Learning to Nerd with Manga! (Nerdification) (Patreon)

It was a warm Tuesday afternoon, and Erica had decided to spend a surprise opening in her schedule wandering out in town. It was too nice a day to waste spent cooped up indoors, and she’d always been more of the outdoorsy type – albeit, a fashionable outdoorsy type! With her snazzy white jacket, smooth blue jeans, and eminently stylish spectacles, she wasn’t the kind of woman who’d ever just blend in with the crowd, and that was before counting her purple hair.

Yes, it was hard work being as stylish as Erica, but she couldn’t help it. Style just came naturally to her! She was always on the lookout for new trends, always ahead of the curve on what was about to become the next in thing. It helped that she had a pretty curious soul, and tended to investigate any new thing that crossed her path with a gleeful intensity that’d probably scare people if she wasn’t so damned cool about it.

Truly, a blessing, and a curse.

But that was why she knew she had to go check out the newest bookstore in town as soon as she saw it. Honestly, it just appeared out of nowhere one day. The sign outside said that this was its grand opening, and while spending her time reading books instead of being out on the town with her friends wasn’t really her idea of a good night, the place certainly looked chic enough on the outside to justify a brief perusal.

Sadly, that image evaporated the instant she set foot inside. Instead of shelves filled with books and works of great literature, the walls were lined with comics and tabletop games! There were even posters of scantily clad heroines and heavily armoured warriors hanging all over the place. Ugh, it was a total nerd den! Not her style at all!

But now she was standing in the doorway and people were starting to look at her. Erica wasn’t about to let herself look like a fool by immediately spinning on her heel – that’d make everyone think she was weird, or worse, that she’d made a mistake. Image was everything to this girl. No, no, she’d just play this off – wander in, glance at a few of the… less offensive looking books… and then wander back out, her ‘interest’ sated. And then no one would ever speak of this again.

So, smiling politely, and trying not to twitch too hard, she stepped out of the light, into the dingy shadows – which, to be fair, were mostly in her own head – towards the shelves. Uhhh, what to pick, what to look at… Ah! She’d heard of this one. It was a popular series. Okay, okay, that’d be fine. She could just browse through this for a second and then put it back and slip right out of the shop. Easy.

She opened the booklet to take a quick read, and- Huh? What was this warning? She was reading it backwards…? Oh! Were manga published from right to left, since they were from Japan? Okay, that was kinda cool…

Pages flipping back, she started skimming. Hm, so this guy had kidnapped this other guy’s son, and now he had to team up with this other weird alien looking dude to get him back, and- oh, they were brothers? Huh, this was actually kinda interesting…

Erica raised an eyebrow, her originally quick flip through the book turning into a slightly longer read as her curiosity was caught. And with her interest piqued, a few things began to pass her notice as she lost herself in the story…

One was that her skin started to grow paler. The fashionista had never shied away from the chance to get a little sun, so her tan was quite rich – or, at least, it had been. For as she turned over the page, the colouration was slowly leaking out of her, dialling steadily down from the look of a healthy lifestyle, to the pallid complexion of someone who hadn’t left their room in a month.

Another was a similar sapping of her muscles. Now, Erica had never been an especially strong girl, she was no body builder, but she led an active lifestyle and did a few days in the gym each week to keep herself in shape. That was beginning to change too, though – her arms and legs losing all trace of development, which her belly gained just the faintest trace of pudge around her middle. She didn’t look unhealthy, at least, but she did look like she’d never seen a gym in her life.

Those changes were minor compared to her sudden loss of height – the girl literally shrinking a few inches as she read through her captivating Shonen manga. Though at least it was understandable that she’d not notice something like that – the world just seemed a little bigger, to her perspective.

Not that she noticed and of these changes at all as she finally finished her volume, snapping the book shut with a clap. “H-huh. That wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be…” She mumbled aloud, a little less aware of the other people in the shop than she should have been. “I wonder if there’s anything else in here that I’d like…?”

Curious, her eyes searched the shelves – before she found herself squinting. Oh, right! Her glasses. She pulled them down off her head where they usually rested, and slid them over her eyes, sighing with relief as her vision swam back into focus… And not paying any attention to the thicker frames her specs had gained.

Now, what was over here? This one looked kinda cool. She plucked another manga off the shelf – this one with a bold looking woman in interesting armour on the front cover. Inside lurked a plot about a pair of sisters who ended up fighting, and constantly stripping everyone of their clothes… O-oh, wow, that was pretty risqué, wasn’t it? B-but, there wasn’t any actual nudity, so it was fine, right?!

