Author's Note: And here we get to chapter three. Everyone who didn't like Michael serving as just exposition in the first story should like this chapter, seeing as he's the main focus. Enjoy!
Michael couldn't help but wonder if the universe was just trying to accentuate how stupid his argument with Mimi had been. Okay, maybe blowing off some steam in the Digital World wasn't the most mature way to deal with an argument over something as simple as Mimi never telling him when she was heading to the Digital World. He understood she needed to practice with Palmon in order to master two different Mega forms, but she could have at least talked about it instead of always running off without so much as leaving a message. Heck, Michael could have even joined along so Palmon would have a training partner and Betamon would also benefit. Still, he knew he had overreacted a bit, and was just letting himself feel angry for a while before he was going to apologize. He did not need to be transported to parts unknown to encounter one of the things that Mimi was training to fight before being sent on another incredibly jarring ride ending with him splashing down in what appeared to be a tropical ocean.
Luckily, Michael hadn't been alone when he landed. As soon as he managed to swim to the nearby beach, he happened to find Betamon's fin sticking out of the sand, and dug his grateful partner out. Then, upon hearing a friendly sounding laugh, he noticed he had landed next to a Gomamon wearing a medal. Apparently, this Gomamon couldn't help but laugh at a creature so strange that it could teleport above the ocean yet had to struggle to swim back and dig out a friend. This told Michael two things: first, this Gomamon wasn't the one partnered to Joe, and second, he must be in a remote area of the Digital World that hadn't had much contact with humans if he was only viewed as a strange creature. This theory was further supported when the Gomamon introduced himself as Gon, as Michael had not yet heard of any Digimon named anything other than its species. Still, despite the differences, Gon seemed friendly enough, and offered to let Michael and Betamon come to his house for some food. Deciding this might be the best place to start looking for answers as to what exactly was going on, Michael agreed.
Along the way, Michael learned that he had landed on the continent of Folder in the Digital World near a place called Netsurf Village. However, that was the extent of useful information, as Gon started to go into a tour-guide type explanation of the beauty of the Net Ocean, which caused Betamon to start discussing a bunch of stuff about swimming in various types of water that really didn't interest Michael in the slightest. Gon continued this discussion right through the streets of the colorful village, but Michael immediately noticed something odd: despite the lively appearance of the village, there weren't any Digimon around. Still, Michael couldn't help feeling he was being watched by something.
These bouts of paranoia had started becoming all too common after months of random Digimon encounters in the real world, but Gon seemed like he would be a good help in this new land. Deciding to follow along yet be prepared, Michael merely gripped his Digivice and followed Gon into his house, ready to have Betamon Digivolve if it became necessary. The feeling of being watched continued even in the house, so Michael decided to do a quick check. He purposely dropped some of the food Gon had offered, and as he bent down to pick it up, he looked out the door. To his surprise, there were a group of Digimon watching him, but instead of being the expected evil Digimon like Bakemon or Vilemon, it was instead a collection of Digimon like Crabmon and Penguinmon that probably lived in this village. However, as soon as they noticed Michael looking at them, all the villagers immediately tried to hide. Finally having enough of being in the dark, Michael interrupted Betamon and Gon's ongoing conversation.
"Hey Gon, sorry to interrupt, but is there a reason everybody in this village except for you is scared of us? I feel like they've been watching us this whole time, and they just went and hid when I looked at them. I could understand it if it were just Betamon and me because they've probably never seen a human before, but why didn't any of them come out when they saw you with me?"
"Don't worry about that. Everybody's just a little nervous. Recently, a horrible monster appeared nearby. He's known as the Demon of the Deep, and he sends his underlings to attack the village and steal our food. Everybody's too scared to even go out swimming. If he had shown up much earlier, our guardian Lord Whamon would be able to stop him, but that isn't an option anymore. Lord HolyAngemon also won't be able to help us now that he's busy fighting Daemon, so there's nothing we can do about it."
