Another day. I wake up as soon as the first ray of the sun touches my skin. I run down the Saotome house and inhale the food tray prepared by my mother yesterday. Once the breakfast is finished, I run toward the forest to continue my training.
After a few minutes, I reach the small clearing where I have been the last three days. This is the place where I learnt with Cologne and Happosai how to reach for my true Ki. Where I learnt how to shape it with all my emotions. Confidence had always been my favorite. But once you have reach a certain stage, you can't rely on emotion. Because it goes against control. Emotions control you. So I've been trying to access to my Ki without any emotions. If I truly want to control my life, I must control my emotions. My challenge: as soon as I reach my true Ki, I'll know I'll be able to do whatever I want of my life.
I sit down in the middle of the clearing, trying to clear my head of all thoughts...
That's not easy you know! It is even harder than trying to listen in class!
After a bit of time, I begin forming small chi balls, each of them containing one emotion. What sight I must be! With small wisps of light floating around me, each of one of the rainbow colors. I can feel it. My confidence, or ego, azure blue. My anger, crimson red. My love, bright pink. My depression for the mess my life is, sickly green. My hunger for food, yellow as a small fire. My hope, purple. My love of nature, aquamarine. My fear of cats, black with some red and blue, I'm still not sure. And some other emotions I still don't recognize. But there are hundreds of them.
I scan my mind, looking for anything which could even remotely look like an emotion. Nothing. I'm in the dark. Void of any emotion. Well, in fact it's not dark. It's like in the mist. The atmosphere looks like it was dark, but there is a light coming from nowhere, and suddenly I realize that must be my inner Ki. But how to reach it, when I don't where is it? I must see past the mist, raise the fog in my mind.
...Still after several hours searching for my inner Ki, nothing. Shit! All my emotions come back as soon as I stop. I'm submerged in an typhoon of emotions, trying to laugh, cry, giggle, sleep, eat, etc... I decide to wait until I'm back in control. I shouldn't have allowed all my emotions to come back at once. I wasn't in control.
Still, I've made some progress. Well, time to practice on Ki control. I stand, and began to run toward the coast. As soon as I reach it, I jump high in the air, preparing myself to the impact on the sea. I land on the surface, and begin to use as less Ki as possible to keep my feet over the waves. I start doing some of the new katas I've been taught, but stop when I'm drenched by an unseen wave, turning to my female body. Well, I concentrate and steam rise from my clothes. I'm dry, and still female. Normal, I want to keep practicing my katas, and I'm not sure if I'm turned to my female body during my fight tomorrow I'll have the leisure to return to my male body. So I want to the best in both my bodies.
I dance on the sea, executing my katas, trying to keep my feet dry. Because of the waves, I'm improving my balance, and lessening the quantity of Ki I'm using to stay onto the sea. It is a very useful exercise. It helps increasing my Ki reserves and my Ki control, as shown by the progress made since I've come up with the Fire and Ice Technique.
With it, I'm able to walk on water, cause the clouds to rain, boil or freeze water. That's some of most obvious use. But I can also with one hit steal heat then with the following hit returning it in a focused manner. It usually cause my target to break in small pieces. I can create a small Hiryu Shoten Ha without having my opponent enraged. Or combined with my Twin Moko Takabisha, I can produce extreme heat and extreme cold. It is an effective trick against dragons.
Talking about dragons, I realize I've made a mistake training near a lake in China. I should have realized a dragon would have been drawn when involuntary I froze it. The following discussion wasn't nice. My foot-in-mouth habitude, Shampoo singing praise about me, and the arrogance of the dragon resulted into a fight as nearly as destructive as the one against Saffron. And what a fight! Near the end, Shampoo received a nasty claw strike to her left thigh, and the dragon tried to kidnap her. I had promised to Cologne I would bring her back, so, trying to protect her, I unleashed a Twin Moko Takashiba, which the dragon withstand without problems, as all of my others Chi blasts. I began a new Twin Moko Takashiba, but transfered all heat from one to the other, with the result that when the frozen ball hit the dragon in its middle, its scales froze, and its beard and whiskers where vaporized by the heated ball. As a result, a dragon nearly blinded (its whiskers are like a sixth sense for them) and more vulnerable (scales explode on a hit when frozen). In his pain-induced rage, he tried to kill Shampoo, and leveled down the near forest , which was still unaffected by our fight. As Shampoo was bleeding to near-death, I killed the dragon. Well, this time it came more easilly, although I still hate the fact I had to kill Saffron and this dragon. I froze Shampoo's wound to stop her from bleeding, and as I had done with Akane, I gave her some of my Ki, combined with Chi and heat.
And I brought her back to Japan, running non-stop when I had to walk, stopping only to eat and check on her wound. This is on this trip that I learnt how to control my curse. My only relief was on the train to Shanghai, I slept five hours straight. Then on the ferry from Shanghai to Osaka, Herb came to me and told me I was now considered a ennemy of the Guardians of China unless I accepted to join them, becoming an immortal in the process, like Saffron. I must admit I was a bit apprehensive when I saw Herb, during the conversation, seemed to be subdued. What could frighten him? I learnt it a bit later, after I told him I would not submit myself to the will of the Guardians. Then he handed me a formal letter of challenge from Shen Long and Feng Huang, under the next full moon, and explained me who they were. Then I knew I was deep in trouble.
I was deep in thinking, so I didn't see him leave. Arriving at Osaka, I hurried to Nerima and delivered Shampoo under the care of Cologne and Doc Tofu. Then, after a demonstration of the Fire and Ice Technique before my parents, the Tendos, Grandmaster Happosai, Cologne, Ukyo, Mousse and Ryoga, I immediately asked my father to grant me the full knowledge of the Yami-sen-ken, as he had promised me. I learnt them all the following day.
One day later, after having read several times the letter of challenge, I asked everyone to meet me at the Tendo Dojo, then explained them what I had done the last ten days. I was immediately assaulted by thousands of questions. I answered none. When everyone stopped, I continued and asked for their help: no school until the challenge, counsel and training from Cologne and Happosai, no wedding, and no challenge. It took me three hours until they all agreed, particularly onto the last two points.
So I learnt first for three days under the care of Cologne, refining my knowledge of the Amazon techniques, like the Bakusai Tenketsu or the Hiryu Shoten Ha. Then Happosai tried to make my life hell for a week, but I endured, and at the end of the week, during a special ceremony I really don't want to talk about, he granted me his full knowledge of the True Anything Goes, along with the title of Grand Master of Anything Goes. For the moment, none knows that Happosai is no more the Grand Master.
Afterward, I asked for Doc Tofu's help. With the knowledge of Happosai, I saw that Doc Tofu could help me. I passed two days learning the foundations of anatomy, pressure points, and ki applied to the body.
I took one day off with the family, especially my mother, then I returned to Cologne and Happosai, asking for more, for their help developping my raw talent I had tapped during the fight against Saffron.
So now I'm here, seemingly dancing on the sea, improving my Ki control, preparing myself for the challenge tomorrow night.
...The sun is going down now, I must return home. I stop my kata, and run at high speed toward the shore, then toward house. I hear the air rushing against my body, and suddenly the air snap loud. I wonder if I did reach the sound speed. I stop at the Saotome house and go directly into the furo. Another day of rest and meditation only, another 24 hours before the fight for my freedom, my life and the Art.
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Sat, 22 Jan 2005 01:31)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.