"You will be monitored and graded through the duration of your initiation, but our instructors will not intervene. You will find an abandoned temple at the end of the path containing several relics. Each pair must choose one and return to the top of the cliff. You will guard that item, as well as your standing, and grade you appropriately. Are there any questions? Good! Now, take your positions."

There was very little chance to questions or further preparation. This year, the future hunters-to-be were being dropped off in the Emerald Forest. Literally. Sections of the floor were retracted into the ship at random, causing hunters to plummet towards the forest below. Most were ready, some even went to the nearest opening and jumped out on their own violation. The ship was moving fairly fast, making students land in different parts of the forest. The sound of gunfire deep below alerted the students that others are in the process of landing, or perhaps have already found grimm to fight.

Sitting on a box was a faunas girl with cow tits horns. She sat on a box twirling a rod in her hand. Between spins she'd lick an end, looking ever so ecstatic as students began to drop. Soon, as if Ozpin knew to tease her, her panel was the last one left. Wasting no time she hopped off the box, revealing what it was: a portable stereo system. This wasn't your run-of-the-mill street dancer's boombox. This was military grade, capable of being loud enough to deafen gunfire. The girl who sat on it put some earplugs on and played a song as they both plummeted to the ground.

As they fell to the ground Evergreen kicked the stereo system away with great force, her song playing across the entire forest until it crashed against an unfortunate ursa. As for Evergreen herself she was in a free fall, spreading her body out wide to slow her decent until she found her target; a really huge tree. Once she was close enough Evergreen swung her weapon at the tree, and it extended a long whip-like wire. When it hit the tree it stuck to the trunk, and Evergreen swung around and around the tree until she came to a halt right at the base. She retracted the other end of her rod, cutting many branches as she did so. Walking away without a care in the world the giant tree branches behind her feel into a big pile.

"Now, where are those ruins?"

The girl listened patiently, her golden gaze only averting from Ozpin when the panels started opening underneath her fellow students: mostly humans, some faunus, all having something to prove by being here. She stood mostly still save for her fingers flexing in her gloves, itching to grasp Blush and tear through some Grimm-- And find the relics of course. Any time now, she thought, her patience running thin now that the ship was silent with anticipation. Kobi didn't have to wait long, however, and was one of the first students to be deployed. She dropped for no more than a couple seconds before disappearing into a rosy tear in space. She reappeared just above the treeline and fell through the canopy, landing comfortably with two legs on two branches.

Kobi pulled Blush off her back, giving it a single handed twirl before dropping to a couple branches and then the solid ground below. She was silent, eyebrows up as she looked around for any sign of Grimm or another student...satisfied with the silence, she rested the BFS over her shoulder and started walking, loosely following the direction the airship flew toward. Even if she couldn't find the ruins right away, she could at least find a partner; if not to help herself, she was always willing to help others. And anyone would be oh-so-lucky to have Kobi Rhodren on their side.

There was an old guy talking. Or at least he looked old; he might just have white hair. The dude - Oswald or something - was explaining stuff. It was probably important, and Argent knew that she should listen. She tried that, though, but this guy used too many words. Motherfucker should've just gave the quick version, like he did at the end, first. 'Get thing, protect thing, move thing' - was that so hard? She boredly ran her tongue along her upper teeth. She had a sub before they took off; it tasted good. She wasn't much of a fan of the onions though. Thinking about it, this really was her first time flying. It was actually kind of like a bitch-version of sailing; so she settled in pretty easily.

"Oh, he's done," Argent remarked to herself as a mechanical sliding noise sounded and the air-pressure dropped. While Argent had little problems with flying, her only real qualm lay in the change of pressure. It made her nose feel weird and her ears dull and it was just not a good time for someone like her who relied on their senses and instinct and subliminimal massaging or whatever they called it. She turned around to see a missing panel in the floor behind her. Was that their exit? Argent took a step forward as the section of floor beneath her retracted, sending her falling horizontally into the sea of green below rather than vertically as she had expected. There was some music playing elsewhere. Words on the edge of her mind that she could only barely hear as the wind rushed through her ears, drowning out all the panicked screams of others and the accompaniment of bowel ejection. Falling was kind of like swimming, now that she thought about it. You're sinking, suspended in non-solid substance, and resistance was a factor one should take into account.

"..."

