Story: Demon's Test: Flabbergasted

This was remarkable fun to write. Not much else to say.


Fun though it might be to watch the normally cool, calm and collected Nabiki Tendo writhe around, lost in a labyrinth of lust, making little grunts and squeals of delight that would have seemed completely out of character to Nalidiel before he began this particular test - and oh, it was so much fun - he had to think of this from a practical standpoint. He needed information. Data. Cold, hard facts. Once he knew his limits and what he was fully capable of, then he could cause the effects he wanted with greater ease and with higher efficiency. So, with a curt nod down at the melted ice queen, he drifted off through the walls and did a quick sweep of the grounds to determine where everyone was and what they were up to.

The fathers were playing shogi and gossiping about how well Ranma and Akane were getting on, deliberately obfuscating evidence to the contrary so that it matched their own expectations. Well, they need not worry too much. So far as Nalidiel intended, the two of them wouldn’t be able to keep their hands off one another by the end of the week. Speaking of the two of them, it looked like Akane was in the training hall kicking the straw out of a particularly sturdy dummy with what looked like a pigtail stuck to the back of its head. She stopped a moment to lean against the dummy’s chest, seeming rather more flushed than might be expected, then shook her head and continued the attack. Ah, young lust. As for Ranma himself, he appeared to be reading a comic in the Saotomes’ guest room. Which only left Kasumi unaccounted for. She wasn’t in the kitchen… Or the bathing room… Ah! There she was. In her own room.

Where she was examining herself in a mirror. Completely naked, save for various food items that were carefully strapped to her beautiful body. Hm. Rather remarkable, that. Okay, now that he knew where everyone was he could probably screw around with them a little more and drive them into a similar frenzy as - Wait, hold on, back up a bit there, let’s do the maths on that again.

Kasumi - clothes + food = Huh?!

“Oh, my,” Kasumi said, because of course she did. “I wonder if Ranma will enjoy his snack. A growing boy like him has such specific needs and wants. I hope I can keep him happy.”

Unseen in the corner of the room, Nalidiel slowly raised a hand to ask a question, then realised he would only get an answer if the teacher personally intervened in the test. So he lowered the hand and bounced the questions around his own mind for a bit.

So. Kasumi had, with minimal prompting on his part, decided to deliver Ranma a snack with her own naked body serving as the tray. This was about as far off base from the character he was familiar with as it was possible to get, unless she suddenly embarked upon a killing spree. Kasumi was the undisputed <i>nice</i> Tendo girl. The one that didn’t really have a temper and looked out for the best interests of others over herself but was also a bit of a prude; that last point made it so that as far as Nalidiel was concerned she was Public Enemy Numbers One, Two and Three. The best he’d been realistically expecting from her was that, you know, he could maybe guide her into letting the various perverted stuff he was causing happen, or keep her away from it. Not in his wildest dreams could he have expected something like this! It had taken him all day - ALL DAY - to drive Nabiki into the state she was in! Yet here was Kasumi Tendo, a character often equated with <b>freaking Belldandy</b> for reasons that went beyond having the same V.A. The only real difference between the two of them, as far as some people were concerned, is that one of them was a literal in-universe Goddess, and the other only in a metaphorical sense. Even when an in-universe demon that was way, way stronger than Nalidiel had directly possessed Kasumi and made her do evil things? They only really barely qualified as evil when you get right down to it. <i>That’s how nice she was</i>.

So… Kinda blown away by her actions here, is what he was saying. The fact that it was <i>so hot</i> had surprisingly little to do with it. The little strips of fish nestled between her breasts? Brilliant. The concentric circles of carrot strips around her navel, culminating with a regular round piece stuck in there? Genius. And, oh dear, oh dear, were those little bowls full of sauce off to the side on an actual tray? Wow, Ranma. The snack of a lifetime. You didn’t even know what you were -

Uh oh. No time to consider what it was that had succesfully driven Kasumi into performing such lustful actions. Instead, Nalidiel made a beeline to Ranma, who was still reading his comic with absolutely noooo idea of what was coming his way any minute now!

<font color="green">Hungry! I’m hungry! I don’t even care what it is, I gotta eat soon! Hungry! I should ignore what food is served on so long as it is delicious!</font>

He had to act. Fast. Sure, greed wasn’t exactly his vice or anything, but right now that didn’t much matter. There was no way he could drive Ranma into enough of a lustful frenzy to find nothing odd about Kasumi’s request, but there was a slim chance he would <i>maybe</i> be able to keep him from reacting when she showed up with food if he played to a vice the boy didn’t remotely suppress. Besides which! It would offer him the perfect chance to lead from one vice to another later on, and maybe even help him figure out what the hell had caused Kasumi to tip into such lustful actions with such relative ease!

<hr>
“Kyaaaa!”

A soul-crushing roundhouse kick landed in the middle of the training dummy’s centre of mass, causing it to explode into a few hundred pieces of straw. Akane took several deep breaths, then began to pick them up. It wasn’t right to expect Kasumi to clean up the mess, and besides which it would help her relax just a little bit. Not as effectively as meditation, but Akane could never quite sit still long enough for that to work. She was an active girl, and sitting still to do absolutely nothing did not sit well with her at all!

