A new day dawned over the city, with only one person within currently any the wiser that things were about to undergo a significant change. But that makes sense when you think about it. Every day is different, after all. Every day changes the world, little by little.
Case in point, let's check in on Fukiyose Seiri, a dark haired maiden, as she woke up on this brand new day. Some girls wake up cutely rolling out of bed. Others sit up, stretch and yawn.
"Up and at them!"
Others leap out of bed and immediately start doing greeting the day. This seems as suitable a time as any to describe this pretty young woman. She is, in essence, a temperamental and hard-working girl with a slender yet solid build and a bit of a health nut. Not that she would ever tell anyone, so what if she occasionally got curious about some health product on television and then stopped using them after a few days? It wasn’t her fault that they always sounded useful at first, then failed to stand up to her expectations.
She's also much more well endowed than you might expect given that description, with her other notable feature being her large forehead.
Not that anyone would be paying attention to her forehead when she started doing jumping jacks. I mean, most people probably weren't, there are fetishes for everything so why not one for foreheads? But jumping around like that without a bra on leads to <i>interesting</i> side effects. Indeed, most would probably gravitate towards her jiggling bouncing bosom, at the very least because the motion was inherently distracting. That much movement at the corner of one's eye tends to draw attention, and given how large and bouncy they were, those tits were likely to keep most of the attention they earned.
"Phew, good workout!" Seiri said after a good five minutes before removing something that looked curiously similar to one of these blood pressure meters from each of her limbs. This was the newest curiosity that had caught her attention, a new invention said to multiply the effectiveness of any training exercise. Whether it would work, well even if it was useless this girl was already fit enough to not need it anyway. "That should wake me up!" She stretched out to the side, and there was a large grin on her face. "Man, I feel fantastic this morning! Like I could run a marathon right now, no prep time or anything."
Other than that though, her morning was normal. She showered, she ate, she dressed, she brushed her teeth, she combed her hair and then she left for school.
As Seiri wandered the streets of Academy City, she found herself unconsciously whistling a tune as she walked. Pedestrians noticed her and occasionally someone would walk by and give her a quick greeting. Really, it somehow felt like Seiri wasn’t the only one who had such a great morning, but that everyone was feeling positive right now. After a while, the amount of passersby kept increasing more and more.
You see, like many other cities, Academy City had locations where industry, shopping centres and housing gathered. But different from many other places, the city itself had been built with that in mind from the very ground. Thus, District 7 which contained Seiri’s goal housed mainly High Schools and Middle Schools. Not to say it was the only District with them, but it housed the vast majority with a few other Districts having more specialized schools.
“Good morning Fukiyose.”
The girl in question turned her head and noticed one Himegami Aisa coming at her from a byroad. Ah, it was such a relief to see her up and about again. Not least because bed rest, while essential for recovery from such critical injuries, is not conducive to long term health.
"Good morning Aisa," Fukiyose enthusiastically answered. "how do you feel?"
To that, Aisa gave a quick spin around, making the other girl note her rather form fitting clothes. She had never seen her friend in hot pants before, it was nice to see that she was putting good use to those clothes Fukiyose had brought her. There was this strange lingering feeling that there was something odd, but she simply couldn't place it.
"I feel fantastic!" Aisa chirped. She stuck her hands on her hips, then smoothed them around the skimpy fabric covering up her butt. Maybe it was this level of enthusiasm and energy? "It's true what they say, what you wear is what you feel, and these hot pants are so much better than the uniform."
The uniform. Right, of course! Their school did have a uniform, didn't it? Actually, Fukiyose was wearing it right now: A black knee-length skirt and a matching blouse with a little bow tie. This morning, Aisa had apparently decided to wear the blouse but foregone the skirt in favour of some rather revealing hot pants.
"Gah! Aisa! That's a little too much, isn't it?" Fukiyose yelled. "Are you trying to get in trouble? Wearing that kind of thing to school is positively scandalous! It leaves almost nothing to the imagination!"
"Yeah?" Aisa nodded. "Why would I get in trouble? I'm simply listening to what my body needs. What can be wrong with that?"
What can be wrong with that? For a fleeting half second the question left Fukiyose flat footed. During that time it simply made sense to her that it was only right that a person should listen to what their body needs and respond accordingly. That could be seen as the very definition of taking care of your health, right? That made sense, right?
But the moment passed, though in future when it came up it would take her just a little bit longer to dismiss. Not by much, but the merest fraction of moments building up and building up as time passed on by. Eventually that moment would be so long that they would blend together, seeming never ending. Not yet, but eventually.
"And your body wants to be put on display like that?!" Fukiyose asked. To which, Aisa responded by putting her hands behind her head and giving her knee a very slight tilt. Thrusting her chest out, deliberately positioning her body to emphasise her feminine attributes... "Cut that out! What kind of medication did they give you at that hospital? Get back home and put on the proper skirt!"
