What remains when everything one takes for granted is jeopardized?
Safe zones no longer existed, and the struggle to survive depended on whose city was more fortified.
No longer.
Wind blew across desolate planes, travelling thousands of kilometers and reaching from the border of one kingdom to the border of another.
Sand and grime fell from worn soles as people marched. Some were in rags, others better off with clothes merely faded from constant use. The smell wafted in the air, a mix of sweat, blood, and earth as people strove onward.
It didn't matter if they were organized, or carried little, what mattered was that each and every person was armed.
Some carried rifles, others swords and steel, and the rare few carried armaments filled with Dust.
Every single one had a weariness and resolution in their eyes that united them through shared hardship and suffering.
The end of Remnant as they knew it was coming, and they were all that were left.
No settlement was safe, and those that believed they were, were no longer around. The hand of the Grimm Shadow had traveled far and toppled entire kingdoms into full-scale evacuations.
As the population dwindled, grudges diminished, petty differences put aside as mutual extinction stared them in the face. It did not matter if you were human, Faunus, rich or poor, death was equal.
With eyes already resolved for what was to come, the people marched, answering the call for even the slimmest chance of tomorrow.
Groups small and large were gathering into a single collective. Spurred by a single message, they marched as if enduring a pilgrimage to a holy land.
Up above, through night and day, a single grounded star continued to shine as a beacon.
The Sun of the Fifth Kingdom, Vermillion.
Hovering over Vermillion, the floating Kingdom of Atlas settled at Vermillion's center, serving as a logistic command and broadcast center.
A single message was broadcast from Atlas for whomever had the means to hear it, no matter how remote their location.
It spoke of resistance.
Of Courage and Valor.
If one was destined to die, then the matter in which one chooses their death would define the final meaning of their existence.
Even a cornered rat lashes out at its attacker, let alone a human.
When the only choice left was to die fighting or die waiting for the specter of death, the actions of the silent majority play out through action rather than words.
"...For Freedom. For Remnant..."
The echo of the broadcast reverberated through the sky, reaffirming the resolve of the pilgrims trudging neither for salvation or lofty ideal.
It was a cry of Rebellion.
A last stand.
War.
With his back turned to the occupants of the room behind him, Ozpin took off his glasses and narrowed his eyes on the growing number of voluntary soldiers pooling into Vermillion. He stood at a lookout point from Atlas's floating kingdom that overlooked the area around Vermillion.
The constant drone of Dust-powered artillery shooting at distant Grimm was a backdrop he'd long since grown accustomed to.
An empty cup clinked near him, a woman pouring him a drink that was decisively not coffee. Rather, it was a tea that Ozpin inwardly abhorred with a passion, and yet he still reached for it in the face of the innocently smiling 'Salem' who'd poured the drink.
YOU ARE READING
The Huntsman of Red V2
AdventureGuardian, Protector, Hero, and perhaps something more, that was what he had always meant to her, but to others he was simply known as the Huntsman of Red, Remnant's final hope. This story is not mine, it belongs to Parcasious