Akane Tendo was, in a word, frustrated. Though to her mind the word didn’t quite seem sufficient. Let’s keep track, shall we? Every day at school she had to clobber a bunch of idiots that thought they could earn the right to date her by beating her in a fight instead of, oh, I don’t know, try asking her out, maybe? Ugh! It was so stupid! All because of that idiot Kuno being unable to leave her alone! That would be bad enough! But! The only guy she really did like only had eyes for her older sister, and she was engaged against her will to a complete jerk of an otherwise handsome boy that could turn into a completely stunningly cute girl when splashed with cold water! Honestly, it was that last one that made her wonder if the other far more mundane things had made her snap under the pressure and made her start wildly hallucinating. Unfortunately it didn’t seem all that likely, given that she had repeatedly pinched her arm to check.

Her thoughts kept returning time and again to that most recent problem. Akane didn’t ask to get engaged to a boy she barely knew! Her goal had always been to take over the dojo herself and run it by herself and hey, if she happened to find some man that was worth spending the rest of her life with that would be great too! The decision being forced upon her was so unfair, and she resented Ranma for it even before taking into consideration the rude things he kept on saying about her, the insults he sent her way… Was it any wonder that whenever the image flashed across her mind of his face in either form, her heart leaped forwards several beats?

“Akane!” called a high-pitched voice that set her martial artist’s danger sense into a fever pitch. She spun into a defensive position, ready to contend with the unrecognised voice, but was completely caught off guard when her older sister Nabiki barrelled right into her in a technique that Akane was usually rather adept at dodging, though had little experience in dealing with from her sister: the flying glomp.

Anyone else would’ve been knocked to the floor by the sheer momentum, but Akane was a martial artist. Sure, she wasn’t able to stop or dodge the incoming attack but she was sufficiently braced to prevent it from budging her a single inch. Though to limit the damage done to her sister she did have to return the embrace until she stopped moving.

“Uh… Hi, Nabiki?” Akane said, gently pushing her sister’s face away from her. “Something I can help you with?”

“Nah,” Nabiki replied, stepping back of her own will with a little bit of a bounce in her step. She clasped her hands behind her back, and while her flying glomp may not have moved Akane an inch the expression on her face sure as hell did. That smile! The twinkle in those eyes! Then there was the tone in her voice on top of that! “I’m just so happy to see my little sister, that’s all.”

<i>Alert. Alert. Nabiki <b>wants</b> something. She wants it <b>badly</b> and is willing to do anything to get it. Approach with caution! Discover what that “something” is as first priority!</i>

“Really? You’re not the sort to come down here without a reason.”

“No,” Nabiki shrugged. “I guess I’m not. How was your first day at school as an engaged woman?”

“Hellish,” Akane snarled. “Having to hang around that boy all day! Do you know, he even had the gall to say he could easily sweep me off my feet any time he wanted? Not a chance! A boy like that doesn’t know the first thing about being nice. So I’m gonna put him in his place tomorrow night with a martial arts dating challenge!”

“Martial arts… dating?” Nabiki asked with a slight tilt of her head and Akane suddenly realised that she’d given Nabiki what she was looking for: Gossip. Leverage against the two of them. “Hm… So, how is that particular contest won?”

Akane opened her mouth to explain the obvious, then closed it when she realised that it wasn’t quite as obvious as she’d initially thought. In any martial arts contest she’d been in - or any sporting event, come to it - there were clear guidelines to indicate who had prevailed over the other. A condition of some sort had to be met that was very clear and unambiguous. A score. An action that guaranteed success. In this case, the winning condition was too vague to mean anything at all. Her brow furrowed in concentration. How should they decide this thing? What would be the best metric?

“It seems to me that you don’t know,” Nabiki said, bouncing on her feet and seeming far too pleased with herself. “Maybe I could lend a little assistance?”

“Hmph!” Akane said, turning on her heel and continuing to pick up the straw. She completely failed to notice Nabiki checking out her butt when she bent over, and didn’t have the faintest clue how close she was to being groped. “So that you can sell the gossip all over school? Fresh with pictures and everything? You must think I was born yesterday.”

“Definitely not,” Nabiki said, licking her lips and pulling back one outstretched hand with her other. “No pictures, no gossip. This whole event is enough… fun all by itself. Why, I’m certain that if the two of us sat down to think about it we could come up with some conditions that could keep Ranma happy! And… Maybe I could even suggest a few winning tactics you could use to make sure he doesn’t stand a chance!”

1. Akane refuses Nabiki’s offer, intending to do things her own way. Nabiki has other plans anyway.
2. Akane accepts the offer, and Nabiki takes the opportunity to teach her how to make men putty in her hands.
3. Akane accepts the offer, and Nabiki helps her sort out what she’ll wear on the date.
4. Meanwhile, Kasumi arrives to feed a hungry, hungry Ranma.
5. Nalidiel tries to figure out why Kasumi is behaving this way so easily.
6. Something else