Aisa pouted, and that was something to see in and of itself. She then turned on her heel and marched off home, luckily not too far away. Though Fukiyose felt a little bad yelling like that. There wasn't really anything wrong, strictly speaking, with her wanting to be out in public wearing that kind of attire. However... Going to school like that? This was so unlike her.
It wasn’t like they had been friends for long, but in the time she had known her, Aisa had always been on the introverted side. Collected and calm, rarely showing her emotions in obvious ways. She had never seen her trying to show off or anything like that. In all honesty, she was probably close to the japanese ideal of beauty. So such whimsical actions and an open show of her feelings were pretty unusual.
Before she knew it they had arrived at Aisa's house. The two girls walked inside, and Fukiyose looked around suspiciously, searching for any sign of whatever might have triggered this strange behaviour from her normally reserved friend.
"So, I was wondering. What brought on this desire for a new look?" Fukiyose asked, finding nothing out of the ordinary. "Ah, please don't tell me it's part of some misguided plan to seduce Mister Woe Is Me."
"T-Touma? Noooo, not at all!" Aisa insisted. To Fukiyose's surprise, the other girl whipped down her hot pants right there and then in the middle of the hall. She averted her gaze so quickly that she didn't even register what kind of underwear Aisa was wearing, and had no intention of finding out. "I'm just trying out some new things, that's all."
"New things?" Fukiyose asked, raising her eyebrow in interest, though this just created the impression she'd spotted something interesting on the plain old boring ceiling. "What sort of new things?" She asked as she wondered if the other girl was decent already. Not that it would be that much of a big deal if she caught a glimpse, she had nothing Fukiyose didn’t have herself.
"Well, I've begun to study this new religion," Aisa admitted. "Purely academically, of course."
A new religion? Maybe that could explain it...? Perhaps she'd fallen victim to some cult leader who was brainwashing her into behaving this way! To think such things could exist even in this city of rationality and science.
"Where did you hear about this new religion?" Fukiyose asked.
"Oh, it was a nice man I met in the hospital," Aisa said, all of a sudden very much inside of Fukiyose's personal space. She stepped back a bit and looked down, grateful that Aisa was at least decent now. "He was a very strange man. I had to almost drag it out of him, he didn't seem to want to talk about it all that much."
Which made Fukiyose all the more suspicious. Usually a religious person wouldn't be so reluctant to talk about their religion, at least in her experience. They'd take the chance for conversion right away, and that meant telling people about it upfront. The only thing that made sense in her mind was that he either didn’t actually believe in what he said, or his faith was somehow dangerous.
Resuming their walk to school now that Aisa was properly attired, Fukiyose knew that she had to get more information about this. As much as it irked her to do so, she might have to ask a certain set of troublemakers for help. Ah, why did she keep on getting drawn into their messes? No, no, no! Don't think like that, this is exactly how phrases like 'ah such misfortune' get started.
"So, what precisely does this religion entail?" Fukiyose asked.
"Well, I'm not quite clear on all the details yet..." Aisa admitted. "From what I've seen so far, it focuses a lot on listening to what your body needs rather than what it wants. It probably has a lot of meditative techniques to help its practitioners learn how to focus on that."
"Probably?" Fukiyose asked. "You mean, you really don't know?"
"No, not yet. I only started studying it yesterday."
Stranger and stranger. Still... She could hardly march up to Touma, Index or any of the others and simply blurt out "I saw Aisa wearing sexy, sexy hotpants that really suited her! This is a strange thing for her to do, we should investigate the religion she's started studying!"
That was the sort of thing that would get you weird looks. Even from those weirdos! What she needed was more information. But... if she met the man that Aisa had met there was a chance he was an esper and that he might do <i>something</i> to her as well, turning her into just another convert before she even knew it.
In other words: She was stalled by Aisa's lack of knowledge. Any further investigation might corrupt her as well. As it stood, all she really had was suspicions that others might not understand without any hard evidence. That was the key scientific principle, of course: Evidence. You must have some sort of hard evidence to back up an assertion, be it physical or mathematical or data analysis, it could not be entirely subjective opinion or it would be outright rejected on the spot!
What did that mean? The answer is obvious! The Aisa Corruption Diary! She had a spare notebook she could use for exactly this purpose: Keeping track of Aisa's weird behaviour since exposure to this religion. Any new data she could safely find out about the religion. Fukiyose nodded to herself. That was it. In order to save her friend, she would have absolutely no choice at all but to stalk her friend!
"Um... Fukiyose? Your forehead is doing that thing where it gleams in the sun, it's blinding me!"
