Huzzah, I feel like I've finally become a true Ranma fanfic author by recapping or redoing the Saffron fight for the first time.
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Gekkaja in hand, Ranma fell for what seemed like an eternity before he hit the steep slope outside of Mount Phoenix. High above him a tornado raged with the king of the Phoenix people, Saffron inside, sending massive boulders high up into the sky as it ripped a huge hole outwards from the hollow interior. Cursing as he tumbled uncontrollably, he lashed out with the staffs crescent moon head into the closet rock and came to a bone jarring halt.
“Please stop spinning world,” he begged squeezing his eyes closed and clutching the ancient weapon for dear life. ‘I’m going to throw up.”
Hearing the very disconcerting sound of heavy rain, he opened his eyes to see all the extra debris created by his hiryu shoten ha was coming to visit him instead of joining the bulk of it pummeling Saffron inside the vortex. Finding a hand hold, he pulled the gekkaja free in time to avoid a boulder larger than him destroying his previous perch. Leaping to the next available spot, a head sized chunk of rock nearly took his own off.
Up above, the top of the tornado ballooned out around a bright orange sphere, the winds increasing in intensity, and the funnel growing further in size.
‘Another fireball? That’ll just make it worse you moron,’ He shook his head and knocked away several head sized rocks.
He could feel the heat from Saffron’s flames warming the violent winds tearing at the side of the mountain. Flames beginning to erupt in violent spurts, the funnel remaining worryingly stationary overhead. An angry scream barely rose above the roar of the wind and Saffron threw his fireball back downwards through the twister. The ball barely started its descent before it was swallowed up by a dramatically widening funnel but above it the air grew still enough for Saffron to escape.
“Is that going to stop?” he gulped as his own ultimate technique fed off Saffron’s fireball and began to shake the entire mountainside. He didn’t know what might happen to the tornado if fed directly by a ball of pure fire and no longer just the hot air of a fighters ki.
Saffron buzzed like an angry hornet away from the destruction and down searching for him with a bright orange aura igniting around his body. Ranma caught sight of another piece of mountain in time to move again before he was crushed. He had barely landed when he heard the high pitched screech of the circular Kinjakan blade screaming towards him. Turning to face away from the mountain and release his hold, sliding out of the way of the magical blade that cut a deep furrow horizontally across the cliff face.
Screaming in pain he hit a piece of rock with his tailbone that refused to budge and went sprawling forward to land face first on a flat outcropping from a painfully far distance. “That hurt,” he reached back to rub at his sore backside without getting up.
A heavy weight crashed into his left leg followed instantaneously by the feeling of sharp blades burying themselves deep into the flesh of his thigh. Mouth open in a silent scream of agony, he was pulled up and carried out up into the sky. Barely able to keep hold of the Gekkaja, he dangled helplessly, every moment a new feeling of misery.
“You came because of Jusenkyo, isn’t that right landling peasant?” Saffron laughed cruelly, violently jerking with each flap of his golden wings in the direction of the cursed training ground. “Allow me to assist you to your destination.”
Crying out, Ranma rolled up and grabbed one of Saffron’s ankles with his free hand. Head dropping back limply, beginning to feel dizzy from blood loss and unrelenting pain. Saffron bounced upwards suddenly and released his talons, only to drive them in again. Ranma didn’t even try to scream, his body going limp to dangle underneath the phoenix, the Gekkaja dangling by a finger tip.
“Look at what you did, landling scum. I wonder what you’ll turn into when I drop you?” Saffron taunted but he could only dimly hear him.
His eyes struggled open to see the lake beneath him where the pools of Jusenkyo should have been. Bamboo poles sticking up alongside taller spouts of water, backfeeding uncontrollably from phoenix mountain with the water taps destroyed. But there were still a couple spots of land in the middle that hadn’t been overwhelmed yet.
‘Better than nothing,’ he gathered the last of his strength and gripped the Gekkaja with both hands and swung it up to drive the crescent moon blade deep into Saffron’s back, the pointed ends exiting out the front of Saffron’s chest. The phoenix released his leg and they both dropped like a stone to land on the last dwindling strip of land in the middle of Jusenkyo.
The next thing he knew, she was waking up from the curse activating and ripping her leg open in a different symphony of agony. Rolling over and away from the water spout that was now hitting her landing zone, she crawled towards Saffron as he struggled to reach his arms back to dig the Gekkaja out.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” she collapsed breathing heavily with her face in the dirt. Reaching down to tear off her pant leg, feeling sharp new spikes of misery as she jostled the limb about. Gathering enough material, she quickly used it to poorly tourniquet her shredded leg around her upper thigh. She didn’t want to consider how torn up her flesh was or the amount of blood that stained the muddy ground.
“I’ll-- kill-- you--,” he choked out, giving up reaching for the weapon to slash at her with his taloned hand. Ice starting to spread further and further over his body from where he was impaled, his regeneration and heat unable to stop it.
‘Well you may have,’ she conceded, no longer able to feel her legs, and with no way to get out of the pools in sight she’d probably pass out and drown before anyone else got here. Rolling onto her back she looked back at Phoenix mountain where the tornado had finally burnt itself out, and took half the peak with it. “Please be safe everyone,” she breathed out, patting her chest to verify that Akane’s dried up form was still with her. “We’re not.”
