That looks like a bug. I mean, it's technically possible, but the chance is 1/25600000000
Probably the number recovery crashed and used the same number to generate all those random rolls. A way to check is to roll a diverent Dx and see if it also returns identical numbers.
I might give that theory substance if I hadn't started rolling different numbers the moment I rolled for something else.
Right now, it seems Clever's theory on Salem's Semblance allowing him to ignore the
fourth wall as well as every other surface is the one with the most weight, terrifyingly enough. If you win that fight, and I disappear, and the police find a corpse fused with a wall, you know who's to blame.
For now, the next part of the Pillar Jaune interlude series, characterisation is a cast-iron
bitch, and the actual update will be up later tonight or tomorrow.
... Probably tomorrow.
You think I should just have one slot be for interludes, so this stuff doesn't happen?
|||
"So… you're a cannibal?" Nora asks, looking up from the sandwich that is her breakfast. At least it's not pancakes. You're not sure how she's not rotted her teeth right out of her mouth, honestly- so many sweet things, so little brushing, it's a small miracle.
"No, because that implies I'm of the same species as the thing I eat." You say, not looking up from your book. "And I don't
eat people, I drink blood. There
is a difference."
As if to punctuate the point, you unscrew your flask and take a swig.
O negative. The infirmary's getting cheap on you.
"... How?" Yang asks, looking up from her own breakfast. Salad.
You... didn't, really expect that from her.
"Well, a pint of blood is a pint of blood, and people survive losing a pint of blood. Certainly less chance they'd survive me chewing an arm off."
... You're, not sure where that example came from, or why you decided to look Yang right in the eyes while saying it- and now that you think about it, you have to say, even with perfect recall, you can't quite figure out how your secret got out among team RWBY- sure, other people know about the more obvious aspects of it, such as your ability to be slashed in half with a rapier and quite literally pull yourself back together, among other things.
Heh. The look on the snow queen's face was
priceless. Almost makes up for being called a putty person for two weeks straight. But, no, somehow, the secret you gave your team, of your heritage and your...
unconventional needs, got out among them too. You're not naming names, and, honestly, you don't even mind all that much anyway- they seem to have taken to the knowledge... if not
comfortably, they're at least not calling you a monster, a freak of nature, trying to put a rifle bullet through your head...
Overall, slightly warmer reception than Pyrrha's. Granted, you could chill your flask on her initial impression of you, so that's not
hard.
"Wait, but, you can eat Grimm too, right? How does that work, anyway?" She asks. You're quite happy to say, however, that after a few days in your positively
charming presence, she seems to have mostly got over her squeamishness of, well, your existence.
If anything, you think you've desensitised your entire team to most levels of gore you're capable of. And RWBY is on their way to join them if you have any say in the matter.
"Simply put- it doesn't. I can absorb
something from them, but most of it disappears before I can, ah, digest it-"
"Do we really have to have this conversation during breakfast?" Weiss snaps at everyone.
"You mean your breakfast of a single apple and a glass of water, both untouched?" You snipe back.
She doesn't respond, only looking down at her barely a breakfast.
Mm
hm.
"As I was saying-" you reach over, grabbing Nora's sandwich with one hand and one of Ruby's cookies, shushing them both as they protest. "If this sandwich and cookie- quit pouting, both of you, you'll get them back in a moment, is about a pint of human blood for me, a Beowolf is…"
You reach into Pyrrha's salad, withdraw a single cherry tomato, and hold it up.
"This."
"... Geez." Ruby says. "Why don't you eat normal food, then?"
"The same reason you don't eat tree bark and leaves- I
can, I do, on occasion, if it's nice enough, but it doesn't have the nutritional value I need- I'm eating it purely for taste. Even animal blood isn't quite right for me. There's absolutely no reason why it
shouldn't be, it simply…
isn't. It's been a point of annoyance for both myself and the only other Otopan I know of."
"Other what?" Ren finally gets a word in, since this is apparently Question Time For The Higher Being, and you begin to explain before Blake cuts you off because
apparently, some kind of dialogue quota needs to be met today.
"Otopan- the third race, besides humans and Faunus. It means 'above us' in one of the ancient Vacuoni languages. As in, someone saying 'they are above us.' Legend has it that they used their... talents, to convince ancient people they were physical gods and had them offer sacrifices for sustenance."
"... Wait, really? You mean he's not just being weird?" Ruby asks.
