Deep within the largest compound in all of Nerima, one man was experiencing trials and tribulations the likes which no mere mortal could understand. Many thought they understood the struggles he went through each and every day. But they were wrong. They didn't understand his noble quest, they failed to understand that he was the last bastion of defense for the hearts of fair maiden's everywhere. For the most beauteous maidens, the fierce tigress and the pigtailed goddess, were both still ensnared in a most foul sorcerer's spell. And the only reason the foul sorcerer Saotome hadn't yet spread his dark arts to the other - lesser, yet still fine - maidens of Furinkan High was because of his efforts.
And yet, despite his best efforts, the two maidens he held closest to his heart were still deeply ensnared. It was a daunting and harrowing task, one that tried his mind and body each and every day. But someone had to stand up to the foul sorcerer, and who better than himself? It was just unfortunate that the cur had a seemingly endless bag of tricks that he shamelessly used to deny him of his honorable victory.
It was most vexing that one who claimed to hold honor so dearly refused to face him honorable.
But perhaps more vexing than even that, was just how tired Tatewaki Kuno was. Watching the light in his beloved's eyes grow darker and darker with each passing day was taking its toll on him. For his beloveds to no longer be able to gaze upon his noble visage with the passionate love they surely held inside their hearts pained him greatly. He used to be able to catch glimpses of their love for him in their actions or their expressions. But the time since he had last seen it was long ago. It was disheartening, made all the worse by the fact that he had to go to university next year, while his lovelies would remain behind, potentially still trapped under the spell.
Sometimes, in his darkest hours, when he felt at his weakest, he wished that there was someone else. Someone pure and untouched that could match the beauteous Akane Tendo and the pigtailed goddess. It was a selfish desire of course, but even he, the noble scion of House Kuno, was allowed to have such thoughts. He had struggled mightily to come to the conclusion that he had room in his heart for a second maiden when the pigtailed goddess arrived on the scene. And now, he knew for certain that he had room for a third.
But, those thoughts were neither here nor there! Despite thinking such things, that did not mean he would not continue to valiantly fight the foul sorcerers' influences to free his loves!
Which was why he was currently flipping through the latest round of fashion magazines. Perhaps he could bequeath his loves with a few simple gifts? While not much, he was sure small acts of compassion such as that would slowly wear away and break down the dark spells put upon them.
But this magazine simply would not do. The clothes these models were wearing were not fit to touch their heavenly bodies. A new approach was needed, clearly.
"Sasuke! Bring me the latest swimsuit catalog! The summer is approaching rapidly, and my loves will surely be in need of the finest swimwear money can buy!" He declared hotly, accepting the magazine from the loyal retainer the moment he dropped down from the ceiling. Waving a hand to dismiss the diminutive ninja, he rapidly began to scour through the magazine, looking for just the right swimsuit to match the pigtailed girl's fiery tresses, or perhaps a nice yellow one, the color the fierce tigress loved so.
But that feverish determination slowly waned, the further in he got. Not only did none of the girls modeling the swimwear catch his interest, he had yet to see a single swimsuit he thought his beloveds would wear! Not even halfway through the catalog, he found his browsing slowing as his enthusiasm waned. The swimwear inside failed to catch his eyes, and the women simply failed to match the high standards for beauty that Akane and the pigtailed girl set.
Eventually, he got to the point where he was browsing the magazine with all the fervor of a man waiting at the dentist office with nothing to do. With his cheek pressed against the palm of his hand, he lazily leafed through it. "No. Nay. Unsightly. Offensive to the eyes. Unable to capture their beauty." He droned on as he rejected each new page as he flipped through it, quickly tiring of the lack of results.
Already, he was nearly at the end of the magazine, and he held little hope for what he would find. This specific publication was known for placing their newer models at the end, a practice he did not pretend to nor care to understand. They had attempted to explain it to him when he had tried to extol the virtues of having only Akane Tendo and the Pigtailed Goddess as their exclusive models, but he could tell that they simply hadn't understood it, so he had ignored them.
So he was wholly unprepared when he reached the final page to find his heart flutter, a feeling only ever evoked by his loves.
