Eventually, and perhaps inevitably, the walk lasted one hour, and then two, and then three, and all that time neither you saw any sign of humans nor did your scroll work. So here you are, cursing your life in stifled silence. Weiss hasn't said a word nor looked at you since your argument, like she's protesting your existence. Maybe she's waiting for you to freeze to death, or she's waiting for you to shout at her. Your face still faintly smarts from where she hit you. The only thing you can hear is the susurration of the wind running across the snowy ground like unseeable kestrels dipping low.
You stop, and she continues to walk ahead a few metres. She hasn't noticed the figure lumbering in the distance behind you both like you have. It's vaguely human, stumbling on two legs, shambling like a freak with recombinant bones. It's far behind you however, hanging ominously on the horizon. The darkness of it tells you it's a Grimm, and the way it's following you means it's following your emotions. No doubt the rift between you two has drawn it near, like two beacons pouring forth the sweet-smelling nectar of negativity. It's so far behind, and so slow, that you're unbothered by it. For a moment you consider not telling Weiss, but it might be a decent conversation starter, and that's enough for you to tell her.
"Hey, Weiss!" You call, making her freeze. She looks lazily over her shoulder, her eyes half lidded and tired, full of vitriol. She doesn't say anything but waits for you to talk.
"You see that?" You point toward the horizon. You see her sigh and visibly deflate, before she walks closer to you. Her eyes scan the horizon, and she barely catches the dark figure.
"You see it?" You ask.
She shrugs, "It's slow. Non-issue." Her words are bland and heavy; uninterested.
"I guess." You're not really sure what to say; she barely gave you anything to go off. She turns around and continues walking, letting you sigh. She's ignoring you as much as she can, behaving like a child.
"Weiss," you say, more sternly. She doesn't stop this time, ignoring your voice. "Really? What to you want me to do? Apologise? You're the one who hit me!" You yell at her. She mumbles something that you don't catch.
"Speak up."
She slowly turns to face you, and there's conflict written across her face.
"I don't want anything from you," she says with a shrug, but she's evidently frustrated. "I just want to not have to talk to you, so don't even bother apologising. I know you won't mean it anyway," she adds, words drenched in misguided annoyance.
"Weiss, I'm trying to be your friend. I swear I- look, I like you, as a person. You're not bad, I want to be your friend, but I feel as though you dislike me inherently. What can I do?" You notice her eyes fixate on something over your shoulder, widening as her whole body tenses. Any words you want to say catch in your throat and extinguish as you turn around.
The Grimm has dropped to four feet, suddenly sprinting faster than a train. It's a distinct change from the humanoid stumbling it was doing earlier, in fact it's more lupine now, and terrifying. The world deafens around you as your eyes stick to the Grimm like glue, and you never hear Weiss calling for you.
"(Y/N)!" Her words suddenly break through the daze. "We need to go!" Her cold hand clutches yours, and before you realise, you're sprinting across the snow, with Weiss pulling you along. As for her, she knows she's too low on aura to sustain a fight with a Grimm like that, and she can't use what she has left on hastening glyphs. Her only hope is to be able to outrun it. Despite the adrenaline pouring into your blood like a broken dam, the creature is still significantly faster than you both. It's no surprise, though humans are developed to be able to run for long times and have high stamina, but the sheer speed of certain types of Grimm makes that useless.
"What's the plan?" You ask, starting to feel your lungs burn like hot coals, and your muscles tensing to rock.
"I don't have one!" She says back.
"You don't?!"
She doesn't respond, but you see each step becoming more wobbly, more tired and strained.
"Weiss, we need to stop!" You yell, but she doesn't. You know she heard you, she's just not listening. With no other choice you bury your feet into the snow and hold her hand tightly, acting as an anchor for her. Inevitably she slows to a stop.
"What are you doing?! Let go of me!" She cries, trying to yank her hand free.
"Weiss, we can't run!" You respond, making her stop fighting so harshly. "We're only delaying the inevitable; we need to fight."
She looks towards you, then the Grimm, then back to you. Fear and anxiety fill her eyes as though they're buckets of crystal blue water.
"Okay," she says, not as resolute as typical for her, but strong enough to fight. You both draw your blades, the sound as slick as a knife cutting through paper. "Do you have a plan?" She asks tepidly.
"The plan is to kill it," you reply dryly.
"Great," she shoots a sidelong glare at you. "I'm so glad to have your strategic genius."
"Good to see that even facing death you can still insult me."
"It's a stress reliever," she chimes, spinning the cylindrical chamber of Myrtenaster. As the Grimm comes closer it pulls itself back to a bipedal walk, and you see it is so much more clearly. It's more bones than flesh and has a peculiar mix of said bones. For the most part it's human, but the legs are canine, with a stifle joint, and its hands are only four fingered. Its head is more a skull than anything, with only a few scraps of black flesh clinging to it, and red eyes embedded inside.
