SMARTALECK PRODUCTIONS

Destiny "rewrite"

By Arun"arun2110@sancharnet.in"

Chapter#01 "Completed on 10/28/2002" "Revision#5"

A Ranma One-Half - Sailor Moon crossover with a pinch
of Ramayana.

Disclaimers:

The characters of Ranma One-half and Sailor Moon
belong to their respective owners. I do not own them.

Author's notes (new):

	The older version was clumsy... Yes, that's the word
that I think best describes it. I believe this one
isn't. I have changed names and they are now Chinese:
They make sense. Much thanks goes to Yanei Wu in this
regard. I have also done away with little
idiosyncrasies that I think made me look like a fan
fiction writer and have endeavored to make myself look
more professional. I hope that you, the reader, will
think so too. ^_^

	Now, on with the story...



Honshu Island: Near the banks of the Agano river, more
than a decade ago...

	A pit by a bamboo groove far-removed from human
settlement, the overwhelming stench of rotting meat
and feces, and the yowling of some thirty odd starving
cats. What could they have in common? A man and his
son, that's what.

	"Poppa! I don't want to be thrown in there again,"
the little boy said in a timid, trembling voice.

	The man glared at his son.

	"No son of mine will be afraid of mere cats," he
announced, as he tied the boy up. "Are you a man,
Ranma?"

	Ranma, for that was the boy's name, stiffened at the
insult. He tried to banish his fear from his face, but
did not succeed completely.

	"I ain't afraid of no c... c... cat," he replied,
putting on a stiff upper lip.

	Genma smiled in spite of himself. His son was coming
along nicely and by the time he reached his late
teens, he would be ready to face his mother as a man
among men. Having proven thus, he would marry a Tendo
and his, as well as the school's future would be
assured. 'The Saotome clan will once again become a
name to be reckoned with!'

	"That's my boy!" he said, proudly. "Now, go in there,
Ranma, and learn the Neko-ken."

	Ranma nodded, albeit fearfully, in reply, his eyes
never straying from the pit.

	Still smiling proudly, Genma picked up his son, and
carried him to the pit, walking at a brisk pace. He
knew training Ranma in the Neko-ken so far from human
contact was dangerous, but it could not be helped.
Things had gotten a little too hot at Niigata, where
the emergency medical services were only a few minutes
away, and because of that, he had to train Ranma in
the wilderness, making do with only a old medical kit.
He could wait a little longer, but he had already
procrastinated too long and the training could not be
postponed any longer. To do so would place Ranma in
more danger than he was already in, trying to master
the technique.

	When he had initiated the training regimen, Genma had
such high hopes for the Neko-ken, but once the actual
training started, his enthusiasm had been replaced
with disappointment. Ranma developed a severe phobia
of cats, and his father, having learnt in his
childhood that the best way to overcome a fear was to
face it, took it upon himself to rid his son of it.

	'Maybe this time, he'll learn the damn technique,'
Genma thought, as he threw his son in. With a heavy
heart, he ignored Ranma's pleas for mercy, as he
retreated to hiding place some distance from the pit.

****************************************************************

	Just as Genma reached his chosen hiding place, Ranma
let out an extra-loud scream of agony. The cats were
more crazed than usual with hunger and one of them,
maddened by the smell of fresh fish, scratched Ranma's
eyes with its claws. Ranma's reflexes kicked in just
just in time, saving him from a life of darkness by
mere fractions of a second, but his eyelid was not so
lucky. The claws nearly tore it in half. Warm blood
flowed like a raging river from the wound and Ranma's
terror only increased as a cat flicked its wet tongue
over his cheeks, licking the lifeblood off his face.
The will to live fled him then and his consciousness
began its first ever retreat into the dark recesses
off the mind where the primeval demon that is the
Neko-ken lurked. However, before he completely lost
himself in the throes of the technique and irrevocably
damaged his psyche, the rampaging cats fell silent and
Ranma felt comforting warmth at his side. He opened
his eyes and saw...

****************************************************************

	A Boodham, according to the ancient texts, is one of
the most powerful fundamental forces of nature. Thi
was a Boodham. Not just any Boodham, mind you, Thi was
The Boodham. Thi's ki skills were beyond compare and
Thi had served one of the Mumoorthigals - the God of
Destruction, Shiva, as his weapon and counselor for
countless millennia, before finally, some thirty
thousand years ago, 'retiring' from the God's service.
Ever since then, Thi had searched for that perfect one
being who'd help it complete The Cycle.

	And not once in those thirty thousand years had
anyone ever come close to meeting the requirements.
Sure, there were a few bright spots amongst the human
population every now and then, but even they were
lacking in one way or another. And so, Thi waited, for
that perfect human specimen, with whom it could unite.

	Time had no meaning to its race, but weariness is a
concept well known to every living thing and Thi grew
weary - weary of the wait, weary of the terms set by
The Covenant and weary of life. That was why Thi
wanted to unite, for a Boodham could die only if its
host did, and you could unite only with a deserving
human host and with none other.

	Those thirty thousand years had not been all boring -
there had been some bright spots: like the battle with
Vi, the most proficient mana manipulating Boodham that
Thi had ever met. Still, these fun times were few and
far between, and the wait had been a very boring
affair, which was why it felt very grateful towards
the human boy in the pit. He fulfilled every condition
set in The Covenant and then, some more.

	He was more than worthy and after centuries of wait,
The Covenant could finally be fulfilled. And Thi,
unwilling to wait even a moment longer, approached the
boy, only to be repelled by the pain and agony the boy
was suffering. Naturally, Thi's curiosity was awakened
by this new discovery and Thi expanded its senses
further, carefully feeling its environment with its
ki.

	The first thing Thi sensed was the boy and the cats.
And then, the boy's father. Thi did not know whether
to feel pity for the boy or anger towards his father,
for it did not take a genius to put one and one
together. The boy was being trained in the Neko-ken,
that horrible technique created by the Gods to fight
the Ashuras, and the boy's trainer, his father, seemed
to be well aware of the effects success in the
technique would have on his son. The Neko-ken had been
banned after the first century of practice for a
reason and the boy's idiot father did not seemed
concerned about the danger his son was in.

	'What a waste of potential!' Thi thought somberly,
for as powerful as the Neko-ken was, it was still
nothing compared to the true power of the boy's mind.
The damage that was already done was not irreparable,
however, as time and love, given enough time, would
heal the wounds inflicted by the cats.

	'Surely, if the boy is left with his father, all my
gifts would be wasted and he would, at most, become
one of the best warriors of his generation, which is
truly a tragedy,' Thi thought. The boy had the
potential to become one of the true masters of The Art
with just a nudge in the right direction.

	Having made up its mind to remove the boy from his
father's influence, Thi extended its senses still
further and got the second shock of the day. The boy
was very close to mastering the Neko-ken, even though
he had been subjected to just ten sessions in the pit,
which was a far cry from the fifty odd ones that other
would-be 'masters' of the technique had to endure. Thi
shook its 'head' in wonder and manifested physically
by his side, thinking that he would not be able to
sense its presence.

	Obviously, it has assumed wrong, for when the cats
froze, the boy turned around groggily and his eyes met
Thi's. Thi hesitated for the briefest of moments,
afraid that it would inadvertently break The Covenant
by uniting against the boy's wishes, but once again,
the boy surprised it by raising his right hand and
beckoning it.

	Happier than it had been for centuries, Thi moved
closer to the boy and manifested itself completely for
the first time. The boy's eyes widened in surprise,
but he did not react as the pulsing energy that was
Thi's physical form engulfed him in a warm embrace.

	His name, Thi sensed, was Ranma.

	As the hug deepened, Ranma's heartbeat slowed to a
crawl. His wounds disappeared, leaving no trace that
they had ever been there, and time dilated, making him
blink once in wonder. The air in the pit became
saturated with energy and random molecules of gas
began to vibrate in the audible range, producing a
pleasant, soothing hum. Tiny blue white motes of light
sparked into existence all around Ranma and glided
down, winking out of existence with little flashes of
organic light.

	Ranma's body levitated off the ground on its own
accord, finally coming to rest a foot from the ground.
His arms and legs spread outwards on their own accord,
and his eyes closed in rapture.

	Tiny veins of power began to glow just under his skin
and his mouth snapped open in a silent scream of
ecstasy as his senses overloaded. He felt, heard,
tasted, sensed and saw literally everything, and it
was all too much for his body to bear.

	Just as the rite reached the halfway point, Thi
sensed another Boodham approach and paused.
Fortunately, the newcomer was its old friend, Vi, and
as it happened, Vi, too, wanted the same thing as Thi.

	Thi thought about it and made its decision. There
were no clauses in The Covenant that forbid the union
of two Boodhams with a single human and furthermore,
the union would ultimately benefit Ranma, giving him
full reign over mana and ki should he ever master his
potential.

	'Be welcome, True Friend!' Thi whispered
telepathically to Vi.

	Vi moved forward and initiated its own union with
Ranma. Thi waited patiently at the sidelines, until Vi
had completed half the rite before joining Vi in the
middle of the pit and the two of them continued the
rite simultaneously.

	The changes became apparent, immediately. Whereas
before, Ranma had been opaque, now, he was one big,
translucent flash bulb. The cats vanished in a flash
of bright white light, and the hum became a
breathtaking symphony of colors and music that
continued to rise.

	As the rite reached its end, Ranma sensed his father
by the mouth of the pit and opened his eyes. He saw
the concerned look on Genma's face and tried to speak,
but his thought processes were too jumbled and he
could not formulate any words in his mind. Seeing the
growing despair in Genma's face, he tried again, and
failed even faster than before, as his senses expanded
even further, and then, without any warning, he
vanished.

*****************************************************************

	Having thrown Ranma into the pit, Genma quickly
covered to his hiding place behind a very large
boulder, a hundred or so yards downwind from the pit.
As much as he cared about his son, the clan's honor
and his self-preservation instincts came first and he
neither wanted to rescue his son, nor be anywhere near
him when he mastered the Neko-ken.

	Of course, Genma knew that it was only a matter of
time before Ranma learned the technique - the boy was
that kind of student. Therefore, he was only slightly
surprised when the yowling and the screeching stopped
a few minutes after the start of the training session.
He had expected Ranma to take at least another two or
three sessions, but the boy had a way of exceeding his
wildest expectations in almost everything he did. It
had happened so many times before that this time, he
had almost expected it.

	Still, fearing for his own safety, which overrode
almost everything else, Genma remained hiding, until
he heard a decidedly strange hum from the direction of
the pit. He tried to ignore it, but his curiosity got
the better of him and he dared sneak a peek. His eyes
first scoured over the land for any intruders and
finding none, fell on the glowing pit.

	'Glowing pit? What the...'

	At once, and for the only time in his life, Genma's
concern for his son's well being completely overrode
his self-preservation instincts, and family honor and
The Art be damned, Genma bee lined for the pit post
haste. The hum grew in frequency, as he got closer to
the pit, until by the time Genma actually reached the
pit, it was so loud that Genma's potbelly began to
bounce up and down and down and up. Standing at the
edge, Genma peered in and caught sight of a
translucent Ranma, floating in midair and glowing with
enough energy to light up Japan for a year. Ranma
opened his eyes then and his eyes met with his
father's.

	Time slowed and there was a flash, which blinded
Genma. He screamed and fell on his knees, clutching
his eyes in pain, as his optical nerve overloaded.
When finally his eyesight returned, Genma searched
everywhere, but found no traces of Ranma. He searched
for five days and finally, on the fifth day, he
abandoned the search as hopeless. In despair, he
headed to the nearest bar, which was in Niigata, to
drown his sorrows in sake. The next morning, he woke
up in the gutter where the bar owner had ordered him
thrown with the worst hangover ever, took stock of his
situation. There was no going back to Nodoka without
an excellent lie, he knew, for she would decapitate
him for the role he played in the untimely demise of
their only son. Thus inspired, Genma's survival
instincts kicked in and crafted with the looniest,
stupidest, lousiest lie ever to feed his wife; one,
she would surely believe in.

*****************************************************************

	The Pools of Sorrow: 156 BC...

	It was a beautiful day and Li Jiang, the Guardian of
The Pools of Sorrow, enjoyed every single minute of
it, as he tilled the rice paddies. The pools had
claimed no guests, err, victims for six months and he
was very grateful to the Gods for this unexpected
streak of good fortune. No guests meant that he did
not have to deal with raving loons.

	The day was so pleasant that Li Jiang began to
reminiscence about some of the more wackier moments in
the job: like the time when a squirrel fell into the
spring of the drowned sixty-year old, hyperactive,
amorous pervert. 'Poor squirrel!' chuckling to himself
at the joke, Li Jiang shook his head with a wry grin
on his face and lifted the plough to the next paddy.
Half the work was done and at the speed at which he
was going, all the fields would be plowed before
evening.

	'Maybe tomorrow I can take Li Chan hunting,' Li Jiang
thought to himself, when suddenly his ki senses
flared. Immediately, he laid down the plough and
turned his attention towards the pools. Something
unexpected was happening and unexpected things had a
way of becoming tragic stories in The Pools of Sorrow.

	'Should have known that this lull wouldn't last
forever,' Li Jiang thought resignedly to himself. True
to his thoughts, a strange looking boy materialized in
a bright flash above one of the pools. He hung in the
air for the tiniest fraction of a second before
gravity pulled him down, plunging him straight into
the Spring of the Drowned Dragon.

	'Spring of the Drowned Dragon? Since when was there a
Spring of the Drowned Dragon? Heck, I didn't even know
that there was a pool over there,' Li Jiang thought
confusedly. Before his thoughts could continue any
further, however, the memories of the Forbidden Pool
were pushed into his head and Li Jiang collapsed on
the mud, clutching his head with both his hands in
silent agony. Images, thoughts and excerpts written by
the very first Guardians describing the entire history
of the pool were forced into his mind in the space of
a few moments and when it was all over, Li Jiang was
half-blind.

	His sight took a couple of seconds to return to
normal and when he could see again, the Guardian leapt
out of the paddy and scampered towards the pools,
making a mental note to record what he had learnt for
posterity at a later time.

*****************************************************************

	From Ranma's point of view, he lay suspended two feet
above the ground, looking into his father's eyes one
second and the next, he was fifteen feet in the air in
a valley dotted with little springs. Gravity did not
exert its hold on him for a few milliseconds and when
finally it did, he could offer no resistance.

	Still, startled by this sudden change of heart on
nature's part, he yelped loudly as he plummeted
towards one of the springs. A sense of correctness and
deja vu filled him as he broke the water surface, and
he felt his body shift again.

	Not completely aware of the changes that were
happening to him, Ranma took a few seconds to reorient
himself before kicking towards the surface.
Unfortunately, he miscalculated his own power and
instead of just surfacing, he shot a good thirty yards
into the air. There he hovered with lazy flaps of his
wings. 'Wings? What wings?' Ranma thought in surprise
and gave himself a quick once over. His examination
only served to confirm his worst fears.

	He was not a human anymore. He was short and he was a
dragon.

	'Short... Dragon...'

