10. Aftermath


    Ruby evaded a downward sh of ws with a final [Petal Form], then countered. Her scythe cleaved into the beast''s shadow-flesh where its spine would have been. She darted away to dodge a fewst desperate attacks, but the damage was done. Panting, exhausted, legs wobbly, she watched the beowolf finally die.


    She stared in disbelief at the disintegrating corpse. An E-Rank Grimm. The two of them, first-evolution huntresses-in-training, had managed to take down an E-Rank. It was an absurd aplishment.


    But not one she could focus on, because while one threat was gone, therger remained.


    Silver eyes turned toward the Grimm seated on the throne. A single elegant eyebrow arched as Ruby leveled her scythe in her direction.


    "Mm," the Grimm said. "Impressive. Maybe not aplete waste of my time. Still," she said, "you''ve just awoken to your powers. If a gem, an uncut one. I have little interest." She uncrossed her legs and stood. "We''ll be seeing each other again, I''m sure. I was brought here for a reason, as were you. Until then, though…"


    With a single curt nod, shadows enveloped the Grimm, and she vanished. In Ruby''s peripheral vision, the Rift''s exit portal mmed open, widening from a line into an oval. Ruby gaped in surprise, having been readying herself for a fight. A million questions ran through her head, but she pushed them all aside.


    Because Yang was hurt.


    She spun on her heel and ran over.


    It took a few seconds of shaking Yang''s shoulder and gently patting her cheek to get her to rouse. Aura-break was no joke. The magical shielding had guarded her from being hurt too bad physically, but she was going to be wrung out. Ruby would be too, for that matter, but at least she hadn''t gone through an aura-break.


    "Ruby?" a groggy Yang asked.


    "We won," Ruby said first. "We''re safe."


    Yang blinked a few times, then remembered their circumstances. She stiffened and shot up—thankfully not to her feet, just sitting. Her head pivoted left and right as she took the empty cavern in. And the exit portal.


    "Huh," Yang said, rxing. "Where''d the girl go?"


    "Shadows ate her."


    "What?"


    "Shadows ate her." After a confused look from Yang, Ruby giggled—it sounded slightly manic to her ears. It had been a long day. "I don''t know, Yang, she said some weird stuff, then nodded at me and just…teleported. I didn''t have to fight her." She sat down, setting Crescent Rose aside. "What the heck just happened?"


    Yang rubbed the side of her head. She tried to find an exnation, but failed. "Your guess is as good as mine."


    "That was a talking Grimm."


    "And an E-Rank," Yang said. "What the hell was this Rift?" Looking to the left, she blinked suddenly. "And what are those?"


    Ruby followed Yang''s gaze.


    "Uh," Ruby said. "Looks like…clothes."


    Sure enough, two metal stands holding huntress outfits had appeared sometime after the Rift had ended.


    "Makes sense," Yang said, grunting as she forced herself to her feet, swaying slightly. "It couldn''t actually send us home naked. There''s gonna be Huntsmen Association agents at our house."


    There would be. If they''d failed to clear the Rift, that would''ve meant an instant breach—an outbreak of Grimm into Patch. Another reason the HA was careful with who it allocated Rifts to. Failure wouldn''t just mean their own death; it would mean danger to nearby civilians.


    Despite her excitement over having received her soul-manifested outfit, Ruby worriedly watched Yang as she headed for the two stands. She was one tough cookie, up and walking so soon after an aura break. Honestly, she seemed to be holding up better than Ruby. Her big sister really was invulnerable.


    "Any guesses whose is whose?" Yang joked.


    "I wonder," Ruby said, rolling her eyes.


    She walked up to the metal stand that had materialized seemingly from nowhere. Her eyes widened as she took the outfit in. The corset. Thebat skirt. The red cape. It was as stylish as she''d hoped. It wasn''t surprising the color theme was mostly red and ck—matched her hair. Outfits manifested from the soul, so they always stylistically fit with their huntress.


    Yang was already slipping on her clothes, so Ruby did the same. Two minutester, she was dressed. She turned to Yang, who had finished first, to present herself.


