The King of Steel (RWBY/ Ozpin SI): Chapter 12

I walked through the long halls of Atlas Academy alongside James as we headed toward where the current Winter Maiden was located.

All the while, the students around us stared at me with awe and whispered among themselves.

This is an understandable reaction given what had transpired just a few days ago with the White Fang and the live broadcast.

Thanks to my manipulation of that video, I had become someone who was kind enough to give the Faunus a lot of benefits out of my own goodwill, only to be spurned by the leader of the White Fang.

And this reaction is exactly what I wanted in the first place, to make the white fang into a pariah who would receive very little support from now on, although that plan is only in the initial phase with the live broadcast only being the first step of the plan.

Fortunately, after I retrieve the fragment of my soul from the Winter Maiden and regain most of my power, I can properly start to concentrate on the rest of the plan and completely eradicate the White Fang.

Soon, we arrived at the massive complex beneath the academy that James had converted into a living space for the current Winter Maiden.

In truth, this place is no less than a five-star hotel room from my previous life on Earth.

And yet, no matter how gilded, a cage is still a cage. A fact that the Maiden knew perfectly yet accepted it as an inescapable fate.

Another reminder of the massive mistake that I made when I gave these powers to the Maidens all those incarnations ago.

The moment we walked through the room’s door, I was assaulted by a pulse of magic that tried to identify any threats toward its wielder.

How interesting.

“I see that you have learned to use your magic beyond its elemental abilities. Did your predecessor teach it to you? Or did you discover it on your own?”

At my question and smile, the old woman who was nearly a decade older than my current body, Fria, looked at me with a gentle smile and spoke with a tired voice.

“I learned that my magic had more to it than its elemental abilities during my thirties, ever since then, I have been trying to explore it on my own.”

I nodded my head at those words and sat down beside her bed.

Despite being a Maiden and a trained huntress who was only in her seventies, she had already become bedridden with a body that no longer had the ability to respond to her instincts and mind.

Truly, time had not been kind to her. A result of a life spent on the battlefield and always surviving with the skin of her teeth where others would perish, accumulating hidden injuries and ailments that healed badly due to her constant assignments given to her by James’s predecessor.

Looking at the woman in front of me, I could not help but gaze sadly.

“It has been a while, Fria.”

“You call nearly fifty years of silence ‘a while’? Ozpin?”

I turned my gaze away from her smile with guilt, knowing that she was right.

Ozma-no. I need to stop hiding behind Ozma’s name especially since I can feel that our merger has accelerated and he is barely holding onto his individuality these days.

I had neglected Fria for more than fifty years now.

After she was given the powers of a Maiden when I was still barely a teenager in accordance with my wishes by James’s predecessor, I had barely maintained contact beyond keeping tabs on her and the Relic of Creation since I had a lot of work to do and many other important things to keep tabs on.

And yet, it does not change the fact that I had thrust this burden on a young woman who should have been living the best years of her life and forced her into a cruel situation that would have broken many adults, much less a young adult like her in those times.

And now that I need that power back, I have come here to callously end her life and take away the burned, when most of her life has already been spent and she barely has a decade and a half to live.

What else can I feel but guilt and remorse for what I had done to her?

Suddenly, I was brought out of my thoughts when Fria held my had with hers, her gentle smile never leaving her face.

“Ozpin, I know what you are thinking, and I will tell you now what I told you all those years ago. I know the burden that you ask me to bear and I chose it willingly. Even now, after all these decades, I do not blame you, and neither do I feel like you robbed me of a life I could have lived.”

She looked away as her eyes stared at a place far away, a place only she would know.

“Granted, I do fantasize about what life would have been like if I had not taken this burden. Would I have become a famous huntress recognized by all? Would I have married the man that I fell in love with when I was a teenager? Would Weda and I have made a family of our own?”

Once again, Guilt consumed me when I heard Weda’s name in her mouth, knowing that the young man who was her team leader back in the day had died shortly after graduating in a massive Grimm outbreak.

Although, a part of my braid did not fail to notice the peculiarity that Weda is the Old Frisian name for Odin from Norse myths just like Fria is the Old Frisian name for Frigg.

But, I suppressed those thoughts ruthlessly.

This is not the time for exploring these curious coincidences, especially when the woman I called a friend once upon a time was pouring her heart out to me.

Fria turned to me once again and smiled, making my guilt worse.

“But, I know that all of these are useless fantasies that might never have realized even if I did not have this burden. And even if I was assured that these things would happen, I would still have chosen to abandon all these good things and chosen to take on the powers of the maiden.”

“…But why? Fria.”

“Because I don’t regret saving the lives of people as I did during the countless assignments I undertook. Because I don’t regret the changes I brought to my home kingdom, and the world at large during my work as the Winter Maiden. Because I don’t regret helping you shoulder the burden that you have been dealing with for thousands of years for the sake of our world.”

I looked away from her gentle smile, feeling like my resolve would waver and I would not be able to maintain my cold nature if I continued listening to her, especially when I felt like my heart was being clawed out because of the guilt I felt for ruining her life like this.

Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath and suppressed the turmoil in my heart, staring at her seriously.

“Fria. Do you know why I am here today?”

“I know. James told me. And, I am ready, my old fried.”

“….You will probably not survive the procedure due to your age and how closely the fragment of my soul is bound to your own.”

“Like I said, I know, Ozpin. And I am prepared for it. In fact, I have been prepared for this day for a long, long time now.”

Sadness consumed my mind at her gentle words, knowing that she spoke nothing but the truth.

Just how heavy must the burden have been for her to speak in such a way, to wish for death for such a long time?

Once again, I cursed myself for the stupid mistake I made by creating the Maidens.

“…In that case, shall we begin, Fria?”

Fria simply smiled and closed her eyes, holding tightly onto my palm. An action that I reciprocated, knowing that I was the closest thing to a family she ever after the death of her team had and that she would prefer to have me with her in her final moments.

Unlike with Amber where I carried out the procedure quickly and with Raven where the objective was to extend her misery for as long as possible, I took a completely different approach with my old friend.

I first flooded her body with my own magic, disabling her pain receptors and protecting her body from any backlash due to the procedure.

Then, once I was sure that she was secure and that she would not feel anything, I slowly guided the fragment of my soul within her towards myself, making sure that her soul would be untouched and would be able to freely ascend to the Afterlife after I was done.

This is a process that is unbearably painful for me since I will be focusing my magic on removing the physical and supernatural pain that Fria would feel because of the extraction, which would mean that I would not have any such protection myself and would feel the pain of merging the broken fragments of my soul back together through my magic.

And yet, I gritted my teeth and endured this pain beyond description, feeling that this was retribution for the countless lives of women that my power had destroyed over the hundreds of years that the Maidens had existed on this planet.

Finally, after nearly a minute of this process, I finally felt like my soul was nearly whole as Fria’s vitals started to drop quickly.

“Goodbye, Fria. I hope you have a peaceful Afterlife.”

I muttered to the unconscious woman and continued circling my magic within her, keeping her asleep and numb as her life slowly faded.

With this, The Fall, the Winter, and the Spring Maidens are no more. But, any victory I felt turned to ash in my mouth as I stared at the lifeless corpse of my friend.

Taking a deep breath and suppressing my emotions, I stood up from the stool and turned back to James who held a sad expression, watching the corpse with me.

“Let’s go, James. We have work to do.”