"Hey, don't talk like that. Just because it looks like you won't be able to win doesn't mean you should just give up and let a monster push you around. Besides, if you need help, Betamon and I will help you fight back. Nobody should have to live in fear."
"Hah, really funny. There's no way you could beat him. He's really strong, you don't look like you'd be much use in an underwater fight, and you're travelling with a Rookie Digimon. Believe me, I understand where you're coming from, but there's no way you'd win."
"Sure, we might not look like much now, but you'd be surprised at the things we've managed to beat. I'm a DigiDestined- fighting to save the Digital World is what I do. Betamon and I have helped beat Ultimate and Mega Digimon before. Heck, four months ago we fought the army of the Seven Demon Lords. We can handle this."
"Wait, did you say DigiDestined? Then that means—wait, that can't be right. Lord Whamon said the DigiDestined would be a savior called in when all hope seems lost who would restore peace to the world. He said a DigiDestined would work with a Digimon more powerful than any seen before, and I've seen plenty of Betamon. You wouldn't be able to beat underlings, let alone the boss."
Michael was about to reply, but before he had the opportunity a crash rang out from outside the house. Running to see the source, he saw a Gesomon and an Octomon were in the process of destroying a few houses. Immediately taking stock of the situation, Michael started to issue commands. "Alright, I think it's safe to say those two don't belong here. It's only two Champion levels, so if we work together, we should be able to drive them off no problem. Keep the Gesomon busy while we deal with the Octomon, and then we'll help you get rid of him." However, none of the gathered villagers were in the mood to cooperate. A Penguinmon elected himself as spokesperson for the group. "Are you crazy? Those guys are way too evil too fight. All we can do is ignore them and hope they go away."
Michael ground his teeth, but didn't want to waste any time arguing. "Fine, I guess Betamon and I will have to handle this one ourselves. Should be a piece of cake." As he started off towards the enemies, however, he lowered his voice so only Betamon could hear him. "Right, this one's going to be tricky. If we had some help this really would be an easy thing to do, but until we convince the villagers to stand up for themselves we'll have to do some careful planning. I don't think we'll be able to win this if we hold anything back, so we might be forced to destroy these guys. You okay with that, buddy?" Betamon nodded, so Michael continued. "Okay then, I've got a plan that should work, but it'll be tricky. First…"
Gesomon and Octomon laughed as they destroyed another house. Ever since they had first arrived here, the villagers were content to just sit back and give them anything they wanted. It was the perfect job. The only one who even bothered attempting to stop them had been that Gomamon, but even he had given up after getting the stuffing beaten out of him a few times. With Whamon driven into hiding, nobody had the power or the bravery to attempt a fight. They could show up, destroy the place, and then be given all the food they wanted. Life was just perf—
"Well, I've always been told to treat others the way you want to be treated. Since you seem to enjoy destroying people's homes, you must not mind that I'm about to destroy you!"
Shocked, Gesomon and Octomon stopped their rampage and turned towards the defiant voice. Standing down the beach was a strange looking creature that looked a little bit like an Angemon without any wings. While they had never seen anything quite like this before, Lord Marine had received a warning from Lord Daemon that something called a DigiDestined had arrived on Folder, and that Lord Marine must guard the tag at all costs or Daemon would personally destroy him. This new creature must have been this DigiDestined, but it didn't look like it was much of a threat, so why exactly did Daemon sound worried about it?
Unfortunately for them, Gesomon and Octomon's confusion proved to be exactly the opening Michael had been hoping to create. While he had distracted them, Seadramon had managed to swim up behind the two Digimon and launch his Ice Breath attack to freeze both of them. Knowing this attack wouldn't hold the two for very long, Seadramon wrapped his tail around the frozen Octomon and throw him into the air, where a Water Blast attack was sufficient to send him flying out into deeper water. However, the time it took to dispatch Octomon proved to be enough time for Gesomon to break free of the ice, and now that Seadramon no longer had the element of surprise, the next fight promised to be more difficult.
