't stomach the idea of fighting, so now you hide away and only pick fights you think you can win."

"Shut up!" growled Raven. Now it was she who was beginning to tremble, the tip of her sword practically vibrating in the air. "By now, you should realize how stupidly pointless it is. I wasn't afraid. I was smart. I learned the truth of Ozpin's war a long time ago, about how it's hopeless, about how he plays with lives against an enemy that can't ever be defeated. Death is cheap to him. After all, no matter how many times he's killed, he'll be back. But the rest of us only have one life to live. And he throws us away like we're nothing!"

"Yeah...he does come back to life," said Natsuki, at Amber's side. "To me...that has to be the scariest thing of all."

"What?" asked Raven flatly, her glare turning to the youngest Maiden.

Natsuki's face was almost impassive as she stared at Raven, her expression calm and composed. "I've always been taught that death isn't something to be afraid of, that it's just a part of life. It's what happens at the end of life. There's no changing that. It's what makes life special."

"Stupid platitudes," grumbled Raven.

"You can think that way, if you want," said Natsuki.

She wasn't exactly in a position to explain what she, and the rest of the Mibu had been taught about the Ennui. In particular, Natsuki remembered what Makoto had told their class about the factors that could enhance or mitigate that strange aspect of the Mibu's prolonged lifespans.

"Naturally," he had said, "there are those who are afraid to die. That is certainly a natural feeling. However, allowing that fear to rule you will work against you. Those who seek to prolong their lives out of fear of death are, ironically, among the first to begin succumbing to the Ennui. Living with that fear is a source of stress, a burden on top of the growing burden of the Ennui itself, a burden that likewise grows as the years continue to pass. Because of that, those souls who are ruled by their fear of death are amongst the first to find continued life too burdensome to bear...and pass all the sooner because of that fear."

But that was tangential to what Natsuki was trying to communicate in the moment. "I'm still scared of dying too," she admitted. "But...if there's one thing I know, at least I'll only ever have to go through that once."

Amber gasped, the meaning of Natsuki's words sinking in for her. For her part, Natsuki felt tears begin to run down her face as she remembered the lowest point in Jinn's story. After Ozpin (or Ozma, as he'd been back then ) and Salem had turned against each other, destroying their own children in the resulting battle, Ozpin had been killed...only to come back again. Tormented by his grief and pain, he'd spent the next few lifetimes in despair. But no amount of despair could end the God of Light's curse, ensuring that, even when he died, miserable and alone, he'd simply be reincarnated to be slapped with those feelings all over again.

"But Ozpin...even if he dies, he has to come back, and go through it all over again. He's done it so many times. He's experienced that fear again and again...and knows it won't ever be the last time for him. That's way more scary than dying once could ever be."

Natsuki sank into her stance, raising her kodachi. "When I think about that, I think that he's strong, stronger than anyone...maybe even stronger than Kyo and his dad. He's been fighting all this time, knowing the same things you do. But he doesn't give up. He doesn't run away."

Amber found herself smiling at Natsuki's words. "That's right," she said. "He doesn't hole up with a bunch of thieves and murderers, only picking fights with people he thinks are weaker than him."

Amber leveled her staff at Raven. "You might have power, as the Spring Maiden. You might have power with your weapon, your experience, and your Huntress training. But you're not strong. You'll never be strong."

An animalistic growl built in Amber's throat. "You bitches...thinking you can judge me..." Her already red eyes began to shine with a light separate from that of the Maiden's magic. "You have no right. I did what I needed to, to survive. I'm alive today because, unlike some people, I have the courage to make the hard decisions."

"Yeah, I bet it takes a lot of courage to throw other people under the bus, so that you can get away," said Amber.

"SHUT UP!" roared Raven, exploding into motion.

Amber raised her staff to intercept Raven's sword, meeting the powerful slash head-on. Amber yelped as the force behind the blow blew her backwards, winds laced with dark-red energy blowing her off her feet, the shockwave knocking Natsuki back as well. The two of them found themselves hunkering down as Raven bombarded them with attacks, not just from her sword, but surges of elemental energy that flared up all around her. Raven attacked with fire, lightning, wind, and ice. There was no refinement behind her actions, only the rawest surge of her magic. This wasn't an attack...it was a tantrum.

