Chapter 34: It Is Normal for Boys to Be a Little Eccentric, Right?
"LadyDevimon."
Having sorted through his thoughts the previous night, Mizuki finally voiced his decision to his partner the next morning. She had just shifted back into her LadyDevimon form from her smaller Nyaromon state.
"LadyDevimon, regarding your appearance and how you act... from now on, you should just follow your own instincts. Do whatever feels natural to you."
"Eh?"
LadyDevimon blinked. She stared at Mizuki, her crimson eyes wide with blank confusion.
Before her mind could spiral into overthinking, Mizuki quickly pressed on. "Actually, I owe you an apology."
He softened his stance, meeting her gaze directly. "I am sorry, LadyDevimon. I was too caught up in the rules and boundaries of the human world. I ended up hurting you without meaning to."
He offered a small, self-deprecating smile. "After lying awake and thinking about it last night, I realized something simple. My companions are the most important thing to me. Everything else is secondary."
He bowed his head slightly. "So, I want to apologize for keeping my distance from you before. I am sorry—"
"Mizu!?"
Seeing Mizuki actually bowing to her shattered LadyDevimon's stunned silence. Pure panic flooded her features. She scrambled to his side, immediately dropping her own posture to mirror his, practically folding herself in half.
"I never blamed you! You really do not need to apologize!" she blurted out, her hands waving frantically.
The memory of her own behavior the previous night surfaced, bringing a flush of deep shame to her pale cheeks. "Actually, I am the one with the problem..."
She lowered her head, her voice dropping to a guilty murmur. "I focused entirely on my own feelings. I completely neglected the fact that you are human, Mizu. You have different habits and boundaries compared to us Digimon. Thinking about it carefully, my mind was entirely consumed with myself back then... I am the one who truly needs to apologize to you."
"Alright, LadyDevimon."
Seeing the visible droop in her posture and the guilt pooling in her eyes, Mizuki quickly called out to halt her downward spiral.
"It seems we both made our own mistakes," he said, his tone light and reassuring. "Since that is the case, let us just leave all of this in the past."
He tilted his head, offering a warm, genuine smile. "Okay? From now on, let us just go back to getting along exactly as we did before."
Mizuki's heartfelt words struck dead center. LadyDevimon looked up into his clear, crystal-pink eyes. A massive wave of warmth swelled in her chest, washing away the lingering anxieties of the past day. She nodded vigorously, a bright smile breaking across her face.
"Mm!"
"Then, it is a promise."
With the air cleared, the small rift between the two partners vanished completely.
Unlike Mizuki, LadyDevimon had not yet fully memorized the complex environmental codes required for drawing ambient data energy. After they finished their morning meal, she hurried toward the designated energy room to continue her studies.
Just as her hand brushed the doorframe, Mizuki's voice drifted over from behind her.
"LadyDevimon."
"Hm?"
Curiosity coloring her features, she turned her head to look back at the young man.
He stood bathed in the morning sunlight. His pink eyes caught the light, gleaming like polished crystal. A faint, incredibly gentle smile rested on his lips. To LadyDevimon, the sight of him standing there felt like a soft spring breeze, brushing gently against her heart and making it skip a beat.
"I like you, LadyDevimon," Mizuki said, his voice soft but entirely sincere. "I really like you."
The gentle confession hit her like a physical force. LadyDevimon froze completely. Her breath hitched in her throat. For a long second, she simply stared at him, her mind blanking out.
Then, she took a massive, shuddering breath.
Gathering every ounce of strength in her digital core, she shouted her feelings back at him, her voice echoing down the corridor.
"Me too! Mizu... I like you the most too! We absolutely have to stay together forever!"
The moment the words left her mouth, a fierce blush exploded across her pale cheeks. Unable to handle the overwhelming embarrassment, she spun around and bolted into the energy room, slamming the door shut as if fleeing for her life.
Left alone in the hallway, Mizuki let out a soft chuckle. He watched the closed door with the fond, amused expression of an older brother watching a particularly cute younger sister throw a tantrum.
