Chapter 7: New Understanding
The morning began easily enough. Throwing on a keikogi would have been faster, but Ranma was becoming increasingly proficient in donning her Lillian sailor uniform and could now dress with only a minimum of fuss in the bright sunlight. Once she was suitably attired, she left camp and began the trip to school.
Almost immediately, she became aware that something felt off. The roads were nearly empty of cars, and she encountered very few girls on her way to Lillian. A disproportionately large number of those girls were carrying weapons of some kind or another. Most of the ones who weren't so equipped were instead carrying large bundles of miscellaneous and unidentified things. It was as if the world was preparing for a huge battle, with all belligerents getting all their supplies in place and everybody else taking shelter behind closed doors.
The strange ambiance, and especially the armed girls, set Ranma on edge. Despite her best efforts, though, she failed to spot any upcoming attacks or ambushes on the trip to and through the campus grounds. In fact, she saw almost nobody at all. Even the statue of the hooded woman in the corpse of trees only had a single girl standing in front of it as Ranma passed by.
The interior of the school building was even more desolate than the exterior had been. Normally several girls could be found changing their shoes and exchanging greetings in front of the lockers near the entrance, but this time it was completely devoid of people. The hallways were likewise empty as Ranma made her way to the vending machines and subsequently to the First-year Chrysanthemum Group classroom. The semi-silent echoes of her footsteps lent an eerie, ghost-like ambiance to the familiar hallways.
Ranma found herself half-hoping that Minako would be waiting to pounce on her in the classroom. It would have provided a semblance of normalcy. However, the newspaper girl was no more present than anybody else. No Yoshino. No Ami. No Tanezaki. Nobody. The school felt as abandoned as a cemetery.
Without anything else to do, Ranma pulled her script out of her book bag and took her seat. Pre-class training had been her plan several days ago, before Minako had ruined it with her morning interrogations. Ironically, now that Ranma had given up on it, she seemed to be able to actually do it. She wasn't sure what was happening, but she was willing to take advantage of the opportunity.
Incredibly, she completed an entire read through of the whole play without being interrupted. Not only that, nobody else had arrived throughout the whole exercise. A check of the clock showed that an hour had passed and that classes should definitely have started, and yet the room remained empty.
There was no doubt about it. Something was definitely wrong.
Ranma left her things where they were and left the room. There were answers to be had, and they wouldn't be found by sitting around.
The classroom next door was empty, as was the one past it, and the following one as well. It was eerie. She had only ever seen the school building teeming with activity in the past, and its absence was surreal and unnatural. It was as if all of Lillian had been abandoned in the wake of an apocalyptic disaster, or Ranma had been spirited away into some parallel world bereft of humanity.
Her pace increased as she continued to walk forward in her search. She kept checking rooms as she went: music room, restroom, supply room, classroom. All of them were empty.
That was until Ranma slid open a door and found one which was populated. It was a mixture of surprise and relief to finally find some other people. There were only seven girls there, but compared to the desolation of the rest of the building, it felt like a crowd. They were all surrounding a dress form which had some kind of metal device encircling it. One of the girls, who had medium length brown hair held back with a headband, was fiddling with the contraption. The other six girls were watching her with eager anticipation.
They all turned to the door at Ranma's entrance. The excitement on their faces melted fractionally as they exchanged glances with each other.
One of the girls, the one who was standing next to the one fiddling with the metal device, asked, "Ranko-san? Gokigenyou. Is there something we can help you with?" She had blonde hair which she also held back with a headband.
"What's going on here?" Ranma asked.
"We're trying to figure out a trick for Cinderella's transformation," the blonde girl said.
Another girl, one who had short black hair and glasses, spoke up. She said, "Actually, it's good that you're here. Come in." The girl waved her arm in an overt beckoning gesture.
Ranma hesitantly walked forward and primed herself to react to anything, be it as mundane as being surrounded in a surprise attack or be it as exotic as one of the girl's mouths splitting open to reveal the rows of serpent teeth inside. At this point, nothing would have surprised her.
The eyes of the girls inside remained fixed upon her
"Go get a tape measure," the girl with black hair said. She then turned back to Ranma, "Here, stand here."
"Huh?" Ranma was confused, but she moved forward to stand on the indicated spot. That notably put her in a position where she was surrounded by everybody else, and she kept her guard up in a seemingly relaxed stance. If one of them attacked, she would be ready for it.
One of the other girls picked up a metal tape measure from a side table and handed it over. The girl with black hair and glasses took it, extended it, and wrapped it around Ranma. It wasn't obviously aggressive, so Ranma bode her time.
"What're you doing?" Ranma asked as the girl circled around her.
"Just trying to get your measurements. We were going to get them from the handicrafts club on Thursday, but since you're here anyway, it'll save us a lot of time if we make this the right size to begin with. Arms up, please." She drew the tape measure around Ranma's bust, waist, and hips, and called out the numbers.
