"Oh, hey guys, what's been going on with you two?"
Luffy asked in a cheery tone, as if he wasn't tossed from one side of the forest to the other. Yang walks up to him and grabs him into a bear hug while letting out crocodile tears.
"Luffy... you don't know how horrible it was. There was nothing to do, no Grimm to fight and my partner happens to be anti-social."
Yang comically cried out with fake pain in her voice.
Luffy rubs her back in comfort while Blake rolls her eyes at the drama Yang was displaying, not really bothered by being called anti-social as she would admit she isn't really into starting mundane conversations.
Although she was going to ask Luffy some relevant questions since he's here now.
"Mind telling me how you survived a fall that would normally kill a person?"
Blake inquired Luffy, seeing as there shouldn't be any way to live through that unscathed, even with aura.
She did see Luffy launch himself into the forest by stretching his arms, but she couldn't wrap her head around how that worked. The two cousins released each other from their embrace for Luffy to answer her.
"Hehe, I forgot to tell you and my other friends... I'm a rubber man. Falling and crashing into stuff doesn't hurt me. See?"
Luffy said while rubbing his head for forgetting to reveal that to his new friends, before he did his usual demonstration by stretching his cheeks apart.
Blake was a little freaked out by how far it was being pulled, but managed to keep her composure. Luffy releases his cheeks after getting his point across.
"Okay... now how did you get yourself flying like that? It didn't look like you did it on purpose like back at the cliff."
She continued her observations, becoming a little more curious. With all that screaming, something had to have gone wrong.
"Oh that... I was exploring the forest looking for the secret thingy, and then I found this small black thing and a big gorilla popped out of nowhere."
Luffy explained as he pulls out the chess piece he discovered from his pocket.
"We fought for a little bit, but the gorilla grabbed my leg and tossed me."
he finished his short story of the events. Yang takes the chess piece and inspects it along with Blake, both having thoughtful looks on their face.
"Maybe this IS the secret relic you were supposed to look out for. I'm surprised you found it already, we haven't even made it to the temple yet. We should probably get going."
Yang concluded as she returns the relic to Luffy, who beams at the thought of finding the thing he was out searching for.
Good thing he picked it up on a whim.
The trio agreed to continue their journey and walked along the path. Silence permeated the air for a long while until they heard a rustling from the bushes. Yang activated her Ember Celica and enters a boxing stance, Blake had her hand on the handle to her variant ballistic chain scythe called Gambol Shroud, and Luffy gets into his usual stance. Out from the brush come a pack of Beowolves, one of them being an Alpha.
"Yang, you look really bored so you can have the big one. Blake and I can handle the others."
Luffy said with a toothy grin, causing Yang to mimic his grin in delight.
Finally she gets an opponent other than cannon fodder.
She turns her attention to the Alpha and rushes in, the beast sending a vertical swipe as she is closing in. Yang sidesteps the attack and throws a few punches amplified by the shotgun blasts attached to her weapon. It slightly staggers the Alpha, but it doesn't stop its pursuit of wild attacks in an effort to claw at the blonde.
She jumps back when it tries to pounce on her, only for it to land on all fours and receive a hard punch to the side, launching it towards a tree head first as a 'crack' was heard upon impact. The blonde turns back to find any stray enemies to thin out the horde for her comrades.
Blake takes out her cleaver and starts cutting down the Grimm in her path with elegant grace. She pulls a katana out of the cleaver as the two weapons were compacted into one, with the katana sporting a pistol as the hilt. Swing after swing, Blake quickly leaves a path of dismembered Grimm in her wake while dual wielding swords.
The Beowolves start swarming her and left her no choice but to use her semblance to leave a shadow of herself as a decoy to escape the numerous claws ready to tear her apart by jumping off her decoy.
She switches her katana into pistol form as the blade is pointing in one direction and the gun barrel pointing the other way. Blake takes a few careful shots, taking out some of the Grimm that are huddled up closely.
The black haired girl ties the ribbon from her arm around the trigger and throws it into the group of dark beasts before yanking on the elastic material, causing the pistol to be fired.