It occurred to her that she was facing face towards the ground, and that landing this way may hurt significantly. It didn't help that she had no fancy-schmancy acrobatic bullshit or 'relatively low terminal velocity' ('What the fuck is a terminal velocity anyway?') to help her out what with the fucking anchor strapped to her back. Anchors were, after all, meant to keep things from moving with their weight. She raised her arms slightly, using the air resistance to shift herself into a vertical position. She brought her knees to her chest and tucked her head in, waiting for the impact like a not-so-metaphorical cannonball.

CRASH!

Argent tore through the treeline like a rock through paper. No, that was wrong - paper beats rock. It was more like a punch snapping a bone in twain, or her harpoon penetrating the flesh of an unfortunate foe. With a final THUNK! she hit the ground proper, leaving a nice dent in the earth. That's right. Fuck you earth, and your lack of fall-cushioning. At least water had the goddamn courtesy to cushion falls under a specific speed, and air wasn't even there, like a spooky ghost.

Argent stretched her limbs outwards and yawned. There was a POP!, and now she could hear things better... and her nose felt weird. Fuck. She leapt to her feet, rubbing her nose through the dark veil on her lower-face.

"...Uhh..." Argent sounded, looking all around here. Where was she to go now? Where the fuck were these ruins? "...Okay..." she droned, resigned to follow after the ship since she didn't see any ruins when she looked out the window.

Ozpin's task sounded simple enough, but Cobalt knew that it was probably much harder than the headmaster had let on. Most likely the forest would be teeming with Grimm, and the relics probably in the middle of their territory. The first unlucky batch of students were sent down unexpectedly, with a few screams here and there from the uninitiated. Hopefully he'd land nowhere near the Faunus students, Cobalt wouldn't be able to bear having to deal with their kind at the moment. Alas, the floor under him disappeared, starting his free fall into the forest. "So much for that bathroom break I suppose..." It seemed the ground was getting closer and closer, but Cobalt had little to actually break his fall. As the seconds passed, a rough landing became more and more of a reality.

Cobalt thought about using his weapon to try and slow his fall down by anchoring it into a tree, but as he actually came close to a tree he realized how stupid that idea was. There was really no way to anchor his weapon into the tree trunk without bodily harm to himself. Cobalt instead ended up smashing through several tree branches, and hit the ground hard. After a minute or two brushing off dirt and leaves, he walked off into a random direction, trying to look for any signs of the ruins.

It wasn't long before everyone had landed, dead or alive. Eve was taking a stroll through the forest, spinning the shooting star in her hand without a care in the world. She had a vague idea of where the ruins were; she was pretty sure it was near a huge cliff somewhere north of her position. She was hearing gunshots and battle cries all around her, but Eve didn't bother to go find them. Their partners were suppose to be the first person they make eye contact with, and she wanted to pair up with a girl with small but supple breasts, or a weak-willed boy who Eve can have fun with. But as she was walking through the forest, she heard something try to sneak up on her. She ducked low just in time to not lose her head.

Looking up she saw what attacked her, and it was deliciously ironic. It was a unicorn. "Wow. And here I thought you only showed up for little girls. But I guess you want to see what a real woman is like, don't cha?" Eve smirked as she extended the rods of the Shooting Star, flipping her weapon around as the unicorn got ready to charge.

Maybe it was the fear of being dropped out of a moving airship without a parachute or first day nerves, but something was clearly attracting creatures of Grimm. And Kobi was lucky enough to have one cross her path: a Beowulf emerged from the brush and almost walked right by. However, she was startled, and lowered her sword from her shoulder with a narrowed gaze. It was only then that the creature looked to her and growled. She stepped back, assessing her opponent. It was relatively small for a Beowolf. Or maybe I just expected them to be bigger, she thought, mind wandering back to her readings (unlike some of her fellow students, Kobi was quite sheltered and she lacked a lot of real world experience against Grimm).

It was just before she stepped forward to face the Beowolf that something else occurred to her from the reading: Beowolves traveled in packs. Her eyes widened at the realization and she quickly turned, slashing up through the belly of a Beowolf that had nearly sneaked up behind her. If she wasn't anxious before, she definitely was now. Kobi twirled her blade once more, looking around as the Grimm emerged all around her. Stay calm or you'll attract more, she reminded herself. Then she stepped forward to attack, slicing through a second Beowolf just as her first victim turned to dust in the wind.

If only Ozpin had given them the students map of the forest before throwing them in there. As it stood now, Cobalt had no idea whether he was getting closer to the ruins or just aimlessly walking in circles. Perhaps that was sort of the point, to stimulate a real combat situation where one might not have any idea where they were, but dammit, in Cobalt's eyes, it was pretty much pointless difficulty. All he really knew was that the sun was above him, and that did fuck all to help him out.

