Hello, everyone! The New World Fool coming at you with a Persona 4 Golden-Persona 5 Royal Crossover spectacular! This project was inspired by one called "Sometimes Lightning Does Strike Twice," over on fanfiction, and as such, takes MANY cues from it. However, as I don't want my work to come off as a cheap knockoff, I will be throwing several of my own ideas into the mix. Such as both Yu and Naoto attaining Metaverse attire, but still using their Tarot Cards to summon their Personas. Speaking of Personas, Yu, in addition to his Wild Card ability, will have a very powerful version of Izanagi, while Naoto has Yamato Sumeragi. Why Yu downgraded will be explained in the story. Here are my planned starting movesets for them.

Izanagi: Ziodyne, Maziodyne, Cross Slash, Megidolaon, Heat Riser, Blade of Fury, Elec Boost, Tempest Slash

Yamato Sumeragi: Eiagaon, Kougaon, Maeiagaon, Makougaon, Megidolaon, Shield of Justice, Heat Riser, Tempest Slash

Also, the Arena games do not exist in this AU, and instead of taking place in 2016, this fic takes place in 2014, as apparently there was an actual Prime Minister election in Japan that year. Similarly, in this AU, Persona 4 Golden happened from April of 2012 to March of 2013, so a year before the events of this story.

All right, I think that about covers everything I wanted to go over. So, let us start the game!

Chapter I

Enter The Metaverse

November 20th, 2014

Tokyo Police Department-Interrogation Room

How long had it been since Sae Niijima had started interrogating this boy, Ren Amamiya? And even with all that Ren had revealed to her, Sae still had so many questions. He had concocted such a tall tale, speaking of a talking cat that transformed into a bus, claiming that he and his friends were essentially like magical girls, summoning monsters with superpowers by ripping off their masks to force criminals to confess their crimes, like something out of a video game. A pretty good video game that Sae wouldn't have minded playing, time permitted, but still a video game nonetheless. But, she couldn't allow her emotions or how ridiculous the whole thing sounded to cloud her judgement. Not now.

"There's something that... baffles me," Sae said as she folded her arms. "You claim to have fought these creatures, these 'Shadows' throughout your infiltrations into what you call Palaces. And yet, I doubt that you would have prevailed so easily, if you did not have someone with previous battle experience. Furthermore, I refuse to believe that you avoided the police's network until today. The only logical explanation is that you had an inside track within the police force. I want names."

The boy looked at her with blurry eyes, but remained silent. Sae silently cursed to herself, before she dragged her fingers through her hair. Of course he refused to speak of his collaborators when she pressed him on it.

But then something suddenly popped into Sae's head. Hmm… maybe this will get him to talk, she thought as she plucked out a file, showing it to the boy. Sae felt a pang of guilt as she looked at Amamiya. He was young, younger than Makoto...

Sae quickly squashed that thought. He was quite possibly the most dangerous criminal in the history of all of Japan. It didn't matter if he was old and gray or a mere toddler, it didn't change what he had done, the lives he'd ruined or destroyed. And Sae, as a prosecutor for the Special Investigation Unit, couldn't allow herself to pity a crook.

Sae cleared her throat, before tapping a fingernail against the photos The photos showed an image of a teenage girl with blue hair, slightly older than Ren, and a young man around college age with silver hair. Sae wasn't sure what it was, but something about this silver-haired man eerily reminded her of the boy sitting directly in front of her.

It was kinda spooky how the silver haired college student reminded her of Amamiya, now that she thought about it...

"Shujin Academy is of high prestige. Yet, they accepted another transfer student just a couple weeks after your own, and an exceptionally high profile one at that. I've no doubt you've heard of her and her accomplishments, such as helping to capture the true culprit of the Hanged Man killer case," said Sae before she leaned in close.

"Tell me… what do you know about the original Detective Prince, Naoto Shirogane, and her lover, Yu Narukami?" the prosecutor demanded.

