Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ The Way of the Beast ❯ Chapter One ( Chapter 1 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Disclaimer: This is a parody inspired by the works of Ms. Takahashi. All characters that I have not created or borrowed from other sources are his. This is a Fan fiction and not meant to violate the rights of those who own the rights to the Ranma One Half series .I have no money and therefore not a good suing target. Thank you very much.

The Way of the Beast

Chapter One

Genma was looking for a way to train his son, ever since he had spent the last of his money on an all-you-can-eat special at that restaurant. He had meant to use the money to buy a rare training manual called the Nekoken, but now he didn't have a yen to his name. He needed something cheap and easy to teach his son. Or at least a good pile of bull plops to tell his son instead. Then the idea crept into his mind, an idea which could be used to train his son without Genma doing any work.

"Ranma, son, get over here. I have something very important to tell you." Genma said as he waited for his son to come closer to him so he could make his idea come true.

"Yes, Pops?" asked Ranma as he looked up to his father. The ten year old boy was just getting ready for his next training exercise. He was having fun with all of the work he was doing, even if it was sometimes not as fun as it could be.

"Son, I think it's time to kick your training up a notch. It is a tenant of the Saotome School of Anything Goes martial arts for the student of a master to create their own style of martial arts within the school. My own dearly departed master, god rest his soul for good, forced me to develop my own school based on my own personal skills. However, my styles were so powerful they had to be locked up for safety. When you're old enough for it to be safe, I will teach it to you. Yet it is your turn to shine! " said Genma as looked to see if his son was buying it. The boy's eyes were shining with joy, giving the older man thanks for the naivity of youth.

"So Pops, how do I do it? How do I make my style of martial arts?" asked Ranma, just shaking with excitement.

"I would recommend you either base it around something you know or something you love. However, this is part of the limits I must place on you as part of your training. While I can continue with training you in the raw Anything Goes school, you must work alone with only a few hints to develop your own martial arts. Your training begins now!" spoke the father as he smiled at his son.

Ranma smiled as he sat down where he was and began to think hard, sticking out his tongue as he did so. Genma left his son where he was as he tried to find some more money to ste... borrow. Or at least some one willing to pay for his victory saki.

In the Mind of Ranma Saotome...

Ranma was thinking hard on developing his own style of martial arts. He looked at the things he loved, and the major thing with came to mind was martial arts. It was his life after all, so it filled a large part of his heart. But even at this young age he knew, 'Making a martial art based on martial arts wouldn't be right, especially since Anything Goes lets ya learn any martial arts ya want. No, I have to try something else. But what else do I know and love?'

He looked over the information about martial arts in his mind and remembered something else. He knew, 'Many fighting styles are based on animals, so what if I used a style based on animals. Not just any animals, but all of them. I can use all of the powers of animals with my fighting skills.'

Then the truth hit him with a strong shock, 'To use all of the powers of animals, I'm going to have to know everything about animals. Where am I going to find that? It's not like I'm a zoo guy... or could I?'

'All of the answers I need will be at the zoo. If I can help out there and learn more about animals, I might be able to copy their powers for my own martial arts skills.' Ranma was so proud of his idea, he ran after his father trying to find him so he could explain it to him.

"Guess I better look at the bars for pops!" said Ranma as he headed to the market districts of the town they were staying at.

Training montage...

Ranma went to work learning everything he could about animals. His father managed to convince the zookeepers at the Tokyo Zoo to let Ranma help out part-time in exchange for knowledge of animals and for a paycheck. A paycheck Genma kept for paying the bills.

Ranma managed to be a great help with cleaning up the zoo with a modifed version of the Anything Goes style based on sweeping and mopping. The keepers kept Ranma from the animals for safety concerns, yet he was able to learn much from the vets in their employment.

Ranma also went to a boy's school with a certain lost boy as well. While in school, Ranma made use of the library by checking out all of the books on biology. Normally Ranma didn't like to learn, but since this was for his art, it gave him the motivation he needed. Teachers were surprised at his high grades in the natural sciences, given his rather lame scores in everything else beside physical education.

Ranma also watched the animals in the wild, could see what they could do and how they acted. From carnivore to omnivore to herbivore, he was becoming an expert in all things biological. This was expressing it's self in his fighting skills. He was moving more animal like, whether it was the quick strikes of a mantis or the slashing of tiger claws. Ranma continued to expand his knowledge of animals with scrolls on martial arts themselves, especially the estotric texts with all of the chi techniques.

Eventually, Ranma was able to discover a way to contact the chi connection which existed between all animal lifeforms. Chi was the lifeforce of all living things from inanimate objects like rocks to plants, animals and people. Ranma figured he could harmonize his own chi with those of the animals he knew so well. It took him weeks of medication, but he found the path to link with the beast kingdom.