Like a boomerang, it came back to its owner, taking out another enemy. She proceeds to swing her weapon around as if it was a kusarigama, using the pistol to speed up the velocity to take out more Grimm.
As all of that action was occurring, Luffy can't help but spectate the battle Blake is waging with stars in his eyes when in the middle of pounding Grimm.
"That's so cool! She has two swords in one with a gun."
He said in childish glee before dodging a swipe from a Beowolf and countering with a fist to the temple. If Blake wasn't in the middle of fighting, she would've sweatdropped at the comment.
Suddenly, he remembered a technique he used against Foxy after seeing Blake's kusarigama in motion. He armaments his right arm down to the middle of his forearm, grabs his arm and starts swinging it around until it stretched to the needed length.
"Gomu Gomu no Flail"
he shouts as he swung his arm outward.
Very much like his Whip with the exception of it being his arm as opposed to using his leg, the limb travels in a wide arc and makes contact with one of the Beowolves, killing it as the creature was sent flying.
Luffy repeats the process on the rest of the unfortunate dark beasts until there were no more Grimm to make victim to his attack.
He looks around for any more baddies and finds none in their vicinity. The two girls notice this too and put away their weapons. They regroup back on the trail with a grinning Yang and Luffy.
"Oh man, I really needed that! At least those guys didn't cut my hair like the Ursai I fought before running into Blake."
Yang said as she stretched out her arms in relief of the workout that transpired. A few moments later, Yang recalled something that Luffy mentioned.
"Hey Luffy, you said a gorilla threw you, right? Are we talking about a Grimm?"
Luffy nodded
"Kinda figured... huh, he sounds like he would be really tough to kill if he gave you a rough time."
she commented with eagerness.
If Luffy got tossed like a ragdoll, then it's gonna be a challenge that she'll probably accept. Not only that, it might hold a grudge against Luffy if he done any lasting damage to it. So having Luffy around may increase the odds of gaining more action, which is a plus in her book.
"Lets get moving before any more show up. We still have an initiation to pass."
Blake informed with the cousins nodding. They wasted too much time here already.
As the trio jogged through the forest with Luffy ahead and out of earshot, Blake decided to bring up something that caught her attention.
"Yang?"
the blonde turned her head towards her
"That comment earlier... are you saying that Luffy is stronger than you?"
Blake asked in curiosity.
Yang did say if Luffy couldn't beat something, then it was guaranteed to be difficult. Yet he was younger than the two of them.
"Oh yeah, he can beat the snot out of me AND Ruby. When we spar, it would always be him versus the both of us. You haven't seen anything until he enters Second Gear, then it just gets ridiculous."
Yang said with a grin, showing no ounce of shame or fear in admitting that. She's humble enough to tell people there is someone far more stronger than her.
When they participated in those spars, Luffy shows practically no restraint when fighting them. If they got a little too confident when they are actually getting somewhere, Luffy would decide to use Second Gear and stomp them to the ground. He would be able to keep up with Ruby's speed and out muscle Yang's strength.
Although the beatdowns do help in some unexpected ways. It's good practice since in a real fight your opponents will show no mercy to their enemies, helps them adapt to facing adversity, it teaches them some humility to make sure they don't get arrogant in their skills, and improves their pain tolerance as they usually get spanked really hard by Luffy.
Blake gulped nervously, a little scared that what she saw only scratched the surface of Luffy's combat prowess, and he didn't even use his weapons as far as she could tell.
Yang on the other hand, noticed something odd about Blake. She seems to be talking more than when it was just Blake and herself, and it started with Luffy literally falling from the sky.
"You know, you've been really curious about Luffy? What, are you interested in him?"
Yang asked with a teasing grin, rewarding her with an eye roll from the bow wearing girl.
The only word that Blake could describe him as is peculiar, what with his childish demeanor and quirks along with being a rubber man. But yet at times, he'd show a more experienced side to himself. The conversation dies out as they approach a clearing, signaling that they have reached their destination.