"Could it be? Doth mine eyes deceive me? Is there truly a third paragon of beauty in this world?" He gasped, feeling short of breath already, his attention completely captured as his mind raced. "Perhaps, one yet to be touched by his dark magics?" Kuno muttered, slamming his fist on his desk and raising his voice as he felt his very spirit invigorated.
"Sasuke! I must know everything about her!"
"Honestly Akane, I don't see why we need to be early today. Heck, cause we had to deal with Kuno, we're barely even early at all!" Ranma groused as they walked through the halls, with the currently female martial artist on the lookout for hot water. Normally, she kept a thermos of the stuff inside of the Hidden Weapons space - which thankfully still worked after her switch to Pure Ki - but because Akane had been in such a rush this morning, she hadn't had the time to fill one up. While she may more or less feel indifferent about which body she was currently wearing after a few years with the curse, that didn't mean everyone else wasn't such a pain in the ass about it. It's why Ranma never contradicted Akane's claims that all the boys at school were perverts. The amount of time's she'd had dumbasses trying to splash her while changing in the locker room was staggeringly high. And they just didn't give up, no matter how badly she mangled them afterwards for trying.
It wasn't like it was the first time Ranma had left the thermos at home though. She'd make do. She had an open invitation to change in the nurse's office during times when the curse was locked or hot water wasn't readily available anyways. At this point she was just annoyed for the sake of being annoyed.
Akane, meanwhile, just rolled her eyes at Ranma. "Oh get over it will you? You're the one that wasted so much time because you thought something was up with the Blue Blunder. Now we only have 10 minutes of time to do some last second studying before our exams!" She declared hotly, her temper still quick to flare up despite all the effort she'd been putting in on purifying her Ki and getting that emotion more under control.
"Well sorry for thinking something was up! I swear he was acting differently than normal. His form was sloppier than usual, and he didn't even spout any poetry! It's like his head was somewhere else." Ranma mused, sticking her hands in her pockets as they crossed the threshold of their classroom.
The other girl had to concede the point, regardless of her wanting to be mad at Ranma and Kuno for wasting her time. He had been off that morning. "Maybe he's finally getting it through his thick skull that we aren't interested." Akane sniffed, though neither of them actually believed that statement.
The pair split off at that point, as Akane did genuinely want to do some last minute cramming before their exams. Ranma glanced around the room to see who all was there that day, her eyes lingering on Ukyo's desk for a few moments. Her best friend had been called back to Osaka about the same day 18 entered his life because of a family emergency, and had been doing all of her schooling there officially. The restaurant was still here in Nerima, so it wasn't like she would never be back, but Ranma still found herself missing Ukyo. And Konatsu as well, now that she thought about it.
Admittedly, she missed Ukyo slightly more than normal today on account of the forgotten lunch. Ranma would kill for one of Ukyo's okonomiyaki's right about now.
Never one to linger on things that made her feel upset that she couldn't punch, she turned her focus to the two boys that were huddled over her desk. Hiroshi and Daisuke were good enough dudes, she supposed. It was nice to have friends that were just regular people in all honesty. Though they were a little perverted, they'd never been part of the Hentai Horde, and had both had normal relationships at some point or another during the time they'd known each other. Heck, it was like an open secret that Hiroshi and Sayuri were crushing on each other really hard at the moment. Ranma would bet anything that the two would be dating after summer break.
Regardless, at the moment, the two were crowded around her desk and looking at something. Probably something dumb, but that didn't make her any less curious. "What're you two lookin' at?" Ranma asked as she pushed her way past Daisuke, who was hogging the aisle.
"Bought time you got here. Dude, you've gotta check this out." Daisuke urged Ranma into her chair, whatever had caught his attention not warranting any care for the fact that Ranma was a girl at the moment. Or that he wasn't one to normally care about this stuff. This was way too important to not share after all.
