Ranma and the Evil Within

Ranma and the Evil Within (Ranma wo Osō Kyōfu no Tatari 乱馬を襲う恐怖のタタリ) is the nineteenth episode in the third season of Ranma ½, known as "Hard Battle", and is the 59th episode overall.

Relation to the Previous Episode
None

Plot Summary
As a sudden shower breaks out over Nerima, Ranma and Akane are in an icecream parlor. Akane stares disspassionately at her cup of juice, asking why something feels wrong and, more importantly, why she has to pay for Ranma's food. Ranma, head visibly wet and a parfait in front of her, merely chuckles that somebody has to and starts wolfing down the ice cream. Akane pointedly notes that Ranma shouldn't be eating like such a pig, stating with more force when Ranma questions this that Ranma's a girl right now. Ranma notes that she never does eat ice cream as a boy, then asks why girls get all the breaks. Annoyed, Akane sarcastically suggests that Ranma ask herself, which the boy-turned-girl giggles she will. Then, to Akane's irritation and Ranma's delight, the smitten clerk stops by the table to offer Ranma a parfait on the house. When the rain stops, Akane strides steadily towards home, Ranma running to catch up and asking why Akane's so mad. When Akane sarcastically asks why she should be mad, Ranma laughs that it's because Akane wasn't the one who got free eats. Further offended by Ranma's obliviousness, Akane storms off, her mood not improving in the slightest when a strange boy, seeing Ranma's female form, offers to buy "her" a cup of coffee, an offer that Ranma accepts.

She is still mad about it when they arrive for dinner, complaining to the rest of the household even as Ranma blithely eats some rice and pickles. Nabiki comments that she thinks Ranma's a genius and asks if her sisters really wouldn't do the same. Kasumi, shocked, protests that's wrong, which prompts Nabiki to ask what kind of an idiot would spend their money if they didn't had to and point out that she certainly never spends her money if she can charm somebody else into paying. Akane protests that such behavior is wrong, a sentiment to which Soun agrees, saying there's no such thing as a free lunch... to his dismay, though, Genma merely pours the contents of a kettle of cold water over his son, dramatically scoffing such "bourgeois values" and tells Ranma to make sure she doesn't forget her old man. Ranma notes tiredly that she's so sick of having to turn back into a boy all the time, whereupon Nabiki asks why she doesn't just stay as is. Jokingly excited, Ranma suggests that maybe she should just stay this way, giving a ridiculous laugh to prove it, though she still has to point out that she's just playing around when Akane snaps at her to cut it out. Nobody notices the way Happosai looks at Ranma after hearing this conversation, though.

That night, while everyone sleeps, Happosai sneaks into Ranma's room with a small brazier filled with incense, which he lights and places at the foot of Ranma's futon. Mentally, he chuckles to himself that he's been waiting a long time for this. Now that Ranma has come to realise the value of his better half, he can make use of this mystical incense, as it won't work without Ranma consenting, consciously or not. Now, he can seperate Ranma's two halves into distinct beings, and he hopes to take advantage of that fact.

While this happens, at the Nekohanten, Cologne suddenly starts awake. While her great-granddaughter continues to sleep, oblivious, Cologne looks out the window at the way the wind is rustling the trees and proclaims the omens are evil. Something bad is about to happen, and she hurries to dress herself and race off to the Tendo Dojo.

As Happosai watches, Ranma inhales the incense, whereupon a translucent version of his female form shimmers into being and then rises up from Ranma's own body, standing at Ranma's feet with her eyes closed. Excitedly, hardly believing it actually worked, Happosai proclaims that this is the ancient "Founding School of Anything Goes Ying-Yang Thank You Mam Personality Splitter" technique. Excited, just barely remembering to keep his voice to a whisper, Happosai boasts to the standing female Ranma that now she's all girl, 100% girl, all the time, continuing that in honor of the great favor he's done by liberating her, she can start repaying him by... slipping into a bra for him. The ghostly female Ranma opens her eyes at last in a disdainful stare at Happosai, who blindly waves the bra and tells her to come and get it. The spirit-Ranma merely laughs mockingly, grows even less distinct in appearance and then vanishes into nothingness from the feet up.

