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Background[]

Asher's story takes place two years before the events of RWBY.[1]

Asher was born in Vacuo and lost his parents to a Grimm attack in the past and was raised by his remaining family ever since. Prior to the start of the story of RWBY: The Grimm Campaign, Asher was a student enrolled in Shade Academy, now a Huntsman. He is described as having had to fight for everything in life. Since graduation, he has been a Huntsman for approximately 5 to 10 years.[2]

After graduating from Shade, he later traveled to Kuchinashi to try and make money to send back to his remaining family in Vacuo while also meeting Opal at The Skillful, being nearly kicked out for his kleptomania. While he tried doing regular Huntsmen jobs at first, he later decided to start doing shadier jobs to make more money than he was before like Assassinations, but only if Asher himself thought that the people he was hired to kill deserved it. During a job involving illegal contraband, he met a woman trying to do the same thing named Abigail Pyre and offered him a better payment than the person that originally hired him. Asher worked with her on multiple occasions and started to open up to her a little about why he came to Kuchinashi in the first place while she revealed that she was doing shady jobs to get back at the people that caused her father to be in debt and killed him after he couldn't pay it back.

On a later job, the two ran into one of the people involved with killing Abigail's father and Asher notices that she is acting more violent than usual when she heard him up. Asher intervenes, but this makes her decide to kill the man after asher decides to look away from the scene.

One night in Kuchinashi, Asher was asked to help Abigail out for a job for the Hana Guild and doesn't look at what they were asked to get for them. After this, Asher is asked by Abigail to deliver the item in question to two of the Hana Guild's agents at the Skillful and he starts to notice that she is acting more talkative than usual. She then gives him a box that can be opened using a number code and tells him to deliver it himself right as she leaves to begin forming her own organization known as "The Hearth". Before she leaves, Asher tells her that she owes him one for helping her start it. When Asher meets the agents that were sent to retrieve the item in question and gives them the code to open the box, they attempt to kill him after they inform him that it was empty and he learns that Abigail set him up. He manages to fight them off and get out alive due to using his semblance, but his eye is scared by one of the agents in the process. This fight would later be considered legendary and Opal formed a rule against fights happening in The Skillful because of it. He later tried to contact Abigail, only to learn that she had stolen his Scroll and steals one of the agents scrolls to help track down his. He manages to find it buried in the ground with a message left by Abigail saying "Sorry".

Episodes Covering these Events

RWBY: The Grimm Campaign[]

The Kuchinashi Incident[]

Hero-gc-group

Team SAFR

In RWBY: The Grimm Campaign, Asher, Pyke Rite, Arrastra Skye, and Fenix Nemean all coincidentally accept the mission at the same time, which while rare, occasionally happens due to the mission board system being flawed in that regard. They are all told to reach a southern Anima port, where a dropship picks the Huntsmen up. Inside, Asher and Pyke doze off whilst Arrastra and Fenix share a meal. As the Huntsmen interact with the pilot, Tom, the dropship receives a message from the legendary Huntsman, Qrow Branwen, who warns the group of a rise in active underworld activity, factions war, and Grimm activity. As Qrow finishes his warning, he begins to tell the group he can’t send them on this message with a clear conscious, but before he can say why, the speaker cuts off in static as a group of Grimm charge at the airship, killing the pilot en route to an attack at Kuchinashi.

The Huntsmen leap off the airship to escape, using various landing strategies to get to the ground. Once in the floor, the group is attacked by a Beowolf, which is promptly defeated. Once the nearby Grimm are slain, the group hears an attack on Kuchinashi, whose alarms blare in the distance. The Huntsmen arrive at the Kuchinashi Approach: a series of ropes and drawbridges that are unkempt, and a part of the city’s security system to keep out Grimm and unwanted visitors.

Ahead, the group notices a pair of Lancers attacking the checkpoint’s gate. Pyke decides to go forward and face the Grimm. Thinking back to the previous events, Asher ties a rope to Pyke and Fenix to prevent the two from falling off the rope bridges and to their deaths. As Pyke begins to attack the Lancers, the group is ambushed by more wasps. After some combat, they decide to make a break for the city once the Grimm breach the first wave of gates. As the group runs towards Kuchinashi, the next checkpoint gate opens for them as city guards flood out and kill the Lancers, led by a surly old man who carries himself as a Huntsman. The guard leads the heroes into a dark cave for safety.