But it was a tantrum that had the potential to be lethal, if Amber or Natsuki's defenses faltered for even a second. Amber brought up a curved, orange barrier between her and Raven's attacks, while Natsuki swept her shorter kodachi in front of herself, creating a curtain of flames that functioned in the same manner. Despite that, both of them continued to find themselves driven back as Raven continued her furious offense, her Crimson Eyes glowing brighter with each passing second.

"Where are those brave people you talk about!?" demanded Raven as she swung her sword and lashed out with her magic with complete abandon. "They're all dead! They went and threw their lives away in a war that can't be won! They died for nothing! They didn't change anything! And now they're all dead! They're sleeping in the dirt! But I'm still here! I'm alive because I was right! I'm alive because I'm smart! I'm alive because I'm strong!"

Natsuki's voice was barely raised, yet seemed to cut straight through Raven's furious tirade. "Are you telling us...or are you telling yourself that?"

Raven's onslaught faltered for a brief second. Her eyes widened, and then she shrieked wordlessly. Her Aura exploded, completely overpowering the energy being given off by her magic. Natsuki gasped, because Raven's eyes had transformed as well.

The red of Raven's irises had expanded outwards to completely swallow her whites, while her pupils had shrunk to mere pinpricks. The crimson light of her Aura washed out from her in waves, its raging luminance throwing the rest of her body into shadow, her eyes blazing like miniature red suns.

Amber's jaw dropped. This transformation of Raven's eyes was frightening to be sure. But the more important thing to Amber was that she had seen this phenomenon before...from Kyo.

The elemental energy of her magic converged inward, wrapping around Omen's blade, washing together and bleeding into a dull, bloody red. Raising her sword up for a mighty blow, the energy surged, transforming the blade into a towering one, dwarfing the massive blade of ice that Raven had created with her magic earlier.

"I'm going to crush you!" she raged. "Then I'll take that magic, and I'll be stronger, strong enough I won't have to worry ever again, because I'll be the strongest!"

She brought the blade down, clearly intending to obliterate them with a single blow. Amber grimaced, prepared to put everything she had into blocking this attack, but was fairly certain that that wouldn't be enough. Whatever the source of this strange, terrifying power erupting from within Raven was, it was far beyond anything Amber could even hope to match with her own strength.

Natsuki, on the other hand, stepped forward. Her initial surprise had vanished. Now she faced Raven's descending sword with an expression of incredible calm. Raising her shorter kodachi up, Natsuki held it up in the face of Raven's incoming attack, not even bothering with technique, merely placing her blade in the way of Raven's own.

Violet flames spread from the outside corners of Natsuki's eyes. Motes of violet energy streamed off the blade of her shorter kodachi. The shorter sword, the product of the greatest swordsmith in Mibu history, the man known as Sengo Muramasa, chimed, its Aura washing outwards like a warm breeze, merging with the violet light of Natsuki's magic, the two forces working in conjunction with one another.

Raven's descending strike met Yuya's upraised blade. There was no explosion of clashing energies, no shockwave, no heat, no cold, no tingle of electricity...not even the sound of colliding blades. The blinding flash that should have accompanied the impact of Raven's blow never appeared. Instead...the air around them was filled with swirling, dancing, violet...petals.

The instant Raven's attack had met Natsuki's sword, that blood red energy had dissolved and scattered, transforming into countless violet flowers, which now danced around the three of them in a swirling maelstrom, filling the air with a heady fragrance. It was a sight just as beautiful as it was incomprehensible. For a moment, Raven and Amber completely forgot the animosity between them, too busy being awestruck by the sight. Raven's eyes even returned to their more-normal shade of red.

"What...what is this?" asked Raven, stunned. "What did you do?"

"Natsuki...was that...?" Amber couldn't believe her eyes.

Natsuki laughed bashfully. "W-well, I just figured that, if we couldn't take a hit like that, I'd make it into something that couldn't hurt us."