April 20th, 2014

Tokyo-Aoyama Itchome District-Near Shujin Academy

Yu Narukami heaved a soft sigh as he walked through the backstreets of Aoyama-Itchome. He knew that he should have been worried, the rise of rumored criminal elements going through his head, but it was hardly something that scared him. His university courses scared him more than some thugs with what would likely amount to some knives. Given what he had faced in the past, some thugs with knives hardly scared him.

Life had become… mundane for Yu since he had started university. And while there were a great many things he wished he could have changed about it, he enjoyed the mundane. There was something… refreshing about being able to really predict everything that was likely to occur in the day to day. Especially after the hectic and dangerous year that he spent in Inaba. Though his time in that sleepy little town had been thoroughly enjoyable and ultimately satisfying, there had been no question about the danger there, between the serial murders that had come to be known as the Hanged Man killings, multiple kidnappings by a misguided man who thought himself a hero, and the twisted personifications of humanity's desires had certainly kept him busy.

These days, Yu hardly looked to fit in, even as he moved through the back alleyways that would have him cut across Shujin Academy, his old alma mater from which he had recently graduated. Dressed in a simple pair of charcoal grey slacks, a white dress shirt, and a charcoal grey blazer, Yu kept an appearance of professionalism while he went to University. Perhaps it had been the time he spent in High School, perhaps it was seeing Kanji dressed so casually, or some mixture of both that had made him want to keep the appearance of a modicum of professionalism. Either way, even with his choice in attire, he usually made for an interesting head turning individual. Being as tall as he was and with natural silver hair, he was hard to miss.

Yu quickly stopped in his tracks when he heard what sounded like a mechanical female voice coming from a phone.

"Kamoshida. Pervert. Shujin Academy. Castle. Beginning navigation."

Yu gasped with surprise as a familiar sensation came over him. However, this sensation felt somewhat different at the same time. Compounding this difference was the appearance of red and black distortions, for a lack of a better word, as opposed to black and white ones, the fact that he hadn't fallen into a TV notwithstanding. Yet, there was no mistaking it. Somehow, he had been pulled into something akin to the Midnight Channel once again.

The next moment, Yu's attire was engulfed in a plume of bluish white fire, leaving a completely different one in its place. Looking down at himself, Yu realized that he was clad in a black and white trench coat with gold designs and several white belts, charcoal gray pants held up by a white belt that, much to Yu's surprise, held a holster with a pistol in it, as well as a katana in its scabbard. He also wore black and white boots and black and gray gloves. Feeling something on his face, Yu reached up and found a mask on it. Removing it, Yu came to realize that it was a white and golden domino mask that seemed to double as a white headband.

Before Yu had much time to process his strange transformation, he heard a male voice speak from nearby.

"But daaaaaaaamn…" the voice said.

Frowning, Yu moved towards the source of the voice, only to stop in his tracks and have his jaw drop at the sight before him.

Gone was Shujin Academy, and in its place was a towering and imposing castle ripped right out of medieval times, and standing in front of the front gates were four individuals. One of them was what appeared to be a small cartoon cat mascot with a yellow neckerchief around its neck. The other three, however, were decidedly human, two boys and a girl, all three of them teenagers no older than Yu had been when he'd first awakened Izanagi.

One of the boys had a mop of raven-colored hair that almost seemed frizzy. He wore a black leather ankle-length tailcoat, a high-necked waistcoat with gold accents, black pants, brown-black winklepickers, a pair of red gloves, and a black and white, birdlike domino mask. Yu couldn't quite place it, but there was something about this boy that reminded him of himself.

The second boy of the group had bleached blonde hair that reminded Yu of his old friend, Kanji Tatsumi, and wore a black leather jacket with matching pants and knee pads, a red ascot, combat boots, a pair of yellow gloves, and a skull mask. For some reason, this boy reminded him of his old friend, Chie Satonaka.

The sole girl of the group had platinum blonde hair and wore a skin-tight red latex catsuit with a cleavage cutout and zippers, a matching red panther mask, pink gloves, dark red thigh-high boots, and a clip-on tail on the back of her catsuit. For some reason, this girl reminded him of his old friend, Rise Kujikawa, better known to the world as Risette.