"You recognise it?"
"It's a Mor of Men," she tells you, inching slightly closer. "Incredibly deadly."
"Oh, we're so done," you say lowly.
"Pessimistic thoughts like that are probably what lured it to us."
"Honestl-" you both dodge and separate when the beast lunges forward, flying in between you both. It's strangely fast for its size and freakish structure. It skids across the snow before turning and pouncing on you. You back up and dodge its landing, and it ends up right in front of you. Its teeth clatter together in a chilling death rattle, before it's clawed, bony hand descends on you. You raise Funeral and lock your blade in between its fingers, keeping it at arms' length.
However, it's other hand is free, and smacks into you like a clumsily wielded mace, sending you sprawling across the snow. You groan as your vision is flooded with fluffy whiteness and a numbing sensation.
When you regain yourself well enough to look up, you see the Mor of Men looking down at you, casting a shadow of lethal intent. You're about to scramble away when Weiss shoots by, jamming her blade as deep as she can into its knee. The creature buckles and makes a bassy sound that almost sounds like a sob, while Weiss struggles to free Myrtenaster from the bone. Before she can however, the Grimm clutches her by the throat and raises her up. She chokes and squirms against its grip, and its other hand reaches down to grab you too. Thinking quickly, you roll out of the way and spring to your feet, spinning around to put as much momentum as you can into your blade. At the end of your 360 degree turn you release the blade, and it cuts through the air like a paper plane, sinking deep into the forehead of the monster, who's head flicks back as he drops Weiss.
She falls to the snow and splutters, delicately handling her throat. You grab her arm with one hand and Myrtenaster with the other, dragging her away before the creature can swipe her again.
"This bodes poorly," you mumble, as she stands with your help.
"I told you it's deadly," she snaps, taking Myrtenaster back. With Funeral still lodged in its forehead you're basically unarmed.
"I need my weapon back."
"Give me a moment," she replies, summoning a new arsenal of glyphs to her side. Each one rotates and hums as they ignite into a roar of flames. Streams of fire lurch from each, keeping the creature at bay. Next, she summons a glyph of a darker colour, you assume a gravity glyph, which appears around the handle of Funeral. The sword shudders and jitters before flying out and into your outstretched hand.
"Thank you," you say, preparing for round two. She nods and lets the red glyphs fade, releasing her wall of fire. While the beast is still stunned you charge forward, slashing at its ankle. With a screech the creature falls to its knee, but swiftly backhands you away. You tumble but quickly manage get back on your feet. Weiss aims to take advantage of its position and propels forward, blade extended to pierce.
Yet the creature predicts this move, and its bony hand clutches the blade before it can penetrate its skin. It almost seems to smirk before ripping Myrtenaster from her hand and raising its other claw to cut her. Skilfully however, she dodges and backs away. Disarmed but not out, she summons a glyph above the Grimm, which musters a shard of ice so large you're surprised it doesn't cleave the thing in two. Luckily it just manages to damage the creature greatly, sending cracks along its bones and tearing what flesh it has. So too does it drop Myrtenaster. You get in close while it's still recovering, though by the time you're close enough to attack it's already recovered. Its claw raises up to kill you, and you barely dodge before it does. It's hand crashes into the snow, and you formulate a plan quickly.
"Pin it!" You shout to Weiss, who follows your lead by summoning a black glyph below its hand, which stops it from moving from its position.
You hastily pull Myrtenaster's handle so that it's wielded in your off hand, before running up the Grimm's sinewy arm. Once you've reached just beyond the elbow you jump, bringing down both blades like a pouncing tiger might bring down its paws. They each slide into the creature's eye sockets well, rupturing the eyeballs into dust. However, the monster does not let you win so easily, and as the blades sink deeper into its head so too do its teeth dig through the flesh of your stomach. Your aura shimmers, then shatters into illusory glass pieces, as darkness begins to lurk at the end of your vision, and a strange mix of pain and adrenal numbness plays at the edge of your senses. The last thing you feel is the thump of the ground, and the coldness of the snow, as well as the monster turning to abyssal dust.
Maybe you hear Weiss calling your name too, maybe that's just dreams starting to blur into reality.
She stands over your unconscious body, tired and frustrated. It's not alien for inexperienced people to lose consciousness when their aura is broken; it's called shock of the soul. Simply put, it's when the nervous system temporarily 'disconnects' the body from the soul. Nerves being the conduit of said soul, of course.
