𝐈𝐧 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐃𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦𝐬 (English)

Chapter 33

Jaune scythed through trees five at a time with a sword made of burning white fire. He was larger than life, faster than light, stronger than anything that existed – because he didn't exist, and because rage and aura made him manifest in the murderer's dreams.

In what was fast becoming a nightmare for them.

The hooded figure ducked and dived around trees and shot across the forest as fast as they could, but they couldn't hope to escape him. Not here. Not in a world he controlled. Jaune threw out his hand and warped the very world itself, making forward back and turning them around so that they were suddenly sprinting toward him. They realised at the last second, panicked, and got their hands up in time for him to swing his sword for their chest.

Aura flashed, tanking the blow. This person was instinctively using it even in a dream. No one else had, as far as he could remember. The whole reason he'd had all those problems early on was because he'd been using aura in his sleep and leaving himself exhausted. Other people didn't because their dreams weren't real. Even when Nora had been hit by Grimm in her dream, she didn't use aura because it wasn't really happening, and she woke up just fine.

This person was actively using their aura.

Intentionally.

"Who are you!?" roared Jaune, swinging at them again.

They ducked the blow, but he undid that, believing them standing. He heard their shocked gasp as they seemed to teleport back in front of his still swinging blade. They were launched away with a startled scream. It was a woman, but then he'd known that. They used the momentum of his blow to take them further away, or so they tried. Jaune simply willed them to land where he was standing, and back they came.

But they adapted. Tucking her limbs in, the woman twisted and transitioned into a spinning kick that would have struck his neck with force enough to break it if he wasn't literally infused with aura. It struck between shoulder and neck, and he grunted. The damage he took was as real as the damage he could do to them, but the difference was he could warp the way this world worked.

Case in point, the trees surrounding them turned silver grey, rising up and stretching out to become thinner and taller. They shot up like bamboo reaching for the sky, then closed in above them. A cage of vertical bars forming a large square, with them trapped in the centre of it. Metallic branches spanned out left and right to cut off the narrow gaps between the bars and trap the two of them together.

There would be no escape.

Grabbing the ankle still pressed into his neck, he twisted and slammed her down, then reached for her hood. His hand was batted away desperately, and the woman yanked the hood down harder still, desperately hiding her identity.

Why—?

Any random person having a nightmare shouldn't care about that. He was a monster to them, a bogeyman, and yet here they were hiding their identity. Was it an automatic part of her dream? She'd obviously done her best to remain hidden from Qrow, so maybe this was triggering the same need to hide her identity. Or maybe it was the fact he was trying that had her automatically defending herself.

He wasn't sure he bought that.

Flames erupted from the floor and burned all around them, making her shy back. The cage became an oven cooking them both, except that he used his aura to protect himself and she thought this was real. In a sense, it was to her. He only meant the flames to try and burn her cloak away and reveal her, but she thrashed in them, screaming and flailing her arms around, too afraid to stop, drop and roll because that would mean rolling around in the fire.