The Art____Chapter 5:
Enter Ryouga, The Eternal Lost Boy & Ukyou Can Cook (in more ways than one)
by GreggSharp
Ranma 1/2 created by Rumiko Takahashi, AMG created by Kosuke Fujishima, Gold Digger owned/created by Fred Perry.
---------
Two figures came out of what the locals thought of as a dead-end alley and looked around with hope beginning to show on their faces.
"The signs, they're in Japanese!"
"I see 'em," the girl looked for a street sign. "We're in KOBE!" The elation faded. "Ryouga, do you remember what happened four years ago?"
"Uhm, we got lost?"
Ukyou glared at him. "We both have reasons for chasing after Ranma Saotome, but as I recall you had said something about how we would catch up with Ranma in no time."
Ryouga laughed a little bit and rubbed the back of his head. "Uhm gee, it's been so long, I don't quite recall."
"Have you noticed the intersection? That this is the same intersection we left FOUR YEARS AGO!" Ukyou's glare intensified. "We've gone through all this crap only to make a four-year full-CIRCLE!"
"Don't worry, Ukyou, we know where he's going thanks to that old woman we met in the Hegemony. All we need to do is catch the train to Tokyo. Easy." With a cocky grin, Ryouga started walking.
After watching Ryouga continue due South, Ukyou turned to the North and looked at the train station. With a sigh and a shrug, Ukyou decided that the past four years had been entirely too long with the stubborn wereswine.
Funny how thinking about everything that Ryouga had put her through gave Ukyou a hankering for porkchops.
------
"This bad."
"You can say that again."
"This bad."
Nabiki didn't look amused. "Look, I'm the first to admit that when a plan goes awry it's more often than not some factor overlooked or discounted. The old saying about 'the entropy factor of any given situation increases exponentially when humans are involved' is quite true."
They both looked through the door to where Kasumi and Ranma were sitting at a table, having a cup of tea and talking.
"Did not think of Kasumi as rival."
"I discounted her myself. In retrospect, this was an oversight. With her projective empathy and kind nature, she can make others feel nice just being around her. Right now, she's being affected by the glamourie even though it's weaker in the male form."
"So he making her feel hot and bothered, and she projecting that. Aiyaa. No wonder both blushing." Shampoo considered her adopted sister. "So what we do, Nabiki?"
"First, we get out of range ourselves." Nabiki tugged at her collar, noting how hot and restrictive her clothing had seemed to get in the past few minutes. The idea of a feedback loop between the two occurred to her, which caused her considerable anxiety. "Next we try to
find a way to awaken the triclops."
"You sure about that 'Biki? No telling what triclops do. Might just hurt Ranma, maybe worse."
"Calculated risk. If those two keep going at it like that, we're likely to find Kasumi doing some very out-of-character things before long."
Shampoo glanced at the two and tried to think of what would be impossible behavior for Kasumi. Her eyes crossed as an image of Kasumi and Ranma [censored] on the table, their [censored censored] as they
[censored].(1)
Nabiki noted Shampoo's eyes crossing and wondered exactly where her adopted sister's imagination was running. She thought she could awaken the triclops before the two kissed, and the triclops' mental shields should shrug the glamourie off like a duck to water.
------
"So why did those boys mob you when you turned female?" Kasumi blew gently on the tea, watching Ranma's face carefully. "That glamourie isn't that strong."
"You and your sisters have mental defenses. It's another little curse picked up in the Faerie Realm, essentially a turbo-charged sex appeal effect. Pops offended an elven mage and, per usual, I'm the one who had to pay the tab. Those guys were surprised, any mental defenses they might of had were down, so they just acted like they were faced with their favorite idol singer or something. Ick. I REALLY got to thank you for that, I was about to use a Fire Ball just to get all those hands off me."
"You've already thanked me several times, Ranma." Kasumi drew a finger across the lip of her cup. "It was easier for me to do this than it would have been for one of my sisters."
-------
People ran out of the way as Ryouga's wereform, a boar the size of a Volkswagon minibus, charged through the city streets, a scent having finally reached his sensitive nose. Now if he could just avoid his curse of Wandering, he would finally reach his hated foe.
