The thought of charging in to help her—of throwing himself at that Rank 1 Grimm—was tempting, even noble. But noble was stupid. Noble was suicide. His knife was sharp, but it wouldn't pierce the Amalgamation's hide. He was more likely to get in Weiss's way, distract her and maybe even get her killed if she faltered for one instant to save him.
No. He wasn't a hero here. Not in that fight.
But he could make damn sure nothing else interfered.
There were four Beowolves left. Four mindless scavengers that were skulking at the edges of the battlefield, waiting for the chance to leap in. And they were watching Weiss, slavering at the thought of fresh blood.
"Not happening," Jaune muttered, and sprinted.
His body screamed with every motion, bruises lighting up like brands, but the adrenaline in his veins carried him through. His first target was the nearest Beowolf, half hunched over as it shook shards of plaster from its pelt. It hadn't even noticed him. Its glowing eyes were locked entirely on Weiss and the Amalgamation.
Jaune closed the distance in a blur of motion. One step, two, three—then the knife flashed. He didn't aim for the neck or the chest. No, he angled up and drove the blade straight into its eye socket.
The beast gave a strangled yelp, jerked once, and then dissolved into ash before it had the chance to realize it was already dead.
Jaune ripped his blade free and kept running. He didn't even slow down.
The second Beowolf had seen it. Its ears twitched and its head whipped around, with its claws lashing out in a backhand strike meant to tear Jaune in half.
Jaune barely had the strength to dodge. His lungs burned, his feet dragged, and the weight of exhaustion dragged at his arms. He knew he couldn't avoid it.
So he didn't try.
Instead, he swung.
The dented wok met the monster's claws with a ringing clang. Pain jolted up his wrist from the impact, but the attack glanced wide, momentum redirected. The Beowolf snarled in confusion as its own strike left it wide open.
Jaune didn't go for the kill. He darted past instead, knife flicking down in a brutal slice across its ankle tendon.
The beast howled and collapsed, leg crumpling uselessly. It thrashed, claws scraping furrows into the floor, but Jaune was already gone.
Because the other two had shaken off their daze. Their muzzles were pointed toward Weiss now, low growls building as they prepared to pounce.
Panic clenched Jaune's chest. If even one of them reached her…
He pushed harder.
The third Beowolf was mid-bound, hind legs coiled like springs as it launched toward Weiss's back. Jaune's arm snapped up and he hurled the wok with every ounce of strength he had left.
The heavy iron pan spun end over end, then smashed into the side of the Grimm's skull with a hollow clang. The beast crumpled mid-leap, its trajectory ruined, and crashed to the floor in a snarling heap.
Jaune didn't stop to see if it recovered.
Because the fourth was already airborne.
Time seemed to slow.
He saw its claws stretched wide, saliva trailing from its jaws, glowing eyes fixed on Weiss's exposed flank.
He saw Weiss herself—too busy stabbing into the Amalgamation's chest-tendril to even glance back.
And he saw what would happen if he didn't act.
'Not on my watch!' Jaune screamed in his mind as he leapt.
His body screamed protest, his ribs stabbed fire through his chest, but he forced himself higher, faster. He collided with the Beowolf midair, driving his knife into its gut with both hands. The blade sank deep, splitting flesh and ichor.
The Grimm howled, thrashing wildly. Its claws raked down Jaune's back in burning lines of agony, and he bit back a scream, teeth grinding so hard he thought they might shatter.
He couldn't stop now.
He wrenched the knife downward, ripping a ragged line through its abdomen, splitting all the way down to its groin. Black ichor sprayed across him, hot and acrid, stinging his skin with the heat.
They crashed to the floor in a heap. The impact rattled Jaune's bones, knocked the breath out of his lungs, but instinct had him moving before the Grimm could recover. He scrambled upright, shoes slipping on ichor-slick tile, and thrust the knife straight into its skull.
The Beowolf shuddered once. Then it dissolved into ash.
Jaune staggered to his feet, chest heaving, blood trickling hot down his back. His breaths came in ragged wheezes now, each one sharp and shallow. He swayed where he stood, the room spinning around him.
Slowly, he turned his head.
Two left.
The limp Beowolf that Jaune had crippled with a tendon slice was still writhing on the ground, claws scraping furrows into the tile as it tried to pull itself toward Weiss with mindless determination. Jaune staggered toward it, ready to finish the job, when movement drew his eye.
