Of Chains and Summoning
Disclaimer: I don't own Ranma one half but The World of Ar'wal is history and characters and some races are of my own creation, influenced by several fantasy books, comics, graphic novels and games
Authors Notes: This story was originally whiten with pen and paper a few years back while I was traveling for work and I would like to share it with all of you, i hope you like it. I don't have any current plans to continue this maybe I will come back to it at a later time maybe I wont I don't know yet but there is at least 3-4 more chapters to come when I get the chance to transfer it from pen and paper to a .odt file.
"Speech",Thoughts
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Location unknown, Time unknown,day unknown, year unknown
She did not know how long she had been here in this crystal cave floating in a sea of color chained to the walls like some animal, it had been so long she had forgotten her name. she was practically skin and bones her body feeding on its self to keep her alive, there was no food here and all that she could remember was that it was THEIR fault, for THEY bound her here and left her to die, it had been so long since she was trapped here that she'd even for forgotten who THEY were, all she could remember about them was that THEY were no match for her in a fight so they used magic to defeat her, when she got out of here she would make THEM pay with THEIR lives.
She felt something subtle at first but it soon became too much to ignore something was pulling her calling toher, for a moment she tried to free herself before remembering how futile it was, in all these long years never once had she so much as freed one limb from the chains that bound her, she would have gone back to wallowing in despair and anger had a portal not opened up and sucked her in ripping the chains from her before the cave became no more, the being it was made to contain having escaped, it no longer had a anchor a purpose and as such was swept away by the powers of space and time
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History of The land of Ar'wal'
In the Third Age the Age of Tranquility long before the Elder God Seshodaru became corrupted by the evil in the hearts of mortals and became known as The Fallen Elder God Seshomaru the destroyer, there were Twelve Elder Gods, each had a order of knights sworn to do as their God asked and given gifts of magic and power by their God, The twelve orders of knights were collectively known as The Order. They did battle with evil in all forms and helped bring peace to the land Arwal.
Ar'wal' itself was covered in beautiful Forrest with trees so tall they reaches the clouds and great planes land so fertile that anything could grow upon them, but when Seshodaru became corrupted he laid waste to the world of Arwal till the other eleven Elder Gods rose together and stopped him, eventually the alliance of the Gods fell apart corrupted by the same taint as Seshomaru they fought amongst themselves and setting their worshipers and knights against each other to fight for what little land survived the battle with Seshomaru. Starting the Fourth Age the Age of the Warring Gods that was over nine hundred thousand years ago.
Some stayed out of the fighting and forged fragile alliances with other Gods in the end all the Elder Gods lay dead slain at eachothers hands, The Battle of the Gods had been all but forgotten by the Races of Arwal but the effects of their Terrible fights were far reaching for from their deaths flowed the power that spun a web of magic over the lands otherwise known as The Weave putting the power of magic in the hands of mortals who knew how to tap into it thus mage's came to be starting the Fifth Age, the Age of Magic.
Some mage's found places where many lines of The Weave came together in great knots of power called Great Nodes, a place where one of the Elder Gods fell in battle, they taped in to the power left behind by the passing of an Elder God, becoming the first Ascended Gods and erected Temples on these Great Nodes for their worshipers to pay homage to them, thus increasing the amount of power they could draw from the node on which the temple was erected. some only had one such temple, others had many, some were good, others evil, some formed alliances, others did not preferring not to get involved in the affairs of other Gods.
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The Land of Ar'wal',Kingdom of Ahera, Mor'tahg highlands, Mar'wean city, Mar'wean Academy of Magic, Time morning of the one thousand two hundred sixty seventh day of the Fifth Age
Mar'wean Academy was the first Magic Academy in Arwal founded by the once great mage now Ascended God Tsu'mata in the sixtieth year of Fifth Age, and it housed and trained some of the most powerful and intelligent Mage's in all of Ar'wal'. it was larger than most cities of Ar'wal', and for all appearances was carved out of one single flawless piece of Jade for which it got its nickname The Jade City, and the High Council of Mage's got their name, The Jade Council.
