In Volume 6, we have three story threads, each with its own timeline.
-The story thread of RWBY/JNPR/Oscar/Qrow/Maria, which I'm going to call the 'hero' thread
-The Cinder thread
-The story thread of Hazel/Emerald/Mercury/Watts/Tyrian/Salem, which I'm going to call the 'villain' thread
This blog will break down the timelines of each. As in my previous timeline blogs this will be a 'minimum' timeline, in which all unknowns will assume to be as short as reasonable.
The Hero thread.
This thread starts off two weeks after the Battle of Haven (BoH), as Qrow says in his letter to Ironwood. Much of this thread happens nearly continuously, with very small gaps.
6.1: The story begins at the Mistral Central Station. Daylight is flooding through the windows. Neptune's comment about Sun oversleeping suggests it's morning. The first train to Argus on the departures board is at 9:00. Since in our world trains that have already departed are removed from the board, I assume that the Argus Limited departs Mistral at 9:00.
As we see onboard, team RWBY has a sleeping compartment. If the train has sleeping cars, then obviously it must be an overnight train. The question then becomes does the fight with the Grimm happen on the first day of the trip, or on the second?
If it's still day 1, then the train wouldn't reach Argus until the next morning at the earliest. Considering that Bumblebee was able to pull a trailer with 5 adults and Oscar plus Yang at not very high speed from Brunswick Farms to Argus in a few hours, it's unlikely that it was very far. So it's unlikely that when the battle with the Grimm happened, the train was still many hours away from Argus. Also, would team JNPR have had enough time to report to the authorities in Argus, contact Jaune's sister and talk with her for long enough for Nora to learn all of the embarrassing Jaune stories, and then meet with Cordovin before RWBY arrives at the end of the same day?
I'm going to assume it's the afternoon of the second day. They've been on the train for more than a day, and Argus is not much farther. JNPR arrives in Argus with the rest of the train within a couple of hours of the fight, but the snowstorm prevents Argus from dispatching a S&R team to the crash site. That evening JNPR contacts and meets with Saphron, and then the next day they visit Cordovin.
6.2-6.6 are all in the span of a few hours. 6.2 happens in real time, with the flashback taking place one or two days after the BoH. Oscar has recovered enough to get out of bed, and the heroes are discussing their next step while working on their weapons. 6.3 happens in a few seconds thanks to Jinn's time stopping ability, 6.4 is immediately afterwards, with a hike up the trail until they find the farm, with 6.5 happening before dark and the first part of 6.6 happening before bed. The fight with the Apathy and the fleeing the farm happens within a couple of hours of waking up on Day 3.
6.7 takes place over the rest of the day. Maria tells her story, RWBY arrives in Argus, meet JNPR and settles in at the Cotta-Arc home.
6.8 & 6.9 are on Day 4. RWBY meets with Cordovin, Qrow gets drunk, JNPR learns what Jinn told RWBY, Ruby speaks to Maria, Oscar goes missing, JNPR finds the statue of Pyrhha, Everyone returns home and Jaune describes his plan.
6.10-6.13 could be the next day, but I think there's an additional day in between for planning purposes. Committing a heist like this with only a few hours of planning in a city that they've never been to would be a bit of a stretch. Also could Weiss just show up unannounced at the base and be sent home immediately? I think this was set up the day before. So it's Day 6. The ship is stolen, Cordovin attacks and is defeated, Adam attacks Blake and is killed, the Leviathan attacks Argus, and the heroes arrive in Atlas that night.
So that's an entire volume in SIX DAYS.
The Cinder thread.
6.2: Cinder awakes, breaks through the wall and kills the woman. Cinder meeting with Malachite could be same day as her awakening, as the weather's the same. A wanted poster says that the BoH was 1 month ago. So Cinder was likely frozen for nearly a month. If it's the same day, then Cinder knew about the Mistralian criminal world beforehand, which is possible based on her experiences with Torchwick. If it's been a few days, then she's needed time to find a few things out and to go throw the woman's
6.5: Cinder returns a week later, is told that RWBY left for Argus a few weeks ago. She fights Neo, and then strikes a deal.
6.7: Cinder and Neo return to the chamber. It's likely that this is shortly after the previous scene, as Neo would not trust Cinder out of her sight at this point.
6.13: No idea.
The Villain thread
6.2: One of Malachite's bodyguards mentions that 'The Big guy asked about them last week'. Presumably this was Hazel. This would be about three weeks after BoH
6.4: Hazel, Mercury & Emerald return to Salem's domain. This could be any time after BoH +3 wks.
6.9: No idea. Watts and Tyrian leave for Atlas.
6.13: No idea. I suspect however that Tyrian's line in 6.9 about 'Her grace must act swiftly' means that 6.13 is shortly after 6.9.
So it looks like the Cinder and Villain threads take place well after the Hero thread. By the time Cinder escapes and The Villains reassemble, the heroes have been in Atlas for weeks. Some of these mysteries will likely solve themselves as the events of Volume 7 play out.
| Date | Hero | Cinder | Villian |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 days after BoH | 6.2 (Flashback) | ||
| 2 weeks after BoH | 6.1 | ||
| 2 weeks, 1 day after BoH | 6.1-6.6 | ||
| 2 weeks, 2 days after BoH | 6.6-6.7 | ||
| 2 weeks, 3 days after BoH | 6.7-6.9 | ||
| 2 weeks, 5 days after BoH | 6.10-6.13 | ||
| 3 weeks after BoH | 6.2 | ||
| 4 weeks after BoH | 6.2 | ||
| 5 weeks after BoH | 6.5, 6.7 |