A/N: I had like a hundred ideas for Harry Potter RWBY crossovers but I thought this one could be fun. I tried something new for the prologue, so if the first half doesn't really work just ignore it. Hope ya like it!

DISCLAIMER: Yeah, I know I'm awesome, but I am nowhere near the sheer kickassery of Monty Oum or Rooster Teeth in general. And Harry Potter doesn't have enough explosions to be owned by me.

PS: So I kinda forgot about how the chapter counter works while writing this, so to keep things simple I'm putting the 'prologue' in the same chapter as Chapter 1. They were both a little short anyways.

[ACT 1]: Viva la Muerte

[PROLOGUE]: A Second Chance

Rhonda smiled softly, watching her son jump up and down on his bed. In this world, little Dustin would need all the happiness he could get - but it was still past his bedtime. She knocked on the door, and almost laughed at how fast he was under the covers.

She walked in and sat down on the edge of his bed. "Dustin, what are the rules about jumping on the bed?"

The five-year-old looked suitably abashed as he answered. "Only do it if you or Dad are watching?"

She nodded. "And do you know why that is?"

Dustin shook his head slowly. Rhonda grinned. "It's so that you," she poked him in the nose. "Don't get hurt."

He giggled and grabbed onto her finger. "Mommy, can I have a bedtime story?"

Rhonda pretended to think about it. "Hmmmm… You've been very good today, so I think I can do that. Which one do you want?"

He grinned widely. "The one with the wizard!"

She smiled and cleared her throat, before speaking in a low, melodic tone.

"Once upon a time, in a world far from this one, there was a bad, evil wizard. He wanted to take over the world because he hurt, and wanted to make everyone else hurt with him. One day, there was a prophecy that spoke of a child with the power to defeat him, so he went out to kill that child. He killed the child's father, and then his mother. But when he tried to kill the child, the mother's love stopped him, and it hurt the evil wizard bad enough to make him run away. The child's name was Harry, and people called him the Boy Who Lived.

"Harry grew up, and when he turned eleven, he went to Wizard School. He learned magic, and stopped the Evil Wizard's plans to heal himself and take over the world again. One day, the Evil Wizard managed to heal himself, and started hurting Harry's friends.

"So Harry walked up to the Wizard and told him, 'If you want me dead, kill me, just leave my friends alone.' The Wizard laughed and killed him, and then turned to Harry's friends. He tried and tried to kill them, but Harry had protected them with his death. With the Wizard unable to hurt anyone else, he was quickly defeated, and the world lived happily ever after."

Dustin stared at her with wide eyes. "What happened to Harry? Did he really just… die?"

Rhonda smiled. "Well, you see, Death doesn't really want to take people from the real world, but it's his job. He has to. When he came to collect Harry, he talked to him. Harry impressed Death, that he would die just to save his friends, so Death gave him another chance. He brought him to a different world, a world where Harry could live a full life. Death brought Harry to-"

Dustin cut in. "Remnant! Here! He brought Harry here!"

She ruffled his hair. "Exactly. Death brought Harry to Remnant, and gave him a second chance!"

-[===]-

Ozpin looked up from his coffee when his office began to glow. The gears above and below the room were spinning rapidly, which was strange because he was fairly certain that the entire structure was mostly decorative. As the green orbs above the office began glowing brighter, he retrieved his Scroll and called Glynda.

"Yes, Ozpin?"

"Glynda, my office is glowing."

"It's what?"

"Glowing."

"Why is your office glowing, Ozpin."

"I don't know."

Suddenly, a column of bright emerald light appeared in the middle of the room. As it died down, Ozpin could make out a figure standing in the middle. It was male, he could tell, and seemed to be wearing some sort of cloak or robes? He had messy black hair, and as the light faded entirely the two men made eye contact, the newcomer's emerald irises almost glowing with energy.

The gears surrounding the office slowed down to their normal pace, and the man swayed before collapsing to the ground.

"I suspect it might have something to do with the strange man that just appeared in the room. Bring someone with medical expertise, he seems to be unconscious."

"Ozpin what the actual-"

He hung up. He turned back to the newcomer and leaned back in his chair, taking a deep draft from his mug of coffee. What an interesting development.

A/N: There's the prologue, here's chapter one!

[ACT 1]: Viva la Muerte

[CHAPTER 1]: So, That's New

As Harry woke up, he knew something was wrong. This wasn't his bed in Gryffindor, nor was it in the familiar Hogwarts Hospital Wing. He wasn't in one of the beds in their magical camping tent, or even in Grimmauld Place.

He didn't know where he was. That was not good. Very not good.

And wasn't he supposed to be dead, anyway?

"Oh, good, you're up. You feel okay?"

Harry groaned and opened his eyes. Yep, still needed glasses. He reached out and fumbled around on the nightstand for them, before shoving them onto his face. A woman was peering over him with a mildly worried expression on her face. A woman with fox ears. What.

It was probably safe to say she wasn't a Death Eater, though.

"Erm… yeah? Where am I, by the way?"

A new voice came from a corner of the room. "Thank you, Nurse, I'll take it from here."

She nodded and left the room. Harry turned to the speaker.