Happosai watches this happen, bug-eyed, and then puts the bra on his own head to think, wondering to himself why she wouldn't listen to him. A tapping sound at the window attracts his attention, but it slides open to reveal the form of Cologne, hair spread wildly in the wind, an apparition that has Happosai falling back on his rear and crying that it's a monster. Insulted, Cologne asks who he's calling a monster, then sniffs the air and asks if Happosai has been stupid enough to use "that" incense - but Happosai falls onto Ranma's futon and fakes being asleep. Annoyed, but unable to do anything and hoping to herself that she was just imagining it, Cologne leaves, not noticing the way that Happosai watches her go from beneath closed eyes.

The clock notes it is 1:30 AM on Tuesday the 4th. Not until 1:31 AM on Friday the 7th does Happosai's foolishness come back to haunt the Tendo Dojo. Literally. A soft blue glow manifests momentarily in Ranma and Genma's room, before a female voice calls out to Ranma, softly exhorting her "love" to wake. Ranma finally comes to and sits up, to discover his female form calling him to be her love, her characteristic pigtail suddenly snapping open to let her hair fall wildly about her shoulders. Ranma yelps in shock, but the spirit suddenly glows with a wavering pale blue aura, pupils of the same lighting up in her eyes as the same light surrounds Ranma, whose expression grows dull and sleepy. Happosai slips into the room, eagerly running towards the spirit-Ranma, but Genma rolls over in his sleep and locks Happosai up in his arms, leaving the old pervert helpless to do anything but watch as the spirit leads Ranma away through the window.

The next morning, an annoyed Akane comes running into Ranma's room, shouting they're going to be late for school. Ranma tiredly tells her to go away and let him sleep, but she won't let him just laze around. When she pulls the covers off, though, she is startled and concerned to see Ranma looks intensely drained, cheeks slightly sunken and dark rings around his eyes. That afternoon at school, she asks what he was doing all night to make him so tired. Ranma doesn't answer, instead absently muttering a "so cute" that has Akane jerk back in shock, blushing, though her embarrassment gives way to hurt when he goes on to dreamily note that "she really is the cutest". Wounded, she loudly asks who he means, then suggests he may be talking about Shampoo. Ranma dreamily turns to her, smiling, and tells her it's none of her beeswax before walking away, tiredly swaying as he goes and brokenly whistling. Akane promptly sticks her nose up in indignation.

That night, after midnight, Akane can't sleep; she keeps seeing Ranma complimenting some strange girl on her cuteness and telling her that it's none of her concern in her mind's eye. She heads into the kitchen to get a drink of water... only to see a glowing, feminine shape head past the window, much to her frightened shock. Grabbing a baseball bat, she races out to the dining room, where she can see it fading from point to point before passing through the wall into Ranma's room. She runs upstairs, then cautiously stalks forward, when Happosai suddenly comes flying through the wall in front of her. Startled, she cracks him on the head so hard the bat breaks, then realises who he is and demands to know what's going on. He only has the strength to croak out that "Ranma just..." before fainting, sending Akane into the Saotomes' room. Genma is too fast asleep to give any answer to the question of where Ranma is, but looking out the window means Akane moves just in time to see Ranma go wandering off arm in arm with someone.

She jostles Genma awake and goes running out into the street in hot pursuit, telling Genma that there's no time to explain when he tries to ask her what's going on. She vows to herself that she's going to get to the bottom of this, then starts when she realises that Cologne and Shampoo are racing along the fence beside her and Genma, Cologne exhorting her descendent to move faster, as time's running out, and commenting that she wasn't imagining it after all. Realising that this means the mysterious "she" can't have been Shampoo, Akane asks Cologne what's going on, but is met with the same answer she gave Genma; there's no time. Their pursuit ends near dawn, when Cologne leads them to a cemetary atop a cliff, where they finally find Ranma sitting in a branch high in a tree overlooking the drop... and seated right beside him, to Akane's sheer disbelief, is Ranma's own female form.