Sure enough, Gesomon was angry, and immediately pressed his attack. He struck at Seadramon's head with his Coral Crusher attack, but Seadramon managed to coil away from the blow and retaliate by biting down on the tentacle. Michael started to cheer as his partner appeared to have the upper hand, but Gesomon merely struck out with his other enlarged tentacle and knocked the sea serpent reeling. The Mollusk Digimon managed to get a few more hits in on his opponent's body before Seadramon managed to recover from the blow to the head and start fighting back.
Michael could only watch as his partner continued to exchange blows with Gesomon. While the fight was currently even, Michael knew he was at a disadvantage. All of Seadramon's attacks had a bit of a delay before they could be used, but Gesomon wasn't leaving any opening big enough. In addition, Seadramon could only fight with his body, while Gesomon had the advantage of multiple tentacles to attack with. Any time Seadramon would be able to immobilize one, the other would just quickly lash out and strike a serious blow. If Seadramon wanted win this one, he'd have to immobilize Gesomon entirely before striking one finishing blow. Suddenly, Michael smiled. He had a plan that should end this fight, but obviously it wouldn't work if Gesomon heard him yell it out to Seadramon. Of course, there was an easy way to get around that problem, and Michael highly doubted that a creature in an area that hadn't yet come into contact with humans would be able to crack such a simple code.
"Seadramon, pull a Remember the Titans, and then hit him with the Indiana Jones special!"
Seadramon's eyes lit up. Who said it didn't pay to have a partner deeply involved in the movie business? As Gesomon lashed out once again, Seadramon bit onto his tentacle. Sure, such a move would let Gesomon get right through his defenses again, but this time, that was the plan. Not that it didn't hurt to execute- instead of attacking with the other tentacle, Gesomon launched his Deadly Shade attack right into Seadramon's face, immediately blinding the sea serpent. However, Seadramon didn't need to see in order to finish this fight. While Gesomon had been busy focusing on his head, Seadramon had managed to surround his opponent with his body. This was just the setup Seadramon needed for his Ice Winder attack. He quickly snapped his coils around Gesomon, pinning all of the Mollusk Digimon's tentacles in place. Then, he emitted a freezing pulse from all of his scales as he applied more and more pressure until his opponent finally exploded into a cloud of data.
With Gesomon defeated, Seadramon started talking to his partner. "You know, in Remember the Titans, Sunshine didn't get hurt nearly that much when he let that guy come in unblocked. I'm going to really need your help with Octomon, since I can't see anything at the moment."
Michael quickly spun to stare back out into the ocean. By focusing so much on the fight with Gesomon, he had forgotten about Octomon entirely. If he was about as strong as Gesomon had been, he wouldn't have been destroyed by the surprise attack. However, Michael could find no trace of Octomon out in the ocean, but that didn't mean he wasn't there, waiting under the water for the perfect chance to strike. Luckily, Gon's voice soon rang out.
"Don't worry about him, guys. I decided to keep an eye on him, but he just ran away as soon as he could swim again. I'm guessing he didn't like the fact that somebody finally decided to fight back, and he's off licking his wounds somewhere. We should have a break before we hear from him again. Still, I guess we owe you and Seadramon a lot for helping us. Tell you what, I know some really good healing plants that grow around here. We can get Seadramon back as good as new, and then there's somebody I'd like you to meet."
It only took twenty minutes for Seadramon to make a full recovery, as Gon hadn't been exaggerating when he claimed there were healing plants nearby. Michael wasn't sure if all seaweed in the Digital World had medicinal properties or not, but he decided to pocket a bit of the extra strands just in case they would be needed later. Now that Seadramon had been treated, Gon lead Michael and his partner into the ocean to meet with somebody. However, when Gon eventually stopped, all Michael could see was what appeared to be a boulder buried in the seafloor. Michael was about to signal Seadramon to ask what was going on, but before he could communicate with his partner, the boulder appeared to rise out of the ground, revealing it to be a Whamon. Michael tried to gasp in shock, only to remember that he was currently underwater. However, before he could do anything else, the Whamon rapidly swam towards its three visitors and swallowed them whole.