"Okay, you know that swimsuit mag that's always full of absolute babes?" Hiroshi started, voice hushed as if this needed absolute secrecy, even though they both knew that they had immediately lost Ranma. But the two carried on their tirade anyway, not giving Ranma a chance to butt in. "I know, I know. You think we're pervs for looking at it. And I keep telling you that we're perfectly normal and you're the weird one, but this time is different, I swear. Their newest model is insanely hot! A walking wet dream, even better than any of the girls around here! She's so attractive that even your prudish ass can't help but feel attracted to her. 100%, money back guarantee!" Hiroshi confidently, yet quietly so as to not draw any unwanted attention from a certain mallet user.
And despite herself, their attitude had piqued Ranma's curiosity. Claiming that the model was more attractive than any of the girls around here was a bold claim. Simply being objective about it, a lot of her suitors were objectively beautiful women, and even some of the ones that weren't suitors, yet were around often, were stunning. There was herself (sue her, Ranma looked good and she knew it), Ukyo, Akane, Shampoo, Nabiki, Kasumi… Heck even Kodachi and Hinako's adult forms were attractive if you ignored their weirdness.
They'd tried to show him this stuff before, but they'd never tried to make a claim like that before.
The magazine was slid into Ranma's hands before she even had time to process it, causing her to blink owlishly at it. The two guys watched on, eager to see Ranma's reaction as she flipped to the very back. But they most certainly did not get the reaction they thought. Normally, Ranma would blush, call them pervs and tell them to buzz off, and they'd tease her about it. But this time, Ranma seemed genuinely shocked. And then that shock turned to disbelief, and disbelief turned anger.
"Nabiki!" Ranma hissed. How dare she do that to her sister?! It was one thing to do it to Ranma, but that was different because he had allowed her to take all those pictures of her out of guilt over freeloading! 18 was new to this world, with no money and no clue on the culture and how things were here! She didn't deserve to have people seeing her like that without her permission! Standing up suddenly and with enough speed to surprise everyone around her, she immediately began to storm out of the classroom to find Nabiki.
But before she could get out of the classroom to confront her, Hinako walked into class in her adult form, immediately shutting everything down as it was time for their exams to begin.
"Back to your seat, Saotome. Don't make me drain you for being a delinquent!" The adult Hinako threatened, flashing the coin in her hand and giving the pigtailed martial artist the stink eye.
Unwilling to risk getting drained by the Ki Vampire who doubled as a teacher, Ranma could only simmer in her anger and return to her seat, where she would proceed to struggle to focus on the exams.
Of course, if Ranma had taken a few seconds to think about things with a cool head, then she would have realized that there had to be a perfectly reasonable explanation for this. Or perhaps Ranma would have noticed that the pictures were professionally done at a level that was well beyond Nabiki's budget.
Kasumi bustled about the home, humming a wordless tune to herself as she went about her work. Her work load had drastically been reduced in the last month since the arrival of Ranma's sister, which was a blessing she happily accepted. In fact, the blonde's presence seemed to just be a blessing on almost everyone in the household all around. Things were tidier, more peaceful, and just generally speaking everyone was happier with her presence.
Even Kasumi herself was happier with her presence. It was difficult to stay in touch with her old friends that had gone off to university while she had stayed at home. So it was very nice to have someone closer to her age that she could chat with. It was an easy camaraderie. 18 was a very attentive listener, even though she pretended she wasn't, and soaked up new information like a sponge whenever she came to Kasumi with questions. She had come to adore spending time with the woman, even if she did like to tease Kasumi about ways she could change her wardrobe that would 'Have that Doctor twisted around your fingers' as she put it. Which was just an awful idea, as Tofu had only just been able to control himself around her.
(18 had presented her with a rather racy set of lingerie when she had said that. Kasumi had reprimanded her for doing such a thing when it was unasked for, but her chiding had lost a lot of its effect because she had been blushing bright red. And if Kasumi just happened to forget to give it back to the other woman. Well. You must understand these things happen.)
Peering at the clock and realizing she should begin to work on lunch, the eldest Tendo daughter finished what she was doing and made her way to the kitchen, upon which, she realized that Ranma and Akane had left their lunches. "Oh my…" She muttered quietly to herself, poking her head out to see who was immediately available. Father and Uncle - who was currently a panda - were playing their customary shogi game, Auntie had stepped out, and 18 was lounging on the couch, lazily flipping through a book at speeds that were a little faster than reasonable.