    Ruby


    [copse]


    Yang


    [copse]


    Yang''s eyes raked up and down her as Ruby''s did so in return.


    Yang''s outfit was…


    Stylish, of course, like most huntress manifestations, but also bold. It showed more skin than normal. Cleavage, stomach, thigh-highs, skintight short shorts—a lot was on disy. Yang had always been confident in her body, so it made sense her outfit would entuate the features she wasn''t afraid to hide.


    With great effort, Ruby managed not to pay too much attention to her sister''s assets. Now that Yang was clothed, she wouldn''t have any excuses if there was any…<em>activity</em>…inside her skirt.


    "Good thing you got a skirt," Yang said with a smirk, as if reading her mind. "That''ll help hide any<em>reactions</em>, going forward."


    Ruby''s cheeks reddened. "Stop teasing me."


    Though honestly, she brought up a good point. Ruby<em>was</em>thankful for how much volume thebat skirt had. She doubted whether it wouldpletely hide any ''reactions,'' as Yang had put it, but at least if she wasn''t excited, the skirt would cover things up.


    "Love the outfit, though," Yang said. "It''s totally you. Nice cape."


    "Thanks," Ruby said. "You too, of course. It''s so cool!"


    "A bit revealing," Yang said, looking down into her cleavage. "But noints, I guess." Sheughed suddenly. "Let''s just hope they don''t evolve into anything crazy. Especially yours, considering your ss."


    Ruby paused, then flushed at the possibility. Her outfit seemed normal now, but Yang was right. Since her ss was [Lust Reaper], would her innocuous outfit evolve into something<em>less</em>innocuous? Thankfully, that was a problem she didn''t have to worry about untilter.


    Ruby looked around the empty cavern, eyesnding on where the E-Rank Grimm had died. A pink crystaly on the floor, which she hadn''t noticed earlier. She jogged over and picked it up.


    ***


    Pink Dust


    Tier: 2


    Description: A potent, primordial form of Dust, best used as an additive to enhance the effects of other Dust mixtures.


    ***


    Tier two, instead of tier one. This crystal would be even more potent than the one before it—meaning she would be able to ration the material across more bullets. It was alsorger and thicker.


    There were no more items of interest besides the exit portal. Their first Rift had beenpleted. It was time to head back into the real world.


    "Guess we should get our stories straight," Yang said.


    "Huh?"


    "We obviously aren''t telling the Huntsman Association what actually happened. Or Dad." Yang raised her eyebrows. "Were you nning to?"


    Ruby''s thoughts had been a little preupied with other things. But now that she thought about it…yeah. Policy was to give a full, urate report to the Huntsman Association, but divulging the details of this Rift seemed, beyond just mortifying, potentially unwise.


    It wasn''t that Ruby distrusted the Huntsman Association, just that telling them about her [Lust Reaper] ss and the talking Grimmgirl might have undesirable consequences. She wasn''t sure she wanted that sort of attention. Whether, even, divulging the information might result with her locked up in an interrogation room…or a cell orboratory. Nobody had ever had two sses before. Much less one like hers.


    And that wasn''t mentioning what the Grimmgirl had said. The allusions to her silver eyes and ''manifestations of power.'' Something was going on, clearly, and she wasn''t sure she wanted anyone besides her and Yang to know about it. Not until she knew more herself.


    Besides, the Huntsman Association wouldn''t believe them in the first ce.


    "Right," Ruby said. "Straightening out our story."


    They did just that. Forty-five minutester, she and Yang had worked out the details. The cover story wasn''tplicated. They''d gone through a long, grueling Rift, with no weird events included. To be honest, that was eighty percent of the truth. While there''d been patches of strange things happening, the majority of their time had been spent progressing through an endless cavern, killing dozens of Grimm. Like any other Rift. The only truly strange thing was howrge it had been, and they couldn''t hide that from the Association; it was self-apparent by how long it took to clear.


    When finished, they stepped up to the portal.


    "Ready?" Yang asked.


    Ruby swallowed. "Ready."


    They walked through.