In the cave, the Huntsman questions the heroes, accusing them of being the ones to have sabotaged Kuchinashi’s defenses during the massive Grimm attack, to the group’s surprise. The protagonists clarify they had just gotten to the city to help and the Huntsman, calling himself Alabaster, warily accepts this. Alabaster explains that this sabotaging has been happening recently, implying it’s because the Kuchinashi crime families are at each other’s throats. He is the sheriff of Kuchinashi, having replaced the previous one who had been killed by the syndicates for failing them.

The heroes ask how they can help with the invasion. Alabaster points the group to The Skillful, a tavern where the important and dangerous people in Kuchinashi frequent. To enter The Skillful, you need a Huntsmen’s license. He instructs them to speak to a woman named Opal, who runs the tavern. Asher tells the group he’s been there before, leading the way into the city.

As they reach The Skillful’s entrance , the protagonists are greeted by an imposing Faunus woman named Buck who sits on a stool outside, rifle ready. Buck recognizes Asher, surprised to see him return after what had previously happened when he visited the tavern. She checks her Scroll, finding he’s not in the ban list, and Asher asks her if he can skip the riddle this time, but the Faunus insists he has to as it's part of the appeal.

The riddle is told as follows: “I have no life, but I cannot die. What am I?”

Arrastra discovers the answer to the riddle, and shows Buck her license, entering the club. As the others follow suit, Fenix discovers that Asher has stolen his Scroll, and becomes annoyed at the fact while he follows the older Huntsman inside. At the Skillful, the group finds Opal, who is surprised that Asher is still alive after his previous stunt.

The group orders drinks with Opal, who points to Daff, a city guard that can tell them more about the Grimm in Kuchinashi. Fenix, however, notices Asher had taken is Scroll once again, taking it back and making his leave as he is frustrated at the older Huntsman.

They find that Daff reminds them of a younger Qrow Branwen. He tells the group more about how the Grimm are avoiding people and instead being more specific with their targets which is odd for them. One such event was a Beringel who has snuck into the city, ignoring an entire sector of people to attack a Hana Guild warehouse. He also informs the group that the Grimm are descending from the northern mountain pass, and asks them if they need help with anything. Pyke asks where the warehouse is, and Daff gives him the necessary information. As he does this, Asher notices the bar's DJ has been watching the group, and tells Arrastra he's going to talk to them and for her to watch the other two.

At the stage, the DJ is suspicious when Asher asks him of the Hana, and tries to leave in a friendly way. Asher, not having any of this, pulls out his weapon and holds it to the man’s side. The DJ tells him that he was paid at the Hedges by The Taskmaster, a former Huntsman who lost his license, to watch any newcomers asking about the crime syndicates. He gives Asher a brass coin with an ‘X’ etched onto it, telling him he can find the Taskmaster if he shows the coin to the right people. Asher tips him and returns to the table.

Soon, the door to The Skillful opens, as four noisy people barge in with a smug attitude, calling themselves Team SMMK (smoke). Pyke and Fenix begin to bother Sil, which incidentally causes a miscommunication that leads to a bar fight, but the teams are kicked out by Opal.

Outside, Fenix takes his leave into an inn, upset at the situation. Asher tells the group about the Taskmaster, and suggests they get a good night’s rest and see where the coin leads them in the morning. At night, Asher is startled by something in the inn, but doesn’t spot anything. The innkeeper later tells them someone was looking for them, and will reach out to them. He tells them the man went to the Hedges, and the group ventures into the urban maze.

In the Hedges, the group enters an old Dust shop, which instead of being well guarded, the Dust is kept in a big bin where all the crystals are kept loose. As Arrastra replaces any missing Dust she has, Asher Mora attempts to swipe some Dust without paying, losing all his trust as the shopkeep spots him. Meanwhile, Pyke Rite goes to a gacha machine and gets two boxes, giving one to the store’s guard; a 13 year old boy. Pyke opens his copy and gets a replica of Beacon Academy, and decides to watch and see what the boy gets.

