Board Thread:Speculation House/@comment-86.143.10.83-20160207173711/@comment-10390252-20160209112728

KNN005 wrote: Maybe the battle ends is a stalemate. Cinder has what she wanted. All she needs to do now is battle Ozpin a little, just enough to weaken him and run. I could see her pulling her people out of the city (Merc and Em) and leaving with her prize. And leaving the dragon Grimm to kill everyone. The only person who likely wouldn't retreat is Adam. Blake's right there and he wants to settle this. I am in favour of Cinder withdrawing, espeically if Ozpin (and maybe Ruby) prove to be too tough to handle easily.

She has the Fall Maiden's powers and Vale is a ruin that will take generations to restore, if it can. The Atlesian military has been humbled and the whole world has been shown how helpless governments, Huntsmen and the military are to protect them. So, arguably, it's 'mission complete' for her and it's time to move on to the next phase of her plans.

Volume 4 may be entirely the characters recovering from what happened and trying to prepare a counter-move. Cinder and her allies (possibly including Neo, who has sworn vengeance on Ruby for Roman's death) are more background presences, rarely if ever seen but a shadow hanging over the world.