Roleplay / Lords Among the Ashes

Run by Iandude0 and Aegir on both sites, Lords Among the Ashes is a pair of quests run tandem on SpaceBattles.com and its spinoff site Sufficient Velocity. The quest takes place in the interim between volumes two and three of RWBY.

Trapped in a leadership simulation Gone Horribly Wrong, Jaune and Ruby have found themselves leaders of two very different nations in Remnant, hundreds of years before the events of canon. Forced to serve and survive for ten years in their new roles, the two protagonists have to grow into their positions as figures of authority while they contend with the many dangers and problems of the world they have found themselves living in.

Yet as time drags on, they find that the world is more dangerous than they could have possibly imagined.

Jaune's story can be found on SB and Ruby's on SV. Each of them also have their own sequel quests, ^*  A Flickering Ember, and A Bright Spark, which have since been rebooted into: The Flickering Ember, and The Bright Spark.

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This Quest provides examples of:

• The Ace: Not only is Jaune one of the greatest generals Remnant has ever seen, he is also a scholar of ancient languages, an expert on Aural manipulation, a nearly invincible fighter, and a Magnetic Hero who's really good at motivational speeches. He's also an accomplished Dust Mage, the key figure in the deaths of three Titans, and the only person known to have ever killed three Mad Gods.
• Achilles' Heel: The Titans used to have one. Their makers installed a deactivation command in their technology that would force them to shut down if they received the appropriate signal. Their forced hibernation has altered them in such a way that the signal would not work a second time.
• Action Girl: In the world of RWBY, this is almost par the course for any female character who has a name.
• After the End: Both the sim and modern-day Remnant take place several thousand years after some cataclysmic event that shattered the various advanced civilizations that came before them. The cataclysmic event was the Titans turning against humanity and likely taking the Fallen Gods with them.
• Alas, Poor Villain: There are a few people who could be considered villains in the story but they all believed they were in the right and genuinely cared about those they were in charge of. It's hard not to feel sorry when they are ejected from the Sim, especially if they 'died' while defending their subjects.
• Almighty Janitor: Several of the players who started out as rulers ended up as advisors to either Ruby or Jaune despite being far more powerful then the other players with the exception of Cardin and Cinder.
• Altar Diplomacy:
  • Cinder is so impressed by what she sees in Normandy that she manipulates events so that she and Jaune marry. This gives Wintershroud access to the Lost Technology that Normandy has rediscovered and Normandy access to Wintershroud's rich mineral resources.
  • Ruby tries to arrange such a thing with Mikael after he assists her in clearing her name and regaining her reputation after the second Peace Conference. Unfortunately, the wedding is called off due to the emergence of a Titan on Mantle.
• Apocalypse How: A Class 1 has occurred by the end of the sim as only two civilizations remain standing and they are entirely separated from each other with the rest having been destroyed by the Titans.
• An Arm and a Leg: Alexandria loses one of her arms during the final years of the sim when her fleet is attacked by what may have been a second sea Titan.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: Ruby's Avatar weapon, Atropos, is capable of piercing through most forms of armor as if they weren't even there.
• Badass Adorable: Ruby is still as adorable as ever while being one of the top three most powerful players in the game next to Jaune and Cinder with her Semblance making her possibly the most dangerous player in a one-on-one confrontation.
• Badass Army: The Norman military. It took sacrificing one-hundred elite soldiers for another kingdom to dispose of a Ghoul. It takes ten Norman soldiers to do the same and they would be expected to survive. It helps that they're led by Jaune Arc, but there's a reason they are the only "Legendary" fighting force on Remnant.
• Badass Crew: Jaune and his crew definitely qualify.
• Badass Preacher: Cardin, being the pope and all, is a pretty good example with him being among the most powerful people on Remnant and one of the few to reach Paragon status.
• The Baroness: Alexandria. She has an impossibly voluptuous figure, leads a fervently militaristic country, is highly devoted to her country's ideals, and has a Slavic accent
• Barrier Warrior: Jaune has the ability to summon Aegis, large shields capable of slowing or stopping enemy attacks. His strongest one to date fully stopped the eruption of Olympus.
• Battle Couple: Jaune and Cinder form a fearsome one. The first time they fight together, they kill a god. The second time, they kill a Titan.
• The Beast Master: Both Jaune and Cinder are this as they are capable of controlling Warbeasts through their Grimmtech suits.
• Beast of Battle: The Normans eventually produce Warbeasts, creatures that have been altered using the flesh of Grimm, and use them to combat the Grimm on the Dark Continent.
• Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: The simulation pulls and extrapolates data from ancient computer networks and classified sources to accurately depict Remnant and its people as it was several centuries ago. This includes Oscar Diggs, a young Professor Ozpin, Paragon of Time.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Jaune and Ruby are some of the most reasonable rulers in the sim and two of the largest proponents of peace, but if anyone is foolish enough to attack their subjects, they will do everything in their power to exact revenge. Her citizens being injured is what persuades Ruby to declare war on Lily. The deaths of his soldiers prompts Jaune to personally rip their murderers apart and vaporize anything left into oblivion.
• BFG: The Harkonnen, Coco's weapon of choice, is an easy to attach frame connecting two anti-air guns to large ammo drums that would rest on her shoulders. It weighs so much that only Coco can wield it. Her Avatar weapon is also this but it uses her own Aura to form the bullets.
• Big Good: Cardin can be seen as this in-universe and out due to his position as the Pope and the person that tries the hardest to bring peace. His efforts earn him the title "Beacon of Peace" at the sim's completion.
• Bio-Armor: Grimmtech. It's armor that's been fused with the flesh of Grimm that greatly increases its user's capabilities. It is hinted to be related to the corruption of the Mad Gods but Jaune had it extensively tested and found it had no effect whatsoever on the user's soul.
• Bittersweet Ending: Both Jaune and Ruby at the simulation's end:
  • Jaune led his people to victory against every single Titan on the Dark Continent when no other nation was able to defeat even one and fashioned Normandy into a great bastion of humanity, ready to stand against any threat the Grimm may throw against them. Even so, such victories came at the cost of many of his soldiers lives, including Sun's.