Dredging through the thick brush of the forest, Cobalt stopped suddenly as he spotted a Beowolf pack just ahead of him. Cobalt readied his axe, preparing to strike down the Grimm just in case they spotted him. But before he could make a move, the Beowulf became aware of something else on one of the open paths, and diverted all of their attention to whoever had stepped onto their territory. The sounds of fighting became apparent, along with the fact that there was another student in the vicinity.

Cobalt peeked out from his hiding spot, trying to get a good look at the student facing down the Beowulf pack. The student was a human female with a massive blade/machine gun. Good. If she was a Faunus, Cobalt would have probably left her to face the pack alone, combat prowess be damned. He wasn't about to team up with Faunus anytime soon, no matter how good one was.

Gripping the Redeemer in it's shotgun form, he fired buckshot into two Beowolves that had attempted to flank the female student. "The cavalry has arrived!"

Argent was no stranger to vast expanses of the same handful of colors and shapes. After all, even people who'd never experienced seafaring could guess that it wasn't very exciting in terms of scenery you could take a picture of and post on social media to gain meaningless renown and establish your 'aesthetic' or whatever. At any rate, navigating the Emerald Forest wasn't an insurmountable enemy that she could not overcome with her own strength. Sure, she had no fucking idea where the ruins would be, but she could tell if she'd been somewhere before, so at least she had that going for her.

Crushing the verdant underbrush underfoot, Argent continued on her merry way. All this walking and all these trees reminded her of her childhood, which kind of made her slightly saltier than usual. Oh how pathetic she was in hindsight, but it's not as if she could travel to the past and bitch-slap herself. What was she doing again? Oh right, looking for the ruins. If Argent wanted to put ruins somewhere, she would put it in an appropriately cinematic location. They were supposed to have some kind of final stand or some shit there after picking up take out or groceries or something for the Ozdude, right?

Speaking of, why hadn't she beat the shit out of anything yet? There were supposed to be Grimm running around like dumbasses! She unsheathed her weapon and tossed it around in her hands idly. Man, this was annoying. On the edge of her hearing, she heard some idiot scream out "The calzone has arrived!" or something like that. Man, what a missed opportunity. She should've walked in that direction if she wanted to have any fun.

Alas, Argent kept on keeping on her merry way.

Focused on the Grimm in front of her, Kobi was taken by surprise by the sound of a gun shot behind her. In the future, she would look back and wonder why she was so surprised to see another student, but in that moment she cocked her eyebrows at him. She didn't dwell on it for long, however, and raised Blush to block a swipe from a Beowolf. "Nice job," she complimented, adjusting her weapon in her hand as she was pushed back. The Beowolf followed up with a lunge forward, but she met it with an uppercut, the large sword cutting through the monster like butter.

Two students of Beacon, a few more Grimm. Those poor Grimm, Kobi thought. She replaced her grip on her BFS, pointing Blush at the other Beowolves as they cautiously approached--five of their kin had just been slain after all--and released a hail of bullets. She wasn't the heaviest of fighters, even with her armor on, so for the moments that she unleashed hell on the Grimm, her small frame was being pushed back by the constant recoil. When she finally took her hand off the trigger, she was next to the other student.

"Hi!" she greeted with a friendly smile. "I'm Kobi Rhodren."

”Yippee ki yay!”

Eve had managed to mount the unicorn and was driving it into everything she could see. At first she hoped to get it’s horn stuck into a tree, but as it turns out it was strong enough to break through those things. Then she tried rocks, but they broke too. So all she could do was force it forward and stay on it despite it’s bucking. It was… Rather exciting. bouncing up and down the unicorn’s bareback, slamming against her loins with each jump. Very exciting.

As Eve continued to buck the horse, she eventually managed to force the beast forward through the trees and brush. As they were breaking through, Eve spotted a small girl in monochrome armor and blond hair. So small, yet so cute! Eve decided to make the little girl her partner. So Eve swung the Shooting Star at a big tree, using it to hook the Unicorn back around and in the direction of the little girl. They were hardly subtle, so hopefully the girl would hear them coming and get ready to fight the unicorn. Otherwise both Eve and the grimm horse were going to chase down the little blond treasure.

”I’m gunna getcha!”

