[Ranma] Identity (rewrite)

[Jason_Miao]

[2012-09-17 21:10:32] < Muphrid> (Re: the Nine all understanding Japanese.  This probably does need at least a throwaway line about some translation.)

Just a minor point, but there are a number of people in the grandparent generation who do speak and understand Japanese, because of the Japanese occupation of portions of China during the war.  So having the Nine understand Japanese is not so as farfetched as it might seem at first glance.

[Muphrid]

That's a fair point.  Though I must confess some fuzziness regarding how far inland the Japanese got and whether these people in particular would have known Japanese as a result.

So, I guess I can see weakening that concern to maybe it should be explained that all the Japanese is being translated.  Something to think about, at any rate.

[Muphrid]

All right, so after some putzing around with First Ones and stuff, I've completed a revision of chapter four to address some of the concerns.

The changes are as follows:

Spoiler: ShowHide

1) The timeline has been shifted so that, as Arakawa suggested, the Amazons do not learn that their people have been taken too until after Shampoo and Cologne go before the Council.
2) Shampoo confesses to Cologne that she attacked Akane prior to the Council receiving them, in a rewritten scene that is third-person from Shampoo's perspective.
3) Cologne uses a faked thumbprint on her letters to further solidify her accusation against Bindi, but Bindi refuses to lift Shampoo's censure, fearing the consequences of being so soft.  Cologne is still popular among the people, and Bindi agrees to have her named as the head of the Amazon war party as a compromise.  The true reasons for this agreement are not made public to the Council.

Some things I'd hoped to work in but couldn't quite find a way how:
4) Cologne going over Ukyo and Akane's stories.  Since she is no longer really surprised by them, I felt it wasn't needed anyway, as well as length concerns.

Any other changes should be fairly minimal.

[Muphrid]

Here's a draft of chapter five.  One thing I'm concerned about:

Spoiler: ShowHide

It ends up being very back and forth--the party goes into Jusenkyo, then they retreat out again, then they resolve to go back in.  Not real sure if that's okay or if there's a better way to structure things here.

[Arakawa]

Seems fine (aside from some stuff with Ukyo in the first scene) so... to contribute a couple mostly stylistic observations:

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Ukyo flashback scene with her dad:

Down the road, a mechanical crab wriggled its legs and closed its pincers, as if the aroma of hot butter sent shivers down its shell.

Whole description leading up to this is very neat. (Is it mostly fanciful, or are you working close to reference materials?) Here, though, I'd say something like "down the back of its shell" or "down the length of its shell".

Hmm, I'm not sure about this scene working as their reunion after X years where Ukyo refuses to meet her father and stops answering letters. It's a good excuse for the exposition but... if Ukyo is stubborn about honour, she doesn't have to compound it quite that way. She can, just as an example, instead have always been insistent that she needs to rectify her dishonour (which precludes being able to live with her family), and her father can be deeply unhappy about it while still respecting her wishes. (Which he does in the current scene as well. It's how Ukyo hasn't bothered to keep in touch that's the problem.) That kind of situation would make sense if they're this ultra-serious martial artist okonomiyaki chef dynasty.

On the other hand if Ukyo has been pursuing Ranma (first for revenge and then for marriage) at the cost of falling completely out of touch with her family, stuff like this winds up ringing particularly hollow ("you would've had a place like this five years ago"):

"You don't think they owe us something?" Ukyō demanded. "If that cad Saotome Genma hadn't stolen our cart, you would've had a place like this five years ago. This is business, Father. If you pay for something, you expect to get it. You don't expect a promise to made in bad faith. The terms of the pact you make should be fulfilled. That's the right thing to do."

Anyhow, this is just my opinion. It probably merits an IRC discussion at some point as to the full considerations of Ukyo's backstory and what she is or isn't likely to do.

The battle closes:

"We will," said Ryōga, "but the old woman is organizing something help out. Have a look."

Probably "something to help out".

Not sure about uses of "brothers and sisters" vs. "sisters and brothers" or such. (Don't remember what note we ended on with the whole 'how matriarchal is amazon society?' question.)

