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  First thing first I want to work on the foundation of the world of Remnant rather than chapter one where the series starts. To do that I want to tackle the characterization and reincarnation system of Oscar, Ozpin, and Ozma. To many it's a fiasco, but to me it's as narrative point that really could’ve tied in more elements in the background in RWBY’s story than just a quick backstory of the world’s beginning. History often shapes how the present world came to be, so Ozma’s story is one that should have ties to other facets of the world in RWBY. For my rewrite I want to crify that I’m defining reincarnation of Ozma/Ozpin/Oscar in general by the title of OZ From the character inspiration. I see it more so as an ability than rebirth. Just for the fact that in review of how reincarnation is dispyed in the show, this system seems pseudo in many factors.

  In many ways I see Oz, or the Oz Cycle as being misunderstood. Which all pys into the masquerading element that the character is supposed to have from the inspiration as the Wizard of Oz. All because yes, the series shows a pseudo reincarnation system right in front of us with a long line of different characters masquerading as one individual without knowing it.

  See after taking a looking into the RWBY community it's highlighted that the series takes inspiration from successful and favorited anime and cartoons that present themselves before RWBY’s runtime. For instance, many contribute elements of RWBY’s reincarnation system to that of the Avatar Cycle from Avatar the Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. Hence why I found it acceptable to name this system the Oz System to conform a standard reference many can agree with. The reason I say this is because in the Avatar series it's emphasized that while all Avatar’s share that small soul and have access to the memories of their past lives, each person is an individual being that defines themselves differently from the rest. No Avatar is the same. Each Avatar has their own likes, ambitions, feelings, and lifestyles that vastly differ from the others. So that’s the system of belief that I want to use to justify that Ozpin is not entirely Ozma, but in more general term that he is an Oz.

  With the original Ozma after Salem got the two brother gods to essentially py ping pong with his body. The show didn’t have him come back right away via rebirth. Instead, I see it more likely that the gods merely dropped his essence into another being simir or ideal to his previous incarnation. I view it like this because with each incarnation of Oz that the audience is shown cannon-wise in RWBY there is already a separate personality and identity before the introduction of Oz.

  This also helps justify in my eyes the characterization and decision making of Salem for the split between Oz and her during the fshback episode in Volume 6. No matter how much Grim and corruption that was in Salem I don’t see any direct evidence that it drastically changed her personality or even exaggerated any of her qualities extremely. We merely got too little of Salem as a character from that episode and a few short snips of her monologuing to fully understand her character. Not to say Volume 6 Chapter 3 – The Lost Fable didn't do an outstanding job fully diving into the history of Salme, Ozma, and the World. Though what has been clearly portrayed is that Salem is selfish in every manner of the way when her backstory is dispyed. One could even say privileged and unbecoming of the real world when things don’t go her way. Further highlighting her secluded life as a princess and contempt she felt for a majority of her life back then. To me Salem wouldn’t discard what I believe to be centuries (or decades) of love and time spent with her Prince Charming/Hero that once rescued her.

  What I believe to be more likely is that over time Salem came to realize that the person she was with wasn’t the man she fell in love with all those years ago, that instead he was some sort of imposture masquerading as Ozma. That after she got off her high of being with her loved one after years of being apart. The time spent together just made it more apparent of the new differences. Sure, she could still sense his soul or essence which was the initial factor when he first appeared at her door after his rebirth. That maybe the issue was herself or maybe the corrosive Grim getting to her, only for her to be more and more convinced over time that she was with an impostor crafted by the selfish gods to torment her. That her dear Ozma would never return.

  A bit of a stretch I won’t disregard but context clues led me to this conclusion in earnest. Honestly, reviewing the story told by the Jinn, the audience and team RWBY and co got a one-sided story with events through the perspective of the second reincarnation of Oz. If you pay attention to the wording in that episode Ruby questions Jinn about Ozpin on what he is hiding and not the truth. That episode was a story from the eyes of Ozpin on what he’s hiding, not the entire truth of what happened back then. We have no overall context of what happened in-between things that the Jinn did not show or what each incarnation of Oz saw. It's so apparent, for instance how the Jinn stops narrating during dialogue and other parts of the episode and that when it gets to Ozma’s second life its fully becomes a story told by Oz. We never get to see Salem after her fall and her perspective of how she supposedly turned evil.

  What I mean is that for a possessive and selfish character like Salem it seems out of character for her to attack her family, to attack her children, regardless of if they are quote on quote bastards in her eyes, they are something that by logic belongs to her. I feel like that was a key point RWBY’s production crew introduced about Salem in the fshback episode. How she values something of hers way too much for her own good or for the good of others. While yes maybe she stopped thinking of her husband the False God variant as Ozma at that time or was merely in conflict with him over their differences in beliefs in how to rule as demi-gods for the future. For all said and done these arguments could have been going on for months before they cshed at night in the castle. There are multiple separate variables we have no clues toward. What I don’t believe is that the same woman that tricked the gods against one another and led the entirety of humanity against those same gods over her deceased husband, would in turn destroy all that she’s built up. That randomly one night she saw her husband and children walking out in the halls with no luggage and started attacking Oz on sight and kill her daughters. Even with the thought that they were out to betray her, Salem’s character at that point wasn’t seen to be ‘evil’ as her Grim variant in present day, no she’s far more represented as selfish, ambitious, confident, arrogant, and misguided.