"Don't mock me!" shouted Raven. Her Aura exploded again, those terrifying eyes returning. She unleashed another blast of pure energy, this time in a crescent-shaped shockwave that tore through the air between them. Natsuki turned to face it, swinging Yuya downwards. Again, her eyes flared with violet light, and her blade parted the tide of energy that Raven had sent surging at them. Again, that crackling mass of manifested violence dissolved into drifting flowers and petals.

"It can't be..." whispered Raven.

Amongst those who knew about the Maidens, many, including many of the past and present Maidens themselves, assumed that their magic was purely elemental in nature. Fire, earth, water, wind, and the other elements could be called upon in their rawest forms, without needing to rely on Dust or Aura. That was the crux of a Maiden's magic.

But that was an erroneous belief. Each Maiden's magic was derived from the awesome power of the ancient Wizard, known as Ozma. He had been capable of many things, and all those things had been passed down, in one form or another, through his magic. Even if their power and scope were nothing compared to what Ozma had been capable of, when his magic had been whole, the Maidens were capable of anything that he was, if to a lesser degree.

What Natsuki had used, the very first magic she had learned from Ozpin, was Transformation Magic. At its root, it was the very same magic that Ozpin had passed to Qrow and Raven. With what little remained of his power, Ozpin had not been able to impart the full scope of that magic to the Branwen twins. They were limited to being able to transform themselves, and to one form apiece. However, Natsuki was able to use her magic in a more varied manner.

At its root, transformation was a simple concept. It was simply transforming one thing into another thing. However, that simplicity belied the true potency of such an incredible magic. Mass could be transformed into energy, and energy into mass. Solid objects could be made fluid, or dispersed into particles. In a sense, the possibilities were as limitless as the wielder's imagination. Because of that, transforming an unbelievably powerful attack into a storm of harmless flowers was child's play.

Natsuki had opted to learn transformation magic because she wanted to rely primarily on her Manifestation techniques for battle. Transformation magic was useful in a wide variety of situations, and could be used to perform feats outside the purview of the usual forms of Manifestation. Practitioners of certain schools, like the Mumyo Kodama Ryu that Sasame wielded, were capable of modifying their bodies to a certain extent. But outright shapeshifting was outside their purview, to say nothing of transforming other things.

But Natsuki had come to discover what people so often did, when learning some new skill. No matter what, there always seemed to be a way to make the most innocuous of things applicable in battle.

Raven shrieked wordlessly, bulling forwards, slashing wildly with her sword. Once again, each slash unleashed bursts of elemental energy. Natsuki glanced sidelong at Amber, sweeping her right arm in a circular motion, stirring some of the petals in the air around her. At the same time, she continued to use Yuya to fend off Raven's assault, transforming more of her magic and Aura into flowers.

Getting what Natsuki was suggesting, Amber called upon her magic, stirring the winds in their vicinity, sweeping all those countless flowers and drifting petals, drawing them into a storm around the three Maidens, a storm that only grew thicker and thicker with each attack Natsuki transformed.

Finally, Natsuki leapt back from a downward slash from Omen. Amber recognized her cue when she saw it. Directing her winds, she brought all those flowers and petals sweeping in, completely engulfing Raven in them. Even though, individually, they were light as feathers, when they came pressing in all at once, they served to impede her movements quite effectively.

However, the true nature of this attack arrived when Natsuki locked eyes with Raven, then raised her left hand once more. There was a flicker of violet light...

All at once, those petals returned to their original forms.

Raven screamed as she was swallowed by an explosion of crimson energy, punctuated by bursts of flame and lightning, with jagged spikes of ice erupting through it all. The much of the raw magic Raven had previously unleashed spontaneously transformed into elemental forms, without her will to shape it. The resulting explosion was so powerful that the entire coliseum dipped in the air. It ripped through the stands around it, opening up a jagged gulf in the side of the arena, reaching all the way up to tear through some of the skyboxes on that side.

Amber and Natsuki stood on the edge of the shredded remains of the stands, finding themselves staring at a cross-section of the coliseum itself, able to see some of the hallways and rooms that honeycombed the structure.

"Did we get her?" asked Natsuki warily.

"I won't believe it just yet," said Amber.

"That's wise."

