Chương 47: Chapter 44: The Inter-Academy Mandate

"We are going to Mistral?!" The high-pitched exclamation from Ruby Rose shattered the oppressive, stagnant silence of Headmistress Glynda Goodwitch's office. Her silver eyes were wide as saucers, her body leaning forward so aggressively over the mahogany desk that her red cloak swept across several stack-pads of structural repair bills. Her hands were planted flat on the polished wood, her fingers twitching against the grain.

Beside her, the remaining members of Team RWBY and Team JNPR stood frozen in a dense, tense semicircle. The atmosphere in the tower was suffocatingly quiet, save for the rhythmic, agonizingly slow ticking of the giant brass clockwork gears overhead. Sunlight streamed through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting sharp, geometric prisms of amber and violet across the room, but it offered absolutely no warmth to the bewildered teenagers.

Glynda Goodwitch stood rigidly behind her desk, her riding crop tucked tightly beneath her arm, her sharp green eyes flashing behind her oval glasses as she adjusted them with a slow, calculating precision. Her face was a perfectly composed mask of academic authority, though the subtle tightness in her jaw line betrayed the administrative pressure she had been enduring for weeks.

"Calm your posture, Miss Rose," Glynda said, her icy, no-nonsense voice easily cutting through the cavernous space. She picked up a stark, silver data-pad, tapping the glass to project a localized, glowing holographic map of the Anima continent into the center of the room.

"You heard me correctly. As of 0600 hours this morning, Team RWBY and Team JNPR are being formally mobilized for an active, cross-continental deployment."

"But Headmistress," Jaune Arc stepped forward, his brow furrowing as he rubbed the back of his neck. His voice carried a hesitant, strain-laced cadence.

"Mistral is halfway across the world. The global communications matrix is still completely unstable after the Battle of Beacon. We're just students. Aren't there active, high-tier Huntsmen or Atlesian Specialists who are supposed to handle transcontinental security?"

"Under normal regulatory parameters, yes, Mr. Arc," Glynda replied smoothly, her emerald eyes tracking his stance. She bypassed his question by pulling up a scrolling military directive on the holotable.

"However, the current global security climate requires an unconventional response. General Ironwood and I have recently finalized a high-priority, joint administrative protocol: the 'Inter-Academy Exchange and Defense Initiative.'""The Inter-Academy Exchange and Defense Initiative?" Weiss Schnee repeated the phrase, her voice dripping with clinical skepticism. She crossed her arms tightly over her combat skirt, her lips thinning into a precise, pouting line as her analytical mind tore into the title.

"Headmistress, with all due respect to the chain of command, that sounds like a hastily assembled bureaucratic cover for a sudden domestic emergency. Has Haven Academy experienced a structural collapse?" Glynda didn't flinch at the Schnee heiress's sharp intuition. She merely adjusted her grip on her riding crop.

"We are currently registering total silence from Haven Academy's primary border outposts. Headmaster Lionheart has attributed the breakdown of their domestic security channels to highly localized, aggressive White Fang insurgencies along the upper terraced trading routes. However, due to severe political friction within the Mistral High Council, General Ironwood is legally and diplomatically prohibited from sending Atlas military units or Ace Operatives into their borders to investigate.

Any overt military presence would be viewed as an aggressive foreign occupation." Pyrrha Nikos shifted her weight, her green eyes reflecting the pale blue glow of the holographic map as she looked at her partners. Her posture was impeccably straight, embodying the discipline of a lifetime athlete, though her fingers sub-consciously tightened around the strap of her shield.

"So... because the official military channels are completely locked by political gridlock, you are utilizing us as an independent variable?"

"Precisely, Miss Nikos," Glynda stated, a subtle, fiercely proud nod breaking her rigid expression for a microsecond.

"As Second-Year students, you have spent the last several months training against apex threats under the brutal, reality-breaking parameters of our Special Campus Security Consultant and Tactical Kinetic Evaluator... Mr. Saitama. You have continuously pushed past human limitations to adapt to his speed and density.