"Ah, 18?" Kasumi inquired, earning her a grunt of acknowledgement in response. "Ranma and Akane forgot their lunches, if you aren't busy, would you please take it to them?"
Glancing up at the sound of getting addressed, 18 looked up from her book, marking her place and setting it aside as she stretched before standing up. "Yeah. Sure. Don't wait for me to have lunch in that case, I'll figure something out."
"Oh my, you don't have to do that. I don't mind setting a portion aside for you to eat when you get back." Kasumi insisted, though her concern was waved off.
"It's fine, don't sweat it. I can just eat with them." 18 reassured as she stepped around Kasumi and into the kitchen, promptly moving towards the bento's and the thermos.
Kasumi just gave her a small smile in response, moving to the fridge to search for the ingredients for lunch. "Alright then. Enjoy yourselves!"
And with that, 18 turned and left, taking to the skies and heading toward Furinkan High.
"Saotome, did your daughter just fly?"
'It would seem so, Tendo.'
"... Can you fly?"
'Last I checked, Panda's don't grow wings!'
"Last I checked, neither do daughters."
'Touche, Tendo. Touche.'
Nabiki rolled her shoulders and sighed as she exited the building, relieved that she only had a few more exams left in her high school career. University could not come fast enough for her.
High School had been fun, don't get her wrong, but she was ready to get the hell out of Nerima. Her dating prospects were absolutely shit because of her reputation - not that she would give any of these morons the time of day - and entering a good university far from Nerima would help fix that. And considering just how much more stable an income she was going to be making acting as 18's manager, a lot of the stresses of running the operations around here would be gone as well. If she played her cards right, she could even grow her reputation and create her own agency!
She waved off her usual crew, who had undoubtedly come to her to talk shop, as she really just wanted to have a peaceful lunch alone to relax and destress. Normally, that would mean finding a good spot to watch the fireworks from whatever antics Ranma got into that day, but things had been calmer lately, so that wasn't an option. So instead, she picked a secluded corner of the school grounds, and parked her ass under a nice tree, eager to dig into her lunch.
It would seem that fate had other plans however, as a strangely angry, and female, looking Ranma had jumped from the third story and was currently beelining her way. Which was both intimidating and confusing. As far as Nabiki could remember, she hadn't done anything to earn Ranma's anger. Hell, even at her absolute worst, she'd never gotten Ranma to be purely angry at her. Peeved and annoyed? Sure. But actual raw, unfiltered anger? Never.
Still, she'd earned the moniker of Ice Queen for a reason. "I'm not paid enough for this shit…" Nabiki mumbled to herself. Setting her food aside the mask of cool indifference went on as she stood up. "What's got you so riled up Saotome?" She questioned as she wracked her brain for whatever possible reason Ranma had to be mad. New fiance? Some old stash of photos of his girl side that somehow had survived? Perhaps she was in an alternate reality where Ranma was the angry and violent martial artist that was ignorant of the fact that he was a big fish in a small pond, that hated girls for being perverts and declared it everyday, only to find himself engaged to Akane, an unsophisticated and socially ignorant girl with a boy Jusenkyo curse that happened to be a way better martial artist than him?
Turns out, the answer wasn't any of those, as a magazine was shoved into her face.
"You're mad because of swimsuits?" Nabiki questioned the smaller girl, genuinely not getting what the issue was as she didn't immediately connect the dots on what the magazine was.
"How could you Nabiki?" Ranma hissed, her eyes glowing in anger.
Which still left a completely baffled Nabiki with no answers. "Look, if you or Akane ended up in here, then it wasn't me. I'll contact a lawyer that owes me a favor, and we'll sue them. Okay?"
Growling at Nabiki, Ranma snatched the magazine back, immediately flipped to a page, and shoved it back in her face once again, where she was greeted by the sight of 18 wearing a strapless sea green bikini, laid out on a pool chair and giving the camera an inviting look. "Oh. How'd you get your hands on this? This issue wasn't supposed to be released until tomorrow." Nabiki nodded as she flipped through a few pages, nodding in approval at the various shots. The full page spread at the end was the best one though, featuring 18 wearing a white bikini top and a matching sarong on bottom, showing a tantalizing amount of leg as she posed next to a hunk of a man.