FWOOSH! Jets of flame spewed from his sleeves, and the heat tingled on Ukyō's face. The flour ignited, casting the sky aflame, and the rest of the party quickly ran out from under the falling, burning powder.

Hmm. It occurs to me that a cloud of airborne, flammable particulate matter would explode in place rather than just catch fire and fall down. (See: coal dust explosions in mines.) Which would be a lot more difficult to avoid if you were caught in it, but a whole lot more destructive if you aimed it properly. See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_explosion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flour_bomb
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIkk0D2tUU8 -- a bit different from your situation in that the flour is packed in bags around a firework

That sort of thing might be what you had in mind, but the actual description comes across as a bit underwhelming. This isn't an essential detail, though.

[quote
"Ukyō-sama! Ukyō-sama!"

She shook—from the cold air on her wet skin, from the pair of hands that jostled her. Ukyō blinked as daylight reached her eyes again. Feeling battered and sore, she sat upright, wincing.

"Good, you're awake," said Cologne, for once without her customary walking stick. "I'm glad you didn't require too much resuscitation."[/quote]

Maybe instead of "pair of hands" mention specifically "Konatsu's hands jostling her", to make it absolutely clear just who is speaking at the beginning of that scene.

Another flashback with revelation:

Second flashback needs to be more clearly delineated; either use past perfect (?) (i.e. 'had') more consistently or do something else that makes it immediately obvious at the beginning rather than jumping into a line of dialogue.

Going back:

Ukyō tossed two tempura bombs at the wall, and the explosions blasted an opening at the base of the wall.

Repetition of 'wall'.

Ending:

I was fine with the back-and-forth. It does give the sense that battling the Sorcerers is an uphill struggle. I think there's a bit of sound reasoning that might be made more explicit: the first party consisted of Amazons going in force, many of whom were only tangentially concerned with the matter. It was repulsed, and the priority was to rescue whoever they could. The second party is much smaller: it consists of the people who are directly concerned with the situation, and some elites (who presumably are relatively more dedicated to war, have a duty to lay down their life for much lesser causes than the bulk of the warriors). The risk turns out to be too great to warrant the ordinary soldiers, though.

Or something like that. I see a certain logic to it. I assume you can ignore that, or rework it however you want to fit with what you think to be the general Amazon view of things (and when they might consider something to be too risky to send the entire army for -- a pragmatic concern which is somewhat in conflict with matters of honour).

Edit: another thing is that I found it difficult (though not impossible) in this chapter was to keep track of which water was cursed and which wasn't, what with all the different kinds of moisture everywhere. This may be because I'm not too familiar with the layout of Jyuusenkyo, so I think you can assign whatever importance you feel like to looking over that aspect of things.

[Jason_Miao]

A brief comment, before I forget:

[spoiler]

Ryōga raised an eyebrow. "Heat-absorbing batter?" he echoed.

"It could be useful!" argued Ukyō.

All cooked food ought to be "heat-absorbing", or something is terribly wrong.

Might I suggest "ablative"?  Ablation is the process (by losing little bits of the material, and drawing some heat away with those bits) by which space shuttles stay cool enough not to burn up during reentry into the atmosphere, and I've seen several game/book universes treat "ablative" as a synonym with heat-resistant.

I didn't think that a repulsed attack, with a vow to return, had anything wrong with it per se.

[Arakawa]

A dissenting opinion:

Spoiler: ShowHide

I don't have a problem with 'heat-absorbing batter'. It could be batter that is far more effective at absorbing heat than normal batter, and perhaps was designed for that specific purpose.

As another example, even with my rant about flour generally exploding, I still think 'exploding flour' makes sense. It's just flour that explodes MORE than usual.

That said, 'ablative' has its own sort of ring to it.

[alethiophile]

Without having read the passage in question, but only the past two replies...to me "heat-absorbing batter" implies batter with a high specific heat and probably a high melting/vaporization temperature, whereas "ablative batter" implies batter that is lost (presumably scattered into the environment) in the course of defending against something. Something could be both, but they're not by any means synonyms.

And that phrase is making me want to read the story, even though I don't ordinarily read Ranma fic. Mayhaps I will.