... Calm,
calm. You take a deep, calming breath, and manage to keep your annoyance to a mild eye twitch instead of slapping her face inside out. That would be
bad, Jaune.
"He drinks blood, he can't go out in sunlight without his skin turning to stone, he has complete control over his body- either he is one, or he's got a Semblance so close even
he can't tell the difference."
"The former, I assure-"
"Ow, that hurts!" You hear a girl yell from behind you, to your left. The pain in her voice, evident enough in her words, is enough to draw your attention. You see- oh, great,
this fuck, messing with a rabbit Faunus' ears. What's her name, Velvet?
"-you- would you excuse me? I just saw something that needs taking care of." You finish absentmindedly, putting down your book and standing up to go deal with some dumb bastards.
You hate it when people act like they're better than others-
you're around, everybody else is immediately on the same level as far as you're concerned. And that level is below
you.
Besides, Cardin's been getting too full of himself recently. He could do with being brought down a peg. It's just a matter of...
how.
"Haha! Told you they were real!" He yells, pulling again, drawing tearful wince from the bunny girl.
...
Ooh!
A lesser known ability of your kind, you suppose, would be the horn,
definitely the horn, actually. You've never actually tried to use yours seriously, they only came in a few weeks ago, but they're just too... look, putty person, you'll take, but being called a unicorn Faunus is just people
asking to have their skulls pushed in. Still, you feel it... no,
them, tucked into your skull, somehow.
... You can take ram Faunus.
Ram Faunus is fine, you suppose.
Cardin and his band of cronies that you honestly can
not summon the energy to remember the names of finally realise you're coming, and for some reason,
don't stop pulling on her ears, despite the fact that you're doing your best to look at least mildly pissed off.
"Hey, clay boy. What, you want a piece too?" The one with the absolutely
hideous blue-grey pompadour/mullet cross asks you, grinning a sadistic little grin as he does.
You pointedly ignore the attempt to jab you. Nope! You are
too dedicated to this that you refuse to let something that small faze you.
"No, I take girls out to dinner before I try to get that far, and you should too." You say blandly, taking some pleasure in how far that throws him off, continuing before they can compose themselves. "No, I just saw my kin's plight and decided she could use some help."
Now
that throws them all off.
"... Your... kin?"
"Yes. Didn't you know? I'm a Faunus too."
You say it with such a straight face that they can't help but... if you had to describe their collective facial expression, it would probably be along the lines 'you're
obviously bullshitting us, but we're so curious about where you're going with this that we're gonna play along.'
"Yeah? What kind? I don't see a tail anywhere."
The smile you give them is perfectly controlled, the only way you can't let your plans go.
"Would you believe me if I said I had horns?"
They look at you, all of them. Cardin's let go of Velvet's ears by now, and even her eyes are slowly roaming up your face to your floppy hat while she rubs some of the pain out of her recently abused rabbit parts. They're all wondering the same thing, of course- what's he hiding under there?
"Not even kidding- let me show you!" You chirp as you untie the string that keeps it attached to your head. You pull it off and let your horns fly.
Two perfectly conical spires of keratin shoot from either side of your forehead at blinding speeds, jerking around the Faunus girl just in time to keep her from dodging straight into one, stopping an inch from Cardin's eyeballs. This is the first time you've actually bothered to use them, and by...
God that's painful. They're shiny with a thin sheen of blood, the tips impossible to see for the glare it causes.
He falls back with a yell as Velvet goes pale, no doubt tracking exactly which kidney she'd have lost if you didn't have the foresight to move it out of her way.
"Well? What do you think?" You ask as Cardin gracelessly falls out of his chair, a startled yell accompanying him. The horns slowly withdraw back into your skull, and you give a little sigh of relief as you no longer have two gaping wounds on your forehead.
Mm. No, you don't think you'll be using those too often.
Cardin seems to be recomposing himself, and you decide it's time to be serious.
"Right, fun time's over- don't mess with the Faunus when I'm in earshot. And I'm
always in earshot." You say, derision for him and his team dripping from every word. Velvet uses the opportunity to finally leave, quickly stepping around you with a mumbled thank you before rushing off.
"Wh-why the fuck do you care about that freak of nature?" He asks, getting up now that he's not at risk of being impaled. "Trying to score points with her or something?"
You grab him by the collar of his armour, hauling him up off his feet. He grabs your hand, trying to pry it off, and his teammates begin to grab their weapons. A gentle denting of his chest plate as a warning has him quickly relenting.
