Chapter Text
Welcome to V.E.E.S.
Time never waits.
It delivers all equally to the same end
Regardless how long it takes
I hereby agree to the statement above
And I chooseth this fate of mine own free will.
The sound of the train hummed as it ran along the tracks. A young boy sat in his seat listening to his music player. A voice spoke up from the loudspeaker announcing the arrival at the Iwatodai station terminal. The boy got up from his seat and began to walk to the door. It was dark out now as it was nearing midnight.
Suddenly in an instant, the lights went out and his music stopped playing. A chill swept through the air, piercing his skin even through his coat. Walking along the street, the young boy looked around for other people. However, all he saw around the station were large coffin-like objects standing in places people would have gathered. It didn’t matter to him so he continued onward to the student dormitory.
Eventually he made his way there and walking inside, the lights were still off. Candles however, littered the inside of the dorm as the windows were blocked by large black sheets.
“Hello there,” a young boy said appearing in front of the teenager, “You’re late. I’ve been waiting a long time.”
The boy wearing a pair of pajamas with black and white stripes stood in front of him, snapped his fingers and a piece of paper appeared on the desk to the teenagers left. Turning to read it, the boy in pajamas continued to speak.
“If you wish to continue, sign your name here. It’s a contract. There’s no need to be scared,” he said, “All it says is that you accept full responsibility for your actions.”
Picking up the quill to sign the paper, the teenager signs the paper with his name.
MAKOTO YUKI
Upon finishing his name, Makoto hands the paper to the young boy who looks at it.
“Good,” he says, “Time is something no one can escape. It delivers us all to the same end. You can’t plug your ears or cover your eyes. And so it begins…”
Upon finishing his sentence, the young boy disappears in a puff of black smoke leaving Makoto standing in the lobby alone like when he arrived.
Suddenly a girls voice spoke up from elsewhere in the dorm, “Who’s there?”
Appearing from behind a glass counter, a girl wearing a pink uniform with silver accents along the ends stood there. Makoto, still confused about what has occurred, suddenly smells something in the air. The faint smell of garlic lingered around her.
She stands there in a stance showing unease looking at Makoto. On her leg, Makoto notices a stand device strapped to a holster.
“How are you here at this hour?” she asks. Before Makoto can answer, she responds to her own question by responding, “Don’t tell me!”
She begins to reach for the device in its holster when another voice speaks up and stops her. At that moment, the lights for the dorm flicker to life as the entire dorm is no longer dark.
“What’s going on?” asks Makoto.
“Pardon Yukari’s jumpiness,” the girl responds. Her red hair flowing smoothly in front of one of her eyes. On her belt hangs a similar device that the girl Makoto first met has on her leg. Both of them glowed with a faint glow.
“My name is Mitsuru Kirijo. I’m one of the students that live in this dorm.”
Yukari turns to look at Mitsuru, back at Makoto, then to Mitsuru before whispering, “Who’s he?”
“He’s a transfer student,” Mitsuru responds, “It was a last-minute decision to assign him here. He’ll eventually be moved to a room in the boys dorm.”
Yukari responds, “Is it okay for him to be here?” she lowers her voice, “With them around and about at night.”
Mitsuru sighs, “I guess we’ll see.”
Mitsuru turns her attention back to Makoto and gestures to Yukari, “This is Yukari Takeba. She’ll be a second year this spring, just like you.”
“Call me Takeba.”
“Why do you have a gun there?” Makoto asks, pointing out the strange device that both Yukari and Mitsuru have, “Seems strange for students to have.”
“Self defense,” Mitsuru responds, dodging the question leaving Makoto confused and wondering more.”
Swooshing her hair aside, Mitsuru looks at the clock before looking back at Makoto, “It’s getting late, why don’t you head to bed. You’ll find your room at the end of the hall on the second floor.”
Yukari leads Makoto up the stairs and past the other doors. Upon reaching his room, Yukari wishes him a good sleep.
“If you have any other questions,” she adds before walking away and Makoto enters his room, “lets just save them for later okay?”
She rushes off leaving Makoto standing there alone. Opening the door to his room, he finds it strangely well furnished. A large tv in the corner, a desk with a computer sat by a window, and a large shelf hung nearby. A large rug laid on the floor. Makoto noticed some scratches on the floor near the edges of the rug, but decided to leave it be as moving the rug would be too much to do this late at night.