[Muphrid]

Whole description leading up to this is very neat. (Is it mostly fanciful, or are you working close to reference materials?) Here, though, I'd say something like "down the back of its shell" or "down the length of its shell".

Hmm, I'm not sure about this scene working as their reunion after X years where Ukyo refuses to meet her father and stops answering letters. It's a good excuse for the exposition but... if Ukyo is stubborn about honour, she doesn't have to compound it quite that way. She can, just as an example, instead have always been insistent that she needs to rectify her dishonour (which precludes being able to live with her family), and her father can be deeply unhappy about it while still respecting her wishes. (Which he does in the current scene as well. It's how Ukyo hasn't bothered to keep in touch that's the problem.) That kind of situation would make sense if they're this ultra-serious martial artist okonomiyaki chef dynasty.

On the other hand if Ukyo has been pursuing Ranma (first for revenge and then for marriage) at the cost of falling completely out of touch with her family, stuff like this winds up ringing particularly hollow ("you would've had a place like this five years ago"):


Anyhow, this is just my opinion. It probably merits an IRC discussion at some point as to the full considerations of Ukyo's backstory and what she is or isn't likely to do.

I've looked around a couple places to get a reasonable description of Doutonbori, though perhaps not to the level of detail and accuracy that I would've liked.

So, with Ukyo, the intention was more that Ukyo hasn't ever responded to her father's letters, and more that he only just even tracked her down relatively recently.  But maybe that's the gist of your concern--that it makes little sense for Ukyo to have cut off all contact.  And if that's the case, I think I agree with that.  The vibe and scene would work just fine if she'd been in contact with him but simply refused to come "home" until finishing things with Ranma.

I was fine with the back-and-forth. It does give the sense that battling the Sorcerers is an uphill struggle. I think there's a bit of sound reasoning that might be made more explicit: the first party consisted of Amazons going in force, many of whom were only tangentially concerned with the matter. It was repulsed, and the priority was to rescue whoever they could. The second party is much smaller: it consists of the people who are directly concerned with the situation, and some elites (who presumably are relatively more dedicated to war, have a duty to lay down their life for much lesser causes than the bulk of the warriors). The risk turns out to be too great to warrant the ordinary soldiers, though.

Indeed, I think I will dwell on this matter a bit more, then, exactly for this reason.

Edit: another thing is that I found it difficult (though not impossible) in this chapter was to keep track of which water was cursed and which wasn't, what with all the different kinds of moisture everywhere. This may be because I'm not too familiar with the layout of Jyuusenkyo, so I think you can assign whatever importance you feel like to looking over that aspect of things.

Right, so the waters from the Phoenix and Dragon Taps are "blank."  They are the source for the rest of the springs, but they should not be cursed yet (even though canon refers to that water as "cold cursed water").  Ukyo will probably benefit from having this clarified, too.


Regarding "heat-absorbing" batter--I'm thinking either scrap the line or have Ryoga point out that all batter should be heat-absorbing, yeah.  Heh. :P  But it can definitely be more heat-absorbing (endothermic) than usual, right?

I'm now tempted to use the word "endothermic"...

Ablative batter could be defensive (like losing material in the process of forming a shield), or it could be offensive, right?  In terms of wearing down some material?  Interesting possibilities here.

[Jason_Miao]

Something could be both, but they're not by any means synonyms.

Agreed, in terms of the real meaning.  There's the definition of a word, and there's how it's commonly used in writing.  They're not always the same.

Another example of the same: "decimation" is usually used by writers (and not just fanfic writers) as a synonym for "devastation" or "utter destruction".  It actually refers to the specific practice of singling out a fraction of a group of people and killing them, in order to instill fear into the rest - which makes the group controllable.  Killing everyone would defeat the purpose of an actual decimation, but the term is frequently used as if it meant to "kill everyone".

I recommend the word ablative because, in fictional writing, it's usually treated as being a synonym with highly resistant resistant protection from heat.  And since the actual mechanics of how the batter resists heat are unlikely to matter, why not claim that it protects from heat that way?  (Also, I think the thought of a okonomiyaki batter that prevents whatever it's wrapping from being cooked by falling apart/evaporating is amusing, but that may just be me.)