One of the security guards—the stocky man that was clutching the broken chair leg—charged in with a raw, wordless yell. His face was twisted in something between terror and rage, but his feet didn't slow. He brought the jagged wood down like a baseball bat, cracking it against the Beowolf's skull with a sickening thunk. The creature reeled, head snapping to the side with a snarl.
Before it could retaliate, the second guard joined in, the taller one who still carried his pan. He didn't hesitate. With both hands gripping the handle, he slammed the iron flat across the back of the Grimm's head.
CLANG.
The beast yelped and twisted, caught between them. It tried to rake claws across the tall guard's chest, but the shorter man's chair leg came down again, smashing into its muzzle, teeth scattering across the floor.
Together, the two men became a storm of desperation—swinging again and again, one high, one low. The Beowolf thrashed, its movements weakening, and then, with one final blow that snapped the chair leg in half, the Grimm collapsed, with the pan finishing it, one last strike driving deep into its skull until the creature dissolved into smoke and nothingness.
Jaune blinked, stunned. They had done it. Neither awakened nor properly trained—just two terrified men too stubborn to lay down and die.
That left one.
The Beowolf he'd clipped with the thrown wok was staggering upright, shaking its head as though dazed. Its glowing red eyes cut through the haze of dust and ichor, narrowing as it looked between Jaune and the two guards. For a brief, terrifying moment, Jaune wondered if the beast might lunge at them instead—at the men who were catching their breath, their arms trembling from exertion.
But no.
Of course not.
The Grimm locked onto him.
A cold weight sank into Jaune's gut. His body was barely hanging on—he was bruised, bleeding and his lungs burned with every breath he took. He had no weapon but his long chef's knife that looked to be on its last legs. His arms trembled from overexertion, and even his ribs screamed with every movement.
He was prey.
But so long as he stood between it and Weiss, he'd make himself into something else.
The Beowolf snarled, dropped low to the ground, and sprang.
'F*ck—!' Jaune cursed in his mind, and forced his battered legs into motion. He dropped to the ground, sliding under its leap. His shoulder skidded painfully across tile slick with ichor and dust. He twisted, coming up on one knee just in time to bring his knife up in defense.
The Beowolf spun on its landing and came at him instantly, claws swiping down.
CRASH.
The force behind the blow was monstrous. Jaune's knife caught the claws and barely was able to block them, but the sheer momentum hurled him backward. His arms screamed as if they'd been wrenched from their sockets. He stumbled and his shoes slid backwards, barely keeping his balance.
It had him. It knew it.
The beast crouched again, shoulders bunching, muzzle curling in anticipation of the kill. Then it lunged, claws stretched wide in the Beowolf's signature midair pounce.
Jaune's instincts screamed at him to dodge—but before he could even move—
THUNK.
The Beowolf's head snapped sideways as a cast-iron wok smashed into its face. The beast collapsed midair, tumbling to the ground in a dazed heap.
Jaune blinked in disbelief, eyes flicking across the ruined restaurant. Someone—maybe one of the security guards, maybe even a desperate patron—had thrown the pan. Whoever it was, they'd bought him a heartbeat.
That was all he needed.
"F*ck you!" Jaune roared, throwing himself forward. His ribs screamed in protest, his legs threatened to give out, but adrenaline dragged him onward. He lunged low, knife clutched in both hands.
The Beowolf was still rising when he drove the blade upward.
Steel punched through its throat, tearing through muscle and tendon, bursting out the back of its neck and into the base of its spine. The Grimm's howl was choked, strangled, cut short in a rasp of air and ichor.
Jaune shoved harder, twisting the blade to carve through whatever held its head aloft. And then, at last, the Beowolf shuddered once, convulsed—and collapsed into ash.
His own body followed.
Jaune crashed to the ground on hands and knees, chest heaving, vision dimming at the edges. His arms shook violently, his knife clattering from his grip. Every breath was a jagged knife in his lungs. Blood trickled hot down his back where the claws had torn him earlier. He swayed, threatening to topple completely—
—and then a shockwave erupted.
A burst of air, cold and sharp, blasted across the room. Frost glittered in the air like shattered glass. Jaune cried out as the gust hit him, knocking him backwards onto his heels. He would have collapsed outright if not for the arms that caught him.
