Freya Crescent was standing on top of a high cliff in the middle off the Burmecian mountains. Her hair was billowing in the wind, while she held her lance and gazed down into the valley where her home town was lying, as always blanketed with rain clouds.
"Burmecia, city of everlasting rain..." the female Dragoon sighed. "How easy it would be for me to simply go home and go on with my life."
A single tear ran down her furry face. "But I can't..." she whispered. "I have to keep looking... keep on searching..." She then looked up into the skies. "Oh, Sir Fratley... wherever can you be? What happened to you that you didn't come back home? How could you forget the promise we made?"
Like all Burmecians, Freya was a tall, anthropomorphic rat with paw-like feet and a thin tail. She was clad in a red cloak which hid the armor she was wearing underneath, and a tall, red hat that was topped with a pair of small dragon wings.
She was a Dragoon, also known as 'Dragon Knight', and she was proud to be one. She also loved her home country dearly and would give anything to feel the soft rain of Burmecia on her face again.
If only she was reunited with the one she loved...
Freya sighed. "No need to stay here, I suppose..." she murmured. "Wherever Fratley is, he won't come back if I just stand here and think happy thoughts..."
She grabbed her lance tightly and jumped down the steep cliff - for a Dragoon an easy feat. The powerful feet of the Burmecians allowed them to take enormous leaps, and the Dragoons have perfected these acrobatic maneuvers and used them in battle.
Freya turned her back to the valley and followed a narrow canyon that was supposed to lead her to the lowlands between Burmecia and Lindblum. But while she was walking along the rocky path between the high cliffs, she heard a groan coming from up above.
Surprised, she looked up and saw a human body lying on a small ledge above her head. From what she could see, it was a tall male, and while he was stirring, he looked like he was in a bad shape.
"Humans rarely venture deep into these mountains..." she murmured. "And if they wish to reach Burmecia, they usually go through Gizamaluke's Grotto."
She jumped up to the ledge and knelt down next to the muscular human. "Hey, are you all right? Can you stand up?"
The young man pushed himself up on his elbows and snarled. "Dang that Happosai..." he grumbled. "If I ever get my hands on him... I swear it, I WILL make him change my name!"
Suddenly, he was becoming aware of where he was. "What? What is this place? I was fighting Happosai in the forest before he knocked me out. Where am I?" He then looked at Freya's furry face and sat up. "And who are you?"
"I am Freya Crescent, a Dragoon from Burmecia," she introduced herself. "May I ask for your name?"
"Are you a Jusenkyo victim as well?" he grumbled, not really understanding what the weird rat-woman was saying. "And my name is Taro, Pantyhose Taro..."
Freya couldn't help it: She had to chuckle when she heard that. "Really? That is your name?"
As soon as he heard her laughing, a familiar rage spread through Taro's heart. "THAT'S NOT FUNNY!" he yelled and jumped to his feet. Freya was surprised when the aggressive martial artist swung his fist around in a blind rage. Using her Dragoon reflexes, she nimbly dodged a powerful blow that made the whole stone platform they were standing on shake. She gulped when she saw the cracks his punch had left behind in the stone. "What's gotten into you? That could have killed me!"
Actually, she doubted it - her armor would have protected her. Still, a punch powerful enough to break stone would have at least seriously injured her.
"Nobody... makes fun of my name!" Taro yelled. "NEVER!"
"Okay, okay, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that. Just relax, I'm not your enemy."
Before Taro could calm down however, the cracks began to wander along the platform and underneath their feet. They both looked down, then at each other's faces.
"Uh-oh..." they both said at once... then the stone ledge broke off from the wall, and both of them plummeted down into the canyon.
Freya was quick-witted enough to flip around in mid-air, so she could gracefully land on her feet. She raised her hands and lance when all around her, the rubble rained down.
Taro, however, did not manage to turn around in time. His hard head hit the even harder rock, and he was knocked out cold... again.
Freya pulled him away just in time before a falling rock as big as Taro's head fell down where he had been lying. Finally, the rocks stopped falling.
"Whoever this human is, he is powerful... and temperamental." She took a deep breath and looked down at him. "He attacked me without any warning... and he could have easily caused the death of both of us. I could just easily leave him behind..."
She then sighed. "Oh, who am I kidding? It was always the Dragoons' duty to protect the helpless... and even though I believe he can take care of himself, I shouldn't just let him lie here in front of this unstable rock wall..."
With another deep sigh, she picked Taro's unconscious body up and carried him on her shoulders. "Well, he's not a lightweight, that's for sure..."
And she continued her way down into the lowlands, this time with an unconscious martial artist on her shoulders. A martial artist who is not even from this world...
With a terrifying roar, the Silver Dragon flapped his wings, creating a stationary tornado that was twisting the small, winged boy in its middle around.
When it was over, the boy's wings were torn up, and he painfully fell down onto the ground.
A beautiful woman with similar wings and bird claws on her hands and feet gasped when she saw her young protege and master fell down. "MASTER SAFFRON!" she shouted and ran at his side.
A man in fancy clothes, with gray-blue hair, smiled when his dragon landed at his side. "Go away from there, woman!" he said and stretched his palm into her direction. A huge amount of magical energies got focussed in the middle of his hand, then he trusted his hand forwards and shouted: "FLARE!"
The energy was released in the form of a massive explosion, which threw the bird-woman backwards. She collided with a rock and yelped when one of her wings was damaged in the process. She sank down to the ground, but she tried to push herself up with her arms again. She looked up and watched how the man she had never seen before in her life walked up to the twitching form of her lord.
"L-lord Saffron..." she murmured.