  • Ruby saved thousands upon thousands of lives and fashioned Menagerie into Remnant's only continent to be virtually free of Grimm. However, she had to abandon Silversun Bay to the Sea Titan to ensure that none of her peoples' lives would be lost.
• Blasphemous Praise: Rather than swearing by any god, the people of Normandy, and some of the refugees who flee there, swear by Arc.
• Blood Knight: Jaune, Ruby, and Cinder all have aspects of this with it being implied that their mindsets are due in part to each of them carrying the Blood of War, Death, and Destruction, respectively.
  • All Jaune felt when the Titans awoke on the Dark Continent was eagerness and a desire to crush them.
  • Ruby has a tendency to really get in the zone when killing Grimm. This ends up being deconstructed later on — she ends up ignoring that Cody needed help while they were defending Redrock Gorge, leading to Cody's death and his city isolating itself from the world.
  • Cinder felt a huge sense of Hunger and Satisfaction from gaining control of Bahamut and turning it against the Grimm of the Dark Continent.
• Border Patrol: The East and West edges of the map contain a large amount of ocean Grimm that don't wander anywhere else but would viciously attack anyone foolish enough to wander into their territory. This slows the rate of dissemination of information throughout the world and also helps isolate Menagerie, bottom right, and the Dark Continent, top left, at the end of the sim once the rest of the civilizations have been destroyed.
• Boring, but Practical: Jaune doesn't have Super-Speed or Super-Strength. He can't teleport, heal, turn invisible, or bring forth Aural constructs to decimate his enemies. What he does have is an incredibly tactical mind and skills honed to perfection. This alone makes him one of the three strongest Paragons in the sim. His Avatar weapons are also this as they are simply an incredibly sharp sword and an extremely durable shield.
• Born Lucky: Jaune quickly reclaims a city on the Dark Continent with very few casualties and seems to find stashes of Lost Technology almost everywhere he looks.
• Born Unlucky:
  • Alexandria. Every single military action that she led throughout her time in the sim ended in complete failure. When she finally decided to abandon her city to the approaching Titans and flee to Oum's Ascension, her fleet was attacked and destroyed by what may have been a second, hitherto unknown, ocean Titan.
  • In a way, Jaune is both this and Born Lucky. The sim chose for Jaune to invade the Dark Continent with him having no say in the matter, his stay there awoke the Titans that took issue with him and his people, and him killing a Titan caused the rest of them to awaken around the world.
• Breath Weapon: Various beasts and Titans have this ability. Among them are the Draconic Tyrant Scales and Cychreides, Ziz and Bahamut, and the Karakinos all can fire streams of energy from their mouths.
• The Cavalry: Jaune and Ruby both act as this to several of the other players that are beleaguered by Grimm during their time in the sim.
• Clueless Boss: Downplayed. Ruby is, by all accounts, a fairly competent leader and quite adept at managing her forces. Unfortunately, she neglected to carefully monitor her naval forces and was entirely unaware of her ships practice of attacking any and all Sherwood vessels that they are able to get away with, including civilian vessels.
• Colonel Badass: Captain Forrest Glenelg, the first person to receive two Order of the Aegis awards, the second for outstanding bravery (facing a Tyrant Scale on foot to buy time for a counterattack).
• Cool Boat: While the rest of the world is in an era of sailboats, Normandy has its own WW2 era battleship and aircraft carrier. They are appropriately dubbed the NTS Behemoth and Leviathan respectively.
• The Corruption: Whatever turned the Mad Gods against humanity. This is implied to have been the interaction between their Grimmtech suits and their attempts to control the Titans.
• Cruel to Be Kind: When Cardin refuses to leave Oum's Ascension after the Titans awaken and says he has hopes that Jaune and Ruby would assist him in his efforts, Jaune immediately dismisses his statement, says that he won't throw his troops to their deaths in a meaningless act of defiance, that Cardin's efforts to save a few more lives could mean death for all of his people, and that attempting virtual suicide by Grimm would be pointlessly risky when he could just flee now.
• Curb-Stomp Battle:
  • Jaune invades the most dangerous continent in the world to take a city and only loses 6 people while annihilating thousands upon thousands of Grimm.
  • His support trip to Coco's city also counts. When he arrived, all the ships in the harbor were filled with evacuees with Coco and the last of the army having to hold back the Grimm so as to not be overrun. Jaune took stock of the situation, arranged his ships, and opened fire. Within two barrages, the Grimm were all but eradicated with all of Coco's forces evacuated.
  • Ruby has her own when she easily defeats the Grimm that invaded Marcus' city.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: Each of the Titans. Even after its armor was weakened, Cychreides was still able to take everything Normandy could throw at it with almost no signs of slowing. Olympus is so unbelievably durable that the only way to destroy it is to journey into the heart of its mountain and detonate a Void Bomb.
• Dating Catwoman: Jaune, oh boy Jaune. Jaune and Cinder eventually grow so close to each other as to elect to continue their relationship after the sim ends.
• Death World: The Grimm are an everpresent threat that every kingdom has to deal with but special mention goes to The Dark Continent. It is the only location where one can find Ghouls, Tyrant Scales, Ziz, and Titans. At least at first, that is.
• Defrosting Ice Queen:
  • At the beginning of their relationship, Cinder thought of Jaune only as someone that she could easily manipulate and feign affection for in order to more easily attain her goals. By the end of the sim, Cinder has grown to honestly care about him, not only as an asset, but as her equal whom she would genuinely like to pursue a relationship with.
  • A non-romantic example occurs with Salem. She initially cares nothing for humanity or any of the people that she meets, but her continual interactions with Jaune and his constant efforts to better the world eventually convince her that humanity is actually something worth believing in.
• Despair Event Horizon: Alexandria by the final year in the sim. Almost every military effort of hers had led to failure up to that point but she managed to keep herself together until the majority of her soldiers, some of her civilians, and all her ships were destroyed by what was possibly a second ocean Titan with her unable to stop it and even losing an arm in the process. Ruby spent part of the last year trying to help her. It didn't work.