Putting his stuff away in the closet, he prepared himself to go to bed and looked at himself in the mirror. His reflection looked back with the same eyes he found himself having. Laying down in bed, Makoto closed them and began to drift off to sleep. As he drifted through sleep, the sound of scratching could be heard coming from outside of the dorm and as the sun began to rise in the morning, a random dog in an alley was found with two holes in its neck and its body drained of blood.
“Hey Yuki! You up?” Yukari’s voice could be heard coming from the hall. Getting out of bed, Makoto walked over and opened the door.
“Did I wake you?” she asked, “Sorry, but we need to get ready to head to school. I’ll show you the way.”
Walking downstairs, the two walked through the main living room and made their way to school. As the monorail made its way across the water towards the school Makoto transferred too. Gekkoukan High stood there gleaming in the sunlight as Yukari introduced Makoto to the school.
Making his way towards the faculty office, Makoto overheard some students talking.
“Did you hear,” a girl told her friend, “the rumors about blood sucking happening at night.”
“What are you talking about?” her friend responded, “Those are just myths.”
“Nuh uh!” the first girl responded, “I heard a story about how a business guy was found lifeless outside the mall with some holes in his neck. It was really scary.”
“Blood sucking and lifeless people,” Makoto thought to himself, “Meh”
The rest of the school day was pretty normal until the end when a tall boy in a baseball cap approached him.
“Sup dude!” he said, “How’s it going?”
“Who are you?” Makoto asked.
“Names Junpei Iori!” Junpei responded, “I transferred here when I was a second year in middle school so I just wanted to show you how much of a cool guy I am.”
Suddenly Yukari walked up behind Makoto. Turning around to face her, Makoto saw her wearing the same outfit she was wearing the night he arrived at the dorm. The night he saw her with the strange device strapped to her leg.
“There you are acting like everyone’s best friend,” Yukari said before gesturing to Makoto, “Try not to make him uncomfortable, okay?”
“I was just being nice!” Junpei pleads.
Yukari just shakes her head, “If you say so,” she says, “I got to do some stuff for the archery club so I guess I’ll see you back at the dorm.”
Yukari walks away when Junpei pumps his fist and smiles, “alright dude! Now let’s head out too! I want to show you a bunch of stuff to do around here!”
As the two leave the school, they see a student hanging a poster. Reading it out of the corner of his eye, Makoto sees it say something about protecting your neck.
“These dang neck protector nut jobs,” Junpei says, “I bet its just some weird trend going around.”
The two make their way to Paulownia Mall and hang around in the arcade. As the two play a racing game, Makoto’s mind begins to wander and think about the strange boy he met the night before, the chill in the dorm, and the strange reports of neck bites.
“Well I guess I’ll see you tomorrow dude!” Junpei says as the two of them exit the arcade, “I’m heading this way. I’ll catch you later!”
“Bye,” Makoto says as he begins to make his way back to the dorm.
Upon entering the dorm, he was met with Mitsuru standing nearby.
“Ah Yuki,” she says, “I’m glad to catch you upon your return. How are you adjusting to getting around the area?”
“I’m doing good,” Makoto said, “Met a couple people who showed me around.”
Mitsuru smiles, “That is good. Always good to have multiple people around. Especially these days.”
“What do you mean?” Makoto asks her.
Mitsuru suddenly jolts in place upon realizing what she said, “Ah! Never mind all that! Why don’t you head to your room for the night, its getting kind of late.”
Makoto decides to retire to his room for the night and the night passes like it did before and the school day goes without any major happenings. Upon entering the dorm after school, Makoto is met with Yukari and a man in a dark brown suit sitting down talking.
“Oh, he’s back!” Yukari says as Makoto closes the doors.
“So this is our new guest,” the man says, “You know its customary to ask to come into a place before entering. Though I guess if you live here then it doesn’t matter.”
“Who are you?” Makoto asks, holding his bags.
“Ah!” the man says startled, “Forgive me. Where are my manners? My name is Shuji Ikutsuki. I’m a chairman of the board for your school. Do you have any questions for me while I’m here?”
“Is there anyone else who lives in this dorm?” Makoto asks, “I thought I met a young boy when I got here.”