	Unsurprisingly, natural curiosity and surprise gave
way to shock, and Ranma's consciousness fled him,
sending the heir to the Saotome branch of Musabetsu
Kakutou Ryuu plummeting towards the ground once again.
If he had been conscious as he fell, Ranma would have
noticed the Forbidden Spring dry up and disappear
below him, but he was not and therefore, he completely
missed it.

*****************************************************************

	Sprinting through the distance that separated the boy
and himself, Li Jiang began to fear in his heart for
the boy's safety. More than a minute had passed since
the boy's impromptu bath in the spring and there was
still no sign of him.

	Naturally, Li Jiang assumed the worst and briefly
wondered whether he should use the Kacchu Tenshin
Amaguriken to cover the distance faster, but decided
against it. He would need all the ki he could channel
to bring the boy back to the land of the living, if he
had indeed drowned. Thankfully, before his fertile
imagination could run any wilder, supplying his
consciousness with some very gruesome imagery, the
pool surface broke and out jumped the boy, launching
himself an impressive thirty feet into the air. There,
his cursed form hovered, while he conducted a brief
examination of his new self.

	'And next he'll faint,' Li Jiang thought. He had seen
enough victims of the pools to predict their reactions
with a fair degree of certainty now and the boy was
displaying all the symptoms of the classic
I-can't-believe-this-really-happened-to-me syndrome.

	And indeed, Ranma fainted, but before he could fall
into another pool, Li Jiang caught him.

	'Poor kid! This must be a horrifying experience for
him,' the Guardian thought, as he carried the young
drake to safety.

	Once inside the safe environ of his hut, Li Jiang lit
a fire and heated some water. Then, sitting beside the
fire, he tended to it and cradled the young dragon in
his lap, patting him lightly. When the water was
sufficiently warm, he took some in a fired-clay bowl
and poured it over the dragon. Immediately, the
mythical beast transformed into a very naked,
indignant and cute little boy.

	"Gyah!" Ranma shouted, awakening out of some
forgotten nightmare. He took a few fractions of second
to reorient himself to his surroundings before his
turned his attention on himself. Seeing himself naked
in the lap of a stranger, he jumped out of Li Jiang's
lap and retreated to one corner of the hut. From his
position there, he glared at the Guardian, his eyes
seemingly boring into his opponent's, as he assumed a
guarded stance.

	"Honored Guest..."

	Immediately, Ranma focused his attention completely
on Li Jiang. Somehow, by the very tone of Li Jiang's
voice, he seemed to realize that the Guardian was a
warrior. Accordingly, he shifted his stance,
unconsciously closing all visible gaps in his defense.

	'Who is this boy and how come he is so skilled at
such a young age?' the Guardian thought, curiously.
Whoever taught the boy must have been a very gifted
teacher.

	"Who are you?" Ranma asked, not liking one whit the
look that the stranger gave him. He had been in tough
situations before, but he instinctively knew that this
was going to be the toughest one yet. Pop was nowhere
in sight and he was trapped, no, cornered inside a hut
with a skilled veteran, who was probably hostile, to
keep him company.

	Li Jiang caught the challenging tone in Ranma's voice
and smiled in spite of himself. The boy had spunk, if
nothing else. Not wanting to provoke a conflict that
would end with the child harboring an instinctive
mistrust towards him, he raised his arms in
supplication and smiled in a friendly manner.

	"I mean you no harm... There are no weapons in my
hands, see?" he said in Miao, turning his arms around
to prove his point.

	'What language is the guy speaking anyway? It sounds
strangely familiar,' Ranma thought. The situation was
becoming more curious by the minute and he did not
like it at all.

	The guide saw the confusion in the boy's face and he
knelt down, taking care to keep his movements as slow
and simple as possible. With slow, deliberate
movements, he took the remains of the fried pheasant
leftover from dinner and pushed the bowl in front of
the boy. He then pointed his forefinger at himself and
pronounced his name.

	"Li Jiang... that's my name. What's yours?"

	Ranma looked at the pheasant and then, back at Li
Jiang, tilting his head as he did. His stance wavered
just a little and Li Jiang decided he could not have
been more correct when he thought that food was the
best way to reach the boy. Ranma's stomach chose that
moment to growl in protest, further reinforcing Li
Jiang's conviction about the correctness of his
decision.

	Eyeing the food with hungry eyes, Ranma's hand went
to his stomach and he dropped out of his stance,
shooting a glance at Li Jiang.

	"Go on," Li Jiang urged in a soothing voice, "you can
eat it."

	Ranma noted the friendly tone in Li Jiang's voice and
even though he did not understand one whit of it, he
understood the gist of the message. He shot a friendly
smile at the Guardian and literally dived in.

	'Oh, Gods!' Li Jiang thought in shock and amazement,
as he watched Ranma rip through the pheasant like a
starved lion. 'What is he?'

	Finally, Ranma finished his impromptu exhibition of
Musabetsu Kakutou Ryuu's special technique, The
Tasmanian Devil, and burped loudly. This initiated a
round of snickers from Jiang, but Ranma cared not
about such and contended himself with rubbing his
stomach in satisfaction. He had never had such a full
meal before.

	Li Jiang chose then to reintroduce himself again by
clearing his throat.

	"Li Jiang," he said pointing his fingers at himself
when Ranma's attention was focused on him. "That's my
name. What's yours?"

	Ranma scratched the base of his pigtail, tilted his
head sideways once again and looked up at Li Jiang
with trust in his eyes. As far as he was concerned,
anyone who parted with food was trustworthy and going
by that logic, this new stranger, dressed in queer
clothes and speaking a weird tongue must be
trustworthy, too.

	"Ranma Saotome," he said at length, when Li Jiang
smiled at him.

	"Ranma Sautome?" Li Jiang said, feeling the name roll
off his tongue. He liked it.

	Ranma shook his head.

	"Sa-o-to-me."

	Li Jiang repeated the word again and looked at Ranma,
who nodded. He had got the pronunciation right.

	"Where?" Ranma said, pointing at the ground.

	It took a few moments for Li Jiang to realize what
Ranma was saying, but realize it he did.

	"Ju-se-n-kyo."

	"Huh?"

	'His tongue seems to be related to mine, but his
dress; I have never seen anything like it... I wonder
where he came from?'

	"Ju-se-n-kyo," he repeated.

	Ranma raised his left eyebrow, non-verbally asking
whether the name was supposed to have any meaning to
him.

	Li Jiang shook his head and sighed. He hated what he
was about to do to the boy, but it had to be done. He
raised a lone finger of his right hand into the air
and signaled that Ranma should wait a little while.

	Ranma nodded and Li Jiang stepped out of the hut. He
took a little water in a porcelain cup with him and
beckoned Ranma to follow him.

	Again, Ranma nodded in acquiescence and followed Li
Jiang out of the hut.

	Once they were at a safe distance from the hut, Li
Jiang raised his right hand and began to draw little
hypnotizing patterns into the air.

	Ranma watched, bedazzled and quite unable to take his
eyes off the little dance.

	Then, when Ranma's attention was focused elsewhere,
Li Jiang cast an eye towards the heavens, and asking
forgiveness for what he was about to do, drenched
Ranma with the cold water. Immediately, Ranma revoked
back to his cursed draconian form. His inexperienced
mind registered the transformation and he spent the
next few seconds checking himself out, just to verify
the facts. Finally, his eyes turned upward and he
looked accusingly at Li Jiang, his eyes filled with
fear and betrayal, only to find the older man kneeling
on the ground with tears brimming in his eyes.
Apparently, Li Jiang felt as sorry for him as he felt
himself.

	Despair took root in Ranma's heart then and a
red-green-black corona of ki flared around him. Thin
veins of power blossomed all over his body and his
aura exploded outwards, scorching earth and throwing
Li Jiang a few feet back. Finally, his ki reserves
exhausted, Ranma slipped into unconsciousness.

******************************************************************

	A month passed and during that time, Li Jiang took
Ranma into his household and raised him as his own
son. Li Jiang's son, Li Chin and Ranma became close
friends during that time, and Ranma gained a passable
knowledge of Miao through the Guardian's tutoring.

	Slowly, the young Saotome began to trust, learning to
love Li Jiang as his own father, now that Genma was
not there for him. His love was reciprocated by both
the Guardian and his son, who treated him as their own
kith and kin. Still, all the love they showered upon
Ranma was not nearly enough to overcome the trauma of
his training. Ranma frequently experienced nightmares
during the night, and during some of the nightmares,
lost control over his ki and his physical form.
Alarmed by these changes in the boy, Li Jiang did some
research and learnt that the hybrid aberration of the
human physique that Ranma exhibited was a sign of a
pure dragon.

	Li Jiang, shocked by this discovery to say the least,
mulled over his course of action for a week before
making up his mind. Accordingly, he set out with Ranma
and Li Chin to the Musk capital, hoping to convince
the Musk Emperor to adopt, or take Ranma into his
house as a servant. A dragon such as Ranma needed much
control over his ki to be written off as safe to those
around him and the only way he could learn that
control was through other dragons.

	The trip lasted a week at the end of which they
reached the first of the Musk outposts. There, Li
Jiang explained his position to the Chief of the Watch
and requested an armed escort for the rest of the
journey to the Musk capital. The Chief of the Watch
reluctantly granted Li Jiang's request, and the
Guardian, Ranma, Li Chin and their escort of two
seasoned Musk warriors set out to the Musk palace.

	The journey to the capital took a further three days,
and once inside the walls of the capital, the Musk
soldiers left them to their own designs and headed
back to the outpost. Li Jiang, then, navigated the
streets of the 'city' to the palace; his two wards
always a few steps in front or behind him. Once they
reached the palace gates, he gave a brief explanation
of the purpose of his visit to the guards, who then
consulted their commander before letting the trio in.

	Inside, he requested an audience with the Emperor
through one of the ministers. The minister nodded his
accent, and the trio were duly bathed and dressed in
plain silken clothes before being led to the throne
room.

	"Honorable Emperor," Li Jiang said, bowing reverently
in front of the throne, "the Guardian of the Pools of
Sorrow pays his respects to thee."

	The Emperor stood up. Standing at just over six feet,
he was a very tall man by Chinese standards, and had
an awe-inspiring figure. His brownish crop of hair was
tied behind his head and his pale red eyes had slits
like a cat, or rather, a dragon. He carried himself
with an air of nobility and he looked down upon them
with a pleased smile in his face.

	"Be welcome in my house, my friend," the Emperor
said, his eyes twinkling joyously at the unexpected
visit. He gestured towards the seats on one side of
the hall. "Be seated. It has been a long while since
you last paid my humble abode a visit, Guardian. What
brings you here now on this very day?" he asked,
seating himself.

	Li Jiang, Ranma and Li Chan followed the Emperor's
example and made themselves comfortable. Immediately,
a burly looking, mountain goat-faced woman brought
them wine, sweetmeats and cold water from the mountain
springs.

	"Honorable Emperor," Li Jiang begun when the
attendant had retreated beyond hearing range, "little
more than a month ago, a new spring revealed itself in
valley of the Pools of Sorrow. I'm here to inform Your
Majesty of the events surrounding the spring's
discovery and subsequent destruction as well as
request a boon."

	The Emperor nodded. He reclined as comfortably as he
could in his silk-cushioned throne and bade Li Jiang
to continue.

	"Proceed with your tale, Guardian. I'm very curious
about what you have to say!"

	Li Jiang cleared his throat and begun his narration.

	"Honorable Emperor, I was tilling the fields on the
day of the last new moon, when...."

	He spoke for the better part of an hour, exaggerating
a great many things and downplaying very little, and
the Emperor listened to him intently throughout the
narration, interrupting him only to clear one doubt or
another. Finally, Li Jiang finished his tale, and by
then, the Emperor was right on the edge of his seat,
his eyebrows furrowed in rapt attention and his lips
curling upwards in utter fascination.

	"This is the most amazing tale I have ever heard," he
said finally when Li Jiang was done, focusing his eyes
on Ranma. "This is little Ranma, I suppose."

	"Yes, Honored Emperor. This is Ranma Saotome, my
adopted son. Ranma, meet the dragon-emperor of the
Musk."

	Not knowing how to react to a dragon, since he had
never seen one, Ranma simply let his jaw hang open and
stared awestruck at the Emperor.

	The Emperor, in turn, had to take only one look at
Ranma's awestruck face before he burst into hearty
laughter.

	"Yes, young Ranma," he said, when, finally, he gained
control of his mirth, "I am part dragon and I can
clearly see that you are, too."

	The boy nodded, a wee bit shyly. Now that he had
overcome the initial surprise, doubts began to creep
into his heart. After all, dragons were supposed to be
very powerful creatures and would it not be wise to
just leave them be? Of course, Ranma's mind forgot the
fact that he, too, was a dragon.

	Before Li Jiang could begin to coax Ranma's trust
towards the Emperor, fate intervened. The crown prince
of the Musk, an eight year old boy about three inches
taller than Ranma, came running into the room
unannounced. Upon eyeing the visitors, he excused
himself politely and began to withdraw, but the
Emperor stopped him.

	"Ranma," he said, introducing his son, "this is my
son, Shin Nan. Shin, this is Ranma and his elder
brother, Li Chin. Will you take them outside, and play
with them while I discuss some very pressing matters
with their father?"

	Shin Nan nodded and grabbing Ranma's and Li Chin's
hands, dashed out of the room. Soon, sounds of three
little boys having the time of their lives began to
echo through the halls of the palace.

	"Now, Guardian," the Emperor asked when the boys were
out of earshot, "what boon do you request of me?"

	"It pertains to Ranma, Honorable Emperor. I beseech
you to take him into your custody and raise him, until
such a time comes, when he is ready to face the
outside world," Li Jiang replied in measured tones.

	"I wouldn't have it any other way, Guardian. With his
phenomenal ki potential, he'll become a menace to
society and to himself, if he doesn't learn to control
it. Furthermore, it is my duty as a dragon - he, too,
is a member of my race, and as such, he's part
family."

	Pause.

	"My decision is made... I'll adopt him, Guardian,
I'll adopt him as my own son, even though I'm afraid I
do not understand why you would ask this particular
boon off me..." the Emperor said.

	"My Liege, I beg that the words I speak never go
beyond these four walls."

	The Emperor nodded.

	"Very well. It shall be as you wish."

	Li Jiang nodded once. The Emperor's words were never
broken.

	"I beg forgiveness for lying to you, Honorable
Emperor. The boy is not part dragon, as I had you
believe only a minute ago, My Liege," he said, "he's a
true dragon."

	If the Emperor was surprised, he did not let it show
in his features. Rather, he leaned back against his
chair and with an affected air of nonchalance, spoke
in a soft voice.

	"Go on."

	"I believe that the boy is not of this world, but
from another, Your Majesty. It is also my belief that
he has a great trial ahead of him... It is my hope
that you will take him under your house, teach him the
ways of a warrior and prepare him for the trials
ahead."

	The Emperor closed his eyes and tapped his fingers on
the hand rest a couple of times. Finally, his fingers
paused and he opened his eyes.

	"I grant thee the boon you seek, Guardian. I will
personally see to it that his training is tough and
rigorous."

	Li Jiang smiled, gratefully.

	"Thank you, Your Majesty."

	The Emperor nodded with a tilt of his head.