  The part of Volume 6 Chapter 3 that goes into Salem’s final transformation into her grim form. Her falling into the bcked pools of alienation as a form of suicide. The brothers grim. All just to discover that a force of pure destruction could not destroy a being of infinite life. That all it could do is create a being of infinite life with the desire for pure destruction.

  I don’t find folly in this cim since it comes from the Jinn’s narration. By the rules that govern the Jinn, this is the truth. What I find folly in is that a being who only desires pure destruction would crave love and create a family. It is merely an observation of mine that while yes, Salem as a Grim craved destruction, it did not define her. Isn’t fitting that such a being would defy the gods mandate in each and any way she could.

  I’m being humorous here but if Oz and Salem were in a steady retionship that normal couples have, there could had been dozens of reasons for what Oz was doing. Hell even with their disagreements straight mortal combat seems a far stretch. If Oz truly saw Salem as evil or changed from her previous self, I felt that their retionship wouldn’t had progressed as far as it did. Maybe the kids wanted to give their mother a surprise and dear old dad was helping them, or maybe they were in fact on the way to Salem with a reason. It's not reasonable that someone would start attacking someone you love after years of being together and giving birth to four children for no reason. When we saw the scene that Oz and Salem disagreed, that's all we saw, a disagreement. Not Salem cruelly gunning it out for Oz but her dispying a more aristocratical and monarchically mindset to ruling.

  I do want to set aside for a moment to talk about Salem because its these subtly things that I wished the show would delve more into because it justifies so much of her character. Why is Salem evil people may ask, well look at her upbringing. The show out right tells us Salem was raised isoted from the world by an evil king in a tower. I won’t go so far to say that the evilness the king had was inherited by his daughter, but it was the Jinn our narrator who procimed the king evil and Ozma as a hero saving the nd. Salem entire upbringing was molded by authority and cruelty, isoted in that tower with her evil father and his advisors, all she saw and witnessed was oppression and greed. It would make complete sense if she craved freedom and the right to explore the world. The Jinn even says that Salem was a girl who wanted only one thing: freedom. To grow up privileged yet to still be bound more tightly than those of stations below her. Then one day a brave hero comes along freeing her, felling all of her oppressors, and opening the world to her to explore. Not only freeing her but also loving her dearly. Ozma became Salem’s freedom from the cruel world she lived in. Then he ups and dies, that happily ever after that usually happens at the end of story books never happens for Salem. From her perspective the world is cruel and unfair, no the world owes her, no even further the creators who made the world owe her even more. She wants and deserves that fairytale ending. It's obvious why she rebelled against the world. It's also a subtle thing of how much of a natural leader and charismatic Salem is a royalty. I mean narratively she would have to be unite the entirety if not a majority of humanity to rebel against their creator gods. No seriously take a step away and really let it sink in that she convinced the leaders of a magic society across different regions of a world with known gods to rise and attack those same gods with the conviction to win and overthrow them. And all of this was for her deceased lover that saved her from a life of captivity. We go further into her story years ter after an unknown amount of time since the fall of humanity to its rebirth and start of society. Being all by herself known as a witch unable to connect with these new humans, remnants of rebellion of the gods. Then she meets her old lover finally brought back again in this new world, hearing her lover's mission to guide that humanity toward salvation. It's fair that Salem ended up becoming a tyrant or a god-queen with all that was set up. She’s ‘evil’ because life has set challenges towards her that she answered with power, rage, deception, and cruelty. I would have loved if we got more interactions with Salem and her subordinates with her fully commanding their loyalty which charisma. That the vilins we got introduced to in the show were rejects and outcasts of the world of Remnant that Salem offered opportunities of glory beside her. Not just these crazy killers, and ambitious supervilins you would see on a Saturday morning cartoon.

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  I want to make the setting and perspective for Oz more in lines to this:

  It was subtle at first, but he began noticing, each time he returned he possessed a vessel younger than the st. Not only that, regardless for how long he lived in each life his regression into a new vessel grew shorter with each incarnation. He knows not why, after all his first reincarnation he appeared in a vessel retive to his time as Ozma, but that status quo ended just as soon as it was established. Over the years he grew paranoid, theorizing the cause to be Salem, that she conjured some sort of curse on him with her final strike, a loophole to erase him from the face of Remnant.