In this city there is an academy and in a classroom of the academy proper we find a male, blue haired, orange eyed Drotan 1 mage giving a summoning lesson "this class is a beginners summoning circle" he said pointing to a intricate chalk circle with runes and strange symbols in and around it "there are two types of summoning circles beginners and expert, beginners summoning circles confine the summoned being to the circle itself and are used to get those learning used to summoning, after some practice you won't need one unless you want to contain what you summon any questions?"
A young blond haired blue eyed human girl of about thirteen summers of age wearing the gray robes of a mage in training raised her hand "Yes Sabrina", "What about the expert summoning circle Mr. Yotsaru?" asked Sabrina. "They are used to summon beings of great power, things like the spirits of fallen champions and greater demons and they are the most complex summoning spells to do correctly and if done wrong the caster of the spell might well die" explained Yotsaru. Another student raised their hand, this one also female and of the same age but a high elf with long lustrous black hair falling loosely to her shoulders and brown eyes "Yes, Mar'ra?"
"If greater demons can be summoned with a expert summoning circle, couldn't a demigod be summoned as well?" she asked "I've never heard of anyone who tried such a thing and survived the process of channeling the magic needed to complete the summoning process that was not themselves immortal or undead, so its most likely not possible for mortals to summon one, it is also forbidden to summon a Demigod because of the chance that it would draw the attention of the God that spawned them with grievous ramifications and I personally would advise against trying such a thing, explaining dead students to the headmistress is such a bother" most of the class laughed at the joke some chuckled, others wondered if it was more than a joke and Mar'ra was contemplating how to summon a Demigod and prove she was the best mage in the school
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Mar'wean Academy of Magic, inner Forrest, sometime after Midnight
It had taken Mar'ra almost a year to get in to the sealed rooms in the library, find and copy the information she needed with out getting caught, six months to get the ingredients for the immortality potion, one week to brew it and three days to set up the summoning circle, the size did not matter but she had to cover almost the entire clearing in the summoning circle to get all the fine detail right but at last all her hard work would pay off for when she summoned a Demigod she would prove she was the best student and then they would give her the advanced training she longed for I can't believe Mr. Yotsaru gave me a failing grade in summoning! This will teach him I'm better than Sabrina, With this I'll show them I'm ready for advancement! The Master Mage's will beg to teach me and Sabrina will finally acknowledge me as her better! Lost in her internal fantasy she did not notice when a dog chasing a cat passed through the circle and scuffed up the circle changing the location from where it would summon, when she finally wound down from her fantasy she drank the potion and began the summoning ritual after a long series of incantations the circle began to glow and hum with power, all that was left was to say was the final incantation "o' stórr eđa ríkr rénáss sási rekkr bođ styrkr!" (o' great and powerful Demigod this warrior summons assistance!) there was a flash of blindingly bright blue light and a thud the clearing was silent for a moment then a loud cry rang out "WHAT THE HELL!" was heard by all in the school still up at the late hour and awoke some that weren't.
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Mar'wean Academy of Magic, Headmistresses office, later that morning
Headmistresses Raven Teminus Arkturis was not a happy Tiger Half-Beast for not only did she have to deal with the academy's worst student and trouble maker Mar'ra Elo'Dana Tel'van but she had to inform the council ,The Jade Council of said student summoning a being from another plane of existence using a immortality potion one of the few controlled potions in the world given out only by the council to those in need of the short term immortality it granted fore when the effects wore off after three hours the drinker of the potion was frozen like unto a Golem with its soul gem removed they could mot move or be repositioned but they could see, hear, feel, think and smell just the same, the effect had been known to last as short as eight hours to as long as four months and she could not punish the little trouble maker till it wore off to top it all off after the being from another plane was summoned she unleashed a potent if uncontrolled spell destroying the a sizable portion inner forest and damaging the academy near the forest in the process she really would like to know who and what she was but the transplaneal being was in no condition to answer questions seeing as she was unconscious when the night patrols and teachers arrived and was currently being treated for dehydration and starvation by Mrs. Goodfello the best healing mage in all of Ar'wal in the Healers hall in the academy's west wing. she would just have to wait till she awoke to slate her curiosity.