Ranma found he could copy the abilities of an animal, just by focusing his chi on that animal. Focus on the strength of a bear, gain that strength only scaled to a human body. Think of a fish and he could breath water without gills. Think of a flea and gain the potential to leap tall buildings in a single bound.

This took three years since he started his path of martial arts skills. It took him another two years to experiment with this new martial arts technique. With the first breakthrough he could only do one animal ability at a time, which was limiting when contrasting it with the flexible of the root school. Yet with practice and study, he learned over time to duplicate more then one animal ability as long as it was the same animal. The next major breakthrough was the discovery of how to duplicate more then one animal at a time.

By the time Ryoga had challenged him to a duel behind the lost boy's house, Ranma was about to copy at least three animal abilities at once before he majorly drained his chi to exhastion. He was really hoping to demonstrate his new skills against Ryoga, who Ranma saw a powerful opponent. The boy with the umbrella had developed his own style from lessons on the streets, plus seemed to have a well-developed sense of strength and speed. As long as Ranma duplicated low end atributes of animals, like the strength of a boar, the match should be one of equals.

However, after waiting three days, Ranma slipped into unconciousness and was stolen away by his father. Buy the time he woke up, he was twenty miles to sea heading to China.

'Apparently, Pops wants to expand my training by taking me to China. He wants me to learn mainland schools of fighting. I just wish I could have left Ryoga a note about this. I'll just have to look him up when we get home and explain things to him. Still, Pops has a lot of faith in this training ground. What is so great about Jusenkyo?'

Much later...

Ranma still couldn't believe his father had taken him to a cursed training ground just because the old man couldn't read chinese. Ranma thought to herself, 'You would have thought he would have learned to read chinese given all of the martial arts created within that nation. I forced myself to learn to at least read several languages so I could find out more details on animal based martial arts, including chinese. If pops had just let me read the darn brosure instead of hidding it from me, I would be able to know what it was we were getting into.'

'Now I'm stuck as a girl half of the time, not to say that girls aren't a good thing. I just prefer not being one when I was born a boy. I had to relearn all of my martial arts again to fit with the changes in reach, strength and agility. Now he has pulled this engagemnt business on me as soon as we get back into Japan. Here we are at the Tendo home and dojo, home of my future fiancee and the Tendo style of anything goes.' thought Ranma as she knocked on the door, and waited for the answer.

"Ranma, my boy, welcome to my home. Where's my old friend Genma?" said a thin man with a moustache in a brown robe. Not to him was a pretty, short haired teen brunette in a traditional kimodo. Ranma really started to feel uncomfortable when the old man hugged her, giving him a good indication of her female body not being the son-in-law they had expected.

The male Tendo, as Ranma was guessing the man was, jumped back as if he had been bitten by a wild animal. He moved on to create the hourglass shape of a woman's body before he lost a battle against unconciousness. He fainted dead away in the middle of his own hallway. As he did so, two other girls had come running up from the inside of the house.

The first was taller and obviously older then the girl who had met him at the door. She was dressed in attractive clothing not too different from what a housewife might wear. Her long, lighter brown hair was tied behind her in a ponytail. The second girl had long hair as well, but it was a darker black which seemed to have a natural blue highlight to it in the right light. She was dressed in a martial arts gi as if she had been training before the door was answered. She was shorter then the other, and looked to be more of Ranma's age.

"Hello, I'm Ranma Saotome. Sorry about all of this, but I can explain everything which is happening." She told them as She waited for their reactions. She was very surprised at the actions of the one in the fancy dress as she started to poke and prod Ranma's breasts.

"I was expecting Mr. Saotome's son to be a boy, not a girl. Unless Mr. Saotome is not to well in the head or something." spoke the short haired girl as she continued to grope the breast.

"Could you quit it?" asked Ranma as she tried to slap the hand on her tits away.

The panda who had appeared from behind Ranma pulled out a giant sign which read, "I am perfectly sane. Not my fault the boy couldn't watch where he was going and got turned into a girl."

"Oh my, what a talented panda. I didn't think panda's knew how to write like that. How long did it take you to training it to do that?" asked the eldest girl from what the red haired woman could see.

"Nabiki, could you stop picking on our guest, she looks like she's been through enough at the moment. Hello, my name is Akane Tendo. My older sister Nabiki was the one... focused on your breasts. My oldest sister Kasumi was the one commenting on your panda. Do you practice martial arts and is it connected to how you trained your panda so well?" asked the girl in the martial arts outfit.

"It's a long story, but I do practice martial arts. As with Saotome school tradition, I am trying to create my own martial arts style. To become a master in my school I have to add to it's tradition with new martial arts. Currently, I am mastering a style of combat which allows me to mimic the abilities of animals using my chi and some kata." Ranma told the girls gather around her, figuring since this was a sister school and pops was going to engage him to them, they could be trusted.