Because he had already committed all the necessary data codes to memory the previous day, Mizuki had no need to lock himself in a room staring at complex strings of text.
Instead, he found himself standing in the wide, open clearing just outside the factory building. In his right hand, he gripped the closed parasol he had acquired yesterday.
Or rather, the Holy Sword.
He looked down at the mundane object. It was a universal truth that little boys loved finding long sticks or umbrellas, swinging them around wildly, and fantasizing about becoming a legendary hero destined to save the world.
Mizuki had been no different in his past life. He had harbored those exact same childish dreams.
But a severe, crippling illness had stolen all of that from him. He had never been allowed to experience that loud, energetic, normal childhood. He had spent his days confined to a sterile bed, too weak to swing a stick, let alone save a world.
Perhaps that was exactly why, now that he possessed a healthy, powerful body, he occasionally indulged in these childish impulses. It was a quiet, harmless way to make up for the massive void left by his past life.
"Is that so?" he muttered to himself, his grip tightening on the parasol's handle.
He glanced around the empty clearing. He scanned the perimeter, listening intently. Nothing. No signs of life, no mechanical whirring, no digital signatures. He was completely alone.
Satisfied, Mizuki took a deep breath. He planted his feet shoulder-width apart and raised the closed parasol high above his head, gripping it with both hands like a broadsword.
"Cleave in two!" he roared, his voice echoing across the empty concrete. "Ruyi Divine Sword!!!"
He poured every ounce of his physical strength into the motion, swinging the parasol down in a vicious, vertical arc. He visualized a world-shattering cataclysm trailing behind the blade, splitting the very earth beneath his feet.
The parasol sliced through the air with a faint swoosh.
Then... nothing.
Absolute silence settled over the clearing. A stray, chilly breeze blew past, rustling his clothes.
Mizuki held the dramatic follow-through pose for three agonizingly long seconds. The sheer absurdity of the situation crashed down on him.
He quickly pulled the parasol back, coughing awkwardly into his fist.
"Ahem. No one saw that, right?"
He darted his eyes left and right, double-checking the rooftops and shadows. Confirming once again that he was entirely unobserved, he forced the burning embarrassment down.
"Never mind, never mind. I need to be serious," he muttered, shaking his head to clear the fantasies. "I actually need to get good at using this weapon."
Just as Mizuki shifted his stance, preparing to channel his energy and restore the parasol to its true Holy Sword form, the ambient temperature plummeted.
Without a single sound or warning, a massive, jagged black claw erupted from the shadow cast by a nearby pillar, lunging directly toward the back of his neck.
It was a lethal, guaranteed kill strike.
But Mizuki did not even flinch.
Seemingly unaware right up until the final microsecond, his body suddenly blurred. He twisted his torso violently to the side, letting the razor-sharp claws slice through empty air mere millimeters from his skin.
He did not just dodge. He used the momentum of his twist to pivot on his heel, bringing his right leg up in a devastating roundhouse kick.
His physical body, heavily reinforced by absorbed data codes and supercharged by the Digi-Soul burning within his chest, became a weapon of terrifying mass. His conviction and spirit ignited, flooding his muscles with explosive, overwhelming force.
"What?!" a raspy, shocked voice hissed from the shadows.
The attacker had clearly expected a clean assassination. Completely unprepared for the human to dodge, let alone counterattack with such blinding speed, the shadowy figure was caught entirely off guard.
Mizuki's foot slammed directly into the attacker's chest.
Bang!!!
The impact sounded like a cannon firing.
A single hit.
The sheer kinetic force of the kick lifted the massive attacker completely off the ground, sending him rocketing backward through the air. The dark figure smashed violently into the reinforced steel wall of a factory building fifty yards away, leaving a massive dent in the metal.
A split second later, the air beside Mizuki distorted, and LadyDevimon materialized, her crimson eyes wide with alarm.
"Mizu! What happened!?"