Michael only needed a few seconds to get over his initial panic. He was even mad at himself for panicking, since Mimi had mentioned travelling inside of a Whamon numerous times, so he really shouldn't have ever worried about being eaten. Sure enough, instead of ending up inside a whale's stomach, Michael now found himself in the middle of a brightly colored space that was completely empty except for himself, Seadramon, and Gon. Almost immediately, a deep voice rang out from seemingly everywhere at once, leaving Michael no doubt that Whamon was currently addressing him.
"Welcome, DigiDestined, and thank you for saving the village from those two attackers. In truth, defending the village is my responsibility, but I am too old to fight. I have only survived this long so that I may fulfill one final purpose. There is a terrible virus threatening this world. His name is Daemon, and he has grown powerful enough to start warping the fabric of the world itself. It is up to you, DigiDestined, to stop this threat. Unfortunately, he has sealed himself away in an ancient structure that can only be accessed by collecting five tags scattered throughout the continent. One tag is located near here, at the bottom of the Net Ocean. However, it is guarded by an Ultimate level Digimon chosen by Daemon himself. Only by perfectly working in sync with your partner will you be able to beat this foe. As such, I leave this as my gift to you!"
Suddenly, Michael felt a tingling all along his arm. Turning to look, he noticed a glowing light encasing his wrist. As the light faded, he noticed he had what appeared to be a larger version of a Digivice combined with a bracelet. When Whamon introduced it as a Digivice 01, Michael had to interrupt.
"It's not that I'm not thankful or anything, but I already have a Digivice that allows me to Digivolve Betamon into Seadramon. Also, there were six of us DigiDestined that got pulled in here, not just one. Is this really going to be needed? Because if it is, I'm not exactly the strongest of the group, so I'm not sure I'd be the best one to have this."
Whamon seemed taken aback by this information. "What? The legends never said anything about multiple DigiDestined. They implied the savior would be one human partnered with an unknown monster. Still, this ability to change your partner's form may be the unknown ability it mentioned, as I have never heard of that capability. The device I just gave you is unable to replicate that feat, but it does have other abilities that may prove helpful in your journey. It can scan data allowing you to see the abilities and statistics of any Digimon, send messages electronically allowing you to communicate even underwater, and even upload and store data. This final capability will allow you to carry things like food and medicine, and even allow you to store away your partner in case of emergency. I have already pre-loaded Seadramon's data into the device, so you need not worry about it registering anything else as the one Digimon it can safely upload. I just hope it will be enough to aid you. You must attempt to reunite with your friends, gather all the tags, and destroy Daemon. I wish I could aid you further, but my time is rapidly ending."
With this, Whamon opened his mouth, allowing Michael, Gon, and Seadramon to exit. Almost immediately after they had left, Whamon began glowing with a bright light before he started to shrink. Gon gasped at what was happening, but Whamon merely sighed out a final message. "Do not worry so much, Gon. I have finally fulfilled my purpose, so it is my time to go. I shall return someday, but from now on, you are to be the protector of the Net Ocean. The medal you received from me is proof of that. It will be up to you to ensure the courage inspired by our two visitors never fades again." With that, Whamon disappeared, living only a DigiEgg behind.
Michael stared into the face of the MarineDevimon who had been nicknamed the Demon of the Deep. Now that he was finally face to face with his opponent, he could admit that he was scared. Before, he had always put on an air of invincibility for the benefit of the villagers, but now it was impossible to keep the charade up. Gon and the others had needed somebody to look to in order to restore their courage, so Michael had just slipped into one of his father's action hero roles. And it seemed to have worked- he destroyed Gesomon in full view of the village, and then easily beat Octomon when the Mollusk Digimon had shown up to investigate the commotion caused by Whamon's death. That seemed to really inspire Gon, but Michael had insisted Gon return to his village with Whamon's DigiEgg. Somebody needed to take care of it, and this way Gon could at least evacuate the village if Michael failed to win this fight.