• Determinator: Jaune will go to any lengths for those he cares for. He endlessly works to ensure Normandy's safety, undergoes Training from Hell to better protect his friends, and continues to protect his soldiers even while he himself is unconscious.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Jaune and his Paragons, along with Normandy's Army halved Cychreides, obliterated Olympus from the inside, and, turned Bahamut against its own hoard before making it self-destruct. There's a reason Normandy has the "Legendary" rating.
• Disaster Dominoes: The second peace conference is very much this. Ruby's denouncement of Sherwood (which would have given a bonus to her other actions) fails, as does her demand for disarmament, and a blockade. Since all of her proposals were aggressive in nature, the majority of the other players saw her as a second Lily and refused to ally with her when she declared war. Seeing that she didn't have the support she had been looking for, Ruby decided to ally with Alexandria. As Alexandria's stated goal is the conquest of the Central Continent, Varric immediately allies with Lily to prevent such a thing, prompting his ally, Neil, to do the same. Since she declared war at the peace conference that had taken years to establish, she almost irreparably damaged her relationship with Cardin. Lastly, with war officially declared, Lily immediately had her agents in Silversun ransack its academy and steal Ruby's advanced ship designs. The GM puts it best.
  Iandude0: You just took peace into a back alley and shot it, you dumbass.
• Dispel Magic: Ruin, Jaune and Cinder's dual Semblance, fully dispels enemy buffs and removes allies' debuffs.
• Divided We Fall: A major theme here with the most successful players being those that were able to unite others beneath them.
• The Dreaded: Jaune, King of Ash and Fire, definitely fits. Not only is he an absolute nightmare on the battlefield, but Conqueror's Presence magically induces fear in his foes, making him more terrifying than even a Titan. Notably, the Grimm fear HIM.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: This happens to Lily. She was one of the most prominent players in the sim, a key contributor to the war on Central, one of the few people to advance their Semblance to Lord, and had won every major confrontation so far but she was Killed Offscreen by a Titan.
• Enemy Mine:
  • Ruby allies with Alexandria, the utterly ruthless head of a fascist state that practices both slavery and impressment of War Refugees, with the stated goal of conquering the Central continent in order to better combat Lily. This immediately prompts Varric and Neil to ally with Lily to oppose Alexandria.
  • Everyone is forced to put away their differences when Grimm activity spikes due to the Titans awakening worldwide.
• Face–Monster Turn: What is implied to have happened to the Fallen Gods possibly due to the mental backlash that came from attempting, and failing, to control the Titans.
• Fallen Hero: The various Mad Gods, corrupted God-level Aura users, that appear throughout the story are implied to be this, having reached the pinnacle of human strength before they were corrupted.
• Fatal Flaw: Several players have this which leads to a great deal of conflict throughout the story, especially Ruby's side of it as she tended to deal more with the other players while Jaune was securing the Dark Continent.
• A Father to His Men: Jaune to the Norman military. They are all immensely devoted to him, believe that there is hope no matter how bleak the situation as long as he leads them, and still treat him as a friend when the battles are done. While he is forced to send some of them to their deaths to achieve victory, each of their passings causes him mental pain and he does everything he can to prevent them.
• Friend to All Children: Ruby and, ironically, Lily show signs of this.
• Friendly Sniper: While her personality gives those less familiar with her the impression of a Cold Sniper, Azure is actually this. The care she has for her people is what initially prompted her to ally with Jaune and the children of Normandy look up to her as a hero when she teaches them about proper weapon handling.
• Frontline General: Jaune leads the charge when his men fight to lay claim to Normandy and continues to do so every single turn until the city is theirs.
• Genki Girl: Ruby of course.
• Giant Flyer: Tyrant Scales and Ziz◊ qualify but the most prominent example would be Bahamut◊ who is the Titan Salem developed before the fall of the Dark Continent and the corruption of the other God-level Aura users.
• Gondor Calls for Aid: Jaune calls on both Cardin and Salem when he has to infiltrate Olympus and plant a Void Bomb inside of it while having to fight hordes of elite Grimm and two Mad Gods.
• Gone Horribly Right:The sim was supposed to imitate the world of Remnant to the best of its ability, and it tapped into government files and ancient computer networks to do so. This allowed the simulation to accurately model the Paragon ritual, Titans, and Salem
• Gone Horribly Wrong: The premise of the fic. Cinder's virus interacts in an unexpected manner with the SDC's simulation software, causing the time dilation to change from x7 to x365.
• The Good King: Jaune. He always does what he thinks is right for his people and goes to any means to secure their safety. He demands much of them but no more than he demands of himself. They understand this and love him all the same.
• Had to Be Sharp: The Dark Continent is the closest thing to Hell on Remnant. It has a higher Grimm population that contains older and more deadly varieties of Grimm than anywhere else. Its civilization has the world's strongest army, the highest concentration of Paragons, and some of the best stewards, diplomats, scientists, and spies in the entire world.
• Healing Factor:
  • As in canon, Aura naturally heals its users wounds, so the higher one's level of Aura mastery, the more potent this becomes.
  • Cychreides has a very potent healing factor that it attempted to abuse during its battle with Normandy.
• Healing Hands: Cardin's Semblance allows him to heal others.
• Heel–Face Turn: Cardin goes from bully jock to the voice of reason and big good of the SIM as the Pope.
• Hero of Another Story: Jaune and Ruby are this to each other. While Jaune is conquering the Dark Continent, discovering Lost Technology, and fighting Titans, Ruby is clearing the seas of piracy, becoming an economic superpower, and inventing Mechashift weapons hundreds of years ahead of schedule. Their stories barely coincide with each other even though they are both rather important.
• Heroic Vow: Jaune makes one to Salem at the end of the sim, saying that after he returns to the real world he will eventually seek her out and do everything he can to restore her faith in humanity.
