Another fun chapter. :) This fic is one of the very few in recent months
that I actually look forward to seeing in my box... Ranmafic that don't
rehash a done-to-death plot or concept are all too rare, and seldom as
well executed as this.

Many thanks.  

Interesting speculation on the mind effects of the curses, although one
which does smack slightly of rationalization. Then again, since it's Ukyou
who's guessing at it and not the author, that's not necessarily a bad
thing.

It does put sort of a sympathetic spin on Ryouga's whole P-Chan situation,
but that's not really why I included it.  There's a pivotal moment coming up
(probably chapter eight), and I've been laying the groundwork for it in a few
roundabout ways.  This was one of them.

My two pfennigs on the Ranma situation: he's an utter jerk in this
chapter, and completely IC. Ranma's a nice guy and a pretty generous soul,
but he's also arrogant, inept at interpersonal relationships, and often
displays a bit of a verbal cruel streak. Not really surprising; this _is_
someone raised almost completely by Genma, after all. Verbally cutting
down people you care about is second nature to him.

That's my take on Ranma as well.  I love the way Takahashi-san uses 
visual metaphor sometimes to flesh out her characters and stories.  How
many times have we seen Ranma step on somebody's face or head mid-
leap?  He isn't being cruel so much as he's oblivious to the way he hurts
other people by his actions.  

Ranma's 'training' is interesting and alarming... 'Relentless' and IMBS
ran on parallel tracks in a lot of areas (Akane's training, etc) and I'll
be curious to see how close a match this is to the scrapped Nekoshiken
concept that never made the final cut of Ill Met. ;)

Oh dear.  I'll be curious to see that as well...

A final thought on the Reikoku, and how one might defeat it...

----------


	The Reikoku gave a noiseless snarl. Black-roded arms raised to
rend, it advanced on the group of young martial artists.

	They had defeated it once. None of them possessed the
newly-acquired skill to take it on a second time. It knew their
techniques, their strengths, their weaknesses, their...

	*WHOOOSH*BOOOOOOOOOOOM*

	"Got it."

	"The bits are crawling back together, Ranchan."

	"Right, run for it! And try to think of something to stop it now
that it's learned to adapt to anti-tank rockets."

-ML

or...

"Anything Goes School Secret Technique - Tactical Nuclear Strike!"

or...

"Lesson number three:  If the Reikoku attacks you with a banana,
the proper defense is to pull the cord and drop the 16-ton weight..."

or...

"Hey, it's an ancient scroll which holds the secret to a long-lost 
technique!  Let's see... 'Dragon Slave?'  I wonder what that does..."

Excuse me.  Got a little carried away there.

Grayson Towler
grayson@rigroup.net

http://www.rigroup.com/~grayson/relentless