  The reason I want to set things up like this is that the original Wizard of Oz that this character is based on is revealed to be this grandiose wizard that’s been masquerading and is revealed to be a fake with no powers lying to everyone. Each version of Oz is not Ozma. I want to make this clear that I do not view any iteration of Oz as the original Ozma. The sole reason being that the show shows us at the very least four interactions of the Oz Cycle where it has a preexisting person living their own lives then the cycle is introduced to them. The two most crifying examples of these four would have to be the second reincarnation and Oscar’s introduction into the show. Of course, I’ll get into not only those two but all four instances and it's apparent that each situation is a repeat of itself. I just wanted to set the tone forward on this part as with the reveal of Ozpin’s identity in Volume 6 and the twist in the Wizard of Oz, this factor of this grand wizard should be interacting with all aspects of the world they are set in. Ozpin identity in reference to the Wizard of Oz should have had some interaction with the current state of the world and present main characters. This aspect fell short to me hence why I felt the need to address it thoroughly at the start of my rewriting of RWBY.

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  Continuing on into the Cycle itself I want to list out all the different alias and identities the show gives us that Oz has lived through. Those being: Ozma the Legendary Hero, The False God, The Hermit/Wizard, The Drunkard, The Settler, The Inquisitor, The King of Vale, Ozpin the Headmaster, and Oscar the Ward.

  Most divide Ozpin history (or the Oz Cycle in my case) into four main incarnations as that’s the four we view the most of him. The original incarnation of Ozma, the Hermit incarnation as the Wizard, the Ruler incarnation as the King of Vale and the Current incarnation as Ozpin into Oscar. While those four incarnations are no means incorrect, I want to delve deeper give justification.

  For the Oz Cycle I want to make clear that it's more of a shared experience power system. Not so much a hive mind, but an ongoing equation with factors adding onto a variable. Maybe the person does not realize this since the ability is like no other in that universe, but yes though a person joins the Oz Cycle they don’t singurly become Oz themselves. It's not the other way around as we are led to believe in the show.

  First off, we have Ozma reincarnating into a body quite simir to his old body. This is the direct influence from the Light God with features and characteristics (gender, size, hair color, and age) into the body of The False God incarnation that spent a full lifetime with Salem as demi-gods with children. Remember the episode showed us that this Oz variation, who was a full-grown adult; was already part of a tribe or vilge that was under attack. This is the start of the cycle.

  Next, we have him going through multiple lives, each one subtly different. One as an old man with no future, another as a middle-aged man with a family, more as a young adult with promising talent, and now a youth that is naive of the world. While I go through all these variations, I want to point out how the cycle itself is seemingly counting down to zero.

  The Hermit is the next one that RWBY shows us; this is his next incarnation after his confrontation with Salem. Now a broken old man at the end of his days, this incarnation was washed over by the fears and worries False God Oz had of Salem. It makes the most sense from his naming and representation that he secluded himself from the world until his st breaths. This would line up with the corretion that the world of Remnant would’ve still been in chaos or healing from the direct battle of its new two gods and resulting death of one of those gods. With Salem either going into hiding or ying waste to that kingdom continuing her path of destruction and onsught from her battle onto her subjects. Either way with that ancient civilization's commander in chiefs and faith basically gone its conclusion was merely a finality. It’s merely a theory but an interesting conjure on Salem’s mental state at the time period for her. Maybe an ancient fable is around in Remnant depicting how Salem left her kingdom after the mysterious destruction of her castle, branching into versions where False God Oz or her were the cause, or where a great evil caused the colpse, or even more poetically how humanity itself polluted the gods and caused the colpse.

  Fables aside I want to focus on the mindset of the Hermit. This is the first sign of an Oz being controlled by their past lives’ memories beside his second incarnation instead of believing them to be an extension of their own memories. At first, I wanted the Old Hermit Oz to be that Wizard variant of creation that sparked everything, the one we see in the Four Seasonal Maidens expnation. We never hear Oz ever denied acting as a sage during his lifetimes, and we know the Wizard gave the Four Maidens their powers.

  This must have been long before the headmaster variant which is Ozpin who is only able to transform Qrow and Raven into birds. Based only on the hypothesis that extraordinary elemental manipution that goes far beyond dust and sembnces holds more promise and power than single bird polymorphing.

  With that thought process I was going to segment that the Wizard and Hermit are the same variant at different points in time. After reviewing the episode in Volume 6 and the World of Remnant episode detailing the Four Maidens, this idea opens several theories up. The age range where the two variations are dispyed in the show don’t match up, but we know the Wizard who decred himself a hermit to have lived for centuries already. The Hermit in his shredded rags and demeanor seems a bit older and begone with the world than the Wizard who showed more of a mysterious and whimsically persona. It was these differences in attitudes that leads me to believe that they were separate entities in the beginning until looking closer in the Four Maidens World of Remnant episode. The Wizard who was a lonely man both cold and frail matches the first representation of the Hermit. Jaded from living for centuries it was the four sisters who opened him up to the world and made his life much happier. They were his first four friends in which he could share time with. In turn he gave the only gifts that held any meaning to him. He summoned every ounce of his powers and bestowed them upon the sisters.