I wouldn't use the word for an offensive-batter ("corrosive", perhaps?) because while it would make sense in the context of the actual meaning, most readers would just be confused as to why "heat-armored" okonomiyaki batter just melted someone's foot.

So, with Ukyo, the intention was more that Ukyo hasn't ever responded to her father's letters, and more that he only just even tracked her down relatively recently.  But maybe that's the gist of your concern--that it makes little sense for Ukyo to have cut off all contact.  And if that's the case, I think I agree with that.  The vibe and scene would work just fine if she'd been in contact with him but simply refused to come "home" until finishing things with Ranma.

Hmm...it would be very "Ranma 1/2-ish" to have the reason she's not answering letters is because she moved around so much that the letters keep getting forwarded to her new addresses, but having caught up yet.  And of course, postal delivery gives the letter to her while they're both talking.

Also like Ranma 1/2, that would kill most of the serious nature of the reunion.  Since in the previous story, I didn't  get a handle on what you wanted to do with Ukyou long-term, I don't know whether the option hurts or helps whatever you're eventual goals are for her, so if you actually need the drama and not just a reason explaining why Ukyou suddenly has a father...

[Muphrid]

Interesting perspective on the common uses of ablative.  It does seem consistent more with the idea of ablative armor (like on tanks), so that's no problem with me.  Whether I want to go with ablative batter armor, on the other hand, is something I'm gonna chew on.

As far as the letters go, I guess it's just the compressed nature of the rewrite that there's not enough space for Ukyo to have ignored her father's letters (for any reason, sensible or not) only to break down and see him now.  Being reluctant to see him, however, or to leave Tokyo and Ranma, is another matter.  Having the letters constantly miss her does sound like a good gag, but I would have to think on how she'd know where her father had set up shop if that were the case.

Anyway, since there are several drafts scattered throughout the thread, and a couple people have expressed some possibility of interest in reading the rewrite, I've collected the latest versions of the drafts in one place at http://muphrid.net/~michael/writing/identity/.

[Muphrid]

So, it's been a while on this thing.

Here's a draft of chapter six.

And since it's been a while since the last chapter was posted for comments, here's a short recap of what's been happening to this point.

Spoiler: ShowHide

The story began with Ranma returning to China, bankrolled by Kuno, to claim his cure, but a group of tribal Sorcerers had already arrived at Jusenkyo, abducting the Guide.  Ranma managed to free the Guide, but not before inadvertently revealing his own knowledge of Saffron, the Sorcerers' true goal.  The Sorcerers took Ranma instead, bringing him to their village.

The Sorcerer village proved difficult to escape.  A group of channelers, sequestered in a guarded tower, were constantly maintaining a magical maze that thwarted Ranma's attempt to leave.  Instead, he was taken to see the leader of the Sorcerers, a woman named Sindoor.  Sindoor revealed to Ranma the Sorcerers' motivations: two decades before, a Sorcerer named Bailu was their captain in a war against a neighboring people.  Bailu lost control of his magic and unleashed a devastating spell that crippled both Sorcerers and their enemies alike.  The Sorcerers seek out Saffron to become their new "Sieve," a means to containing magic before it runs amok.  Ranma attempted another escape, assaulting the channelers, but was thwarted again and resolved to help the Sorcerers with their quest for Saffron for a time, long enough to find some way to escape on his own.

The Sorcerers sent a party to Jusenkyo to use the mountain there as a base of operations, but they were harassed by a party of the Sorcerers' enemies--the Amazons.  As Ranma began to learn Sorcerer magic, he teamed up with these Amazons to establish contact (via radio) with the Amazon village, alerting the Amazons of their capture.

With that news, Cologne, Mousse, and Shampoo returned from Japan to try to convince the Amazon leadership that a war party should be sent to rescue Ranma and their captured people.  To do this, Cologne attempted to invoke the Last Right:  the right of a wife to pursue her husband's body without restriction.  To provide evidence that Shampoo was (in the eyes of the law) Ranma's wife, Cologne called upon Akane, Ukyo, Ryoga, and Konatsu to join them in China and help give testimony, but Cologne was thwarted by hostile elements of the Council.  Only by blackmailing them could Cologne force the Council's hand and gain control of a party.