The man in question had short, grey hair, but actually looked quite young. He had green eyes, much darker than the bright emerald that always greeted Harry when he looked in the mirror. His face was thin, aristocratic, with small glasses perched on his nose. He was like… it felt like a betrayal to think this, but he was like a cooler Dumbledore.

Also probably not a Death Eater, but mostly because the way he rocked that cane would have made Lucius Malfoy die of jealousy.

"Hello. I am Headmaster Ozpin of Beacon Academy, and you teleported into my office."

Harry blinked. "Oh. Um… sorry about that?"

Ozpin looked at him for a minute, then nodded. "I took the liberty of taking fingerprints and running descriptions of you through our system, and according to the combined databases of the Four Kingdoms, you don't exist."

Harry shrugged. "Given that I've never heard of these 'Four Kingdoms', that would make sense."

Ozpin raised an eyebrow. "Vale, Atlas, Mistral, Vacuo?" Harry just shook his head. "Well then, Mister…?"

"Potter. Harry Potter."

"Well, Mister Potter, what is the last thing you can remember before appearing in my office?"

Harry thought for a moment. "Dying."

"Cause of Death?"

"Killing Curse."

Ozpin tilted his head. "What now?"

Harry's eyes widened. Was this man a muggle? Oh well, he could always obliviate him later. "Do you believe in magic?"

The mysterious headmaster chuckled. "Yes, Mister Potter, I daresay I do."

Harry nodded. "Well, I'm a wizard. Got killed by another wizard."

Ozpin leaned forwards slowly. "Would I be correct in saying you have no knowledge of the creatures of Grimm?"

"Yep."

"Well then," the elder man spoke as though that solved all their problems. "That explains quite a bit. Welcome to Remnant, Mister Potter, I hope you enjoy your stay."

"What."

Ozpin gestured vaguely with his cane. "Multiverse Theory, alternate dimensions, you're from a different universe. Not the strangest thing to happen around here. The most unexpected, yes, but not the strangest."

Harry sighed. "Of course it would never be that easy."

"Tell me, Mister Potter, do they have Aura in your world?"

-[===]-

Deep in the Grimmlands, a blonde-haired, blue-eyed teen woke up in the wreckage of a Bullhead. He patted himself down, reassuring himself with the presence of both his family sword and secondhand scroll. Pulling out the latter, he checked the time and date.

Good. He hadn't been out for too long, just two or three hours. Now to find the rest of the passengers. He turned around and his eyes widened.

Well… he'd found them.

Thing was, they were dead. Jaune was not ashamed to say that he threw up.

-[===]-

"So… what is it that Huntsmen do again?"

Ozpin sipped from his mug of coffee. "Fight Grimm, help people, the likes."

Harry blinked. "Where do I sign up?"

Ozpin eyed him over the rim of his mug, amused. "I know I don't look like much, but I am the Headmaster of Beacon Academy."

"Oh, right. Can I join?"

Ozpin considered it for a moment, before leaning back with a vague smile. "I don't see why not. Classes begin in two weeks, I would advise you to spend that time wisely."

Harry's grin almost split his face. "Thank you, sir."

The Headmaster paused on his way to the door, before half-turning back. "No, Mister Potter, thank you. I have made more mistakes than any man, woman, or child in this world, but something makes me think this won't be one of them." With that, he swept out the door.

What a cheerful guy.

Oddly enough, Harry still preferred him to his previous headmaster. Where Dumbledore was strange, cryptic, and abstract, Ozpin was (admittedly still strange) but also straightforward in an oddly refreshing way. And he had a cool cane.

Speaking of sticks, where was Harry's wand? He patted himself down, and almost had a heart attack when he felt an unfamiliar stick in his pocket. Was this…?

Oh Merlin, no.

It was the Elder Wand.

A quick pat down revealed the presence of his Invisibility Cloak, which was expected, and the Resurrection Stone, which was not. Well, it kind of was, but not in a good way.

There were no two ways about it - Harry was the Master of Death.

On the upside, he could finally get around to fixing his old wand? That had been the main reason he'd ever wanted the Elder Wand in the first place, Mastery of Death aside. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and fished around in the mokeskin pouch around his neck. After pricking his finger on the shard of Sirius' mirror he managed to retrieve his loyal Holly wand.

"Reparo."

With a pleasant clacking sound, the broken stick of wood snapped back together, just like new. Face-splitting grin back in place, Harry swapped the Elder Wand to his left hand, grabbing the Holly with his right. His newly fixed wand began spewing green and gold sparks as he swished it through the air. The Elder wand, not to be outdone, began sparkling in crimson and silver, and he spun in a circle, wands held high, laughing victoriously.

"Harry James Potter is back in business!"

A/N: Poor Jaune, wonder what's gonna happen to him. And Harry is the Master of Death? I bet all of this is entirely unexpected, regardless of it being literally chapter one of the fic.

As for why the 'bedtime story' blatantly acknowledges murder, you gotta remember that this is Remnant. A world that is literally 98% Grimm. A world where people die every day. In modern times, we can afford to shelter children from death but in Remnant, I'd say it would be kind of hard to do that.