  Now I wouldn’t say this was the point where Oz lost his magic powers from the era before Remnant, after all lifetimes ter he was able to gift polymorphing abilities to Raven and Qrow, but the levels of power and influence waning may have started to decrease at this point. Maybe Oz kept doing this to other individuals or objects across history in Remnant, maybe other folktales we haven’t heard of yet are merely retellings of him gifting fractions of his powers to heroic and good willed people.

  Again, even while I write this, it's more of a stretch but I want to give justification to Oz status as ancient semi-god being who's seen most of current humanities existence. Such a being should in some manner have more identifying stories in history across the world. If the maidens reinspired his devotion to humanity and his belief, I see more reason that he began traveling and exploring the world in hopes of fulfilling his mission set upon him by the gods.

  Going even farther what we know from the Jinn while being the truth, this is the subjective truth. For all we know the Jinn didn’t show us all of the lives and souls the Oz Cycle has been a part of or them in order. Heck I’m merely inferring that the centuries lived that the Wizard mentioned were his current incarnations lifespan at the time and not any prior reincarnations since other incarnations weren’t mentioned in that short and the Jinn hadn’t shown any other variants besides the known ones right now.

  Talking about that, I feel the need to compile what I’ve concluded and believe gives get justification to power levels within the show. We are discussing one of the most powerful beings in the show right now anyway. Ozma was titled as a Legendary Hero in the time before Remnant by the Jinn. This should set high above the curve amongst individuals pre-Remnant. A person able to conqueror entire castles full of other magicians and combatants in his prime. With the feat of entirely destroying a comparable castle in his csh against Salem in his next life. Ozma was such a cut above the rest not only in power but also in character that the God of Creation himself set the task of leading humanity onto Ozma after his brother and him gave up on humanity as a whole. If we continue with my revision that he was able to keep himself alive for centuries as the Wizard/Hermit and that he roamed around Remnant creating numerous myths by gifting powers and creating wonders, his power level with magic is unparalleled by all except Salem the final boss of the series.

  Now we know very little about magic, very little indeed. All we do know is that it was a gift from the two brother gods, specifically the brother God of Darkness who remarks magic as his own gift when the human kingdoms of pre-Remnant attacked the two brothers under Salem’s trickery. We have no idea if magic power is set from birth, if it grows with the individual or time, or the ranges of its full capabilities in RWBY. On one side I do enjoy this as magic truly is this mystical element from a forgotten time that we and the cast of RWBY have no idea about. But you know who does, Salem and Oz who can use magic and are either more powerful or wiser than the rest of the world.

  If you want to have a power system based upon itself another power in verse, then that power should have its own system. If not both power systems can end up not being reliable or end up open to criticism to your audience. Just think of it as setting a prologue for a story then putting out the ending also, all without carefully or fully thinking of the middle or traits of your main characters. You’ll end up winging it and creating plot holes as the story progresses just to get to the ending you already announced only for you to realize in the end that the ending you once created no longer fits the story you were never ready to create.

  Note that this is not a slight a RWBY as a show as this analogy is not what I believed happened in the show. As I mentioned earlier, several internal and external factors happened that put pressure on the production of the show. I truly believe against all the criticism that the directors besides all the setbacks fans believed happened, had a fully story and idea of RWBY’s plot prepared.

  I think the Drunkard variant of Oz is just important as any of his other lives because it shows how the stress and burden of saving the world has and will take a toll on Oz. The Drunkard from what we see from the show is an alcoholic in ruff clothes wasting away his life. I think this Oz is more of a continuation of his fears in his life as the Hermit and the actions as the Wizard. Maybe this Oz mented that he couldn’t save the world like he wanted in his st life. Or he could have died peacefully and didn’t want to continue on his eversting mission, entrusting his mission onto others. Maybe he saw the worst of humanity while he was trying to save others. This all leads to the hypothesis that the Drunkard incarnation saw all his work in creating heroes, making wonders, and forming bonds with companions was for nothing since Remnant is no closer to peace. Devil’s advocate, the presence of Oz could’ve made things worst.

  Now we get to his next life in the Oz Cycle, in this life he isn’t a heroic youth in his prime or an old sage ready to dedicate his talent till his st days. No, instead this Oz was a scientist. A man already content with life, enjoying time with a loving wife and kids. Who could have had a successful career for years enough to support his family in a more stable era possibly. This is something no other Oz experienced or had within the same compacity and the reason this variant ended up so different from the rest. This variant of Oz had a period of healing only simir to that of the Wizard with the Four Maidens. Healing in which he chose not to lead humanity, entrusting that responsibility on the growing stability of the nations he helped develop prior as his time as the Wizard. This Oz was the Settler, or Big Daddy Oz as I like to call him; chose another path instead of fighting valiantly against the Grim. I see the value of this variant of Oz creating The Long Memory as a rather acute detail. maybe this Oz delved into the sea of ancient knowledge that they now possessed from his previous incarnations and began experimenting with dust and sembnces in honest. Maybe this Oz was the inventor of dust included weapons that let humanity mimic magic. It could’ve been the first sighting of dust enchanted weaponizing if we pay attention to the timeline. Afterall there is no mention of when the weapons we see in RWBY present day were developed. Maybe the Settler with his incarnation of Oz after his miracle making days as the Hermit and wallowing as the Drunkard from an answer in his own way to help humanity. While he spent time with his family in peace as we see in the episode, he was the one to create catalysts to connect the concept of aura and dust to recreate magic’s combat power. Hence the clockwork staff we the audience see created may have been the one to introduce weapons using dust into the world of Remnant.

