"Okay, ya got a deal!" Ranma declared. "Though ain't I too old for an apprentice?"
"Can fix that I can, believe it young man," said the old man.
Akane stared at the spot where Ranma had stood a moment ago. "Eh?"
"Nice going, sis," said Nabiki. "Wonder what the fiancees are going to do about this. Wonder what Kuno will say about you banishing the foul sorcerer Saotome once and for all."
"Eh?" said the twitching Akane, looking a little even more upset.
"Bwee?" said P-chan, torn between being angry about Ranma running out yet again or comforting Akane.
"Gone, poof!" said Nabiki as she went upstairs.
"How are we going to unite the two schools now?" Soun asked.
The panda just shrugged and started scarfing a rice bowl. He didn't want to think about the possibilities that this was going to go over with Nodoka. She wasn't here though, hadn't been seen in ten years. Maybe she'd gone on with her life.
"I suppose I'll have to set one less place now," said Kasumi, calculating adjustments in the shopping.
"...baka..." said Akane to no one in particular.
Inside Akane was finding a way to avoid conflict and blame, otherwise the current situation would be devastating. It was easy enough. Cute scantily clad foreign girl + Ranma + wish = RANMA WAS OFF WITH ANOTHER FLOOZIE! The girl had been a genie (or more likely some magical princess type) but obviously in order to manipulate Akane like that she'd also been pretty intelligent. So the dumb blonde thing was an act and she was actually stealing away Ranma who would be completely clueless about this!
Nabiki went into her room, closed the door, and made a few calls. Ranma photos would be going up in price now with the lack of a Ranma, but selling the story of his disappearance would make her a tidy profit for now. The only concern was the spin she would put on it.
The wizard turned out to talk in rhymes constantly, was as eccentric if not as annoying as a Kuno, and was definitely a Master Wizard.
His tower turned out to be a farm that he'd gotten for services rendered years ago and he'd turned into a magical lab.
Ranma had spent most of his life on the road and in Japan. He didn't have the problem some Japanese did, in that they spent all their lives in cramped areas and having trouble in large expanses. Or with being used to crowds and not finding anything even remotely resembling a crowd. Here in an area that was on the maps as being within the Free Lands Of The Coast, he was a little over a days travel from Shan On The Sea and a few days from the three Ethshars. None of which made a great deal of sense to him, but apparently the really rare ingredients required a trip into town.
There were chores to be done and Ranma didn't have a lot of problem with these either. Feeding chickens and slopping pigs were the same no matter what world you were on. Of course, he incorporated martial arts into such activities but that was pretty much what you'd expect of him.
It only took a day for him to learn to make an athame a magical dagger that was a part of him and needed for the overwhelming majority of spells.
It was while he was learning Finger Of Flame that Ranma came to realize something. This was, to him at least, an aspect of Anything Goes. It required exacting ritual to be sure, but you had to sense the magic (which he could with the dagger) and then sometimes alter things as you were going along. It was this sense for being able to alter as needed that was, according to the mage, the mark of a true wizard.
Before making the athame, he hadn't really been aware of it - hadn't known what it was even if he did feel something. Now he knew and now the magic wasn't manipulating his life - he was manipulating it.
Magic became another opponent to defeat, and it had already slapped him around a few times. Now he was taking the fight to it.
By the third day he had mastered Displaced Whistle.
By the fourth day he'd learned Esham's Oenological Transformation.
By the fifth day he'd made his first spell, altering the ritual for the water-to-wine spell so he could turn a glass of water into orange juice. His Master was pleased both by the new spell and the drink, and mentioned to Ranma that this would definitely shut a few "old fogies" up about taking an older apprentice.
By the sixth day, the Spell Of The Spinning Coin had been mastered and Ranma was ready to learn something useful.
Which was when Ranma started to learn one of the most staggeringly useful spells in wizardry - Tracel's Adaptable Potion.
One of the downsides of wizardry was that it was time consuming. Most spells required a great deal of time in the casting. Some spells - like the Spell Of Optimum Strength - took three hours or more to cast. The Spell Of The Obedient Object took over an hour in which a bowl had to be constantly stirred. Cast the spell into Tracel's Adaptable Potion, however, and you could then unleash the spell's effects in as much time as it took to drink a potion.
Oh there were spells you couldn't or wouldn't load into potion form. Ranma heard a recounting of someone who'd tried doing that once with Lugwiler's Dismal Itch and privately vowed not to do that himself. Though going off and casting it on Tatewaki Kuno was a pleasant moment's fantasy.
Wizards tended to specialize and Ranma's master was no exception.
People would come from miles around, at least during periods of pleasant weather, to get an expertly made piece of magical clothing done by the infamous Froderick.
The details had come out while Ranma had been demonstrating his new Ranma's Juice Infusion spell and the two had shared a quiet moment sipping the fruits of his labor. Apparently his current master had grown up the third child of a clothier. He had not been the most skilled, nor had the best eye, and when he'd suddenly announced that he wanted to be a wizard it had been with his family's blessing. It had worked out all around too, as his background had predisposed him towards his specialty in his new art.
A number of spells could be put into clothing, the simplest of which was a preservative spell that mostly repelled dirt and grime. It was trickier to make the spell permanent, but certainly possible.
Ranma wasn't exactly a fashion plate, but looking over the supply of clothing and fabrics that the old wizard kept around and hearing stories of some of the work previously done - he could certainly see the possibilities and why people would make treks all the way out to this farm in order to get something like this. A hooded cloak that resisted fire - very useful if you put fires out for a living. A thin silken sash that was as strong as steel - potential martial arts uses as well an all purpose tool that looked like decoration. Though Froderick insisted that it was neck armor.
Eight days into his training, about the same time that Nabiki was making her first phone call in another world, Ranma was working on mastering the Adaptable Potion when:
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Wed, 04 Feb 2004 11:36)
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.