She knew it was a bad idea to leave Mt. Phoenix. She knew Lord Saffron should have waited until he had grown a bit more. Ever since he was defeated by that human, Ranma Saotome, and was reborn as a baby, she had sworn to never let anything happen to him.
But she had been weak. Now that Saffron had regained the appearance of a six-year-old, he had pestered her again and again by asking to be let out of his golden prison that were his personal chambers. Kiima, as well as the old chamberlain, had the feeling that it was a bad idea for him to leave the safety of his palace, but the young prince had been persistent, and in the end Kiima had relented, against the warnings of the chamberlain.
How foolish of her.
While she didn't know how she and her lord could did come here in the first place, she was certain that it wouldn't have happened if they hadn't left Mt. Phoenix. If she at least had brought along an escort of phoenix warriors...
Soon after they had appeared in this desolate desert, they had spied the silver dragon in the skies. It came down on them, and the man who was its rider addressed them, asking Saffron directly where he had received his impressive powers. When Saffron proudly exclaimed that he was the emperor of the phoenix people, the landling seemed impressed. He introduced himself as Kuja and invited the prince and Kiima into his personal palace.
But Saffron was not interested in associating with 'landling scum', and when he told Kuja that, a disappointed frown appeared on the human's face.
"Too bad," was what he replied.
Right after that, he had ordered his dragon to attack them. And while no normal human would have had any chance against the lord of the phoenix people, this powerful creature was something else. On top of that, Lord Saffron had yet to regain all of his powers, and in the end, he was overwhelmed by the flying beast.
And now Kiima could do nothing to help him. With a broken wing and multiple bruises, she helplessly watched how Kuja picked up her lord and carried him over to his waiting dragon.
Before he left, though, he looked across his shoulder and smirked at her.
"I wish for you that you pass out quickly," he said. "The Sand Worms of the desert have a nasty habit to swallow their prey alive."
And with a malicious giggle, he snapped his fingers. The silver dragon let out a mighty roar and flew up into the skies.
Kiima gritted her teeth. "D-damn you..." she muttered. Then, a haze fell upon her eyes and mind, and in the end, the darkness of unconsciousness engulfed her.
In the darkness of the forest, a young maiden looked around in confusion.
"Where am I?" she asked in a scared voice. "It's so creepy here... Katsunushiki? Where are you?"
Strange voices were echoing through the mists, and Akari Unryu nervously stepped backwards. "I don't like this place..." she murmured. "I only wanted to go and feed the pigs... how did I end up in this place?"
She walked backwards until her backside bumped into someone who was standing behind her. She yelped in fright, but at the same time, the figure with the pointed hat she had walked into yelped as well. They both turned around.
"P-please d-don't hurt me!" they said at once.
Akari was surprised to see that the person she was looking at was just a little boy. True, he looked a bit weird with his pair of glowing eyes underneath the dark brim of his hat, but he wasn't in the least threatening.
"You... you're no monster?" he squeaked. His gloved hands clutched his short, wooden staff, and Akari could tell that he was at least as frightened as she was.
She smiled. "Don't worry, I won't hurt you. Say, what's your name?"
"V-vivi..." the boy muttered. "Vivi Orunitia... you... you aren't from that theater ship, aren't you?"
Akari blinked. "Theater ship? I have no idea what you are talking about, sorry."
"We... we crash-landed in this forest..." Vivi gulped nervously. "I got thrown overboard... until now, I wasn't able to find anyone else..."
Suddenly, the snapping of branches and the rattling of metal heralded the arrival of another person. Vivi sighed in relief when he saw the armored knight that had just entered the clearing they were standing on.
"Master Vivi!" he shouted. "Quick! It's... it's the princess..."
"The princess?" Vivi gasped. "Wh-what happened to her?"
"Princess? What princess?" Akari asked in confusion.
"There is no time to answer your question, fair maiden," the armored man said. "We need to hurry, or the princess' life is forfeit... Master Vivi, do you think you could use your formidable magic to assist me?"
"A... assist? With what?" Vivi asked.
"With defeating the vile monster, of course!" the knight insisted.
Akari's head was spinning. 'Magic? Monster? Just what kind of place is this? Oh Ryoga... I wish you were here...'
And then, it happened: Out of the treetops, a bulky shape dropped down in front of the little group, with army that looked like long vines, and a bulbous body that resembled an organic cage. And inside the cage body of the plant monster, the huddled form of a girl was trapped.
"Steiner!" she shouted. "Help! Get me out of here!"
"Princess!" the knight proclaimed as he drew his sword. "Never worry, I will free you from this monster!"
Vivi and Akari, however, could only do one thing:
They screamed like little girls.
Not too far away from this, a young martial artist was walking through the forest, trying very hard not to get lost in the mist.
'Keep walking ahead!' the Sylph called Ran told him just when he was about to turn around. 'I told you, just follow the path!'
"Sorry, it's just that for a moment, I could have sworn that the path is turning right..."
In his mind, all three Sylphs sweatdropped. 'But you were turning left...' Kane murmured.
Suddenly, they heard loud screams coming from up ahead.
Ryoga frowned. "That voice... it sounds so familiar..."
'Can it be that there are other travellers in the Evil Forest?' Kari wondered.
Suddenly, Ryoga gasped. "Akari!" he muttered. And then he started running to where he had heard the screams. "AKARI! I'M COMING!"
He didn't know that just behind him, a young boy with a tail had heard the same screams, and was on his way to help them as well...
Read the comments on this episode
See other episodes by Shritistrang
(Posted Wed, 09 Jul 2008 16:24)
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.