  This version of Oz is probably the best example of how an individual in the Oz Cycle does not equivalent to being one or the entirety of his previous incarnations. To once again reference the Avatar series reincarnation system, think of the retion of Roku or Kyoshi in contrast to either Aang or Won. The honor and caution Roku had, the duty and discipline from Kyoshi, how peaceful Avatar tried to live his life, and how Won’s arrogance started the whole Avatar cycle. Yes, they shared the same soul and desires, but each had their own personalities and convictions on how the Avatar should maintain bance. I think the Oz Cycle main function is about accepting that these memories as a part of you, not as your identity. That while you may have the experiences from a past life, those experiences do not define you. You as an individual must learn from them and build upon them to support the future. I find crity in the fact that when the brother God of Light expined Ozma’s reincarnation to the Legendary Hero, the god stated that Ozma would reincarnate in a manner that would ensure he was never alone.

  The next variant being the Inquisitor is an interesting addition to the lineage of Oz. So far in the incarnations we’ve seen so far, the Inquisitor is at the same time the least and most like Ozma. The least being that his skin tone, eye color, hair color and overall features are a far cry from Ozma’s original design. Yet this Oz was the most active version since the Wizard who gave other people powers beyond their belief. This Oz had the same adventurous spirit and drive Ozma had, traveling unknown nds in search of the relic lost to history. Age way and timeline wise it would make sense if he was younger in age than the Settler, being that even though he was defined in age he was still spiry and experienced enough to travel around looking for the relics. I would even theorize that maybe this version of Oz who we see using the relics in the fshback was the one who found them and used his powers to hide the relics in their chambers. Maybe not all-powerful chambers but at least a powerful array or enchantment that enables only the maidens able to open. The Maidens being the most trusted people to Oz.

  Chambers we have no clue of how they were created. Be it that the relics created these special areas themselves or if Oz trying to hide or contain them created these areas with his magic. Again, we don’t exactly know the full extent of magic users like Oz in RWBY. All we can infer is that the relics are powerful enough to warp reality. Be it the relics or Oz himself, we do know the relic of Knowledge was safeguarded in a pocket dimension. That and the fact that relics attract grim, using an extra measure beside the Hunter Academy to protect world warping relics gifted by two progenitor gods does make sense.

  This also fits timewise, remember by the time RWBY starts with our main cast, the Huntsmen Academies have been around for about a century. Ruby as our main character is 15-16 years old being the youngest amongst her friends and teammates who are a year or two older than her. The parents of Ruby and Yang who were peers of Ozpin should’ve at least been 18 years or older since graduating from Beacon and having kids. Let's compile that Ozpin seems to be a few years older than team STRQ which included Ruby’s parents in order to recruit them as the youngest Headmaster in history to his secret war against Salem. We can generalize around 60-70 years of the academy system being in pce before Ozpin’s natural birth and pcing Ozpin in his te 30s. Why I’m including this random tangent about age, well it's because I’m nearly done going into the different variants of the Oz Cycle and are about to go into how the cruch of this reincarnation could work to help expin some of Ozpin’s cowardice and urgency we see in the show. That 60-year gap will become important in a bit, no worries.

  King of Vale Oz is another version of Oz where we know the least and yet the most about. We know that he was a central figure in the Great War and was the one who founded the Hunter Academies. We know that the Great War sted around 10 years, and its conclusion roughly occurred eighty years before the events in the beginning of RWBY. The silhouette of King of Vale Oz shows him as an adult man with long flowing hair and a developed body. Usually, kings and royalty are portrayed in their prime ranging in the mid to te twenties. Now these next parts are my theories on King of Vale Oz since we only know of his involvement in the war. That while King Oz founded the academies, it was his predecessors that built them. By that I mean creating the cities and faculties around the academies. Building city sized campuses, gaining, contributing, and maintaining educated staff that not only know how to fight but are educated is no easy task. Doing so in four separate regions just at war with each other is even further difficult. Though I say this it's not impossible in 100 years to do. What I find folly in this cannon event is the secrecy of the four magical reality warping relics that are held at those academies. Even if Oz moved the relics from their original locations to the academies I feel like the popuce and governments right after a world-wide war would pay significate attention to these academies being built. Or that the fact that these relics which should be local legends in their world, folklore that wouldn’t be forgotten in a century were easy transported. Truly imagine hiding these reality warping artifacts from the public, not vetted staff, hired builders, and raiding Grim attracted to the relic with the only ones knowing being the most trusted followers of Oz. I don’t even want to theorize about the aspect of how the pocket dimensions fit into this. With not even a rumor or piece of gossip leading towards these relics in the schools being even more unbelievable. Regardless of being king of the superpower that won a world-wide war this would have had taken a few more decades to pn and prepare. With the period of the Great War ending and the establishment of the Hunter Academies being so short in-between it would make so much more sense if the Hunter Academies were meant to be set in pce long before the war by Oz and his followers across history.