Myrtenaster and Funeral lay beside you, each one pridefully wearing the dust of the dead Man of Mor. Funeral however bares a mark of sacrifice; the blade is cracked. A long crack, in fact. If she lifts the weapon, it will no doubt break. She might as well leave it in the snow. It's useless to her now, anyway. Then again, by that logic she may as well leave you behind.
Her eyes flick to your mouth, still breathing, though shallowly. Without your aura the cold is affecting you much worse, and it won't be long before you never wake up again.
This is all her fault, she reminds herself. Arrogance and pride did blind her, and now she's lead you straight into the embrace of Death herself.
Weiss suppresses the alien urge to cry, it's simply not fitting of a Schnee, and holsters Myrtenaster first. Next, she picks up Funeral, which turns to fragments as she does so, and makes sure to keep every part of the broken blade wrapped up in her sleeve, which she rips away from her bolero and straps to her back. Finally, she looks to you, who sleeps peacefully. She's envious, that's the first thing she feels. Then pity, and then something strange, like an emotion between appreciating art and loving a pet. It's abnormal to her, and she's somewhat ashamed of it. With a cold, wet sigh she lifts you onto her back, using small glyphs in certain places to offset your weight. She's already strong, so it helps plenty enough. With you limply placed on her back against the wrapped-up Funeral, she continues walking through the cold and desolate plains.
Cold wind gnaws and scratches at her skin like sharp nailed digits, and the storm grows heavier to punish her. In her mind she deserves it. It's her decisions that did this. At the very least you should be allowed to live, even if she freezes out here. At the very least she should be made to atone, to be punished, beaten. All the times she's been hit, whether by her parents or by Winter, they were deserved. She knows that. Schnees must be perfect, all the excess glass of flaw and sin cut away by loving hate till there's nothing but a perfect statue.
Someday she'll be in control, she thinks, and then the world will be her chessboard to play instead of her just being another piece upon it. She'll be gentle though, and enact moves that deliver righteousness and justice when she's the head of the SDC. Better than any who came before her. But the only way she can do that is by suffering now, suffering and struggling and striving and surviving. At the end of the day her will is all that matters, like the key to her happiness.
In the distance she sees a cave, more like a hollow cavity in the ground, actually. The shelter it offers is barely anything when compared to the agony of the storm, but the only place you stand a chance of surviving. She hobbles over as best she can, enduring the way her legs weaken and numb. Wind pours into her ears, wailing at her to surrender, to collapse. But she refuses, not while there's still a chance to save you. This desire to help someone else before herself is unfamiliar, she notes.
Just as her legs give way she crosses the threshold into the cave, as both you and her fall to the stone. She hisses and rolls onto her back. It's somewhat less harsh in here, and her aura isn't fully drained yet.
She checks you, who're thankfully still breathing and then pulls you further back into cave, as deep into the earthy womb as she can. At the back she props you against the wall, and places Funeral, still wrapped in her bolero's torn-away sleeve, next to you.
She's surprised when she notices how your lips have blued in the cold, leading her to check your hands, which feel stiff and hard. Even for someone with no aura you've gotten much colder much faster than she anticipated, especially with all the clothing you chose to wear. As long as you're freezing your aura won't regenerate. She sighs and debates with herself about whether it's worth it to save you when her only choice endangers herself, requires the last vestiges of her soul, in fact. The only choice she has is to summon a red glyph below you, large enough to warm you, but not so large that it drains her own aura too fast. Yet similarly, she's wary that heating you too fast may have an adverse effect on your skin or your internal systems, so she has to focus on warming you slowly than hastily. With a sigh and a prayer, she summons the warm glyph below you, as her aura grows fainter and fainter, like a candle in the wind.
She looks outside, it's just after noon now, and the days are short and weak upon the continent of Solitas.
Her eyes turn back to your wilting lips and trail down to your hands, where she sees the same discolouration. Curiously she observes your bandaged arms poking out from under your sleeves. A second of trepidation passes before she pulls the sleeve up entirely to look at the entire arm, bandaged from wrist to elbow. It's tightly done too, so no skin peeks out. Curiosity burns inside of her, yet she refuses the urge to unwrap them out of a respect for you she's found has unwillingly burrowed into her heart. What lies under them intrigues and scares her. The first thought is scars: either placed by you or someone else. The second thought is that they cover tattoos or markings that you're ashamed of. Either way, she thinks it's related to your past.
You stir a bit, but don't wake up. The sign of life, though mediocre, makes her smile still. She sits next to you, still having to keep her concentration of the red glyph, as long as it's needed, she can't sleep nor truly rest. All she has left is hope and her own will now, although even those falter and fade as the reality sets in. With a pithy sigh of melancholy, she rests her head against your unconscious form, counting down the lonely seconds she has left.