At last we’ve made it inside of Shishio’s laboratory. We’re just one step away from getting Shishio’s legacy! At least that’s what we thought. We wound up being bounced around all over the place, and it got hairy when Sanosuke got his final showdown with Kenshin! But Kenshin really came through! He beat Sano fair and square! Now it’s our turn! We’re charging in full speed ahead!

Wind howled desolately around the ruined building where once Makoto Shishio, the Red Priest, had researched his dire magics and plotted the domination of the world. A gust blew through the blasted doors and down the central staircase, but lost itself long before it reached Kaoru Kamiya and her friends, still descending into unknown depths.

Yahiko collapsed at the head of yet another staircase. “Oi, busu, just how deep is this laboratory anyway?”

“How am I supposed to know?” Kaoru retorted. “Come on, we have to get down there before Yumi and Shishio!”

“But it’s so deep!” Misao objected.

“Hmm.” Kaoru peered into the darkness below. “We didn’t get much of an idea of just what Shishio’s legacy is, but if it’s hidden this deep, it’s got to be something special!”

“Whaddya mean?” Yahiko demanded, as Aoshi started down the stairs on his own.

“Pretty unpredictable things can happen when you experiment with magical techniques,” Kaoru explained. “That’s why it’s good to build your lab deep underground.”

“In case whatever you’re working on goes out of control,” Aoshi added without turning around. “You can protect some of the surrounding area.”

“Out of control?” Yahiko gulped.

“That’s right,” Kaoru went on. “I found a deep laboratory once. At the bottom was the body of a mahoutsukai – and nothing else.”

“That was all?” Misao asked.

“He was trying to dig it really deep and died of exhaustion.”

Everyone sweatdropped.

A slight change in the air told Aoshi the stairs were coming to an end. He invoked light and flung the glowing sphere into the darkness below. It illuminated a circular chamber.

“There it is!” Kaoru cried, running the rest of the way. “There it is! There it is!” She looked around the chamber, lined with statues of fanged monsters like the ones in Shishio’s now-destroyed temple-fortress.

Megumi raised a hand to her mouth. “The décor is in truly bad taste.”

“You got that right,” agreed Misao.

Across the chamber from the stairs there was a door – seemingly the only exit. Kaoru walked up to it. “Shishio’s legacy must be in that room.” She took hold of the door-pull, a ring in the mouth of another beast. “Okay, I’m going to open it.” She pulled. Slowly, creaking, the door opened, revealing…

“Another stairway,” Yahiko sighed.

“It never ends!” wailed Misao.

“What’s with him?” Kaoru demanded. “Why would he put a door in front of it?” There had been other small chambers, but all the rest of the stairs had been open.

“Because Shishio built the place,” Aoshi explained. “We should have been prepared for bad jokes like this.”

“Well, I guess this isn’t the deepest chamber then,” Kaoru fumed.

“Kaoru-san, look!” Misao cried. “Another locked door!”

They all looked where Misao was pointing. There it was – under the stairway where they had come in!

“Which do we take de gozaru ka?” Kenshin asked.

Kaoru thought. “The obvious choice would be to go down. On the other hand, it could be a trap. This is Shishio we’re talking about, after all.”

“Equally, the other door could lead to a dead end,” Aoshi added.

“Either way, I’m almost as tired of stairways as Yahiko,” Kaoru grumbled.

Elsewhere in the maze of corridors, the man who looked like Shishio put his hand on a block of stone, no different from a hundred others in a featureless wall. It slid inward. He touched two more blocks, seemingly at random, and a section of wall rose to reveal a doorway. He and Yumi passed through, and it closed behind them.

“Ohohoho,” laughed Yumi. “With my knowledge of this laboratory’s interior, there’s no way the others can catch up with us! I will be the one to activate Shishio-sama’s legacy!”

Her companion, the man who wore Shishio’s face and form, said nothing.

Once again Kaoru got ready to open a door. “What happens if we find another stairway in there?” Yahiko asked.

“I turn violent!” Kaoru snarled, and flung the door open. There wasn’t a stairway – there wasn’t much of anything except a medium-sized room, with a single door leading out of it.

“Okay, there’s no stairway,” Yahiko remarked.

Kaoru shrugged. “All right, let’s check it out.”

Aoshi turned around just in time to see fire blast out of the door leading to the down staircase, the one they had nearly gone through! They hastily piled into the room and slammed the door behind them.

So it was a trap, Kaoru thought. “Let’s go!” They all headed through the dark doorway.

