The Games We Play

DISCLAIMER: This story is NOT MINE IN ANY WAY. That honor has gone to the beautiful bastard Ryuugi. This has been pulled from his Spacebattles publishment at threads/rwby-the-gamer-the-games-we-play-disk-five.341621/. Anyway on with the show...err read.

Firefight

I floated above the Grimm in a sphere of solid white, the light so bright that standing within it almost made me feel like the world had been washed away. It was a massive thing, encompassing a volume that far surpassed many buildings, and it moved as I did. Outside the bounds of the sphere, light fluctuated and flowed in shifting patterns of blues and greens and similar colors, the light of my soul interacting with the air in strange ways.

Though I felt their attention on me keenly, none of the Grimm were quick to attack. These Grimm were old enough, experience enough, and, thus, intelligent enough to know a trap when they saw one and I could all but hear them consider how to best test my Aurora without endangering themselves. Though their bodies were being forced into more and more grotesque shapes, they didn't seem to feel any particular urgency as they monitored me and tried to decide on their first move.

It was intelligent behavior, I acknowledged. Truthfully, the first one to attack me would have been at a fairly severe disadvantage.

But that didn't mean they were any safer hesitating.

I took a moment to decide upon my target before choosing the Humbaba as a test of my abilities.

The moment I did, I vanished.

Flux (Active) LV1 EXP: 00.0% MP: 10000

It is said that the ability to decide one's own place in the world is one of the soul's greatest gifts. This skill changes that truth from a metaphor to lethal weapon. By violently twisting one's Aura into complex patterns, the user of this technique is able to alter their position in space, allowing them to cover short distances instantly. Using this technique requires both tremendous power and focus, as the user must have the strength of will to force their soul to redefine the location of their body without disassembling themselves entirely in the process.

Range: 10 meters.

In what I could only scarcely call a moment, I felt myself fly apart, tearing at seams that I didn't think existed. It wasn't material pieces I was reduced to either, nor even fully energy, but rather a cloud of possibilities in a fashion very similar to when I'd used my Dimensional. I could feel it as the probability of me existing in one place was reduced to zero and as my odds of existing in another raised to one. For my body, it was an unspeakably strange feeling.

But I was more than just a body, now more than ever. From the simultaneously internal and external perspective granted by Sahasrara, I saw my moment in a different way—as if I'd been viewing myself with one eye and had abruptly switched to the other, altering my perspective. I willed my body to be elsewhere, erasing it in one place and all but remaking it in another.

End result? I appeared directly in front of the Humbaba, moving faster than the eye could see to appear in front of him, catching him within the edge of my Aurora as I did. At once, the Humbaba flinched as if in agony, small clouds of white smoke rising from his skin as if he were burning in the light. He tried to lunge backwards to escape it but I followed him step for step, keeping him within the range of my power and turning up the heat.

Literally.

Elemental Soul (Active) LV1 EXP: 7.14% MP: 250

The shifting of Aura in accordance with one's Elemental Affinity, now refined to the point of transformation. Unlike its predecessor which empowered the user by imitating the properties of the chosen element, this skill allows the user to directly transform his Aura into the physical form of an element. Power changes as the caster's INT, skill level, and Elemental Affinity grow. Only possible for those closely attuned to the forces of nature.

Aligns Aura towards a specific element.

Enhances the effects of the appropriate Elemental Aura, while so aligned.

Additional 250 MP used per minute.

Elemental Soul was a skill I'd played around with somewhat, but had been forced to limit my use of for much the same reason as Aurora—namely, its breadth. While it was a simply enough skill at its most basic level, when used solely with my Aura, it was also something that could easily go out of control. Using Fire as an example, if I used Elemental Soul while limiting myself solely to my Aura, all it would do was wreath my body in flames. If I used it in conjunction with Aureola, however, the effects of the skill would expand, surrounding me in a raging bonfire that could incinerate anything that came near. Used with Aurora?

