Ranma sighed to himself as he leaned back in his seat on the bullet train, his pack with all his belongings on the seat next to him. As much as he'd tried to make things work in Nerima and deal with everything that happened there, he'd finally reached a breaking point. He wasn't entirely sure what it was that finally pushed him over the edge, but in the middle of the night he'd grabbed his pack and headed for the nearest train station, catching the next train out to anywhere. He wasn't even sure where he was going, as long as it was as far from Nerima as he could get. He'd actually caught a quick nap as he waited for the train to leave. He was rather surprised now to find that no one else was in the same train car as he was, but it was a relief to have silence for a while. It would be good to get away from the weirdness for a while.

As he thought that, the train pulled to a halt in the station. A voice chimed over the speakers. "Welcome to Hosu District, Musutafu. Please have all identification ready as you disembark, have a nice day."

As the doors swung open, Ranma frowned. He didn't actually have any identification papers or anything of the sort, as his travels with Genma had never involved anything of the sort since they rarely used any form of transportation. Still, it wouldn't be the first time he'd stepped around something like that. Slinging his pack onto his back, he wrapped his ki around himself in the Umisenken, vanishing from sight. With that done, he calmly walked out of the train and the station, being careful not to bump into anything as he went. Once he was out, he let the technique drop and moved to mingle with the crowd.

He frowned as he noticed something odd. Quite a few people looked...different. They had odd shaped faces, or unusually shaped limbs...or an unusual number of limbs. Is there a convention in town or something? he wondered as he glanced around. Or...I don't know what day it is. Is it Halloween? Maybe some local festival? Shrugging it off, he kept walking, doing his best to be unobtrusive.

He tried not to think too hard about what was around him as he moved on, however. The last thing he needed was to stumble across a brand new weirdness...especially with the way his sixth sense was telling him that the odd anatomy of those around him wasn't entirely cosmetic. He did his best to close his mind to it, ignoring the ki flows around him and focusing on finding someplace he could get a bite to eat. He quickly made his way to a less crowded area of the city...only to be distracted by a loud scream.

Turning towards the source of the scream, he saw a massive creature smashing up a storefront. It was some kind of restaurant, and the creature looked to be a cross between a komodo dragon and an octopus, standing on its hind legs and swinging several tentacles ending in claws about to tear the place apart even as it grabbed cash and valuables that it stuffed into a sack.

Okay, monsters don't normally do petty theft...I think, Ranma thought to himself. Then again, the last time I saw something like that, Taro was after me to get Happossai to change his name. He noticed that most everyone was keeping their distance, and he could feel several strong, focused ki signatures closing in from the distance. He started to move away to get out of the carnage...only to hear the scream again, this time coming from a little girl the beast was holding in one of its claws, another holding a knife to her throat.

Before Ranma had fully thought his way through what he was doing, he'd blurred through the crowd, tossing his bag at the creature's face as he moved in. Flipping through its shifting limbs, he struck the numbness pressure point on the wrist of the knife claw, causing the knife to drop from the suddenly nerveless fingers. A second strike caused the limb holding the girl to go slack, dropping her. Ranma caught her, kicked away from the beast, and set her down at a distance. "I think you need to cool off!" he snapped as he rounded on the beast.

"You some sort of new hero?" the beast snapped out, its voice grating as it inhaled something. Feeling the flow of energy, Ranma rolled to the side as it spat some sort of sludge at him that dissolved the ground he was standing on.

"None of that now!" Ranma joked as he flipped through the limbs again, striking the point where the energy for that had focused, pushing his ki in to cut it off. "Don't you know it's rude to spit in public?" He flipped around the limb that swung at him, striking a paralysis point to lock it up.

The beast tried to strike back, but his limbs wouldn't obey him, and the paralyzed one interfered with the movement of his others. "What kind of hero are you?" it demanded as it sucked in air, only to choke as nothing came out.

"Good question," Ranma observed as he managed to get onto its back. "Why don't you sleep on it?" With that said, he brought his hands together to strike the sleeper point, sending the beast into lala land. As it fell, he leapt back lightly, snatching his bag before it was crushed beneath the beast.

Noticing that most of those around him seemed stunned rather than pleased, he decided it was best to get a move on. The last thing he wanted was to get in trouble over this. He turned to leave, only to hesitate as he felt something hit him...but do nothing.

"Quite the efficient takedown," a dry voice said as someone landed lightly behind him. Turning, he saw a man somewhat taller than him with stringy black hair, pale skin, and penetrating red eyes, dressed all in black save for a mess of grey strips bundled around his neck. He stared at Ranma over the strips, and Ranma could feel his eyes like black holes trying to take something from him. "Certainly makes my job easier, but I don't recognize you. Which Hero Association are you with?"

Ranma blinked in confusion as he stepped back. "Hero...what? What are you talking about?" He shifted into a fighting stance, not liking the way the guy was looking at him.

The man raised an eyebrow and was silent for a time, then spoke again. "Do you know who I am?" he pressed.

"Not a clue," Ranma replied immediately. "And whatever you're trying to do to me with your eyes, stop it! It's not affecting me, but it feels really weird."

The other eyebrow raised, and the black holes behind his eyes seemed to close. "So you could feel that? Interesting. What's your Quirk, kid?"

"What the heck are you talking about?" Ranma demanded as he moved back slowly. "I was just trying to help!"

"There are laws about that, kid," the man continued as he moved forward. "Where have you been living, Nerima?"

"What of it?" Ranma countered angrily.

The hostility from the man seemed to fade. "Ah, that explains it," he allowed. He shifted out of his aggressive stance. "What's your name, kid?"

"...Ranma Saotome," Ranma responded. "Who are you?"

"Shota Aizawa," the man replied in a friendly tone. "Though I also go by Eraserhead. I'm a Licensed Hero, which makes it my job to deal with situations like this." He gestured as the cloths around his neck snaked out and wrapped up the creature Ranma had knocked out. "How'd you take him down, anyway?"

"Pressure point strikes," Ranma answered carefully, a little bit less aggressive now he realized this was law enforcement of some sort. He tried to avoid pissing off the law if he could. "Numbed his limbs to get the girl away from him, paralyzed another to throw him off balance, and a sleeper point to knock him out."

"How'd you find the pressure points?" Aizawa pressed firmly. "He doesn't have a baseline anatomy."

"They're still there, though," Ranma indicated. "It's not like they don't exist. They're right there, see?" He gestured to the creature.

Aizawa glanced over, then back at Ranma. "Look, Saotome...you aren't in trouble for trying to help, but I need you to come with me while we sort this all out. You didn't know what you were getting into, so I'll vouch for you and make sure nothing bad happens, but you need to clear it up before things get worse, okay?"

Ranma hesitated. He wasn't sure he wanted to just go along with someone like this, but as he saw others who were in similarly odd outfits approaching with similarly disciplined ki, he knew running and hiding wouldn't get him far for long. Then again...

As his stomach growled loudly, Aizawa's eyes seemed to smile. "We'll stop for lunch along the way. My treat, as thanks for keeping the girl safe before we got here."

"Lead the way," Ranma replied eagerly. He wasn't going to say no to a free lunch.