Silver Maiden

CHAPTER XXIX - Der Schatten Kehrt Zurück

Penny and Hillphire had done most of the work keeping the Grimm from getting too far out of the hole in the mountain. Meanwhile, Nora, Ren, Jaune, Hollie, Sun, and Oscar kept the White Fang at bay, responding to each repeated incursion and saving many lives in the process.

"Let us know if you need backup!" Nora said into her microphone.

"We're good here!" Penny said, smiling as she fought alongside Hillphire, both of them gunning and hacking and stabbing their way through endless hordes of Grimm.

"Hillphire, are you gonna be all right?" Jaune asked after defeating one of the White Fang, watching as he ran off.

"Yeah," Hillphire said, panting. "As long as I am in this suit of armor, I will be fine." He glanced over at Penny, who was smiling at him. His face was enclosed in the armor, but she could sense him return a smile.

"Okay, back me up!" Penny said, deploying eight swords at once, holding two in either hand while the others floated around her.

Hillphire had upgraded this particular system, which he had given the name "Dancing Sabers." It no longer used the old scheme of wire control, thus eliminating the possibility of Penny's chassis being destroyed in the same manner. This new system operated off of the same technology as Bedivere's claymore, utilizing gravity Dust and a little of his forbidden technology to allow Penny to remotely control each sword within a certain range. In this case, her range was double that of Bedivere's claymore. Each of her swords could reach out to a hundred meters before falling out of radio range and falling to the ground.

"I'm on it!" Hillphire responded to her as he stowed his modular axes and deployed two precision rifles, taking shots at Grimm that were attacking Penny at oblique angles as she slashed her way through the ones right in front of her. His aim was perfect and her speed was incredible. Together, they formed an invincible team.

He noticed a White Fang member high up on the mountain, targeting his combat partner. He took aim with his right-hand rifle, switching the ammunition to explosive Dust, and firing. The would-be assassin was knocked right off of his perch and fell all the way down to the base of the mountain. His aura would protect him, but he was effectively out of this fight.

"I think he has better aim than you," Sun said to Hollie.

"Psh," she scoffed. "Only because he has a computer-aided guidance system."

"Wow, that sounds like something he would say."

"Well, that's what he actually calls it."

They both shared a chuckle before engaging a number of Grimm that had leaked past Penny and Hillphire's wall of projectiles.

"You, you, with me!" Jaune said, sheathing his sword as he directed two strong-looking civilians to help him.

"What do you want us to do?" one of the two men said.

"The guy in the mech is about to run out of ammo. We need to refill him ASAP."

"O-Okay, just lead the way!"

Jaune ran over to a Dust munitions tent, which contained the exact ammunition both Hillphire and Penny used in their weapons. He brought up his microphone.

"Who needs to reload first?" he said.

"I'm still good on ammo," Penny said, firing away as she leaped around and dodged, slashing through some and shooting at others.

"I'm running low," Hillphire said.

"Okay, we're taking these to the big guy first!" Jaune said to the two men as they rolled enormous carts over to where the two were fighting.