The world around me became a raging inferno, engulfing the Humbaba along with everything else around me. The flames weren't just physical, either; Elemental Soul enhanced my Aura, instead of replacing it, which meant that the effects of Aurora combined with the sudden fire to strike at the Grimm even more deeply. The flames were hot enough that the ground around me liquefied in moments and swiftly began to boil—and had a normal human abruptly found themselves within easy reach, they'd have melted even as they burned.

But needless to say, I wasn't content to stop there. Not when I still had cards to play, at least—and I'd chosen to play with fire for a reason. Because I was using my Aura to create them, I could feel the flames as easily as if they were my own limbs, swirling around me and rising brilliantly from the light of my soul. Around me, I could see the patterns in the sky shift to reds and purples, as though the sun was setting, but more than that, I could see the Aura within the flames, blazing hot to my senses. But instead of drawing away from that, I reached out to the sensation and drew it inwards, fanning the flames hotter and higher with each passing moment.

And then, as if flicking a switch, the flames closest to my body turned white and the rest turn blue.

Surya (Active & Passive) LV1 EXP: 0.00%

The ultimate technique of the ancient warrior Vasusena, mastered in his final moments as he reached a higher level enlightenment and understanding. An extremely powerful fire technique only usable by refining and purifying one's Aura to an incredible level, it is a skill that allows for the generation of extremely intense flames which surround the user in his entirety. Rather than a single attack, this skill represents the ability to generate those flames and the state of being that allows their use, with the cost and form of the attack dependent on the wearer. The power, versatility, and intensity of the flames increase with the Fire Affinity and Wisdom of the user, but are said to be able to burn almost anything.

At this point, the Humbaba wasn't even trying to fight back, he was simply attempting to escape from the range of my flames before he was incinerated by them utterly. With each wound I inflicted, his condition seemed to worsen as his body refused to heal properly, plagued by the Brahmastra's curse—and he was burning faster by the moment, red matter all but drooling from the frame of his increasingly skeletal figure.

And I still had fuel to add to the fire.

"Suryasta," I said, feeling the Fire Elemental form behind me. "It's time."

Suryasta didn't nod or answer—didn't do anything but focus on me, in fact. But that was all he needed to do for me to feel the confirmation running down the line between us and feel the change. As I closed my eyes, I felt Suryasta both come apart and come over me in a way that was both hard to describe and intensely familiar. It felt more than anything like using Bai Hu's ultimate technique.

It made sense to me, in a way—felt natural even. By their very nature, both Bai Hu and my Elementals were part of me given form, at once internal and external. They were pieces of my Aura and my Soul shaped such that they could aid me and give me strength, but we were still one, in the end, if also a strange and unusual duality. Merging with them, then, was like unifying my Elemental to create Keter; a form of restoration…and also addition. In creating my Elementals, I'd attached pieces of myself to forces of nature, giving them slowly growing hearts and minds, as well as different ways to experience the world.

When Suryasta returned to me, Fire came along for the ride.

Agni (Active) LV1 EXP: 0.00%

An ancient technique named after its user, one of the Apauruseya of Vytal. The man that became known as Agni was born with a tremendous kinship with the element of fire and forged that connection into a being that burnt hot enough to sear the world. As it raged endlessly in the battles that reshaped the fallen world, however, Agni found a yet deeper truth within the flames—that they were born of his soul, as much a part of him as he was of them. Joining the ranks of the legendary god-kings of Vytal, he mastered this art alongside them, internalizing the part of himself that he had previously unleashed to reach for new heights of power.

Fire Affinity rises to Max.

The user of this skill is immune to Fire Elemental attacks.

Active MP-based skills that do not naturally share an affinity with an Element way be given the Fire Element at no additional cost.

Only those with a Fire Elemental may use this skill.

A Fire Elemental may not be manifested while this skill is active.

Only one Elemental may be merged with in this fashion at a given time.

The Grimm burned.

