Dust is toxic to human biology; infusing it into one’s system by any means will cause pain and internal injuries. Whatever the people of Remnant know about these side-effects is still a mystery to us, but observing our examples allows us to infer the damage is not caused by Dust’s elemental manifestations.

If the Lightning Dust which Hazel Rainart stabbed into his arms was automatically converting itself into electricity independent of his will, then anyone making physical contact with Hazel would be subjected to the electrical flow. Yet no one seems to suffer a jolt when striking him; Qrow even makes sustained contact as he tries to cut through the forearm Hazel is using to block his sword. Qrow isn’t being shocked at all, which would seem related to how Hazel is paying no real attention to him.

Neither do I think Hazel’s pain-blocking Semblance would allow him to ignore the paralyzing effects of electricity on human muscles, which Aura alone certainly fails to prevent.

Hazel also failed to burst into flames after injecting Fire Dust. Neither did even his hair or clothing ignite from a tremendous increase of body temperature. The air around him does not waver from heat haze. He produces no fire at all except as deliberate projectiles manifested through his intentional punches.

Our final piece of evidence is that we’ve never seen Nora Valkyrie attempt it.

If Dust instantly converted into an elemental form when infused into the human body, then Nora’s Semblance would allow her to absorb it instantly and painlessly. She would be able to use Lightning Dust far more easily than Hazel.

The fact that she doesn’t suggests that infusing Lightning Dust into her body would cause her harm and pain, no matter how quickly she converts the Dust into relatively harmless electricity. Therefore, she is generally much better off triggering Lightning Dust outside of her body and absorbing only the manifested energy.

This is apparently so obvious to her friends that Ruby seems to consider it safer for Nora to receive a boost from being shot with a Lightning Dust Round rather than “shooting it up”.

=================================

back to my Dust index

Given Maliwan’s thoroughly artistic flair, I feel it’s natural to suppose their Remnant version would be found in Mistral City.

But how are Maliwan guns different in RWBY compared to Borderlands?

Well, the RWBY verison of Maliwan is the manufacturer most different from the original Borderlands version, since Dust makes elemental properties inherent to ammunition rather than projectile weapons. Since Maliwan’s weapons were subpar in all other qualities, manufacturing art-piece hobbyist guns would be more of a side-venture next to the business of mining and refining Dust to make high-quality ammunition. There would seem to be a market for such goods, given the existence of firearms companies like Jakobs and Torgue, who are overly-selective about the kind of ammunition they manufacture, and those like Dahl, who don’t bother to produce any at all.

Unfortunately for Maliwan, the Dust market came to be internationally dominated by the Schnee Dust Company, as a matter of RWBY canon.

In desperation, Maliwan gambled much of their remaining capital on a bold new direction: They bought the licences to several of Hyperion’s proprietary technologies, constructed brand-new manufacturing facilities, hired or re-trained teams of skilled craftsmen, and began to produce new lines of elemental-projection weaponry. Putting a positive spin on this abrupt departure from tradition, Maliwan adopted a new sales pitch, hypocritically claiming to believe in “honoring the past by embracing the future” while simultaneously framing the existence and use of older, more conventional firearms as shameful, embarrassing, and brutish.

This proved to be a massive success. While Maliwan sacrificed a portion of their future revenue to pay their dues to Hyperion, they pulled themselves out of a losing battle with the SDC, and their new weapons boasted great appeal to their Mistralian customers, as well as foreign markets. Even some student and professional hunters began to place orders for custom elemental weapons rather than go to the effort of designing and building them personally.

In fact, they have proven so successful that the SDC may have decided to muscle them out of that market, too.

=================================

back to my Dust index

back to my kingdoms of Remnant index

The Great Kingdom of Mantle, later known as Atlas, has always pushed the boundaries of science and engineering farther than any other kingdom on Remnant; indeed, this is how they earned their place as one of the Great Kingdoms, despite their humbler territory. As Mantle’s mines produced less and less Dust to fuel their efforts in the Great War, there grew an ever-greater demand to make more efficient use of the Dust they had left, even as the kingdom continued to lose its most skilled Dust-mages in the fighting. As always, the kingdom turned to technology to solve their problems, and thus designed weapons that could give everyday men the power to harness more of Nature’s Wrath than bullets alone could express. Such a culture makes a fitting birthplace for the Hyperion corporation.

But how are Hyperion guns different in RWBY compared to Borderlands?

Like digistruction technology, Reverse Recoil technology seems to be a practically magical brand of science-fiction that doesn’t yet exist on Remnant… or at least not in a form that can be mass-marketed to the common man. Without that, Hyperion weapons wouldn’t offer enough to compete against Dahl, especially since anyone willing to invest piles of money to acquire the best gun possible is probably a professional hunter or specialist, who tend to simply design and build their own weapons.