Oh yeah, if he could also avoid calming down so that his lycanthropy didn't get overwhelmed by the Faerie curse.
--------
Nabiki pulled out the artifact. It was the one absolutely sure way that she could bring the triclops out. Getting a VERY long stick, she snuck downstairs with it.
Shampoo was sitting at the table with Ranma and Kasumi, having decided that this would keep the two from trying anything. Unfortunately, she now realized that this put her quite within Kasumi's
projective field.
Ranma was trying to figure out what was going on, without much success. Still shaking (more from nausea than fear) at the thought of what could have happened on the field, he had been having a nice little
talk with Kasumi when Shampoo pulled up a chair.
What really puzzled Ranma was the way Kasumi would pout, immediately followed by Shampoo. Every time Kasumi reacted to some statement, Shampoo mirrored it. He couldn't detect a curse, but there was some really odd enchantment on Kasumi.
Then there was the appearance of that googly eyed spider puppet dangling from a string near the staircase. When had that appeared there? And who was that looking in the window?
----------------
Ryouga shifted forms back to human and glanced inside. There was Ranma, finally. No mere wall could keep him from getting his revenge!
Ryouga ripped the wall apart, smashing his way through a cabinet and the refrigerator. "VENGEANCE WILL BE MINE! RANMA, PREPARE TO DIE!"
Kasumi shrieked, turned, and saw the shattered remains of dinner. Her chocolate layer cake, following a Western recipe her sister had just downloaded, had become a spatter against the floor.
Ranma and Shampoo leapt out of the way as a section of cabinet was batted by Ryouga into their table.
"My...dinner. My favorite teacup..." Kasumi looked down, the bangs of her hair completely hiding her face.
"SHUT UP! You have no idea of what I've been through thanks to Ranma."
Nabiki looked around the corner. The fuzzy spider (something which had terrified Kasumi when they were all younger) hadn't worked, but THIS might do it without her interference. In fact, maybe this would work TOO well.
"Do you have any idea how long I worked on that cake?" Kasumi's voice had gone to a whisper.
"I don't CARE about your STUPID cake!"
Ranma noted two things, martial arts and magery having made him observant about sudden changes in his environment. Shampoo suddenly had the sort of expression one would expect if a live grenade had just been thrown into her lap. Nabiki was out in the hallway...praying?
"It was chocolate," whispered Kasumi. A slight tremor went through her. "Real chocolate, not that funny tasting Japanese stuff..."
"Ranma, because of you, I have been to the Gates Of Hell!"
"Aw man, that's a tourist trap if I've ever seen one," Ranma formed a pattern while speaking. "Shield." He formed a second pattern and held it ready. His eyes tracked a bit of movement and he noted a battleaura beginning to form around this strange man who had just come through the wall. "I'm really sorry if you ended up there, but what's that got to do with me?"
"We were having beef sukiyaki today to celebrate Ranma's victory," Kasumi whispered. A little spark of lightning seemed to flash around her right hand.
Shampoo decided that the entry to the kitchen wasn't safe and decided to watch this from across the street. Say, maybe the street two blocks over. Oddly enough Nabiki was already there.
"Enough talk! DIE, RANMA!"
Kasumi's head came up. A third eye opened in her forehead. Her canine teeth extended into fangs. She began to float a few inches off the ground, surrounded by an aura of red.
Ranma, being a mage and therefore able to pick up on subtle cues that a martial artist might miss, strengthened his Shield spell and prepared to use Hide.
"MIRV," said the Triclops that looked a bit like Kasumi.
----------
Ukyou left the train station, wondering if she was at the right station. A meteor landed about ten yards away, plowing through one of those plastic Colonel Sanders statues before finally coming to rest in a McDonald's playpen.
The smell of roast pork brought her close enough to notice that it was Ryouga. Her eyes widened. Someone had burned a set of kanji onto his chest. It looked like the word "BAKA."
Ukyou's thumbs got that prickly sensation, and she moved away from Ryouga. A woman teleported in and turned slowly to face the Lost Boy. "YOU. BROKE. MY. FAVORITE. CUP."