Cologne explains to the three of them that this is Happosai's fault, and she should have been better prepared after detecting the smell of the personality splitter incense in Ranma's room that night. However, she notes, this could only have happened if Ranma himself allowed it; if he allowed the vigilance of his yang (male side) to waver, then his ying (female side) was able to assert itself and break free. This causes Akane to remember Ranma joking about staying a girl from that fateful Tuesday night, while Shampoo notes that, even freed, Ranma's ying has stayed close to him. Genma stands up and walks back from the group, noting that as a father, he now has a duty to both of his children. Yang Ranma will wed Akane to carry on the Anything Goes school, while Ying Ranma will need to catch a rich husband. Grinning widely, he makes some victorious punches and then loudly boasts that this way he'll have it made in the shade before laughing uproariously.

Unfortunately for them, Ying Ranma hears and turns to them, eyes shrinking to narrow dots and glowing with eerie light. The ground under Genma's feet ripples and shudders, knocking him on his backside before the tree nearby suddenly collapses over on top of him - luckily, Genma has skill enough to leap away at the last second, while Akane, Shampoo and Cologne run for it when it starts to fall. Chuckling to herself in a menacing way, Ying Ranma advances towards Ranma's fiancees, who both get ready to fight. Cologne interposes herself to defend them from the evil spirit, warning them that this isn't an enemy that they can beat. Ying Ranma's advance is cut off when the sun finally completes its rise; wailing and groaning in pain, she fades away into nothing in mid-writhe. Even as Genma disbelivingly asks if she's some sort of vampire, Akane goes running over to the tree to wake up Ranma, who promptly falls out of the tree in confused exhaustion.

Back at the Tendo Dojo, Ranma is taken to his bed, Soun entering the room to hear the whole confused story. Happosai also enters, admitting no guilt in all that's gone on. As Shampoo and Akane both express their sympathies for Ranma, Genma can only mourn the evil that has befallen his boy, snapping at Soun to bite his tongue and that Ranma is just an innocent victim of circumstance when Soun implies that Ranma may be responsible for all of this. When Ranma asks just why Ying Ranma keeps haunting him if she's been freed, Cologne darkly explains that the true danger of the personality splitter incense is not that it can seperate personal energies, but it also seperates personality elements as well. The spiritual Ranma that has been unleashed isn't just an embodiment of Ranma's ying energies, but also of the evil side of his personality. She is, Akane realises, Ranma's bad side given seperate life and power.

Genma notes that he's not sure if the two sides can stay seperate for long, with Soun noting that they do seem very attracted to each other, conjuring up an image where the two Ranmas get married in a traditional Shinto ceremony. Neither of the girls is very happy with Soun's "little joke". Drawing things back to the serious, Cologne states that if they don't intervene and soon, Ranma will be enslaved by Ying Ranma. Fortunately, she has a plan...

That night, when Ying Ranma materialises and heads to Ranma's room, she finds she cannot pass through the walls; spirit wards have been plastered all over the window, wall, the interior walls, even on Ranma's head. Hurt, she falls to her knees, sobbing how Ranma could do this to her and then, tears running from her eyes, cries out to him as "My love!" Inside, Ranma promptly finds himself reaching out to her, but locked in place, caught between the urge to go to her and his own desire to stay well away from her, Cologne, Genma, Shampoo, Akane and Soun all encouraging him to stay. Outside, Ying Ranma continues weeping for Ranma, only to look up when Happosai approaches her, brazier in hand. He declares that he has kept the two Ranmas apart long enough; while he admits no guilt, instead asking if it was really so wrong to want to get in touch with Ranma's "better half", he does declare he should have asked permission before calling her forth and begs Ranma to forgive him. He looks up when he realises that Ying Ranma is now on her hands and knees before him so she can look him in the eye. The spirit hooks a finger into the edge of the undershirt she's wearing, promising that if he does a favor for him, she'll let him have the bra she's wearing.