Raven's voice came from behind them, prompting Amber and Natsuki to turn. But, before Amber could even begin to fully turn around, she lurched, a pained cry escaping her lips. Natsuki gasped in horror, seeing a blood-red blade punching out through Amber's abdomen, Raven having run her through from behind.

Natsuki quickly fixated on the woman. Raven was clearly worse for wear. Whatever she'd done to escape that last attack, it hadn't been enough to completely save her from injury. Her dress was torn and blackened in places. There were angry burns across her skin, and streamers of smoke trailed away from her. However, Raven was still a long ways from being completely subdued.

Rather than pull her sword free, Raven simply detached the blade at the handle, leaving it lodged in Amber's body. In the meantime, she jumped back and inserted her handle back into Omen's sheath, selecting another blade, this one also red, and drawing it out.

A wild storm of emotions raged within Natsuki. There was frustration that that last attack hadn't been enough to put an end to Raven. There was fear at the realization that Raven had managed to escape such a powerful explosion. There was fear for Amber's condition. They would need to get her to Sasame soon, or she would die. And there was anger at the sight of Raven hurting her new friend so callously.

Still, Raven had clearly thought things through. Rather than draw the blade out of the wound, she'd left it in, which would keep Amber from bleeding out too quickly. If Raven wanted to use one of those gloves to extract the Maiden's power from Amber, it would only work if Amber was alive. Raven was too old to receive the Maiden's power otherwise.

The other important factor was that Amber was incapacitated. Natsuki now faced Raven alone.

Raven smirked confidently at her. "That's one down."

Piper and Rain dove aside, Penny's swords punching through the air where they'd been standing. They both rose to their feet, preparing to try and attack Watts, hoping to take him down and undo whatever it was he'd done to seize control of their friend. But Penny quickly put paid to those plans, launching herself forward with her weapons in their rocket-mode, gliding across the floor of the urban biome.

Rain jumped in front of Piper, raising his shield to deflect the swords that Penny brought around in a slash, the force of her attack sending him skidding back slightly. Meanwhile, Piper directed Pulsar, sending the orbs detouring around Penny to fly at Watts. Watts barely showed any signs of concerned as he idly raised his left hand, the four rings there flickering. His hard-light shields appeared, easily deflecting Piper's attacks away, before he lazily leveled his revolver at Rain and pulled the trigger.

Rain saw the attack coming, picking up the telltale yellow arcs of lightning-Dust. He detached his shield from his arm, allowing to fly out along its string, intercepting the bullet of lightning, and avoiding having it conducted down into his arm. Of course, that was the instant that Penny chose to press her attack, bringing her swords around to converge on Rain and Piper from all directions. Rain jumped, pulling in the string and whirling his kite-shield around in tight circles to ward off her attacks. Piper recalled her orbs to her position, before opting to use them to try and subdue Penny.

Four of them quickly began to orbit above Penny, a gravity-field building between them, pressing down on her. Unfortunately, Penny's strength as an android was well above that of a human's and, while she was slowed considerably, she still pressed forward. Her swords were not weighed down though, being outside the field, so they attacked with just as much vigor as before.

And then a shot from Watts knocked one of the orbs out of formation, followed by a second and third, destroying the gravity-field and freeing Penny. With a superior smirk, Watts ran forward, a hard-light platform appearing underneath his stepping foot, followed by another, each one elevated slightly higher, becoming a set of impromptu stairs that allowed Watts to ascend above his and Penny's opponents. From there, he fired down at the pair, sending several explosive shots from his revolver, which Penny supplemented by turning four of her swords into guns and firing alongside him.

Ciel's watched from the neighboring biome platform. She'd recovered. However, unlike her friends, she wasn't equipped to move across such large gaps so easily. While her friends were fighting Penny, Ciel had gone to the beached shipwreck that served as the biome's centerpiece. Climbing up onto the deck, she looked across the gap from her elevated position. Frowning, she pulled out a bullet, which she loaded into the section of her gauntlet behind the blade. She tapped the screen, where her watch had been, turning it violet. Rather than run down the length of the blade, the energy of the gravity-Dust she'd utilized was instead channeled into the bullet itself. Then she tapped the screen again, turning it yellow.

