Blake's heart lurched the moment she saw him.
For a brief instant, despite the blood-red sky, the endless sea of Grimm below and the literal apocalypse unfolding around them, everything seemed to narrow down to a single figure falling through the air, fifty meters away.
Red hair and blue eyes, with grimm mask concealing part of his face.
His sword, resting comfortably in his hand.
Adam Taurus.
The sight struck her harder than any physical blow could have. It was an odd feeling unlike any that she had ever received. Old wounds she had already buried and healed suddenly reopened all at once.
It wasn't even the fact that the man was a part of Sleepless that concerned her. She was more-so surprised that he was...
Alive.
While Blake was distracted with her memories of Adam—he attacked.
A crimson slash erupted from his sword without warning.
The attack crossed the distance between them almost instantly, carving a glowing line through the air as it raced toward her position.
Though consumed by her own memories, it was fortunate that Blake's prowess was that of a Rank 2.
Her foot kicked against empty space and her body twisted sideways. The energy blade passed through the location she had occupied a fraction of a second earlier before continuing into the distance.
The moment she dodged, Blake kicked off the air accelerated towards him. Her katana flashed from its sheath and she closed the gap between them in seconds, forcing Adam onto the defensive as steel collided against steel amid open air.
Sparks scattered around them and wind screamed past their bodies. Far below, the crimson landscape of the moon continued rushing closer.
In her mind, Blake was already evaluating.
Rank Two.
Adam's prowess was definitely Rank Two.
Beyond the obvious tell, where he was able to straight up block the power of her Rank 2 body, the pressure surrounding him was vastly different from the very last time Blake had seen him.
Back then, all those years ago when he had been her mentor in Menagerie, he had been a Rank 1. But now...
It seemed he had grown stronger after his confrontation with Jaune and Pyrrha during the Shadow Realm expedition.
The realization wasn't entirely surprising. Many awakened tended to become much stronger after surviving near-death encounters, and from what Blake had heard about the fight towards the end, where Pyrrha had been trapped under rubble.
Jaune had almost killed Adam.
However, this situation did not make it any less irritating. Their weapons clashed again and Blake pushed forward. The name left her mouth before she could stop it.
"Adam! Why?"
The question escaped alongside another slash.
"Why are you doing this? I thought..."
Adam's expression remained hidden behind the Grimm mask, then he performed a complicated feint with his sword, only for his leg to lash outwards and kick towards Blake. The attack struck her squarely in the abdomen and the impact launched her backwards through the air.
"What?" Adam asked coldly. "You thought I was dead?"
Blake opened her mouth to respond, then instinct screamed. Without hesitation she twisted sideways and the crimson slash Adam that had launched earlier suddenly reappeared.
Her eyes widened.
It had never disappeared, rather the attack had circled back and worse still, the crimson arc of energy had changed. The original crescent form had somehow expanded into a colossal crimson greatsword formed entirely from runic power.
The energy weapon descended toward her position and Blake raised her Katana to block. The collision shook the air and a deafening shockwave exploded outward. For a moment it appeared as though she had successfully blocked.
Then the crimson blade cut straight through her, bisecting her in two.
The giant sword continued past.
Yet, oddly enough, no blood appeared from the wound. Instead, dozens of Blakes erupted outward from the wound.
Phantom clones. An entire army of her. And each... carrying her katana, possessing identical movements and identical expressions.
But there was something different about her clones from before. Around every clone lingered a black-red silhouette. A phantom shape that was overlaying their bodies.
Interestingly enough, the outline resembled Adam. Not perfectly, and more like a shadow of him. A conceptual echo formed from runic energy.
Dozens of phantom Adams overlaid themselves alongside dozens of Blakes.
The sight was unsettling. Then every Blake attacked simultaneously and their blades swung forward as one.
Red-black energy erupted from every strike and the resulting slashes dwarfed buildings.
Dozens of them.
An entire storm of destruction converged toward Adam's position. For the first time since their reunion, Adam grinned and the Grimm mask covering his face lit up with crimson light.
Then, something enormous descended from above the two fighters. A gigantic paw collided with the incoming attacks, scattering them away and detonating their force worthlessly.
The attack that could have leveled city blocks vanished beneath overwhelming force.
Blake's eyes narrowed and the creature responsible finally emerged.
A Manticore.
A Rank Two Manticore.
Skyscraper sized, with black armor-like hide covered its frame while runic energy coursed beneath its skin like molten rivers. Its wings eclipsed huge portions of the sky. Even from a distance Blake could feel the oppressive grimm essence radiating from it.
Adam casually landed atop its head, as though standing upon a mount. As though it belonged to him.
Blake felt something cold settle in her stomach. The Grimm wasn't attacking him. Not even showing aggression. It simply carried him.
Around them the scale of the battlefield became increasingly apparent.
Blake finally forced herself to look beyond Adam. The region surrounding them was infested. Nevermores filled the skies and manticores soared between in between.
Vespulas moved in swarms numbering in the thousands. Farther away she spotted stranger Grimm she didn't immediately recognize.
