Ranma 1/2: One Page Per Volume, Part Nineteen

[rainsometimes]

Art runs from right to left this time, being from a newer unflipped edition. Sorry about the wonky scan quality!

A page close to the end of the "Secret Sauce" arc, in which a child messing up the okonomiyaki sauce made by their friend leads to dramatic consequences ten years down the line. Ukyo buries her okonomiyaki equipment, Ranma and Akane pretend (very unconvincingly) to already be married, and there is much domestic drama and misunderstandings.

Here we see Ukyo go into a kind of chef's trance as Ranma, having sacrificed himself to guzzle up all that remains of the vile sauce the story revolves around, now looks like an okonomiyaki ready to be cooked (it should be added at this point she's undergone a lot of emotional pressure, and she's also suffering from cooking abstinence). The lower right panel implies Ukyo could do decently in a fight even when bereft of her weapons, at least if she sees her opponent as an okonomiyaki to be flipped!

I think this is the last arc in which Ukyo and Akane are openly opposed to one another in a battle over Ranma where there's no other suitors. After this one they seem to grow closer - even though there was no resolution in the story itself that would show why. Maybe there could be scope for a good between-the-panels fic in that...