Queen Salem revealed herself to the people of Remnant with an offer: a reduction in Grimm across the globe, but in exchange, five children, one from each nation, were to be delivered to her as a hostage. But once they were delivered to her, Salem realized a critical flaw in her plan: the children were too adorable to harm.
— Fanfiction Dot Net summary
A RWBY story by Selene Sokal
, Children of the Grimmlands is an Alternate Universe Fic of the existing AU Children of Remnant. After Salem secures the five children she demanded...she immediately breaks down and finds she can't harm them after all. Instead of torturing and tormenting them as part of a decades-long Batman Gambit, she desperately does everything she can to make them comfortable despite the fact that she made no preparations for keeping children safe and happy. However, she still teaches them leadership, diplomacy, combat, and magic, because she believes they need every advantage they can get in the world.
Unlike Children of Remnant, the story focuses more on Salem's perspective and how she raises the Claimed. While it is a comedy fic, the story does not shy away from examining how much of a terrible person Salem was to even conceive of the plan in the first place, even though she couldn't go through with it.
Can be read here at Fanfiction Dot Net.
Children of the Grimmlands contains examples of:
- Abusive Parents: Coco's parents all but bullied her into accepting an arranged marriage with Jaune with threats of Financial Abuse.
- Action Mom: Summer Rose, who uses her espionage skills to...help Jaune's birth parents reach out to him.
- Adaptational Heroism: Whereas Children of Remnant Salem bullied and abused her adopted children for the purpose of destroying Remnant, this Salem decided to become a genuinely loving parent.
- Adaptational Nice Guy: Cinder is still an ambitious, power-hungry minion, but she shows genuine courtesy and respect toward others like Emerald.
- Ambadassador: With her sanity intact, Weiss is able to train to be the team diplomat, unlike in Remnant where Blake had to double-up as diplomat and spymaster. Weiss remains an accomplished sorceress, however.
- Arranged Marriage:
- Salem had bad experiences with her father arranging a marriage for her, but considering that when she chose for herself it basically destroyed the world, she has decided that Jaune will have to have his marriage arranged by older, wiser heads. Cinder, meanwhile, is desperately pointing out that Jaune is still young, arranged marriages are extremely rare these days, and Cinder herself is not an option, please pick someone else.
- When Cinder asks about the girls, Salem laughs and says they can handle it themselves, since she taught them to take what they want. She is seemingly unaware of how all their romantic inclinations revolve around Jaune.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: When Salem breaks down crying over what she's done, Jaune comforts her for no other reason than because she's sad. Salem decides to make him her heir right then and there.
- Beleaguered Assistant:
- Watts is run ragged trying to placate both Salem and her rambunctious adopted children.
- Cinder herself must balance the unenviable tasks of being Jaune's mentor, Salem's assistant, and the whims of Jaune's sisters.
- The Chessmaster:
- We have Cinder, who is very good at reading the situation for her own benefit.
- Thanks to Cinder's tutelage, Jaune becomes a very literal example by the time he enters his teenage years, mastering the game of chess with a very stern poker face.
- Pyrrha invokes this, playing as many boarding games and chess as possible. Not just because she wants to be a more analytical person, but she wants to be able to match Jaune in a game of wits.
- Child Hater: Watts is not thrilled to have to deal with a bunch of rambunctious rugrats. Of course, the situation with the Claimed is infinitely worse since they have Grimm powers and no one to reign them in (since Salem insists on spoiling them). His lab is covered with all sorts of entirely accurate warnings about the horrible things he keeps in there—warnings which Blake ignores because she wants to steal his poisons.
- Children Raise You: Having to raise kids does make Salem less of a spiteful monster, although she's far from infallible in that role.
- Commonality Connection: The Schnees and the Belladonnas buried the hatchet and bonded over the shared trauma of their children being ripped away from them.
- Compelling Voice: Jaune gets an upgrade from Remnant; his voice works on anyone, not just his sisters. It even works on inanimate objects, though that's unreliable outside of the Grimmlands, where everything is suffused with the power from the Pool of Darkness. The only person he can't control is Cinder... because she makes him so flustered that he can't get an order out.