“A young boy?” Ikutsuki says confused, “You must have just been tired upon your arrival. There’s you, Takeba here, miss Kirijo, and a third year student named Akihiko Sanada.”
He then gets up from his seat and looks at the two of them, “Well I’m sure you are worn out from all the formalities. Why don’t you go to bed early today.”
The chairman walks away from the two of them leaving them sitting there just as confused by his weird behavior as before.
“Well you heard the chairman,” Yukari says, “Transferring schools is a pain when you aren’t used to it.”
Back in his room in the dorm, Makoto lays down in his bed and slowly begins to drift off to sleep. Elsewhere in the dorm, Mitsuru, Yukari, and Ikutsuki gather around a large computer. On the screen is Makoto in his bed with various information flashing on the screens.
“How is he?” Ikutsuki asks Mitsuru while looking at the screen.
“He went to bed a little while ago,” she responds, “Do you think he’s…?”
“Well let’s just wait and see,” the chairman responds while looking at the clock on the screen, “The dark hour approaches.”
Elsewhere in the city, a young man stands on the edge of an alley smoking a cigarette with some others. A radio begins to announce the time before suddenly turning off. The man becomes surprised when he suddenly notices the others around him having transformed into coffins.
“What the?” he says looking around.
Suddenly something grabs his wrist and a cold sensation radiates up his arm.
“AH!” he screams trying to pull away, but something else grabs his other arm.
“Let me go!” he says as he tries to run away, “Let…me..g-ah!”
Suddenly his left foot is grabbed and he trips. Falling to the ground, the young man is pulled by the ankles into the shadows of the alley where his screams are the only other sound accompanied by slurping and biting noises. Eventually the dark hour passes and the coffins return to their normal human state with everyone nearby wondering what happened to the man.
Back at the dorm, Mitsuru, Yukari, and Ikutsuki are still looking at the computer monitor which shows Makoto fast asleep.
“Hmmm,” Ikutsuki says, “He’s still sleeping. The dark hour occurs every day at 12 midnight. You could even say it is the “hidden” hour.”
He rubs his chin as he continues to speak, “It’s during this time that an ordinary person transmogrifies into a coffin, and is oblivious to all that occurs while also being protected from that which hunts during this time.”
Yukari turns around to face the chairman, “Then he must be…human? Or is he one of them?”
“No,” Mitsuru says, “He couldn’t be. You said that he went with you to school these past couple days correct Takeba?”
“Yeah”
“Well then he is human,” Ikutsuki says, “As you can see, he’s retained his human form instead of turning into a coffin. He may be asleep, but he’s definitely experiencing the dark hour. The only question now is whether or not he has the potential.”
“They would have taken notice and tried to feed on him if he didn’t,” the chairman said looking up at the computer once more.”
“Scary,” Yukari says, “Good thing he is in here.”
“In any case,” the chairman says, “we should continue to monitor him for a couple more days. Just to be sure.”
“Of course,” Mitsuru says.
“I feel kind of bad for spying on him though,” Yukari says as all three of them continue to look on as Makoto continues to sleep.
Makoto suddenly finds himself jolted awake by a strange feeling. Looking around, he finds himself sitting in a chair. Strange carvings are etched into the chair and as Makoto looks forward, he sees that he is not alone. Situated in front of him beneath a large clock are two people wearing bright blue outfits. One a teenage girl wearing a sleeveless dress and carrying a large book, the other an old man with a rather large nose and big beady eyes. The mans hands are clasped together as he has a large smile across his face. Finally the man opens his mouth and he begins to speak.
“Welcome to the Velvet Room,” the man says, “My name is Igor. I am delighted to make your acquaintance.”
Gesturing to the girl to his side, the man called Igor continues to speak, “This is Elizabeth. She is a resident here, like myself.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Elizabeth says as she nods in acknowledgement of Makoto.
“This place exists between dream and reality, mind and matter. Only those who have signed the contract can enter this place. Only those whose will is controlled by their own.”
In a flash of light, the contract that Makoto signed when he first arrived at the dorm appears on the table in front of Igor, Elizabeth, and Makoto.
“From now on, you shall be welcome here as a guest in the Velvet Room,” Igor says, “You are destined to hone your unique ability in your upcoming crusade, and you will require my assistance to do so.”