With his bridge burned, Asher goes to the front of the shop next to the guard, where the boy opens his box and gets Shade. Asher tells him he went there, which sparks the kid’s interest, telling Asher about how he is in the current combat school in Kuchinashi, and wants to be a Huntsman himself. The guard tells Asher about how his favorite Professor, Takaya, is organizing a resistance to protect the city as the police don’t do much in Kuchinashi. Pyke tries to swap the two miniatures, and the boy thinks he’s a thief, but this doesn’t go anywhere as Pyke gives him both and just runs off scared. The boy, awestruck by Asher, offers to help him with his mission after the older Huntsman says he’ll give him an honorary Huntsman license, telling Asher about how someone came into the shop a few days ago to ask about the Taskmaster. The two swap contacts in case the guard sees anything, where Asher learns his name is Taupe. Asher gives the Scroll to Fenix, having taken it again.

The group decides to head east to find the Taskmaster, noticing as they go in that direction, there are fewer people in that way, and more and more shadier shops. There, Arrastra notices a man with the Hana symbol tattooed on his forearm. The group shows him the Taskmaster’s coin, which scares the man. The Hana member says he already had people talk to him about the Beringel incident, that there’s a new guy in charge above him in the Hana totem pole, and that the Hana had sent members to the mountains because the Wave had something happening there which the Hana thinks has to do with the Grimm.

As this happens, Fenix receives texts from Taupe, which say that the group had some friends looking for them, and as such Taupe pointed them in their direction. The group leaves the Hedges before they run into whoever’s looking for them, and head north to the mountains. On the exit, they run into Daff, who tells them not many people go there nowadays, but the ones who do tend to go digging for something. He lets them pass, giving Fenix his contact.

In the mountain pass, the group finds that people have been excavating around the area, caving in their dig sites for unknown reasons. They come to a dead end, finding another cave in. Pyke notices some abandoned mining gear owned by the Pastel Company, and Asher goes on a lookout, hearing the call of several Beringels. Three Beringels ambush the group. As they turn to leave, a pair of Sabyrs approaches them from behind, a pair of Grimm which do not belong to the kingdom of Mistral.

As they battle with the Grimm, Team SMMK arrives and kills the monsters in a smokescreen. When the darkness dissipates, the heroes find SMMK has Daff bound and bloodied. They demand that the heroes tell them why they were looking around the Hedges, and what they’re doing in the Kuchinashi northern mountain pass.

In the ensuing standoff, Sil tells the group that his team is there to ensure that nobody finds out about something in the mountains. In doing so, he tells the group Team SMMK will take care of two birds with one stone, demanding they either leave Kuchinashi, otherwise they’ll be killed. Sil uses his Scroll to activate various bombs around the dead end in the mountains. As this happens, Fenix tries to use his own to sneak a picture of what was happening, only to be caught by Sil, who fires the bombs, causing a massive landslide that comes tumbling towards them.

The group manages to save Daff from the falling into the rocks as they maneuver themselves around the collapsing mountain pass, finally reaching a clearing. Immediately after this, Alabaster and a group of city guards arrive to find a bound Daff with the group. Ready to arrest the group, he demands that they tell him what happened. Unable to convince him of what happened, the group is restrained by the Kuchinashi guard and are imprisoned in the local Kuchinashi jail.

The group finds themselves inside one of the cells, the bars supported by Lightning Dust, perfect to hold even the most capable Huntsmen. There, Pyke asks the guard if Daff is alright, and discovers he’s still out in the local hospital. Meanwhile, Arrastra uses her glasses to communicate with other prisoners through a reflection of light through signaling, learning that they can trust Takaya. Soon after, Alabaster arrives, informing them that their council was here, intrigued they even have a lawyer. As the group leaves to meet their council, Arrastra notices a fox Faunus who nods at her, indicating she gave her the message.