"Oh, sorry!" Fukiyose came back to reality, and came back hard. Now that she thought about it, this couldn't really be a one woman job. Much though she would like to keep things running low. She would have to find someone, or someones to help her in this endeavor. The only question was, who could she turn to that could get the job done?
<hr>
The die was cast. The city had been enveloped in a magical energy that would, over time, turn its residents into perverts. Not just any perverts either, but <i>his</I> kind of perverts.
Walking through the streets it seemed strange to believe, but there it was. Planted in their minds like a seed ready to sprout, every cute babe would gradually come around to the idea of flaunting what her mama gave 'em. As for the boys? Well, they'd all develop a "look but only touch with permission" policy.
Which kind of illustrates what sort of pervert Veritas was. He wanted <I>everyone</i> to enjoy themselves. He was still a bad guy, no question, but he could have easily been miles worse.
Right now he was walking through the streets with a bag slung over his shoulder. His destination: A Certain High School. He was even wearing the uniform. The boy's uniform, that is. Now, he knew full well that the Mysterious Exchange Student angle would probably bring him all sorts of undue attention. Still, it was not as if he had much choice in the matter, and besides which... He had a suitably interesting fake 'mystery' setup that should satisfy anyone who bothered looking.
Because otherwise he'd be so boring that they'd probably dig deep enough to work out what he was really up to. What a crushing paradox!
Speaking of which: His thoughts returned to what might well prove to be the biggest obstacle in his little plan. A student who happened to attend. A boy named Touma.
This boy had somehow managed to steal away the much searched after Index Librorum Prohibitorum and then been declared her new caretaker. Had apparently been involved in the defeat of Aureolus Izzard who had single-handedly killed the Knights of the Roman Church sent after him. Then there was the Angel Fall incident which he had been part off, though details on that were sparse, it did say that an actual Archangel had been involved. He beat back a terrorist magician who had attempted to bring danger to the city, stopped the inquisition of Orsola Aquinas and defeated the infamous Nun squad from completing their mission. Then there was the rumour that a certain Level 0 had defeated the number one Esper of the city, which was the achievement he was the least sure that it was true.
Not to forget his recent involvation with the very event that let him do this whole thing. It had apparently been with his help that the ones trying to brainwash the city into compliance were stopped. Maybe he should get the guy a gift in thanks?
To discover that such a boy attended the same school as his project Aisa was... To say the least, frightening. What a terrible coincidence! Attracting his attention right here and now, before it was too late for anyone to do anything about it... Disastrous! Utterly disastrous!
Which left him with two mission objectives for the day: Turn Aisa into his first acolyte, spreading his word, his gospel, his truth to all the people of the city. Investigate Touma, identify the nature of any threat he may cause and neutralise it. This second one left him more wary than the first, as he had no idea what sort of intellectual giant he might be dealing with, what sort of masterful tactician or godlike fortune he might have to contend -
"Index! Put the muffin down before someone gets hurt!"
"Uwaaaa! Hunger!"
“Nonono! You aren’t even supposed to be here! Ehhh I didn’t mean that I don’t want to spend time with you, but you aren’t a student and...Hey! I just bought that muffin with the last of the money I had! That was meant to be my lunch, you bottomless pit!“
"It is your divine punishment for leaving me to starve!"
On second thought maybe he didn't have anything much to worry about after all. How many times can you say that the biggest threat to your plans currently had a ravenous nun munching on the top of your head? Veritas marched right up to the stand, reached into his pocket and placed a coin on the counter.
"Two muffins please," he said with a smile. The shopkeep handed them over, and then he immediately whirled around to offer the muffins to threat and walking encyclopedia of magical knowledge alike. "Here, for you."
"Huh?" Touma grunted, taking hold of the offered muffin suspiciously. "I don't normally take charity..."
“Touma don’t be ungrateful! Charity for the poor is one of the greatest virtues! Thank you sir!” Came from the nun which somehow managed to instantly get down from the male’s head and grab the muffin quickly.
"Charity? Not at all! That was... Quite entertaining. I should think you've both earned a little lunch just now. My name is... Naoto Veritas. I shall be attending here as of today."
"Great... more strange characters intersect with my life..." Touma sighed. "Oh well!" he shrugged. "Welcome to class, I guess."
Strange, huh? Oh Touma, you had no idea how strange he could be.
- Veritas works at joining Touma's circle of friends while promoting perversion under the radar.
- Misaka won a punishment game against Touma, leading into the Invasion Arc. How does Veritas respond?
- Fukiyose searches for someone to help her investigate Aisa's weird behaviour. Potential fatesplit for characters she could ask.
- Aisa spots Veritas and says hello.
- Other characters are being affected by the new religion. Let's look at them.
- Something else
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