There were no more stairs, but the corridor seemed to stretch for eternity – either that or it was leading them in a very large circle.

“In a dungeon like this, the builder designs it so only he knows where all the convenient shortcuts are,” Aoshi explained.

And at that point, the tunnel branched off in a Y. “Oh, now I’m getting mad!” Kaoru squawked. “Which way do we go?”

“Calm down, Kaoru-dono,” Kenshin soothed.

“I know!” Kaoru turned to Misao and Megumi. “You’re both priestesses, right? Can’t you tell which way we’re supposed to go?”

Misao hesitated. “That’s easy to say, but…”

“Ohoho, let me try,” Megumi offered. She stepped forward and knelt. As if summoned, a staff topped with a glowing blue sphere materialized in front of her.

“Whoa, she’s the real deal,” Yahiko breathed.

A tear sparkled briefly on Megumi’s eyelashes before falling to the stone floor.

Kaoru recoiled. “Did I do something wrong?” she stammered.

Megumi turned around. “No, I was thinking about my father,” she explained. “He gave me this rod and taught me how to use it, so I was praying for his help.”

“Oh, poor Megumi-san,” Misao wept.

Aoshi stared, impassive as always.

“All right, I’ll try again,” Megumi murmured. She took her hands from the rod so it stood on end, and then it dropped, pointing down the left-hand tunnel. “I sense something from that direction,” she announced.

“What?” Yahiko squawked. “You mean it’s just like when you drop a stick to decide the way?”

Fox ears twitched on Megumi’s head.

One way was as good as another, so they headed down the left-hand tunnel – until it ended in a blank wall.

“So what about this?” Kaoru demanded. “It’s a dead end!”

“Maa, maa, Megumi-dono didn’t mean any harm,” Kenshin tried to calm her.

Misao stepped forward and rapped on the wall. It didn’t sound quite solid. There was a candle bracket in the corner; it seemed oddly placed to illuminate the room so she pulled on it. The block of stone where it was mounted slid inward. The room shook, and the wall vanished!

“Wow, it opened!” Misao marveled.

“All right!” Kaoru cheered. “Megumi, you’re amazing! Let’s keep going!” She ran forward.

“She changes moods very quickly, but she’s a good person de gozaru yo,” Kenshin murmured.

“I can see that,” Megumi replied, quietly sad. Ken-san had returned as she had hoped and prayed… but his heart would never be hers. Even he didn’t seem to realize just how deeply he belonged to the fiery-tempered girl who had just run ahead into the darkness.

It looked like an ordinary storeroom, lined with barrels, boxes, pieces of old furniture, and even less identifiable junk.

“What’s with this place?” Kaoru demanded.

“Looks like no one’s used this room for ages,” observed Aoshi.

“What would a shortcut be doing in here?” Yahiko wondered.

Kaoru heard something. “What’s that?” she asked. She peered into the shadows. There was a darker shadow there, deeper black against the room’s darkness, in the shape of a monstrous… fowl.

“A ghost!” Misao screeched.

But it wasn’t a ghost. Out waddled a white duck – much larger than the birds that swam on lakes and rivers or waddled about farmyards, nearly the size of Yahiko, but still a duck. It waddled close to Kaoru and peered nearsightedly at her through thick, cracked spectacles, askew on its yellow bill.

“Who are you?” the bird demanded in a human voice. “And what have you done with my Shampoo?”

Kenshin blinked. “Oro?”

“Why would a duck need to wash its hair?” Misao wondered.

“Duck?” the bird sputtered. “You dare to call Mousse of the mazoku a duck!?”

Kenshin and Aoshi exchanged glances. “Mazoku?”

“Look at this magnificent form and tell me what you see!” the duck raged.

“A duck,” Kaoru replied.

“Duck,” agreed Misao.

“Duck, from every possible angle,” Aoshi added.

“The duckiest-lookin’ duck I’ve ever seen!” laughed Yahiko.

“And what do you think, mister?” the duck demanded, turning toward Megumi.

She blinked in amazement. “Mister?”

The duck came closer, peered at her through his thick glasses. “I’m sorry, Miss.”

Megumi sweatdropped. “You’re a very handsome… duck.”

The duck facefaulted.

“So what are you doing here?” Kaoru asked.

“I have nothing to say to you!” the duck retorted. “Not until you tell me what you’ve done with my beautiful Shampoo!”

“That again?” Kaoru grumbled. “We’ll see about that!”