Outside the range of my Aurora, I saw the other Grimm pull away slightly even as the world around us began to burn. As I stepped forward, the ground continued to liquefy and boil, causing my feet to sink slightly into the viscous fluid before I caught myself. The Humbaba stopped as I approached, no long able to even move. Instead, he tried to lift a single skeletal limb and I watched apathetically as it began to vanish, everything from finger to forearm quickly vanishing as I entered its reach—and he entered the reach of Surya.

I didn't bother lifting a hand against the creature. Instead, I simply passed through the space he occupied and watched as he was vaporized by the flames.

Your level has increased by one! Your level has increased by one!

I noted the levels absently, well aware that I now had enough points to improve another stat by fifty. A part of me had already begun considering the best choice, both in the grand scheme of things and accounting for what I would soon be facing, but I let the thoughts drift to the back of my mind as I focused instead on what was in front of me.

Which is to say, I turned my attention to the other Grimm and began to contemplate the best way to kill them.

The combination of powers I was using now was as impressive as I'd imagined it would be, but it was also my first time testing it. Part of that was because several pieces of that puzzle were relatively new additions to my repertoire, Agni most notable of all—and part of it was simply because it had been difficult to test. The problem with things like Elemental Soul and Surya were fairly obvious; it was difficult to become a raging storm of elemental power without drawing attention. If I tried to use it while at Haven, it was possible I could do so without anyone noticing, regulating the flow of heat to keep anyone from getting burned or noticing a sudden increase in temperature, prevent my Aura from incinerating anything I came in contact with, and regulate all the other factors that made life difficult in the center of a firestorm or a hurricane…but it would be really difficult and there was a constant risk that I might accidentally incinerate someone. It wasn't something I'd been willing to test, even knowing what I was capable of.

Truthfully, that was also why I hadn't tried it out around my teammates, either. Fires as hot as the ones I was making didn't need contact to burn—even the area outside of Aurora's reach had been rendered fairly inhospitable to life by the sheer heat that was being let off. Had there been any Lotus Eater trees left standing in Brahmastra's wake, I'd have sincerely wondered if they would have combusted or melted from being so close. While the effects of Aurora itself were limited solely to those I recognized as enemies, the flames generated by my other skills would burn friend and foe alike and given that they'd progressed to the point of making people evaporate, that was a bit of an issue.

So while this combination of skills was one I'd wanted to try for a while now and have been adding new skills to ever sense, the fact remained that it was something restricted to situations when I was surrounded by things I wouldn't miss.

Such as, say, this entire godforsaken continent and everything on it. I had no reason to hold back here and given the infestations of the Grimm in general and the Lotus Eaters in particular, it could do with a good razing, anyway.

As for Aurora itself, I'd avoided using it for two main reasons. One, the sheer breadth of the lightshow it created was a pain in the ass to hide, even for me—and it wasn't something that could just be hidden behind an illusion, either. While I could make my Aura much harder to notice than most people's thanks to the skill Tranquility, it was a relative thing and the effectiveness dropped with blatant displays of power. As such, while the veritable explosion of Aura caused by Aurora might be relatively muted, it would still be like taking an active tuning fork and shoving it against the teeth of any Hunter nearby, which would draw the type of attention I didn't want. I didn't mind people knowing I was powerful, so long as they received that information on my terms and in such a way that it was advantageous to me.

But I don't need people to know the full truth, because—as I have become increasingly aware of over time—it's really hard to plan for things you don't know about. Which, thinking about it, is probably also why all of my enemies are so tight lipped, the bastards.

The second reason was even more simple; Aurora automatically struck out at those I recognized as my enemies—but I recognized a lot of people as enemies. A lot of people that I would just as soon not be aware of that fact. While I would be in close proximity to people like Cinder especially, it wasn't something I could chance; after all, if I made a mistake and a fight broke out, she could probably trap me in some kind of extra temporal blender and kill me before and after my death. No, thank you.

But again, none of that mattered here and it was my chance to cut loose without worrying too much. And where I was going, I knew full well I wouldn't be able to hold anything back.