"It is Devimon," Mizuki said, his voice cold and analytical. He lowered his leg, his pink eyes locked on the distant, crumpled metal wall. "That guy somehow managed to drag himself all the way to the factory area. He was probably trying to find Andromon."
Piecing together the fragmented data he had sensed during the brief clash, Mizuki easily deduced the fallen angel's desperate plan. Devimon had come looking for a powerful local asset to absorb, completely unaware that Andromon had already been dealt with and had vacated the premises.
"What? Devimon? That bastard..."
Hearing the name, LadyDevimon's initial shock instantly transmuted into a raging, volcanic fury. Her dark aura flared violently. It was unforgivable enough that the fallen angel had attacked her in the past. But to repeatedly crawl out of the shadows and attempt to murder the single most important person in her life?
"Devimon!" she shrieked, her claws extending into lethal, jagged blades. "You deserve to die!!!"
Driven by pure, murderous rage, she bent her knees, preparing to launch herself toward the dented building to tear the fallen angel apart.
A firm hand clamped down on her shoulder.
"Calm down, LadyDevimon," Mizuki said, his tone steady and grounding. "Devimon has already left."
"Eh!? Left?!"
LadyDevimon froze, the dark energy swirling around her sputtering out. She blinked, the blinding rage in her chest hitting a sudden, jarring halt.
"That is right," Mizuki nodded, keeping his eyes on the empty shadows near the dented wall. "That guy probably has not fully recovered from our previous battle. From that brief exchange just now, I could feel his data signature. His current strength has regressed to the Champion Level."
He adjusted his grip on the parasol. "He just took a kick from me without any defensive guards up. My physical strikes right now carry the kinetic force of an Ultimate Level Digimon. Even if that blow did not kill him outright, he is going to be in an agonizing amount of pain."
Despite his calm words, Mizuki's expression remained entirely serious. His jaw was set tight.
There was no room for relaxation. Devimon's sheer cunning in orchestrating a perfectly silent ambush, combined with his cold, rational decision to immediately flee the second he realized he was outmatched, proved exactly how dangerous he was.
So what if his raw power was currently stuck at the Champion Level?
Mizuki refused to underestimate an opponent with that level of tactical intelligence. The mere fact that Devimon had managed to retain his sanity and cunning after his forced, chaotic digivolution into NeoDevimon was terrifying proof of his sheer willpower.
As Mizuki silently processed the tactical variables, LadyDevimon stepped closer, her shoulder brushing against his.
"Mizu, what should we do next?" she asked, her voice tight.
With her anger fading, a cold wave of delayed fear washed over her. She kept her eyes scanning the perimeter. Even though she knew logically that Mizuki possessed the raw power to protect himself, the reality of the assassination attempt terrified her. She silently vowed never to leave his side again.
"Hmm..."
Mizuki tapped his chin, his mind working rapidly through the possibilities. "LadyDevimon, we need to leave this area."
He turned to face her. "Devimon dragged himself to the factory area today for one specific reason. He wanted to find Andromon and devour his data to repair his own damaged core and recover his strength."
His pink eyes narrowed. "Following that exact line of reasoning... I am very worried about the only other Ultimate Level Digimon residing on File Island."
LadyDevimon's crimson eyes flashed with sudden realization. "Monzaemon of Toy Town?"
"Exactly."
A dark, predatory smile touched LadyDevimon's lips. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend. I understand perfectly, Mizu."
She stepped closer, her crimson eyes gleaming. "I already finished memorizing all the environmental codes yesterday. I will transfer the data to you while we travel."
Mizuki nodded, his gaze locked on the horizon. "Good. Now, take me to Toy Town."
"Understood!"
With a sharp snap, LadyDevimon's massive, tattered black wings unfurled behind her. She wrapped her arms securely around Mizuki, pulling him close. With a powerful thrust that cracked the concrete beneath them, the pair launched into the sky, tearing through the clouds at breakneck speed toward Toy Town.
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