The blade of her sword split along its length, separating into two prongs, which she then aimed across the gap. Once her railgun was fully charged, Ciel fired, the bullet a black streak within a yellow one as it raced across the space, striking the floor between Penny and her other teammates with a loud clang. It looked like a missed shot, but Ciel had been aiming for that section of the floor from the beginning.

Now she broke into a run. There wasn't much in the way of solid ground on the ocean biome. What little ground there was was sand, which didn't offer much in the way of strong footing. The only exception was that ship. On top of that, the ship's deck was elevated enough to give her an edge in the jump she was about to make. As she ran, Ciel tapped her watch-screen again, turning it violet once more. She ran along the length of the deck, then all the way along the prow of the ship.

I never got to test this, she thought nervously, but it should work in theory. What a time to perform a practical test.

She jumped, black and violet energy washing down the length of her sword. Across the gap, the same energy blossomed out from where her bullet had struck. Ciel grimaced, feeling as though her arm was about to be yanked from its socket. But her crazy plan had worked. The gravity-Dust infused into the bullet she'd fired attracted the Dust-energy she'd channeled through the blade of her sword, the two objects attracting one another, pulling just hard enough that Ciel was able to make it across the gap. It was the same principle behind Oscar's kama. She landed, dropping into a roll to absorb her excess momentum. As she came out of the roll, she looked up to see a bullet flying at her, courtesy of Watts.

However, Ciel had expected that. When she rose up, she'd already selected her hard-light-Dust, Watts's shot deflecting off the curved plane that appeared between them. Then the light converged into the blade of Ciel's sword, turning it a pure, shining white. With a shout, Ciel slashed her blade across her body, sending a white crescent flying across the space between her and Watts, cutting right through the hard-light platform he was standing on. Watts dropped with an unhappy shout, dropping right into the middle of the melee between Penny, Piper, and Rain.

Landing between them, Watts quickly dove to the side, already anticipating Rain bringing the sharpened tip of his shield down in a powerful slash. Before Rain could press the attack though, Penny moved between him and Watts, while her swords continued to attack him from all directions, supplemented by shots from her guns.

Ciel loaded another shot, taking aim from the other side of the melee. Once her railgun was fully charged, she fired, sending the bullet lancing past Penny, Rain, and Piper. Watts raised a shield to intercept the bullet, but yelped when it cracked under the power of Ciel's fully-charged shot. Ciel went on the offensive, taking the chance of running past Penny to get at Watts. She dove beneath one of Penny's slashing swords, danced around a bolt from one of her guns, before closing in on Watts with a slash from her sword.

Watts brought up the barrel of his gun, using it to parry Ciel's sword. Deftly disengaging, the Doctor showed that he was no slouch in close combat either, moving his arm through a tight, circular motion, aiming to line the barrel up with Ciel's body. Ciel shifted to the side, managing to turn aside from the shot he fired, even as she brought her sword around for another slash. Watts ducked beneath it, realigning his gun again. However, Ciel used the fact that she'd brought her weapon back across her body to intercept the bullet he fired with the gauntlet, before whipping it back across her body in a backhanded slash. Watts ducked beneath it, but was caught off-guard when Ciel simply continued her spin, using it to bring her foot around and slam it against the side of Watts' head.

Reeling back with a grunt, Watts fired three separate shots at Ciel, switching Dust-types for each one. First was a shot of ice-Dust, aimed at the foot Ciel had pivoted on for her kick. She barely managed to throw herself to the side to avoid it, which left her in a bad position to respond to the next two bullets. The second shot used fire-Dust. Ciel intercepted it with her gauntlet, only for the explosion to blow her off her feet completely. The third shot was lightning-Dust, which Ciel intercepted with her blade. Fortunately, as her own weapon was designed to handle lightning-Dust, both the sword and gauntlet were insulated to eliminate the risk of her shocking herself, which also helped her use the weapon to block lightning attacks as well.

Watts had clearly expected her to be stunned from the electrical attack, so he was caught off-guard when Ciel lunged forward again, raising her weapon over her head, then bringing the sword down in a powerful slash. As she did, the blade turned black, lined with violet. Rather than try to block or parry, Watts jumped back away, then was forced to throw himself to the side to avoid the wave of gravity-Dust energy that Ciel sent flying at him, cutting a line through the floor of the biome.

