This is the long-awaited revival of an old fic, which had been lost for a long time.
The original had been taken down to be re-worked, and then our computer crashed, deleting all my hard work! .
DISCLAIMER: I don't own either Ranma 1/2 or Yu Yu Hakusho.
Other than that, I guess I just have to get on with it, right?
Prologue first, then chapters.
~~~*** PROLOGUE ***~~~
Ranma grunted as he got up off the ground. Despite that he was fighting very hard, his mind was still wondering, still questioning...
'Why me? Why now? Is this a punishment?'
The form of his latest enemy was slowly pursuing him. It looked like a man, except for the fact that he had two moonlight-white horns jutting from the top of his smooth, midnight head. The rest of him was that same midnight color, including the small, one-meter wings that were totally useless in flight, but did manage to make him look threatening. His pointed eyes did hold a kind of intelligence in them, but his speech made him sound somewhat childish. From the moment he had laid eyes on him, Ranma knew that this was a demon, but in all his life, he had never before seen a demon! Heck, he wasn't sure if he had ever truly even seen a god, as Saffron didn't strike him as really being all that great.
This... demon, he called himself Shinji, and he called himself that a lot, as he didn't seem to have a full grasp of human language.
Ranma was searching for a way to take this guy down, but the monkey-suit his father had shoved him into was extremely restricting. He was almost glad that Shinji had shredded it so, as it afforded him more room to move.
"Saotome quit fight?" Shinji seemed almost disappointed, but then brightened. "Shinji guess he just get to killing then!"
Shinji then pointed one hand at Ukyo, who had been stripped of all her weapons when she first attacked the demon.
"NO!" Ranma was on Shinji in an instant, already giving him a high-speed licking and proving why he was the greatest (in his mind). "YA!" With a final kick to the face, Ranma slammed Shinji through the air and into the ground.
Frowning, Ranma waited for Shinji to get back up. He had already learned that such attacks had little effect on Shinji, but his muscles were already beginning to complain to him from the exertion.
Shinji got out of the rubble with a smile, patting the dust off his shoulders. "Is that all?"
"I'm just getting started!" Ranma stood defiantly, holding his ground.
Shinji frowned. "But human is not hitting hard enough!" A smile formed. "Maybe if Shinji kill one? Might make Shinji feel better?" Shinji nodded to himself as if satisfied. "Yes. Shinji thinks he will kill today!"
Nabiki frowned at the newcomer's atrocious grammar, but stayed quiet. Her pictures might be the last anyone ever sees of Ranma, or the first of the strange demon that was attacking the wedding originally destined to be a wrecking zone.
Akane clenched her fists defiantly. If that guy wanted to kill someone, he would have to get past her first!
Ukyo backed off, still searching for her meter-long spatula, and any of the bombs she had originally brought with her.
Genma stood in the demon's way, ready to be of help at any instant.
Even Ryoga, whose style was most similar to Shinji's, was backing off somewhat from the strange aura the demon seemed to be putting off, like bluish flames, rather than the omnipotent wash that was the aura he was used to.
Shinji had a short encounter with Genma first, and basically swatted him to the side. Then Ranma ran up to Shinji again, and rammed one fist into the back of his head, but Shinji rolled forward and continued on his way toward the others with a quick glance back to Ranma.
Ranma gasped when he saw Shinji's choice. "AKANE!"
"WHAT?! Oh... BACK OFF!!" Akane gripped the handle of the mallet she always had with her.
Ranma went into another volley of punches and kicks, but found that this time Shinji fought back. After a few seconds of dancing around each other's hits, Ranma was struck off-balance in the side of his stomach, and then got a straight kick square in the face.
Shinji then grabbed Akane around the back with little effort. "What do you do now? Human fighter?" He had one hand holding Akane's head and the other holding her arms.
"Let.her.go." Ranma was holding his fists at his side; his anger was beginning to overcome his confidence, and it showed in his aura.
Shinji smiled teasingly. "And if Shinji doesn't?"
Akane answered first. "I'm gonna make sure you NEVER TOUCH ANYTHING AGAIN!! NOW LET ME GO!"
Ranma scowled as he walked toward Shinji. "Let her go, and I'll fight you. But our fight has nothing to do with her or anyone else."
Shinji frowned. "Shinji decides who is part of fight and who isn't! And Shinji will kill this girl now!"
"WHAT?! LET ME GO YOU PERVERT!!!"
Ranma ran after Shinji with a loud cry. "LET HER GO, NOW!!!"
Smiling, Shinji jumped back just when Ranma's fist landed where he had been, precisely aimed for his head, missing Akane's own head, which was positioned much lower.
When Ranma looked up at Shinji from his new standing space, he saw Akane go limp as Shinji apparently broke her neck. Shinji then dropped her to the ground. "Shinji drop!"
Ranma immediately went to Akane's side. But a quick check for a pulse showed that she didn't have one.
Shinji seemed to be feeling rather good about himself as he stood there, watching Ranma lose hope. He noted the way Ranma's aura seemed to change color several times, over and over, as he went through the process of realizing that Akane was dead.
It became purple, green, red, yellow, and an assortment of other colors before finally settling on a blanched goldish color. Slowly, menacingly, Ranma stood.
"You wanted a fight. Fine, I'll give you a fight. In fact, when you started this fight, you said one of us would die... well, I'm here to make sure that one is you." Turning around, he showed his golden eyes to the demon, who backed up slightly at the vision of this royally pissed-off human.
