Tracen Academy Incident #3: Testimony of a MerUma

The tape recovered from Agnes Tachyon’s laboratory provides useful information about the transformation epidemic in Tracen; however, it is still unclear how it is triggered or what causes the transformations, in order to prevent more Uma Musumes from turning into mermaids. Nevertheless, the testimony of a MerUma Musume provides useful information: April 14, 2022, Testimony of “El Condor Pasa.” - Tell us, Miss El, what happened? - Well, it was just a regular, ordinary day at Tracen, and Grass and I had to train for our upcoming race in a few days. We’d been working on our speed and endurance, but we still lacked stamina, so we decided to go to the school pool to train there. - Okay, go on. - I was going first, so I changed out of my regular uniform into my school swimsuit, got into the pool, and started with some basic warm-up exercises. Everything was going well at that point until I felt something strange—like a tingling sensation in my legs. - A tingling sensation? - Yeah, like when your leg falls asleep and you can’t feel it—just a lot of weird little pricks. - All right, go on. - It was a strong sensation I couldn’t ignore, so I tried to move one of my legs to touch it with my hand, but I couldn’t move them. I ran my hand over my left leg but only felt something rough, like scales. Soon I felt my feet stop touching the bottom of the pool. I got a little scared, so I dove underwater to see what was going on. I couldn’t believe what I saw. - What did you see? - My legs were gone! I had a long, scaly red fish tail! I was so shocked that my mouth fell open and I felt like I was drowning, but I wasn’t—I could also breathe underwater. I noticed I had gills on my abdomen and small fins on my sides. - Did it hurt? - No! As I mentioned before, it was as if my legs had gone numb, but that wasn’t the case. - So... how do you explain that bruise on your face? - Ah... well... Well, since I was so surprised, I swam over to Grass Wonder, who was standing at the edge of the pool still wearing her regular uniform, and excitedly shouted, “I’m a mermaid, Grass-chan!” My shout and excitement were so intense that I splashed water from the pool on her, and surprisingly, she instantly turned into a mermaid, just like me. But she didn’t look happy—she had a terrifying smile on her face. She was soaked, her uniform was wet, and now she couldn’t walk to go change clothes. I realized right then that she was upset. She turned to look at me, and the next thing I knew, she hit me in the face with her fin and knocked me out. - Uhhh, that must have hurt. - Yeah.... heh heh - All right, now... Do you remember taking any strange substances? A potion, a drink, or something like that? Or maybe... did Agnes Tachyon give you something from her experiments? - No, we didn’t drink or consume anything strange from Agnes Tachyon; in fact, we didn’t see her all day. - All right.... Your transformations are triggered by contact with water, that’s very helpful.... - But.... - Hmm? - When Grass and I went to the cafeteria, all the food smelled and tasted different to us. The menu featured chicken croquettes with rice and carrot cake, but for some reason, everything tasted and smelled like fried fish. - Fried fish at the cafeteria, huh? We’ll have to look into that. Thank you very much for your cooperation, Miss El. - You’re welcome~