"The reason I
care, Cardin, is because I know an ego that needs popping when I see one, and yours is long overdue. I couldn't
care less about what little spat you have with the Faunus because frankly, you're so below me that it's like watching a rat pick on a toad! Now, call it intuition, but your antagonistic nature hasn't made you many friends, no?"
You're drawing stares from a lot of people now.
Don't care. Let them.
"Fuck these goddamn sheep! The best damn Huntsman in the whole fucking school-"
"Is. Right. Here."
You bring Cardin close, snarling each word in his face, and you almost swear he's ready to wet himself. The fear from him is... intoxicating, a scent that carries in the sweat beading on his forehead, the slight shaky breaths he takes as your eyes bore into his, drilling straight through to his soul.
... His neck is right there. Fresh, warm blood, pulsing through his jugular. All it would take is
one nip and you can stop being hungry-
"Mr Arc! Put him down, then all five of you, follow me."
And once again, what you can only blame as sheer
divine intervention to stop you from getting a decent meal, Goodwitch appears, and the moment's passed. Now that you're not focusing on him so much, your hunger subsides, and you put the boy down, following her out of the foodhall with the rest of team FKHD.
|||
Well, that certainly could have gone worse. Your arrogance is more all-encompassing than Cardin's and his teams, so you get off lightly for thinking
everyone is beneath you, instead of just a subset of people. However, you're chewed out for the public body horror, threatening Cardin with a weapon, Goodwitch quickly cuts you off to say that there is no possible way she's going to consider your giant horns as anything
but a weapon, denting his armour, something she says you're going to fix, and, once they're dismissed, you're chewed out even
further for almost losing control of yourself.
You stayed silent for a moment, and she seemed to take that as a sign of regret.
"... We need you to control yourself. I know it's difficult, but you're doing better than we ever expected."
"A pint of chilled, O negative blood is like a sandwich and a cookie to me, and that's all I have every week. You don't need me to control myself, you need to feed me properly," You shoot back,
"because I'm not losing control, I'm starving! Let me hunt on my own if you have no other option!"
Goodwitch seemed... conflicted. She was obviously disturbed by the fact that one of her students feeds on human blood, and that you were insisting either on getting more, or on hunting Grimm to eat.
"... I'll... see what can be done. In the meantime, however, I'll send a note along to the infirmary, and increase your dose to two pints."
"Thank you." For a moment, you couldn't help but feel a little awkward- you...
were being somewhat difficult, you know that much.
"... For what it's worth, I apologise for being such a... high-maintenance student."
That got a smile out of her, for some reason.
"Everybody has different needs. There's no need to apologise for that."
You wonder what she meant by that.
Still, you have classes to get through, and the math department's fairly far away-
"Um, excuse me? Jaune, was it?" A familiar voice says.
You look around and find Velvet walking up to you. As you notice her, a slight blush forms on her cheeks.
"Correct." You state simply, curious about why she's here.
"I... just wanted to thank you for what you did. I, you scared the living daylights out of me, with your..." She gestures with her fingers, poking two out from her temples. "but, thank you, for getting me out of that. And, erm, I... heard a little of what happened after I tried to leave."
You raise an eyebrow at her below your hat, and her blush deepens, her eyes widening and her heart speeding up.
"I-I just wanted to say that... I-I don't think you really, think you are so above us all! Because, if it really was like watching a rat pick on a toad, you wouldn't have bothered intervening! Y-you would have just sat back and watched like everyone else! So, I think, I think that you really do care about people, even if you feel like you have to hide it behind arrogance!"
... That sits there for a moment. Gets comfy. Puts its feet up on the metaphorical coffee table.
You...
genuinely have no idea how to respond to this.
"You're... welcome?" You venture.
"W-well, that's, really all I wanted to say. So, thank you, again, and I'll, let you go now." With that, she walks past you, eventually coming under the shade of your hat. In there, half-shadowed, you hear her mumble something else.
"A-and for what it's worth, if-if you were just trying to score points with me... y-you did!"
Before you can even
begin to come up with a response to that, she runs off, leaving you standing there, utterly speechless. You feel your jaw hanging open slightly.
"Mr Arc? Don't you have a class to be getting to?" You hear Goodwitch behind you, and you don't need inhuman senses to
hear the smile in her voice. Whatever she saw of that, she obviously enjoyed the show
immensely.
"... I genuinely don't know how to react to any of that."
She walks up beside you, gently placing a hand on your shoulder.
"In my experience? Dinner and a movie is always a good start."