	"When do you plan on returning home?" he asked.

	"As soon as possible, Your Majesty. I still have to
inform the Matriarch and the Council of Joketsuzoku
Elders what has transpired and..."

	The Emperor nodded, again, leaning back on his throne
once more.

	"You will dine with me tonight, of course."

	"Honorable Emperor..."

	The Emperor held up his arms, forestalling any
arguments.

	"Argue not, Guardian. My mind is set."

	Li Jiang took a deep breath.

	"Very well, Your Majesty. My son and I will dine with
you tonight, but tomorrow, I beg that Your Majesty
grants me leave then. I have errands to run, my crops
to attend to and I do not wish to outstay Your
Majesty's hospitality."

	"And when you leave, I shall order an escort to take
you right to the doorsteps of The Council."

	"Thank you, Your Majesty. I'm very grateful for Your
hospitality."

	The Emperor nodded with a soft smile.

	"We of the Musk look after our friends," he shot a
glance at Li Jiang, "and allies."

	Pause.

	"That reminds me," he continued, "you must feel very
tired after your journey, Guardian. In fact, you look
tired... Guards!"

	Immediately, two spear-wielding wolf-men appeared at
the door.

	"Take my guest to one of the free bed chambers."

	"Yes, Your Majesty," the duo replied simultaneously.

	The Emperor nodded and turned to Li Jiang.

	"I shall send your son to you once my sons and he
have finished playing. Now, go and rest."

	Li Jiang bowed humbly and retreated, following the
guards to his room.

	Time passed quickly the rest of the day and when dusk
came, a dinner was held in Li Jiang's honor, and they
ate, drank, and made merry well into the night. The
next morning, Li Jiang and Li Chan bade farewell to
Ranma, and left the Musk capital.

*****************************************************************

	A month later...

	The Emperor stood atop the bulwarks of his palace,
looking down upon his capital with his hands clasped
behind his back. He stood thus, unmoving with his eyes
staring into the far off distance, until he was
interrupted by the sound of footsteps approaching from
behind him.

	"Your Majesty, Master Hai Fung has come for the
audience you requested."

	The Emperor nodded.

	"Very well. Show him to my inner chambers. I'll be
with him shortly."

	The guard nodded, paid his respects, bowed one final
time and ran off into the fortress walls. The Emperor
followed him deliberately at a slow pace into the
palace. He negotiated the winding passageways to his
chambers and entered without knocking to find Hai Fung
seated on a bamboo chair.

	"Welcome, Master."

	The former sensei and mentor of the Emperor stood up
and bowed slightly. His pointed, tiger-like ears and
eyes showed his tiger ancestry, and he carried himself
with a bearing that would have done any pureblooded
tiger proud.

	The Emperor bowed at his waist in return and
straightened himself before his Master did.

	"Be very welcome, Master," he repeated.

	"Thank You, Your Majesty," the old warrior replied,
waiting, until Qin Shi was seated before taking his
seat in deference to the Emperor's station.

	"Does this day find you in good health and cheer,
Master?"

	"Yes, it has..."

	Qin Shi nodded.

	"Master, I called you here to ask a boon off you."

	"A boon?"

	"Yes, Master, a boon to teach my two sons The Art of
War and The Art of Peace."

	Hai Fung nodded. It was common knowledge that the
Emperor had adopted a young dragon as his second son.

	"I... I am much honored, Your Majesty. When do I
start?"

	Qin Shi nodded.

	"As soon as possible, Master... Perhaps even as early
as tomorrow if it suits you."

	Pause.

	"I suppose... Yes, I'd like it very much," Qin Shi
replied.

	"Then, that's settled... A cup of tea, Master?"

	"Yes, I'd like that very much, Your Majesty."

	Qin Shi nodded and ordered some tea for the two of
them. While they waited, the conversation strayed into
less important matters, and the two of them
reminiscenced about a time when the two of them were
student and Master, and not Emperor and Advisor.
Finally, after an hour of small talk, Hai Fung left,
leaving the Emperor alone to his own devices.

*****************************************************************

	The next day...

	The Emperor snored on in his chambers, seemingly
unaware of the two shadows that crept upon him
silently with the utmost caution.

	A lone cock crowed in the distance as the first rays
of the morning sun began to stray into the room.
Still, the Emperor lay still. Sensing success, the two
shadows crept in closer still, until they were
crouched only a few feet from the foot of the bed.
Then, with a mighty battle cry, the two launched
themselves at the Emperor, bending their legs in
anticipation of a rough landing as they reached the
apex of their flight.

	The Emperor, who had long since sensed his two sons
creeping in on him, rolled over and avoided them at
the last possible moment. He pushed himself off the
bed with his hands and landed softly on the soles of
his feet.

	"You lose, boys," he said with an affected air of
boredom. "I saw that one coming from a mile away!"

	In truth, it was all bluster and internally, Qin Shi
was trying to overcome the shock that two very
inexperienced children had crept into his bedchambers
almost without his noticing it. Nevertheless, shocked
as he was, he was still ready for the ritual morning
spar, and spar, they did.

	Moving with a grace that went above mere poetry to
something beyond that, the three wound through the
passageways, until finally they reached the open
grounds within the palace walls. Qin Shi smiled
contentedly to himself while evading, blocking, and
parrying strikes and counter strikes the two boys
launched at him. And as they danced, he noticed the
difference in this styles: Shin's moves were faster
and had more strength behind them, whereas Ranma
executed his attacks to perfection to inflict the
maximum damage with the least force. More importantly,
he could not quite place his fingers on the Ranma's
style, as the boy kept switching styles,
unrecognizable ones at that, before he could build an
effective counter against any of them. It appeared
that the young dragon was a jack-of-all-trades, but a
master of none.

	In short, Ranma was the most fascinating fighter he
had ever fought with and Qin Shi's smile grew in
intensity as he admired the fighting skill of his two
sons.

	'Our expectations might be realized, after all,' he
thought, remembering the conversation he had the day
before with his Master, Hai Fung. It had been evident
then and it was evident now that Ranma was destined to
be one of the greatest, if not the greatest warrior
ever in the history of the tribe.

	The boy's speed had only increased slightly since his
arrival two weeks back, but on careful examination,
Qin Shi could see that Ranma was already directing his
ki to super-boost his moves on an unconscious level.
'How did he learn to use his ki so quickly?' Qin Shi
thought disbelievingly. 'It's just not possible!'

	No sooner had Qin Shi thought such, a near hit by a
ki powered punch from Ranma proved him wrong. Shocked
beyond belief by this new revelation Qin Shi lost his
focus and Shin utilized this momentary lack of
concentration to sneak a glancing hit into his
father's guard. The blow signaled the end of the
impromptu spar and Qin Shi raised his hands into the
air, accepting his defeat. The two boys fell upon him
squealing with laughter and he carried the victorious
duo into the palace on his shoulders.

	"You two fought very well today," Qin Shi said as he
sat his sons down on the breakfast table.

	Shin and Ranma looked at each other, and smiled
impishly as the servants laid the table. They
chattered amongst themselves as the table was being
laid, but once the table was set, Ranma abandoned all
thoughts of talk and dug into his meal, devouring it
with a gusto that never failed to awe the viewers. Qin
Shi took a small bite himself and spared a glance at
his second son. Noting the increase in bulk since his
arrival, he nodded to himself. Ranma had been a bag of
bones when he had first laid eyes on the boy, but he
looked a lot better now.

	"Ranma, would you tell me the name of the style you
were using just now?" he asked.

	"That was the Saotome branch of Musabetsu Kakutou
Ryuu, the Anything Goes School of martial arts. I'm
the heir to the school..." the boy begun and trailed
off, remembering that now, there was no school and
therefore, technically, he could not be the heir.

	Qin Shi nodded, gulping down a mouthful of smoked
salmon.

	"I can easily see why you were the heir," he said in
admiration.

	Ranma blushed and his hands automatically went to
scratch the base of his pigtail. Qin Shi found the
gesture too cute to resist and pinched Ranma's cheeks
affectionately.

	"That's my boy," he said. "Anyways, I'm going to take
the two of you to meet your new sensei today."

	"Can't you teach us, father?"

	"Who is it, father?"

	Ranma and Shin asked simultaneously.

	Qin Shi shook his head.

	"No, as much as I want to, I cannot... I have a
kingdom to mind, after all," he explained. The
Emperor's first duty lay with his kingdom, after all.
"As for who he is, he was my teacher and he taught me
everything I know."

	Shin seemed to accept his father's explanation, but
to Qin Shi's consternation, Ranma's questioning look
did not waver. He was not going to be shut up with
just a few tidbits of information, it seemed. 'And is
it any wonder? From what he revealed about his other
father, it is not the least surprising that he doesn't
exactly trust his martial arts teachers.'

	"His name is Hai Fung, Ranma, and he's one of the
greatest warriors in the history of our nation. C'mon,
let's finish our meal and then, I'll answer all your
questions regarding the Master."

	Ranma nodded, finally, in acceptance, willing, for
the time being, to take his father's word on the
subject.

*****************************************************************

	After breakfast, Qin Shi escorted the boys out of the
fortress and into the woods to the east of the city
walls. There, after about a quarter of an hour's walk,
they came upon a clearing, where Hai Fung stood
waiting for them.

	Qin Shi bowed to him, and Ranma and Shin followed
their father's example. Hai Fung bowed in return and
bade Qin Shi to join him at his side. When Qin Shi was
in position, Hai Fung exchanged a few words with the
Emperor and beckoned the boys to him. Ranma and Shin
scurried from their positions a few dozen yards off to
the side and on reaching Hai Fung's side, bowed, once
again paying their respects to his age and station.
Pleased by this show of respect, Hai Fung smiled and
as if by magic, took a stick from literally out of
nowhere, taking the opportunity to spank his students
behinds.

	Twin cracks echoed across the clearing and the boys
yelped loudly, jumping into the air, holding their
stinging behinds with both their hands. They jumped up
and down a couple of times, yapping like licked
puppies and giving Hai Fung the evil eye. The Emperor,
who stood watching the proceedings from the sidelines,
could not contain his mirth at the sight of the two
pissed children and burst out laughing.

	Hai Fung's face, however, took on a grim expression
and he threw the stick away, shaking his head in
disgust.

	"I have never seen such a worthless lot," he said to
them and turned to Qin Shi, "but seeing that I have
nothing better to do with my time, I guess that I'll
have to make do with these two."

	Qin Shi nodded. Experience had taught him that such
was Hai Fung's way of praising his students.

	"I'll be looking forward to see what you can
accomplish with them, Master."

	Hai Fung nodded once, and turned towards Ranma and
Shin.

	"Children!" he said, solemnly. "My name is Hai Fung,
and I'll be teaching you The Art of War and The Art of
Peace. You'll refer to me as Master and you just
learned your first lesson: Never drop your guard, lest
it becomes the last thing you ever do. Your enemy is
always waiting and watching you, bidding his time,
until you put the wrong foot forward and then, he'll
strike... Remember, if I had chosen to, I could have
hit you anywhere I wanted and you'd be dead, or dying
right now."

	Pause.

	"Life is very fragile. All it takes is that one
perfectly placed strike to end it. It is that one
strike that you must always be on the guard against.
Do you understand that?" he added.

	Ranma and Shin nodded, slowly, still rubbing their
behinds. Their butts still stung like hell, but their
opinion of the old geezer had increased a bit. Perhaps
the old man wasn't a complete homicidal maniac, after
all...

	"Ranma and Shin, introduce yourselves," Qin Shi said,
stepping forward.

	"I'm Ranma Saotome Qin, Master," Ranma said.

	"And I'm Shin Nan, Master," Shin added.

	Hai Fung rubbed his thin, long beard, thoughtfully,
weighing his students against some ancient scale.

	"And what schools do you practice?" he asked them.

	"Saotome branch of Musabetsu Kakutou Ryuu."

	"Northern Wind School of Wu Shu."

	Hai Fung nodded at Shin and turned towards Ranma with
a thoughtful expression.

	"Musabetsu Kakutou Ryuu?" he asked. In all his years
as a warrior and as a teacher, he had never heard of
such a school.

	"Yes," Ranma replied, "it means School of
Indiscriminate Grappling..."

	"Indiscriminate Grappling? What a queer name... We'll
see how effective your school is, Ranma. Care for a
spar?"

	"Sure!" Ranma replied, super-fast.

	"Oh, no, you don't," Hai Fung added, quickly. "If you
think you're ready for a sparring session with me,
young man, you're dead wrong." He turned to Shin.
"Shin, step into the middle of the clearing and
prepare yourself for a friendly spar.

	Shin nodded and the two contestants walked to the
middle of the clearing. Sure enough, in spite of his
ever-increasing skill, Ranma was no match for Shin,
whose meager knowledge and conscious control of ki won
the day. Ranma, for what it was worth, ended up
sprawled on the forest floor, clutching his stomach
and groaning, while a triumphant Shin stood gloating
over him. Hai Fung smiled amusedly at the show and
turned towards Qin Shi, speaking quietly.

	"Both of them have huge potential and Ranma's style
is one of the most efficient, if not the most deadly
one I have ever seen. Even now, with almost no
knowledge and control of ki, he is nearly on par with
Shin, which is simply astounding.

	"As for Shin, he depends too much on his ki and takes
it for granted. His potential is great, too, and with
the right training, both of them will surpass me one
day. Truly, My Emperor, my prayers to the Gods have
been heard: Their answer stands right before me in the
forms of these two," he said with gleaming eyes.

	Qin Shi nodded.

	"Then, I trust the boys under your care, Master. I
must go now and attend to the matters of the court."

	"Of course," Hai Fung nodded, "please, don't let us
keep you from Your duties... As you can see," he
pointed to the two boys, who were circling each other
warily once again with determined looks in their eyes,
"everything's fine and dandy here."

	"Then, I'll go," the Emperor said quietly to Hai
Fung, before addressing the boys loudly. "I must go
now, Shin... Ranma... I'll see you two at supper
tonight and you can tell me about your first day under
the Master's tutelage." 'Err, torture... Hehehehe!'

	Unaware of what they were in for, the boys shot a
quick nod in Qin Shi's direction and returned to their
staring match.

	"Master..." Qin Shi bowed solemnly.

	Hai Fung's lips creased upwards in a gentle smile and
he returned his student's bow, bending just a little
bit lower than the Emperor.

	Qin Shi straightened himself, and flicking off some
imaginary specks of dust on his robes, walked out of
the clearing without looking back again.

	Hai Fung and the boys watched his disappearing form;
until the thicket hid him altogether, before turning
to face, or rather, look at one another curiously.

	"Now, boys," Hai Fung begun, breaking the silence,
"let's see some of the moves you know and we can take
it from there."

	And so, the training session began. It did not end
until both Ranma and Shin had exhausted themselves
completely and utterly.

*****************************************************************

	Five years later...

	Ranma and Shin stood in the middle of the very same
clearing. The trees had grown and changed, and so had
the boys.