Turning away from the destruction of the phoenix’s home, she saw Saffron’s clawed hand locked in place reaching out to her, his body frozen completely solid by the Gekkaja.
Tenderly taking out the doll sized body of her fiance from her shirt, she took a haggard breath. “I’m sorry Akane, I couldn’t get you to the water in time.” The dolls eyes were still partially open but there was no time for her to get back to the mountain even if she still had two good legs.
As was her luck, one of the spouts of water spraying water uncontrollably straight from the source decided to change it’s angle enough to cover her with water. Akane, still in her hands, was suddenly her real size again and crushing her. “Chunky tomboy,” she wheezed and started to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Here she was going to die of blood loss and Akane was going to live but become some monstrosity worse than Pantyhose Taro.
Gasping with sudden realization, she slid out from underneath Akane. ‘The Gekkaja! I can freeze it all!’ Dragging herself past Saffron’s claw, she broke the staff free causing a spiderweb if cracks to spread over his body. “Let me help you cool off, your highness,” she pushed his rock solid body into the water, immediately feeling the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end as a warm red glow pulsed then spread over the water. Too tired to care, she tossed in the staff and dropping lifelessly onto her back.
Zx
“Ranma-- please wake up.”
She dimly heard Akane plead with her, drawing her back from blissful unconsciousness. Ranma had expected to be surrounded by a lake of ice by this point not a mix of colorful pudding, hardwood, snow, chocolate milk, and asphalt. All the bamboo poles had been replaced with candy canes, palm trees, or light poles.
“You’re alive,” Akane sobbed and crushed her in a hug.
“Am I?” she asked in a tiny whisper, having trouble believing that what she was seeing was real. The spouts of water that had been everywhere were now doing things like spitting up feathers, bubbles, or turning into twisty straw like shapes that stayed in place.
Her eyes tracked upward feeling that she was being watched. Hovering in the air was what looked like a small dragon, it’s long serpent body with limbs that were all from different creatures, twisted and coiling as it observed her. It made a pleased sounding name like a car horn before vanishing with a confusingly loud twig snapping noise and then reappear with a burst of popcorn popping near her leg.
“Akane, what is that?” She struggled against Akane who was still crying over her.
The little dragon creature was difficult to look at, like her eyes refused to focus or even accept it was there. Details about its form kept shifting like she was seeing multiple random creatures all overlapping each other. It did a quick little somersault with the sound of snapping fingers and all feeling suddenly returned to her leg and her weakness from blood loss vanished.
“What the hell happened to my leg?!” Ranma screamed, pushing the distracted Akane away so she would finally snap out of it. Her mangled leg was still covered in blood but had been replaced by one covered in red fur and ending in a hoof of similar color.
“I fix!” It cheered repeatedly in a high pitched voice and zoomed around them in a circle in excitement.
“This is not fixing!” She screeched at the small creature, reaching down to confirm that she wasn’t actually going crazy from blood loss.
“I’ll get it!” Akane reached out to grab the creature as it made its next pass around them. Her hand passed through its body as though it was made of smoke, its tiny legs, arms, and wings lagged behind the body before it snapped back together like a toy being reassembled. “I won’t get it.”
“I play too!” It exclaimed and a small platform popped up with a giant spring to fling a screaming Akane out into the chaotic mess of the pools.
“Akane!” She called out in alarm, her fiancé coming down to land in one of the few sections still water. Except there was no great splash but her bouncing back upwards like she had landed on a trampoline. Akane gave her a similarly confused look that the water was now no longer acting like a liquid.
“Fun!” It happily cheered and started laughing.
The entire world started to spin around her while she remained fixed. The creatures laughter causing random splashes of color splatter against the world that now reacted like a flat painting. It finally seemed to pay attention to what was happening to the surrounding area which made it laugh like piano keys being randomly struck by a toddler.
Ranma snapped her hands up to cover her ears and squeezed her eyes shut tight as the world around her became an impossible to understand cacophony of chaos. She felt like she was weightless, tumbling through a cold empty void one moment and the next she was crushed by the force of gravity in a sweltering sauna. Opening her eyes only briefly time slowed to an immeasurable crawl as she struggled to close them once again to shut out the impossible structures that danced around her. The creatures laughter solidified like it was concrete yet it poured into her ears like liquid.
And then it stopped, depositing her unceremoniously face first into a field of soft grass.
Groaning she pushed herself up to her hands and knee, her horse leg not allowing the movement, she threw up a flock of butterflies out of her mouth. Whimpering at the assault on her senses and mind, she rolled over into a sitting position. The nice open field or the pleasant sunshine and temperature barely registered after being put through whatever blender she had just experienced.
“OOOOOoooooh!” The dragon creatures voice sounded like it had found something it really liked. “I fix?” It asked, jumping in front of her face.
“Fix whatever, just please leave me alone,” she cried, falling over onto her side as another wave of chaos washed over her like electricity dancing over her skin, making various portions of her body feel light and others heavy, finishing with a burp that let the last butterfly escape her.
“Fixed!” It exclaimed happily doing a little dance that made it look like it had twenty legs and arms. “Bye bye Wild Horsey!” It waved it’s whole body like a hand and then folded in on itself like a piece of paper being crumpled up before vanishing into a small dot.
“Today can’t get any worse” She whimpered and tried to bury her head further into the grass.
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Muse has been struck.