And yet, all four of these characters gave Yu a very strong sense of deja vu. It almost felt like he had seen these people somewhere before. For some reason, as Yu dwelt on the strange deja vu feeling, the phrase "movie theatre," came to mind. Perhaps he had run into them at the theatre in Shibuya?

Only problem with that theory is that I haven't been to the theatre in a really long time… thought Yu. Either way, I can't stand around here. I gotta hide!

Thinking quickly, Yu ducked into a nearby alleyway in the hopes of eavesdropping on the costumed teenagers before him without getting detected himself.

"What's up?" the girl of the group asked.

"N-nothing! I was just thinking we should chose a codename for you too," the blonde boy said, whom Yu recognized as the voice who had spoken earlier.

"A codename?" the girl asked, vocalizing what Yu was thinking.

"I'm Skull, he's Joker," the blonde boy explained, indicating himself and the raven-haired boy respectively before indicating the cat-like creature. "And that's Mona."

Joker, Skull, and Mona… thought Yu, his mind whirring at top speed. He could only think of two types of people who would need a codename, at least in real life: thieves and spies. If these kids were thieves, then Yu had an obligation to stop and apprehend them, especially considering where they were. Granted, these kids were using this place to commit some kind of larceny rather than murder, but all the same, using a Shadow World to commit untraceable crimes was not something he could just sit by and allow to happen.

That being said, Yu still didn't have enough information on these kids to just go in guns blazing and try to apprehend them. So, for now, Yu stayed where he was and continued to listen.

"Judging by your costume…" Mona said thoughtfully, his voice sounding like it belonged to a twelve-year old boy.

"I mean, she's got that tail and stuff so…" Skull said thoughtfully before turning towards Joker. "What do you think, Joker?"

"Hmm…" the raven hared boy, the Joker, hummed thoughtfully. "How about… Sexy Cat?"

"Wait!" the girl of the group objected. "Is that what you're going to call me from now on?! I am so not down for this!"

"Well, what do you wanna be called then?" Skull asked the girl.

"Something better than just a little cat…" the girl said, her voice still sounding a touch irritated by Joker's suggestion. "Maybe… 'Panther?' That sounds pretty cool, right?"

"Huh? Why?" asked Skull, confused.

"'Cause it sounds more… ferocious?" the newly-dubbed Panther said half-heartedly.

"She's a cougar…" Mona said, his voice suggesting that he was… well, head over paws for this Panther girl.

"Don't call me that!" snapped Panther. "More importantly: Kamoshida!"

Yu frowned at the mention of a Kamoshida… it couldn't be that Kamoshida, could it? The Olympian who taught at the school? What did he have to do with this Shadow World?

Yu was quickly pulled out of his thoughts by an all-too-familiar sound. Looking up, he saw that the thieves had moved closer to the front door, and quickly noticed that what looked like a blue prison cell door had appeared as though from nowhere, and what looked like a small prison warden in blue had appeared. Joker seemed to be the only one who noticed the door's appearance, apart from himself that is.

Joker turned towards the door and approached what looked like a young child with platinum blonde hair dressed in a blue warden's outfit and had an eyepatch covering her right eye. After speaking to the child, a girl by the look of it, Joker was admitted through the cell door.

This immediately struck Yu as odd. When had dealings with the Velvet Room, he'd been given a key to admit himself into the space between dream and reality, mind and matter. The fact that this Joker had to actually be let in by what he could only assume was Margaret's younger sister raised several questions for Yu. Had Joker misplaced his Velvet Key somehow? Or had he never been given one to begin with?

After a few moments, the Joker emerged from the Velvet Room and after speaking with his teammates, the Joker and his partners in crime darted off and snuck into the castle through what looked like a very conveniently-placed hole in the wall.