"So does the Tendo tradition have a requirement for masterhood, and if so how far have you guys have come to mastering it. I mean I have been tring for the last five years to get my style to something which would be respectible for a master. How long have you been trying?" asked Ranma as she looked at the girls, trying to judge their combat skills.

"Kasumi and me mostly use martial arts as a way to keep fit and keep from getting fat. Akane is the only one of us who takes the training serious, and father hasn't been training anyone in the style for a long time. I also haven't heard of anything needed to become a master of the Tendo school. Then again I haven't heard about the Saotome school till today." said Nabiki, as she looked harder at Ranma.

"How would you like to test out you skills in a battle between you and myself? I would love to see this new style you have developed." asked Akane as she nodded in one direction, which was the same way the dojo was from what she saw from the outside.

Moments later...

Akane was getting ready for the battle between herself and Ranma. It looked like the redhaired, busty girl was standing like she wasn't ready for battle. The Tendo girl was getting annoyed that after all of the talk of a new style, this girl wasn't taking it seriously. So she told the Saotome girl, "I guess I'm going to force you to show your style. Hiyah!"

With that Akane run into an attack, fist pulled back for a rapid push of force. As she closed in on Ranma, her opponent said, "Shell of the Turtle" ! Ranma then moved his hands to block any attack which the redhead would be facing head on from Akane. Akane's fist connected with his forearm, only to stop like it was hitting harden bone. In many ways it did feel like she was puching directly into the shell of a turtle, only one with an even harder shell then she had experience before.

She pulled back as she shook off her hand from the sudden stop she had experienced. Before she could do anything, Ranma called out another attack, "Speed of the Wolf"! Then the Saotome girl attack with a number of super rapid strikes, yet instead of punched there was another form of attack. Ranma had decided to strike with tickle attacks on Akane, causing the girl in the gi to start to giggle uncontrollable.

The Tendo daughter was trying to get control of herself from this unusual attack. Ranma let up for a minute to allow Akane to make a retreat from the tickle fight, leaving the black haired girl to get angrier at the situation she was in. She thought to herself, 'She's not taking me seriously, she's treating this as a game more then a sparring match. The fact of the matter is her style is superhuman. I have to find a way to break her technique or to spring a surprise attack.'

Akane took on the mind she could beat Ranma with a fake out with her attack, as long as Ranma's turtle shell didn't cover his entire body. Preparing to launch what would be an obvious punch, she then moved into a sweeping kick against the legs of the other girl. Only to hit a solid obsticle again as it seemed Ranma's defense did extend to his legs.

Akane limped back a few feet as she felt the pain in her legs from hitting something hard. She was trying to avoid the blows she used to break concrete against the other girl, yet she was starting to consider using the rock breaking blows. Then again it would be consider rude by Kasumi to break the bones of a guest on their first day in the Tendo home. She needed a new plan to beat the red haired girl, yet nothing seemed to be coming up given her powers.

'It would be a whole lot easier if she was attacking me, then I could use her force against her. I wonder if those turtle and wolf powers would be any use if turned back on her. I just can't figure out a way to come out on top with these attacks, and it's bugging the hell out of me.' she thought as she circled Ranma, looking for a weak spot.

Finally she made her choice, "I just can't think of a way to over come your style. I might have some moves which could over come your defenses, I just don't want to bring it out in a friendly spar. Kasumi would kill me if I was to break your bones."

"I can see the strength in your moves, so I have no doubt you could break the strengthening the "Shell of the Turtle". However, there are a number of animals which have massive regenerative properties like certain lizards or starfish. Any one of those could be used by myself to heal my wounds with rapid speed." Ranma said as she walked up to Akane and shook her hand.

"I just glad you're not a boy, " she told her as she took Ms. Saotome's hand. She continued, "No offense, but I hate boys!"

Ranma just frowned at those words.

Later in the Tub...

Ranma was thinking over the fact he was going to have to tell the Tendos, he could change sexes with the application of water. He had already turned back into a male in the tub and was deciding on the wording of his next little talk with Mr. Tendo and his daughters.

'I know it will be important, but I also know if I was them, I would be freaking out at the new. I shouldn't be surprise if they don't react the best when confront with the curse. I'm glad I forced myself to become more educated during my studies of the veternary sciences. I think many of my rougher edges got smoothed off under the guidance of my sensei.' Ranma thought as he rose from the tub to dry off.

"Of course, being the son of Genma Saotome does cause a lot more rough edges to emerge." Ranma said to himself as he dried off. Only for the door to open while he was naked and Akane to step in, also naked. They looked at each other with saucer eyes before Akane stepped out of the room, then screaming her head off.

'I must be cursed in more ways then one. Likely due to who my father is.' Ranma thought as he wrapped a towel around him.