- Cooldown Hug:
- Jaune gives Salem a hug when he sees she's sad. However, he only adds to her guilt and makes her cry even more, but she does eventually calm down.
- Played for Laughs, with Cinder trying to comfort Salem, only to get a very crushing Bear Hug in return.
- Cowardly Lion: Despite being understandably nervous and terrified of Salem, a young Jaune still demands, through his tears, that he and the other girls be taken home. It's one of the reasons Salem can't go through with hurting him and the others.
- Cuteness Proximity: After kidnapping five children for the express purpose of torturing them into Child Soldiers, Salem takes one look at them, decides that they are too adorable to hurt, and finds her mothering instincts coming screaming back. She has to scramble to find them food and beds because she can't have these little angels sleeping on the piles of dirty rags she had prepared for them.
- Dark Is Not Evil: The Pool of Darkness can be a brutal thing to endure, but Salem is able to ensure that the transformation of the Claimed into Grimm isn't as painful as it could be.The Darkness: TRUST ME, THIS COULD HAVE BEEN A MUCH WORSE EXPERIENCE FOR BOTH OF US.
- Doting Parent: Salem indulges her children to overcompensate for having planned to torment them. She is unable to say "no" to her precious angels, even when they play around with sharp knives. Salem bawls heavily when Jaune enters his teenaged years, mourning how fast he's grown up.
- Even Evil Has Standards: In addition to Salem giving up on her plan to torture the Claimed, Watts had a very real twinge of guilt over his role when he first heard about the plan. He was still willing to go along with it, however.
- Failure Gambit: Cinder sets one up: she forces the children into an actual mission outside the Grimmlands. Cinder knows they'll screw it up, but she wants the children to understand that a real mission isn't like home training, where everything is controlled and safe.
- Gargle Blaster: When Drowning Her Sorrows, Salem drinks Grimmstuff-infused whiskey. Cinder notes it would kill anyone else who tried to drink it, and that even being in the same room as an open bottle of the stuff probably wasn't good for her health.
- A Glass of Chianti: Salem enjoys a glass of wine as she prepares to stick it to her ex-husband.
- Incapable of Disobeying: Jaune's siblings are conditioned, due to their transformation into Grimm, to obey his every command and be at his side, even for something as mundane as sneaking cookies.
- Incompatible Orientation: Coco, being lesbian, has no interest in marrying the Prince of Grimm.
- The Leader: Even before Salem names Jaune her heir, he took charge of the Claimed. Their very first scene is the girls hiding behind Jaune while he manages to demand that Salem send them home, albeit with tears in his eyes.
- Literal-Minded: At thirteen, Blake has found out that girls sleep with boys they like, and so makes plans to sleep on Jaune's chest like a cat.
- Lighter and Softer: Children of Remnant is a story about an evil, child-abusing Salem who rears children to serve her twisted schemes. This story features a nurturing, loving Salem who comes to care for her charges.
- Lima Syndrome: Exaggerated. Salem goes from wanting to torment the children to wanting to care for them like they were her own in about a minute.
- Love Dodecahedron: Pyrrha and Blake are absolutely in love with Jaune in every way, Weiss appears uninterested in sex but still wants to marry him for the power and because she wants to help, while Emerald is a lesbian but wants to marry him to cheese off her sisters. Jaune, meanwhile, has a giant crush on Cinder that Cinder does everything in her power to discourage because she knows the girls will murder her.
- Meaningful Echo: Salem sarcastically refers to the children as "little angels" when talking to Ozpin before they arrive. Later, she does repeatedly think of them as little angels.
- My God, What Have I Done?:
- Salem's plan gets derailed when she takes one look at the children, finds them too adorable to harm, and promptly realizes that she is a horrific monster for kidnapping children for the express purpose of torturing them into Child Soldiers. She has to scramble to find them beds and food, and later breaks down crying because she feels like nothing she's doing is good enough.
- Later, she throws Jaune in the Pool of Darkness after he asks to be like her, only to immediately freak out because she didn't think before doing it and doesn't know if he can even swim.
- My Greatest Failure: After her failure to take down the Ace Ops, Pyrrha was so ashamed and angry over her defeat, she resolved to be more intellectual and calculating.