Yu decided to wait a couple of minutes before entering the castle himself, so as to not encounter the Thieves and cause complications. Once he was sure these apparent thieves were gone, Yu walked towards the front door and pushed on it a bit, feeling it slowly swing open. He came to a massive foyer with a large staircase leading up on two sides. Plush red carpet softened the hardened soles of his boots. But it was the large painting in the front of the foyer that grabbed his attention.

The picture was of Suguru Kamoshida, the PE teacher and head coach of Shujin Academy's elite claim-to-fame volleyball team.

Now that was a face Yu could have gone the rest of his life without seeing that large. However, upon closer inspection, Yu realized that the man shown in the portrait had yellow eyes, indicating that it was actually the man's Shadow-Self.

Does that mean Kamoshida is capable of summoning a Persona…? thought Yu before an involuntary shudder ran down his spine at the thought. Kamoshida had rubbed him wrong in multiple ways during Yu's final year of High School at Shujin Academy. The man had pestered Yu about joining the Volleyball Team. But, after seeing how badly injured the rest of the volleyball team was, he had absolutely no intentions of joining. Thankfully, Yu had the excuse of having to study for his University Entrance exams to help with dodging that particular bullet. Besides, he preferred basketball as it was.

Well, not that the Shujin Academy basketball team actually played anyone because of Kamoshida… but, still, at least it wasn't disbanded like the track team had been, something that to this day, Yu personally called bullshit on, especially considering the broken leg the student involved had gotten, courtesy of Kamoshida.

"INTRUDER!"

The voice caused Yu to be yanked out of his thoughts and spin towards it's source, seeing a golden armored knight was bearing down on him with a sword. It then erupted like ink mixed with blood before something new formed out of it. It was some sort of horse of purple color with a white mane and two large green horns. It reared up and snorted before charging.

Yu's eyes went wide before he brought up both arms in a cross, hoping to be able to block the attack, and went flying several feet away, causing Yu to drop his sword in the process.

"I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL YOU 'CAUSE KING KAMOSHIDA TOLD US HE'D REWARD WHOEVER BROUGHT HIM THE INTRUDERS' HEADS! I'LL KILL CAUSE THAT'S WHAT HE WANTS!" snarled the Shadow as it reared up to try attacking Yu again.

However, before the dirty two horned beast could move a muscle, an all-too-familiar, raspy voice entered Yu's mind.

Hmm hmmm hmm… I rather think not, said the voice, which Yu immediately recognized as belonging to his Persona, Izanagi, as Yu pulled himself up off the ground. He raised a hand up at the twin horned horse. Before his very eyes, a blue Tarot card bearing the insignia of the Fool Arcana began to spin into existence.

Shall we, then, Seeker of Truth? Izanagi asked Yu from within his subconscious.

"Indeed we shall," Yu replied before crushing the tarot card. "Ziodyne!"

With a sound of shattering glass, a humanoid figure dressed in an attire similar to Yu's current outfit, with the exception of a metal face mask and blades on its feet, carrying a large nagatina with a completely straight blade appeared. With a cry, Izanagi summoned a torrent of lightning bolts from the heavens, striking the dirty two-horned beast and killing it with a single blast, its remains disintegrating into black ash with a pained cry.

Yu turned to look up at Izanagi, who in turn looked at his summoner. "Good to see you again, Izanagi," Yu said to his Persona, who chuckled.

"And it is good to see thou again, Summoner," Izanagi replied.

"So… why have you regressed from Izanagi-No-Okami? What happened?" Yu asked his Persona.

"That is a question thou should be asking thyself, Summoner," Izanagi said. "As a Persona, I am merely thy true self that has been accepted by my self from what you call 'reality.' Perhaps it is not I that has regressed, but thou. But, we haven't time to dwell on this matter. Right now, we must move."

Yu quickly picked up on the sound of booted feet heading his way, causing him to straighten up and press his back against the wall.