A girl with long black hair sighed and quietly asked, "The Yamayurikai really are on a different level, aren't they?"
Her neighbor also sighed and said, "Yeah."
"Hmm?" Ranma asked, turning to look at the two girls.
"Nothing, nothing," the first girl said. Both of the girls blushed.
"Thanks," the girl with the tape measure said once she had finished measuring Ranma's height.
Ranma still wasn't exactly sure what was going on. However, one thing she did know was that the school was almost entirely abandoned. She asked, "Where is everybody?"
The girls looked back and forth at each other. The blonde girl asked, "What do you mean?"
"Were you looking for somebody in particular?" the girl with black hair and glasses asked.
"No. I meant the school's all empty," Ranma said.
"Were you expecting more people?" the girl with glasses asked.
"Yeah," Ranma said. She was confused. It was school, so of course there were supposed to be more people.
"Is there something going on today?" the girl with blonde hair in a headband asked. She looked at her neighbors.
"I didn't hear anything," her neighbor with long, black hair said.
"There's classes?" Ranma asked.
The girls exchanged another set of glances, confusion more prominent on their faces this time. The girl with glasses said, "But it's Sunday."
"We're only here because we need to get ready for the festival next week," the girl with brown hair said.
Suddenly everything made sense. It was Sunday, which of course meant that there were no classes, which of course meant that nobody had come to school. Almost certainly the few girls she had seen in the morning had likewise only come to do preparations for the upcoming festival.
"Oh, is that it?" Ranma asked.
She had had no idea what day of the week it was. Traveling on the road was not conducive to keeping track of a calendar. It just hadn't mattered when hiking through the mountains of China and the forests of Japan if it was a Tuesday or a Friday. The rain either fell or it didn't, they either found food or they didn't, and a punch to the chest was just as painful no matter what day of the week it was.
"Did your old school not get the day off?" the blonde girl asked.
"Something like that," Ranma said. The Saotome School of Anything Goes Martial Arts had no weekends, sick days, or holidays.
"Wow."
"Incredible."
"That sounds hard."
"Ehh..." Ranma shrugged. "Gokigenyou."
She quickly walked out the room and made her way back to the First-year Chrysanthemum Group classroom, eager to escape her feelings of chagrin as well as any awkward questions from the girls.
If it was Sunday, it meant that effectively she had the entire day free. It provided a good opportunity for more training. The rehearsal on Friday had shown how far behind she was compared to the others, and she hated being behind anybody, let alone everybody.
Now that she knew there were no classes in session, Ranma migrated to the Rose Mansion. She felt more comfortable there. She paced back and forth in the conference room, reciting the script out loud with a projecting voice as if delivering the lines to a distant audience. She could still feel the afterthought nature of Cinderella's feminine speech pattern, but her tongue was becoming progressively less tied up with the language.
The completion of that read through provided as good an opportunity as any to eat lunch, so she briefly paused to devour her packages of instant noodles.
Once the sharper edge of her hunger had been addressed, she pulled out the copy of "Human Sword Hanjiro" from her book bag. She had done a lot of good practice over the past two days, and she told herself that the short break would help her better concentrate on her afternoon training.
She eagerly opened the book to the first page and then lost herself in the story of the lowly man who, through his impeccable swordsmanship and indefatigable focus, rose through the ranks to become a high ranking military officer. It was every bit as gripping, dramatic, and exciting as Ranma had come to expect from Shoutarou Ikenami.
The reading left her feeling refreshed and energized, if possibly distracted with visions of bandit raids and samurai duels. The afternoon was progressing, though, and she had more work to do. If the next rehearsal with the Yamayurikai was not successful, she wanted to be sure that it would not be because of her.
Ranma returned to the Cinderella script and resumed her training; images of demanding step-sisters and opulent dancing replaced the dusty streets of ancient Kyoto in her imagination.
A couple of hours later, she decided she had done enough for the day. She was not going to miss dinner this time. She felt much more confident in her ability to deliver her lines, even if she had had no luck with memorizing them. The sun was descending down the sky, but it was still bright as she cleaned up her trash and began her return trip to camp.
When she arrived back at the temple, Ranma took the time to do a more careful search around the area for spectators. It was easier to do as well as more important to do in the afternoon sunlight. Once she confirmed she was alone, she hopped over some foliage and landed in the camp.
She quickly changed her clothes, and Genma tossed her a bottle of hot water after she had finished changing. They then slipped out of the camp and proceeded with their standard practice of trying to beat each other senseless.
Their fight brought them through the streets and along the river bank. It continued until they came to a tentative armistice in the early evening. There was no way that the cessation of hostilities could possibly last through the whole night, but they both had a vested interest in a temporary truce while they got some dinner.