Elmekia Lance!

Later, after the duck had revived, Kaoru resumed her interrogation. “So what are you doing here, Duck-san?”

“Shishio-sama summoned me to this place to help with his research! Yes!” The duck seemed very eager to please now. “He wanted to learn techniques that are only known to the mazoku.”

“You’re the poorest excuse for a mazoku I’ve ever seen,” Aoshi scoffed.

“You sure he ain’t just a duck?” asked Yahiko.

“Shishio-sama told me that if I helped him, Shampoo would be mine.”

“Um… what does a duck need with shampoo?” asked Megumi.

The duck shook his head. “No, no, no, not shampoo. Shampoo. She’s the most beautiful girl in all the Three Worlds.”

“Oro?” Kenshin blinked.

Misao gasped. “You were helping Shishio for love? That’s so sweet!”

Everyone turned on her. “You don’t have to admire him!”

Kaoru turned back to the mazoku duck. “If you helped with his research, then do you know where Shishio’s legacy is?”

“Hmm…” the duck thought. “I’d say what you’re talking about is the secret research that Shishio-sama was working on years ago.”

“You don’t know?” Kaoru raged. “Mattaku! Then tell us the quickest way to the deepest chamber!”

“I won’t!” The duck turned away and folded his wings across his chest.

“If you don’t tell me I’ll turn you into Peking Duck!”

The duck recoiled. “I’ll tell! I’ll tell!”

Yumi continued her journey, followed by the strangely subservient being who looked like Shishio. Glowing red lights appeared ahead – the eyes of bat-winged demonic figures, advancing toward them!

“Guardian mazoku, eh?” Yumi asked. “We don’t have time to fight these things.”

The man who looked like Shishio pushed her to one side. “Leave them to me.” He turned and addressed the creatures. “You mustn’t bother us.”

The monsters stopped and took a step backwards.

“Leave this place at once!” the red-robed priest continued.

One by one, the guardian mazoku winked out of existence, banished back to their own plane.

“Of course,” Yumi murmured. “All the mazoku in this place were summoned by Shishio-sama.”

Her companion showed no sign of resenting the fact that she spoke of Shishio as if he were another person altogether. “Come, let’s hurry on ahead,” was all he said.

Kaoru and her friends followed Mousse out into the round chamber they had entered earlier. “Well?” she demanded. “Where’s the shortcut to the laboratory?”

”Right here,” the duck replied. “This leads straight to the lab.”

“It does?” asked Yahiko in a skeptical tone. All he could see was an empty room – though for the first time he noticed that the floor was inlaid with a circular pattern, and they were standing in the middle of it.”

“I think it’s some kind of transport like before,” Kaoru said. “Okay, climb aboard, Duck-san.”

“Duck-san?” the duck protested. “I’m a mazoku, not a duck – and my name is Mousse. Mousse.”

“Looks like we’re all set to go, Duck-san,” Kaoru interrupted.

Light swallowed them, and then they were falling! They landed in a heap in front of a metal door.

“Okay, we’re here,” the duck announced.

“So Shishio’s legacy is behind this door, huh?” Kaoru asked.

Kenshin walked up and tried the door. “It’s locked de gozaru yo.”

“Of course it’s locked!” sniffed Mousse. “It only opens for someone with great magical powers.”

“If you want power, then it’s my turn.” Kaoru drew her bokken.

“If you say that then you’re going to be very embarrassed if you can’t open it,” Aoshi murmured.

“That’s what you think!” She pointed her bokken at the doors.

Unmoving doors, by my power
Open yourself to me!

Green light poured from the crevice between the doors, enveloping Kaoru. With a rumbling creak, the doors slowly swung outward.

“It worked!” cried Yahiko.

“They opened!” Misao echoed.

“Piece of cake!” Kaoru grinned.

They filed into another vast area. “Mou, I’ve never seen a lab as big as this one!” Kaoru marveled.

“It will be difficult to find Shishio’s legacy in here,” Aoshi pointed out.

Kaoru turned toward Mousse. “Hey, Duck-san! You know what Shishio’s legacy might be?”

The duck bowed its head. “Shishio-sama never told me exactly what his research was,” he admitted.

“You really didn’t know?” The edge in Kaoru’s voice suggested she was getting hungry for roast duck.

“You don’t trust anybody, do you?” the duck complained. “I swear I’m telling you the truth!”

“Then can I ask you what sort of research he was doing here?” Kaoru persisted.