"Hah?!" Ryouga struggled to get up.
Ukyou watched a dumpster float overhead without any apparent support. It took a position directly over Ryouga and seemed to hang there for just a moment.
*CLONG!*
"You RUINED dinner. We're gonna have to eat Cup Ramen or Akane's cooking, now!"
*CLONG!* Parts of the dumpster were now coming off. The playpen looked decidedly worse for the wear.
"AND WORSE! Do you realize how long it's been since I've had decent chocolate!"
*CLONG! CLANG! CRUNCH! CRINCH!* *Rattle* The remains of the dumpster settled into place.
He attacked her chocolate, Ukyou realized what the woman was saying. She would have expected such behavior from that Mousse guy they'd met coming out of Faerie, but Ryouga? "That must have been some chocolate."
Kasumi turned towards the woman.
Ukyou blanched when she realized she'd spoken aloud. "Oops."
"It was a chocolate hazelnut cake using real Belgian cocoa and a kahlua-based icing. Damn wereboar."
Ukyou blinked. She watched as the third eye in the woman's forehead slowly closed, and the woman almost fainted. Ukyou was there to catch her. "Damn, sugar, you exhausted yourself."
Ryouga groaned under the remains of the dumpster.
"Sugar," Ukyou called out to him. "You just stay there and let your lycanthrope healing factor cut in. I'll take care of this."
"Must get home," Kasumi mumbled.
"Well, just give me the directions, honey, and I'll take you there. Then maybe you can tell me where I can find someone I'm looking for."
------
"Oh, don't worry, Ranma." Nabiki shrugged it off. "Kasumi, even as the Triclops, doesn't kill. It's still Kasumi, it's just that the regular Kasumi is all the yang and the Triclops is all the yin. Or do I have it backwards?"
"She right. Kasumi not killer."
"Then why did you two run?" Ranma kept looking over at the sleeping Kasumi. She looked so vulnerable and innocent while sleeping, but Ranma remembered the Triclops.
"Not kill not same as not hurt."
"From what she said, she knew Ryouga was a wereboar, so didn't feel the need to hold back." Ukyou glanced over at the sleeping Kasumi.
"Don't worry, whenever the Triclops manifests it pretty much wears her out." Nabiki smirked. It hadn't worked exactly as planned, but now that Ranma had found out about the Triclops, Kasumi would be out of the running.
"Uhm. Oh yeah, Ukyou, I wanted to ask you something." Ranma sipped on his Cupstar brand ramen.(2)
"Yes, Ranchan?" Ukyou flushed. Ranma had turned out to be SO good looking when he'd grown up.
"Why were you looking for me that you'd tag along with Ryouga. That's a pretty desperate thing to do."
"Why? Hell, I'd follow my fiance anywhere!" Ukyou winced as she remembered the visit to the Gates Of Hell. She would have been far more comfortable to have kept thinking of it merely as a place with horned
red-skinned deformed pan knockoffs with pitchforks than to have actually seen the place. The Gift Shop and "Hell's Kitchen III" had been particularly unnerving.
"FIANCE?!" Ranma looked at Ukyou. Everyone else (except the sleeping Kasumi) immediately realized what this meant. (Having been coached by Nabiki on what she'd found out about multiple fiancees.) "MISTER SAOTOME!"
Akane materialized Mjolnir, Shampoo built up battle aura, Nabiki started making entries in her journal, Ranma cracked his knuckles.
Genma, in panda form, wisely decided to take a short training journey.
------
Cologne considered ways that she could manipulate the situation to her benefit.
=========
NEXT TIME ON RANMA 1/2: The Art (6) A Tale Of Mousse And Squirrel
a word on the spells here since there has been questions made regarding them. This is the same system that i came up with for Tetsuo in Happi Days, BTW.
This magic system is loosely based on some purely mythical Chinese Sorcery stories. He forms a pattern woven from one of the six Chinese Elements (Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Spirit, Wood) with his chi (which provides the "kick" to get the motor of the spell running). He is a generalist mage, as his school of magic is "Anything Goes" or whatever works.
Therefore he isn't as good as a specialist but has a wider range of spells that he can access.
