I mean yeah, this was a decent opening chapter, but it’s pretty dull and vanilla. Thousands of fanfics start off just like this, and really the only drive to continue reading is trusting in the summary- which isn’t a good thing. In terms of foreshadowing, if “defeated by icecream” is the draw, that’s pretty weak. Firstly its a background for a side character- so either largely irrelevant or the expectation level about the seriousness of the story goes down.

Two, clearly Jaune’s sword seems to be one of the main focuses of the chapter- if not the story as a whole. Yet you don’t even describe what the sword looks like.

Third, that cheesy scene at the end where Jaune “felt” he was hearing fact over fiction. That’s actually the silliest thing I’ve ever heard. Like how do you feel truth verses falsehood if you are hearing a story for the first time. Anyways my personal opinion aside, it’s a trashy setup scene for a romance story.
You might as well changed the statue to include the woman too. Not subtle at all.

The real questions I have about this story is what makes the romance special outside cannon? Is it the people? The connection? Like what do you add in terms of story elements to make this pairing flourish? So far all we’ve gotten is a more special Jaune, and we can find thousands of fanfics just like that.

Return soon,plewse

This is really good, and you give awesome advice! Please update again soon!

This is a good story, I particularly like your writing of restricting story to main cast without overvaluing their existence, for now. Most of RWBY stories, including canon seems like to ignore there's 4 years time in Beacon, and there's 2nd, 3rd, and 4th year students in there, along with countless hunters out there in Remnant. Now, I don't know if you did it on purpose or not, but I like the idea that even Pyrrha have to be wary and put in some effort against her fellow 1st year in that Pyrrha vs Nora duel.

A place where a 1st year student can become the best in entire school never speak well of Glynda, Ozpin and other's capabilities. So much for a premium hunter school (or is it The Best?) where cream of the crop would gather. So, Coco's brief performance is another point to you.

I always find it hilarious that doing better and smarter than named monkeys that are called background characters would make them titled "Prodigy" and "Genius".

Last one, another kudo to that throw out about secret, where most other fics tend to follow the "secret is to be shared among friends, neighbors, their parents, their grandparents and their dogs, and nothing bad would happen and it will never leak to any enemies nor opportunists" cliche.

Update soon, pleaaaase.

Ruby and Nora on the same team? Oum save us all.

Great story and good advice! Keep it up!

that was a brilliant couer al'aran reference
kudos to you

Ah shit I caught up already :( Really good read, loving the characters and loving the lil Writers Advice sections you make, they're not only interesting but super easy to understand even for someone like me with no experience in writing. Can't wait for the next chapter :D 10/10

A damn good story. Hopefully you get a chance to update eventually, but even if you never do I'm glad to have found this bit. It's been a while since I've found a new author on that's an all around good author and does a story I enjoy.

Thanks for this story.

As someone who loves the show (anime? cartoon... whatever), I'd like to say that I love how your story has turned out. I feel as though the characters of RWBY have a better chance to explain who they are in this fanfiction than in the official release, but that's subjective. My point is that whatever plan you have for this story, do it. Wither it be a bit on who feels about what, a discussion on trust, life goals, a battle with tiny baby Grimme. whatever it be, it won't matter how strange it'll sound on paper, you have proven yourself to be a competent writer. so take your time and have fun (if need be, you could make a shout out to a social media site where you could post update notes since isn't really the best place to post updates or future notices).

(SPOILERS)
Sid Meier, a producer of several strategy video games and simulation video games, once said "A game is a series of interesting choices", to which I agree with. However, I'd like to take that a step further and anything in entertainment would apply to this quote. The choice to make whole new teams was an interesting choice. Different people say and react differently. I also found it fascinating that the Deathstalker is practically unknown in this AU and the fact that it acted like a never-ending nightmare that up to this point still creates problems for the cast of Beacon. I don't know if Pyrrha is actually afraid of spiders, but I hope to see more of that here; even if it's only just for an omake.

writing fight scenes is not easy, it has to 'flow'. 20 years of martial arts and some military time has given me insight on how to make this work out easy enough although the devil is mostly in the details.

ST-103

I just found and finished what you've posted of this work today, and I really enjoyed what you wrote so far.

It's very refreshing to read a Jaune/Pyrrha dynamic where the latter doesn't instantly latch onto the former out of desperation for companionship. Ultimately, getting past the bumps will probably result in a healthier relationship in the end.

It'll be interesting to see just how much Blake revealed to Jaune. I can see her talking about being a Faunus, but I'm not sure if she'd go as far as to talk about being a former White Fang member so quickly in their relationship.

I really appreciate that you changed up the initiation and team set up. Too many stories leave the Emerald Forest essentially unchanged, to the point where it's utterly predictable. The Blighted story line also helps to add some mystery and tension the story, since the readers can't rely on their knowledge of the show to guess what will happen. I'm interested to see whether this will be a purely AU element, or whether you have come up with a butterfly-related explanation about where the Blighted come from (my current guess is that someone/thing made them-they seem unnatural, even for Grimm.)

On Sanderson's laws, I mostly agree with you and think even Sanderson takes them more as guidelines rather than literal laws. Or rather, authors should adhere to their spirit rather than their literal wording. After all, Sanderson's works often include characters using powers that they do not fully understand with them, and the readers, only learning more about how things work later on.

I wouldn't say something like that conflicts with the first law because proportionality between power use and reader understanding does not necessarily mean having knowledge of how the power works. Rather, it means that use of a power should somewhat conceivable to the reader from what they know of it. Jaune's sword having an unexplained special property letting it damage Blighted makes sense. It being able to turn Grimm into fluffy bunny rabbits with a single swing does not. Or, to paraphrase you a bit, "magic" use should come off as an organic outgrowth of the system, rather than as an asspull.

Keep up the good work and see you soon.

Pretty nice chapters, glad you came back(hell, i was thinking about this story just yeasterday!). While it doesn't happen so much, the chapter is pretty cute and nice. Regarding Aura, it isn't specifically to Huntsman, simply to those who train themselves into becoming one or at least a fighter of sort, either legal or illegal. About it i'm going usually with the things:1)'If i meditate, my reserves grow';2)'Channeling it in my arms, i can hit harder and run faster', the difference with Ruby, is thath her semblance gives her an huge boost in speed, plus rose petals;3)'I can putting it in other things for make them harder'.