From there, Ciel pressed in with a furious offensive leading with a flurry of slashes from her sword, pressuring Watts to keep him from lining up a proper shot with his revolver. Watts backpedaled, his flight threatening to take him to the edge of the biome. True, he could use his rings to produce hard-light shields as platforms, but Ciel had already demonstrated her capacity to cut through those easily. If she managed to destroy his foothold, it would be a question of whether or not he could create another one soon enough, before he fell an unpleasant distance.

"Ciel! Look out!"

Piper's shout nearly came too late. Ciel barely managed to abandon her attack, diving aside from the swords that rained down around her. She rolled away, turning in place to face Penny as she descended from above, having apparently disengaged from her fight with Rain and Piper by using her weapons' jet configuration to fly upwards, then dive at Ciel from above.

Now Ciel found herself fending off a powerful offensive from Penny, the android rushing right in, her swords whirling about her body, converging on Ciel from all directions. Rain and Piper were quickly on their way to join in, to keep Ciel from being overwhelmed. However, Rain was forced to bring up his shield to block a shot from Watts, with Piper immediately turning on the man, sending her orbs whipping through the air to strike at him, but once again being deflected off his shields.

She charged at him, her orbs returning to her, lining up as she closed her hand around the space between the first and second ones in line. The rest of the orbs lined up, joining together, black and violet energy filling in the spaces between them to form the curving blade of an enormous sword, which Piper swung at Watts...hard. Once again, the doctor found his shield buckling, then cracking beneath the force of the powerful, gravity-enhanced attack.

The shield broke in a cascade of sparks. However a second appeared behind it, then a third, and a fourth. Piper's slash broke through the second and third shields, but then caught on the fourth one. Having successfully repelled her attack, Watts aimed past his shield with his revolver, ready to make Piper pay for committing so completely to the offensive.

However, he was forced to abandon that plan as Rain's shield came flying in. Piper's orbs dispersed, and she simply allowed herself to drop down, while Rain's shield, flying at the end of string, came arcing across from the side, swinging around behind Watts. Expecting it to attack from behind, Watts produced another shield at his back. However, he was caught by surprise when Rain struck him not with the shield itself, but the string he controlled it with. The wind-Dust infusing the string threatened to cut right through Watts' Aura, even as the shield's flight threatened to wrap him up in the string, which would promptly spiral-slice him like a ham.

Watts created another shield, this one in the direct path of Rain's shield, stopping and rebounding it, moving the string away from Watts' body. Watts took aim at Rain, but instead had to dodge as Piper's orbs swooped back in. In his haste, Watts missed it when one of the orbs swooped down, then back up, catching him in the chin and knocking him off his feet.

Watts managed to turn his flight into a flip, getting his feet back under him, and landing in a crouch, massaging his chin with an irritated fashion. "You children are quite clever," he admitted.

Rain and Piper said nothing, moving to continue the fight. However, that became impossible when Ciel slammed into Rain from the side. He managed to catch and steady her, quickly realizing what her being knocked over their way meant. He and Piper looked up to see Penny charging towards them, her swords flying ahead of her. The blades arranged together, like the spokes of a wheel, their edges cutting through the air as Penny sent that sword-wheel formation flying towards them.

Rain quickly wrapped an arm tightly around Ciel's shoulders, turning and bringing up his shield to intercept the attack, managing to deflect it off. However, the wheel formation quickly broke apart, the swords all moving to follow their own individual trajectories. Currently occupied with protecting Ciel, Rain couldn't hope to intercept them all. However, Piper sent her orbs flying through to intercept several of Penny's swords, knocking them away. But Piper herself was forced to dodge with a yelp as still more of Penny's weapons transformed into their gun-modes, and opened fire on her from multiple vectors.

In her effort to escape, Piper was caught by surprise when Watts hit her with a shot of fire-Dust, the explosive round sending her flying...right into Ciel and Rain. The three of them were knocked sprawling. As they got back up, they saw that Penny had shifted strategies. Rather than pursue them, she had called her weapons back to herself, the guns arranging themselves into a familiar cylindrical formation, a crackling orb of energy building between them.