  It's more likely that his followers had instructions to create the schools as fortresses to ensure the protection of the relics since Oz couldn’t trust the Grim being by the relics in case Salem ever wanted them. He then years ter came back in the body of royalty as we see with King of Vale Oz and went along overseeing the project to completion. This feeds into my theory that Inquisitor Oz used his magic after finding the relics to help seal them and enlisted others to help safeguard them. Purely because we saw this Oz exploring and interacting with at least one of the relics. Now it's true the chamber could've existed since the time of the Wizard Oz since he was the one who created the Four Maidens, that and the Four Maidens are the only ones able to access the relics behind their chambers. It just makes sense to me that the Inquisitor who seemed the most outgoing and adventurous as his title states to be the one to discover all the relics. Afterall that incarnation of Oz was the first one we as the audience saw interacting with any of the relics. With that I can infer that the Inquisitor Oz would have companions that traveled with him, no doubt one of them being a Maiden that allowed him to access the chambers or to set up the rules for entry.

  From there, King of Vale Oz who we saw depicted in his mid to te twenties took part in the war that sted 10 years and lived on until old age where he passed away in that 60-year time gap, I mentioned before.

  Finally, we get the test reincarnation aside from the current as Ozpin, the Headmaster Oz variant.

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  With Ozpin I do want to talk about his allies that we do see in the show. This part is truly just a fan idea that I personally would love to see, but it’s truly a critical element to my rewriting of RWBY. So far, I haven’t really changed anything from the original plot of RWBY that was shown, all I’ve done is justify and deep dived into its history and how Oz and Salem workings as the world of Remnants oldest beings should and could have more presence in the backgrounds of the series. What I want to introduce which doesn’t have to be taken seriously is the Order of Oz. A cult like following of allies that Oz has collected after centuries of walking the world of Remnant. We clearly see that Ozpin has generals and agents across different nations in RWBY, why not push that idea deeper. The Order of Oz has been doing just that and more to ensure the mission Oz obtained from the gods ended up completed. Its origins could be from various individuals Old Wizard Oz gifted, with ties going as far back to the ancient kingdom that Salem and False God Oz once ruled. Descendents of followers of that god version of Oz who was seen as a good deity in contrast to Salem. I would make them a continuous secret group that went from legends, to kings, to generals, and now spies. They could be this mysterious 1%, pulling the strings on how the world revolves around. Trying to stop wars and get rid of conflicts before they happen. In some way or form they should have made contact with every single incarnation of Oz. It could be this fun little detail that they don’t always know that its Oz they are in contact with during these events. For instance, between the Drunkard, Settler, Inquisitor, King, and Headmaster variants, the Order of Oz didn’t directly make contact with each version.

  The most important thing though to think about is timeline wise because there is never a specific set of dates for when events happened in the world of RWBY. All we do know for sure is that the four huntsman schools and profession came into existence about one hundred years ago from present time. Just think of the generations it would take to get for sticks and clubs to swords and from swords and archery towards complex interchangeable weapons. Advanced weapons that can handle recoils and not break into pieces from heavy attacks or malfunctions that current weaponry in today’s age still has difficulty with. That and the advanced technology we see in RWBY, being motorcycles, cars, skyscrapers, touch screens and holographic phones, intercontinental communication, airships, Anime Gundam’s, and st but not least working and combative Androids.

  As bias as I try to be towards the source material, I am writing this rewrite because I see faults In RWBY's story. This rewrite is based on my perception of the show while trying to keep faithful to the ongoing original story. As such I don’t believe each version of Oz had complete control of the direction the world of Remnant progressed in. If he did, war would’ve been a thing of the past. Based on how surprised the forces of Salem and his allies were, Ozpin’s revival/rebirth as Oscar the Ward must have had been less time than the previous or of their prior information. I would like to theorize that each incarnation of Oz itself is taking less and less time to reincarnate. I may be generalizing but I so believe that it took a period of time far closer to millenniums for the False God Oz incarnation to appear. We don’t even need to or rather can't base anything off of Salem’s reaction or dialogue from them meeting again since it wasn’t discussed. The sheer fact that humans began existing after their complete wipe from existence by the brother God of Darkness is staggering to say the least. Even if you wanted to disregard evolution and make it that humanity just started appearing again in the world like magic. The periods of time it would take to develop rural vilges and societies from basically nothing is absurd. Sure, we didn’t see kingdoms outright with False God Oz when he first awoken, but proper metal weapons just ying around clearly shown how far humanity had progressed since its rebirth. A crazily vast amount of time in-between not recorded. Time Salem had to experience in whole. I wouldn’t be surprised if Salem had to relearn her own humanity after clusters of humans started reappearing. I fully wouldn’t bme her if she went mad in-between all that, earning the title of Witch that early Remnant humans dubbed her.