"Woo! Man, those guys were pissed, eh, Joker?" a voice Yu was quick to recognize as Skull said, panting as he spoke. "Haven't had to run like that in a while... wonder what got them all riled up like that? I mean, we all took cover whenever a Shadow was on patrol, and got the drop on them, right? So then why's the security level through the roof?"

"Hmm…" the small cartoon cat, Mona, said thoughtfully. "I don't think any Shadows could have seen us while we took cover, and I'm pretty sure the security level is supposed to decrease whenever we get the drop on a Shadow…"

"Hey," Joker said. "Whatever is going on here, we'll figure it out. Right now, we need to skedaddle back to the infiltration point and get out of here before we get swarmed."

The rest of the group nodded in agreement before taking off in the direction that Yu presumed the hole in the wall he'd seen them scamper through was in. Yu, meanwhile darted back through the front door and into the alleyway he had spied on the thieves from earlier, just in time to see the thieves emerge from the whole in the wall. Joker then pulled out his smartphone and pressed something on it.

"Would you like to return to the real world from the Castle of Lust?" the mechanical voice that he had heard earlier asked.

"Yes," replied Joker.

"Returning to the real world from the Castle of Lust. Thank you for all your hard work," the mechanical voice said.

No sooner had the voice spoken did the world around Yu and the thieves distort with the same red-and-black waves as before, and within a few seconds, the castle had disappeared, leaving Shujin Academy in all its splendor in its place. Looking down at himself, Yu quickly realized that he was back in his street clothes. A glance down the alleyway towards the Phantom Thieves revealed that they too had reverted back into what he could only assume was their normal attire. Noticeably missing, however, was the strange cartoon cat. Upon closer inspection, however, Yu quickly realized there was a perfectly normal and kinda adorable black cat in Joker's school bag. Perhaps like how his friend Teddie took a human form in the real world, this Mona took on the form of a regular cat?

"All right, guys, here's the plan," Joker said as he tucked his phone back into his pocket. "I'll make some Calming Aromas tonight to help put the security level back within reasonable levels. We'll meet up here again tomorrow."

"Sounds like a plan to me," said Skull, who now that he was in his regular outfit and didn't have his mask on, looked vaguely familiar to Yu, and not in the same sense of deja vu he'd gotten when he'd seen the group in their costumes, which seemed to be tied to that Shadow World in some way.

"Well, see you guys tomorrow!" said Panther before she and the others parted ways. Once the thieves were gone from his sight, Yu emerged from the alleyway and walked as fast as he could in the direction of the nearest subway back to Shibuya, where his apartment complex was located. A plan was already forming in Yu Narukami's mind.

As Yu walked, he noticed that the sun was much lower than the afternoon sun they had left under, indicating the much like in the Midnight Channel, time worked the same in this new Shadow World

Yu pulled out his phone, glad to see service had returned, but found himself at a loss in terms of what to do with it. He couldn't call the police about this, he'd be laughed off the line. Yu couldn't help but growl in frustration. It was the same damned thing with the Hanged Man killings and Namatame's abductions back in Inaba. But this time, he didn't have the others to back him up. If anything, he'd have to either start a new Investigation Team from scratch or join up with those thieves.

Yu suddenly noticed something off about his phone's home screen. A strange app bearing a black and red eye with a star as the pupil was shimmering away, apparently having installed itself onto his phone.

I wonder… is this how those thieves got into the Shadow World? thought Yu as he examined the app, apparently called the "Metaverse Navigator." If that was indeed the case, then clearly the powers that be had decreed for him to become involved in the affairs of Shadows and Personas once again, and there was no way he couldn't ignore what those kids were up to, so in truth, he had no say in the matter.

However, Yu knew for a fact that this wasn't something he could do alone. But, could he really ask one of his friends to come to Shibuya and possibly endanger themselves?

A memory suddenly surfaced in Yu's mind. He saw her face, that luminescent blush when she confessed her feelings for him, and he had confessed his feelings for her… no, he wasn't just going to call a friend.

Yu pulled up his contacts list and pressed the button labeled "Naoto Shirogane."

