Author's Foreword:

So, the first story I publish under this label. I'm fascinated by the concept of Nabiki being a witch, which is something a lot of people did around here on this site, but I can't remember if I've seen one with Ranma being an animal familiar to her... Well, there's "Ranma Saotome doesn't MYAH!", but it wasn't really a summoning and Ranma was more like Kasumi's pet rabbit-cat-thingy than anything else.

I wish that particular fanfic got a follow up, tbh.

Anyway, here's the thing, enjoy!

xxx

The Greedy Witch

.

As she finished the magical circle, the 13-year old smiled to herself. A work well done, if she said so herself.

She' been dabbling in some small time spells for quite a while now since she found that tome on that creepy bookstore that disappeared the moment she turned her back to it. Thankfully, the book actually worked, it would be troublesome to get a refund if that was not the case.

The spells she tried were a couple of simple things, like one that let her detect lost coins in a 3 meters radius and a hex to make people to lose pocket change more easily. While she was satisfied with her progress, she wanted more. But to do more, she needed more powerful spells, and to do more powerful spells, the book specifically said that she needed a familiar.

Hence why she was currently completing the summoning ritual to invoke one such being. She just hoped to avoid something that calls to much attention (like a fire elemental) or too gross (like a frog with bat wings). The book said that she had only one shot and there's no backsies once she summoned a familiar.

Anyway, time to stop musings and start this ritual. Clearing her voice, the novice witch started to chant:

"Oh, beings of magic,

Hear my call, for I plead for assistance!

Listen to my soul's request,

I just ask for one chance!

I, Nabiki Tendo, summon thee,

My familiar!"

Good! The circle is starting to shine, just like the book said! Nabiki could barely believe that such simple attempt of poetry (which honestly wasn't one of the best things she has ever heard) could have a powerful effect in tearing a bit of reality to summon a creature.

Ah, the light is now covering the entire circle, not only the drawing! This means that her newest minio—I mean, familiar was coming through!

It was then that a black cat with red accents over it's ends elegantly pulled itself from the floor where the magical circle had opened a portal from wherever it came from. The circle stopped to shine and Nabiki stared at the cat with a satisfied smile that soon turned into a greedy shark smile as she thought about the possibilities that just opened themselves to her. She curiously noticed that the cat hadn't opened it's eyes yet, it was sleepy, maybe? Anyway, she needed to make eye-contact with the cat, it was an important step to the ritual.

"Hello, creature of magic, could you please look upon the windows of my soul? Tell me if I'm worth of one such as you." She asked politely. The book specifically said to be polite with creatures you summon. Especially if said creatures are to be your business partners.

The cat made an expression that seemed somewhere between frustration, defiance and "I know I'll lose, but goddammit, I will fight till the end!" It's weird that a cat could make such an expression, even more so that Nabiki actually could identify it.

"Please, oh creature of magic, look upon my eyes, for I am in need of a partner!" she tried again. This time, the cat made a weird sound that suspiciously sounded like snort.

"Yeah, right. Then the deal is sealed for reals and I'm stuck as someone's slave, thanks, but no thanks." Oh, okay, she wasn't expecting that!

"What did y—" she was suddenly interrupted when the circle shined again and suddenly a hand grabbed the cat's tail and made electrocuted the feline. It had no choice but open it's eyes wide, all three of them, and look directly into Nabiki's.

Suddenly everything went even more bright as both Nabiki's and the cat's eyes shone in the same shade of blue color.

When the room got dark again, or at least just dimly lit, only Nabiki and the cat were left. No signal of the weird electrocuting hand. Then the cat started to cuss with some choice words about whoever was the owner of said hand.

"-dammed goddess of magic, if I was human I would kick her ass like there's no tomorrow." Finally stopping their piece, the cat looked at his slack-jawed summoner. He makes a resigned sound and introduces himself:

"Hello, my name is Ranma Saotome," then suddenly his third eye flashed like a camera, temporarily blinding Nabiki. "Uh, sorry 'bout this."

And then Ranma coughed up a polaroid photo.

Author's Notes:

Believe it or not, this isn't supposed to be a NabikiXRanma shipping. I get that a lot of people like this particular ship and I particularly enjoy some fics that have this ship, buuuuuuuut I'm also actually really into AkaneXRanma. Mostly because I'm usually pretty vanilla when it comes to my ship tastes.

Though, honestly, I'm not really a diehard defender of it. Limiting myself with that would limit the kind of stories I could read, you know?

Anyway, about this story, I just had this idea today (as in, February 1st, 2019) and I decided to write and publish it as soon as I could to get it out of my head. I don't actually know what to do with it, but I see potential for comedic hijinks with this setup. I can see Nabiki using Ranma as a way to collect blackmail, Nabiki teasing Ranma on a unrequited crush on Akane, maybe a team of magical girls shows up to mess with Nabiki's schemes... Lots of fun stuff, y'know?

That's not even counting how the canon events play out with Ranma out of his usual role before he even meets Shampoo and Akane (on this AU he already met Ukyo).

As how Ranma ended up as a magical cat... I dunno yet, my favorite idea for now is that he died and this is an unexpected side effect of neko-ken training. I think I'll expand it if I ever come back to this concept.

UPCOMING IDEAS:

- Magical Kung Fu Princess Ranma-Chan!: In wich Ranma falls in The Spring of The Drowned Magical Girl, tormenting everybody with sugar-coated magic and secretely loving every second of it.

- Akane Tendo vs The World: Akane is a normal girl, at least as much as martial arts heiress with a knack for videogames can be. That is, until she meets a girl called Ranma Saotome when she showed up during her dreams "as a shortcut to China" and over a year later had been engaged to a boy with the same name. Now she is unwingly dragged into a battle against The League of Evil Fiancées!

- The Crimson Mad-Scientist: A Spring that exchanges physical prowers for high intelligence, what happens when a genius of martial arts falls into The Spring of The Drowned Genius Girl? A Ranma 1/2 fanfic concept with mild elements of Tenchi Muyo and the webcomic Girl Genius.