Of course, Michael had at least known this situation was coming, so he had a plan of sorts. After all, the goal of this fight wasn't so much to destroy MarineDevimon as it was to collect the tag he was guarding. Seadramon didn't have the power to destroy his opponent, but he could still distract him. It would be tough, but Seadramon was certain he could buy Michael enough time to find the tag and at the very least relocate it to a nearby island. Hopefully, MarineDevimon wouldn't find the new hiding place, which would mean somebody could more easily come along later to get it without having to fight the Ultimate level Digimon at all. After all, Michael and Seadramon had long since accepted the fact that they weren't the main fighters of the DigiDestined, but that didn't mean they couldn't be the best support team possible. Using his new Digivice 01, Michael sent Seadramon some encouragement before preparing to swim off on his own.
As soon as Seadramon received Michael's message, he launched a flurry of Water Breath attacks towards his foe. Normally, this attack wasn't very effective when used underwater, but its purpose this time was more to force MarineDevimon to react and hopefully lose track of Michael in the process. Unfortunately, Seadramon had severely underestimated MarineDevimon's speed. Before the attack had even crossed half the distance, MarineDevimon seemed to disappear, only to reappear laughing in front of Seadramon and swat him deeper into the ocean. Seadramon barely had time to stop his descent before MarineDevimon appeared in front of him again. Seadramon tried to bite his opponent, but MarineDevimon disappeared as quickly as he appeared, and Seadramon was suddenly struck from behind. As he recovered, Seadramon saw MarineDevimon floating fifty feet away.
"You know, I'm almost excited. When Lord Daemon said the DigiDestined were here, I thought I'd have the laughable job of fighting some terrestrial Digimon. Can you imagine, a terrestrial Digimon attempting to defeat me, Lord Marine? There isn't a single being that can match my underwater speed, and such power would have been wasted on an opponent who would have succumbed to the ocean with minimal effort. Luckily, I get to fight an aquatic Digimon, which means I'll be able to enjoy beating you for so much longer!"
With that, he once again sped towards Seadramon, and struck another blow before retreating. Still, despite the pain, Seadramon couldn't help but celebrate a small victory. MarineDevimon seemed to have forgotten about Michael, which meant phase one of the plan had at least worked. Also, MarineDevimon seemed to be the type to toy with opponents rather than outright destroy them, which meant the diversion might actually last long enough for Michael to succeed in his part of the plan. Not that any of that would make it any easier to escape later, as MarineDevimon darted in to land another blow. At this rate, Seadramon might not last long enough even with his opponent's help.
Deciding he needed to at least make the fight interesting, Seadramon got inventive. When he next saw MarineDevimon, he used a modification of his Ice Winder attack to freeze a thin layer of water around himself instead of its usual approach of freezing and squeezing the enemy. As soon as he saw MarineDevimon disappear, he quickly shattered this invisible barrier, sending shards of transparent ice in all directions. Sure enough, he was rewarded with a grunt of pain towards his right, and he saw MarineDevimon had a few cuts spread along his body. Unfortunately, his opponent's pain quickly turned to anger. Seadramon quickly repeated his previous maneuver, but before he had a chance to shatter the ice MarineDevimon appeared right in front of him and blasted him in the face with his Dark Deluge attack.
MarineDevimon snarled as he beheld his now paralyzed foe. That had been much closer than he imagined. He didn't think it was possible for anybody to hit him in his own element, and he had perhaps grown complacent with that fact. That last attack may have been a lucky hit, but it had damaged him much more than he had thought possible. Clearly, he would need to find a way to improve his defensive skills in the future before this weakness would cost him dearly. However, that was a future matter, and right now, he had the simple task of revenge. For every single bit of damage he received, he was going to ensure his opponent felt double the punishment…
After a few minutes of vicious beating, Seadramon was on the verge of destruction, barely managing to hold his data together. Having calmed down slightly, MarineDevimon decided he could pause the attack in order to further gloat. "Well, it looks like Lord Daemon had nothing to fear from you. He made it sound like the DigiDestined would be a challenge. If he's so scared of somebody like you, I wonder how he'd fare if I dragged him into my territory. After all, the partner Digimon that he warned everybody—wait a minute, partner? Where did your human go?" Quickly spinning around, MarineDevimon noticed a small shape entering the water from a nearby island. Snarling, he grabbed Seadramon's motionless body and hurled it towards the island, only to speed after it himself.