It was easy to forage for food in a nearby convenience store. Genma walked out with some curry and bread, and Ranma helped himself to some rice balls and sushi. They then found a random bench in a park and took a wary seat.
"How are things going with you and Ogasawara? You came back late the past few days. You think you're all close to her now?" Genma asked between hastily chewed bites.
"Yeah, of course," Ranma said.
Sachiko had stayed behind with him after school, dealt with the newspaper club for him, thanked him for his help with the play, and even brought him stuff to eat. If those weren't signs that things were going well, he didn't know what would be.
"Good. Then I guess you may be ready for the next step of your training," Genma said. Ranma tensed, eager to hear what it was, and he was rewarded by Genma snatching away one of his rice balls. "For the next step, you gotta get invited to her home."
Ranma was left tense in confusion, but he didn't let that stop him from capturing one of Genma's rolls of yakisoba bread, avenging the loss of his rice.
"Her home?" Ranma asked. "What's that gotta do with anything?"
"Foolish boy. Oh, to be cursed with such a stupid son," Genma said melodramatically. Despite his expansive gesturing, he still deftly parried Ranma's attempt at grabbing another piece of bread. "Don't you see? This is what everything's been leading up to. You need to get into her mansion and learn everything about it: see where they keep their stuff, find out who is around and where they stay, learn the pattern of their daily activities. Report back to me once you have completed this. Only then will you be ready for me to show you the true power of the Umisenken."
Ranma growled and shook his head. He said, "This had better be worth it." It was only a half-hearted complaint. Ranma was already convinced that there was something of value to learn in Lillian, if only he could learn it.
"Have some faith in me, boy. It's worth it. Just don't mess it up. You got to keep nice with Ogasawara until this is over," Genma said. "And hurry up. You only got one week left before things start getting dangerous."
"Yeah, yeah," Ranma said.
Upon reflection, Genma's request did seem to have some sense behind it. Trying to learn another person's way of life wasn't without precedent. Back when he had been training to learn the naginata with Shiori Fukuyama, Ranma had been forced learn all aspects of the onna-bugeisha's lifestyle, including seemingly unrelated skills such as tea ceremony and poetry. It had felt insane at the time, but the final results of that training spoke for themselves.
Fukuyama hadn't been an isolated case, either. It had happened a couple more times during his training trip, such as with Wataru Inoue and Rikiya Horiuchi. Being asked to embodying an entire lifestyle was a rare, but not an unheard of, path to attaining mastery of a form of martial art. Presumably Genma was looking for Ranma to do the same thing with Sachiko.
Putting the pieces together, the most natural conclusion was that these Umisenken techniques Genma was teaching him were in fact related to the verbal mastery Sachiko, and to a lesser extent Yoshino, had demonstrated. His objective had to be for Ranma to understand Sachiko's entire lifestyle in order to lay the proverbial groundwork in preparation. In that light, visiting her home made perfect sense; there were countless little details of Sachiko's life which wouldn't be apparent from merely observing her in Lillian.
Ranma's theory neatly explained most of Genma's demands thus far. Genma's insistence that Ranma wear the Lillian sailor dress was just like when Fukuyama had insisted that Ranma wear a female kimono throughout his training. The request to blend in was a ruse to get him to act like Sachiko and the others. His suggestion to befriend Sachiko or Eriko was because they were both in the Yamayurikai, the champions of the school-wide competition. Genma's refusal to explain the whole training process in advance was a precautionary measure to prevent Ranma from trying to skip some steps and forming bad habits before he was ready.
The theory didn't quite fit all the facts, though. Genma's list of recommended girls to befriend was odd, but Ranma could justify Genma's suggestion of Kanina as a backup plan if the Yamayurikai had proven to be impenetrable. What he couldn't explain was why Sachiko had been targeted, or indeed any "rich girl." It would have made more sense to select Youko and Sei in addition to Eriko, especially as Youko was clearly the one in charge of the Yamayurikai and thus the strongest. However, as far as a working theory went, it seemed pretty good.
While Ranma had been speculating, Genma had managed to snatch two pieces of sushi away. Ranma noticed the losses his inattention was causing just barely in time to save a rice ball from Genma's brazen raid. Intercepting that last attack was enough to clarify Ranma's priorities for the immediate moment. All of his conjectures about this new technique Genma was teaching him were pushed aside as he instead focused on finishing his meal. The sooner it was in his stomach, the less of it would disappear into Genma's own. It was likely that Genma would resume the general assault the moment he had finished his own dinner, too, so Ranma needed to be sure to finish first.
As predicted, the battle restarted right as Ranma and Genma concurrently finished swallowing their last bites. It then raged throughout the evening, and it was late at night before they made their way back to camp. Thereafter, Ranma fell onto his cold bedroll once again, another day done.
Last Updated: December 17, 2021