"These came out really well." Nabiki mused, failing to see just what the issue was as she had assumed the details of her job had been told to Ranma during their little trip last week. "So, again. What's got you so riled up?"
Ranma stalled mentally, incredulous that Nabiki didn't seem to see what the issue was. "How could you take advantage of 18 like this! She just got here and doesn't have anywhere else to go! Honestly, when did you even have time to take these pictures? And to sell them to some magazine for everyone in Japan to see is low." She huffed hotly, pushing the envelope instead of letting her anger get talked down.
Meanwhile, Nabiki blinked a few times, baffled by this development. "Take advantage of 18? We signed a contract, and she was quite happy with all the terms and conditions. Hell, if anything, I'm the one that got taken advantage of. A mere 20% is all I'm getting!"
"Huh?"
"I mean really, I made a big blunder letting her open the negotiations. I knew she was smarter than you-"
"Hey!"
"-but really, I was playing to her tune the whole time. Made me choose between negotiating conditions or pay. And I chose to negotiate pay. But that's my fault for going to the negotiation table without knowing all the cards in her hand. Seriously, I showed up to negotiate thinking we were playing go fish, when we were actually playing poker."
Ranma deflated, a bucket of cold water being dumped on her anger as Nabiki explained the situation. Her being upset over the failed negotiation was too real for it to be anything but the truth of the situation. And hearing this made Ranma feel like a colossal ass. "Aw, I'm sorry Nabiki. I shouldn't have assumed…" She trailed off, a sheepish expression on her face as she fiddled with her pigtail.
"Eh. Apology accepted. I don't blame you for thinking that honestly. Old me probably would have done what you were assuming if I thought I could get away with it." Nabiki waved it off as she sat back down, grabbing her food to finally get some peace and quiet and eat. "Did you need anything else Ranma?" She asked, mask fully off now as she began to dig in.
"Not unless you're willing to share lunch? 'Kane and I forgot to grab ours since she was in a rush to get here early."
Nabiki shot a glare at Ranma, holding her bento more protectively which was a perfectly reasonable action when anyone even suggested taking away some of Kasumi's food from you. "Yeah, I didn't think so. I'll figure somethin' out, don't worry about it."
Nabiki glanced back and forth between the lunch in her hands and one of the few people she considered a friend, seemingly considering actually sharing some of it. Fortunately, she never had to make that decision, as the loud voice of one Tatewaki Kuno rang out, drawing everyone's attention to him.
"So it was true! The Golden Haired Valkyrie was indeed spotted flying through the skies of Nerima, no doubt looking for her true love! Well look no further, for you have found it!
Both Ranma and Nabiki froze up as they listened, incredulous expressions on their faces. There was no way…
Immediately, Ranma broke into a sprint towards the crowds, though she was too late to save her sister from the headache of Kuno it would seem.
"Ah, you are clearly starstruck by the immediate mutual attraction we share, no doubt. Allow me to introduce myself, fairest Valkyrie! I am the rising star of the Kendo world! The Blue Thunder Furinkan High! The noble scion of house Kuno! My name is Tatewaki Kuno, age 19. I challenge you! If you defeat me, I shall allow you to date me! I strike!"
18 descended on the grounds of Furinkan High, unbothered by the attention she was drawing to herself. She'd gained a thick skin years ago, so some whispered words and blatant stares didn't even phase her.
Though she might have been a little more bothered if she realized that everyone was whispering about the possibility of being engaged to her sibling. A new, beautiful girl with a distinct and exotic appearance entering the scene in a unique way that immediately drew everyone's attention?
That was practically screaming 'new fiance'.
Many of the more mentally quick students immediately found their closest Nabiki Tendo underling to place bets, uncaring for the odds. This was a slam dunk easy bet if they had ever seen one.
Another, much smaller, portion of the students were clamoring in excitement because they recognized her from the magazine, and were excitedly and fervently whispering amongst themselves about how she was even hotter in person.