Michael breathed a sigh of relief. He had managed to easily find the tag, which looked much like a soldier's dog tags except for the fact it was triangular and encased in a blue V. However, the biggest mystery about the tag was the fact that it had started glowing aqua as soon as Michael touched it, and it seemed to have his name carved into it. However, he hadn't really had time to ponder this, as he knew Seadramon wouldn't be able to hold on forever. Quickly swimming to a nearby island, he hid the tag and returned to the water, hoping to swim around the battle and come from another direction in order to lead MarineDevimon away from the true location of the tag. Then, he'd find a way to get Seadramon out of there and hopefully escape. However, before he could implement this plan, he saw Seadramon's head break the surface of the water. Any celebratory thought quickly left him, however, as he found himself ensnared in the tentacles of a battered but extremely angry MarineDevimon.
"So, you thought you'd be clever and use your own partner as a distraction while you steal my tag, did you? Now, I know you took it, and if you want to see another few minutes of this life, you'll tell me where it is!"
As MarineDevimon slowly squeezed tighter, Michael realized his time was almost up. Seadramon was barely alive and hadn't moved at all, so he couldn't expect any help from that direction. Nobody but Gon knew exactly where he was, and even if he were to come and help, there would be no way for them to escape MarineDevimon when he was this angry. Michael knew he couldn't tell MarineDevimon where the tag was, so he resolved to at least take that notion of victory with him. Then again, there was one thing he could do right now, so he started laughing in MarineDevimon's face.
"You're a riot, you know that? So you've almost killed my partner and you're about to kill me. That still doesn't mean you won! I knew we wouldn't be able to destroy you, so I changed the victory conditions before we even started. You fell right into my trap. So, go ahead and destroy us. Then you'll just have to explain to your boss how you got beaten by a dead guy. You made the fatal mistake of underestimating me. Congratulations, you've officially been beaten by America's best DigiDestined."
MarineDevimon didn't seem to take this rant well, but before he could do anything a massive aqua light suddenly burst into existence on the nearby island. MarineDevimon let go of Michael in order to use his tentacles in an attempt to shield his eyes, but the pain in his eyes quickly faded as a new sensation took its place: an indescribable pain in his chest. Glancing down, he saw he was impaled on a jagged silver blade protruding from the golden helmet of a red sea serpent.
"If I may add to my partner's lovely speech, you also made the mistake of toying with me instead of destroying me when you had the chance. Too bad I won't repeat that. Lightning Javelin!" MarineDevimon was suddenly blasted with blue lightning and disintegrated into data. Michael could only stare in awe at his partner's new form. In addition to the new horn, color, and helmet, he had grown to almost twice his original size, and had numerous red fins extending all along his body that probably made him much faster in addition to stronger. However, Michael's look of awe was mirrored by a look of worry on his partner's face.
"Michael, are you okay? This isn't an action movie! You can't just count on something coming in to save the hero at the last minute. If I hadn't Digivolved to MegaSeadramon right there, we would have both been killed. That isn't exactly the time to start bragging." However, MegaSeadramon still couldn't resist smiling at his partner. "Besides, best American DigiDestined? You do realize Mimi became an American citizen last year, and she can reach two separate Mega forms. In the future, next time you go all crazy action hero on me, at least make your boasts accurate."
