Alabast is sitting in the bleachers for Goodwitch's class and is listening to her talk about whatever she was talking about this time. He actually surprised himself with how well he is able to escape into his mind while looking like he's actually paying attention. He can't even practice his semblance because there isn't a desk to hide his experiments. His Darkness could be practiced in a dark spot, except for the fact that the lights are absolutely flooding the entire room. Goodwitch said it's to keep the students awak, but Alabast believes that he might have accidentally struck one of her nerves at some point.
Alabast wouldn't have cared if he did it purposely, or if he found out what made her do this. But it's disappointing because it gains him nothing in the slightest.
Seraphina puts on her good student expression but is bored out of her mind. She thought this was a combat class. Not an interrogation and lecture. She wants to put Alabast in his place a little. It should be an easy thing to do even without her semblance.
"…. And that's the importance of your battle awareness. Now you shall keep the various points in mind and demonstrate that you paid attention while you spar with your appointed partner" Goodwitch states. "Any questions or complaints?"
She looks out across the room and sees a blond haired boy raise his hand. "Any OTHER questions or complaints?" She doesn't see any other hands go up so she sighs and faces the new problem student besides the twin teams. "Haaah. Yes, Jaune Arc. What is it?"
Jaune lowers his hand and uncomfortably shifts in his seat. "D-Do we really have to spar? Or can we just pass?"
"Pass?" Goodwitch repeats. "You wish to pass on the sparring session?"
Jaune snaps his fingers and nods. "Yes. That. Exactly that"
Weiss shakes her head and places her palm over her face.
Pyrrha raises her hand in the air. Goodwitch gladly takes the chance to put off scolding Jaune.
"Yes, Ms. Nikos"
Pyrrha lowers her hand. "It seems that my partner is not here today. Shall I take Jaune's place and spar with Ms. Schnee?"
Jaune looks like Pyrrha is his angel that just saved him from a deadly fate. He really did not want to spar with Weiss, she's a very scary person he has found out.
Goodwitch adjusts her glasses. "Very well. Ms. Nikos shall spar with Ms. Schnee for today. However…."
Glynda looks at Jaune. "…. All students must spar today before class ends"
"Awwww schnazz berries" Jaune deflated into his seat.
Yang taps Jaune's shoulder. "I think you meant 'Schnee' berries" Yang puns and earns a few groans from various students. She gives a thumbs up to Weiss. "They're pretty bitter"
Alabast can't help but smirk, shake his head, and roll his eyes at Yang's pin and joke. He'd rate that as the best one she's made in a while.
"Now, since every student needs to spar today. That means we will need someone to volunteer to spar twice today" Glynda continues and ignores the student's banter.
A few people raise their hands. Yang, Nora, Cardin, Mercury, Emerald, and a few others all try and volunteer.
Alabast looks around the room and see that students are apparently very eager to fight. He doesn't want to bother fighting someone as weak as Jaune. What's the point-
"Thank you Mr. Noir for volunteering. Why don't we get started with Mr. Arc's spar since he's so eager to get it over with" Glynda coldly says with a smirk on her face.
Alabast wonders what Jaune did to piss Glynda off this bad. It's almost the worst mood he has seen her in.
"Wait what?!" Jaune sits up and nearly falls backwards. He was stunned at the fact he'd have to fight Alabast, and now he was just told he is going first. "You've gotta be kidding me" He whispers under his breath.
"Afraid not" Alabast says as he stands up. "Let's get a move on Lover Boy"
Jaune's shoulders slouch and his head tilts slightly to the side. "Lover Boy?" He complains.
Alabast walks towards the changing room on the right. He doesn't bother turning around. "Could always go back to Vomit Boy" He walks into the room and closes the door behind him.
"But Lover Boy?" He complains again as he stands up from his seat.
Ruby cups her hands around her mouth. "You can do it Jaune!" She loudly whispers encouring words.
Jaune smiles and stand up. He turns towards Ruby. "Tha-"
"Try not to die! Just do your best! He might let you live" Ruby loudly whispers again from the other side of the bleachers so everybody hears her.
"Aww man" Jaune slowly walks to the changing room on the left.
Yang taps Weiss' shoulder. "50 Lien says Alabast uses Jaune to literally mop the floor"
"Your on!" Weiss folds her arms over her chest and looks away from Yang. "Alabast is either going to finish this quickly or drag it out like a cat plays with its food"
Blake turns around in her seat and glares at Weiss. "There are so many things wrong with what you just said"
"Pffft!" Yang covers her mouth with both hands to stifle her laughter.
Weiss looks at Blake. "W-Well…. I'm not wrong"
"Could you guys at least wait until I leave?!" Jaune pleads as he finally goes down the steps.