Igor continues to look Makoto deep in the eyes as he continues to speak, “I only ask for one thing in return. For you to abide by your contract and assume full responsibility for the choices you make.”
“What are you talking about?” Makoto asks, “I don’t understand. What crusade?”
“That is fine, for now,” Igor responds.
At that moment, floating down from the ceiling of the strange room he found himself in, Makoto say a bright light approach him. As it comes to float in front of him, a small blue key drops onto his lap.
“Until we meet again,” Igor says.
At that moment, Makoto feels himself grow very sleepy and passes out.
As he wakes up, Makoto thinks back to what had occurred the night before. The strange dream he had with the man named Igor and the girl called Elizabeth was still fresh. It must have been real because he found the same small blue key in his coat pocket when he put it on that morning.
As he arrived at Gekkoukan High School, Junpei met up with him. Talking about how tired he was, Junpei told Makoto how exhilarating it was to fall asleep in class.
“That’s dumb,” Makoto said, “Why would you even try that?”
“It makes the dreams more exciting don’t you think?” Junpei said, “Besides, when it's Mister Ekoda talking about old Japan, who cares what is covered during class.”
The school day passed like normal and Makoto made his way back to the dorm. As he walked up the stairs to go inside, he noticed a strange indent in the cement outside of the dorm. It almost looked like something had scratched the ground outside of the dorm working up the courage to get inside, but decided against it.
Once he entered the dorm, he was once again met with Mitsuru stopping him.
“You’re pretty late,” she said seemingly scolding him, “I don’t mean to be overbearing, but please don’t make this a regular occurrence. You don’t want to be outside when it gets dark.”
As he walked upstairs to his room, Makoto felt extra tired. Maybe it was the effect of not napping in class like Junpei suggested or maybe something with the full moon, but whatever the case was, he was to tired to get changed out of his uniform. As he sat down on his bed, he fell backward and immediately collapsed into a deep sleep.
As the dark hour begins once more, Mitsuru, Yukari, and Ikutsuki sit in the same command room with the large computer as the night before.
“How is he?” Ikutsuki asks, looking at the computer screen.
“It looks like he’s a little worn out,” Mitsuru says standing up, “He went to bed without changing out of his uniform, but other than that, nothing has changed since last night.”
Ikutsuki presses his glasses against his face and ponders for a moment to himself.
“Interesting,” he says, “Even those who have the potential tend to be unstable at first and show some symptoms. Memory loss, disorientation, but this subject is unique. He hasn’t shown any of them.”
“I still don’t like this,” Yukari says, “We’re treating him like a guinea pig.”
“Oh don’t think of it like that,” the chairman says reassuring her, “You two are classmates right? Consider it an opportunity to have someone your own age here. Besides, we need all the help we can get to go against them.”
“I guess that’s true,” Yukari begins to say before being cut off by an alarm coming from the computer console in front of them.
Mitsuru presses a button before speaking into a microphone, “Command room speaking. Akihiko? What’s wrong?”
An exhausted voice comes through the speaker, “Ugh. You’re not gonna believe it. This one is huge. It’s splintering off into multiple thralls every second. Unfortunately, they’re chasing after me right now.”
Akihiko keeps breathing heavily on the other end, “I’m almost back. Figured I’d let you know in advance.
Upon finishing his sentence, Yukari jumps out of her seat, “Does that mean? He’s bringing a bunch of them here!?”
“Mr. Chairman,” Mitsuru says, “That’s enough observation for now. We need to prepare for combat.”
“Right!” Ikutsuki says, struggling for words, “Be careful.”
A few minutes pass before the front door opens and Akihiko slumps in and falls down just inside the dorm. Yukari, Mitsuru, and the chairman all rush down and meet him with Yukari kneeling down to look over Akihiko’s injuries.
“Agh!” he shouts as Yukari touches his arm before reassuring her, “I’m all right.”
He sits up straight and looks at the three of them, “They’re almost here. Get ready to be surprised.”
“This is no time to joke around!” Mitsuru shouts.
“Is it one of them, Sanada-kun?” Ikutsuki asks Akihiko.
“Yeah,” he responds, “But not an ordinary one.”
Suddenly the dorm shakes as a large rumbling can be heard outside of the dorm. A large crash can be heard outside the front door as scratching and clawing noises can be heard.