• The High Queen: Ruby. Not only does she become highly charismatic, intelligent, and beautiful as she grows into her role as the leader of her people but she also reduces corruption, cuts down on piracy, and leads relief efforts to other nations.It's no wonder why her people absolutely love her.
• Hijacking Cthulhu: Jaune and his Paragons, with the help of Salem, gain control of Bahamut and turn it against its hoard, severely reducing the number of Grimm on the Dark Continent.
• Hope Bringer:
  • Ruby becomes this by the end of the sim thanks to her support efforts to the other kingdoms. This earns her the title "Beacon of Hope."
  • Jaune is this to his soldiers. No matter how desperate the situation may be, they continue to fight and cling to the belief that they will be victorious because he is leading them.
• Horrifying the Horror: Conqueror's Presence makes Jaune so terrifying that not only do Grimm fear him, Mad Gods do as well. Wearing the flesh of their greatest generals as armor probably doesn't hurt either.
• Hot Wings: Cinder is capable of sprouting these from her back while in Avatar form.
• I Gave My Word: An Arc never goes back on their word, no matter how gruesome it may be.
  The very first word of an Arc was not some grand promise of triumph. It was a scream of bloody retribution, demands that those responsible for harming him and his would be destroyed, no matter the cost. And like every other Arc, he kept his word, killing and slaughtering to make it so. Thousands died, both enemy and friend to make his word a reality.
• The Idealist: Ruby. She is constantly working to create a better future for everyone and she eventually becomes a symbol of hope for the rest of the world, earning her the title "Beacon of Hope".
• Idiot Ball: Declaring war at a Peace Conference was definitely not a good idea.
• Infinity +1 Sword: Avatar Weapons are incredibly powerful armaments unique to each individual that often come with esoteric abilities. They can only be summoned by Paragons or Gods.
• Inside a Computer System: The entirety of both quests takes place in a simulated version of Remnant five-hundred years before the events of RWBY occur.
• Iron Lady: Alexendria
• It Can Think: The older Grimm have developed a level of intelligence that the younger ones lack, allowing them to direct lesser Grimm and retreat when their defeat seems likely.
• It's Personal: Lily takes this attitude towards Ruby and Silversun as a whole after they destroy the ship her daughters were on while privateering and attack her vessels even when they aren't flying pirate flags. Ruby reciprocates after Lily sets fire to her docks.
• Kaiju: The Titans. There are implied to be nine in all. The Dark Continent has three: Cychreides, Olympus, and Bahamut. Mantle has one described as a colossus. Central, the largest continent, has three: a "Beast", "Fangs", and a Sand Worm. There are implied to be two that reside in the ocean.
• Kill the God: By the end of the sim, almost every single Paragon has partaken in killing at least one god.
• Know When to Fold Them: Ruby decides to abandon Silversun at the end of the sim and opts to retreat inland with the rest of her people rather than try to fight the ocean Titan and risk everything that she had built up to that point.
• Kraken and Leviathan: Sea Grimm tend to grow to be the largest in size since they tend to live longest. The most dangerous sea Grimm are Deep Ones◊, Leviathans◊, and Krakens. The only thing worse than them in the ocean would be the two sea Titans.
• Lady of Black Magic: Cinder is elegant, composed, graceful, and perhaps the most offensively capable Dust mage in the world.
• Lady of War: Cinder is elegant, composed, graceful, and her skill with a variety of weapons makes her one of the deadliest fighters in all of Remnant.
• The Leader: Every player of the sim technically qualifies as they each lead their own country, but the most prominent example would have to be Jaune. His mix of charisma, determination, and tactical success ensure that his people thrive on the Dark Continent to such a degree that other players quickly join with him so as to take part in his success.
• A Lighter Shade of Gray: Ruby's position once she allies with Alexandria against Lily in the Central War during the second Peace Conference. While Lily has effectively killed hundreds during the cold war period and practiced enforced enlistment of refugees in the southern half of the Central Continent, Alexandria has done the exact same thing but was also the one who led the first open assault in the war when she led an attack on Lily's forces during the first Peace Conference. The primary reason that Ruby chose to ally with Lily over Alexandria is the fact that she's personally had to deal with Lily's aggression towards her. Unbeknownst to Ruby, Lily's aggression is actually partially justified due to Silversun ships practice of launching unprovoked assaults on all Sherwood vessels and one of Silversun's assaults killing Lily's daughters on their first unsupervised voyage.
• Lightning Bruiser: Cychreides is several times the size of an aircraft carrier, incredibly fast for its size, very heavily armored, and can hit harder than anything that came before it.
• Living Legend:
  • Jaune's accomplishments are initially considered so ridiculous that no one believes them. Those who actually know of his accomplishments when they meet him are often left awestruck.
  • Robespierre Arc and Siegfried Schnee are famous for their contributions during the Great War, with those aware of them terrified of what may happen if their assistance is required once more.
• Lost Superweapon: The Titans are revealed to be this as they were originally weapons designed to be used against other cities until...
• Lost Technology: The Dark Continent was home to several advanced civilizations and a great deal of its infrastructure is still intact when Jaune comes to claim it.
• Magic Knight: Not only is Jaune both incredibly deadly in melee combat, and fully capable of flinging lightning at his opponents at range using Aurea Victus, he is also a proficient Dust Mage that specializes in Dust weaving thanks to Cinder.
• Magnetic Hero: Jaune. The sheer magnitude of his successes makes him a Living Legend that quickly draws the other nomadic tribes to him, and his rescuing of Coco's city inspires the populace to follow him as well. He had the largest following in the sim from turn two and it only grew from there.
• Magnetic Weapons: Azure's weapon is a portable railgun capable of hitting its target from several kilometers away.
• Mama Bear: Lily's first objective when her city was being attacked by Alexandria was to see her daughters to safety, and even trained them extensively for their first voyage which was led by one of her best captains. She also does everything in her power to make Ruby and Silversun pay after they attacked and sunk her daughters' ship.
• Marriage Before Romance: Jaune and Cinder initially only marry because doing so greatly benefits both of their kingdoms. Over time, however, they begin to trust one another and develop actual feelings for each other that persist even after the sim ends.