However, the Hyperion of Borderlands does have one other proprietary brand of technology which translates excellently into the Dust-filled world of RWBY: E-Tech.

On Remnant, Hyperion is primarily a research-and-development corporation that focuses on inventing and patenting new technologies. In this way, Hyperion raises itself above “mere” manufacturers. The corporation styles itself a master who watches lesser manufacturers compete with amusement, choosing which gladiator to bless with its internationally-licensed technologies, and demanding tributes for its generosity.

The most conventional of those technologies would be the use of magnetic rails and coils in sniper rifles and rocket launchers, which use Lightning Dust to propel physical projectiles in place of Fire or Air Dust. More radical still are the weapons that don’t fire bullets at all, but instead convert Dust directly into projected elemental attacks: Ice blasters, Acid sprayers, Glue splashers, Sonic canons, Flame throwers, Plasma casters. Neptune Vasilias’s electric-polearm / plasma-rifle and Flynt Coal’s sonic-projectile trumpet are canonical examples of this Dust technology.

Such devices would allow anyone to exert some form of control over powerful manifestations of Dust without needing the kind of Semblance or practiced years of skill required to be a Dust-mage, though with the drawback that these weapons couldn’t change elements just by loading different types of Dust, and the few that could would be horribly more expensive to buy and maintain.

=================================

back to my Dust index

back to my kingdoms of Remnant index

At least one culture within Remnant is polytheistic. Here’s what I imagine a Remnant pantheon might look like.

Note that these deities could be very real or entirely fictional. Regardless, they are heavily tied to Dust, since Dust is either their gift to humanity or humanity’s inspiration for them.

=================================

Agni is the chief deity; a god of the sun, light, fire, hunting, cooking, metal-working, and fatherhood. He is loving, cheerful, and productive, but also hot-tempered, single-minded, and restless. Agni’s emotional struggles serve as model lessons on the tragic uselessness of power and passion without compassion or control. He delights in communing with mortals through man-made flames such as lanterns, cooking fires, and forges, but when fire gets out of control and reduces everything he loves to ash, he is left only with sorrow and shame. Agni stands as a model for personal accountability; the archetype of someone accepting responsibility for one’s mistakes, and trying again.

Prthivi is his sister, wife, and equal; a goddess of earth, agriculture, architecture, administration, material wealth, and motherhood. She is the generous queen who provides every resource men dig up from the earth. Prthivi is also the bridge between the mortal and the divine, as she is the one who crystallizes the essence of the gods into Dust. Her martial aspect is defensive where Agni’s is aggressive, and together they represent the fertility of the sexes.

Vayu is their rebellious younger brother; god of wind, flight, performance art, messengers, travelers, nomads, scouts, spies, thieves, con-artists, and persuasive speakers. Indolent and silver-tongued, he never makes anything of permanence himself, but instead inspires or tricks others into doing work for him; not always so that he may steal the product for himself, but often for their own good, or for the benefit of someone else. The clouds mark the highest point of Vayu’s domain; he cannot reach the heights of Agni’s sun.

Apa (Edit: 4/23/2017 – probably wrong on this one) is the baby sister; a goddess of blood, healing, immortality, and water. Prthivi may be the goddess of motherhood, but Apa is the goddess of birth and midwifing. While Apa’s domain is vital and underestimated only at one’s peril, she is nevertheless the smallest and weakest of the gods, with the most tenuous authority over her worldly element. Her older sister has more authority over natural and man-made bodies of water by controlling the shape of their beds, and her older brother Vayu has more influence over precipitation and sailing. Her power in bodies of water is limited further beyond the bright shallows; deeper and darker waters are enemy territory, especially as Agni cannot hunt there. She is therefore a humble and supportive figure who cooperates with or serves others for the good of the whole, quietly proud of her skills, and better regarded than Vayu.

The minor god of lightning, Indra, was born when Vayu attempted to steal some of Agni’s fire for himself. In some accounts, Vayu seduced Agni in the form of a woman, while in others, Agni’s fire simply changed form to better suit Vayu’s home in the clouds. The minor god of ice, Himavat, was likewise born from the union of Vayu and Apa.

=================================

back to my Dust index

back to my kingdoms of Remnant index

For Dust-mages, using raw Air Dust is very much like Avatar: The Last Airbender’s Airbending – relatively pathetic on the attack, but absolutely amazing for personal mobility.

Early Dust-mages of Remnant were probably using this stuff to mask the sounds and scents of their passage from the Grimm when possible, and to hasten their escapes when not. With some inventive tools and clothing, gliding through the air over short distances would be possible – but only short distances, since Dust runs out and climbing too high in the sky will attract the attention of all of the flying Grimm in the area.

Nowadays, Air Dust is probably used in airships for jet propulsion, and it might also be mixed with Earth Dust to create the Gravity Dust so vital for lifting Atlas’s flying bricks into the sky.