Pyrrha gives him an uncertain smile and a thumbs up for encouragement. She doesn't really want to see Alabast bully Jaune. But it's not like Jaune doesn't deserve it. Even if it was due to his own dense self for not taking a hint.
Jaune gets to the changing room and closes the door behind him on the second try. It got stuck and he had to fiddle with it.
Nora rocks side to side as she taps her heels on the metal below her. She's going to enjoy watching her leader pummel another leader. Even if that other leader is Jaune. She doesn't really care who it is. She just wants to see Alabast fight. But the fight she really wants to see is Ren. She hardly ever gets to just watch him fight. He's so cool and does so many flips. You can see the seriousness on his face as he tries to outsmart his opponent. The way his hair braid bounces behind him is also so adorable.
Nora ends up causing her partner to reconsider if Nora is actually sane or not.
Ren just has his arms folded over his chest and leans back as he waits for the fight to start. He wants to see how much Alabast has been able to improve. He knows that Alabast holds back against them when they do team exercises. So maybe Alabast will let loose a little to test Jaune.
Nora's partner for the foreseeable future is just some random Human gal. And Ren's partner is some human guy. Both partners wish that this partner trial will end already so they can go back to their own respective teams. It's bad enough they don't know many people here to begin with but they get paired with members of the weird twin teams.
Alabast exits the changing room. He's wearing his combat uniform that is still the same as always. It's the same old military esc uniform with the sleeves rolled up and the cape over his left arm that goes dow to his mid thigh to hide his arm.
The crowd looks at Alabast and the huge sword on his back. The students that came from around Remnant and hadn't seen Alabast fight before wonder if it's some mind game to intimidate his opponents.
As he waits, Alabast rolls and stretches his shoulders.
"Oh damn. He really does plan on taking this a little serious" Yang says as she leans forward.
Neptune rests his arms on his thighs. "How can you tell? He looks the same as he always does"
Yang shrugs. "It's a girl thing"
Sun looks back at Neptune. The two bros communicate with their eyes, not needing to talk.
"What the hell does that mean?" Neptune silently asks.
"You think I know? I was going to ask you the same thing. Your the cool guy right? Why don't you know?" Sun silently responds.
Blake and Yang ignore the two guys as they stare into eachother's eyes and act weird.
"Just because I'm cool and dated a few girls doesn't mean I understand them! In fact, I don't think any guy can understand girls!" Neptune responds.
Sun points a finger gun at Neptune. "Good point. They are and shall always be mysteries to us men"
"Will you two stop whatever you're doing? It's about to start" Yang says without taking her eyes off the stage.
Jaune walks out from the changing room and walks up onto a stage. He's wearing jeans that have a white patch over the left knee, a black short-sleeved hoodie, orange forearm sleeves, a white diamond-shaped chest plate, white spaulders with rerebraces set under them over his shoulders, black high top shoes, brown gloves that expose his fingertips, he also has elbow guards on, and he has two belts on. His sword is strapped to his left hip in a sheath.
Jaune stands across from Alabast and rubs the back of his head. "What a coincidence seeing you here Alabast"
"What a coincidence" Alabast mimics back.
Jaune smiles uneasily. "Are we like, trying. Or are we trying-trying?"
Alabast tilts his head a little. "Is there a difference?"
Jaune kicks an imaginary stone. "Yeah…. not really I suppose. But I'd like to think there is a difference in the fact that I'll still be able to walk after one of them"
Glynda's voice comes through some speakers. "Remember the rules I explained in great detail earlier. You have 4 minutes and then the person with the higher percentage of aura wins. The time will start when you move to attack"
Alabast reaches over his head with his right hand and grabs the handle for Nights Fall. He the holds the blade out to his side and then lowers it until the top of the blade touches the ground. "How about we go with….. trying"
Jaune unsheathes his blade. "And which one is that? Please let it be the one where I don't die"
Alabast smirks. "Guess we will just have to find out together, won't we"
Jaune gets in a stance with his blade in front of him in his right hand. "I don't really like guessing….. unless it's on tests. Then I really love guessing" He grabs his sheath in his left hand and it transforms to a shield.
Alabast raises a brow. "That…. just gave me an idea"
Jaune smiles slightly more confidently. "Does that mean…"
Alabast points Nights Fall at Jaune. "Just that I hope this fight will be interesting"
Jaune smirks. "I'll do my best to prove that I belong here then"
Alabast puts his left foot forward and brings Nights Fall behind him. "Let's do this then! I'm tired of talking!"
Alabast dashes forward. He brings Nights Fall up into the air from behind him and brings it crashing down towards Jaune.
The blond haired teenager's eyes widen at the speed of Alabast. He had expected Alabast to be slower when wielding such a big weapon. And he had been anticipating an attack from Alabast's Darkness semblance.
Jaune brings his shield up above him.