• Mass "Oh, Crap!": The news about the rest of the Titans awakening freaked out the rest of the players to the point that they finally decided to put aside their differences and stop fighting after several years of warring with each other.
• Mental Fusion:
  • The Norman soldiers have an instinctual understanding of each other while under the effects of Jaune's Semblance to the point that they coordinate as if they were a single entity.
  • Jaune and Cinder use their status as Mindlink Mates to bolster each other's Auras and combine their Semblances of War and Destruction to form their Dual Semblance, Ruin.
• Mindlink Mates: Jaune and Cinder share a soul-bond that allows them to, among other things, sense each other's emotions.
• Mighty Glacier:
  • Jaune isn't particularly fast when compared to other Paragons, but his incredible offensive and defensive capabilities make facing him similar to wearing down a mountain.
  • Olympus is rather slow, especially when compared to Cychreides. But its armor is so thick that only the most powerful of strikes could hope to dent it, and any damage they may cause would likely be piddling.
• Monster-Shaped Mountain: Olympus◊, the Titan of Doom, is a walking mountain capable of crushing any structure in its way that also acts as a carrier for the legions of Grimm inside it as well as two Mad Gods. Clouds wrap around its peak and it steps over geographical features as if they were children's toys.
• Mook Maker: Olympus is capable of producing its own unique Grimm.
• My Death Is Only The Beginning: If a Titan is killed, it initiates the Vengeance Protocol and sends the activation commands to wake the rest of the Titans around the world.
• My Greatest Failure:
  • Jaune takes this attitude towards the deaths of a few of his soldiers during the trip to reinforce Clearwater Harbour. He reflects back on the mourning daughter and widow those soldiers left behind whenever he loses men to the Grimm and renews his determination to not let such a thing happen again.
  • Ozpin has this attitude towards the ruler that began the Great War eighty years ago as he was the one to provide him the Paragon ritual and the person who failed to prevent Salem from turning him into the tyrant that Remnant knows him as today.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast:
  • Anyone identified by the moniker of Paragon or God is more than likely leagues above most normal people. It doesn't help that many of them don't have the most pleasant semblance names either.
  • Each of the Titans fought have had rather terrifying monikers, such as Cychreides, the Titan of Death, or Olympus, the Titan of Doom.
  • By the end of the series, all Paragons were given a title in commemoration of their achievements: Light Amidst the Darkness (Aurora), Lord Among the Ashes (Azure, Coco, and Sun), Beacon of Hope (Ruby), Beacon of Peace (Cardin), and King and Queen of Ash and Fire (Jaune and Cinder, respectively).
• Negated Moment of Awesome: Ruby's efforts to defend Redrock Gorge would have been a definite Moment of Awesome with five players facing off against a force of thousands of Grimm were it not for Cody's death.
• Never My Fault: Lily
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • Ruby's recklessness and bloodthirstiness at Redrock Gorge unintentionally leads to Cody's death and his city's decision to isolate itself. Even worse, she was one who proposed that the leaders should attack the horde surrounding Redrock Gorge themselves... even though even though the Grimm threat had been reduced to the point that the army could probably handle it.
  • Jaune similarly screws up when his invasion of the Dark Continent awakens three Titans, and when the Normans kill Cychreides, which awakens the other Titans all around the world.
• Nightmare Fetishist: Ruby has an incredible fascination for weapons, thinks a human wielding claws that are dripping blood looks cool, and literally drools at the sight of Jaune's Howitzers.
• No-Sell:
  • The Titans are entirely immune to all but the strongest of restrictive abilities. They also lack souls so they are immune to any effects that target them.
  • Mad God Samael has a strong soul — enough that he entirely resists Ruby's Curse.

• Old Soldier: Robespierre Arc◊ and Siegfried Schnee◊ are two of the greatest generals, stewards, and spy masters that Remnant has ever seen. Both have retreated/were exiled from society after their assistance in the Color Revolution, but everyone who knows of them fears what will happen if they feel that their presence is required once more.
• One-Man Army: Anyone to reach the level of Paragon is almost certainly this. Ozpin even states that a single Paragon could very well destroy one of the four major kingdoms if they chose to.
• Our Dragons Are Different:
  • Tyrant Scales◊ are large draconic Grimm that breathe fire and are normally only found on the Dark Continent. They are considered to be even deadlier than Ghouls.
  • Cychreides◊ is much worse. It is almost three times the size of an aircraft carrier, is incredibly fast for its size, has armor that not even battleship cannons can dent, and breathes fire, among other things. It also has a nasty surprise in an additional Wave-Motion Gun attack.
• Our Ghouls Are Creepier: Ghouls are some of the strongest and smartest of Grimm that are normally only found on the Dark Continent. Defeating them usually takes either a prepared Lord, a Paragon, one-hundred elite soldiers, or ten Normandy marines. When they are critically injured, they execute a berserk attack on their murderer that can even be lethal to Paragons. They're also Animalistic Abominations that are quite ghastly to look at◊.
• Peace Conference: Cardin organizes two of these at Oum's Ascension. The first took place at the end of year four and coincides with Jaune and Cinder's marriage It was largely successful as it set up relief efforts, established refugee sites, and convinced some players to become neutral. The second took place during year seven and did not go as well due to a series of Disaster Dominoes that was started by, among other things, Ruby's declaration of war on Lily.
• Persona Non Grata: Ruby is this to Cody's city as she was the one who proposed that the leaders should attack the horde surrounding Redrock Gorge themselves, even though the Grimm threat had been reduced to the point that the army could probably handle it. This led to Cody's death, the first unintentional one in the sim, and his city isolating itself from everyone else.
• Personality Powers: Semblance names and effects have a tendency to match the personalities of their users.
  • Cinder desires power, destroys those who oppose her and intimidate the rest into complacency. Her Semblance is Destruction.
  • Jaune is a natural born leader who excels when commanding others and feels most content when fighting for humanity. His Semblance is War.
  • Ruby has a fascination with weapons and is better at associating with them than she is with humanity. Her Semblance is Death.