	The changes were most visible in Ranma, for he was
perhaps a foot taller than before. All signs of
malnutrition had long since disappeared and in the
place of the scrawny little kid, there stood now, a
determined young man with a small ponytail that
stretched to his shoulder blades. The hair was tied
neatly in a knot, and he was dressed in an indigo
shirt and black pants. A single emblem, the seal of
the Musk royal family, hung around his neck and he had
intricately carved wooden bracers made from thin
strips of the Tree of Life on both his wrists. His
muscles stood bulging and a towering flame of ki
burned around his body, lighting the clearing in a
bluish-white light.

	Shin, too, had grown and he stood just as tall as
Ranma, though the changes were less apparent in him.
His slit eyes had become sharper and more piercing,
and he was dressed in the same fashion as Ranma,
bearing the same emblem, wrist guards, shirt and
pants. His muscles knotted and strained under his
shirt, and a soft wind blew against his dress,
outlining the well-developed physique underneath. An
aura, similar and yet, weaker than Ranma's, burned
around him, and it, too, bathed the area in much the
same manner as Ranma's.

	The two stood there for the longest time, not moving,
sizing each other up, until finally, at some unspoken
signal, the two leapt at each other in complete
silence. They met in midair and the battle began.

	They fought without using ki blasts, though the
opponents used their ki to boost their strength,
stamina and speed to inhuman levels. Even so, the air
shuddered under their passing and huge clouds of dust
were thrown into the air as earth gave under the
tremendous forces exerted by the two. The ground shook
and thunderclaps rang across the clearing, steadily
increasing in frequency, until the end of one could
not be discriminated from the start of another.

	Every once in a while, one of the combatants would be
forced to brace himself against the ground as the
other pounded at his defenses with animalistic
ferocity. During those times, huge explosions rang
through the clearing, tearing the forest floor, and
throwing clods of dirt and rocks into the air as the
defender used force redirection techniques to redirect
the opponent's blows downwards.

	Finally, after an eternity of ear-shattering
explosions, the pair separated and peace returned to
the clearing once more. Standing there in the middle
of the now destroyed clearing, they gazed long and
hard at each other, breathing hard, their rivalry
clearly written on their faces. Finally, after a
staring contest that seemed to stretch forever, they
turned towards their master and bowed at their waists.

	"Well done, my dear students," Hai Fung said,
emerging from underneath the shadows of one of the
trees. How he stood there unseen and unobserved until
then was a mystery, but emerge, he did.

	"Thank you, Master," the two said in unison.

	"Yes," Hai Fung nodded to himself, stroking his white
beard thoughtfully, "it was a nice fight, but
something was missing..."

	"Missing?" the two asked in amazement. They had just
torn up the whole clearing and emerged literally
unscathed, and that was all he could say! Why, the
nerve of him!

	"Yeah!" Hai Fung nodded, gravely. His demeanor
screamed his disappointment at them. Perhaps he had
been dead wrong when he chose them as his heirs, after
all.

	"Pray tell, Master," Ranma, the more adventurous of
the two, spoke. "What exactly was missing in that
fight?"

	Hai Fung shot him an evil eye.

	"Curious, are you?" he asked, tilting his head to
further examine the bold young man before him.

	Ranma nodded.

	Hai Fung eyed Ranma some more, judging him against
some new but still very ancient scale. Finally, he
nodded in return.

	"Come to me, Ranma. As you're obviously the more
curious than your brother, I'll tell you first."

	Ranma looked at Shin, stuck his tongue out in a very
un-royal manner and walked up to Hai Fung with a
bounce in his strides. Yes, this was going to be the
day when the Master finally acknowledged him as his
best student.

	"Come closer... My old bones fail me!"

	'Yeah, right! And I'm really the four hundred year
old mummy that rules the Joketsuzoku.' Thankfully,
Ranma did not give voice to his thoughts, rather
opting to keep them to himself. Secretly, however, he
gave himself a pat on his back for his quick tactical
sense and his even quicker wit. Every time he thought
he had reached the peak and could go no further, he
proved himself wrong.

	"I'm coming, Master," he said and closed the distance
between them to less than three feet.

	Whap!

	"I thought I told you to not use ki in the fight.
Now, look around you. The whole clearing's destroyed
and we don't have any place to train tomorrow?"

	The stick broke in the middle: Ranma's back proved
too hard for it, but boy, had it stung? Ranma looked
at the broken stick, at the evil old troll who wielded
it and then, back at the stick.

	"That hurt, you know," he complained in an annoyed
voice, rubbing his rapidly reddening butt. Was it any
wonder that it was always too sore to sit upon come
suppertime?

	"Hehehehe..."

	That was Shin. He had always enjoyed a good show and
this time was no different from any other.

	"Nice challenge, 'big' brother," Ranma said, sneering
lopsidedly at his sibling, "but I guess you'll have to
try again later. Obviously, you're too young to beat
me."

	Whap!

	Another sting. Another glare. Where was the old man
getting his sticks from, anyway?

	"And you," Hai Fung said, focusing his attention on
Shin, "what were you thinking, when you begun using
the forbidden Blades of Heaven technique?"

	"I... eh... I..." Shin stuttered. Now, how was he
going to escape out of this mess? Oh, yeah, he was
going to escape the same way he always did. "But...
But... But... He started it!"

	"Huh?" Ranma asked, his mind going into overdrive,
trying to figure out exactly how he had started
something his brother did. Finally, it all came back
to him. "I did not!" he shouted.

	"Yes, you did!"

	"Did not!"

	"Did, too!"

	"Oh, shut up both of you," Hai Fung said,
exasperation creeping into his old mind.

	The bickering duo shut up and focused their attention
on Hai Fung, once again.

	"Thank you," Hai Fung said. "Now, get your scaly
butts to the palace. The lessons in advanced ki
manipulation will start tomorrow."

	"Thank you, Master," the two said in perfect harmony,
bowing to Hai Fung as they did.

	Hai Fung bowed slightly in return and the two made
off into the forest, starting their bickering brawl as
soon as they thought they were out of earshot.

	"Don't worry, Shin, I'll go easy on you next time!"

	Shin snorted in mock disgust.

	"You're speaking as though you beat me back there...
If my memory serves me right and I know it does, I was
the one mopping the floor with you. Which side of the
bed did you wake up today, little brother?"

	Ranma laughed, derisively.

	"C'mon, porky, admit it, you couldn't beat me even if
your life depended on it."

	"Arghhh! That's it! How many times have I warned you
to not call me by that name, Ranma?" Shin shouted in
indignation, balling his fists.

	Ranma smirked, refusing to answer the question.

	"A thousand times... No, a ten thousand times," Shin
shouted indignantly, again.

	"I'm sorry, brother," Ranma said, sincerely. "Did I
hurt your poor widdle porky heart?"

	"That's it! Die!" Shin screamed at the top of his
lungs and launched himself at Ranma; murder in his
eyes.

	The situation deteriorated steadily from then on and
by the time the palace patrol came upon them, they had
succeeded in beating each other unconscious and make a
bloody mess of themselves.

*****************************************************************

	A week and a half later...

	Ranma and Shin sat in the middle of a large clearing
bordered by trees and shrubs. The boys looked as good
as new: The wounds from their recent 'disagreement'
had healed and the scars disappeared. Their
comradeship, too, had revived during that time, and as
they sat together, Hai Fung could almost feel the
brotherly love radiating between them. Glossing over
the last five years of his life, he marveled at the
leaps and bounds his students had made in The Art and
a little self-indulgent smile blossomed on his face.

	"Shall we start today's lessons?" he asked, finally
breaking the silence and eyeing them critically.

	"Yes, Master!" the two replied in unison.

	Hai Fung nodded.

	"Close your eyes and meditate. When you find your
center, reach for your ki and allow it manifest
visually."

	The duo nodded and closed their eyes in uncanny
unison. They had done this so many times before that
it was almost second nature to them now.

	Presently, a white corona of power formed around
Ranma, and then, Shin.

	"Good," Hai Fung said, taking two very thin, green
strips of wood from the ground beside him and handing
it to them.

	"Try to focus your ki into that strip," he said.

	Ranma's aura immediately turned blue and a huge
current of ki flooded his strip, incinerating it
completely in mere seconds.

	Whap!

	Ranma glared at Hai Fung, rubbing his sore pate and
muttering evil things about accursed old mummies under
his breath.

	Hai Fung gave his student enough time to recover,
noticing with affected aloofness the fact that Ranma's
aura did not disappear when his attention was focused
elsewhere. His mind boggled at the control the boy had
managed to achieve at such a young age and he smirked
to himself as memories of his younger days came back.
Finally, when he surmised that the two had gained
sufficient control of their auras, he broke the
silence.

	"Good work, Ranma," he said, opting first to
congratulate Ranma to throw the boy off-balance.

	"Huh?" came Ranma's wise reply. Just a minute ago, he
had been hit with The Evil Stick and now, he was being
congratulated. 'What the hell's going on?'

	"You didn't lose control of your aura, when you were
focused elsewhere," Hai Fung explained. "That's a very
good sign."

	"Heh." Now that he had the answer, Ranma's ego came
bursting to the fore. "Thanks, I guess, Master," he
said, shooting a sidelong glance at Shin. 'One more
scratch on the board for Ranma Saotome Qin. Beat that,
big brother!'

	"Now, try again," he said, handing another strip to
Ranma, "this time, however, don't try to use your ego,
err, confidence as a proxy to channel your ki into the
wood."

	"As you wish, Master," Ranma replied. 'That explains
why the old man hit me, I guess.'

	"Remember... When using weapons forged from metal and
such, you can use your confidence, or for that matter,
any emotion you choose as a proxy, though I'm firmly
against such practice. When it comes to wood and such,
however, never, ever use your emotions to channel your
ki. Just will your ki to flow into them and it will."

	The boys remained silent for almost a long minute as
they digested this new lesson. Finally, Shin broke it.

	"Why, Master? Is there any difference?" he asked.

	"A very good question, Shin," Hai Fung replied,
taking the opportunity to give his student a pat on
the back. "Trees and all other living things have well
defined ki lines in their physical bodies. These lines
are formed and reinforced throughout their life. They
survive death, slowly growing stronger in bones and
other, more permanent, organs. As such, channeling ki
through a piece of wood is like performing a ki
transfer. you must not taint the ki you wish to
transfer with emotions because 'emotion-tainted' ki
destroys the harmony in the body.

	"This is not to say that ki transfers cannot be
accomplished using 'emotion-tainted' ki. They can be
done, but their disadvantages are too many and they
far outweigh the advantages. Take for example, wood.
It becomes stronger when you focus 'emotion-tainted'
ki through it, but what it gains in strength, it loses
in flexibility. In extreme cases, like when you
channeled too much of your confidence-flavored ki into
that strip of wood, the ki lines are completely torn
apart and the wood disintegrates. The same is true for
humans and animals alike. Channel enough tainted ki
through something and it'll burn into a crisp.

	"Pure ki, however, has none of these shortcomings and
has many things going in its favor. In fact, a pure ki
transfer is similar to absorbing the ki in the air.
The only difference: you channel it into the
recipient's system instead of him drawing it
willfully. It's not tainted by emotions and therefore,
it has no set path, which it has to follow, but
rather, follows the paths set by the recipient's
body."

	Ranma and Shin nodded.

	"Excuse me, Master," Ranma asked, when Hai Fung once
again closed his eyes in meditation.

	"Yes?"

	"But what about swords and other handcrafted weapons?
Why can we use tainted ki with them?"

	Hai Fung took a deep breath.

	"That, my dear Ranma, depends on a number of factors.
The make of the weapon, the material used, the skill
of the smith who forged it - they all influence the
way the weapon interacts with ki.

	"Take folded weapons, like that broadsword the
Emperor has, for example. That one was folded
forty-seven times by the Emperor's great grandfather
himself. Its folds are so intricate and numerous that
it's almost alive... Such is the complexity of the ki
lines it bears. A weapon such as that sword can easily
slice through six, seven, eight feet of granite
without taking a nick. you can focus pure ki, or
tainted ki into it and it wouldn't make much of a
difference... The ki lines are so complex that all the
shortcomings of one proxy are overcome by the
advantages of the other. Such weapons are called
Spirit Borne and you should be wary of anyone who
wields them. They are nigh impossible to counter in a
battle.

	"There's another class of Spirit weapons: Those made
from extremely old bone and wood. These artifacts bear
huge ki lines within them, and can store and channel
prodigious amounts of ki. The Spirit Bane, the most
powerful of this class, we have in our armory, was
made using a highly secret composite technology known
only to our people."

	"Oh!" the two boys said simultaneously.

	"Yes," Hai Fung replied, taking a deep breath. "The
Spirit Bane is made of three separate parts: shaven
strips from the canine of Jia Long, the first dragon,
a wooden spine from the very first Tree of Life and a
bronze casing, folded over fifty times. The bronze
acts as the focus for the user. The spine acts as the
storage medium for the ki and the teeth of The First
One act as the channel. The weapon is so powerful that
the only one to ever lay hands on it was The Divine
Emperor himself! It is said that, with that weapon,
one can match the power of the Phoenix-God Saa Fuu
Lang for limited intervals of time." Hai Fung did not
bother to add that the either of them was already
strong enough to wield The Spirit Bane.

	"And then, there are the normal weapons. These are
crafted with far less skill than the spirit and the
folded weapons, and as such, are far less potent in
the battlefield... you can channel ki into these
weapons, but they only respond perfectly to the hands
that shaped them. This is why, all Musk and
Joketsuzoku soldiers craft their own weapons."

	Ranma and Shin nodded.

	"Thank you for the lesson, Master."

	"You're welcome, children. Now, get back to the
exercise at hand."

	The boys took the strips in their hands and as
before, tried to focus their ki into them. As usual,
Ranma was the first to accomplish the task, though
Shin, as always, was not too far behind.

	"Excellent," Hai Fung said, when both of them had
managed to not only channel the ki into the wood, but
also to maintain it. "Ranma, move to that rock over
there and Shin, you move to that one," he said,
pointing to two medium sized boulders at the far edge
of the clearing.

	When the boys were at their prescribed places, Hai
Fung spoke again.

	"I want you to channel your ki into the strips in
your hands and hit the boulders with the boulder with
the strip. I want you to focus a cutting edge on your
strips with your ki and use it to 'cut' the boulder."

	The two nodded and set upon the task. Hai Fung closed
his eyes and waited for the ear shattering explosions
to begin.

	He did not have to wait long for the explosions
started almost as soon as he closed his eyes.

	Bam!

	Bam! Bam! Bam!

	"Ranma! Shin! For God's sake, I thought I asked you
to cut the rock, not shatter it into a million
pieces."

	"Sorry, Master," the two replied, meekly.

	Hai Fung sighed. He knew that it was too much to
expect the two to get everything perfect in the first
go, but he could not help himself. 'It's fortunate
that I planned for this beforehand, else today would
have been wasted.'

	"Very well. Run to the northern wall of the palace
embankments and you'll find a large pile of boulders
there. Carry 'one' here and try again. Every time you
crush a rock, you'll repeat the process, until you get
everything right."

	The two acquiesced, bowed and took off.

	'Now, where was I again?' Hai Fung thought, eyeing
their fast disappearing figures and lazily stroking
his beard. 'Oh, yes, ramen and fried rabbit...'