Statistically and operationally, you are the only units uniquely qualified to act as an independent, high-density peacekeeping vanguard capable of stabilizing Haven's perimeter without triggering a diplomatic crisis." Lie Ren stood in absolute, meditative stillness beside Nora, his sharp eyes tracking the tactical coordinates blinking on the display.

"Our parameters are strictly investigative, then? We are to establish a secure, physical link with Haven's administration and avoid direct conflict with the local council?"

"Those are your explicit orders, Mr. Ren," Glynda commanded, her voice dropping into a severe, warning register.

"You are to land quietly, bypass the domestic political noise, and navigate straight to the lower terraces of the city. To ensure you are not flying entirely blind, I am uploading an encrypted set of coordinates to your scrolls. An independent, high-level Beacon operative is already on the ground tracking these regional anomalies. Your absolute first priority upon landing is to rendezvous with him at that secure safehouse."

Glynda intentionally kept her gaze fixed on the data-pad, keeping the deeper layers of the shadow war carefully guarded. She and the rest of Ozpin's secret group had strictly agreed during their private meetings that maintaining absolute secrecy regarding Ozpin's reincarnation into a young farm boy and the true, hidden nature of the enemy driving the global threat was paramount. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

Giving these teenagers the volatile truth about Leonardo Lionheart's potentially compromised state or the shadowy mastermind coordinating the Grimm from the dark would cause immediate panic before a long transcontinental flight. They would let Ozpin guide them through the next steps once they arrived safely at the Mistral safehouse.

"A secret operative?" Ruby tapped her chin, her short red hair swaying as her mind raced through the tactical setup. Then, a sudden, comedic wave of concern washed over her face, her eyes turning into giant, worried circles.

"Wait a second! Headmistress! If Team RWBY and Team JNPR are both leaving for Anima immediately... who is going to keep Vale safe? What happens if a giant horde of ancient Grimm marches out of the Emerald Forest while we're gone?" Yang Xiao Long let out a short, boisterous laugh, rolling her violet eyes as she slouched her shoulders, her golden hair catching the sunlight.

"Uh, Earth to Ruby? Did you completely forget who is currently sweeping the front courtyard with a standard straw broom right now?"

"Oh! Right!" Ruby's face instantly flushed a slight, embarrassed pink as she slapped a hand against her forehead comically.

"We have Saitama! He can just swat them away like he did with those weird big monkeys in the woods." Then, she blinked, another thought short-circuiting her brain as she leaned forward again.

"But wait! Who is going to accompany Saitama when he goes into the city? You know what happens when he goes to the domestic sectors alone to buy discount groceries! He gets completely lost, he doesn't carry a scroll, and yesterday he ended up wearing a synthetic black male wig on the news because he accidentally kicked a terrorist van upside down!"

A prominent, mutual blush rapidly spread across the cheeks of Weiss, Yang, and Blake at the mention of the dashing, wig-framed hero from the previous afternoon, while Nora bounced on her toes with a giggling snicker. Glynda Goodwitch's ears flared with a sudden, deeply hidden tint of crimson behind her hair. She quickly cleared her throat with an aggressive, authoritative rasp to steady her exploding blood pressure.

"The... the domestic security of our Security Consultant has already been structurally handled, Miss Rose. I will be appointing the remaining First-Year students, specifically Toby, Marcus, Chloe and Lyra, to handle his weekly supermarket escorts and monitor his discount coupon schedules. He will be thoroughly supervised."

"Well, that's a relief for the grocery stores," Nora remarked with a wide, playful grin, resting her hands on her waist.

"Though I think Marcus is still trying to force him to try that hair growth serum! I hope the roof of the janitor's closet survives the training!" Throughout the entire briefing, Blake Belladonna had remained completely silent, her arms pressed tightly against her sides, her amber eyes fixed staring at the floorboards with intense, heavy distress. Her feline ears, carefully concealed beneath her signature black ribbon bow, twitched violently at every tick of the clockwork gears.