  • Salem has lost faith in humanity a very long time ago, which wasn't helped by the gods actively screwing her over in the past. Fittingly, her Semblance is Hate.
• Playing with Fire: Cinder's favorite means of destroying her opponents. She can even sprout functional Hot Wings from her back while in Avatar Form.
• Poor Communication Kills: One of the contributing factors to the ongoing hostilities on the Central Continent is that none of the leaders make any effort to communicate with each other. Cardin tries to rectify this by establishing a Peace Conference that most of the leaders attend thanks to it coinciding with Jaune and Cinder's wedding. This is somewhat remedied when Jaune installs advanced radio towers throughout the world that greatly increase the ease of diplomatic communications, and trade, as well as evacuation and relief efforts.
• Power Levels: It goes Awakened->Adept->Lord->Paragon->God levels of aura mastery.
• The Power of Hate: Salem's Semblance, Hate, allows her to empower herself and her comrades' offensive abilities while decreasing their defensive abilities.
• The Power of Trust: Jaune and Cinder trust in each other to the point that their reaction to realizing that they have access to each other's minds is simple acceptance.
  Cinder: If anyone had earned the privilege to even try understanding her, it had to be him.
  Jaune: You didn't know how she was able to get into your mind, and you didn't particularly care. You didn't really keep any secrets from her, anyway.
• Pragmatic Hero: Jaune, while The Good King and A Father to His Men, will sacrifice soldiers if it is absolutely necessary, pursues every advantage he has against the Grimm regardless of how morally ambiguous it may seem, and is not above disabusing others of their idealistic notions if it means saving lives. His actions determine his first moral axis to be Lawful.
• Pre-Asskicking One-Liner: Jaune and Ruby both give these during their time in the sim.
  Jaune: You would shatter them on the relentless gears of War.
  Ruby: Now it was your turn to show it what happened when one flirted with Death.
• Press-Ganged: Both Lily and Alexandria do this to War Refugees fleeing their countries to bolster their numbers. Ruby and Jaune quickly put a stop to this.
• Pride:
  • Lily's defining trait, one that prevents her from seeing her own faults and goads her to exact retribution from those she perceives as having wronged her.
  • This was the Semblance of the Tyrant who launched the Great War eighty years ago. He didn't take Menagerie's rebellion well and so nuked their mines along with a large portion of the continent.
• Ragnarök Proofing: The ruins and technology found on the Dark Continent are remarkably intact for structures that have been around for centuries, if not millennia.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: As the leaders of each of the different cultures are trained Huntsman and Huntresses thrust into their position by the sim, they are almost guaranteed to be the greatest fighters their nation has to offer.
• Rapid Aging : The players Auras will rapidly age their bodies to what they were in the simulation once they leave due to their souls considering that their natural state. Those who have reached the stage of Lord or higher will age the least due to the slowing of aging that comes with that level.
• Really 700 Years Old: Aura works by restoring one's body to its natural state depending on their level of mastery of Aura, effectively slowing their aging. Lords age at half the normal rate, Paragons a quarter, and Gods don't age at all. Of the two Gods, Professor Ozpin has lived for centuries while Salem has lived for millenia.
• Reality Warper: Sun becomes a minor one when in Avatar form and boosted by Jaune. This allows him to alter reality in such a way that Cychreides' plasma cannon is entirely deflected.
• Reasonable Authority Figure:
  • Cardin spends most of his time in the sim being its "Beacon of Peace", leading relief and refugee efforts, trying to establish peace between the numerous hostile states in Central, and becoming a genuinely good person that everyone in the sim eventually grows to respect.
  • Jaune supported Cardin in almost all of his efforts, personally lead the charges to lay claim to Normandy, had the Bio-Armor they found extensively analyzed to guarantee that it had no negative effect on the user's soul, and willingly shared his information on advanced technology, Grimm, and Titans with the other leaders when the giant monsters awoke around the world.
• Recruitment by Rescue: How Jaune gains Coco as a follower.
• Restored My Faith in Humanity: Jaune does this twice.
  • When he and Sun go to explore the ruins outside of Normandy, Sun confides in him about his past and the abuse his family suffered through that led to him losing faith in the world. He then goes on to say that the work Jaune was doing and the constant effort he put forth to uphold his ideals had put a spark of hope back into him that people were worth believing in.
  • Invisible text from Toppling Olympus has revealed that the simulation's version of Salem has had her faith restored by Jaune due to what he is willing to do for his people. As someone who witnessed the fall of the Dark Continent along with the corruption of the various God level beings and who would themselves later turn against humanity in the real world, this is a big deal. So big a deal, in fact, that she has advised Jaune on how to ascend to Godhood: by getting the scroll from her real-world counterpart. She has faith that if he manages such a thing, then he will have earned it.
• Rousing Speech: Jaune delivers several throughout his time in Normandy that never fail to ignite his people's hopes and spirits. Aurora delivers one as well while evacuating a city plagued by Grimm.
• Ruling Couple: Jaune and Cinder, following their marriage. They both take part in the governing of their kingdom and they excel at it almost as much as they do at actual combat.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The Titans. When they first went rogue and destroyed the ancient civilization that had created them, the last of the civilization's scientists were able to send a shut-off code that sent them all to sleep. The only ones known to rouse from this are those on the Dark Continent that awaken whenever humans venture there. If one of them were to die, however...
• Self-Destruct Mechanism:
  • The Ahriman Protocol. Bahamut, and presumably the other Titans as well, can be forced to self destruct when their will is overridden by that of another's.
  • Ragnos release a highly flammable gas from within themselves upon their demise that they light as their last act.
• She Is All Grown Up: While neither of them are unattractive, Jaune and Ruby matured quite well during the simulation.
  • Jaune went from a scrawny, naive kid who lagged behind his teammates◊, to a battle-hardened leader and king◊ whose heroics has won the hearts of many. He also caused Cinder to fall in love with him over the course of the story.
  • Ruby◊ similarly grew into a beautiful young woman◊ whose mastery of transformation weaponry allowed her to sow death and destruction on the battlefield.