*****************************************************************

	Fifteen years later...

	Qin Shi sat on his throne, absent-mindedly stroking
his beard with his left hand. 'It's now time to pass
my responsibilities to the next generation,' he
thought to himself lethargically. He was growing too
old for the job and just like his father, he planned
to abdicate in favor of his sons.

	The fact that Ranma and Shin had grown into fine
warriors was a big bonus. They were as well trained in
The Art of Peace as they were in The Art of War, and
one could not have hoped to find a better Emperor
anywhere in the kingdom.

	"Honorable Emperor," the Chief of the Palace Guards
said, bowing in reverence before Qin Shi, "the Princes
have arrived for their daily audience."

	"Excellent!" Qin Shi replied, straightening himself
against his chair. "Show them in and summon my
advisors."

	The Chief of the Palace Guard bowed again and exited
the throne room.

	Presently, Shin and Ranma entered the great hall.

	"Good morning, Honorable Father," the two said,
kneeling before Qin Shi. "Has this morning found you
in good health and cheer?"

	"Arise, children," Qin Shi replied. "I'm well. How
fare you?"

	"We're as well as can be, Honorable Father," Shin
replied.

	Qin Shi nodded.

	"Very well. Come and sit besides me, children, whilst
we wait for my court. I bear important tidings and you
need but wait a few minutes before all is revealed."

	Shin and Ranma nodded, and before sitting on their
seats to the left of the Emperor, exchanged confused,
questioning glances. What news could be so important
that the Emperor had to have his entire court present,
before he could speak of it?

	Fortunately, they were in luck. The courtiers were
not nearly as tardy as they always were and arrived en
masse in short order. Soon, the throne room was filled
with whispers and rumors were flying about everywhere.

	"Honorable Emperor," one of the oldest and most
respected courtiers finally dared to ask, "why has
Your Excellency summoned us at this wee hour of the
morning? The sun is pale and the cock, yet to crow!"

	Qin Shi stared down the impudent man with a glare and
cleared his throat. Immediately, all whispers died and
silence reigned in the room. The courtier, for his
part, bowed deeply in apology and sat on his chair.

	"My reign is at an end, I fear," Qin Shi begun, "and
it's now time to pass on the Throne of the Dragons to
one of my sons."

	Pause.

	"I summoned all of you here to bear witness to the
naming ceremony." He cast his eyes on Ranma and Shin.
"Come and stand before me, my children, so that I
might pass on my burden to you."

	Ranma and Shin stood up from their seats and turned
to face their father, their shock at this sudden turn
of events, clearly written on their faces.

	"Long and fruitful has been my reign, but the time
has come now to end it," Qin Shi addressed the hall in
a solemn voice. "Shin Nan, Ranma Saotome Qin... Are
you willing to bear the weight of the Musk nation and
carry it into the future?"

	"Yes, we are, Honorable Emperor," the two replied,
solemnly.

	"It is well, then," Qin Shi said and once again,
turned to address his court. "Many Emperors have ruled
the Musk before me and many more shall before the end
of the Earth, but none, I hope, will ever face the
dilemma I face today. Standing before me are my two
sons, each near and dear to my heart in his own unique
way. They're both highly skilled in The Arts and they
have proven themselves repeatedly, both on the field
and off against our enemies: The Phoenix and The Ox.
Both of them would make a fine emperor, but as per the
laws set by my ancestors, only one can inherit the
Throne of the Dragons.

	"I have given the decision many an hour of careful
thought, and yet, I cannot decide between them. In my
eyes, they are both equals and I cannot place one over
the other. As such, I decree that they be put through
a trial by combat and the one that wins shall be the
rightful heir to my throne!" he announced.

	Pause.

	"Does anyone among you wish to contest their rights
to the throne?" Qin Shi asked his courtiers. It was
part of tradition that the Emperor should ask his
courtiers the last question, just as it was tradition
that no one raises his voice against it.

	"I do, Honorable Emperor," Ranma said, stepping
forward.

	Qin Shi raised an eyebrow, shocked by Ranma's
challenge and yet, doing well to conceal it. He eyed
his youngest son with appraising eyes, trying to
discern the reason behind his challenge. Ranma stood
silently before him, looking very much like a
teenager, as he had stopped aging when he turned
eighteen - a sign of the control he had attained over
his ki.

	"You would refuse your Emperor," Qin Shi asked.

	"Yes, Sire, I would. I refuse to spill dragon blood,
now and forever," Ranma replied, meeting his father's
piercing gaze and not backing down one little bit.

	"Think about what you say, young Ranma, before your
words force my hand."

	Ranma nodded, bowing in reverence.

	"My mind is set, Sire."

	Qin Shi looked at Ranma imploringly for the longest
minute, but Ranma did not flinch. Finally, Qin Shi
took his eyes off him and spoke.

	"Hear this then, proud Prince," he said addressing
the entire court, "by the venerated laws of our
people, there is only one punishment for your willful
disobedience of My Word. I, Qin Shi, the fourteenth
Emperor to sit on The Dragon Throne, cast thee out of
the Musk nation. you have a fortnight to leave the
lands of the Musk, failing which, you'll be hunted
down to the ends of the earth."

	Qin Shi cast his eyes about the hall, looking so
majestic that no one dared to breathe lest they offend
him.

	"I also decree that Shin Nan, the First born of the
Royal House, to be the rightful heir to The Dragon
Throne."

*****************************************************************

	The stars were bright and white, and the night sky
brimmed with them.

	A cold wind blew from the north. It rustled the
leaves of autumn as it wound its way through the
Valley of the Musk, relentlessly driving out the mist
that had settled on the valley. It was as fresh, if
not as invigorating, as the sweet, fragrant filled air
of spring.

	A wolf pack howled in the far distance and to their
beat, a lone owl hooted from atop an ancient oak. The
forest assumed a life of its own as darkness
approached and black shadows began to play tricks on
the mind's eye.

	Ranma sat atop a tall boulder, his form outlined
against the night sky. His shoulders were drooped and
his head hung low. His silken robe fluttered in the
wind and his slow, irregular breaths condensed into a
cloud of white as it touched the cool night air.

	"Ranma?"

	Silence.

	"Ranma?"

	Again, there was a long pause.

	"Ranma, where are you?" Shin's voice sounded very
close now.

	Finally, Ranma raised his head and acknowledged his
brother's call.

	"I'm here, big brother," he whispered into the cold
night. It had been many years, since he passed the
stage where he could be tracked and now, not even Hai
Fung and Shin, the closest among the Musk in terms of
skill, could do that.

	He had to wait only a few seconds, before Shin's face
appeared at the base of the boulder.

	"May I join you?" Shin asked.

	When Ranma did not reply, Shin jumped into the air,
landing lightly right next to Ranma.

	"Father's worried about you, brother," he said;
whispered, sitting beside Ranma. "He asked me to
search for you, when he saw that you weren't present
at the dinner table."

	"I know..." Ranma replied in a quiet, subdued voice.
"I just needed time on my own..."

	"I understand."

	Pause.

	"I'm sorry it had to come to this," Shin added.

	"Me, too, brother," Ranma replied in a strained
voice, "but it couldn't be helped. you know my
feelings on the subject and I'll never, ever spill
dragon blood over some earthly title."

	Shin nodded.

	"Still, father's very downcast and he has eaten but
little."

	Ranma sighed and closed his eyes.

	"I don't fault him... He should know that. Things
would have turned out the same way, I feel... I'd have
refused to fight you no matter what."

	'Just like I would have, little brother!' Shin
thought. If Ranma had not objected first to the
emperor's idea, he would have.

	"Yes, I know and father knows, too... Still, he
blames himself..."

	"He shouldn't. Come, we'll go the palace right now,
and I'll... I'll talk with him..." Ranma said and
stood up.

	Shin, however, remained seated.

	"Ranma, are you well?" he asked.

	Ranma gazed into the far off distance, taking his
time to frame an answer.

	"No, I'm not, but if father's willing to bear the
pain, then so am I."

	Pause.

	"Come, let's go," Ranma breathed and jumped off the
boulder.

*****************************************************************

	Qin Shi stood at the palace gates with Shin Nan, the
new Emperor, and Hai Fung at his side. Eleven days had
passed, since he delivered the ultimatum to Ranma and
every second of those eleven days had been pure hell.
Sleep, thirst, hunger - everything eluded him, and he
had spent many a sleepless night standing alone on the
palace bulwarks, looking into the night sky, silently
shedding tears of remorse.

	The days were made harder by the fact that it was he,
with his own words, who had thrown Ranma out of the
nation. Even now, as he stood watching his son saying
his farewells to his friends, the whole situation
looked too surreal to be true and even though he knew
that it was not, he wished that it were, too.

	After what seemed like a very long wait, Ranma
finished with his friends and acquaintances, and moved
onto the three most important people in his life. He
faced his father first, and without a word passing
between them, hugged him.

	"Fare thee well, father," he said, tenderly, "I'll
miss you."

	"Farewell, Ranma. I'll miss you, too. May the Gods
bless you with a long and happy life."

	Ranma tightened his hug and took a deep, strangled
breath.

	"I'm sorry I disappointed you, father."

	"Nonsense, my child," Qin Shi replied. "I'd never be
disappointed by anything you do."

	Pause.

	"Take care and think of me sometime," he continued.

	Ranma released the hug gingerly and locked eyes with
his father.

	"I'll do that, father. You'll think of me, won't
you?"

	"Of course I will," Qin Shi replied, nearly moved to
tears, "I love you, my son."

	"And I love you," Ranma replied, "I must go now,
father."

	Qin Shi nodded, only reluctantly releasing Ranma's
hands.

	Ranma forced a smile on his melancholy face and
looked at Qin Shi one last time, before turning to Hai
Fung.

	"Master, I beg pardon for the dishonor I have brought
upon you," he said to the wizened grandmaster.

	Hai Fung, who for the first time in a very long while
looked his age, shook his head in denial.

	"You haven't disgraced me, child. Your actions have
always been honorable, and I call you my student with
much pride and honor."

	"Thank you, Master," Ranma said, solemnly bowing. "My
conscience rests a little more peacefully... I'll try
to practice what you taught me."

	"I know you will. It's the hope of every teacher that
his student becomes better than he is. I have been
truly blessed on that account, having taught not one,
but two such students," he shot a sidelong glance at
Shin. "I'm very grateful to the two of you."

	Ranma nodded as did Shin.

	"Thank you, Master, for everything you have taught
me," Ranma said and bowed, again, in respect.

	Hai Fung returned it with a great deal of decorum and
watched with a heavy heart as Ranma moved onto his
brother.

	The two brothers hugged each other tightly without
muttering a word. They remained thus for the longest
time before separating.

	"I guess this is it, brother. I..."

	"Don't say it," Shin said, placing his finger on
Ranma's lips and silencing him. "We'll meet again in
the future and the goodbyes can wait, until then."

	Ranma nodded.

	"I hope so."

	Pause.

	"I'll be on my way then," he said, and shouldered his
backpack, while at the same time turning to leave.

	"Wait a minute, brother, I have a question to ask of
you," Shin interrupted.
	
	Ranma turned around and looked at Shin quizzically.

	"Yes, Brother..." he ventured.

	"I was wondering whether you'd tell us where you're
going, so that, we could, you know, maybe visit you
sometime?"

	Ranma's lips curved upwards in a small smile.

	"I'd like that very much," he replied. "As for where
I'm going, I'm going to seek asylum in the land of our
allies, the Joketsuzoku. I hope to learn their arts
before going wherever fate takes me."

	Shin nodded in tacit approval. Even though the
ideologies of the Joketsuzoku and the Musk conflicted
with each other, the two states got along just fine.
The threat posed by the Phoenix tribe and their
God-King forced an unlikely friendship upon them, and
relations between the two states were always cordial
and warm.

	"A wise choice. Convey my greetings to Matriarch Shi
Huu and the other Elders," he said.

	Ranma nodded, smiled forlornly and departed, never
again to enter the Musk Lands.

*****************************************************************

	The walk to the Village of the Councilors took eight
days and Ranma spent the time planning, or rather,
re-planning his future. All his life, he had been
raised to become an emperor of a kingdom and now, he
did not even have a nation to call his own. Such a
sudden change is always hard to deal with and in
Ranma's case, it was made all the more hard by the
fact that he did not have his family to fall back on
either. As a result, the hike became almost a
pilgrimage to rediscover himself and his center.

	At the end of the eight days, Ranma encountered a duo
of guards at the outskirts of the Joketsuzoku capital.
They probed him with their ki and he, in a show of
good faith, reigned in his ki as tightly as he could,
in difference to their station and bowed, exposing
himself to them as a sign of good faith.

	"Who are you and what are you doing here, Stranger?"
the guard nearest to Ranma asked in a polite voice,
after she had returned Ranma's bow.

	"I'm a Musk warrior, Honored Ones, and I have come to
seek shelter with the Joketsuzoku," Ranma replied in
his most unpretentious voice.

	"Be welcome, Joketsuzoku-Friend," the guard said,
bowing slightly. "I'm Hwa Shi and my companion is Yue
Shi."

	"And I'm Ranma Saotome Qin of the Musk Royal House,
Honored Ones," Ranma replied, "and I would be most
glad if you'd point me towards the Village of the
Councilors."

	'Do wonders ever cease? I'd never thought that a Musk
Prince could be so polite!' "What news have you for
the Council, Prince of the Musk?" Hwa Shi asked.

	"I bring no ill-tidings, Honored Ones, but rather, a
request for The Council."

	Hwa Shi nodded. If he thought that the message was no
concern of hers, then she was not going to press the
issue. Plenty took place between the powers-that-be in
the Musk and the Joketsuzoku camps, and the common
populace was usually kept in the dark about it.

	"Would you like to be escorted to The Hall, Honorable
One?" she asked. The Hall was the shortened form of
The Hall of The Councilors.
	
	"Yes," Ranma replied with a slight nod, "I'd like
that very much."

	"Very well... If you'll follow Yue Shi, she'll take
you there."

	Ranma nodded at Hwa Shi and turned towards her
companion, who led him through the forest and into the
maze of winding streets that led to The Hall. Finally,
they reached a low, thatched, circular building at the
center of the village. It was easily the biggest one
in the village and a squad of ten highly skilled ki
adepts stood guard around it.

	One of those ten, the squad leader, walked up to meet
Yue Shi with a smile on her face.

	"Sister, what brings you to The Hall of The
Councilors?" she asked, examining Ranma from head to
toe.

	Yue Shi smiled.

	"And it's nice to meet you, too, sister," she
replied. "As for why I am here," she shot a glance at
Ranma, "I was escorting Prince Ranma of the Musk
here."

	The squad leader gave Ranma an once-over and nodded.

	"Thank you, then, Yue Shi," she said, dismissing the
Joketsuzoku, "I can take things from here. I'm sure
that you need to return to your post as fast as you
can."

	Yue Shi nodded, gratefully and bowed. She turned
around and headed back to the outpost. Ranma and the
squad leader watched her for a couple of seconds
before turning to regard one another again.

	"I'm Saa Long, Prince Ranma. Welcome to the
Joketsuzoku," she said with a slight bow.