*Twang~!*
Nights Fall hits the shield head on but glances off the shield. Jaune let's the momentum of the huge blade slide off his shield to mitigate how much force he feels from the blow.
But even with him redirecting the blow, his entire left arm feels like it was just shaken.
Alabast doesn't stop. After Nights Fall digs into the ground he spins once and delivers a back kick to Jaune's chespiece. Alabast continues his spin to face Jaune and jumps into the air above his opponent and hoping to end this sooner rather than later. He wanted to fight Seraphina, this was just a warm up.
Jaune barely had time to think after he brought his shield up above his head and deflected the first strike. He just saw a foot flying at his chest and then he felt his feet slide on the ground as he was kicked backwards 4 feet.
After he got his bearing back he looked around quickly but couldn't see Alabast anywhere. But he did see a shadow.
Jaune thrust Crocea Mors into the air and drops his shield at the same time to be able to see above him. Jaune sees Alabast above him and that he is about to deliver an axe kick.
This forces Jaune to bring his shield back up.
Alabast brings his left foot high into the air and shows off his extreme flexibility. He does a forward spin as he's about to make contact with Jaune. Alabast doesn't care if he kicks the sword or the shield. Neither will like to take this kick.
Jaune tries to jump to the side. Why block when you could evade? But Alabast had already gotten too close for Jaune to fully dodge.
The axe kick crashes against the flat side of Jaunes shield which nearly causes Jaune to collapse to his knees. But he holds his stance in a squat and even pushes back a little.
Alabast jumps off the shield which knocks Jaune off balance for a second.
Jaune swings at Alabast who blocks with his own blade.
Alabast lands on his left hand and launches off his fingers towards Jaune. Alabast kicks towards Jaune's face.
Seeing the telegraphed kick, Jaune side steps it and is about to stoke Alabast with his sword but gets slapped in the face by something furry. He stumbles back a step and his left palm ego wipe his mouth.
"Pfft! Pah!" Jaune tries to get the hair out of his mouth. "Dude! The hell was that?!"
Alabast lands on his right leg and leans on Nights Fall as the tip of the blade digs into the stage. "Something I was working on. I normally don't use it in a fight but I've decided it's about time to get over that little lapse in judgement" His tail sways behind him.
Jaune shakes his head. "Whatever" He gets in a stance. "My turn"
Jaune dashes towards Alabast and assess the situation. He watches as Alabast keeps his right hand on his sword and jumps in the air.
Except, the blade doesn't leave the ground and Alabast stays upside down in the air.
A second later Jaune swings at Alabast's wrist.
*Shing~*
But he's only met with a smaller blade coming out of the original big one. It was Hollowed Silence unsheathing from Dark Heart, the rifle.
Jaune doesn't stop and tries to muscle through it.
Alabast notices what Jaune is trying to do and lands a punch with his right hand on Jaune's face. After, he gets down and lands on his feet. He picks up his rifle from the ground as it finishes its transformation into the rifle.
Alabast then tosses Dark Heart off the stage and brings his katana up to his chest parallel to the ground.
"Oh shi-" Jaune looks at Alabast and instantly regrets his choice in trying to get out of fighting Weiss. This is much scarier. So much scarier.
Alabast runs at Jaune and the two begin clashing.
Jaune is forced back a few steps but eventually finds his rhythm and stops getting pushed back. He blocks a strike with his shield and then swings his sword to counter attack. Alabast either dodges or deflects with his sword. Jaune doesn't have any fancy footwork but keeps what he has working as he adapts to Alabast's speed and power.
Alabast moves around Jaune. Side to side. Stacking from various angles. Even swapping hands to increase the speed and randomness of his attacks.
"Gotcha" Jaune slashes vertically and manages to cut Alabast's cape that covers his left arm.
Alabast narrows his eyes and brings back his right fist.
Jaune sees this and braces himself to block and then counter.
The fist disappears and the next moment it crashes into the shield and sends Jaune 12 feet back and he rolls to a stop.
Alabast grabs his cape and looks at the damage. There's now a big cut through it that basically goes down the entire thing. "This is why we can't have nice things Jaune"
"We have nice things?" Jaune asks in a daze as he gets to his feet and looks around trying to get his bearings back.
"Figure of speech" Alabast uses his right hand and takes the cape off and also tosses it off the stage. "You know…."
Alabast fixes his sleeves and then points Hollow Silence at Jaune. "…. I think that's enough of a warm up"
"Warm up?" Jaune shakes the tingling feeling in his arms away. "Gods damn, feels like I'm at the end of the marathon already"
Alabast grips his katana with both hands and activates Bestia Fang to cover his knuckles and fingers in its knuckleduster 2nd form.
"Can I tap out already?" Jaune asks as he sees something mechanical move over Alabast's hands.
Jaune doesn't want to wait and find out what Alabast will do when he's not warming up and charges forwards. He attempts to shield bash Alabast but is fully stopped when Hollow Silence clashes with his shield.
