Martial Arts Dining Arc

The  is the 38th story arc covered in the Ranma ½ manga, spanning eight chapters. This arc was included in volume 16 and 17 of the  and volume 15 of the Viz Media tankōbon.

Plot Summary
A boy named Picolet Chardin II comes to Furinkan High and challenges Ranma to an eating contest. Picolet is lighting quick and food literally vanishes in front of him, causing Ranma to lose. When the Tendo girls tell Soun what happened at school he panics and tells them that 20 years ago, he and Genma lost a match to Picolet's father and promised their unborn daughters as his child's bride as payment for the food they ate. Now Picolet has come to collect and Ranma volunteers so that he can learn how to defeat Picolet.

Ranma travels to the Chateau Chardin and begins his training under Madame St. Paul. She first outfits Ranma in an iron corset and tells Ranma that the corset will remain until her training is complete. She quickly realizes that everyone around there eats just as fast as Picolet but she is unable to keep up with them and starves. Akane disguises herself as a maid to help Ranma, but Picolet prevents it. Ranma decides enough is enough, but finds that the iron corset prevents her from transforming back into a guy without agonizing pain.

The rest of the family scramble for ways to help Ranma by digging through Happosai's books. They find a technique called Parlay du Foie Gras, but the pages in the book describing the technique are missing and Picolet only gives vague clue to its secret. While watching Genma and Soun fight over a foie gras Ranma discovers the technique's power. With one week away, Ranma begins training for the Parlay du Foie Gras but Kasumi discovers that everyone who has mastered the Parlay has met a tragic end. Ranma finally masters Parlay du Foie Gras gets ready to defeat Picolet so she can get out of the wedding and get the iron corset removed. However, training for Parlay du Foie Gras starved Ranma to the point where the corset simply fell off. Akane is told that the secret to Parlay du Foie Gras is to feed the food to your opponent so quickly they do not notice it. But this also means that training for it requires one to focus on not eating any food.

The match begins and everyone watches on as Ranma seems to hold her own against Picolet, but Picolet uses various tactics to make Ranma appear inelegant while not eating any of her food. Akane worries that Ranma will have to marry Picolet after all. The match proceeds, and Ranma tries the Parlay again, this time tossing the food into the air so that it lands in Picolet's upturned mouth. Everyone sees him eating, but Madame St. Paul refuses to make a point deduction against him. Picolet decides to unleash another technique to prevent the Parlay, laying his face down onto the plates and eating like a dog. Ranma quickly uses the Parlay to feed all of his food to the audience, but with one plate left Ranma does not have enought energy to move the food any longer. Weak from hunger Ranma finally eats after days of fasting and defeats Picolet. As promised he relases Ranma from their engagement.

Major Events

 * Martial Arts Dining is introduced
 * Ranma learns the deadly Parlay du Foie Gras technique to defeat Picolet.

Changes in anime

 * Scenes where Akane sneaks bread for Ranma is slightly more romantic, less goofy. Also Picolet doesn't eat the bread.
 * Ranma never tries to quit his training.
 * Ranma's nightmare is more focused on getting married and kissing Picolet, not having huge mouth,
 * Akane never peeks on Ranma training.
 * Happosai doesn't show up in the anime version, Akane finds about dangers of Parlay du Foie Gras by eavesdropping on Picolet.
 * Anime skips the scene where corset falls of Ranma. So he never tries to challenge Picolet as a man.
 * Parlay du Foie Gras is never explained properly, just demonstrated.
 * In anime Ranma curse is still a secret, so his classmates don't show up to cheer for him during final duel.

Characters Introduced

 * Picolet Chardin II
 * Madame St. Paul