• Shock and Awe: Jaune's favored method of ranged combat after he was given Aurea Victus from Ruby as a wedding present.
• Spiteful Spit: Neil spits on Ruby's boots before leaving the Peace Conference to ally with Lily and Varric in response to Ruby allying herself with Alexandria, the woman whose stated goal is the complete conquest of the Central Continent.
• Stronger with Age: Grimm grow larger and more intelligent with time, making the older ones a nightmare to face.
• Super-Empowering: Jaune's Semblance, War. It allows him to form an Aural gestalt when enough people are fighting under him, allowing each of them to exceed their normal capabilities and letting them share information on a somewhat instinctual level. His Avatar form also qualifies but it only empowers other Avatar forms.
• Super Mode:
  • Paragons and Gods have the ability to transform into their Avatar forms, a true manifestation of the user's soul. Paragons can only maintain this form for a short time while Gods can do so indefinitely.
  • Those equipped with Grimmtech can also do this as their suits are only summoned forth when the user wills them to be.
• Super-Soldier: Many of Jaune's marines are enhanced with Grimmtech suits to increase their capabilities and they prove instrumental in the Fall of Olympus.
• Super-Speed: Ruby. Her time in the sim has only made her faster.
• Super-Strength: Coco. Her Semblance not only makes her incredibly strong, it also grants her the Required Secondary Powers necessary to use it, such as the ground not sinking beneath her, and her not being blown back from firing the Harkonnen.
• Supernatural Fear Inducer:
  • Titans have a presence about them that imbibes a sense of fear and despair upon their enemies that even Paragons are not immune to.
  • Conqueror's Presence, one of the abilities of Jaune's Semblance, is statistically more terrifying. It allows him to inflict almost crippling horror upon his opponents. He has only ever used this ability on the Creatures of Anonymity but if he were to use it on humans it would likely draw the Grimm upon them in droves.
• Superpowerful Genetics: Cinder, Jaune, and Ruby.
  • Cinder carries the Blood of Destruction, an inheritance passed down in her line since before they were cast from power by those who had placed them there
  • Jaune carries the Blood of War, a power cultivated in his line in an attempt to avoid the self-destructive nature of others without losing any of their might.
  • Ruby carries the Blood of Death, a legacy bestowed upon her line for the sake of destroying the Grimm but that may destroy themselves in the end.
• Taking You with Me: Both Ghouls and Cychreides attempt to pull this on their murderers by disregarding their own safety and hitting their killers with everything they have left.
• Teleportation: Sun gains the ability to switch places with any of his clones after he becomes a Paragon.
• Telescoping Staff: Sun's Avatar weapon is a staff with dimensions that he can freely change at will.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Normandy hits Cychreides with a Supernatural Fear Inducer, corrosive and explosive bombs, hypersonic bullets, destruction forged Aural constructs, an ice mine, a gravity spike through its eye, dozens of rounds of howitzer and battleship fire, and hundreds of rounds fired from the Harkonnen. It almost isn't enough.
• This Means War!: Ruby considers an assault on her civilians to be adequate reason to declare war on Lily.
• Time-Limit Boss: The Titans become these following their awakening — all factions from both sides of the story are in a mad rush to kill them, because while the Titans are monsters already, everyone would be put in a worse position and wiped out if they didn't do something.
  • Cychreides. If it hadn't been defeated exactly when it was, the Titan would have used the injured Normans as a distraction to temporarily retreat and fully heal before attacking again.
  • Olympus. It is capable of shattering almost any structure in its range. If it had been allowed to advance to the Norman outcropping, the amount of lives lost would have been drastically higher.
• Time Master: Ozpin. As a Paragon, he is able to disrupt local time in an area, accelerate an individual, or rewind time itself to save an ally.
• Took a Level in Badass: This happens to many players throughout the game but shout outs go to those who have gone through the Paragon ritual.
  • Jaune goes from being possibly the weakest hunter in-training in his school with only months of actual training to becoming the top player in the game and among the three strongest fighters alongside Ruby and Cinder while running the most powerful military in the SIM to boot.
  • Ruby goes from a cute Genki Girl to one of the three most powerful and terrifying hunters in the sim while being the most potentially dangerous in a one-on-one confrontation as she is a Paragon of Death.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Cardin
• Training from Hell: Jaune undergoes this before the Fall of Olympus and the rest of the Norman Paragons do so after. It started with every bone in his arm being shattered, his chest being impaled, and then being told to get up and try again.
• Turned Against Their Masters: The Titans did this to their makers who are implied to be the Fallen Gods of today.
• Unconscious Objector: Jaune continues to maintain the Aegis protecting his people against the eruption of Olympus even after he passes out from the strain of doing so.
• Undeathly Pallor: While not undead, this is a side-effect exhibited in anyone who advances sufficiently far in Grimmtech such as Jaune, Cinder, and Salem.
• Undying Loyalty: The people of Normandy treat Jaune with an almost divine reverence and its stated that each would give their lives a million times over for the sake of their lord. He fully reciprocates.
• Universally Beloved Leader: Jaune and Ruby are this by the end of the sim. Ruby's people adore her for the effort she puts forth to better their country. Jaune's civilians treat him as near divinity and his soldiers treat him as a close friend because of both how hard he strove to secure their safety and the victories he attained while doing so.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: While Cinder married Jaune solely for the benefits of being connected to a powerful warrior-general and his kingdom, she grows to genuinely care for him as her husband and equal. This means that Cinder will violently retaliate against anything that will try to take Jaune away from her.
• War Is Hell: The war on the central continent consumes thousands of lives, causes a vast increase in Grimm activity, and even its original instigators wanted an end. The biggest proponents of peace were Cardin, Jaune, and Ruby. Cardin, as the sim's resident Pope, spent years trying to establish peace between the hostile states. Jaune, the Paragon of War, accepted refugees, refused to become an Arms Dealer, stopped impressment in the northern hemisphere, and sent food and soldiers to supply Oum's Ascension. Ruby also accepted refugees, stopped impressment in the southern hemisphere, advocated for peace, and hunted down pirates. Ruby eventually joins in on the war after Lily attacked her docks in revenge for Silversun sinking the impressment ship her daughters were on for their first voyage. Ruby allies with Alexandria Steelshine, but Varric and Neil immediately ally with Lily to oppose them.