CHI BOLT: (high chi) similar to the "Ha do ken", "Kamehaha", or any number of similar effects. Forms a sphere of chi which delivers a considerable kinetic impact, roughly equal to being slammed by a charging bull but without the horns. Ranma can only do this three times before tiring, while Tetsuo would pass out after casting this once.
FIRE BALL: (medium) an explosive ball of flame. Amount of damage can be increased by feeding it more chi prior to release. Essentially a grenade spell.
FLAME FIST: (medium) causes one's hands to be enveloped by fire. Said flames can then be thrown in a manner similar to a fireball. Does not burn the caster.
HEALING SLEEP: (medium) causes a healing sleep where healing (mental and physical) is accelerated. Can be resisted by those with mind shields or a strong will.
HIDE: (low chi) general use cloaking spell, makes the target (usually the caster) hard to notice. Not invisible/inaudible, but unless the target does something to call attention to his/herself the effect is generally the same.
ICE HAWK: (medium chi) spirit magic spell incorporated by Ranma into the Anything Goes style. A bird of white mist that freezes the target when it strikes. Can be used on a low level to cool drinks.
LEAP: (low) temporarily decreases gravity for target to 1/8 normal. lasts for three seconds.
LIGHTNING FLARE: (high) throws a lightning bolt.
LIGHTNING GRIP: (low) rather like hitting someone with a taser.
MIRV: (extremely high chi) a very high level spell that causes massive property devaluation. Think "tactical nuclear weapon."
MOSTLY HARMLESS: (high) slams target's pleasure centers, stimulates endorphins, and otherwise makes the target feel good and upbeat for five minutes or so. Can be addictive.
QUICK FIX: (medium) a spell that will fix small rents, tears, breaks, by taking two things that were once part of a whole and making them whole again. Ranma gets a LOT of practice with this spell.
SHIELD: (varies in chi required) general use protection spell. like a Star Trek deflector, it doesn't stop anything, just absorbs most of the damage. More chi can be fed into the Shield to increase the amount of protection. It can also be used to form a "wall" instead of the default "armor".
Enter Ryouga, The Eternal Lost Boy & Ukyou Can Cook (in more ways than one)
by GreggSharp
Ranma 1/2 created by Rumiko Takahashi, AMG created by Kosuke Fujishima, Gold Digger owned/created by Fred Perry.
---------
Two figures came out of what the locals thought of as a dead-end alley and looked around with hope beginning to show on their faces.
"The signs, they're in Japanese!"
"I see 'em," the girl looked for a street sign. "We're in KOBE!" The elation faded. "Ryouga, do you remember what happened four years ago?"
"Uhm, we got lost?"
Ukyou glared at him. "We both have reasons for chasing after Ranma Saotome, but as I recall you had said something about how we would catch up with Ranma in no time."
Ryouga laughed a little bit and rubbed the back of his head. "Uhm gee, it's been so long, I don't quite recall."
"Have you noticed the intersection? That this is the same intersection we left FOUR YEARS AGO!" Ukyou's glare intensified. "We've gone through all this crap only to make a four-year full-CIRCLE!"
"Don't worry, Ukyou, we know where he's going thanks to that old woman we met in the Hegemony. All we need to do is catch the train to Tokyo. Easy." With a cocky grin, Ryouga started walking.
After watching Ryouga continue due South, Ukyou turned to the North and looked at the train station. With a sigh and a shrug, Ukyou decided that the past four years had been entirely too long with the stubborn wereswine.
Funny how thinking about everything that Ryouga had put her through gave Ukyou a hankering for porkchops.
------
"This bad."
"You can say that again."
"This bad."
Nabiki didn't look amused. "Look, I'm the first to admit that when a plan goes awry it's more often than not some factor overlooked or discounted. The old saying about 'the entropy factor of any given situation increases exponentially when humans are involved' is quite true."
They both looked through the door to where Kasumi and Ranma were sitting at a table, having a cup of tea and talking.
"Did not think of Kasumi as rival."
"I discounted her myself. In retrospect, this was an oversight. With her projective empathy and kind nature, she can make others feel nice just being around her. Right now, she's being affected by the glamourie even though it's weaker in the male form."
