Moment Subpages are Spoilers Off. You Have Been Warned!
The premise of the fic itself: it takes most of the protagonists of Coeur Al'Aran's various works, introduces them to the canon RWBY cast, then pits them against each other in a battle royale.
- Chapter 1: Knight's introduction to the cast has him effortlessly block Yang's Semblance-enhanced punch, and when told about the war, demands Jinn tell Salem that he killed her before and will do so again, establishing him as the most righteous of the iterations.Knight: Inform Salem that I have slain her once, and that I shall slay her again. Never shall she be allowed to rule over this land. Remnant is not, and has never been, hers. Nor shall it be as long as I stand!
- Chapter 2:
- Knight gets more moments, starting with his blasé reaction to the truth of Salem, simply commenting on how he's faced worse. Later, when Fate asks him to demonstrate his strength, he picks up Ozpin's desk and holds it over his head with one hand. Yang and Blake try replicating the feat, except they can only lift it a single inch.
- Barista gets an understated moment of his own, in that he already knew about Salem and is just as blasé about everything as Knight, despite not having any fighting skills.
- What is Ashari's reaction to Salem threatening to hurt Emerald if he doesn't comply? He tells her that he's already killed two Salems and threatens to try for a third. He says this while Tyrian, Hazel, and Cinder are present, completely unafraid of them.
- Chapter 4: When Yang tries to force Xiong to see Ozpin, the latter threatens to both expose the war to the public and to expose Ruby's and Yang's statuses as anchors to Salem's side. Physically, Xiong is no match for Teams JNPR, RWBY, Knight, or Leviathan, but he successfully blackmails them into leaving him alone and is appropriately smug about it.
- Chapter 5:
- An offscreen one: When Warchief told Ironwood his story, the latter put the former through multiple simulations. The results aren't shown, but they were enough to convince Ironwood that Warchief was a strategic and tactical genius and give him command of Atlas's military forces.
- In a sparring match, Knight disarms and defeats Pyrrha in three seconds. His next matches are with Yang and Pyrrha, then with Team RWBY, and both end the same way.
- Fate faces Jaune in a spar and goads him into charging at him before he detonates two of Nora's grenades in Jaune's face. He is disqualified for breaking the spar's rules, but he takes Jaune out in one shot.
- Chapter 7:
- Grimm is physically the strongest iteration on Salem's side, but a single blow from Knight warps his Crocea Mors and dislocates his shoulder. The injury doesn't stick because of Grimm's physiology, but from that point on, he makes sure to keep Knight at a distance by summoning his namesake.
- When Grimm is about to die, Ashari saves him by blinding Knight with a flashbang and tear gas. Even then, Knight disarms him with a blind swing.
- Yang is initially confident that, even if Knight is down, RWBY and JNPR will be enough to take Ashari. She's disabused of that notion within seconds, as Ashari tears through the two teams with his bare hands. It's made very clear that if Ashari wanted to, he could have killed all of them then and there.
- Ruby goes off on her own to get water for Knight, only to run into Null. The latter shoots her in the shoulder and would have killed her had a Beowolf not interrupted.
- Leviathan gets his own moment when he catches Ashari by surprise and then almost drowns him in the ocean. Had he not been shot, he would have killed Ashari easily.
- Chapter 8:
- After being shot, Leviathan transforms into his massive Grimm form, and is about to drown Vale in a last-ditch attempt to win the war. Who stops him? Knight, who cuts through Leviathan's body with impossible strength and burns away the water before he can be drowned. He ends up dealing the killing blow.
- Ren and Nora get their own moment where the former lures Leviathan far enough out of the water for Nora to drop an industrial crane on him, pinning Leviathan in place for Knight to finish off.
- Chapter 10:
- In previous chapters, Null had used his Semblance to kill other iterations in a single attack. Here, he fights Agent Rat, and is completely on the backfoot. Rat blinds Null with smoke, keeps above and around him with his grapnel hooks, and when Null thinks he has a shot in, Rat uses a hidden knife to render Null's left arm limp. Knowing he is outmatched, Null is forced to flee into a crowd.
- Chapter 13:
- An understated one for Hunter; after Barista's death and Ironwood forcing him and Fate to fight, he flees into the Emerald Forest. Winter leads RWBY, JNPR, Fate, Knight, and the Ace Ops into the Emerald Forest to find him, but even after searching for hours, they find no trace of him. In his natural element, Hunter might as well be a ghost.
- Headmaster Arc demonstrates his intelligence-gathering skills, gaining access to Beacon's servers through what is later revealed to be backdoors put in the system by Ozpin and obtaining a wealth of information that he shares with Cinder. By the end of their second meeting, Cinder is practically enthralled with Headmaster.
