Ch 23: Wolfden (2)

*Snick* "GGGGGGYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!" With his Aura weaponized around his hand, Ray's hand had turned into a razor-sharp blade and cut clean through Wolfden's arm, severing his arm from just above the elbow, right below Wolfden's arm plate.

[Why!? How!? How could I miss judge a simple block!? How can his clawless paw be this sharp!?] As Wolfden screamed in pain and shock. Ray took advantage of the gap created and aimed a leg sweep at his knees. Once again, Ray weaponized his Aura, this time over his shin, and cut through Wolfden's resilient fur, tough flesh, and dense bone with little resistance. Severing both of Wolfden's legs at the knees.

Wolfden fell to the ground, whimpering. The shock suppressing the pain and quieting his voice. Looking up at the 'Food' looming over him, he experienced fear for the first time in his short life and tried to drag himself away with his remaining arm.

"Much better. Dogs should remember their place and remain crawling on the ground rather than trying to walk on two legs like a Fanus." Ray mocked down at his defeated enemy. He may have enjoyed the fight, but he had no mercy for those who would hurt those he cared about without a second thought. In fact, he was downright sadistic at times.

"Here, let me help you." Ray spoke kindly. However, his actions were anything but kind. With a flick of his pointer and middle fingers, Ray sent a crescent of Aura flying through the air and severed Wolfden's remaining arm at the elbow.

"GYAAAAHHHH! *hic* *sob* *hic* Please. *sob* Please *ugh* Sorry *hic* Wolfden is sorry *sob*."

"There, there. It will be alright. Don't worry. I'm not going to kill you. You still have so much to tell us." Ray crouched down beside the pathetic Grimm Lord and petted his head using his Semblance to stimulate Wolfden's pleasure nerves, making sure that it felt good to him.

[Why!? Why does Wolfden enjoy his touch?!] Wolfden was horrified and humiliated by his treacherous body's reaction but couldn't stop his tail from wagging

"Alrighty, now. Let's stop that bleeding. We wouldn't want you to die of blood loss, now would we?" As Ray continued to pet Wolfden, he sent four Storm Tears to each of the stumps where Wolfden's limbs had once been. The Storm Tears positioned themselves at equal distance around the wounds and started sending powerful, concentrated arcs of electricity to the Storm Tear directly across the injury from them, cauterizing the wounds as they circled it.

The fear, pain, and humiliation, at last, proved to be too much for Wolfden's mind to bear, and it finally shut down. Allowing Wolfden to escape his torment into oblivious sleep.

[Now that I know everything about what you are, let's see what you know.] Ray sat down beside Wolfden, his hand resting on the back of Wolfden's head. To all watching, it looked like he was simply waiting for Ozpin's reinforcements to arrive while guarding his prisoner. However, the truth was something far more sinister.

An enemy should never, ever, let Ray come into contact with their body. An honestly impossible feat once combat is initiated. Once Ray touched someone and latched a bit of his Aura onto them, as long as they remained within his Domain, he could no longer just read the signals sent through their nervous system but hijack that very nervous system and intercept, modify, or generate his own signals. That is what it truly means when he says that within his domain, his will is absolute.

It became even worse if he was able to grab hold of their head or the back of their neck. The brain is composed of various proteins and chemicals, but electrical signals control it. By stimulating the parts of the brain that contain memories, Ray can have those memories sent to the conscious portion of the mind as electric signals. Signals that he can read.

While he waited, Ray looked around, his sight passing over a small Nevermore, no bigger than a crow, perched up in a tree a little over 25 meters away, watching him.

[I look forward to meeting you 'Swain'.] A smile tugged at the corners of Ray's lips as he let his gaze slide past the Nevermore like he didn't find it important or interesting. The Nevermore watched him for a moment longer before flying away.

"Ho Ho. That is quite the fine catch you got there, young man." A portly white-skinned man, about 5'8", with light gray hair and a truly gorgeous mustache who looked to be in the early stages of old age wearing a double-breasted burgundy suit with gold piping and buttons and olive-colored cavalry boots walked out of the brush with a blunderbuss that had a double-bladed ax head as the buttstock slung over his shoulder and greeted Ray.

"Nice to meet you, Professor Port. Your mustache is as magnificent as the rumors implied." Ray greeted the Grimm Studies teacher at Beacon Academy back.

"Ho Ho. Well, thank you, my boy. Now, what do we have here?!" Professor Peter Port laughed at Ray's honest flattery and turned his attention to the creature beside him.

"I'm not sure. Some sort of mutant Beowolf? I can tell you it is a Grimm without a shadow of a doubt. There isn't a spark of Aura in it or a soul, as far as I can tell. But it is intelligent enough to talk and communicate, even if its speech is a bit broken. Possibly even sapient since it was able to give itself a name."

"Ho? A name you say."

"Yeah, it called itself Wolfden."

"Fascinating. In all my years of studying Grimm, I have never heard of such a thing, and I have heard and seen some extraordinary things. Why when I was younger...blah blah blah blah…" Professor Port began to go off on one of his rambling, exaggerated stories about the feats of his youth that were just as famous as his mustache. But legend had it that if you could stay awake through his lectures, which were more like an autobiography with liberal creative licensing taken, you could gain some valuable pearls of wisdom that you could never find in any book. Personally, Ray suspected that it was just learning patients and how to endure long stretches of boredom while staying alert on missions.

"Professor Port," Ray interrupted him, "Shouldn't we get this Grimm somewhere secure before it regains consciousness."

"Ah, yes, *Ahem* Right you are." Professor Port swung the cage he was carrying on his back over his shoulder with one hand, letting it fall to the ground with a loud thud next to the downed Wolfden. "Just put the creature in there. No prey has ever escaped my cage."

Ray doubted even Professor Port, a Huntsman famous for capturing Grimm alive to conduct research on, had ever tried to cage a Grimm with Titan level strength. Still, there were no better options at the moment, and Wolfden would be out for quite some time after the mental and physical trauma Ray had inflicted on him.

"Alright. But let's make sure we properly secure it when we get back to the academy. I may have crippled it, but that doesn't change the fact it hit like a Titan while its limbs were whole." Ray roughly stuffed Wolfden into the cage and secured the door while giving Professor Port a friendly reminder.

"Indeed." Professor Port nods at Ray's words, taking them very seriously.

As the two begin the long trek through the forest to return to the academy, Ray turns to look in the direction his friends had left and where he can hear fighting going on in the distance.

[I wonder how Ruby, Yang, and the rest of the gang are fairing.]