Air Dust can also be used for gunpowder and rocket propellant. Indeed, whereas Fire Dust creates heat and expanding gas, Air Dust creates only expanding gas.

If Air Dust produces more gas than Fire Dust with virtually no waste heat, it might be not only the superior form of gunpowder, but also the superior form of “combustion” engine fuel (especially for machines meant to operate in hot environments).

Air Dust might be similarly effective as the explosive charge in bullet tips and fragmentation grenades.

Mercury Black’s ammunition deserves special mention. It seems to me that his cartridges are all Dust and no bullet, and thus he is employing his own skill at Dust-casting to weaponize the forces he conjures. This makes perfect sense to me, since his father stole his Semblance and forced him to learn how to fight and kill with universal skills alone.

As far as I can tell, the purpose of Cordovin’s mech’s air cannon is knocking multiple, small, flying, fragile targets (such as the swarming Manticores) out of the air with quick and wide blasts, whereas its other projectiles require more charge-up time or more precision and so are better used against larger, tougher, slower targets (such as the Leviathan).

=================================

back to my Dust index

Steam Dust is obviously unparalleled for fueling steam engines. Whereas pure Fire Dust allows you to forego a supply of wood or coal for heating a water supply, Steam Dust allows you to also go without needing a water supply.

What’s more, Steam Dust produces less waste heat than Fire Dust, while producing more expanding gasses, so on top of reducing the weight of your fuel, you’re increasing the horsepower and reducing issues with overheating.

Here’s where I’m told that while combustion engines are more efficient at providing a varying level power on demand, steam engines are superior to combustion engines at providing a steady flow of constant power. Then you consider how Steam Dust allows one to design a steam engine just as small and portable as a combustion engine, which is otherwise impossible.

Imagine if the most desirable form of vehicular Dust engine in Vacuo uses Steam Dust. Build the engine to collect the water vapor in a filtered tank, and you can create a supply of potable water as you travel across the desert. Efficient!

I have no idea how effective Steam Dust could be as gunpowder or an explosive charge.

=================================

back to my Dust index

If Ice Dust is actually a thing and not simply Water Dust being used to make ice, then it’s probably a hybrid of Water and Air Dust.

Used directly as a weapon by Dust-mages, ice is superior to fire or lightning in many respects. The flash-freezing cold violently ruptures and destroys flesh, without any risk of starting uncontrollable fires. Heavy frost can be used to weigh down, lock, and capture targets, preventing them from chasing you or defending themselves far longer than the paralysis caused by short-lived currents of electricity. Ice formations can also be used to create temporary alterations to the battlefield in ways akin to Earth Dust.

Ice Dust was also the easiest way to preserve food before the invention of electric refrigeration, and in the modern day is an invaluable way of keeping hard-working machines at optimal temperatures.

Very much like Earth Dust, Ice Dust cannot be used for gunpowder, as the expanding mass of ice would destroy all but the most specialized of gun barrels, while the same expansion could allow Ice Dust to be used as the explosive charge of fragmentation grenades.

Indeed, Ice Dust could be used very much like Earth Dust in modern forms of ammunition, when it is used simply to produce hunks of ice. Otherwise, you would use Ice Dust in bullet tips, warheads, or grenades which are not designed to explode with concussive force but simply to release and trigger the Dust to freeze a target from the inside or outside.

For engineering irony, you might be propelling a Freezer-tip bullet or Freezer-warhead… with Fire Dust.

=================================

back to my Dust index

Sorry, Avatar: the Last Airbender fans; Water Dust isn’t Waterbending, plain and simple.

A Waterbender could fight for hours with whatever water is at hand, but a Dust-mage can only hurl water as long as he has Water Dust to burn. When the Dust is gone, the conjured water is soaking uselessly into the ground, and the Grimm are still coming.

Waterbending was never one of the offensively stronger forms of Bending. Sure, a water-whip hurts, but scorching flames, paralyzing lightning, and flash-freezing ice are immediately deadly. Projectile rocks conjured with Earth Dust could hold sharp cutting edges so much more easily than water. Even concussive Wind Dust blasts would probably be faster and farther-reaching because of air’s lighter mass.

Waterbending could reward patience and defense in a way that Water Dust just can’t. Air Dust runs out just as quickly, but is very effective when used for a quick getaway rather than to stand and fight. Using Water Dust for the same thing requires a body of water to travel over or through.

Additionally, if the water produced by Water Dust is elementally pure water, it’s not even safe to drink.

Outside of mixing with other forms of Dust to create valuable hybrid forms, there are two remaining possibilities I can still think of that would give Water Dust value:

1) If Dust can be used to exert control upon the existing world rather than simply adding to it. If Water Dust could be spent to gain temporary hydrokinesis, then it could be used medicinally, particularly with first aid and major surgery.

2) Ice Dust doesn’t actually exist; you use Water Dust to conjure ice.

=================================

back to my Dust index