- Chapter 14:
- In contrast to the previous search for Hunter, Ashari manages to find a snare trap and confirm his presence. He and Emerald never lay eyes on Hunter, but it's more than the heroes ever found.
- While investigating Team JNPR's temporary room, Agent Rat fights three Atlas soldiers, one of whom is a Specialist, and defeats them all easily.
- Chapter 15:
- Winter starts a fight with Magnis, only to find herself severely outmatched. The veteran Huntsman uses his shield as a second weapon, occupying her saber with Crocea Mors only to bash her with the shield. In the end, she finds herself held in a chokehold and only gets out of it when Warchief orders her to stand down.
- The regular Jaune has been overshadowed by the iterations since they showed up, but here he gets a chance to show his tactical and analytical skills. He keeps JNPR out of Magnis's melee range and is able to pinpoint Magnis as a Jack of All Stats almost immediately, identifying him as an all-rounder. While Winter is furious when he defies her orders, Ironwood praises him for knowing his team's strengths and what to commit them to.
- RWBY gets their own moment, as their discussion with Nicholas Arc has them contact Ozpin and Ironwood, putting an end to the unnecessary fight.
- Chapter 17:
- Warchief leads an ambush of Atlas soldiers against Cinder's group. The soldiers destroy the hideout, but the villains escape on a giant Nevermore. When Warchief tries to ground it with gatling cannons, Grimm jumps off and tears one cannon apart and uses it to damage the other, all while ignoring the soldiers shooting at him.
- It turns out that while Warchief attacks Cinder and RWBY and JNPR fight the White Fang, Xiong killed the leaders of Vale's three biggest crime groups and plans for the Malachite twins to subdue the rest of the city's gangs. By Chapter 25, Vale's underworld is under his control.
- Chapter 18:
- Grimm fights six huntsmen simultaneously, taking advantage of their attacks to spill blood and summon more Grimm to occupy them. The fight ends when he creates an entirely new Grimm from nothing that burrows into the Mountain Glenn tunnels.
- Adam fights Magnis, Blake, and Yang at the same time while Jaune hangs back. Magnis shuts Adam down handily, and it becomes clear to Jaune that Blake and Yang are hurting more than they're helping, as Adam pushes them into Magnis's way.
- Jaune makes himself useful by trying to free Adam's iteration (the future Revolutionary), but before he can finish, Headmaster takes Jaune hostage to end Adam's fight with Magnis, Blake, and Yang.
- Chapter 19: How do Adam and Headmaster escape? Roman stops by with a military Bullhead, blows out one of the walls, and has them leap onto it before flying away.
- Chapter 20: Fate and Jaune sneak out of Beacon to attend Headmaster's soiree. Despite the former taking every precaution he knows to ditch pursuit, Agent Rat somehow managed to follow them to Headmaster's apartment. At the same time, Headmaster expected to find Rat, and managed to do so.
- Chapter 25:
- Knight has had enough waiting around and goes out to Vale himself to find and fight Cinder's faction. After paying Xiong a visit, he ends up facing the White Fang and Cinder's group on his own. The end result? A complete massacre, with all of the White Fang sans Adam dead, Mercury dead as well, and Ashari down his right arm. Nothing the villains have can do anything to Knight, and the only reasons they escape alive is because Grimm has his namesake dogpile Knight while Ashari masks their escape with smoke grenades. Ironwood, Ozpin, and Warchief all watch through a drone and are overcome with awe.
- A downplayed one for Xiong when he meets Knight, as he shows no signs of fear despite being aware of what the man could do. This level of calm actually impresses Knight.
- Chapter 30: The climactic battle between the King of Vale and the King of the Grimm comes to an epic conclusion.
- By the time Grimm puts his final gambit into action, Knight has singlehandedly slaughtered over half of the million-strong Grimm army that had been sent to kill him.
- Grimm's gambit itself qualifies as this plan to kill the most invincible of Jaunes ends up succeeding. He charges in, fatally impaling himself on his opponent's blade, and takes advantage of the one weakness Knight has demonstrated throughout the story: the need to breathe. By creating thousands of miniature Lancers and using them to plug up Knight's lungs to suffocate him to death.
- Each combatant gets an understated one as they expire:
- Knight acknowledges Grimm as a Worthy Opponent, from one king to another, and fades with dignity as he hopes for Ruby to pick up where he left off.
- Grimm mentally commands the remnants of his namesake army to disperse nonviolently as a final middle-finger to the sociopaths on his side who wanted to use him as a weapon.
- Chapter 34: Xiong reveals that from the start, he never wanted the wish. What was his motivation to fight in the war? To completely ruin Cinder's plans and see her face when she realizes she lost. And he achieves that here, having spirited away the Fall Maiden before Cinder could reach her, leaving her bereft of the woman's powers. Cinder immolates him for this, but Xiong dies laughing in her face, triumphant in his goals.