Once again lost in another fictional world, and trying to ignore how hot under the collar it made her feel, Erica was soon starting to change even more – and just as before, she was completely oblivious to it.

Her hair was the first to show what was happening – mussing up from its normally neat locks to curl and spring in every direction. A normally tame and sharp hairdo turned wild and feral, her purple follicles descending into an utter mess on her head, as if she’d been dragged backwards through a hedge multiple times. A white hairband appeared in the middle of it all, a desperate attempt to control what could not be controlled, but while it was cute, it could do little to straighten her unkempt hair.

Her clothes weren’t far behind – her white jacket becoming a red cardigan between turns of the page, any fashion or style points she still had evaporating by the second. Beneath it, her red top slowly morphed into a comfortable, loose purple T-shirt – and then grew less loose, as her body plumped up again, her distinct lack of exercise now entirely self-evident. Though it also grew less loose in the chest region, which balanced things out a little…

And it was certainly a point of pride for Erica when she finally closed her latest manga volume, her cheeks rosy and her breathing heavy. “That was… Um… Kinda interesting… But do you guys have anything more, ah…” She licked her lips. “Hardcore?”

Her confident, if aloof, attitude from before was all gone. Now there was just an awkward girl shying away from having to actually engage with any real people. Looking for something that she couldn’t quite put her finger on, the former fashionista paused for a moment, her attention caught on all the coooool posters hanging on the walls around the shop – before her gaze fixed on the aisle at the back of the store, away from prying eyes. The ‘Adult’ section.

Oho! Yes, that was what she was after. Whistling innocently, Erica tried to wander down through the shop, making a show of looking at the various displays and books on her way, until she ‘accidentally’ found herself, by complete coincidence, in the middle of the hentai section. Huh, how about that? Oh well! Better check it out while she was down here…

She snatched up the first book she could see and cracked it open – a perverted grin spread wide over her face. Tentacles! Boobs! Jackpot!

Greedily, her eyes drank it all in, hands shaking as she flipped through the pages, practically drooling as she read on. And with her attention so happily occupied, of course she missed the finalisation of the transformation that had begun the instant she set foot inside this strange new store she’d found…

Her outfit shifted one last time, losing every last ember of style that she’d had left. Her socks, originally prim and proper, became purple and white striped stockings, while her shoes switched from sneakers to sandals. Her jeans turned baggy – but still fit quite snuggly on her heavier rear – as the legs shortened, becoming a pair of comfortable but not entirely well fitting shorts. Indeed, that fit her new clothes well – comfortable to wear, but an utter fashion disaster none the less.

Freckles dotted her pale cheeks as her spectacles turned into square shaped, thick rimmed glasses. Her belly poked out from under her slightly too small T-shirt. Her hair stood up wildly, refusing to be tamed.

Yes, there was no doubt about it. Just one look was all you needed to know – this woman was a complete nerd, through and through.

“Awesome!” Erica snorted, then giggled as she closed her latest book and hugged it to her chest. “This is such a great read! I gotta get this series~ Oh, I wonder if there’s more of it out in JP? I gotta check when I get home…”

A shadow fell over her, and she blinked behind her thick lensed glasses, looking up to see the shop keeper staring down at her. “Can I help you, miss?”

“Oh!” Oh geeze. Social interaction. Agh, this was why she hated leaving her room! “Um, y-yes, I think so! Uh, can I get all of this series, to go?” She handed him the hentai that she’d just been reading.

He looked down at it, and then grinned. “Of course Miss. And might I say you have excellent taste.” He grabbed a few more books off the shelves. “I had a feeling when you first came in that’d you’d be just the kind of customer this shop needed.”

“D’awh~” She giggled nervously, blushing hard at the praise. “Oh yeah,” she snorted, “I can already tell, this is absolutely gunna be my favourite place in town to splurge~”

“I look forward to it.” His grin never faded as he bagged up her books, and then let her pay for it all on debit. “I’m sure I’ll see you again very soon.”

“You know it!” Erica patted her new bag. “These babies are only gunna keep me satisfied for so long~”

Oh yes, the concept of oversharing, or ‘too much information’, was definitely lost on this socially dense young nerd now. She didn’t even blink as she snatched up her bag, and started scooting out the door. Because once she got home, she could snuggle up in bed and really get to enjoy all of her new purchases. Spending her night reading books instead of being out on the town? Now there was her idea of a good time~