In the jail’s processing area, the group meets their lawyer, who convincingly utters complete nonsense to get the guards to allow him a private conversation with his clients. The group asks the lawyer who he is, and the man laughs, finding it funny they’ve been using his coin and his name around the Hedges; the Taskmaster. The man asks the group what they know about the Pastel Company, which hasn’t been in Kuchinashi until the past month. Javi Pastel, a member of the company, decided that he was interested in doing an offshoot of his family business every so often. Many nobles come to Kuchinashi looking to make a name for themselves, digging into the mountains for Dust and wealth with the restricted use of explosives, however, Javi was interested in something else.

The Taskmaster informs them that a few weeks ago, Javi began blasting into the northern mountain pass, where he found some sort of treasure trove of an “older than old” civilization. Javi began to make a big show of it, trying to incite the criminal organizations to buy it, convincing the Wave to buy something from him. During this time, the Hana Guild is taken over by a new leader, who stops the dealing of narcotics and changes the Hana’s presentation, becoming a shadowy organization rather than a public one. The Hana Guild was interested in purchasing something from Pastel as well, but when Javi decided to stop offering, he turned up dead and only one unknown item missing from his home. The Taskmaster believes that the Wave was responsible for this, taking the items before their rivals could. He explains that this is where the heroes come in:

He tells them that he knows of another passage into the mountains from Pastel’s house, that leads into a larger path into the northern mountains. The problem is the house is under lockdown by the police for the next few days until an estate sale occurs to bid items in the house. The Taskmaster tells the group that he wants them to find a Scroll belonging to his associates in the house. As a piece of motivation so that the heroes obey his orders, the Taskmaster offers to give them information on the following:

The name and information of the banker who owes Arrastra’s family immense debt. For Asher, the name and whereabouts of the woman who nearly cost him his life the last time he was in Kuchinashi. For Pyke, he could tell him the result of the time Fate dealt him a hand he couldn’t face. And for Fenix, the information on the White Fang in this city. The group accepts the offer, and is let go.

With four days to prepare, each member of Team SAFR split off to ready themselves for the heist in Pastel's Estate. On the first day of preparations, Arrastra, Asher, and Pyke resupply their Dust stock, having run out from their previous encounter with the Grimm, where Asher learns from Taupe that Team SMMK is looking for the Huntsmen, as is Headmaster Takaya. The next day, the Asher and Arrastra approach the Headmaster in the Kuchinashi combat school, where they learn that Takaya had learned about them from Taupe. Tayaka offers to help them stop the crime syndicates however he can. On the third day of preparations, the two go to the Upper Cliffs of Kuchinashi to take a look at the Pastel Estate, learning about its layout. On the final day of preparations, Asher looks for more information through his criminal contacts.

On the day of the heist, the group splits into various covert tasks throughout the mansion to find the items they need. Sneaking into the estate through the third floor balcony, Asher searches Pastel’s office in search of the Scroll that the Taskmaster has requested from the Huntsmen, discovering a hidden compartment in his desk. As he finds it, Asher hears a faint knock on the office door as his weapon gets caught onto the drawer. He decides to hide in the room as the door’s lock is busted by Lavender, who enters the room. Asher draws his other weapon to her throat, and asks her what she’s doing in the office. Lavender convinces him to talk things out with her, but not before Asher notices a compact shotgun in her purse. He asks her why a reporter would have a weapon, and Lisa tells him she was hired to find something.

As the party continues, Asher hears arguments stir downstairs. He decides to trust Lisa Lavender, who opens the office drawer’s lock and returns Asher his weapon. Asher notices Lisa is a Faunus, with spider fangs in place of canine teeth. Lisa takes the Scroll placing it on her purse, then speaks onto her own Scroll, “Hey Sil. I got it,” she speaks. Asher hears Sil tell Mina a good job, revealing her identity. Asher activates his Semblance, blinding Mina, and manages to wrench the target Scroll from her that was in the locked compartment he'd been searching for. He smashes her through the door into the hallway, alerting the guards, then crashes through the window and swings down into and through the library window to join the rest of the group.

