Ranma frowned at the sky. This wasn't a normal storm. He'd seen enough of rain to tell that much, having the curse had caused him to pay a bit more attention to such things.
The lightning seemed to be crawling from a central point.
"Hey, granny," said Ranma to the old woman, drawing a momentary blank on her name, "you expecting one of them youkai to show up?"
"No," said Kaede, letting the 'granny' comment slip by without more than a frown.
Lightning flared into the center of the village, accompanied by sufficient thunder that anything else Kaede said was drowned out.
Ranma frowned as he turned back to watching from the doorway. Big fellow, and it wasn't often that he saw something uglier than Taro's cursed form. Roughly twice his height, massively muscled like some foreign weightlifter, with black spikes over red skin and a pair of long curving horns like a goat. One arm ended in a sort-of crab claw, the other had a humanoid hand ending in iron talons. One leg ended in a cloven hoof, the other ended in a perfectly normal looking human foot except for the size.
"Patchwork youkai?" asked Ranma, seeing if Kaede had any answer. Instead the old woman was gathering her bow and some arrows.
"WheEre iS iNuyaSHA?" asked the youkai, sending a lightning bolt into one hut. The thatch roof immediately caught fire. "I brINg hIS deATh."
Ranma saw the kids coming out of the burning hut, saw the youkai lower his humanoid hand and prepare to send lightning out again if that corona was any indication.
Ranma moved. Even the Old Letch stayed away from kids. This youkai was ready to fry kids. That was so very very not sitting well with Ranma.
WHACKUM!
Having done a running flying kick to the back of the thing's head, Ranma bounced to the ground and kicked off again. "Hey ugly, ya looking for trouble? Cause I think I can oblige ya."
"NaRAku swEArs I cAn... wHO THe hELl aRe yOU?" asked the youkai. A human? No, it couldn't be. A human couldn't have kicked him in the head and actually stagger him. He threw a lightning bolt, expecting to fry this annoyance.
"I'm Ranma Saotome of the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts," said Ranma, dodging the lightning bolt and grabbing a pair of hardwood chopsticks from an abandoned lunch.
"I AM GENMA!" roared the youkai. "I AM THE SPELLSTEALER! I TAKE POWERS FROM THOSE I DEFEAT AND THEY BECOME MY OWN STRENG- GAKK!"
Ranma smirked at where the open mouth had just made too tempting a target. His remaining chopstick was flipped idly up and caught again. "Ya know, you might have my Pops' name - but you ain't even THAT good."
"muu pam mur mis," said the youkai as he grabbed the chopstick and began working it out of the roof of his mouth.
Ranma waited until the youkai threw his head back after grabbing the chopstick, pulling it out of his mouth. WHIPPPPPP!
"YEAGHHHHH!" said the youkai, now with a chopstick up one nostril.
Ranma nodded, impressed. On a normal opponent, that would have been a kill move. On this guy, it was apparently just real damn painful. "Man, you must be more brainless than Kuno for that not to kill you."
The youkai ripped the chopstick loose, staggering as apparently that DID hurt.
Ranma leapt in, closing the distance. He could take advantage of that and put down Big Dumb Ugly before any more huts got burned down.
The youkai Genma grinned and grabbed as Ranma came closer, losing the dazed stance. "FoOL! nOW i CAn mAKe yOUr strENgth my OWn."
Ranma felt it, an attack flowing from the youkai to himself. Some sort of chi siphon ability? Well, he'd been hit with Miss Hinako's attack but this was different. In fact...
Genma's eyes were wide as he felt his own attack being used against him? "What ARe yOU?!"
"Trouble," said Ranma, gritting his teeth and settling into the wrestling match, "just ask anyone in Nerima and they'll tell you that."
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(Posted Thu, 18 Oct 2007 19:30)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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