Happosai immediately proclaims her a vile temptress, then, wearing a goofily lecherous grin, asks why she didn't say so earlier. Using his incredible speed, he removes all of the spirit wards before anyone can react, much to the horror of Akane and Shampoo. No longer impeded, Ying Ranma destroys the window with a telekinetic pulse, begging Ranma to come with her. Ranma is powerless to obey, and when Akane tries to stop him, a telekinetic pulse from Ying Ranma sends her flying back, the two Ranmas vanishing into the darkness. Happosai is first to leap out, asking what happened to the evil spirit's promise, but Akane, Shampoo, Cologne, Genma and Soun race off after the two Ranmas, making sure to trample Happosai in the process.

They catch them in the same place as the last night; despite himself, Genma can't help but look at the way Ying Ranma is cuddling up to Ranma without noting they seem like a perfect couple, to which Soun points out that they are two halves of the same person and so it's only neccessary. Akane snaps at them to cut it out, then angrily stalks forward and yells at them to cut it out, her cry drawing Ying Ranma's irritated attention. Genma and Soun run up and join Akane, Genma declaring that young ladies shouldn't date without a chaperone and Soun yelling that young men should be with the fiancees that their fathers picked for them. Furious, Ying Ranma stands up, her eyes glowing and her hair rising straight up, telekinetically tearing two huge trees up by the roots and hurling them at the two fathers, the impact knocking Akane onto her face as well.

As she looks up, she sees the two Ranmas stalking towards her, and she feebly pleads with Ranma to wake up. Mindlessly, mouth open and teeth bared like fangs, he lunges at her - only for Shampoo, in cat form, to come flying through the air and latch onto his head. The sight scares off Ying Ranma, who has inherited Ranma's ailurophobia, and the combination of her absence and the sight of Shampoo-cat clinging to his face snaps Ranma out of her control. Shampoo returns to Cologne and regains her human form, but as she and Akane congratulate Ranma on being set free, Ying Ranma comes hurtling through the air to smash a crater where the group had been standing, the humans narrowly escaping. Cologne hurls a spirit ward at the evil spirit, but it is Akane who manages to finally attach it to her forehead. Ying Ranma wails and screams, thrashing and writhing and begging "her love" to save her, but finally fades away into nothing. Her curse has been broken.

The following night, Happosai slips into Ranma's room with personality splitter incense once more; neither the things he saw nor the sound beating he received from everyone involved have detered him, and he gloats for "girl side, come to Happy" as he lights the brazier. Ranma promptly springs out of bed and kicks him in the back of the head, snorting disdainfully that he's not going to fall for that trick again and fanning the smoke away from himself. Unfortunately for both Ranma and Happosai, the still-sleeping Genma inhales the fumes, a demonic panda rising from his body and threatening them, aura ablaze, and forcing the two of them to run for it...

Trivia

 * The "spirit Ranma" has all of Ranma's physical powers and abilities, the ability to become invisible or perhaps teleport, can walk through walls, can induce a hypnotic enthrallment in Ranma, and has powerful telekinesis.
 * This is one of the few episodes to portray Genma actually concerned for his son's sake and even defending him from Soun's accusations.
 * This is the first time Ranma has been seen receiving free food due to her female form's looks. Normally, he just swindles Akane into paying altogether, or she flirts for a little extra after paying full price for something.
 * The way that Ranma laughs after joking about staying in girl form is known as the "noblewoman's laugh" and is a traditional sound in Japanese anime intended to convey either an upper-class nature or pure snobbery. The laugh invoked by Kodachi Kuno is a exaggerated parody of this trope.
 * In this episode, the Japanese animation trick of "mind control eyes" is used on both Ranma, when the spirit-Ranma hypnotises him into attacking Akane, and on the spirit-Ranma herself throughout the episode. Like with Miyo, it is used to signify her mystical nature.