But, fortunately for 18's sanity, she didn't care to process the whispers of the crowd around her, scanning around to find her sibling. Which shouldn't be too hard a task, seeing as how they were the only one in a sea of students not wearing a uniform. She really didn't want to resort to Ki sensing, as she did not want to deal with the headache it gave her.
Hoping to spare herself from a headache, she glanced at the crowd and began to call someone out, only for someone to step through the crowd.
He was a relatively handsome man with a charming face and a confident smile, though he was dressed quite eccentrically. Instead of the standard uniform most students wore, he was wearing a blue hakama, and was carrying a sword interestingly enough. She didn't think high school students were allowed to carry live steel last she checked, but perhaps that was just one of those things she had yet to learn about this world.
Somehow, 18 didn't believe that for a second. But, she was curious to hear what he was going to say, so she simply crossed her arms and stared him down, her gaze intimidating a few of the onlookers.
But not the wannabe samurai it seemed. "So it was true! The Golden Haired Valkyrie was indeed spotted flying through the skies of Nerima, no doubt looking for her true love! Well look no further, for you have found it!" The boy declared while posing dramatically.
Android 18… Did not have a response to that. Unlike most people who came to this part of Tokyo, she simply hadn't encountered a lot of the Nerima weirdness, and what she did encounter simply couldn't bother her. It was all so tame compared to the shit she had been through. That, and things had been rather peaceful by Nerima standards anyways. But even with all that being taken into consideration, and how weird her very existence was, she was not expecting… Whatever the hell this was.
"Ah, you are clearly starstruck by the immediate mutual attraction we share, no doubt. Allow me to introduce myself, fairest Valkyrie! I am the rising star of the Kendo world! The Blue Thunder Furinkan High! The noble scion of house Kuno! My name is Tatewaki Kuno, age 19. I challenge you! If you defeat me, I shall allow you to date me! I strike!"
Because that makes sense. Seriously, what was with these people and challenging total strangers to fights? He was clearly not all there mentally, on top of posing absolutely no threat to her whatsoever, so 18 decided to just ignore him and walked forward through the crowd, towards the little redhead that she finally spotted that was sprinting over.
The crowd, meanwhile, gasped in horror and fright. Kuno was attacking someone with a real sword, and they weren't putting up a fight at all! Many couldn't tear their gazes away, while others couldn't help but to look away, unwilling to watch the bloodshed that was sure to unfold.
Kuno himself felt a sense of horror building up in him, as this was not going the way he imagined. Had he read his Valkyrie wrong? He had thought his suspicions had been confirmed the moment her visage graced his eyes in person, but he had been certain she was a magnitude of power that far outclassed both the pigtailed girl and the fierce tigress. And yet he now found himself in the position of attacking his beloved with a naked blade, while she offered no resistance! Worse yet, because he had misread her, he had attacked with his full strength! He had overcommitted to the attack, as was his custom for when he challenged his loves, and because of that, he couldn't retract his blade in time. Everyone could only watch in horror as the blade sliced through the air, aimed to slice diagonally down across her chest.
"Watch ou-" Ranma tried to call, only for the painful screech of metal snapping to ring out, halting her words.
The katana shattered on impact with 18's shoulder, not even making the Android flinch or waver as she walked through a gap in the deathly silent crowd. All eyes were on her as she walked up to Ranma, many noticing for the first time that she was holding a plastic bag in her hands. "Kasumi asked me to bring you your lunch." She spoke plainly in her usual almost bored drawl, completely unbothered by what had just happened.
The collective breath everyone was holding was released, as the mundane reason the beautiful stranger was here caused a cacophony of voices to burst to life once more.
At this point, a slightly out of breath Nabiki finally caught up, having witnessed everything as well, though she was shocked to the extreme as she tried to reevaluate - once again - just how powerful 18 was. "How did you do that?" She asked, only to receive a blank look in response.
"Oh, hey Nabiki. How did I do what?"
"With the sword… It… You didn't do anything and it shattered! It didn't just break, it shattered to a million pieces!"
