Okay, but how does it work and on what moral/legal systems?
Like, what's a "crime", here?
@Letter Bee
Presumption of Innocence allows a person to 'smell' a person's state of mind, their regular personality, and subconscious thought (Edit: filtered through Mikhail's interpretation). Basically, it's like Rofls' character's emotion-sight, only the information is rendered as smell.
As for what moral/legal system and what counts as a crime, well, Mikhail mixes traditional and modern moral systems, but he typically detects the 'Seven Deadly Sins', or rather, emotions and mental states associated with the Seven Deadly Sins. However, he has different ideas of what counts as a 'Sin' than other people.
Examples:
Pride - Egotism and Arrogance, Mikhail hates this sin/mindset while smelling it in himself.
Lust -
Not the same as sexual attraction, Mikhail interprets Lust as 'addiction' or 'obsession' and 'the desire to possess other people'.
Envy - Resentment at what others have or others are; Nico pings this a lot, but again, Mikhail doesn't mind. Other people, though...their envy is probably less justified.
Greed - The desire for power and material items, Mikhail's ability to smell this particular sin manifests strongly when the greedy person is willing to harm others to get what he wants; otherwise, minor greed only gives off a slight whiff of sulfur.
Wrath - Overwhelming rage and the desire to do harm; this pings Mikhail only if it is out of proportion to any offense.
Gluttony - This doesn't add to the sulfuric smell unless one is wasting limited resources; merely eating a lot, though doesn't ping him.
Sloth - Mikhail considers this the least of the sins, so he has to strain himself to actually catch a whiff of it.
Note, however, that to Mikhail, all types of sin smell the same; it's just that some types of sin add to the collective stink more. With Presumption of Innocence constantly active, every human, including Mikhail himself, stinks, but that just means that those who smell of sulfur beyond the normal baseline stand out.
Does that make better sense?
@January, Ah, all right.