The Huntsmen spill into the library's secret tunnel and shut it behind them, heading deeper into the mountains. They find a deep maze of hallways after going upstairs, discovering a bank of computers in an underground containment system. The room has several destroyed and fried computers, Sabyr claw marks on walls, and blood in the floor. Using the stolen Scroll, Arrastra logs into a computer and finds several files – on the security doors and shipping logs. She unlocks another doorway, then realizes Pastel had been importing merchandise all around the world. The door leads into more passageways, finding active cameras in the hallways that are still clawed and bloodied. Asher finds another computer, seeing that most of the power of the hidden containment system was converted into a room labeled “8”. Fenix attempts to kick a door open to proceed on their path, but finds he can’t break it. After a moment of silence, something thuds back on the other side of the door. Asher knocks on the door in a pattern to identify he is human, and hears a rhythmic pattern back. The door unlocks and opens into a different room – a larger, carved rock room that contrasts the industrial look of the containment system. There, they see several people hiding off to the side, aiming weapons as combat initiates.

The group defeats the thugs in a short fight, prompting the only conscious bandit to beg them to let him live, explaining they’d been locked in to escape the Grimm. Pastel had hired them to help with experiments they had been conducting on something that had been found in the mountains. The bandit tells the group that Grimm had been brought here in cages and that Pastel had been conducting experiments on them as well.

The Huntsmen decide to have the bandit lead them across the facility, who takes them to the security room. There, Fenix disarms a trap in the room before they can enter, finding a charred body of an unfortunate soul who had been caught up in the room. The group finds a keycard in a corpse in the security room, and checks the computers, which shows various cameras across the facility.

“Room 7” has various locked boxes which have been slammed open, the camera pointing at the only box that was still lodged shut. Another room’s camera points to the Grimm holding cages, who are now torn open. The group discovers most fies and systems have been transferred to L1, the lowest level of the subbasement where backup archives are stored. The group diverts power to the L1 elevator, as power in L5 shuts down almost entirely.

As this happens, the computer screen flickers, and a woman’s voice speaks to the group. This is Lemon, the leader of the Wave. Lemon recognizes the group, surprised and impressed that they had both found Pastel’s laboratory and survived Team SMMK, even having led to Mina’s arrest. Lemon asks how they had found the facility, as she has been looking for it for a long time, and smugly tells them that Kuchinashi will be a different city when they return to the surface. Arrastra notices that Lemon is wearing something from the auction, an old silver and gold necklace with ornate jewels in its center, glowing blue. Lemon asks out of curiosity, after having put her through so much annoyance, what team she’s dealing with – Arrastra declares they are Team SAFR (Sapphire). Lemon cuts the screen off, and the team begins to hear Grimm coming towards them. The group runs into the old school Gravity Dust-powered elevator room, the door behind them beginning to be ripped through by the Grimm. As Team SAFR fights various Grimm, a Beringel breaks the elevator’s cable, causing it to plummet into L1.

Upon crashing, the team realizes that the surviving gorilla Grimm has glowing blue eyes, and thinking back so did the other monsters they had seen in the elevator – the color of Lemon’s necklace. They enter the backup room in the facility, and find a various databases of items that had been numbered; various experiments that were being conducted on the Grimm. One of the items, labeled “03”, has an archive filled with notes. The item had an effect on the Grimm, with security videos on the item displaying Javi Pastel holding up Lemon’s necklace, putting it on, and opening the Sabyrs’ cages. Pastel motions to a woman tied up to a chair, and motions at her, which causes the Grimm to obey his command and maul her. Pastel turns back to the camera, excitedly saying it will make him very rich. They find logs about how he backed out on selling the item to the Wave as someone else showed up in town, and that items 05 and 08 were still in the facility. The team saves all the logs into their Scrolls, and finds a shaft leading back up to the mountains of Kuchinashi. As team SAFR makes their way to a clearing, they realize: Kuchinashi is on fire.

Fenix receives a call from Taupe who worriedly asking if they had made it out of the Estate. The Wave had made a move the night of the auction sale, with all their enemies and authorities gathered in one place, the Grimm came and attacked. The team tells Taupe that Team SAFR is on the way, as the Kuchinashi Incident arc ends.

Episodes Covering These Events

References[]

  1. Eddy Rivas' Twitter
  2. RWBY: The Grimm Campaign RTX 2020 Panel
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