Michael couldn't help but start to laugh. "Hey, I was originally planning on just staying silent, but how often do you get a chance to go out like that? I wasn't exactly thinking clearly. Still, what exactly happened there? I understand how you Digivolving got us the win, but how did that even happen? I thought you needed a Crest for that…"
Michael trailed off at that moment, because a glowing orb was slowly coming towards him from the island. Instinctively, he reached out and grabbed it, only to see it was really the tag he had recovered earlier emitting the light. Before he could make a comment, the tag suddenly seemed to change in his hands. Instead of the triangular dog tag, it looked exactly like the tag that Mimi used to wear her Crest. The only difference was the Crest itself: whereas Mimi's was green and had a teardrop-type symbol on it, this new Crest was more of an aqua color and had a shape that resembled a gunbai from an old samurai film. Michael couldn't help but smile as he put the tag on. Now that he had a Crest, he could help take the fight to Daemon instead of sitting by on the sidelines.
Gon couldn't help growling in frustration. Despite everything that had happened, the other villagers were stubbornly refusing to do anything to help themselves. Michael was out there risking his life in order for them to at least have a chance to escape, but they seemed content to wish the problem away without doing anything. Finally, he couldn't take it anymore, and he just snapped.
"That's it! If you won't do anything to save yourselves, then I guess I have to. Lord Whamon named me his successor, but I won't be able to save you from yourselves. I'm heading out to help Michael and Seadramon. At least they seem to care about what goes on around here more than you do!"
The villagers all seemed to be reduced to staring at Gon in shock. Actually, it looked like they were staring in shock at something behind him. Turning around, Gon noticed a giant red sea serpent rising out of the water behind him. However, before he could do anything more than gulp in shock, the MegaSeadramon started glowing and shrunk all the way down to a small green Digimon that looked like a cross between a penguin and a seal. This allowed Gon to see Michael standing behind the Digimon, and suddenly everything clicked. While Gon started laughing with exhilaration, Michael seemed to be slightly disappointed in his partner, though even he couldn't keep a smile off of his face.
"Really, you couldn't have stayed as MegaSeadramon for a few more seconds? You kind of ruined the entrance by switching back to your In-Training form."
"Hey, you try Digivolving to Ultimate once in a while and see how well you hold up. I'm not sure how long it will take me to get used to that, but it will probably be a while until I can hold my rookie form even after reverting from Ultimate. Until then, you may as well get used to calling me Chapmon."
"Alright, fine. Though if anybody ever asks us how this happened, say we stayed at the Ultimate level long enough to start a parade or something." Michael then turned from his partner towards Gon. "Thanks for offering to help, by the way. If the tag hadn't turned into this new Crest, I don't think we would have made it on our own. Still, do you know exactly why that happened? The tag didn't look like this at first, and by changing it might have lost the ability to open up Daemon's hideout."
Gon sadly shook his head. "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I don't know anything about that. Lord Whamon would have been able to describe everything to you if he were still here, but until he hatches I won't be able to tell you anything. That doesn't mean I can't help you though! I know exactly where to go to find answers. When you recover from your fight, you should head to Holy Angel Castle. Its ruler, Lord HolyAngemon, is the leader of this land, and the general in charge of fighting Daemon. He'll be able to answer all of your questions. You'll also probably run into all of your friends there, too. After all, if they're anything like you, they'll be helping other Digimon across the continent, and they'll probably get directed to Holy Angel Castle as well. Now, the castle is pretty far away, but there is a fairly safe way to get there. You should be fine."
Michael nodded. "Alright, looks like our next stop is Holy Angel Castle. Though, promise me one thing, Gon. You'll have to take care of the Net Ocean while I'm gone, and next time I need it, you'll come to save me instead of me saving you."
"You don't have to ask me twice. Next time we meet, I'll make sure I'm strong enough to beat even you!"
Author's Note: And there we have it. Whamon gets to explain what's going on in the Folder Continent, and anybody who's ever read the Digimon Adventure V-Tamer 01 manga is probably thinking they now know the entire plot of this story. For those of you who haven't read it yet, I highly recommend you do so at some point in time- it's a great story. For those of you who have read it, I am only adapting its plot, so there are going to be a few changes that might surprise you. I just liked it so much that I wanted to include it, and it was a good setup since the newer group were all at a level where Ultimates posed a real challenge. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter, and please leave any feedback in a review or a PM!