"So he making her feel hot and bothered, and she projecting that. Aiyaa. No wonder both blushing." Shampoo considered her adopted sister. "So what we do, Nabiki?"
"First, we get out of range ourselves." Nabiki tugged at her collar, noting how hot and restrictive her clothing had seemed to get in the past few minutes. The idea of a feedback loop between the two occurred to her, which caused her considerable anxiety. "Next we try to
find a way to awaken the triclops."
"You sure about that 'Biki? No telling what triclops do. Might just hurt Ranma, maybe worse."
"Calculated risk. If those two keep going at it like that, we're likely to find Kasumi doing some very out-of-character things before long."
Shampoo glanced at the two and tried to think of what would be impossible behavior for Kasumi. Her eyes crossed as an image of Kasumi and Ranma [censored] on the table, their [censored censored] as they
[censored].(1)
Nabiki noted Shampoo's eyes crossing and wondered exactly where her adopted sister's imagination was running. She thought she could awaken the triclops before the two kissed, and the triclops' mental shields should shrug the glamourie off like a duck to water.
------
"So why did those boys mob you when you turned female?" Kasumi blew gently on the tea, watching Ranma's face carefully. "That glamourie isn't that strong."
"You and your sisters have mental defenses. It's another little curse picked up in the Faerie Realm, essentially a turbo-charged sex appeal effect. Pops offended an elven mage and, per usual, I'm the one who had to pay the tab. Those guys were surprised, any mental defenses they might of had were down, so they just acted like they were faced with their favorite idol singer or something. Ick. I REALLY got to thank you for that, I was about to use a Fire Ball just to get all those hands off me."
"You've already thanked me several times, Ranma." Kasumi drew a finger across the lip of her cup. "It was easier for me to do this than it would have been for one of my sisters."
-------
People ran out of the way as Ryouga's wereform, a boar the size of a Volkswagon minibus, charged through the city streets, a scent having finally reached his sensitive nose. Now if he could just avoid his curse of Wandering, he would finally reach his hated foe.
Oh yeah, if he could also avoid calming down so that his lycanthropy didn't get overwhelmed by the Faerie curse.
--------
Nabiki pulled out the artifact. It was the one absolutely sure way that she could bring the triclops out. Getting a VERY long stick, she snuck downstairs with it.
Shampoo was sitting at the table with Ranma and Kasumi, having decided that this would keep the two from trying anything. Unfortunately, she now realized that this put her quite within Kasumi's
projective field.
Ranma was trying to figure out what was going on, without much success. Still shaking (more from nausea than fear) at the thought of what could have happened on the field, he had been having a nice little
talk with Kasumi when Shampoo pulled up a chair.
What really puzzled Ranma was the way Kasumi would pout, immediately followed by Shampoo. Every time Kasumi reacted to some statement, Shampoo mirrored it. He couldn't detect a curse, but there was some really odd enchantment on Kasumi.
Then there was the appearance of that googly eyed spider puppet dangling from a string near the staircase. When had that appeared there? And who was that looking in the window?
----------------
Ryouga shifted forms back to human and glanced inside. There was Ranma, finally. No mere wall could keep him from getting his revenge!
Ryouga ripped the wall apart, smashing his way through a cabinet and the refrigerator. "VENGEANCE WILL BE MINE! RANMA, PREPARE TO DIE!"
Kasumi shrieked, turned, and saw the shattered remains of dinner. Her chocolate layer cake, following a Western recipe her sister had just downloaded, had become a spatter against the floor.
Ranma and Shampoo leapt out of the way as a section of cabinet was batted by Ryouga into their table.
"My...dinner. My favorite teacup..." Kasumi looked down, the bangs of her hair completely hiding her face.
"SHUT UP! You have no idea of what I've been through thanks to Ranma."
Nabiki looked around the corner. The fuzzy spider (something which had terrified Kasumi when they were all younger) hadn't worked, but THIS might do it without her interference. In fact, maybe this would work TOO well.
"Do you have any idea how long I worked on that cake?" Kasumi's voice had gone to a whisper.