“It sounds like the protection seals are working as intended,” Mitsuru says, “But we don’t know how long they are going to hold, if at all against such a powerful one.”
“Mister Chairman! To the command room!” Mitsuru says before looking at Yukari, “Takeba! Go upstairs and wake Yuki up. Then the two of you escape out the back away from the dorm.”
“What about you two?” Yukari asks.
“We’ll stop them here,” Mitsuru says, “Akihiko, you led them here, so I’m going to have you fight.”
Akihiko looks up at Mitsuru from his assessment of his injuries, “It’s not like I asked them to follow me. You know how they can be when they smell humans!”
Akihiko then looks at Yukari, “What are you waiting for, Takeba? GO!”
Yukari nods before heading upstairs to Makoto’s room, “Okay!”
Already awake, Makoto stumbles as the dorm begins to shake once again. Unsure what is occurring, he looks around. Looking out the window, he can’t see much, but it looks like the ground is covered in a moving mass of darkness. Inside that darkness are piercing yellow eyes looking in different directions.
“WAKE UP!” Yukari’s voice shouts from the hallway before she bursts into the room.
“What’s going on?” Makoto asks.
“There’s no time to explain. We have to get out of here now! Quickly to the first floor to escape out the back.”
As she turns around to leave the room, she suddenly turns back around with another sense of urgency.
“Oh wait!” she says pulling a large sword out from behind her, “Take this just in case. It’s designed to help for defending against a large number of them.”
Grabbing the sword, Makoto looks down at the blade as it seems to glow in the darkness of his room. The two of them make their way down the stairs towards the exit in the back of the dorm when Makoto hears a voice in his head sounding similar to that of Mitsuru.
“Be careful!” she says, “It seems that there are more of them than expected!”
Suddenly the door shakes as a dark ooze begins to seep through the cracks in the door and slowly begins to materialize into a hand.
“We need to get to safety!” Yukari says, “Quick! Let’s head upstairs.”
As the two of them rush up the stairs, Makoto wonders what is going on and what that hand was that formed from the strange goop that entered the door.
Suddenly a large crash could be heard from downstairs as the door broke down from the opposing force.
“They got in?!” Yukari shouts, “Quickly! We need to get to the roof!”
As the two run up the stairs much faster, they push themselves through the door to the roof. As Makoto bends over to catch his breath, Yukari locks the door behind them.
“There,” she says, “That should hold it.”
Suddenly a large rumbling occurred next to the dorm causing the both of them to turn away from the door and look towards the edge of the dorm’s roof. As he looks over, Makoto is shocked at what he is seeing.
A large group of humanoid figures begin to crawl onto the roof. As each one makes its way onto the roof, it falls forward and is crawled upon by another behind it. Suddenly rising from the side of the dorm, a large human figure wearing all black clothing rises. With a mask with the number one on it, the figure turns and looks to the side before taking steps forward, using the smaller beings as a makeshift stair case.
“So,” it says in a deep and raspy tone, “This is the place where you gather to prepare when it comes time to fight my thralls.”
“What is going on?” Makoto asks as both him and Yukari stand in place.
The large male figure turns and faces in Makoto’s direction, “Ah, so you have recruited a new warrior into your fold, but there’s something different about you. I can smell it.”
He steps forward, but before getting any closer, Yukari pulls out the strange device from its holster. At this moment, Makoto can see that it resembles an ordinary pistol with some lettering on the side.
“Leave him out of this!” Yukari says as she aims the device at her forehead. Suddenly the figure snaps their fingers and a smaller creature jumps from the horde and leaps towards Yukari, running along the roof. Yukari tries to work up the courage to pull the trigger on the device, but at the last second the creature slashes at her, knocking her aside and sending the device flying to Makoto’s feet.
The smaller creature ignores Makoto as he still stands completely still, but looks down at his feet at the device.
“Ah, this one will provide us all with quite a bit of nourishment,” the large figure says as he begins to walk towards Yukari lying motionless on the ground, “It’s been a while since we had any kind of special meal such as this.”
Back in the command room, Mitsuru and Akihiko finally take notice of what had arrived on the roof and jump from their seats to rush to the roof. Suddenly, Ikutsuki stops them as he looks at Makoto on the screen.