	Ranma nodded, returning the bow with one of his own.

	"This way, please," Saa Long said, leading the way
towards the entrance of the Hall.

	Ranma followed Saa Long's lead quietly, and waited at
the door for a few minutes whilst Saa Long went in and
announced his presence to The Council. Finally, after
a couple of minutes, she stepped outside and showed
him into the dim lit main hall of the building. The
room was filled with the overpowering smell of burned
incense and as Ranma entered, his eyes water and he
coughed, being unaccustomed to such levels of smoke.
His body took a few seconds to adjust itself to the
creepy atmosphere in the room and when it did, he saw
a large round table positioned at the very center of
the room with the various elders seated around it.

	"Matriarch Shi Huu, I'm Ranma of the Qin and I bear
greetings from the new emperor of the Musk Empire, my
brother, Shin Nan," Ranma said, bowing once to the
room's occupants and then to the oldest woman in the
room, the Matriarch.

	The Matriarch, for her part, coughed once into her
hands and let her eyes wander over Ranma's physique,
judging him in her mind's eye. Finally, after what
seemed like an eternity, she nodded her approval.
Immediately, the tense atmosphere in the room relaxed.

	"Hai Fung has trained you well, Prince of the Musk,"
the aged Matriarch said at length.

	"You're too kind, Honored Matriarch," Ranma replied.
"Forgive this one for intruding in unannounced during
your meeting."

	Shi Huu smiled, leaning forward on her seat. Contrary
to popular opinion, not all the Musk were uncivilized
brutes. The young man before her was evidence of that.

	"May I ask, Prince, what brings one of the heirs to
the Throne of the Dragons to our humble village?"

	"I'm here to request asylum with the Joketsuzoku,
Honored Matriarch. My father, the Musk Emperor, has
cast me out of the Musk nation for disobeying his
words."

	"You disobeyed your father's words and he cast you
out?" Shi Huu asked, hiding her surprise quite well.
The Musk warriors had always been the most powerful in
the valley and with someone like Ranma to lead them,
they would have become nigh invincible. Yet, here he
stood telling her that he had been cast out for
disobeying his father's words. Would the Musk really
throw away such a chance at greatness for the sake of
a few laws? 'Yes, they would... Just like I would,'
she added to herself mentally almost as an after
thought. The law was the law and nothing stood above
it, after all.

	"Yes," Ranma replied, nodding emphatically, "I
refused to fight my brother for the right to the
Throne and father cast me out."

	"Oh!" Shi Huu said, exposing her toothless mouth in a
smile, "you stood up to the Musk Emperor? Hmm! Well,
then, I guess I have no choice but to offer you
shelter, do I?"

	Ranma's face brightened with gratitude.

	"Thank you, Honorable Matriarch. My gratitude knows
no bounds," he said, bowing deeply at his waist.

	"Now, young man," Shi Huu said, raising off her seat
with a small, queer smile on her face, "let us not be
hasty. If you want to stay with the Joketsuzoku, you
have to earn your stay... the hard way. What can you
do that can possibly benefit the tribe?"

	"Master Hai Fung always said I could have earned my
living as a teacher, if I weren't a prince. Perhaps I
can impart my knowledge of The Art to your warriors as
a token of my gratitude for your hospitality."

	"Young man," Shi Huu said with a slight frown. The
boy wasn't an imposture, or... was he? He was a dragon
and there weren't that many dragons in the world, but
there were some and not all were as benign as the ones
that gave birth to the Musk Dynasty. "If you were a
real Musk prince, you'd have known that it's an
unforgivable crime to teach Musk techniques to
outsiders, even allies such as the Joketsuzoku," she
said waving her hand around with a flourish at the
warriors that surrounded them.

	Ranma nodded, agreeing with the Matriarch's wisdom.
He would not be able to teach the Joketsuzoku the Musk
techniques. 'But...'

	"Quite true, Honorable Matriarch. I cannot teach you
the techniques developed by my forefathers. However,
nothing prevents me from teaching the techniques I
developed."

	Shi Huu raised an eyebrow. 'He could be telling the
truth... He certainly has the potential to reach the
level of mastery needed to create truly powerful ki
techniques. Nevertheless, do I take that chance...
After all, not everyone with the potential to become
great becomes great!'

	"And how powerful are these techniques of yours?" she
asked, after ruminating over her thoughts for several
moments.

	"I'm willing to fight the most powerful warrior in
your nation, using only my techniques to prove their
prowess."

	Shi Huu snickered. The boy definitely did not lack in
self-confidence. She had to give him that. However, he
was going to lose. The elite cream of the Musk
warriors were, and always had been, faster than their
enemies and their allies, but their repertoire was too
small to make that edge in speed lethal to their
opponent. Moreover, they concentrated too much on
particular field of The Art and would never be
fearsome opponents in a one-on-one duel, even though
they were nigh invincible when they worked in teams.

	"As the Matriarch of the Joketsuzoku, I'm the most
experienced warrior in the Joketsuzoku nation and I
accept your challenge. If you can prove that your
techniques are as powerful as you claim them to be,
you'll be a very welcome addition to our tribe,
indeed."

	Pause.

	"Even if you fail to defeat me, I grant you asylum
within the lands of the Joketsuzoku. We," she said,
looking around, "value our allies and will not abandon
one in your time of need!" 

	Ranma bowed at his waist.

	"I'm forever indebted to your kindness, Honorable
Matriarch."

	Shi Huu nodded and attacked Ranma without preamble.
The battle was going to be as much a test of mettle as
it was of skill, and if the boy were as good as he
claimed, he would not require any time to prepare
himself for a duel, or even take a proper stance.	

	Ranma, without rising from his bow, seemed to feel
the incoming killing strike to his neck and
somersaulted over the heads of indignant Joketsuzoku
Elders thrice, before catapulting himself out of The
Hall and high into the air with a mighty shove of his
arms. There he hovered, nearly forty feet in the air,
looking at his opponent with an appraising eye.

	Using this little breather to their advantage, the
Joketsuzoku common folk parted, giving the two
combatants a very wide berth in the center of the
village. Word had spread about the Musk Prince in the
village and they had all gathered to see what a dragon
looked like, but now, they were going to see the fight
of their lives.

	Shi Huu, for her part, slid to a stop outside The
Hall, and awaited his return to ground level. If she
were to follow him into the air, she would deplete her
ki levels and put herself at a severe disadvantage for
the rest of the fight.

	Ranma, when he realized that she was not going to
engage him in mid-air combat, floated down and assumed
a stance. Shi Huu was upon him, immediately, and they
exchanged blows too fast for the naked eye to see.
Ranma slid around her Amaguriken and retreated,
shooting a small ki blast at the ground to cover his
retreat.

	Observing this second retreat, Shi Huu shook her
head. Perhaps the boy had been kidding all along. He
seemed to have a lot of ki, but no real skill.

	When he had retreated a safe distance, Ranma began to
circle Shi Huu, leading her into a spiral. He
carefully avoided her blows, closing the distance
between them ever so slightly with each step. His eyes
were always set upon her with grim determination, and
his mind and aura was as calm as the waters of a
frozen lake.

	Finally, just as he got within the effective range of
her fists, Ranma allowed himself a little smile of
triumph.

	"You lose, Honorable Matriarch," he whispered into
her ears, before punching up at the sky with his right
fist, "Hiryu Shoten Ha!"

	The slight breeze that had been blowing through the
village suddenly became a raging tornado and Shi Huu
could only watch in utter disbelief as the tornado
sucked her up into the air. She tried to use her ki to
escape the winds, but the action only strengthened the
tornado and made it that much harder to escape. It
took her precious seconds to realize that it was her
ki, which served as the fuel for the twister, but by
then, her ki reserves were almost completely expended.

	Still, she pulled in her ki before she lost
consciousness, hoping that the action would be enough
to starve the tornado.

	It was.

	Immediately, the tornado disappeared, leaving her
stranded in mid-air, with no ki to expend. She fell
down hard and staggered after a few seconds into a
clumsy stance, only to lose consciousness mere moments
later.

	Everyone was stunned with disbelief. Their most
experienced warrior had been defeated by a mere
teenager who had not even been hit once in the fight.

*****************************************************************

	Outside the village healer's house, half an hour
later...

	The Joketsuzoku Elders gossiped in a faint murmur as
they awaited the prognosis of Shi Huu. The boy had
proven himself a match for the Matriarch and
rightfully, earned his shelter in the village.

	Inside the tent, Ranma stood beside his downed
opponent as he bored the healer about Shi Huu's
health.

	"How is the Honorable Matriarch doing?" he asked.

	"She'll be fine, though I'm not that sure about The
Council, as well as the men and women out there," the
village healer, Yein Luo, a crone well past her
hundreds, replied. Like Hai Fung, she, too, was around
four-feet high with a well-maintained mane of
silver-white hair. And like all other Wise Ones [1],
she had a staff made of silver wood, which acted as a
ki battery. It was literally gushing with her ki to
his trained eyes.

	"Hmm!" Ranma said, his demeanor saying: Oh, that's
perfectly understandable.

	Of course, he did not understand what she said.

	Looking at Ranma, Yein Luo shook her head in mirth.
He seemed to be very easy to read when he was
uncomfortable and right now, she could tell he was.
Obviously, he had not understood her words and needed
a more detailed explanation.

	"As Shi Huu said before the start of the battle,
she's the premier warrior in the village - not the
most skilled, mind you, but her experience in the
field more than makes up for any lack in skill - and
she's one of the few who're privy to all our secret
techniques. It'd be nigh impossible for anyone in the
village, least of all, an outsider, to defeat her, and
yet, here you are. you have not only defeated her, but
you have done it without receiving a scratch in
return."

	Pause.

	"This is not only unbelievable, but unprecedented,"
she added.

	Light dawned at the end of the tunnel and Ranma
nodded in comprehension, his face lighting up.

	"Well, I suppose that it's reasonable," he said.

	"How did you create that tornado, anyway, Ranma?"
Yein Luo asked, her curiosity getting the better of
her as she attended to Shi Huu.

	Ranma smiled, congenially.

	"Well, do you practice the fighting arts,
Honorable..."

	"Yein Luo."

	"Honorable Healer Yein Luo?"

	"Yes, I do. However, I'm not very proficient at it. I
know a couple of secret techniques: The Kacchu Tenshin
Amaguriken and The Splitting Cat's Hair for example,
but most of the higher stuff goes right past me," she
replied.

	Ranma nodded. He had surmised as much. Even though
her ki was tightly focused, she did not have the
enormous reserves that characterized all warriors.

	"I'll teach you that," he pointed his thumb behind
him, "if you'll teach me The Healing Arts."

	Yein Luo nodded, wiping Shi Huu's face with lukewarm
water from a bowl. It sounded like a good proposition
and she would be loathe passing up such an
opportunity.

	"It's a deal. I'll teach you what I know and you
teach me what you know."

	Ranma nodded in acquiescence.

	"Thank you, Honorable..."

	"Yein Luo would be enough, Ranma," she said, placing
some herbs over the steaming bowl.

	"Thank you, Yein Luo," he said, bowing to her.

	Shi Huu chose that moment to return to the world of
the living.

	"Oh! My aching head!" she moaned.

	"Don't overexert yourself so soon, Honorable One.
Even though you might think otherwise, you aren't as
strong as you once used to be," Yein Luo advised.

	This was, of course, the wrong thing to say to Shi
Huu. She snorted in disgust and tried to sit up, but
the exercise proved too great a task for her frail
body. She collapsed back onto the bed and lay gasping.

	Yein Luo shook her head sadly in resignation. Things
were not going the way she hoped they would. The
Matriarch, her grandmother, needed at least a week of
bed rest to rebuild her ki reserves, but the old woman
was too bullheaded to follow her advise. Any sign of
feebleness on her part would weaken her position in
the Council, after all.

	"Anything I can do to help?" Ranma enquired, his eyes
focused on Shi Huu's gasping form. He could sense Yein
Luo's distress and Shi Huu's weakening ki.

	"No," Yein Luo shook her head, "I'm afraid there's
nothing you can do, Ranma. The Honorable Matriarch's
ki reserves are severely depleted and she needs the ki
she lost in her battle with you to survive."
	
	"Well, I can help if that's the case," Ranma
announced, gladly and moved over to Shi Huu. He
pressed his right hand against her chest and began
performing a ki transfusion right before Yein Luo's
astonished face.

	Half a dozen Elders rushed into the house, ready for
battle, only to stop and stare in astonishment as
Ranma completely loosened his hold on his ki. A
milky-white glow five-feet thick formed around him as
he gently placed his hand on Shi Huu's chest and
transferred his ki to her body. Within minutes, Shi
Huu's reserves were restored to their original level
and Ranma took his hand off her.

	Watching Ranma perform the ki transfer, the Elders
nodded to themselves. This action on his part
confirmed what they already knew. Ranma was definitely
prime breeding material.

	Thus, unaware of the danger he was in, Ranma
unwittingly started the husband-hunting season.

	Looking up and drawing his ki into himself, once
again, Ranma shuddered as his danger sense went
haywire. Suddenly, he felt as if the whole world was
ganging up against him.

	The Elders watched Ranma's shudder and smiled, evil
plans forming in their minds. Oh, if only they were
just two hundred and thirty odd years younger!

	Ranma saw their smiles and paled. He was not going to
have a single moment of peace in his life. He just
knew it.

	Poor Ranma.

	Grin.

*****************************************************************

	The day after...

	Shi Huu sat up in the bed, smiling at Ranma's
friendly face.

	"I'm much indebted to you, Ranma," she said, her
voice brimming with gratitude.

	Ranma nodded, bowing to her.

	"How do you fare, Honorable Matriarch?"

	"I'm doing all right, thanks to you, child."

	Ranma straightened from his bow.

	"You're welcome, Honorable One."

	Pause.

	"As much as I wish it was not so, I have an ulterior
motive for this visit..." he said.

	Shi Huu smirked.

	"Don't we all?" she asked in reply.

	The comment put Ranma a little at ease. Still, there
was some hesitation in eyes.

	"What troubles you, Ranma?" Shi Huu asked, finally
when he did not speak.

	"The Elders and the warriors keep calling me either
boy, or child, or..." he said at length.

	Shi Huu raised an eyebrow.

	"And?"

	Pause.

	"Is there anything wrong with it?" she asked, mostly
out of doubt.

	"Yes, there is," he replied, his voice quiet and
commanding. "I'm not a child. In fact, I'm
twenty-seven. It's just that I stopped growing seven
years back," he muttered.

	Shi Huu was surprised and her eyes widened
accordingly. If Ranma had come that close to attaining
true mastery of The Art, her decision to accept him
into the folds of the tribe was vindicated even
further than it already was. Without a word, she
looked at the trio of Elders who were by her side.
They were eyeing the boy in a rather disquieting
fashion, completely oblivious to her presence. Shaking
her head, she turned back to Ranma.

	"They'll call you Ranma from now on," she said, "I'll
make sure of that."

	"Thank you, Honorable One."

	Pause.

	"May I ask for another boon?" he asked.

	Shi Huu nodded.

	"I know that I'm to start taking classes as soon as
possible..." he paused.

	"Go on..." Shi Huu prompted.