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Mar'wean Academy of Magic,Healers hall, two weeks later
Abruptly sitting up in one of the many beds was a woman with red hair so long that pooled around her even when she sat up, pale skin and blue almond shaped eyes wearing a plain nightgown, said eyes were wide with worry and hope for she hadn't dreamed of being free much less of being clean in a while maybe it was not a dream but another hallucination she had not had one of those in a long time either way it was a welcome escape from reality and the cave that was her prison but this feels so real it must be a dream, i might as well enjoy it while it lasts she rationalized with her self,
As she looked around the room she noticed that hers was not the only bed in fact there looked to be more than fifty other beds nor was she the only one in the room as there were ten or so other people in beds about the room some wearing bandages and not all of them were human and there was an old human woman about 165.1 cm (five feet five inches) in height with short curly gray hair that almost reached her shoulders wearing a off white dress under a white apron, she was currently giving a young wolf like girl of about ten summers a strange lightly glowing green liquid that smelt of honey and lilacs on a golden spoon "come on now Rouge take your medicine like a good girl really it dose not taste bad at all" the ten year old had her head turned to the side with her mouth firmly shut "Mmmp mmmu" the old lady lowered the spoon just out of the little girls sight "why not?" she asked Rogue "it tastes like boiled..MHph!" what ever it was that the girl was about to say was abruptly interrupted by the golden spoon and green liquid being introduced to her mouth the spoon removed and the girls mouth being held shut by the old woman leaving Rogue no other option other than to swallow the foul liquid
"That was mean Mrs. Goodfello!" whined the girl once Mrs. Goodfello removed her hand from the girls mouth"Well if you had be more cooperative I wouldn't have had to do that now would I?" "S' still mean" grumbled the girl "What was that Rogue do you want some more?" asked Mrs. Goodfello, Rogue noticed that the red head human lady was awake and eager to get Mrs. Goodfello's attention off of her pointed to the red head and blurted out "Hey, shes awake!"Mrs. Goodfello followed Rouge's pointing finger to the red head mystery woman that had been her charge for a little over two weeks "ah, your awake" she said putting down the bottle of green liquid and the golden spoon and making her way to the bed said red head was sitting on.
Picking up a oval shaped stone she hit it hard on the table and to the red head's surprise it began to glow brightly "Now, if you will please look forward and try not to blink" not knowing what else to do in this situation the girl did as she was told and Mrs. Goodfello passed the glowing stone in front of each of the girls eyes individually "hm, your eyes appear to be acting normal, are you having problems remembering any thing?" "A little" was the red head's uncertain response "can you remember your name? Place of birth? Who you are?" she asked "N..no I cant, do...do you know me?"
"No, I don't your memories are most likely locked away from a mishap with the summoning " she said before picking up a a yellow pill about the size of a gum drop "but this Munin (memory) pill will help with that it will unlock your memories some may need a mere flash of the whole memory to unlock it and some will have to play out in there entirety be they good or bad it will not be instantaneous and will happen randomly over time till they are all revealed and remembered, it tends to go from the most recently forgotten or locked away memories near the surface of you subconscious mind to the most deeply burred and most likely painful of them, but whether you take it or not is your decision" she explained before putting it in the red head's hand and seeing the look in the young woman's face added "don't worry you need not decide now think it over for a while, now if you will excuse me I must retrieve the headmistress" and with that she left the room leaving the confused red head to her thoughts.
Is this a dream or have I escaped?with that thought she closed her eyes and opened all of her senses and she Felt the world around her never before in all of her dreams and hallucinations had she not been able to tell that they weren't real by opening her senses and feeling where her body was which up till now had always been the cave my prison she mentally added, opening her eyes and looking at the hand that held the strange pill that the old woman gave her do I want to remember? She asked her self picking up the strange pill and inspecting it, it seemed normal enough in fact it looked kind of like candy "Yes, I do" she mumbled quietly to her self before popping the pill in her mouth and swallowing after that the world went black and she fell back on the bed reliving the past within her mind
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Authors End Notes: Many thanks to Autobots Butterfly for Beta reading for me
1 High Mountain Snow elves with skin as pale as snow and orange or blue eyes, clear blood, black lips, tong, internal organs, inside of mouth, sphincter, nipples, male "Glands" and female liba minoria/genitalia