  Again, I’m generalizing but between Ozma’s reincarnation into False God Oz which hypothetically took millennial to occur. Towards current day reincarnations such as King of Vale of Oz to Headmaster Ozpin Oz which took a few decades or a few years depending on when King of Vale Oz passed away. That and Ozpin’s reincarnation into Oscar which took only months to occur. I would like to base my theory on the Oz Cycle being finite on these pieces of evidence.

  Let's divide the periods of time into millennium, centuries, semi-centuries, decades, years, months, weeks, and days. Then let’s apply them to the criteria of Ozma, False God Oz, Old Hermit/ Wizard Oz, Drunkard Oz, Settler Oz/ Big daddy Oz, Inquisitor Oz, King of vale Oz, Headmaster Ozpin Oz, and finally Oscar the current incarnation. Now let's use the previous depiction where Ozma to False God theorizing that it took millennium and how Ozpin to Oscar took months to get proper ranges of the general time between each incarnation.

  Using that to range things, then let us say a millennium spanning into centuries go on after his Hermit and Wizard persona each existed from the False God, a great deal of time between the both of them living of course. Then maybe ranging in a few centuries to semi-centennials for his transitions after Drunkard and Oz Daddy, let keep this going by decreasing the transition period to rge amounts of decades just at the mark of being at or below centuries. Where we hit the mark of a few decades and years where the transitions for Inquisitor and King Oz took which now have led to Ozpin. A person who was born only a few decades after the King of Vale died and then existed as himself a couple more until the cycle to hit him. Meaning months in the cycle after his death as Ozpin, we then get Oscar the Ward variant. All of which lines up almost perfectly if we use context clues that were established during the events of volume 4 and 5 to create a timeline. We have lore setting up events in history, we have a character in reference to those events and finally, abilities with limits established by the dialogue of characters that have much more information than we do as viewers or team RWBY has. But the reason I’m putting so much effort into this timeline is because it helps build the character of Ozpin and the desperation that the Cycle of Oz creates.

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  When it finally gets to Ozpin, he’s this young and promising Huntsman fresh out of the academy, not yet a headmaster or the level of one but a talented Huntsman none the less. Far less cryptic and secretive this younger Ozpin is much more a warrior and militant than his other versions. He’s a genius hunter brought up in a world used to conflict and wa doctrine molded to fighting monsters. A man with a beautiful bewitching fiancee he’s dearly in love with and means to marry right after education. A thing set in stone maybe merely a few weeks or months away. Again, this all might just be fan fiction to most, but these background elements make Ozpin as a character must more retable and interesting as a character. I already mentioned the idea that Ozpin is a few years older than the members of team STQR. Not by much but he would have had to be since Ozpin already had the position of Headmaster when recruiting the team. This would give enough time for him to gain some standing as a headmaster, notice promising teams and prioritize them further develop them for the future. I can imagine him more as an older brother/ guardian to characters like Qrow and Tang when they were attending Vale’s academy.

  Maybe for Ozpin the entrance into the Oz Cycle was a traumatic event. Hearing voices in his head that terrified him. I would think in time as like how Ozpin informed Oscar the consciousness of the inheritor and originator would blend together. After a while Ozpin would calm down and rational decide to get in contact with the Order of Oz. Maybe it's a cryptic message he left behind like “I would like my cane back”, but it's something that gets Ozpin into this inner circle of the Order. At this point I believe the previous incarnations of Oz would have had little help to Ozpin, but the mass amounts of time between each variant would leave gaps that Ozpin would have to piece together. Much like how the Order without Oz direct supervision accomplished so much with older vague instructions left behind. They probably used the talents and connections they gathered under period between the Wizard and the Settler to gain favors, agents, and the right benefactors to establish the building blocks for the academies. Then during the King variant and possibly some of the Settler's lifetime, to construct the academy's as a whole that we the audience see today. Maybe this could’ve been the underlining reason the Order made contact with Father Oz the Settler, seeing that variants revolutionary work with dust weapons they would have recruited him for their services. Though not into their inner circle, the Order could have worked with the Settler in creating defenses and weapons. Then working with the Settler towards learning designed skills, csses, and courses for future generations to learn.

  The reason I say this and give such a big background setting of Oz is that thanks to the show we the audience get to see the characteristics of each variant so far shown. The heroic and loving Ozma, the cowardly and pragmatic ancient god-king, the sorrowful and driven Old Sage, the intelligent and selfish Father Oz, the wise and indoctrinated Ozpin, and finally the naive and cautious Oscar. Ozpin is portrayed as wise and secretive in contrast to his other incarnations. Let’s compare the Settler to Ozpin for instance, this is more of a comparison of wisdom vs intelligence. How one mind might be brilliant in terms of mathematics and science, the other will know how to best apply this knowledge to the betterment of all.