The entire airspace had become a hunting ground. An ecosystem of monsters. And somehow Adam stood among them unharmed.
Then his voice echoed across the battlefield.
"You've created some truly powerful runes, Blake."
The words carried clearly despite the distance. His blue eyes studied her with open interest.
"That one in particular... a Meta Rune? Powerful too, from the looks of it.""
His gaze lingered on the phantom-like overlaid clones of himself surrounding her own clones.
The giant Manticore beneath him let out a low growl and Adam rested his sword across one shoulder. The crimson glow behind his mask intensified.
"I'm not sure if this is fate, Blake, but I'm glad I got to see you before the end comes."
Blake said nothing, her body slowly reconnected. The two halves that had been separated moments earlier flowed together seamlessly and flesh became whole once more.
Within seconds no trace of the wound remained.
Her emotions, however, were significantly harder to repair.
The initial shock was fading, leaving only anger that remained. And confusion. But the overwhelming surge of emotions that had threatened to cloud her judgment was beginning to settle.
Adam was here.
Alive.
Working with Sleepless and standing atop Grimm that obeyed him. The question was, why? Why did Adam do all of this? Why fake his death, and why join an organization that wanted to bring about the end of the world.
It was foolish.
Adam had friends and family back in menagerie. He wasn't supposed to be a fool that went around doing moronic things like this.
Blake had many questions but... she knew that whatever answers she wanted, she wasn't going to get them through conversation.
Not immediately.
Her eyes narrowed.
'Fine. If he doesn't want to talk and explain himself, I'll just have to beat him up until he's ready to talk."
The thought felt surprisingly reasonable.
While the decision settled comfortably in her mind, at that exact moment a Vespula lunged towards her. The giant insect attempted to drive its stinger through her torso but Blake pivoted and her foot smashed into the creature's head.
The impact launched it spinning away through the air. Before it could recover, multiple arms manifested around her body. Each moving independently.
One arm seized another approaching Vespula by the neck. A second grabbed its wing and a third wrapped around its stinger.
The creature shrieked, but Blake ignored it. Her eyes remained locked onto Adam. Then she threw the grimm at him.
The captured rank 1 Vespula became a projectile and its body accelerated toward the Rank Two Manticore like a missile. Simultaneously dozens of Blake clones surged forward through the air.
Their phantom Adam silhouettes mirrored every movement.
The air itself trembled beneath the collective pressure generated by dozens of Rank Two combatants moving in perfect synchronization, each one carrying a fragment of her will and each one surrounded by the strange red-black phantom silhouette that mirrored Adam's shape.
Far below stretched the endless scarlet landscape of the moon while above them countless flying Grimm filled the heavens like a living storm, their roars blending together into a single monstrous chorus that echoed across the battlefield.
The Manticore swatted aside the Vespula that Blake had thrown at it, crushing it's kin in the process.
It's body was truly enormous, even for a Rank 2.
It was clearly a Peak Rank 2 monster. Its wings beat against the air with enough force to create shockwaves that scattered weaker Grimm from its path. Unlike awakened, whose power largely originated from their runes, Grimm possessed physical bodies that became increasingly monstrous as they climbed the ranks.
At Rank Zero the difference between a Grimm and an awakened was relatively small. A peak Rank Zero awakened could generally contend with a peak Rank Zero Grimm in terms of raw physical capability. There were exceptions, of course, particularly among creatures on the verge of evolution, but the disparity remained manageable.
Rank 1 was where things began to shift.
Peak Rank 1 Grimm were stronger than awakened in pure physicality, forcing awakened to rely more heavily upon their runes rather than brute force.
By Rank 2, the gap became enormous.
Creatures like the Manticore before her possessed bodies the size of skyscrapers. Their flesh, muscles, bones, and natural durability had all reached absurd levels. Without transformation-based runes such as Taiyang's Dragon Rune or Qrow's Crow Rune to bridge the physical disparity, most awakened simply could not compete with them in direct contests of strength.
Which was why Blake had no intention of fighting fair.
Her clones spread outward through the sky while simultaneously unleashing crescent-shaped slashes of red-black energy. Dozens of attacks converged upon the Manticore from different angles, each one powerful enough to slice apart lesser Grimm with ease.
The Manticore simply raised a paw.
Runic energy condensed around the massive limb and the creature swatted through the incoming attacks like an adult brushing aside insects. The slashes detonated harmlessly against the construct of energy surrounding its claws.
Blake narrowed her eyes.
Strong.
The creature barreled forward through the sky, closing distance with shocking speed despite its size.
Around her, smaller Grimm surged to intercept. Vespulas darted through the air while Nevermores descended from above. Blake and her clones moved among them fluidly, carving through the lesser creatures while gradually advancing toward Adam.
The Manticore seemed to grow irritated. Perhaps it was tired of enduring the constant barrage of energy attacks or perhaps it simply wanted the fight to end.
Either way, the giant beast suddenly opened its mouth.
Blake felt danger explode through her instincts.