Mousse frowned. “It seemed to involve fighting a powerful mazoku.”

“Fighting a mazoku?” Misao gasped.

Kaoru tugged on her ponytail. “I wonder…”

“What are you thinking?” Aoshi asked.

“Shishio wanted to resurrect Shabranigdo in order to cure his burns, right?” Kaoru asked. “Now, he wasn’t expecting him to be reborn in his own body, meaning he was expecting him to be reborn somewhere else.”

“And if he let Shabranigdo run loose, the world would be destroyed and there would be nothing for him to rule,” Aoshi picked up her thought. “So he was looking for a way to destroy Shabranigdo.”

“It’s not strange that he’d get ready to go after the Dark Lord in a stand-up fight,” Kaoru went on.

“And the research was to prepare for that battle,” Aoshi continued.

“It’s possible.” Kaoru turned to the healer-priestess. “Ne, Megumi, could you do what you did before and find Shishio’s legacy?”

“I’ll try.” Megumi bowed her head in prayer. Her attention passed slowly over statues lined with books, chests, jars of spell components, scrolls and boxes. “Kaoru-san, that ornament!”

“Huh? That?” It was a pink teddy bear, perched incongruously between an amphora and a set of alchemist’s balances.

Misao frowned. “I never thought someone like Shishio would collect something that cute,” she said.

“It’s not cute!” Kaoru snapped.

“I’m sorry,” Megumi’s shoulders sagged. “Everything in here has so much magic that I can’t tell which is the legacy. There’s nothing that stands out – the teddy bear only does because it looks odd.”

“No choice, then,” Aoshi added. “We’ll have to check everything in here.”

“Well, let’s get to it.”

So they moved through the lab, checking everything. Kaoru was started when she opened a box and a bird flew into her face – but then she realized it was nothing but a pop-up toy on a spring. “What was with the Red Priest?” she fumed, jamming the toy back into its box.

Mousse seemed to be checking things right along with them – well, sort of. He kept walking into shelves and things on account of his poor eyesight. But his path brought him ever closer to a corridor, half hidden behind some shelves. Unnoticed by the others, he darted away.

Megumi was the first to notice his departure. “Duck-san?” she called – and followed.

The duck came to a rack of eyeglasses. He felt pair after pair with the tips of his wings, and finally settled on a pair of thick spectacles with round lenses. “This should do it.” He put them on. Green light enveloped him. His hunched body straightened, his webbed feet narrowed. His wings shrank into arms and the untidy crest on his head turned into long, straight black hair.

Megumi gasped.

The mazoku turned around. His glasses shone like blank, mad eyes. “So you saw,” he said.

“Ken-san!” she shrieked.

Kenshin gasped. “Megumi-dono!”

“Heh heh heh,” Mousse chuckled, advancing toward Megumi.

Megumi backed up. “Don’t be foolish,” she said. “I’m sure that Kaoru-san will use the power of Shishio’s legacy to help you find your… your Shampoo – just as soon as we’ve taken care of this little problem we need it for.”

“Megumi-dono!” Kenshin ran in, followed by Kaoru and Aoshi.

“Who’s this guy?” Kaoru demanded.

“It’s… it’s Duck-san!” exclaimed Megumi.

“Heh heh heh,” Mousse chuckled again. “Do you see my strength, little people? Do you see my true form?”

“What?” Yahiko gasped. “That’s the duck?”

“Then what was wrong with you before?” Aoshi demanded.

“When Shishio summoned me long ago, he sealed my true power into these glasses. That seal was the form you saw before. And now that I have these glasses back, I won’t let anyone have Shishio’s legacy! I’ll claim it myself and use its power to win my beautiful Shampoo!” With a cry like that of a striking hawk, he raised his arms and showered them with glowing kunai.

DIGGER BOLT!

Kaoru aimed lightning at him. The blast struck him full on and he vanished in a cloud of smoke and dust.

“Got him!” Misao cheered.

But through the haze they saw the gleam of his glasses and heard his low, mad laughter. Mousse was still standing, completely unfazed by Kaoru’s attack. “You’d be well advised not to underestimate my power!” he snarled.

“Why, you big overgrown duck!” Kaoru snapped.

Mousse leaped into the air and attacked. This time a variety of hooks, scythes, and other implements on chains emerged from his sleeves. Kaoru narrowly escaped being entangled.

“Hold on!” Misao yelled. “Why don’t you stop hovering up there and come down?”