    And were instantly transported to their backyard.


    Behind them, the Rift sealed up, blinking out of existence.


    There was a stic table set up a dozen feet away, situated on the porch by the sliding ss door leading into their house. Two huntsmen were there, a man and a woman. An in-progress match of some card game wasid out on the table, an easy way to pass time during a long and tedious watch duty.


    The woman was a brown-haired faunus with antlers. The man, an older veteran with gray eyes and a scar on his cheek. Second and third evolution, by the badges on their chests. Ruby didn''t recognize either of them, which wasn''t that odd, because even if the ind of Patch only had so many Huntsmen stationed there, there were still too many for her to know all their faces.


    They hadn''t drawn their weapons, but they had shot to their feet in less than a second—alert, for all they''d been ying a card game while waiting. They rxed as they saw Ruby and Yang arrive, not a Grimm. The Rift had been sessfully cleared, and they wouldn''t be dealing with an outbreak event.


    "Well done, girls," the man said after a second of looking them up and down. "But I hope you realize the trouble you''re in."


    Right.


    Time for the consequences of entering a Rift without the Huntsman Association''s clearance.


    ***


    Before they were grilled by the Association, their dad came out from the house and started equally scolding and fretting over them. Ruby made her apologies, as did Yang, though it was obvious neither of them<em>regretted</em>what they had done; they''d saved months of waiting by jumping on the opportunity when it came. The only question was whether Yang''s im was right: whether the Association was going to be genuinely upset with them, with real consequences to follow, or whether it would be a p on a wrist.


    She and Yang were separated by the two huntsmen posted to watch over their Rift, and the questioning began. Ruby gave the mostly-urate report she and Yang had coborated on. The man didn''t seem to be suspicious of the retelling. Why would he be? It wasn''t like he had any reason to believe the Rift was anything but a normal one.


    Once the initial questioning had finished, they''d been temporarily released. Ruby went upstairs to take a much-needed shower. Interestingly enough, when she de-summoned her huntress outfit, the clothes and supplies that had magically been taken when entering the Rift reappeared. So they hadn''t been swallowed permanently.


    Post-shower and getting changed, she, Yang, and Dad reconvened downstairs for food. Seeing how it had been nearly twenty-four full hours of rigorous activity since she''dst eaten, she and Yang devoured enough grilled cheeses to feed a family of eight. Only when she was ufortably stuffed did she finally acknowledge defeat and retire to the living room to enter a blissful catatonic state.


    Two hours after that, someone higher up the Huntsman Association chain ofmand came to question them—and deliver verdicts and punishments.


    Yang was right; it was a p on the wrist. The sum of it was that they were on ''probation'' for the next two months, and what they''d done would be reported to whatever Huntsman Academy they decided to attend. Ruby was slightly stressed over that second part, but even she recognized that none of the Academies would care. They valued, far and away,bat performance more than anything else. Maybe it would be a minor ck mark on their record, but she doubted it would make the difference between an eptance or denial.


    When all of that was finished, the HA officer left their house. Dad scolded and congratted them one more time. His thoughts on the matter were obviously mixed. He didn''t seem to actually disapprove, just that, as a parent figure, he couldn''t<em>condone</em>them grantly breaking thew.


    Overnight, Ruby slept for probably twelve hours straight. Yang even longer.


    "Alright," Yang said after they had devoured another huge breakfast, continuing to make up for the previous day''s food debt. "I think it''s time we go practice. And test a few things."


    Dad was standing over by the fridge, so Yang couldn''t say it outright. But Ruby picked up her meaning.


    Pink Dust. Assuming it was going to be a consistent addition to their arsenal—and with how powerful it was, it had to be—they needed to have a grasp on its effects, how potent it was, and the best dust ratios to use in any given bullet.


    Beyond that, they needed general practice. Through divine timing, the next Beacon qualification event was in four days, and while Ruby and Yang were new to their semnces and sses, it was possible they could ce high enough to qualify for the uing semester. They just needed to y catch-up. To spend every waking moment sparring.


    There was pre-exam cramming to do.