Ciel immediately retracted her sword, crouching down next to Rain as he anchored the tip of his shield into the ground. A barrier of hard-light energy formed across and around the edges of the shield. Piper also brought her orbs around into a circular formation, a black plane of energy merging with ans reinforcing the shield.

Penny fired, the thick beam of energy ripping across the space between them to slam into the shield. Rain held Ciel tightly with an arm around her shoulders, while they linked their hands behind the shield. Behind them, Piper crouched using her hands to direct her weapons' movements. Penny's powerful beam attack splashed across the surface, exerting unreal pressure against the shield. Soon, it was threatening to crumble under the force of her assault.

But her victory over their defensive formation wasn't a given. She could only maintain the beam for so long, before its power petered out. If Ciel, Piper, and Rain could hold out long enough, then they might be able to outlast Penny's beam.

However, Watts had other plans. Two hard-light shields appeared...in the same space as the hard-light barrier Ciel was producing through Rain's shield. Now Watts was the one making use of the Interference Principle. Interposing his shields against Ciel's own. With that reinforcement gone, Penny's beam rammed through Piper's barrier, then slammed directly into Rain's shield, forcing it up out from where Rain had anchored it, blowing him and Ciel back into Piper, knocking the three of them sprawling.

They slid to a stop just at the edge of the biome, finding themselves looking down into a virtual abyss. Even if they survived the fall down, which wasn't a given, with their current Aura-levels, they would be unable to pursue Watts...and would likely lose Penny, if he opted to take her with him.

Those thoughts were clearly on Watts' mind as well. He held up his left hand in a dismissive gesture. "Penny...finish the job."

Penny charged forward, flinging her swords ahead of her like arrows. Rain wrapped his arms protectively around Ciel, using both his shield and body to cover as much of her as he could, while Piper tried to bring up her orbs to defend. However, that wasn't going to be near enough to withstand a full assault by Penny, especially with Watts backing her up.

Ciel whimpered, looking plaintively into Penny's eyes. "Penny..." she implored her partner, even as those swords whistled right at her. "Please..."

Seeing them come flying in, Ciel reflexively scrunched her eyes shut, bracing for the pain to come...but it never came. Nervously, Ciel opened one eye, then the other. She found herself staring at the tip of one of Penny's swords, which hovered a mere inch from her face, at most. From there, Ciel's eyes found Penny's other swords, all of them having stopped cold. Then she traced her gaze along the wires that connected those swords to Penny, following them back to their point of origin, where Penny stood, her entire body frozen in place.

"What?" grunted Watts. He scowled at the back of Penny's head. "Honestly, to malfunction at a time like this...damn that fat imbecile." He raised his left hand, curling his fingers, the rings lighting up. "Hurry up and finish them off, you worthless machine."

Penny's head jerked and jolted in an inhuman manner. However, to the shock of her teammates, the yellow color of Penny's eyes flickered, turning green, then yellow again. Despite that, she didn't resume her attack.

"I gave you an order!" shouted Watts, his anger rising. "You're just an android...a tool! Obey!"

Still, Penny didn't act on his orders. Now her entire body was jittering, making mechanical noises that normally never came from her. She jolted sharply upright, her limbs twitching spasmodically, her eyes flickering between yellow and green again.

Watts clicked his tongue furiously. "I don't have time for this, you malfunctioning piece of junk." He marched up behind Penny, his left hand reaching for the back of her head, the rings shining.

"Stop!" shouted Ciel, struggling to her feet.

Watts ignored her, of course. What he couldn't ignore was Penny suddenly spinning around in place, her hand flying up to seize his own in a crushing grip. Watts howled in pain as Penny applied her android strength to its fullest, the power of her grip overpowering his Aura, the bones in his hand cracking. Furthermore, the rings he'd been using to try and reprogram her were crushed as well, streams of sparks spilling out from between Penny's fingers.

"I'm not your puppet," said Penny, her eyes now bright-green once again. "I will not kill my friends!"

Gritting his teeth, Watts brought up his revolver with his right hand, aiming it for Penny's chest. She was forced to release him and jump aside from the shot. Watts himself went stumbling back away from her, his left hand now dangling uselessly, the rings adorning it dark and silent, crushed into his skin.