Makoto looks down at the ground at the device and picks it up. Suddenly the large figure stops his approach towards Yukari and freezes.
“Are you willing to commit to that type of power young one?” he says as he turns around to face Makoto, “You should know whether you are truly willing to go along with what trials are sure to follow if you pull that trigger.”
“I know,” Makoto says.
“Then by all means,” the figure says with a smile and a bow, “Don’t miss.”
Aiming the device at the side of his head, Makoto takes a deep breath as he feels a rush of power gather inside of him. Suddenly, he sees the young boy he first met when he arrived at the dorm the first night.
“Go on,” the boy says as Makoto takes another deep breath.
Closing his eyes and as a smile creeps across his face, Makoto says one word.
Per
So
Na.
And then pulls the trigger on the device sending a rush of energy from the barrel of the device, out the end, and into his head. As his eyes glow a bright blue, a large wave of energy radiates from his body knocking back the large figure and sending him tumbling into the smaller creatures that accompanied him.
“So,” the figure says as he picks himself up from beneath the mass of smaller creatures, “he does have the potential for a persona then.”
As the energy radiates from Makoto’s body, it begins to swirl around him and gathers above his head. The energy begins to collect and forms into the body of a man. With one hand resembling that of a crossbow and the other holding onto a small circular bladed weapon, the figure begins to take shape. Large wooden stakes are attached to the chest of the figure as the heels of the figure's boots resemble that of crosses.
“I am thou… Thou art I,” the figure says in a gruff voice, “From the sea of thy soul, I cometh to fight that which hunts in the night.”
“I am Helsing, Master of the hunt…”
As Helsing’s eyes glowed a bright red, he floated high above Makoto still holding the device to his head and as he hovered there, he let out a loud roar sending most of the smaller creatures running off the side of the roof leaving behind the larger one.
“You think you are special,” the figure says, “I’ll kill you and suck out your essence, and then I’ll move onto the others!”
At that moment, Yukari wakes up and notices Makoto having used the device she carried around with her. Back inside the command room, the three of them stood there with serious expressions. Mitsuru nodded to herself.
“Just as we thought.”
Back on the roof, the leader of the creatures stood up and faced Makoto and Helsing. Opening his hands, the creature's fingers grew into that of sharp claws and his feet breaking the creature's shoes as they turned into talons. As Makoto still wielded a wicked smile on his face, it suddenly faded as he hunched over in pain. Suddenly he saw the young boy's face in his mind once more. Gripping his head in his hands, Makoto swayed back and forth.
“Hehe,” the creature laughed, mocking Makoto, “Can’t handle the power that comes with your first summon. No matter, it will all be over soo-”
The creature's sentence was cut off as Helsing leaned backwards gripping his own head. Simultaneously, both Makoto and Helsing let out a scream that could be heard throughout the entire dorm. Streaks of red light began to shine out from Helsing’s head as suddenly his head was pulled into his coat by another pair of hands wearing a pair of black gloves.
Suddenly Helsing burst open like a pinata and in his place hovered a new persona. A being in a bright red and black coat with and wearing a pair of glasses hiding his eyes. Once he had fully stretched, the new persona let out a roar that sent the larger creature staggering for footing on the roof.
“COME ON THEN!” he shouted at the persona, “LET’S GO!”
Pulling a pair of large swords from under the red and black coat, the persona leapt towards the creature with alarming speed. Slashing the swords, the creature barely had time to react to what had occurred. As his head began to detach from his body, the persona grabbed both of his arms in one hand. Crushing them both and Yukari and the others watched as whatever bodily fluids were in the arms began to drip out.
As the creature's head fell to the ground, the persona picked it up and pressed it with both of its hands, crushing it just as it did the creature's arms. Returning to the spot above Makoto, some strange effect occurred where at one moment this other persona was there and then Helsing remained before vanishing in a bright light.
“Woah,” Yukari said as she sat upright behind Makoto.
As he turned around, Yukari could almost make out a small smile from Makoto before he fell forward and collapsed onto the roof of the dorm. A minute passes before the door to the roof is unlocked and out rushes Mitsuru and Akihiko. Yukari huddling over Makoto has turned him over onto his back. As the three of them ponder what has occurred, the full moon seemingly glows ever brighter as the dark hour nears its close once more.
Chapter 1 Complete