Argent looked to the sudden sound off in the distance. Her animal eyes caught sight of a shape in the shadows of the treeline. It was a... horse with a horn. No, that wasn't the right word. It was a... something or other. She'd figure it out sooner or later. Perhaps unwisely, the pint-sized huntress opted to take the time to ponder the truth of what it meant to be a horse. Argent had seen seahorses before. They had no legs. Or arms. And the dudes got pregnant with a fuckload of kids at once, which was weird.

Oh, and they also lived in the water.

...

Yes. She could now confirm, without a shadow of a doubt, that the charging equine was, indeed, not a seahorse. She wasn't an idiot. It like a narwhal with legs, obviously. Which, of course, meant that she was going to kill the fuck out of it. Narwhal ivory was worth a fuck-ton of money man. She could like, buy... a bunch of useful shit with that kind of dough. Like dust or something. Probably not dust.

Argent hefted up her large, thick anchor and triggered the form change to a harpoon gun. As the arms folded inward, she raised the gun and aimed in the direction of the not!seahorse. "...Wait a goddamn..." Argent narrowed her eyes as she stared down the sights of her harpoon gun. There was something off about that strange, narwhalish not!seahorse, but she couldn't exactly tell what it was from this dis- "What the fucking hell?"

Argent quickly leapt backwards and fired her harpoon into a tree opposite her, creating a makeshift tripwire for the incoming Grimm-mount. Just as she did so, she heard the clarion call of "I'm gunna getcha!", which flummoxed her greatly. For a huntress, this individual's choice of tactic was very ineffective. How would she "get" the Grimm if she was mounted on it already? Perhaps she was simply unable to violently impale the beast and feed on its corpse until it dissolved, like a real man's man would. If that was the case, Argent would be driven to pity this individual on principle.

Only after the Grimm did a sick flip after running into her wire, though. There was no room for pity on the field of battle. Between pity and pure, unadulterated violence that would make cinemas give a recording of it at least an R rating, there was only room for one of them in the metaphorical town of battle.

Cobalt tore into another Beowulf vertically with his axe, slicing it cleanly in two pieces. The rest of the Grimm were singlehandedly taken out by the female student, withering under her suppressive fire. He should have expected no less, she was of the fairer race after all. It was truly a sight to watch someone of such a short stature carry such an unwieldy weapon, and use it effectively as well. The Grimm began to retreat, unable to stand up to her assault, retreating back into the depths of the forest. After waiting a few moments to ensure none of the Beowolves decided to regroup and attack again, Cobalt turned to greet Kobi.

"I'm Cobalt. I have to say, I would not expect someone with a small frame to use such a massive weapon." The weapon seemed even more intimidating up close, truly Frankensteinish. The brutality of the broadsword had been combined with the efficiency of a machine gun. It was a relief Kobi was not a Faunus, otherwise; Cobalt would have a horrible time trying to off her. He then held out his hand, offering a handshake of friendship. "I was worried for a moment there would be no other humans around. Bloody Faunus can't be trusted to do a damn thing. Hopefully, if they came across one; both Kobi and Cobalt could use their combined firepower to assert human dominance.

"Ah well," Kobi started, easily resting Blush over her shoulder, "I use a lot of aura to manage a heavy offensive. The armor keeps me safe, though." This would be her partner for the next four years, so she saw no harm in explaining her strength to him. Besides, she was always happy to draw attention to her beautifully crafted armor: if it wasn't for her soft and polite speech, the money put into her defense was a hint at her wealth. Still, enough about her. It'd be rude to not return the wonder he had for her, though it came off as rather forced and a little awkward. "You're skilled with your axe."

Thankfully, Cobalt offered his hand. She replaced Blush onto her back and took his hand with a friendly smile...which faltered slightly as he continued to speak. "Oh. Well. Faunus aren't all bad," she said diplomatically. This would be her partner for the next four years; this was not something she wanted to deal with. She pulled her hand back and fixed her hair, gaze drifting away as she came up with another topic for conversation: "Ruins. Do you know the way?"

This little faunas seemed more cunning than Eve gave her credit for, setting up a tripwire attack to cause the unicorn to flip. Latching the tips of her weapons onto the neck of the beast, Eve landed first so she could slam the beast into a tree. This time it couldn't just pierce through with it's horn, landing with a sickening crunch. The unicorn's head slammed into the ground by it's side, cracking the horn off it's head. Eve nonchalantly walked up to the horn, and drove it into the neck of the beast. The horn, as well as the unicorn itself, dispersed into a cloud of shadows after the beating it had taken.