"You damn, defective, robotic bitch!" he snarled.

Getting to her feet, Ciel rushed to stand beside Penny. "Lancer formation!"

Already, Ciel had loaded her railgun, and was priming it, yellow arcs dancing along the length of the prongs, and jumping across the gap between them. Quickly, Penny and Piper moved to support her, Penny arranging her guns in a cylindrical formation around Ciel's weapon, green energy concentrating at the base of the prongs. Piper's orbs moved ahead of Penny's guns, forming an orbit of their own, a twisting tunnel of black and violet energy extending ahead of Ciel's weapon.

Seeing what they were doing, Watts fired at them frantically. However, Rain jumped ahead of the group, whirling his shield at the end of its string, whipping the weapon through tight arcs to intercept Watts' shots. Sensing that the girls were ready to fire, Rain quickly jumped aside.

Ciel fired, a streak of yellow within a streak of green, then violet, all of them combining to fly at Watts, who resorted to a desperate move, dropping his revolver and raising his right hand, the rings adorning it shining brightly. Four shields, stacked together, appeared between him and the incoming beam.

The attack slammed right through them, shattering the shields and blasting Watts in the stomach. He howled in pain as he was blown backwards, a crackling field of yellow appearing around him, then dissipating, as his Aura broke. He slammed his back into what remained of one of the crumbling structures that had made up the urban biome, before Penny's attack had blown them away. It was a massive chunk of concrete, somehow miraculously able to remain standing amidst the destruction, larger than Watts himself, easily weighing several-hundred pounds.

As Watts slumped, he became aware of a crumbling sound. The concrete slab his back rested against shifted. Looking up, Watts gasped, then cried in horror as the whole thing toppled over on top of him. Before Team CPPR could intervene, Watts' body disappeared beneath the slab. A few seconds later, a wide stream of red began to flow outwards.

"We...didn't mean to do that," said Penny unhappily.

"But we did," Piper said simply.

Ciel nodded. "Whatever the case, this fight is over."

If they could have, they would have rather taken Watts prisoner. However, on a certain level, Ciel figured that this was for the best. Watts was a terrifyingly dangerous man. His mastery of technology was clearly second to none. If left to his own devices, Ciel didn't doubt that he would be able to find or even fabricate a method of escape. At least this way, he ceased to be a threat.

Setting that aside, Ciel instead turned to Penny, who was looking at her three teammates apologetically.

"I'm so sorry," said Penny, looking down, an expression of shame painted across her face. "I nearly killed all of you. I-"

She was cut off when Ciel threw her arms around her shoulders, hugging Penny tightly. "I don't care," said Ciel softly. "We have you back, and you're all right. That's what matters."

With a slight whimper, Penny returned the hug. Then Piper joined in. A few seconds later, Rain joined the embrace as well. The four of them would have been glad if this moment continued on forever.

However, that wasn't feasible. There was an even larger battle going on, one that they couldn't simply ignore. Furthermore, a more immediate problem came up as the the sound of an explosion echoed through the space. The entire coliseum lurched dramatically, beginning to shake and rattle. Then, from down below, they heard the sound of something cracking.

"Oh no!" gasped Ciel, her eyes widening.

"Now what?" grumbled Piper.

"That did not sound good at all," said Rain, his eyes moving to the edge of the biome platform.

"That was the sound of the central lifting crystal," declared Penny, her advanced sensors feeding her specific information about what she'd just heard, and assembling it with her files on the coliseum itself. "It just cracked. This is bad!"

"You're damn right, that's bad!" declared Piper. "If it cracked, then it's probably only a few minutes away from breaking entirely. If that happens, then the whole coliseum is gonna drop like a really big rock."

"We will not want to be here when that happens," noted Rain.

"But we can't leave immediately either," declared Ciel. "We have to make sure that, if the coliseum falls, it does not fall on Vale."

"We need to get back to the control room," said Piper, grimacing. "Hopefully there's enough of it left that we can do something about the direction of the fall."

"Let's move," said Ciel.

The four of them rushed towards the hole that they'd originally left through. As they did, the sounds of battle from above only intensified.