A massive sphere of light began forming deep within the creature's throat. Runic energy condensed at terrifying speed as the surrounding air distorted beneath the sheer concentration of power.
Then the beam came. A laser erupted from the Manticore's mouth like a second sun. The attack tore through the battlefield with overwhelming force, vaporizing Grimm unfortunate enough to stand in its path while carving a glowing trench through the sky itself.
Blake was swallowed whole, or rather, the Blake that had been standing there was. The beam passed through her body and her form immediately dissolved into nothingess.
A clone.
At the exact same moment, one of the duplicate Blakes a hundred meters away abruptly changed direction. Blake had used her substitute rune to replace her body with that of a clone to avoid the attack. She surged forward while condensing an immense quantity of runic energy around her blade.
Unlike before, she did not release the energy, instead, the power accumulated as layer after layer wrapped itself around the katana until a colossal crimson-black blade extended from its edge.
The clone swung downwards and the Manticore twisted unexpectedly.
Despite its massive size, the creature moved with frightening agility, dodging the primary slash at the last moment.
Except that had never been the real attack.
As the sword completed its arc, additional blades suddenly manifested throughout the air like afterimages becoming reality. A dozen gigantic energy blades appeared one after another along the path of the original strike.
Each one descended toward the Manticore, and each one was powerful enough to carve apart hills.
For the first time, Adam moved. Standing atop the Manticore's head, he casually lifted his weapon and sliced through empty space.
Reality tore open and a crimson rift appeared before the descending blades. Blake's eyes widened as the attacks vanished into the tear.
Then identical rifts opened behind a dozen of her clones.
The redirected blades emerged instantly and the resulting destruction was catastrophic.
Several clones were bisected before they could react while others disappeared beneath explosions of red-black energy. One moment they had been attacking the other flying grimm, and the next they had become victims of their own assault.
Adam had redirected her attack.
The realization sent a flash of irritation through Blake.
A spatial manipulation rune.
Troublesome.
The surviving clones scattered and in the midst of the attack, Blake disappeared. The entire exchange up until now had been a distraction.
While Adam and the Manticore focused on the direct assault, one clone had quietly maneuvered into position behind them. The instant the opening appeared, Blake activated her substitution.
Reality blurred and her true body exchanged places with the hidden clone. Suddenly she was behind Adam and her blade flashed toward his back.
However, Adam blocked the attack without even turning around.
Steel met steel and the impact reverberated through the air. Slowly, almost mockingly, Adam turned his head to look at her over one shoulder.
Then multiple arms erupted from Blake's body, in which each hand held a weapon. Each weapon attacked from a different angle and a storm of blades descended upon Adam. The red-haired swordsman responded by rotating his weapon in a smooth circular motion.
Every strike was deflected with every angle covered and every attack denied.
It was beautiful.
Adam's swordsmanship was one of the greatest aspects in which Blake had ever witnessed. He was better than her by a mile.
Adam exploded into motion. His foot lashed forward toward Blake's face. She raised her katana to intercept, intending to cut the limb while defending simultaneously.
However, the moment her weapon met his foot, crimson energy erupted from Adam's leg. The kick transformed into a beam-like blast which slammed into Blake and drove her backward.
A portal suddenly opened directly behind her.
Her eyes widened.
She hadn't even sensed it. The spatial tear swallowed her whole and then another portal opened—directly in front of the Manticore's mouth.
The creature had already prepared another beam.
The instant Blake emerged, the attack fired and a second sun consumed her whole. The laser swallowed her completely.
Fortunately, the body being annihilated was yet another clone. The real Blake had immediately switched positions with a surviving duplicate elsewhere on the battlefield.
By now, the surrounding airspace had become noticeably emptier. The countless lesser Grimm caught in the crossfire had largely been exterminated by her clones.
Yet despite all of her efforts, both Adam and the Manticore remained completely unharmed
Neither of them had suffered so much as a scratch.
Adam observed her quietly for a few moments before finally speaking. His tone was almost conversational.
"It was lovely catching up, Blake, but unfortunately, I have a prior appointment."
A portal began opening beside him.
"I'll be seeing you."
Before Blake could close the distance, Adam stepped through the spatial tear and the portal sealed behind him.
Gone.
Just like that.
For several seconds Blake simply stared at the empty space where he had disappeared. Frustration churned inside her chest. Not because she had lost or because she had failed to capture him. But because he had once again left without answering a single meaningful question.
Then her expression hardened.
A cold glint entered her eyes.
"If you think for a moment that I'm letting you go that easily..."
Her grip tightened around her sword.
"You'd be a fool."
The Manticore roared and the surrounding Grimm surged forward. Vespulas, Nevermores, and dozens of other creatures rushed toward her from every direction.
Time seemed to slow and Blake watched them approach.
Watched every wingbeat, claw and every movement. The frustration Adam had left behind transformed into something colder.
Sharper and more focused.
The Grimm reached striking distance and Blake's eyes gleamed as a single word escaped her lips.
"Die."