“Sounds like fun,” the avian mazoku grinned.

Misao sweatdropped. “Umm… I didn’t mean for you to come down here.” She started to back away.

He advanced on Kaoru. “Of all the mazoku, I am the master of hidden weapons,” he said. “Just as a quietly-floating swan conceals his feet beneath the water, so it is impossible to see what’s in my hands!” He struck – but her bokken was just as quick, and blocked his attack.

“Oro?” Kenshin stared at Mousse’s weapon.

Yahiko burst out laughing. “A training potty? You attacked my sensei with a training potty?”

The mazoku’s glasses began to glow. “You laugh at me?” He rose into the air again.

“Kaoru-dono!” Kenshin called. “Don’t go for him head-on!”

“Thanks for the tip!” Kaoru replied. Hmm… I can’t use my Dragon Slave underground like this… I’m pretty much limited to…

ELMEKIA LANCE!

Mousse easily evaded her attack.

“Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu – Ryuu Tsui Sen!”

But Mousse was no longer under the dragon’s hammerstroke.

“I’ll end this now!” the demented mazoku screamed. He clapped his hands and fire exploded all around him. “Sloppy!” he chortled. “You’re all sloppy and slow!”

“I think you underestimate us, Duck,” Aoshi said with a slight smile.

“Don’t call me duck!” Mousse raged.

“Duck!” Aoshi taunted.

“Duck!” Kaoru echoed.

“I’m going to try a Ra-Tilt,” Aoshi murmured to Kaoru.

“Then I’ll do Elmekia Lance,” Kaoru replied. “Let’s do it!”

But at that instant a stone plaque, dislodged by the force of Mousse’s fireworks attack, fell straight onto Kaoru’s head. Stunned, she dropped to the floor. Misao bent over her.

“Damn,” Aoshi muttered. A combined attack might work, but he had a feeling even the Ra-Tilt by itself wouldn’t be enough to destroy this mazoku.

Brilliant violet light shone from the stone tablet. Mousse leaped forward. “Don’t touch that!”

Kaoru picked herself up and stared at the glowing artifact. “You don’t suppose…” She picked it up.

“Oh no!” squawked Mousse.

Kaoru held it up and watched as the mazoku cringed away from its light.

“I don’t believe it!” he cried. “How could it just fall into your hands?”

“Looks like I get the prize!” Kaoru retorted. “Even your attacks can’t break through Shishio’s legacy!”

“That’s Shishio’s legacy?” asked Aoshi. “That stone tablet?”

“Shishio’s legacy?” Misao echoed.

Megumi stared. “That’s…”

Kaoru stood defiant, the tablet in one hand and her glowing bokken in the other.

Light! Gather within me and become a flash!
Smash the abyssal darkness apart!
ELMEKIA FLAME!

Brighter and fiercer than the Elmekia Lance, the light tore into Mousse. He cried out and clutched at his shoulder.

“Aoshi! Misao! Now!”

Back to back they stood, pooling their power while Misao began the incantation.

Source of all souls, which dwells in the
eternal and the infinite,
everlasting flame of blue!

Aoshi took up the chant.

Let the power hidden in my soul

And then both spoke together.

Be called forth from the infinite!
RA TILT!

Mousse’s body was enveloped by a column of blue light! He screamed as he was torn from the material plane and sent to the Astral. Fading into infinite distance they could hear a last despairing cry from him.

“Shampoo…!”

“It worked!” Misao cried, and flung her arms around Aoshi. The chimaera’s white marble face turned an uncharacteristic pink.

“Oi,” said Yahiko. “Is that piece of rock really Shishio’s legacy?”

“Who cares what it looks like?!” Kaoru snapped. “What matters is what these runes say.” She peered at the inscription.

“Heh heh heh heh heh,” Shishio’s laugh echoed from somewhere high above them. “That isn’t the true power of the tablet.” The tablet shot out of Kaoru’s hands and sped toward its true master.

“The tablet!” Misao cried in protest.

“Ohohoho!” laughed Yumi. She snared the stone slab out of the air. “At last it’s mine! Shishio-sama’s legacy – the manuscript of the Claire Bible! At last! At last it’s mine!”

Her triumphant laugh echoed from the stone walls.

NOTES, EXPLANATIONS ETC.

It seemed pretty natural to make the chicken-mazoku into a duck. Watch for more Ranma characters in Oro Next.

Time to get serious again, as we face the final showdown with Yumi and learn what the false Shishio really is. O-tanoshimi ni!