• We Do the Impossible: Jaune earned this reputation by turn two, so much so that most people think his accomplishments a gross exaggeration. By the end of the sim, the rest of the world has either retreated from or been destroyed by the Titans. The Normans have killed three of them.
• Weaponized Offspring: Shatterers spawn a wave of elite Grimm from their corpse when they are killed.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist:
  • Alexandria believes that the Central continent would be best run with her ruling over it. The only way she sees to make this a reality is through war, with any who do not assist her being considered her enemies.
  • What the Tyrant who started the Great War eighty years ago is said to have been. He wanted to stop the Grimm and genuinely help the world, his methods just weren't very popular, even though they kind of worked.
• Wham Episode: Several on both sides:
  • It was a good idea at the time: Ruby's plan needlessly gets Cody killed, the second player death in the sim, and his city isolates itself from the rest of the world as a result.
  • The Last Gasp of Peace: Ruby declared war on Lily and forged an alliance with Alexandria. This caused a series of Disaster Dominoes as several formerly neutral parties to ally with Lily in retaliation, making the war larger than it ever was before and possibly alienating Cardin permanently.
  • Cleaning Up: Lamplight Landing has been purged of Grimm and a young Ozpin has come to assist Ruby.
  • Turn 7 Results (Jaune): Jaune's engaged... to Cinder.
  • The Darkness Awakens: The Titans of the Dark Continent have awoken.
  • Battle for Jersey part 8: Cychreides has been killed but it was a programmed Warbeast that, with its last act, initiated the Vengeance Protocol and awoke the rest of the Warbeasts around the world.
  • Titan Aftermath: A simulated version of Salem is in the sim and she's interested in Jaune.
  • Toppling Olympus: Sun was killed by the Mad Gods of Olympus right before Jaune ripped them apart.
  • Turn 20 Results (Jaune): Salem requests that Jaune find her real world counterpart and restore her faith in humanity like he already did for her. Once he does, her real world counterpart will give him the God-level Aura ritual.
• Wham Line: Several on both sides:
  • Cleaning Up:
    "Oscar Diggs, at your service, Your Majesty. I was drawn to your city by the tales of your force's acts of heroism on the high seas. I was hoping to offer my services to you in this time of turmoil."
    And with those words, Ozpin, your Headmaster from outside the simulation offers you his hand.
  • Turn 7 Results (Jaune):
    When Cinder came to Normandy, she was impressed. Suitably so to discuss an alliance and after a feast held on the first day to welcome her, you got one. Well, it was one way to get an alliance, though the new ring of black dust crystal on your finger seems weirdly cold.
  • Battle for Jersey part 8:
    [SYSTEM FAILURE, IMMINENT]
    [ACTIVATING HADES PROTOCOLS]
    [WARBEAST 5 COMPROMISED. VENGEANCE PROTOCOL INITIATED.]
    [WARBEASTS 2, 12 DETECTED. WARBEASTS ACTIVE.]
    [WIDENING SEARCH. SIX SIGNALS IDENTIFIED.]
    [SENDING ACTIVATION COMMAND.]
  • Titan Aftermath: The Watcher:
    "You may refer to me as... Salem. Perhaps we shall meet again, if you heed my advice."
  • The Calculus of war:
    "... All of the continents other than Menagerie and the Dark Continent are lost. The situation is untenable."
  • Turn 18 Results (Jaune):
    "Though, if you would trust anyone to know about the Titan, it would probably be the one remaining member of the group that made it. [...] Bahamut was my greatest creation, and my greatest failure. And I have reason to believe we can control it again. At least long enough to trigger the self-destruct mechanism."
• Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: Ruby wonders this about Jaune while visiting Oum's Ascension for the first Peace Conference and Jaune and Cinder's wedding when she sees that, in an era where the rest of the world has smoothbore cannons and flintlock pistols, his men are carrying modern rifles and utilizing Howitzers.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist:
  • Ruby starts as this, but eventually loses her naivete as the sim progresses and develops into The Idealist.
  • Cardin has a bit of this later on when he refuses to abandon Oum's Ascension in hopes of saving more lives to the point that even Ruby gives up on him. He eventually confides in Jaune that he has hopes that Jaune and Ruby would be able to marshal their forces and turn Oum's Ascension into one last bastion against the darkness or at least assist in its evacuation if it was deemed untenable. Jaune swiftly relieves him of this notion.
• Win to Exit: The players are forced to survive for ten years in the sim before they can leave. While being killed in the sim will also eject them, this method can cause the players' physical bodies to experience permanent injury or even death.
• World of Badass: Considering that the Sim is modeled after a death world it makes sense for the people running the show to be able to survive in such a world.
• Year Inside, Hour Outside: The nature of the simulation. For every year spent in the simulation, only one day passes for those outside it. Once the simulation is over, the participants' Auras age them to their in-sim forms as that is what they recognize as their body's natural state.
  • This becomes deconstructed once the sim ends as each of the players have aged ten years while their former teammates have not. This has led to a psychological, social, and emotional disparity between those who didn't participate in the sim (and thus were ignorant of what happened in there) and those who lived through horrific things and grew in ways their former comrades couldn't imagine.
• You Are in Command Now: What happens to every single leader in-sim. In order for each of them to experience a national leadership position, the sim killed off each of their superiors so that they would be forced to take the reigns. One of the NPCs even wonders about this, thinking it may be the greatest chain of assassinations of all time.
• Young Conqueror: Jaune starts his conquest of the Dark Continent during his late adolescence and continues to seize more and more cities from the Grimm as time goes on.
• Zerg Rush: The go-to strategy for the Grimm is to attempt to overrun their adversaries using their massive numerical advantage. The older ones subvert this via deploying a level of tactics that is utterly lethal.

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