The Amazon war party launched an assault on the Sorcerers at Jusenkyo, but the resulting battle disrupted the water supply of the springs, causing a massive eruption of cursed water.  It is there, as the area around Jusenkyo is flooded and awash with creatures cursed by multiple springs, that Ranma, taken prisoner by the Sorcerers, awakens in a cell....

[Arakawa]

A few typos that I missed in the previous round. (I'm going by the versions on your website.)

Spoiler: ShowHide

Chapter 1

Ranma dashed in after them, coming after the girl, but a golden barrier rose between him and her, protection the girl in a shimmering sphere.

Should probably be 'protecting'.

"Fortune that you broke the castk," the Guide insisted. "That's why you come, no?"

Typo.

Chapter 2
In retrospect, "the Communist Party forced them into hiding" is actually a fairly clever explanation for why Sorcerers and magic used to be a things, but now are no longer common knowledge....

There are a lot of weird typos, or things-that-might-be-typos in the latter part of the chapter, at least in the version on your website; I'll just list them and you can check the relevant text:

the last of her warmth died away, leaving him to still and lifeless room

when mention Saffron comes to me

men seek destroy everything that opposes them

The Sieve has meditated mediated

Tilaka was like a burglar, going through the desk draws and filing cabinets

rushing the helpless spellcasters to the to the rest of the tower

Also, I'd reword:

as amicable as the situation can be

Maybe "as amicable as the situation will allow" or such? Your usage is a bit weird in context.

Chapter 3

Didn't notice any typos in this chapter.

Sorry that my re-reading is proceeding slowly; I'm off on a somewhat hectic two-week trip. I'll post feedback on Chapter 6 when I get to it....

[Muphrid]

Thanks for the catches; I've committed and pushed changes to the website regarding those errors.

[Arakawa]

Chapter 4

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"No doubt it is admirable to send dozens or hundreds of men away to save just one of our own," Bindi had said back then,

In the context of even somewhat-matriarchal Amazons, using 'men' as a counter jumps out a bit. I'd change it to use some other word. (You could perhaps make an argument for using 'men', but not easily develop it in-story... even while their original language may or may not make the distinction the way English tends to do.)

The Amazons as a people might stand idle, incapable of decision-making, for days to come unless a major break in situation came.

Maybe 'break in the situation'?

Chapter 5

Spoiler: ShowHide

You don't expect a promise to made in bad faith

Maybe 'to be made'?

She holes and rips in her outfit she left unpatched,

Perhaps 'The holes and rips in her outfit'?

It was a slow process, and for that, the precession into the Maze was deathly quiet.

??? 'precession' ???

Isn't that a thing planetary bodies do? Perhaps 'procession'?

and when an arrow came close, they merely soared higher, out of reach. Even Ryōga's bandanas, which he hurled repeatedly in an endless stream.

Second sentence is a jarring sentence fragment.

Maybe something like "they merely soared higher, out of reach -- even of Ryoga's bandanas, ...".

Ukyō tossed an open cannister of flour,

Perhaps 'canister'? (Not sure about this, though. Google seems to throw up evidence for either spelling, with no obvious regional distinction.)

an unusual gesture to throw a lit match,and—

Missing space after the comma.

I remember quibbling about 'falling, burning powder', so you can just refer to my earlier C&C about it; feel free to ignore my quibble, though....

in twos and threes around the Jusenkyō,

Using 'the' with Jusenkyo may be a bit unusual....

"Briefly, perhaps!" cried Cologne, her robes whipping in the wind. "if we're close to our target, it may keep the Sorcerers occupied long enough."

Punctuation or capitalization. Either 'in the wind' should be followed by a comma, or "if we're close" should be capitalized ("If we're close").

Akane and Ukyō followed, repelling down the sheer wall with the bundles of noodles serving as ropes.

??? 'repelling' ???

Perhaps that should be 'rappelling'.

Ukyō repelled the rest of the way down gradually

Again, 'repelled' seems not right here.

And now for the main event....

