EBNY: Grimm Times

Battle in the Woods

Erin squinted as the wind whistled past his face. He saw the green canopy of the Emerald Forest approaching fast. Reacting quickly, he pulled Lumberjack out of its holster in shotgun form, loaded with some gravity dust and began firing it to slow his descent. As he began to see tree branches flying past, he switched Lumberjack to its axe form and with a powerful swing, buried the blade in a passing tree.

"Alright, landing is done. Now to find the relics." Erin muttered.

'And a partner.' he added as an afterthought.

He got down from the tree and began trudging through the woods. It wasn't too hard walking through the brush, even without an outlined path. Then again, he was quite used to walking through the forests back at the Island of Patch.

Suddenly, he heard a noise. A voice. And a quite beautiful one at that.

"Damn it! Where is that thing?"

Stepping closer, Erin managed to identify the voice as that of a girl.

"Maybe that way? No, that's not it."

When he finally found the owner of the voice, he saw it was a faunus girl with fish fins coming out of her forearms. Her hair was dark red with turquoise streaks and just barely reached her shoulders. Her clothes, a maroon tunic and a turquoise sash around her waist, were clearly meant to facilitate movement rather than provide armor. She was pacing around in a clearing, obviously having no idea where to go.

"Lost?" Erin asked as he leaned against a nearby tree.

The girl looked over at him, turquoise  blue meeting forest green.

"I would like to say no, but I'm pretty sure you've noticed that's not the case." she said.
"I saw the temple while we were falling, but now I have no idea where it is! I'm used to less trees."

"Mind if I help you with that? Seeing as we're now partners." Erin asked.

The girl looked confused for a second before she remembered Professor Ozpin's words.

"Right, eye contact. Sure, why not. It's not like I'm gonna get anywhere on my own." she decided.

Erin nodded before stepping away from the tree to examine the trunk. He remembered a very useful trick to navigate forests by using lichens. By looking at the side of a tree where lichens grew, one could determine which direction was north.

"Alright, north is that way. Now, the cliff should be to the south, so that way. The Forest Temple was slightly to the east, which means it should be that way." he calculated out loud.

The girl simply stared at him in amazement.

"You got all that just from looking  at a tree?" she inquired.

"Yup. It's an old navigation trick. I can explain it to you later."

Suddenly, they heard a loud growl. It was still far away, but that probably would not be the case for much longer.

"Grimm?" the girl asked.

"I think so. We should get moving before it gets closer." Erin decided.
"I'm Erin, by the way."

"I'm Neli. Nice to meet you." she replied.

"Likewise."

*

After the launch, Bianca was counting herself lucky that she had gotten to the ground unscathed. Everything was going fine until that blonde girl, she had heard Ruby calling her Yang, had blasted past and obliterated the ice ramp she was planning on using to get to the ground. She was then forced to quickly switch to fire dust to clear some tree branches before loading another ice dust crystal to rebuild the ramp. To say it was nerve wracking would be an understatement. Not to mention a waste of two perfectly good dust crystals. She didn't want to be part of the fun police like the Schnee heiress, but she would definitely have to give Yang a word when she saw her again.