18 blinked a few times, before glancing over her shoulder at the stone still Kuno, who was staring despondently at the bladeless handle of what was once his prized katana. Briefly, she wondered if he would be fine. But she ultimately shrugged it off. His fault for swinging a sword at her with such weak strength. She'd been completely unbothered when a Super Saiyan attacked her with a sword. Of course a weakling like him would be unable to make her react to his sword strike. "He's weak?" Android 18 offered, as if that was the only explanation for why that happened.
At this point, Ranma groaned as he remembered a piece of their conversation from the training trip, where she had casually mentioned that bullets, of all things, shouldn't offer any threat to Ranma. If that was the case for Ranma, who was now aware of how outclassed she was, then a simple sword wouldn't pose any threat to 18.
"Anyways, I brought your lunch and your hot water. Oh. And Akane's lunch too. Where is she?"
"Uh… I think she went to the library?" Ranma guessed as she finally accepted the bag, having not paid any attention to what Akane did as she had been more focused on finding Nabiki. Mindlessly, she reached in and took the thermos out, dumping some of it over his head to trigger the change.
"Eh. Her loss I guess. If she wants it, she'll come find it."
"Er… Right. Did you wanna hang out some? I had some ideas and stuff that I wanted to talk to you about." The now male Saotome asked as he straightened out his clothes, gesturing with his head towards the tree he and Nabiki had been at previously.
"Sure. Ask away."
And with that, the two siblings strolled away, leaving Nabiki to handle bets and information distribution as the crowds swarmed her. Which she was more than glad to do, as today was sure to be one of the most historical days of profit she'd have yet.
As for Kuno? He stood there completely unmoving for several hours, shaken to his core, until his loyal retainer Sasuke finally came to retrieve him, hours after school had ended for the day.
Author's Notes:
As always, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed the chapter! I wanted to get this out last week before the new semester of college began, but the ending really fought me. I'm still not thrilled with the way I finished this chapter, and maybe at some point down the line I'll go back and rewrite it, but for now it's good enough.
At least I finished the second chapter for the month, which is what I care about more.
This chapter felt the most Ranma-esque of all the chapters I've written so far, while also (hopefully) highlighting how I think the characters have changed in the year since the end of canon. I want to reiterate that the year that has passed since the end of canon has been extremely peaceful in comparison, so characters have grown and reflected a lot. Mostly I was trying to get that point across about Nabiki and to a lesser extent Ranma and Kasumi as well, though I think I've been showing Ranma's growth in maturity throughout the entire fic. I'm not thrilled by all the scene changes and POV swapping I had to do, but I wasn't sure how else to handle this chapter? With Ranma being at school, and 18 not, I couldn't really think of any other way to go about this chapter.
Also, I hope my attempts at humor are making people laugh. I like to think I'm funny/entertaining since I continually get support for this fic, but maybe I'm just missing the mark horribly lmfao.
As always, Ranma's training with 18 is largely going on in the background. And Ryoga's training now as well. There will be a showdown between the two soon to show off the fruits of their labors under their new teachers, but that won't be for at least another 2 chapters or so.
Anyways, that's all from me! Hope you all enjoyed the chapter. I didn't get to do the world building I had planned on, so next chapter will be a bit of a lore dump, on top of a crossover of sorts, though they will not be major characters. I've thought a lot about this, and for the sake of the story I'm going to tell I think they're needed, as they provide something nobody in the Ranma canon can. I currently have no plans of adding a 4th series crossover however, beyond some nods/cameos. Perhaps at some point there might be a chapter where Ranma and 18 fly around the world and one shot various villains from other anime? I haven't fleshed that idea out at all, it just sounded silly and fun lol.
If you're wondering, Ryoga and Ranma have both grown a decent amount in a short time frame, a benefit of having a far more powerful teacher than yourself. Ranma has grown more than Ryoga though, due to having spent longer training with their new teacher. Also, 18 passively grows stronger without having to do anything. Akane's hasn't moved though, as she is struggling a lot more with Ki manipulation that either of the boys.
Changes in Power Levels:
Ranma: 228 - 270
Ranma (Neko-Ken): 456 - 540
Ryoga: 194 - 209
Android 18: ~290,000,000 - ~291,000,000