There was a break for lunch that was where the heavier foods were introduced and I finally got my fill of protein. French dishes weren't just purely heavy like those in the isles but focused more on depth of flavor and creativity. I quite enjoyed my lunch thanks to that. The class that came next was Herbology. There was nothing terribly interesting about it compared to Hogwarts lessons. The professor named Garlick was slightly interesting since I remembered that the Hogwarts herbology teacher in Hogwarts legacy had that name. -
I'd not seen any indications that that particular storyline had ever actually been true during my first year at the school however. For example there was no goblin rebellion at that time as far as I was aware. There were a few historical figures that appeared in that game but no mentions of the player character or many of the events that absolutely would have been recorded if they happened. Still beyond the name this was clearly not the professor from that game as it was a stout man with wild brown hair and permanent dirt under the fingernails.-
It was right after the class that things took a turn I wasn't expecting. That oh so familiar window opened up on my way back to the dorm room. On it was Ruby alongside her father and Qrow though they were frozen in time.
"Is there something you need?" I asked curiously.
"The world broke!" she blurted out.
"What?" I asked confused.
"They were supposed to explain it, I don't know! Everything just got so bad after you left!" she sobbed.
"Give me a moment and i'll come over so they can explain." I say ending the contact and making my way to somewhere private and entering the bazaar.
From there I spent a pittance to grab a day in that world before opening a doorway there. Immediately a fist tried to strike me only to pass through me harmlessly.
"You! This is your fault!" Taiyang yelled angrily.
"I will need context. When I left your world I took the source of most of your problems with me so please do explain what has happened that would have you behave like this." I said calmly.
"You took Salem and Ozpin killed himself after telling everyone the shadow war was over! Now all four kingdoms are at war because Ironwood and Atlas decided to take over!" He yelled angrily.
"I see. So what you are saying is that after I solved your single biggest problem the ambitiously militant kingdom decided to make a play for world dominance?" I asked for clarity.
"Yeah, pretty pathetic isn't it?" Qrow said from nearby clearly not sober at all.
"You want Salem back. Or to be more specific you want a common enemy capable of threatening humanity enough to keep the ambitions of it in check." I said calmly.
"Everything would have been fine if you hadn't interfered!" Taiyang hissed angrily.
"Oh no this has almost nothing to do with me. This is an event that would have happened regardless of my interference. If my memory serves about seven or so years from now in fact. What I did was remove the last roadblock stopping Atlas from doing it sooner. James Ironwood is an ambitious man who believes the best thing for humanity is for it to fall under one banner, Atlas's banner. He was already stockpiling military armaments for a similar attempt before you even knew I existed." I explained casually.
"You don't get to shirk responsibility for this! If you hadn't taken Salem and left Ozpin broken Ironwood wouldn't have done this yet!" Taiyang argued.
"Yet. That is the key word here. Like I said my actual role in this matter? Minimal." I say calmly.
"Enough Tai, the kids right. We should be thanking him for taking Salem away but reality makes a joke of logic." Qrow said taking another gulp of his flask.
"It wasn't supposed to be like this. We were supposed to defeat Salem and it would fix everything." Taiyang said with an aged expression.
"Salem was certainly your biggest problem but you are giving humanity WAY too much credit. While she was around people watched Atlas gearing up for war ever further and said nothing because she was still the greatest threat worthy of such actions. But those preparations don't vanish because she did. They simply feed a different function. But I am impartial to this matter. If you want to buy or sell something by all means but otherwise this conversation has little meaning." I say frankly.
"Can you fix this issue or not?" Qrow asked drunkenly
"Of course I can. The real question is if I should. This matter was made by your own people. Is it not something your people should fix?" I asked calmly.
"Of course it is! But a lot of people would die if we did that! You could fix it without that!" Taiyang said righteously.
"Oh, no. I'm afraid there's been a misunderstanding. Both of the "easy" fixes for your situation involve a considerable amount of death. If you want a bloodless solution.... well that's outside my ability. If I give humanity a common enemy again there would need to be a show of force to make it really stick. And If just killed all of the upper echelon of Atlas the kingdom would collapse and the problem is solved isn't it?" I said casually.