"Ah! Shinji will get real fight now! Shinji is so happy!" Shinji then hopped slightly into the air before launching himself at Ranma.
Ranma noted the movement, and began moving himself. Taking a footing that lent him to falling backward, he watched as Shinji came at him.
Just when Shinji was upon him, he spun around so that he was thrown to the side, where he lashed out with a powerful straight kick into the side of Shinji's stomach.
Shinji cringed as he flew through the air, but quickly recovered. Grabbing his right wrist, he threw forward his palm and launched a beam of great power. "MAKUJAI!!"(1)
Ranma saw the ball of energy coming at him, and smirked confidently.
Just before it hit him, he dodged it and came down on Shinji from the sky. "HA!" The two of them then went into a set of punches and kicks going at great speeds.
Ranma quickly got the upper hand out of sheer speed; introducing Shinji to his knee, then hitting him several times on the face and finishing with a roundhouse to the side of the head that sent him flying.
Shinji got up off of the ground somewhat quickly and looked at Ranma. Smiling, he pulled one arm back. "Take this human!"
"...?"
"SUPER MAKUJAI!!!"
Suddenly, a white-hot sphere of power at least three meters in diameter shot forth from him, heading for Ranma with harrowing force.
Ranma smiled as he pulled his hand back. When he threw it forward, he launched his own attack. "Arrogant Tiger Blast revised: CRAZED TIGER'S FURY!!"
The two attacks clashed, and in a bright explosion, cancelled each other out.
Before anyone could recover, the two were back into their melee.
As they fought, one could practically see each of them growing in power. Ranma seemed to be genuinely growing, and Shinji exposing power he had previously held back. Ranma was always just a little bit ahead, and when he noticed that the fight seemed to be getting nowhere, he pushed off from his opponent.
Really ticked off, and growing impatient, Ranma pulled back both hands.
Seeing this, Shinji pulled back one fist and began to gather all his energy into that fist, which began to glow with a sickly black glow.
Ranma could feel it, and was fairly sure that everyone else felt it also. His energy was all there, same as always, but it felt... different somehow. Like he was tapping into different sources besides his chi.
But he only barely realized this. All he knew, was that it was new; and that it would help him to express to that JERK how he felt!
Putting both hands forward, he called on that new energy. As he called on it, it seemed to make him more and more tired; but he didn't care.
Snarling, he called the only thing he could think of as his attack's name. "VENGEFUL STRIKE!!!"
Like a cannon going off, the blasting forth of the half-meter wide ball of energy seemed to pull with it the very air. It's tinted-glass-like surface showed the bright center energy that arced through it like a hundred lightning bolts. And the lightning seemed to be barely contained by the ball's surface, as great bolts of power seemed to surge up from the ground to touch the sphere, like so many hands longing to touch so much power.
Shinji smiled as he pulled the last bits of his power into his tightly clenched fist. Pulling it forward, he shouted in effort. "YAAAAAHHHH!!!!"
Ranma's attack and Shinji's fist met with a bright flash that threw lightning everywhere. After a time, however, it seemed to stabilize somewhat; going to a more stable single light that threw an eerie glow across the already daytime landscape of Ranma's ruined family home.
Ranma saw this, and pulled his hand back once more. He was already sweating hard, and he could barely see straight, but he had to make sure that he gave it his ALL!
Pulling it forward again, he opened his palm and offered his previously made attack the very last of his energy. "HAAA!!!"
The last tremor of power sent a quiver down Shenji's arm, and the light of the meeting point seemed to follow it as he found that his arm seemed to be penetrating the surface of Ranma's attack. Or rather, Ranma's attack was swallowing his arm!
The pain was starting to register in his mind, and he yelled out. The pain was gut wrenching! It was like sticking your hand into a fire! Except a thousand times worse, and without simply destroying your nerves after only a few seconds.
"Aah-!" No matter how hard he pushed, it simply seemed to make no difference! Soon, his entire arm was consumed in the bright light!
"AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!" As the power overtook him completely, a satisfied smile seemed to come over him. "HAHA!!! THANK YOU! HUMAN! THANK YOU! FOR NOW, SHENJI IS FREE!! HAHAHAHA!!!"
*K-DOOOOM!!*
The explosion was so extensively massive that it was heard across the entire district of Juuban (2), and people everywhere turned their head toward that place even as Ranma was thrown violently into the walls of a nearby building.
Everyone available, or those who could find themselves still able to walk after the explosion, went to check on the fallen.
The color in Ranma's face was already draining, and his pulse quickly slowed to an erratic final beat, stopping completely.
Lowering her head, Nabiki placed a cloth over Ranma's face.
Ranma Saotome had died. Initial diagnosis: A broken heart.
~~~*** End Prologue ***~~~
Prologue notes:
(1): I am no good at Japanese names. I do not know how to translate them, or how to create them. Normally, I just assume that they sound Japanese. If they actually turn out to even have a meaning, that is, truthfully, totally by chance (and my ear for pronunciation). So, if someone out there could help me in that department, by either translating for me, or by showing me a place on the web with a utility for such, it would be greatly appreciated.
(2): Fear not. Despite the obvious temptation of a multi-crossover, this will have none of the Sailors. In fact, the only place these people may have even heard of them, is in the cartoon strips. I.E. Magic will have little (I said little, not no) place in this fic.
Well, let me know what you think.
Alex Ultra: Creator of Eternal Realm
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