Chapter 6

Spoiler: ShowHide

First some minor corrections:

he didn't want sense of paralysis and fear to take control of him again,

Seems like there's a missing word here; something like 'he didn't want that sense of paralysis and fear'.

but that just a strong front.

'but that was just a strong front.'?

a day that had nerve-racking for Ranma

'that had been nerve-racking'?

That sense of disorientation, of wondering and confusion,

Should that be 'wondering and confusion', or 'wandering and confusion'? (I genuinely can't tell which one....)

I'd have to be a blind idiot not to, and Ōsaka has enough idiots already.

What does Osaka have to do with this? (They're in Tokyo, right?)

"You're wrong, Ucchan. Akane isn't like that now. Too much has happened for things to be like that."

...

Akane looked to the griddle. "Hello, Ukyō. Has Ranma been making a pass at you for long?"

I don't really share Brian's immediate skepticism for the Ranma/Akane pairing, but... ouch. (Discussed in 'more general impressions' below.)

"You go sneaking around without telling me, and now you make fun of my dead mother?You're worse than nothing, Ranma."

"mother?You're" has a missing space.

Chapter Feedback

The 'beetle the size of a Volkswagen' was an amusing touch. (I notice your writing style involves doing lots of shout-outs and references, including ones that it might not make strict sense for Ranma to know about. This was the first one that I actually found amusing, though. Well, okay, that and the reference to Nethack; but before this chapter they were ignorable at best, and sometimes slightly distracting. This is a personal point, so you probably don't want to consider changing it....)

I liked the scene of Ranma in the sorcerer-priest's laboratory inside a collapsing mountain. For whatever reason, the basic fact of them being cut off from everyone else like that works to give the Jyuusenkyo setting a thrilling sense of scale that wasn't present in your earlier descriptions. (And goes to show that descriptions aren't the only thing that serves to give a sense of the setting.)

(The early portions of Ranma treat it as just this place; whereas it is obviously an ancient site of power and every tribe within a hundred miles has some kind of interest in it.

I also haven't read the Saffron arc, so I'm not sure how much work canon already does to give a clear sense of the layout and infrastructure of the location, and how much additional work you may want to do to ensure the grandeur kicks in earlier.)

--

I'm not sure how much Cologne should be able to infer from the Ranma/Shampoo scene here, regarding their earlier confrontation; I think it would be wise to go back and double-check this scene against what she's supposed to know when preparing to go before the Twelve, when she suddenly discovers Shampoo has been keeping things from her.

More general impressions

It was interesting to re-read the whole fic up to now and take stock of my impressions. I think I said before that there are two disparate threads here, the first being the adventure-story in an exotic location and the second being the Ranma/Akane romance. The real challenge is to make both of these things interesting and relate them to one another.

The adventure-story aspect of things is very well done; I enjoyed putting on the soundtrack to Wild China while reading the Amazon council portion. It also seems like there's a solid series of hooks and reveals (in terms of things like: Ranma really being the next Sieve candidate (if I understand correctly), the Riverfolk turning out to be Amazons, and whatever weird thing it is the Sorcerers do with curse water (that has yet to be explained)). There are elements that seem to foreshadow that something will happen without necessarily divulging what (e.g. what happens if the Sorcerers realize that Ranma and not Saffron is the guy they want for Sieve?).

The setting is also fairly lush, and is sort of an element of interest in itself. Something like the details of the Council of Twelve and Amazon politics, I found added an enjoyable amount of detail to the adventure. If you might consider polishing the worldbuilding further, that's only because the part that's done already works very well.

One minor detail of worldbuilding it occurs to me you could add, for example: so far, you've only called the ki Sorcerer tribe 'Sorcerers'. However, is that really the tribe's proper name? Much like the world-at-large calls the Joketsuzoku tribe 'Chinese Amazons', and the Sorcerers call them 'Riverfolk', while the Amazons in the fic call themselves both 'Amazons' (in a casual context) and 'Joketsuzoku' ('Village of Woman Heroes' -- the tribe's proper name), you could give the Sorcerers a second 'formal' name that's a bit less generic. I notice they have (or had) Princes -- are they a Kingdom of some kind, much like the Amazons style themselves a Village?