Elsewhere In Japan…

A young woman who looked as though she was in her Senior year of high school with dark blue hair that reached down to her lower back wearing a light tan suit with black dress shoes and a white dress shirt and blue tie underneath exited a police prefecture and made her way over to her red motorcycle, a serious expression on her face as she put on her helmet before reving up the engine and departing.

The past year had been… turbulent, for Naoto Shirogane. Ever since she had revealed herself to be a woman to the public, things had gotten pretty crazy in regards to her social standing. Gone were the lovestruck girls who had the hots for what they had thought was a handsome, princely detective, and in their place were boys who were lovestruck with a beautiful, highly intelligent, and "busty," as they say, woman. Too bad for them she already had a boyfriend, and those who didn't take the hint had to be persuaded with the gun she had gotten by defeating that unholy creature that was far too close to the Grim Reaper itself for her comfort. Not to mention how the media had recently taken to calling her the "Detective Princess," which was quite honestly, more irritating than being called the Detective Prince.

And while she did get a surge of cases in more rural areas like Inaba, cases in bigger cities, such as Tokyo, were few and far between, mostly thanks to her apparent successor as the Detective Prince, Goro Akechi.

Naoto couldn't say she liked Akechi. For one thing, he treated detective work as if it were just a game, or a show to perform. Not that there was anything wrong with people in show business, considering she was best friends with one of the biggest idols in all of Japan, but Akechi… he just treated their shared profession as though it were a game.

There was something else about him too, from what Naoto had seen from Akechi's televised appearances. Perhaps it was just the detective's intuition she had been born and bred with, but something about Akechi brought to mind one of the first things her grandfather had taught her about detective work.

"Always keep an eye on the quiet suspects. Sure, you might have some nut come along ranting and raving about his crimes, and perhaps he is guilty of those crimes. All the same, keep an eye on the quiet ones."

It had been this instinct that had told her Mitsuo Kubo had not been the real Hanged Man Killer, but rather a copycat who had killed one man in an attempt to take credit for the other two. And this same instinct came into play with Goro Akechi, and it wasn't just because his surname shared three letters with Tohru Adachi's… the question was, why?

Naoto slowed her motorcycle and parked it outside the hotel she was staying at while she had been working on her most recent, just finished, case.

As she made her way to her hotel room, Naoto's phone went off. "Naked truth lies only if you realize appearing in nobody's eyes till they sterilize stop the guerrilla warfare to keep it fair bro change your rage to a smarter greater cause-"

Naoto's heart fluttered in her chest at the sound of that particular ringtone. There was only one person she had set that particular ringtone for. Quick as a flash, Naoto reached to her pockets and pulled out her phone. Sure enough, it was her boyfriend, Yu Narukami.

Pressing the answer button, Naoto spoke into her phone. "Senpai? Is that you?"

"Hey, Nao-chan," the voice of Yu Narukami said on the other line. "Something's happened… something tied to Shadows and Personas is happening again, and it seems as though the powers that be have decided to get me involved again…" he said, making Naoto's blood run cold.

"Senpai… do you think this new incident with Shadows and Personas in Shibuya could have anything to do with these mental shutdowns happening there?" Naoto asked, recalling the unofficial research documents she had come across some time back, when she'd been looking into the death of her cousin, Minato Arisato, a search that had proved fruitless.

"Well, if what they say about these people just up and going nuts all of a sudden is true, then I'd say it's a pretty good chance…" Yu said.

"Don't say another word, Senpai," Naoto said as she allowed a smile to cross her face. "I'll need a little time to make the nesscessary arrangements, but I'll be down there as I can."

"You know, Nao-chan... my apartment has a second bedroom," said Yu.

Naoto's smile seemed to become more amused. "Are you suggesting that I use it?" she asked her boyfriend.

"I'm sure as hell not saying you shouldn't," replied Yu.

Naoto chuckled. "Very well then, I accept," she said.

"Perfect... and Naoto? It's good to hear your voice again," said Yu.

Naoto smiled. "You too, Senpai."