"I don't CARE about your STUPID cake!"
Ranma noted two things, martial arts and magery having made him observant about sudden changes in his environment. Shampoo suddenly had the sort of expression one would expect if a live grenade had just been thrown into her lap. Nabiki was out in the hallway...praying?
"It was chocolate," whispered Kasumi. A slight tremor went through her. "Real chocolate, not that funny tasting Japanese stuff..."
"Ranma, because of you, I have been to the Gates Of Hell!"
"Aw man, that's a tourist trap if I've ever seen one," Ranma formed a pattern while speaking. "Shield." He formed a second pattern and held it ready. His eyes tracked a bit of movement and he noted a battleaura beginning to form around this strange man who had just come through the wall. "I'm really sorry if you ended up there, but what's that got to do with me?"
"We were having beef sukiyaki today to celebrate Ranma's victory," Kasumi whispered. A little spark of lightning seemed to flash around her right hand.
Shampoo decided that the entry to the kitchen wasn't safe and decided to watch this from across the street. Say, maybe the street two blocks over. Oddly enough Nabiki was already there.
"Enough talk! DIE, RANMA!"
Kasumi's head came up. A third eye opened in her forehead. Her canine teeth extended into fangs. She began to float a few inches off the ground, surrounded by an aura of red.
Ranma, being a mage and therefore able to pick up on subtle cues that a martial artist might miss, strengthened his Shield spell and prepared to use Hide.
"MIRV," said the Triclops that looked a bit like Kasumi.
----------
Ukyou left the train station, wondering if she was at the right station. A meteor landed about ten yards away, plowing through one of those plastic Colonel Sanders statues before finally coming to rest in a McDonald's playpen.
The smell of roast pork brought her close enough to notice that it was Ryouga. Her eyes widened. Someone had burned a set of kanji onto his chest. It looked like the word "BAKA."
Ukyou's thumbs got that prickly sensation, and she moved away from Ryouga. A woman teleported in and turned slowly to face the Lost Boy. "YOU. BROKE. MY. FAVORITE. CUP."
"Hah?!" Ryouga struggled to get up.
Ukyou watched a dumpster float overhead without any apparent support. It took a position directly over Ryouga and seemed to hang there for just a moment.
*CLONG!*
"You RUINED dinner. We're gonna have to eat Cup Ramen or Akane's cooking, now!"
*CLONG!* Parts of the dumpster were now coming off. The playpen looked decidedly worse for the wear.
"AND WORSE! Do you realize how long it's been since I've had decent chocolate!"
*CLONG! CLANG! CRUNCH! CRINCH!* *Rattle* The remains of the dumpster settled into place.
He attacked her chocolate, Ukyou realized what the woman was saying. She would have expected such behavior from that Mousse guy they'd met coming out of Faerie, but Ryouga? "That must have been some chocolate."
Kasumi turned towards the woman.
Ukyou blanched when she realized she'd spoken aloud. "Oops."
"It was a chocolate hazelnut cake using real Belgian cocoa and a kahlua-based icing. Damn wereboar."
Ukyou blinked. She watched as the third eye in the woman's forehead slowly closed, and the woman almost fainted. Ukyou was there to catch her. "Damn, sugar, you exhausted yourself."
Ryouga groaned under the remains of the dumpster.
"Sugar," Ukyou called out to him. "You just stay there and let your lycanthrope healing factor cut in. I'll take care of this."
"Must get home," Kasumi mumbled.
"Well, just give me the directions, honey, and I'll take you there. Then maybe you can tell me where I can find someone I'm looking for."
------
"Oh, don't worry, Ranma." Nabiki shrugged it off. "Kasumi, even as the Triclops, doesn't kill. It's still Kasumi, it's just that the regular Kasumi is all the yang and the Triclops is all the yin. Or do I have it backwards?"
"She right. Kasumi not killer."
"Then why did you two run?" Ranma kept looking over at the sleeping Kasumi. She looked so vulnerable and innocent while sleeping, but Ranma remembered the Triclops.
"Not kill not same as not hurt."
"From what she said, she knew Ryouga was a wereboar, so didn't feel the need to hold back." Ukyou glanced over at the sleeping Kasumi.