- Not So Above It All: Weiss is the most mature of Salem's children, and is too grown up for chocolate milk...and then takes a swig.
- Not What I Signed Up For: Watts knew that signing up with an immortal Sorcerous Overlord would almost certainly result in his death; he considered this a fair price to pay for his revenge. He did not expect to have to kowtow to five spoiled little children with creepy superpowers.
- Opportunistic Bastard: The Adel parents joined Salem's religion, but Coco disgustedly notes they're "devotion", including marrying her off to Jaune, is out of nothing but social advancement.
- Overprotective Mom: Salem can be overprotective, but she has an... odd definition of it. For the most part, she takes the position that her children will be safest if they are the most dangerous things around, and teaches the girls combat and politics, whichever they prefer. She's more traditionally overprotective with Jaune, who she refuses to let learn combat because he might get hurt.
- Parental Favoritism: Downplayed. Salem admits in her head that Jaune is the favorite, hands down, but she treats all of her children very well. When Pyrrha says her only desire is to be useful to Jaune, Salem tries to gently convince her of her own self-worth more (though she doesn't have much success).
- Precocious Crush: Jaune gets a huge crush on Cinder, the first girl he meets who is not family, the second he sees her. Cinder is very worried about this even before she realizes that his sisters are all stalking her.
- Predator Turned Protector: Salem goes from planning to be an Evil Matriarch for the Claimed to be a loving, albeit indulgent, mother figure for them.
- Reformed, but Not Tamed: While Salem loses a lot of spiteful edge after raising kids, she's still a somewhat self-centered queen who believes she is entitled to power and glory...and she instills this into her children.
- Sibling Rivalry: Thanks to their powers, violent natures, and obsession with Jaune, each of the Claimed girls can create fights that become literal small-scale wars.
- Smart People Play Chess: Blake and Weiss are the more intelligent of Salem's children and enjoy the intellectual challenge of chess.
- Sore Loser: Pyrrha throws a rather destructive tantrum after Clover beats her in a game of chess.
- Spoiled Sweet: Jaune is spoiled rotten by his adopted mom and siblings, but his genuine kindness is strong enough that even Cinder can't dismiss it.
- Stern Teacher: Cinder is the tutor of Salem's children and is the only person, besides Salem, who isn't cowed or scared by their tantrums or powers.
- Strange Minds Think Alike: When the Claimed turn fifteen, Weiss tries to marry Jaune. It's pointed out that they're only of legal age in three counties in Vacuo (whose governments and laws aren't even recognized by the central government of Vacuo, meaning said marriages aren't recognized as legal), and she is prevented from giving her presentation to Salem. Salem, on the other hand, is Drowning Her Sorrows because Jaune has to get married now that he's of legal age, with Cinder trying (and failing) to point out that he is only legal according to the unrecognized governments of three counties in Vacuo.
- Taking You with Me: Watts has zero illusions about Salem being a destructive monster. He's willing to die if it means Atlas gets destroyed as well.
- Tragic Keepsake: For at least the first few weeks, Weiss refused to take off her dress no matter how dirty it got because, to quote Salem, "her mommy gave it to her." It's one of the things that contributes to Salem's breakdown.
- Undying Loyalty: Deconstructed. Jaune's four sisters care for him... but this means that they have little life or autonomy of their own. Salem is let down to see that Pyrrha has no other life goal beyond serving as Jaune's protector. While Jaune likes having sisters who obey his command, it prevents him from learning to do things on his own, prompting Cinder to send him on his own personal journey into Remnant.
- Unskilled, but Strong: In Remnant, Salem refused to let Jaune learn to fight as part of a long-term plan. Here, she initially doesn't want him to get hurt, but is eventually convinced to allow him to train. Unfortunately, this goes nowhere because any time Jaune gets hurt during training, his sisters get their revenge on the person who did it.
- World's Best Warrior: By the time she enters her teenage years, Pyrrha becomes one of the strongest warriors ever. She can even fight her own mom and win.
- Wouldn't Hurt a Child: Salem decides she can't go through with tormenting innocent and helpless children who haven't done a thing to her.
- Yandere: Emerald was perfectly prepared to frame Coco for murdering her own family to keep her from marrying Jaune.