After that plan failed Jaune spins to his side and decides to use Alabast's movement as a template for his own and begins trying new attacks with Crocea Mors. He still attacks with his sword and defends with his shield, but he tries attacking from different angles like Alabast did.
Unfortunately for Jaune, Alabast doesn't move his left foot and only pivots on it as he defends and attacks from the same spot. His sword swinging much faster and stronger than before, but Alabast lets Jaune catch up. He wants to see what Jaune is up to.
As they clash Jaune gets more and more tired. But his swordsmanship sees a staggering increase in skill. But when you start with 1, anything higher is great.
Alabast is forced to step back or else he would have taken a slash across his chest. While it wouldn't hurt him, it would drain his aura and needlessly boost Jaune's ego…..
Alabast looks at the panting Jaune as he barely is standing. Maybe he does need a bit of an ego boost…..
"Good job Jaune" Alabast compliments while he stays in a left foot forward stance.
"Th-thanks…" Jaune catches his breath little by little. "W…why? What… wait…. What did I do that was good?"
Alabast points where his left foot previously was. "I didn't move my left foot once I grabbed my katana with both hands"
"Pffft! Hahaha! Blake! He grabbed his katana! Hahaha!" Ruby can't hold her laughter in.
Everyone gives Ruby a strange look.
Blake covers her face with her hands and tries to pull an Alabast and disappears into the darkness.
Jaune looks at Ruby and then back to Alabast. "Am I missing something?"
Alabast looks at his small girlfriend that is blushing as she realized she had shouted that. She tries to disappear like Blake.
Alabast sees Ayaka has a blush on her face and is covering her mouth with the back of her right hand. "I think we're both missing some context"
"Isn't it normal to hold that katana with both hands?" Jaune asks. "I'd say you holding it with one hand earlier was weirder. And you switching hands in the middle of it. I'm surprised you could have even wielded such a large katana. It's the biggest I have seen and I worked in a blacksmith in Vale for a few months"
Jaune and Alabast look at each other's eyes.
""Wait""
They both turn and look at the crowd. Blake was practically steaming she was blushing so much. Ayaka was laughing beautifully and poking Ruby who looked like a steam engine went into overdrive. Ruby brought her feet up into her seat and her head rests on her knees while her arms wrap around her legs and head.
Yang and Weiss shrug at each other, clearly out of the know.
Alabast and Jaune look back at each other.
"They don't mean…" Jaune says
Alabast nods. "I think so"
"But I was talking about…." Jaune panics
"I know buddy" Alabast says in a grave tone.
Jaune lowers his arms. "Why would they think I was talking about…."
Alabast closes his eyes and shakes his head. "I don't know. And I'm afraid to find out…"
"What did you do to corrupt poor innocent little Ruby?" Jaune asks as he takes a step backwards.
Alabast's eyes snap open and he glares at Jaune. "Don't make it sound like I corrupted her!"
"Who else would?" Jaune points his sword at Alabast. "I think you and her need to have a talk about a few things"
"I mean you're right…" Alabast can't deny that. "But! I didn't corrupt her like that! I don't know…. where she could….. have read about that kind of thing….." Alabast slowly says as he turns to look back at Blake in the stands. "Ruby has been reading a lot lately. She didn't read before unless Weiss forced her to for school…."
Alabast had seen Ruby reading some of Blake's books out of sheer boredom before. But now he knows how Ruby was corrupted. He could see Blake's ears visibly flatten like she was caught red handed. 'Bad Kitty' he mentally scolds Blake.
"Enough with the interruptions!" Glynda commands. "There is still a minute left in the spar" She looks at the two students down on the stage. "Now continue and stop talking"
Alabast shakes his head and grips his... he tightly holds Hollow Silence and looks back to Jaune.
Jaune is slouched and can't believe that the things he said were interpreted in such a vulgar way by the most innocent person he has met besides his younger sister. One of his sisters were innocent at least. He brings his shield up and unenthusiastically gets ready. "Let's get this over with please" He mutters to himself. He's surprised he has made it this long.
Alabast slowly approaches Jaune. Not putting one foot past the other. He takes slow shuffles forward to not disrupt his stance and potentially be knocked off balance or caught off guard if Jaune decides to pull out a trump card or his semblance…. which could be both.
Jaune leaps towards Alabast and clashes with Hollow Silence for a second.
*Bzzzzz*
"Huh?" Jaune looks up at the hologram screen and sees his Aura bar.
"Jaune Arc's aura has fallen below the red. He has lost" Goodwitch states. "That was an excellent bout… if we look past the interruptions. You both may return to your seats"
"Actually" Alabast speaks up and plants his sword in the ground. "I would like to fight Seraphina now. It'd be a hassle to come back down he later"