"Don't worry, whenever the Triclops manifests it pretty much wears her out." Nabiki smirked. It hadn't worked exactly as planned, but now that Ranma had found out about the Triclops, Kasumi would be out of the running.
"Uhm. Oh yeah, Ukyou, I wanted to ask you something." Ranma sipped on his Cupstar brand ramen.(2)
"Yes, Ranchan?" Ukyou flushed. Ranma had turned out to be SO good looking when he'd grown up.
"Why were you looking for me that you'd tag along with Ryouga. That's a pretty desperate thing to do."
"Why? Hell, I'd follow my fiance anywhere!" Ukyou winced as she remembered the visit to the Gates Of Hell. She would have been far more comfortable to have kept thinking of it merely as a place with horned
red-skinned deformed pan knockoffs with pitchforks than to have actually seen the place. The Gift Shop and "Hell's Kitchen III" had been particularly unnerving.
"FIANCE?!" Ranma looked at Ukyou. Everyone else (except the sleeping Kasumi) immediately realized what this meant. (Having been coached by Nabiki on what she'd found out about multiple fiancees.) "MISTER SAOTOME!"
Akane materialized Mjolnir, Shampoo built up battle aura, Nabiki started making entries in her journal, Ranma cracked his knuckles.
Genma, in panda form, wisely decided to take a short training journey.
------
Cologne considered ways that she could manipulate the situation to her benefit.
=========
NEXT TIME ON RANMA 1/2: The Art (6) A Tale Of Mousse And Squirrel
a word on the spells here since there has been questions made regarding them. This is the same system that i came up with for Tetsuo in Happi Days, BTW.
This magic system is loosely based on some purely mythical Chinese Sorcery stories. He forms a pattern woven from one of the six Chinese Elements (Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Spirit, Wood) with his chi (which provides the "kick" to get the motor of the spell running). He is a generalist mage, as his school of magic is "Anything Goes" or whatever works.
Therefore he isn't as good as a specialist but has a wider range of spells that he can access.
CHI BOLT: (high chi) similar to the "Ha do ken", "Kamehaha", or any number of similar effects. Forms a sphere of chi which delivers a considerable kinetic impact, roughly equal to being slammed by a charging bull but without the horns. Ranma can only do this three times before tiring, while Tetsuo would pass out after casting this once.
FIRE BALL: (medium) an explosive ball of flame. Amount of damage can be increased by feeding it more chi prior to release. Essentially a grenade spell.
FLAME FIST: (medium) causes one's hands to be enveloped by fire. Said flames can then be thrown in a manner similar to a fireball. Does not burn the caster.
HEALING SLEEP: (medium) causes a healing sleep where healing (mental and physical) is accelerated. Can be resisted by those with mind shields or a strong will.
HIDE: (low chi) general use cloaking spell, makes the target (usually the caster) hard to notice. Not invisible/inaudible, but unless the target does something to call attention to his/herself the effect is generally the same.
ICE HAWK: (medium chi) spirit magic spell incorporated by Ranma into the Anything Goes style. A bird of white mist that freezes the target when it strikes. Can be used on a low level to cool drinks.
LEAP: (low) temporarily decreases gravity for target to 1/8 normal. lasts for three seconds.
LIGHTNING FLARE: (high) throws a lightning bolt.
LIGHTNING GRIP: (low) rather like hitting someone with a taser.
MIRV: (extremely high chi) a very high level spell that causes massive property devaluation. Think "tactical nuclear weapon."
MOSTLY HARMLESS: (high) slams target's pleasure centers, stimulates endorphins, and otherwise makes the target feel good and upbeat for five minutes or so. Can be addictive.
QUICK FIX: (medium) a spell that will fix small rents, tears, breaks, by taking two things that were once part of a whole and making them whole again. Ranma gets a LOT of practice with this spell.
SHIELD: (varies in chi required) general use protection spell. like a Star Trek deflector, it doesn't stop anything, just absorbs most of the damage. More chi can be fed into the Shield to increase the amount of protection. It can also be used to form a "wall" instead of the default "armor".