  Ozpin through my interpretation would have noticed the shortening in time between the reincarnations. Noticing how the years of the Oz Cycle are slowly tinkering down to zero. He would begin panicking as he now fears his existence. How with the thought process that in just a few incarnations his mind would reincarnate into the body of a teenager, then child, then infant, and potentially nothing. Fearing if he would even exist after regressing from whatever is after an infant. It doesn’t help that as he reviews his memories each life before was either extremely short or spent nothing in research/questioning his existence. If you review, he died young as Ozma who was in his prime, lived what I assume at least two or so decades as False God Oz to start a kingdom and family. Spent unknown time as the Wizard who was already old of age but magic could extend his time, most lives from then were middle age and focused on different tasks. From spend time with a family and creating weapons, to traveling across the world in search of the relics, to running a kingdom during a time of war.

  So, Ozpin starts to panic and begins rushing into battle as a warrior. Instantly sets himself up as the headmaster at one of the academy’s while preparing forces in the Order and possibly even awarding abilities to members without caution he deems worthy. This ultimately depleting whatever magic reserves he would have left after all his incarnations. Even pushing to have his lovely fiancée join the Order to be his side as his most trusted ally during this time as he conflicted with other high members of the Order that didn’t believe in his methods. Then in the academy he gives special privileges to certain promising huntsmen and huntresses, groups them together and gets them ready to war on HIS side. A war that the Order completely loses, horribly at the cost of many of their forces and incurring the wrath of Salem into collecting her own forces and waring back against Ozpin.

  Now I know what you’re thinking, wouldn’t this create a plot hole with the addition of Maria’s backstory and fshback to her losing her silver eyes. To that I say that the Order of Oz was just a fun idea I thought of to demonstrate the desperation and folly Ozpin houses. He is a fake grand wizard, a fake Ozma. His actions in replicating and falling into this role that is not his should show great consequences. He is the first Oz since the False God that we see fail as an incarnation (not counting the Drunkard). That and with my depiction of Salem I would see it that she would only house agents of her own to get rid of forces that could hurt her, aka the silver eyes. It was only after Ozpin’s mini crusade that she in full decided to go after the relics. I really want to make it seem that the recent few decades of RWBY are fully important, events that lead to our protagonists taking center stage should be grand since we what their journey to be just as epic. Let there be this status quo that got broken which leads to our heroes being the ones to save the day and fix things.

  I truly believe that this somewhat vague backstory for Ozpin and the Oz Cycle helps justify many things and fill in plot points that aren’t expined or explored. Ozpin as reference to his concept is a small man behind a curtain masquerading as this fabled wise sage of a king who is also a legendary hero. That for why he was so secretive in earlier volumes and so directionless in ter is because he isn’t this all powerful being. No instead he’s this scared and tired man with generations of memories in his head and the weight of the world on his shoulders. A duty and responsibility he never asked for.

  When Oscar gets introduced, this concept justifies the problem of if Ozpin is in control of Oscar secretly or not, which is a no. Yes, previous versions are able to gain control in times of danger or immediate high stress but it's more of a defense system much like that of the Avatar state from the Avatar that RWBY takes inspiration from. Rather than a single entity, it's a collective force reacting. All that Oscar hears is past memories and experiences, things that will be added onto his consciousness. The difference with all the other incarnations so far is that they had years and decades to build up distinct egos and beliefs. Oscar is the youngest so far and by proxy the naive Ward. Being easy to be “directed” by Oz. Ozpin in theory has already ceased to exist as he was and has now become part of the Oz Cycle. Ozpin as he exists in Oscar’s head is merely a lesson for Oscar to learn from. In no way from the interactions in the show is Ozpin in control of Oscar, it's just the sharing of experiences that Oscar already owns. In a sense its Oscar himself reacting to the situation, just not realizing it because of the disconnect between his current mind and the several past experiences from the cycle. Since he hasn’t bonded with the Oz cycle completely just yet the periods when he goes unconscious and is taken over is the memories from previous cycles stepping in to react to the situation. His mind and body just aren’t ready yet, just like how Ozpin reassured him when they first met. Over time Oscar would no longer hear Ozpin in his head, and they would become one, that same process should have had occurred with every single incarnation of Oz if the rules apply.

  That and the OZ Cycle does not work like the Avatar cycle which keeps being referenced in this rewrite thanks to the fact that we the audience directly see Oscar is not a newborn baby but a young teenager who was alive during Ozpin’s time as a headmaster. A very important fact when referring to my timeline for Oz incarnations, sure an argument could be made for the rge segments in time between the earlier variants truly. That said the fact that enemies and allies react to the reappearance of Oz being so soon after his death which was months before leads me to believe that the reincarnation process does in fact take a rge period of time to occur.

  [FINISH]