That in mind, I flicked my gaze from the Morrigan to Garmr—and then used Flux to appear above the former, Reaching out with my power to do so.

Reach (Active) LV1 EXP: 0.00% MP: 1000

The ability to reach beyond the limits of the mortal frame by use of the soul. By expending great power to do so, the user of this skill may increase the range of another skill by thirty, even if that skill would normally require physical contact with the target, in which case it instead provides a range of thirty meters.

I came down on the massive crow, landing directly between its wings and letting my Aura handle the rest as gravity pulled me through the enormous Grimm. Even as I fell, however, I lifted both of my hands, gathering power into the form of a pair of spears. The one in my right hand burned with scarlet incandescence, while the one on the right seemed like nothing more than a plain and simple lance. I threw the red spear first, an Agniyastra bolstered by the power of Agni, and watched as it caught the Garmr in the shoulder and blew the colossal limb clean off before exploding into a column of fire that flooded forth in every direction, as intense as the flames of Surya. The Garmr released a sound somewhere between a roar, a howl, and a scream as the flames washed over him and left him a quickly thinning figure as matter sloughed off his frame. I watched him calmly for a moment, gauging the damage I'd caused—and then threw the other spear to compare it.

The simple lance looked, at first glance, like nothing more than one of my Magic Missiles, if perhaps a bit longer and a touch thinner. The somewhat golden color that capped its tips was fairly easy to overlook, especially while it was in motion, and it wasn't anywhere near as visually impressive as my Brahmastra or Agneyastra or even Gungnir. Even its effects were fairly subdued in comparison to its compatriots—it shimmered once in midflight, touched the skull of the massive Grimm, and vanished into its skull. There was no flash of light, no explosion, nothing.

But the Grimm dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.

Longinus (Active) LV1 EXP: 17.96% MP: 80000

A legendary spear said to have been bathed in the blood of a god. Originally nothing more than a simple weapon, it was said to have been exalted by the experience and became something far greater. It is said to have no physical form but to be able to pierce any defense by cutting through the very space its target occupies. Before the edge of the spear of Destiny, all things stand equal; it cuts through whatever is in its path without distinction. Power increases with INT, skill level, and Metal element affinity.

Complete defense penetration.

I landed as the Garmr fell to the ground with an earth shaking thud, rolling my wrist. As I'd expected, Longinus seemed like a fairly troublesome weapon to use. While it's rather exorbitant cost was mitigated somewhat by my other skills, it was fairly expensive for what it did—which was base damage. Granted, it was base damage that utterly ignored the opponent's defenses and natural durability, but still; compared to the damage of Agneyastra or any of my other, far cheaper attacks, it had done a fairly minor amount of damage.

On the other hand, if I encountered an opponent I otherwise couldn't scratch, Longinus would allow me to at least do some damage. I wondered if it would work against Malkuth's physics fuckery.

…Somehow, I doubted things would be that simple—and even if they were, he could probably find a way to work around it. But it was still a nice thought.

Shaking away the thoughts, I turned my head towards my next opponent, the massive 'peafowl' that was the Panoptes. I say 'peafowl' because even before the…remodeling the Brahmastra had given it, the Panoptes was a fairly monstrous looking thing, with everything from its body to its plumage covered in massive eyes, down to the very nails of its clawed feet. Further, while its eyes had recovered from the damage of the Brahmastra, they'd come back wrong, with many of the eyes either grown over with black scales or reduced to massive blobs of tiny red orbs, somewhat reminiscent of egg sacks. It was kind of hideous, but…well, I had no leg to stand on when it came to eyes. I could win a staring contest with a few hundred of the beasts and have eyes to spare while doing so.

Nonetheless, I settled down in front of the creatures and snuffed out my flames with a thought, seemingly giving him an opening. And indeed, I was outright inviting the monster to attack me—because there was still one more thing I wanted to try.

Taking a slow breath, I activated Kavacha and waited.