The two security guards were there—one gripping his arm, the other bracing his back, holding him upright even as they themselves shook with exhaustion.
Together they stared forward.
Towards Weiss.
Their expressions were caught somewhere between awe and horror, eyes wide, mouths parted, breath coming quick.
Jaune followed their gaze.
The Amalgamation had risen again.
It no longer had any resemblance to a wolf or a man. Its legs were gone, severed completely, leaving jagged stumps that were frozen over in crystalline layers of ice. Its arms had twisted into grotesque blocks of frozen flesh, gnarled and jagged like sculpted glaciers, which were crumbling into stumps. However, the beast loomed taller now, hunched and supported only by the writhing tendrils that sprouted from its back that had stabbed into the tiles, holding it aloft like a puppet on strings.
Weiss stood before it, her ice rapier flashing in her hand. Her face was pale, lips pressed tight, eyes hard with grim determination. She darted forward, feet skidding across the ice-rimed floor, and in one final movement too fast for Jaune's battered eyes to follow, she plunged the blade into the Amalgamation's neck.
There was a deafening crack—the sound of ice shattering under unimaginable pressure.
And then the shockwave came.
It blasted outward, tearing chairs and shattered glass across the restaurant. Frost spread in a halo, crawling up the walls, coating the ceiling beams. The air turned brittle and sharp, every breath stinging Jaune's lungs like knives.
The Amalgamation gave a gurgling roar, its head jerking back, black ichor freezing mid-spray as Weiss twisted the blade deeper.
Slowly, agonizingly, the creature began to topple backward.
Jaune's heart slammed against his ribs. It was over.
But then Weiss staggered.
Her grip faltered, her knees buckled, and her free hand clawed at her mouth. She bent over, shoulders shaking, and vomited a stream of blood across the frozen tile. The sight struck Jaune harder than any Grimm's blow.
His vision might have been blurred at the edges and the world swaying in and out of focus, yet even through the haze, one thing stood out to him with horrifying clarity.
The spirits.
The tiny manifestations that had circled Weiss—the grinning flame, the furious shard of ice, the flexing little cyclone—had disaapeared. Snuffed out like candles.
Weiss herself was swaying on her feet, pale as frostbitten marble. Her rapier still jutted from the Amalgamation's throat, but her arm trembled, unable to drive it any deeper. Her shoulders sagged, her breaths came ragged and uneven, and Jaune realized the truth.
Her Aura tank was empty.
That last strike had been everything she had left.
A tremor rippled through the monster's bulk, and Jaune's stomach plunged as he realized what was going to happen in slow motion.
The maw yawned open.
And from its depths came a wet, hungry roar as the maw clamped forward in one last, desperate strike.
Jaune didn't think. He couldn't.
Thought was too slow, too fragile. Instinct consumed him, burned through the fog clouding his mind. His body hurled itself forward before reason could drag him back as if something primal seized him.
His legs screamed. Every nerve shrieked, tendons straining to the breaking point, bones rattling like cracked porcelain. It felt like shards of glass tearing through his calves and thighs, like his own body had become his enemy. But he forced it. He drove it.
Time stuttered, then crawled.
He heard his own heartbeat in thunderous clarity—each thump a cannon blast in his ears. He felt the grit of tile under his shoes, the spray of blood in the air, the ragged heave of breath tearing through his throat. The world narrowed to Weiss's silhouette ahead of him, small and fragile against the looming horror.
Weiss's eyes widened as she turned her head toward him.
Jaune reached her.
With the last dregs of strength in his battered body, he threw his arms forward, slamming into her body with a desperate push. The impact was clumsy, but it was enough. Weiss toppled backwards, stumbling clear of the strike.
The maw's jagged teeth snapped shut with monstrous force. Jaune's arms—outstretched from the shove—were caught in its path. He heard the sound before he even processed it: a wet, tearing snap and slice that echoed through his bones and skull alike.
For an instant, he didn't understand what had happened, only staring close up as the Amalgamation's maw writhed again, then shuddered. The ice spreading from Weiss's blade had finally claimed the monster and its black flesh crystallized. The tendrils that were locking it in place before, were now crumbling into brittle shards, and just a single second later, the Amalgamation dissolved into ash.
Jaune's body went weightless as he toppled backwards. He looked down and saw only stumps where his arms had been, severed clean past the elbows and spurting blood like a fountain.
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AN: Advanced chapters are available on patreon