Thus you could continue calling them 'Sorcerers', but establish that they have a formal name, something more flowery and appropriate to them being in China, the way 'Village of Woman Heroes' works for the Amazons. The Sorcerers' Ki manipulation is only superficially similar to Western sorcery anyways, much like the Amazon tribe is no relation of the Greek Amazons....

Now, on to the romance aspect of things, which is an entirely separate thread from the main story, and which you're delivering via flashbacks so far in this iteration....

I don't know, my thoughts here are still coalescing as to what the exact problem is, but here's my best attempt to explain for now.

Akane glared daggers at him. "You won't tell me you love me. You go sneaking around without telling me, and now you make fun of my dead mother?You're worse than nothing, Ranma. Do you hear me? You're not even a man!"

Not a man.

So that's what he needed to prove to her. That's what she wanted to see from him.

In terms of backstory, this seems to be the scene you've been building up to for, to justify Ranma's determination to get a cure this time at any cost. The connection here is utterly tangential, though; it's more like Akane has flown off the handle in the usual fashion, and then Ranma has flown off the handle at the 'not even a man' comment and is using the issue of his curse (if unconsciously) as a way to escape the basic issue of not being able to deal with Akane when these kinds of situations arise....

I think the basic problem Ranma actually has to confront is what to do about these kinds of quarrels. Either Akane is going to stop picking fights of her own accord (which is an idea this scene explicitly and thoroughly josses, to the extent of Ukyo lampshading the notion for us), or Ranma is going to have to figure out some different way to respond to her, that curbs her unreasonable behaviour. (Basically, in a way that makes it clear to Akane that either she has to make an effort to be more reasonable, or (as a matter of basic obviousness) things will not be able to work between them. In this scene, however, Ranma seems to me to be acquiescing in a way that validates her unreasonable behaviour.) Ranma's fetch-quest to Jyuusenkyo is basically a distraction from this main issue.

So, either Akane needs to change; and, after the degree of uncharitable behaviour she exhibits in this scene, this will take a lot of work on her end to motivate. Or Ranma needs to use the subsequent events in the main story to realize what the real problem is, which will ironically make the curse be a secondary issue again.

At the very least, the narrative needs to be more in tune with this glaring irony.

---

I mean, whereas in canon Akane could blow up at Ranma in this way, and Ranma was ineffectual in dealing with her because it worked in the service of comedy, having her do the same thing in the context of a fic that plays itself straight comes across as varying degrees of painful, depending on how much involvement the reader has for the characters. But, now that you're established this character interpretation, I can't predict how you're going to fix this dynamic without explicitly departing to a different interpretation.

A minor problem is that the Ranma/Akane scenes are sometimes a bit digressive from the main story thread. This is not because of their length, but more because of their emotional payload, which does not always fit in the flow of the adventure narrative. So far, I don't think that's been a large problem up to now; it should be folded into the broader problem I mentioned earlier that 'Ranma and Akane's fight doesn't motivate Ranma's trip to China'. If the motivation for Ranma going to Jyuusenkyo as a result of these events (or a slightly different sequence of events, maybe) is made more clear, then the flashbacks with Akane will be a more organic part of the story in terms of narrative and motivation (like the Shampoo flashbacks currently are).

The flashback scenes with Ukyo occur less often, and work well because Ukyo is a much more reasonable person than Akane, so the emotional content in them is less distracting. She also has a scene occurring at Dotonbori which (with the very well written description of the street and Ukyo's father's restaurant) is a minor setpiece in itself, and works to keep things interesting. (Adds depth and variety to the setting, basically.)

The flashback scenes with Shampoo work well because, while Shampoo is also highly unreasonable, her unreasonableness is more... justified by her culture and upbringing, I guess? In any case, it's more understandable; also, since the pairing is Ranma/Akane, Shampoo's flaws are not something that needs to be overcome to the same extent as Akane's flaws, for the overall fic to work.

Moreover, the Shampoo flashbacks tie in very well into the main-story thread involving Amazon politics; so they don't feel like digressions plot-wise. (They're preparing to face the Nine, Cologne discovers unexpected complications, then a flashback is perfectly timed to explain what the complications are.)