	"I was wondering whether I can take Yein Luo as one
of my students and learn The Healing Arts from her in
return."

	"I don't see any reason why you couldn't do that,"
she replied. There might be hope yet, of Yein Luo
getting into the Council, after all.

	Ranma nodded, a Cheshire cat grin forming on his
face.

	"As you wish, Honorable One."

	Shi Huu nodded.

	"Thank you for your wise counsel, Honorable One,"
Ranma said, gratefully.

	"You're welcome."

	Ranma stood up and bowed.

	"I'll take leave, now, Honorable Ones," he said to
the four of them when he rose up.

	They bowed in return and he left.

	When he was gone, Shi Huu turned towards the trio of
Elders in the room.

	"I'm sure all of you realize that if what Ranma said
was true, then he's very close to attaining true
mastery of The Art."

	Nod.

	"I saw the way you looked at him just now. Believe
me, I, too, feel the same way, but I ask you to
exercise some restraint. He's too great a find to be
squandered through magical potions and the like;
wouldn't you agree?"

	Again, they nodded.

	"I'm glad you agree with me 'cause I was going to do
this whether you agree to it or not." She cleared her
throat. "Your grandchildren may chase him, but they'll
do it politely. That means: No magical, or mind
altering potions, no marriage challenges and such.
They can seduce him, however, but only if he's
willing... In short, they have to woo him the way
everyone else does and they have to make him fall in
love with her... Else... I needn't make myself clear
on that one, do I?"

	The three nodded in acceptance, even though they did
not actually plan to follow the Matriarch's commands.
They were sure that with just a little nudge in the
right direction, the newest addition to the
Joketsuzoku would see things their way and greatly
enrich their family's gene pool.

	The nudge, of course, would be in classic, no holds
barred Joketsuzoku style and all the men in the
village were going to go mad with lust.

*****************************************************************

	A week and a half later...

	Ranma awoke long before the sun rose up in the
eastern horizon and took the time to practice his very
own kata, developed soon after he first defeated
Master Hai Fung. This had become a rhythm for him: Get
up, practice, eat, teach, eat, goof around with the
other men, get bear hugged by scantily clad, super
cute girls, faint, get up, again, eat and sleep.

	By sunup, the whole village was buzzing with
activity. Ranma ended his morning exercises and
returned to Yein Luo's house, for breakfast. The
healer, on arrival at the village, had graciously
offered him her abode for lodging, while his very own
house was being built and he accepted it, as he had
nowhere else to go.

	Strangely enough, his host was not present at the
dining table and Ranma had to fetch the food from the
kitchen, before settling down for a nice cold
breakfast. When he was done with his meal, he headed
out to his morning classes in one of the thickets
around the village.

	A couple of hours later, Ranma returned exhausted
from a long morning spent teaching very old and very
stubborn students. He opened the door of Yein Luo's
house and felt a ki he hadn't felt before. It was
sweet, bitter, piquant and slightly sour, and tasted
divine to his senses: The perfect flavor.

	His curiosity piqued, Ranma made his way upstairs,
finally coming to a standing halt in front of a room,
he had assumed to be a storeroom.

	It wasn't.

	He opened the door, took in the contents, developed a
healthy nosebleed and dropped unconscious, hitting the
floor with his head and making a nice, resounding and
unhealthy thunk.

	The stress of the impact from Ranma's very hard head
was too much for the floor and it developed cracks.

	Poor floor.

	Poor Ranma.

*****************************************************************

	Lein hummed a folk song as she dried her naked form
softly with a silken towel. She tied the towel around
the soft brown mane of hair on her head, and stepped
out of the bath into her room.

	'Nothing beats a lukewarm bath taken after spending
ten days without one,' she thought, contentedly,
removing the towel and ran her right hand over her
hair. Her movements were made in such a way that they
attenuated the smooth, feminine curves of her form
against the mirror.

	She loved her job as a healer, but the work hours and
the tours were pure murder. Summons at unearthly hours
were common and one of them had come from a border
settlement a month ago. Even though she left for her
patient immediately, it had taken her ten days just to
get to the village, and ten days more to get back.
Another ten had been spent taking care of the
terminally ill Matriarch of the village, whom she had,
through a miracle of sorts, managed to bring back from
the brink of death.

	On arriving back to the Village of the Councilors,
all she wanted to do was a soak and a nice, long, warm
bath.

	Unfortunately, fate and her friends thought
otherwise.

	As soon as she stepped into the village walls, her
friends accidentally 'found' her and they took it upon
themselves to bring her up to date on the hottest
gossip item of the year: Ranma, the latest addition to
the village, and how he had successfully defeated her
great grandmother, Shi Huu, the all-powerful Matriarch
herself.

	Though unwilling to begin with, Lein succumbed to the
unbridled enthusiasm of Shan Pu and the rest of the
gang, and soon became part of the Ranma-mania in no
time at all. Once that was done, they spent the rest
of the morning roaming around the village, gossiping
and generally having fun. For all her skill, Lein was
at the very excitable age of twenty-three, and had to
have her daily dose of fun, after all.

	Seeing the way the girls in the village drooled over
this Ranma, she silently found herself curious about
how he looked and acted and whether he would find her
attractive or not. She did not have to wait long to
find out, she realized, after her friends informed her
that Ranma was staying in her house. She hastily
excused herself and went home, determined to make a
good presentation of herself to him. She was not
chasing him, of course, she was just curious about
him.

	However, her plans went awry. Ranma had not arrived
immediately, or even a little later. Three hours
passed with her sitting in the hall waiting and
finally, seeing no sign of him, she decided to take a
bath to freshen up and rid herself off the damnable
nervousness that was plaguing her. The bath took
nearly half an hour and as she dried herself, looking
at her reflection in the mirror, she heard a dull thud
from behind her.

	She looked back and saw a strange boy lying on the
floor unconscious, a small puddle of red forming near
his face. Even though she did not recognize him, she
realized what had happened and shook her head,
chuckling to herself.

	Donning a silken robe, she moved towards him. She
knelt down by his side and awakened him up with the
help of a pressure point in his forehead. The boy
opened his eyes slowly, looked at her face, her open
robe and the assets on display, and fainted.

	Ranma would always say in the following years that he
had not eaten that afternoon and this was the cause of
his fainting spells.

	He was lying, of course.

	All his life, Ranma had been secluded from members of
the opposite sex. Even though he knew the truth about
the birds and the bees, thanks to Wu Zhu Yu and Dang
Shen, his bodyguards at the palace, he had never given
the subject much thought as all the women in his life
had reminded him of, well, one animal, or the other.
That, of course, had changed with his introduction to
the Joketsuzoku women and their very healthy bodies.

	In the eight days he had spent in the Village of the
Councilors, he had been presented with glimpses of
many an 'economically' dressed, drop dead gorgeous
femme fatales. Yet, everything he had seen until then
paled against sight of her soft, glowing, creamy white
skin, and the thin, transparent veneer of silken
material that hid and yet, did not hide the soft,
smooth curves of her body.

	From the deep-blue, crystal clear orbs that were her
eyes, his eyes trailed down, past the nape of her neck
to her shoulders and her wonderfully pert, delicious
looking breasts. They paused there, taking in the
sight of them for the smallest fraction of a second,
before trailing downwards to her feasty, exposed hips
and the little bush of straight, light-brown hair that
surrounded and hid the lips of her luscious vulva.
Ranma's brain overloaded at the dirty thoughts that
filled his mind and he knew no more.

	Lein sighed, took his head in her arms and rested him
against her chest.

	Slap! Slap!

	"Just give me a couple of minutes," Ranma moaned,
drunkenly, without opening his eyes. Some incredibly
soft and warm pillow supported his head and he did not
want to wake up, ever.

	Lein snickered.

	Slowly, Ranma opened his eyes, frightened to death
and quivering. Now, he had done it. She was probably
going to pound him to within an inch of his life. His
eyes fell on her person and he felt faint, his fears
forgotten.

	"Don't faint," she said, pleadingly, "I promise to
not hurt you."

	It was the sweetest voice he had heard in his entire
life. He opened his eyes, again and fought the
fainting spell that threatened to deliver him into the
clutches of unconsciousness once more.

	"Who are you?" she asked.

	His heart skipped several beats, when he saw her lips
move.

	"I... I... I'm..." he shook his head to clear it. His
mind was hazy and he could not remember anything. "I
do..." again, he caught sight of her eyes and again,
he felt his memories fading, "I'm... err... I don't
know who I am!" His desperate frustration was clear in
his voice.

	She snickered, again.

	Her laughter proved too much for his overburdened
senses and he gladly welcomed the sweet call of
unconsciousness as it embraced him with loving hands.

	Looking at his unconscious body, Lein smiled to
herself. She was beginning to feel comfortable with
this stranger and it was affecting her in a weird sort
of way. She slapped him lightly, once again, and he
opened his eyes, only to faint when she snickered
again.

	'Does he find me so despicable?' she thought, and it
brought hot tears to her eyes, which rolled and
cascaded down her cheeks. A single, sparkling star
collected near her chin and fell on his forehead.

	Ranma was having the time of his life in his dreams,
when it began to rain. Not wanting to transform into a
dragon, he woke up and laid eyes on her angelic face.
Tiny beads of stardust trickled from her eyes and he
found himself paralyzed with remorse. He wanted to
make those tears go away, but he was at odds as to how
he was going to make that happen. If only he knew the
reason for her distress.

	Building up his courage, he opened his mouth to
speak, but his voice failed him and no words came out.

	He closed his mouth, waited a moment, opened it and
tried again.

	"Why are you crying?" he tried to ask. It came out as
a silly squeak.

	She looked into his eyes and saw the concern in them.
She smiled in spite of herself and amazingly enough,
he did not faint, though his eyes clouded. She heard
his heart pounding away inside his chest and hers
pounded in harmony with it.

	'He likes me!' she realized with a start.

	She blushed and he panicked.

	When she smiled, he felt his worries disappear and
his heart struggled to break free from the stifling
confines of his chest. Her cheeks reddened then, and
he decided that she looked like a Goddess when she was
like that. His eyes began to cloud once more. He shook
his head forcibly and cleared the fog that threatened
to strip away his sanity. He wanted to see her
forever, damn it!

	The blush continued to grow in strength. 'Maybe I'm
doing something wrong,' he thought and it frightened
him.

	Coming to the wrong conclusion and panicking, he
removed himself from her lap and retreated to the far
edge of the room. Hugging the wall and waving his arms
around in an overwhelmed manner, he begun apologizing
to her, asking her to forgive whatever mistake he had
committed.

	"I'm sorry. I won't do it again, I swear..." he found
himself blabbering on and on with no respite.

	She found his nonsensical blabbering very endearing.
He looked so cuddly and cute waving his arms around
like that. Her blush subsided and her tongue unraveled
itself. 'You're so cute!'

	"Am I really?" he asked, ceasing his 'Look! I am a
birdie,' impression. Now, it was his turn to blush.

	When she heard his question, her blush returned with
a vengeance.

	"Did I say that aloud?" the question was directed
more to herself than to him.

	He nodded.

	"I'm sorry," she whispered.

	"Don't be," he whispered back.

	Pause.

	"Ummm... You're not mad at me, or anything, are you?"

	She shook her head.

	He exhaled deeply. He was immensely grateful that she
was not angry with him. He did not know what he would
have done, if she had been. Extricating himself from
the wall, he moved just a little closer to her.
Amazingly, he found that he could think clearer now.
His heart still pounded desperately in his chest, but
it was not as bad as before.

	And his name came back to him.

	"Ummm... I'm Ranma. Sorry about this," he apologized,
scratching the base of his neck.

	She looked shocked for a moment, and then burst out
into a hearty laugh.

	"You... You... are... Ranma," she managed between
gasps, when she found herself unable to rein in her
laughter.

	Ranma felt his heart grow despondent. 'She thinks I'm
nothing more than a big joke.' He turned away to hide
the tears that were creeping into his eyes.

	She saw him turning away and caught the glint of
tears of pain on his cheeks. Instantly, her laughter
died away. She rose up and went up to him. She took
his shoulders in her arms and turned him around.

	"Don't cry, I'm not laughing 'cause I think that
you're a joke," she explained, somehow knowing
intuitively the reason for his tears.

	His expression brightened.

	"You swear."

	She laughed joyously and nodded.

	His heart began to pound, once again. Her lips looked
so inviting when she laughed. His chest felt heavy and
he sighed in contentment.

	"Yes, I swear. I heard all about you and how you
defeated great, great grandmother, and I guess, I was
expecting you to be more rugged... like the others."

	"Rugged..." 'What 'others?' Is it possible that she's
in love with someone else?' His shoulders slumped in
defeat.

	"I meant:" she continued, seeing the look on his
face, "rugged, like the warriors that I take care of
when they're sick, or hurt."

	His shoulders rose up again. 'Thank you, God!' he
thought; screamed in his mind.

	"What's your name?" he asked. It would not do to say
he was in love with her without knowing her name,
after all.

	She blushed and covered her mouth with her right
hand.

	"Oh my! I forgot that, didn't I?" she asked,
embarrassedly.

	"Yes, you did," he replied.

	"My name's Lein."

	'Lein.' He rolled the name in his mouth and decided
that he liked it very much.

	"Thank you, for taking care of me, Lein," he said and
bowed to her. As much as he wanted to be spend every
waking hour with her, he knew that he would go mad, if
he were in her proximity for even a minute longer. He
straightened from his bow and his hands went to the
base of his neck.

	'He looks absolutely adorable like this,' she thought
and swooned.

	When she did not reply, he continued, "ummm... It was
nice meeting you, Lein. I... I apologize for, um...
you know, um..." he pointed towards the towel she had
used to dry herself.

	She blushed twelve shades of red. Too embarrassed to
open her mouth to reply, she nodded her head. Apology
accepted.

	"Ummm... Thank you, again, your adorable cuteness,
for taking care of me," he shouted as he bounded out
of the room.

	'He thinks I'm cute.' Her hand automatically went up
to her cheek and she swooned, again.

	"Nice to see you, too, great granddaughter," an old
and very familiar voice cackled from the side.
Startled out of her reverie, Lein turned and saw Shi
Huu perched atop the tree outside her window.

	"Great, great grandmother, what're you doing here?"
Lein asked, not at all surprised to find the old woman
on the tree.

	Shi Huu grinned, mischievously.

	"Nothing," she whistled, innocently, "I just wanted
to see how my great, great granddaughter and her lover
were getting along," she replied, hopping off the tree
and into the room through the window.

	Lein blushed.

	"He's not my lover, great, great grandmother," she
whispered, embarrassedly. Gods! Old people could be so
embarrassing. 'At least, not yet, and not for very
long, if I have any say about it!'

	"Child, you don't live for three hundred years
without recognizing the signs of love," Shi Huu
replied, "I saw the way he looked at you. He's fallen
head over heels in love with you."

	"He has?" Lein blurted out, before she could rein in
her wayward emotions and control herself.

	"Oh, yes, child. And by the looks of it, so have
you."

	Lein's cheeks reddened, yet again. 'My cheeks are
going to turn permanently red, if this keeps on much
longer!'

