Over a hundred likes. Wow... Sorry for taking so long- scrapped two different versions of the chapter before I settled on this one, then I suffered a bad case of laziness. I’ll try to get chapters out faster in the future.



Also, please prepare yourselves for the expositional onslaught that is coming.



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Ruby had woken up after around an hour of unconsciousness (at least, as best as the rest of team RWBY could tell) in an infirmary of some kind. Her team had been sitting nearby, waiting for her to wake up.



Once they realized that she was awake, Yang had quickly moved to her side and started to fuss. It had taken a while (and the intervention of Weiss) to convince her that Ruby was fine.



Her team had then began to fill her in on the details that they knew of, and what had happened while she was unconscious. After she had collapsed, Yang had gone berserk and scared the ever-loving crap out of the crowd- thankfully, Weiss managed to defuse the situation.



After the crowd had dispersed, they had been approached by a middle-aged man, who had attempted to talk with them. Key word being attempted, as neither group could understand the other initially. Again, key word being initially.



The man had chanted a bit (something that had almost resulted in a fight breaking out again), and then had waved his staff. Then, he had talked again. This time, however, they could understand him- and vice-versa.



The man had done his best to explain some things for them- such as his name, Colbert, where they were, and why they were there. They were, apparently, at the Tristain Academy of Magic, where Colbert served as a professor. As in actual magic, not just some cheap parlor tricks. WBY had been… skeptical of that. They wouldn’t have believed it at all if a chant hadn’t allowed them to understand an entirely different language perfectly.



Then they had gotten to the why, and Yang had to be stopped once again by Weiss and Blake from causing harm to the man- and Ruby could understand why she was so upset. Apparently, the second-year students had been summoning familiars for themselves- creatures that were expected to serve their masters until death, protecting them if necessary. Mostly, though, they served as, as Yang so ‘lightly’ put it, glorified pets.



Ruby glanced at the mark on her hand and grimaced. When Yang had realized exactly what it was supposed to represent, she had been furious- heck, she was still furious! Blake was just as mad, though she had at least not attempted to maul the professor when she learned of it, though she no doubt glared at him. Weiss, while not as mad as the other two, was still mad none-the-less.



Professor Colbert, after his brief explanation, had offered his help in bringing Ruby to the school infirmary. Yang had immediately been opposed, but had, in the end, relented when Weiss and Blake had pointed out that it would be best for Ruby to lie down and rest somewhere other than the hard ground, and that the academy would be the best place to do so for the moment. She still carried Ruby all the way herself, though, and had apparently kept an eye on her like a hawk as the healers had examined her. Likewise, both she and the rest of WBY had refused to relinquish their weapons, something Colbert had agreed to.



The professor had then left after jotting down a rough sketch of the runes on Ruby’s hand, saying he would return some time after she woke up to explain more to them. The healers had followed shortly after, though either they or a maid would return every now and then to check on her. Thrice now a dark-haired maid had shown up to check on her while she was awake. The second time, she had stated that the professor was busy at the moment and would get to them first thing in the morning.



They had learned more from the maid, named Siesta, on her third visit- mostly about the society here. In short, those who could use magic were nobles, ruling over the commoners- those who, due to their birth, lacked magic. And while there were exceptions to this, it was almost universally magic-users who held power, purely because of what they were born as. Blake had… not been happy. At all.



Siesta hadn’t been able to tell them much else, however, as she had to leave to attend to other duties. So, the team had retired for the evening, trying to get some sleep. Or, at least, they would have, had Ruby not taken a glance out one of the room’s few windows.



Two moons.



There were two moons.



Two whole moons.



Suffice to say, team RWBY didn’t get that much sleep that night.



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That’s it for now. Yes, I know, it’s not all that big a chapter, but I just needed to get this expositional onslaught out of the way. I will probably be going over these things in later chapters as they are actually encountered in far greater detail, though I will only be doing one or two at a time. Mostly because I just can’t do exposition very well in really large amounts. I promise that next chapter is going to be longer and far less "Tell-don't-show"-ee. I'll try to avoid repeats of this in the future.