Turning back towards the other girl, Eve gave her a wink and blew her a kiss. "Well, hello cutie. Name's Evergreen. But you, darling... Can call me Eve. What's yours?" Eve walked over to the girl, sizing her up. Her head just barely reached the bottom of Eve's breast; she could slap her with her boobs if given the chance. The girl also seemed to use some sort of spear gun at the moment, but Eve somewhat remembered the weapon looking more hook-like before she busted through the underbrush. Her dress and armor seemed reminiscent of Mistral, though Eve doesn't remember veils being popular anywhere in that country. Though she did have the smell of a faunas about her, which would at least explain why she would want to hide most of her features.

Argent watched carefully as the four-legged narwhal soared through the air like a majestic bird before crashing into the cold hard ground similarly to how a slightly less majestic bird with clipped wings would crash into the concrete pavement. She was far less interested in the adept acrobatic maneuvering displayed by the she-huntress with the bullwhip than she was in the visceral imagery of the battle. The Grimm was like a dying flame in the night, the sublime sights and sounds shined brilliantly in the darkness, and then ended with nothing more than a whimper, leaving nothing but shadow. Argent blinked and nodded in approval of the turn of events. It was, indeed, pretty good. At least a 3/10 in terms of aesthetic composition. Admittedly, that was a rather biased rating; she was kind of miffed that she didn't get to go to town on the beast while it was laid out and ready to be brutalized like a... thing that gets brutalized.

After pondering the nature of nature and breaking free of her reverie, Argent finally turned to the huntress, only to see nothing more than a face full of mammaries. The first thing she noted, other than the sudden absence of green, was the smell. It was like a raw burger, or maybe more like a medium-rare steak. It didn't smell like long pig at any rate, so she probably wasn't human. Whatever the case, she had seen fit to seek out another huntsman to deal with her threat, which was a point against her. But Argent had good manners, so she would introduce herself before she said anything. "I am Argent," she said, carefully reciting the introduction she had rehearsed with her guardian, "It is a pleasure to meet you. Eve." She blinked twice, allowing her robotic words to settle before she continued in a much more natural cadence: "Where the fuck's the ruins so we can get done with this shit?"

"That explains a lot." Cobalt thought it wise that he should probably remember the whole aura thing of hers. It would probably come in handy in later on, maybe if it even came down to having to fight Kobi one day. Kobi composed herself as Cobalt would expect any human to, superior, with a hint of sophistication. If Cobalt had to take a guess, she was from a rich family. Her armor was ornate, and of a far greater quality than one would find at any typical blacksmith. Granted, given her weapon, he should have expected no less. However, Cobalt frowned slightly at Kobi's comments. Hopefully she wasn't one of those faunus sympathizers... almost as bad as the White Fang themselves.

"Yeah. The dead kind usually aren't too bad." Half of it was a joke, half of it wasn't. Either way, it was just to spite Kobi a bit. But they had to find the ruins before any infighting, so Cobalt climbed a tree, not waiting for Kobi's response. In the distance, he spotted what appeared to be a building, which would probably be their best bet. "We should probably head south, I saw some buildings in that direction. It'll be our best bet."

"Honestly? No idea. Why don't we just screw around until we stumble upon it? Not like we have a time limit or anything." Eve of course had her own interpretation of "Screwing around", but just kept it to a tease for now. In all seriousness they really needed to get going. It felt as if they had been in this forest for a month now. "I figured we should just keeping heading northish until we find a dead end. If we run into tougher grimm along the way, it means we're on the right path, yeah?" Taking out the Shooting Star and twirling it around Eve walked onward with Argent. "Let's go, luv, time's a wastin!"

The girl wasn't a stranger to ignoring shit comments in order to keep the peace. Still, it took her a good deal longer to let the annoyance pass this time, and it was clear on her face. The casual racism she could deal with--but in a partner? She wasn't sure. "Alright, south it is," Kobi agreed, less than cheerfully. On her heel, she turned away from Cobalt and started walking. On any other day, she'd sheathe Blush. But today, she knew it was in her best interest to remain vigilant.

Argent was not a particularly tactically minded person, so she decided that that explanation was as good as any. She hefted up her heavy weapon and triggered its dormant state for easier movement. The mechanical orchestra of the relevant components sliding into their compact place was short and quiet, just like its wielder. Perhaps it was ADHD, but it was like they'd been standing in place for like, three months now. "Indeed," Argent intoned with a slow, sage nod, "Animals drown if they don't swim. Unless they have gills. Or are anaerobic in nature." She paused. "Holding your breath only prolongs death." And with that statement, she followed after the cow-woman in a northwardly direction.