Slowly, her jaw unlocked, her voice dropping into an emotional, trembling whisper that arrested the room.

"I can't go." The room fell into an absolute, suffocating quiet. Ruby turned her head sharply, her silver eyes filling with immediate confusion.

"Blake?" Blake looked up, her gaze bypassing her friends to lock onto Headmistress Goodwitch with absolute, raw vulnerability. She reached into her pocket, pulling out the silver scroll she, Yang, Weiss, and Nora had confiscated from the hooded Faunus spy at Junior's Club the previous night. She had already shared the terrifying contents with Ruby, Jaune, Pyrrha, and Ren after returning to the dorms, but presenting it to the faculty felt like a final, definitive breaking point.

"Last night, we intercepted an encrypted tactical log from the only remaining White Fang operative left inside Vale's borders, a spy sent specifically to monitor Saitama's movements because the rest of their cells fled months ago," Blake explained, her hands shaking slightly as she extended the glowing device toward Glynda.

"The log contains direct, high-priority operational orders from their central command hub. They are setting up a massive surveillance perimeter around the Belladonna estate in Menagerie. The order says to... to neutralize the political threat posed by my father, Ghira Belladonna. My parents are in danger, and I need to deploy to Menagerie immediately to warn and protect them." Blake took a sharp, agonizing breath, her posture tightening as she prepared herself for the inevitable academic and social fallout.

She looked Glynda straight in the eye.

"And to do that... I have to confess something, Headmistress. I haven't been entirely honest with the administration. Before I enrolled at Beacon... I was a member of the White Fang. I was an insurgent." She dropped her head, bracing for a harsh reprimand, operating under the long-held assumption that only her teammates and JNPR knew her criminal past. Glynda Goodwitch didn't say anything for a long, agonizing moment.

She merely stared at the trembling young girl, her expression unyielding, until she slowly let out a long, exhausted sigh that entirely dissolved the clinical coldness of the room.

"I understand, Blake," Glynda said softly, her voice carrying a rare, deep-tier solemnity that made Blake's head snap back up in sheer surprise. Glynda made no movement to stop her or call for security. Instead, her eyes sharpened as she treated the situation as a multi-front tactical crisis.

"The White Fang threat is two-pronged," Glynda acknowledged, crossing her arms as she recalled the inner circle's recent strategic discussions.

"Their operational, aggressive cells are currently strangling the upper terraced routes of Mistral to isolate Haven Academy. But the political heart and future leadership of the Faunus are being systematically targeted for a total coup inside Menagerie. Your family is the primary obstacle to their radicalization path." Blake blinked, her voice cracking.

"You... you aren't going to arrest me? You aren't going to expel me for lying on my application?" A soft, genuine smile touched Glynda's lips behind her glasses, a rare look of peer-like warmth.

"Professor Ozpin and I have been fully aware of your operational history with the White Fang since the very afternoon you first submitted your enrollment forms to this academy, Miss Belladonna. We have never cared about where a person's soul was forged. Your past is an unchangeable sequence of data points. It is your current actions, your willingness to stand against the dark to protect others, that define exactly what you are." Glynda tapped the console, altering the deployment manifests.

"Therefore, I am officially granting you a formal leave of absence from the standard curriculum for a high-priority, off-the-books security detail inside Menagerie. Go save your family, Blake." She turned her sharp gaze back to the remaining teenagers.

"Which means Team RWBY, minus Miss Belladonna, and Team JNPR are the ones formally assigned to the 'Inter-Academy Exchange and Defense Initiative.' You will deploy to Mistral immediately to stabilize Haven's perimeter, locate our secret operative, and investigate the border silence. Your transport leaves the eastern docks in two hours." The weight of the split assignment settled heavily over the room, but the lingering fear was entirely gone, replaced by a dense, unyielding wall of mutual resolve.

Blake felt a massive wave of relief wash over her chest, a sudden warmth blooming across her features as she bowed deeply toward the desk, her feline ears twitching happily beneath her bow.

"Thank you... thank you very much, Headmistress Goodwitch. I won't fail them."