	Shi Huu nodded and continued.

	"Yes, he is. Moreover, before you ask for it, you
have my blessings, granddaughter. He's definitely the
perfect match for you: Both your Yin and Yang's
perfectly complement each other. In fact, I have never
seen anyone else whose Yin and Yang complemented each
other so perfectly."

	Lein's eyes widened. Of course, she knew of the
legends. When two people with complementary Yin and
Yang meet, nothing on Earth could stop them from
falling in love. They were soul mates, after all.

	"Moreover, your marriage would greatly strengthen the
family," the old woman said and hopped off.

	Lein nodded, mutely, her heart, fluttering like a
butterfly's wings.

*****************************************************************

	Ranma ran out of the house and into the street,
wandering around the streets with a very light heart
and an even lighter spring in his steps.

	Everywhere he went, he saw skimpily dressed girls.
All the men and boys were drooling at them, and the
married women had a dreamy look on their faces and in
their eyes. The married men, too, had goofy grins and
all of them were quite friendly towards Ranma. Ranma,
of course, did not understand what was going on and he
wondered why they were all acting so friendly all of a
sudden.

	'Must be some sort of Joketsuzoku festival or
something!' he thought to himself.

	Just as he was about to turn a corner, a voice
beckoned him.

	"Hold on there, sonny!"

	Ranma turned around and had a very frightening close
encounter of the face-to-face kind with one of the
younger Elders. She stood atop her staff, nicely
balancing her four-foot frame and eyed him,
speculatively.

	"Argh! A demon!" Ranma shouted and jumped high into
the air.

	The Elder snorted in disgust. She was at that ripe
age, where her looks were her worst enemy and to have
it pointed out to her in so rude a manner, just made
her want to puke and die in disgust. 'Children,
nowadays, are so disrespectful!' she thought,
indignantly.

	"It's little old beautiful me, and not some demon in
disguise," she said, sweetly, putting on her most ugly
smile to his horror. "Come down. I have a proposition
for you."

	Ranma released his ki and landed softly on the
ground.

	"Elder, forgive my insolence, but you're as ugly as
they come and..."

	Thunk!

	"Now, why did you have to go and do that?" Ranma
complained. It was his turn to act indignant now. "I
was just telling you the truth." He had hoped that his
long days of suffering under sticks and other torture
items were over, but apparently, one could not hope to
cheat fate.

	Thunk!

	Now, there were two matching bumps, one on each side
of his head.

	Hello, demon Ranma.

	Grin.

	The Elder waved her staff around and with a flourish,
brought it to rest by her side.

	Ranma raised an eyebrow at this display, while at the
same time, rubbing the bumps, gingerly.

	"Sonny, I want you to consider what I'm about to tell
you very, very carefully, before you make any
decision," she said.

	Ranma felt alarm bells going off inside his brain,
but decided to ignore it for the time being. She
wouldn't dare to attack him, would she?

	"Go on, Elder," he said, slowly in a measured voice.

	"Sonny, I have been observing you, since you stepped
into this village and I feel that a nice lad such as
you should not be walking around without a girl in his
arms. Therefore, being the gracious woman I am, I'm
offering my granddaughter to be wedded to you as your
wife..."

	Boom!

	When the sonic boom died away, the Elder looked at
the rapidly disappearing cloud of dust that was Ranma
and chuckled evilly.

	"Look's like son-in-law's a bit uncooperative. If
he's reluctant, then a more direct approach must be
taken," she spoke aloud.

	Lightning flashed in the background and a peal of
thunder shook the very air. The first shot in the
'Ranma, be my husband,' contest had been fired and
hell was about to break loose.

	Poor Ranma.

	Poor village.

	Poor, poor Ranma.

*****************************************************************

	Ranma's life took a turn towards the worse from that
day on and it just kept on getting worse. All eligible
girls in the village chased him, and threw themselves
at him every chance they got. The boys grew insanely
jealous and the girls steadily became increasingly
violent as time passed.

	Indeed, several times during the course of the first
week, huge brawls broke out between the girls, when
several prospective suitors tried to seduce him
simultaneously. Soon, the private brawls became huge
free for all hit-fests and toothless grins became that
much more common in the village.

	Eventually, the married ones decided they had enough,
and refused to work in the fields, until some sort of
agreement, regarding the rules and regulations of the
husband hunt were reached. The nights were very
memorable, sure, but the damage done during the
daytime was getting harder and harder to repair by the
day and soon enough, they'd be too tired to enjoy the
nights.
	
	An emergency council meeting was called, and it was
decreed that none should try to seduce Ranma, or drug
him, or force him to do anything he did not want to,
which was exactly what Shi Huu had advised before, but
now, the other Elders were a little more willing to
follow her words. Things slowly returned to normal
from then on, though the rivalries sparked during
those three weeks continued to fester for many more
years to come.

	Many of the boys in the village rejoiced at the fact
that Lein stayed clear of the brawls, until a chance
happening one day shattered their hopes.

	On that fateful day, Ranma met Lein on the way back
from one of his classes and she smiled at him. Of
course, Ranma fainted immediately, and one of the
bullies in the village, Yue Shi, who fancied himself
as one of Lein's suitors, decided to show an
unconscious Ranma what he thought of the newcomer's
carousing ways.

	He had not landed three blows on Ranma, when Lein
exploded in an uncharacteristic display of anger and
figuratively castrated him. His friends did not fare
much better.

	After that, it was generally accepted, though never
spoken vocally, that everyone should stay on Lein's
good side when it came to Ranma.

*****************************************************************

	Two months after the end of the husband hunting
season...

	Shi Huu sat facing Ranma in the middle of the glade.
Ranma listened to her, nodding every once in a while.

	"No, Ranma, Hai Fung was wrong. Two different types
of channels crisscross the human body. One is for ki
and the other is for mana. Ki is like Yang, it's
easily accessible and its nature causes its users to
grow stronger when they use it. Mana is like the Yin,
it's dark, mysterious and not easily accessible. It's
also vastly more powerful than ki, if you know how to
use it.

	"The body cannot survive without both ki and mana. As
the body ages, it uses more and more ki, and mana...
We die when the rate of consumption exceeds the rate
of production. Masters of The Art have found a way to
circumvent this process: With enough ki, the body can
live far longer than normal. This is what masters of
The Art strive to achieve. They train in their youth
and increase their ki potential manifold, so that they
may live for a long time.

	"However, this dependency on ki does have its
drawbacks. With so much ki in the body, there isn't
enough mana to balance it. The body adapts in such
that its very nature turns towards the Yin aspect.

	"This is why, I and the other older Elders are only
two-feet tall.

	"Getting back to the subject at hand, as the body
turns slowly towards the Yin, it needs more and more
ki to maintain the balance. When the Yin aspect
finally overtakes the Yang aspect, we die."

	Ranma nodded.

	"Master Hai Fung was only partly correct, then. I
guess this explains why I'm not able to activate, or
deactivate my curse using only my ki."

	"That's correct, Ranma," Shi Huu said, nodding, "your
ki provides only half the key needed to open the
lock."

	"Honorable One..."

	"Yes, Ranma?" Shi Huu looked up at her student, who
had risen up during the course of her speech.

	"Does this mean Master Hai Fung's theory about the
curse was correct? Will I truly be able to get rid of
my curse?" he asked.

	Shi Huu nodded.

	"Yes, Ranma... You're very close to becoming one of
the true masters of The Art...

	"Somehow, your body has learned to not only generate
huge amounts of mana, but also to manipulate it
subconsciously. That's why your aging process has
slowed considerably in the last eleven years. When you
truly master The Art, you'll stop aging altogether and
for all purposes, you'll become immortal. Once you
cross that point, you'll be able to control your
curse."

	Ranma nodded.

	"Thank you, Honorable One."

	Shi Huu smiled, looking at Ranma. He had adapted
admirably to life in the village and was adjusting to
the women much better than she had expected. He was
very lucky in that regard as almost all Musk, save a
few, were severely gynophobic and tended to avoid
women almost completely. The fainting spells he
suffered, whenever Lein giggled at him, had stopped
and the sparks of attraction that flew between them
had blossomed, though it would be another year, or
more, before their love became something beautiful. He
was, and most probably always would be, a clueless
nincompoop when it came to dealing with the opposite
sex, but at least he was learning and would be a
little better by the time he and Lein decided to tie
the knot.

	"Ranma, I wanted to ask you a personal question. Can
I?" Shi Huu asked, after a couple of moments of
silence.

	"Go on, Honorable One. I'll answer it, if I can,"
Ranma replied, lost in his thoughts.

	Shi Huu nodded.

	"How far have you taken your physical relationship
with Lein?" she asked intent on making the most of his
relaxed guard. Several times in the past month, Ranma
had gone missing for hours on end and when he
returned, he always had a goofy grin plastered all
over his face. She suspected that he was getting some
from Lein, but could not be sure. The boy could not be
probed without his knowing and countering it, and her
great, great granddaughter, too, could be very elusive
when she wanted to.

	Ranma, lost in daydreams in which he could control
his curse, did not pay particular attention to the
question. Even if he had, his mouth would still have
worked faster than his brain and he would have blurted
out the truth. Now, however, with his concentration
elsewhere, his mouth really decided to pull a fast
one, and swallow his entire foot and his ankles, too.

	"As far as possible," he said with a sly grin, "Lein
is... Lein is unbelievable in the sack!"

	Seconds passed.

	Finally, Ranma's brain caught up with his mouth and
comprehension dawned, along with embarrassment. His
hands went to his mouth too late and he stared at Shi
Huu, as if he were a deer caught in the headlights.
When Shi Huu did not react at all, he decided to take
the reprieve to run off some place, where he could
hide for the rest of his life.

	Three minutes after the cloud of dust caused by
Ranma's impromptu exhibition of 'Exit, stage left!'
settled down, Shi Huu's staff shook once, twice,
thrice and finally, collapsed, depositing her firmly
on the ground on her back.

*****************************************************************

	Two years later...

	"Lein, I'm home," Ranma shouted one early evening,
returning home after a long day of teaching advanced
classes in The Art. Usually, his wife would have
completed her appointments and would have dinner ready
to serve, but today, she wasn't.

	Just as he was beginning to wonder whether everything
was all right, Lein walked out of the kitchen, her
face glowing with sheer delight. She rushed to him and
hugged him with all her strength.

	"Long time no see," she said, gaily.

	Ranma hugged her back and kissed her gently on her
lips, before releasing her.

	"If I remember correctly," he said, his eyes gleaming
with mirth, "it was only this morning that I last saw
a certain brown-haired Goddess."

	Lein nodded.

	"Still, I missed you," she whispered into his ears,
snuggling into his chest.

	Ranma eyed his wife with curiosity. She was acting
strange, though he did not have any problem with it.
In fact, he could grow to like this kind of welcome
everyday of the week.

	"And may I ask why my beloved wife is so happy
today?"

	Lein's blissful smile grew tenfold and became dreamy.
She snuggled even closer to him, took his right hand
in her arms, and kissed it.

	"Yes, you may."

	"Well," Ranma said, "why don't you stop keeping your
poor, dear husband in the dark and tell him the reason
for your happiness." He took her head in his arms and
brushed his lips against her forehead.

	Lein responded by kissing him full in the lips and
hugging him even more tightly. Finally, she released
him, reluctantly and spoke.

	"I'm pregnant," she said, her voice a whisper.

	Seconds ticked by.

	Ranma stood silent for a long while, gazing at Lein
with absolute wonder. Finally, looking into her eyes,
he released her, threw his arms into the air in
exultation and hoorayed mightily. Then, he picked her
up by her waist, and whirled her round and round
around the room.

	Needless to say, Ranma and Lein did not sleep much
that night, and neither did their neighbors.

*****************************************************************

	Eight months later...

	The room was almost pitch dark. The only light in the
room was from the errant rays of starlight that
strayed into the room to caress the sleeping forms of
its two inhabitants.

	Presently, the sleeker of the two, a pregnant woman,
rose up and begun rousing her companion. Or rather,
tried to.

	"Ranma... Ranma... Get up..." she said, repeatedly.

	Ranma groaned sleepily, when he finally stirred.

	"Wake me up when I'm seventy," he murmured and
drifted back to sleep.

	Thwap!

	"Wake up!" Lein was fairly seething now. There she
was, having his baby right in the middle of the night
and he wasn't showing even the least concern.

	Ranma opened his eyes and looked at her through the
darkness.

	"What is it now?" he muttered, crankily. He had not
gotten much sleep during the last eight months. Lein's
emotions had been on a roller coaster during that time
and she had woken up at all kinds of unearthly hours
to cuddle with him, make him check the house and such.

	"I'm having your baby and you're here sleeping like a
hog," she replied, between a gasp of pain. She
clutched his arm and squeezed it hard as a
particularly powerful contraction hit her, followed by
the consequent wave of pain.

	"But you have been having it for the last nine
months, Lein. Lie down and try to get some sleep.
Whatever's bothering you can wait, until tomorrow
morning," he replied, submissively, yawning as he
spoke.

	Thwap!

	Ranma rubbed his pate, his drowsiness gone. For a
woman who had given up The Art nearly a decade and a
half ago, she sure could hit when she wanted to.

	"I'm having your baby right now, idiot," she shouted
and screamed as a smaller, less powerful contraction
hit her.

	Immediately, Ranma was up on his feet.

	"You are? Why didn't you say so before?" he asked.

	One stare was all it took for him to shut up. Even he
was bright enough to realize that opening his mouth
would be tantamount to suicide.

	"C'mon," he said, cradling her in his arms, "let's
get you to your grandmother's house."

	Lein nodded and put her arms around his neck.

	Lifting her, Ranma first made sure that she was
comfortable. Then, he summoned a trio of ki torches,
which floated in mid-air and painted the room with
eerie white light. Finally, he walked out of the
house, into the street and into Yein Luo's house.

	His daughter, a testament of Lein's and his love for
each other, was born roughly nine hours later. He
named her Shian Huei: Fairy Flower.

*****************************************************************

Notes:

	Jack and Jill... Oops! Wrong story! Hehehehe.

	1. Old people are wise, aren't they? Well, the Elders
are old and therefore, are called 'The Wise Ones.'

Old Author's notes:

	Well, that's the end of the first chapter.

	I have read fan fictions, in which the writers have
taken the Joketsuzoku's words at face value. We are
told that only a few of the Musk warriors survive in
the original Ranma universe, but we don't know for
sure. For the sake of this timeline, I'm assuming,
that the Musk were more powerful than the Joketsuzoku
in their heyday.

	The story can be found at the following webs: mine
[When I get around to updating it, which won't be
anytime soon. :p], Darkensis - the Red, The
Penultimate Ranma Fanfic Index, Yoruko's Den
(www.geocities.com/yoruko7), Getzeye's Fanfic
Page(http://getzeye.anifics.com), Lady Cosmos and the
FFML miniarchive.

	Much thanks goes to Jakub, Pete, Yanei Wu, Getzeye,
Lance Smith, Chelsea, Malikite, Alex, Patricia
Clarkson and Don Morales. They are the ones who made
this story what it is. I only smoothened the rough
edges and hoped that it'd be enough. ^_^

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