Hey, if Daneel can suddenly update his Digimon fic, so can I. Have some surprise fic updates.
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“What’s wrong, Ken?†Wormmon asked, trying to make sense of data displayed on the screens before him and failing. There were pictures of him there, many circles displaying data, dozens of circles around specific parts of his body branching off into windows displaying various descriptions and details, recordings of the Chosen’s partners featuring scenes of them fighting and evolving, and even still models of them featuring the same type of displays as the ones surrounding his own. How it all fit together, he had no idea, but Ken had been working on it since the night before and the frown on his face had held a place on his face for hours.
Perhaps what confused Wormmon the most, however, was the fact that he had been here all night, working. He hadn’t returned home to sleep, nor had he gone to class; instead he’d stayed here the whole time. Wormmon was happy about that, of course, as it allowed him to spend more time with his partner—but at the same time, this was something that had never happened before and he couldn’t help but wonder what it could mean.
Ken remained silent for a moment, apparently completely engrossed in his work, and abruptly all the images besides the ones of Wormmon vanished, replaced by a massive display of Stingmon and all of his data.
“When you evolve into Stingmon, you receive an enormous boost in power. Your Child form hides an immense amount of potential which all comes to light as you grow into an Adult. Your exoskeleton grows exceptionally tough, as to be expected of an Insect Digimon, but despite that, your speed does not drop in the slightest—rather, it increases many, many times over. Your keen eyes give you the ability to accurately discern and target vital areas on your opponent’s body and with you Spiking Finish you can deal devastating blows even at high speed. In a one on one fight, your power can rival any of the Chosen’s Armor Digimon and there are only a few of them that I would consider more powerful then you in a direct confrontation. Even then, however, with my intelligence and the many resources we have available, I believe that we could win a fight against them if we were adequately prepared. At least, if it was in a one on one fight.â€
Ken clicked a button and the full roster of the Chosen Children was displayed, featuring both the old Chosen and the new ones. All told, they numbered twelve, and it was easy for Wormmon to see the Kaiser’s point.
“However, our chances of a one on one fight are sadly negligible, and with the mobility allowed by the Digital Gates, even if we did manage to corner several of them, it would only be a matter of minutes before the others arrived. The sad truth is that on our own, we are hopelessly outnumbered and the resulting difference in power is something that is all but impossible to plan around. There are too many variables and working together they show too many different abilities for us to accurately guess their abilities, especially if we take this into account.â€
A video display appeared, showing V-mon’s evolution into Gargomon via Hikari’s Digimental of Light.
“With this, we have to assume the worst—that every single one of the Chosen’s partners possesses, at least in theory, the potentially to evolve using every other Digimental. This gives them a startling number of possible Digimon, which can be used to address any number of situations; the amount of versatility they now possess is perhaps the most threatening thing about them. How can we properly deal with them or create plans to counter them when they may well possess fifteen or twenty other Digimon we don’t know about yet? I can’t be sure of anything with that many unknowns involved. If I make a plan to deal with Fladramon, what if Gargomon appears? And if I plan for him, what about the other Digimentals? As it is, I cannot deal with them using just strategy, because I can’t fight strategically when I have no idea what I might be dealing with. It’s like playing chess, but I’m not allowed to see the opponent’s pieces. And if we wait for them to display all the other possible Evolutions they might have access too, we’ll simply be pushed further and further into the corner.â€
Wormmon shifted worriedly.
“But what about the Dark Towers, Ken? As long as we have those, we still possess the advantage of numbers, at least in our own territory.â€
“It’s not enough—if nothing else, our recent defeats have proven that. Even outnumbered hundreds to won, we’ve lost every encounter, because for all the advantages the Towers grant, they have an enormous weakness as well—if the Tower is destroyed, every captured Digimon in the area is immediately set free. In the end, even if there are hundreds of Digimon in the area, the Chosen only really have one opponent; it’s like one of those games where if the leader of your party dies, your entire team is defeated. We’ve set them against dozens, even hundreds of opponents and they’ve prevailed for that one simple reason. As a result, any plan taking advantage of our superior numbers is incredibly risky, because if they can destroy the Dark Tower in the area then all of our forces could turn on us. It’s too risky.â€
“Then how do we win?†Wormmon asked, believing with every byte of his being that Ken had a solution.
“There’s only one way. It’s a little simplistic, but it’s the only answer I can think of—we will win if we bring to bear so much power that nothing they can do, none of their versatility or teamwork or plans, has any hope of mattering. And to do that, we need Perfects. Andromon on his own provided better results than entire areas of Digimon; if not for the errors displayed in the Ring’s attempts to control him, he could have won. We need to change our strategy and focus more on powerful individuals rather than armies of weaklings—starting, of course, with you. You will be the one to crush the Chosen, Wormmon, it’s simply a matter of getting you to reach Perfect.
“Then how do I do that?†Wormmon said, getting excited at the thought.
“On your own, I don’t know if it’s possible. When you evolve, the Digivice releases my power and converts it into something you can use to reach Adult—by itself, I don’t think it has the power to elevate you to Perfect. But I’ve been reaching the matter, and I’ve discovered something interesting—the method the Chosen once used to reach Perfect. Their Digivices didn’t have enough power by themselves—so they simply used external sources of power called ‘Crests’ to provide what was needed. I don’t know where we could find any Crests, but the notion gave me an idea of my own—if we don’t have the power to evolve on our own, then it’s a simple matter of finding another source of power to aid in the process. And I did.â€
He typed a few commands, causing two windows to pop up, featuring complex blocks of code.
“This is, to put it simply, the Source Code that composes Digimon. The window on the left is yours, Wormmon, and the one on the right belongs to the Agumon partnered to Taichi Kamiya. It features a number of differences from a normal Agumon that I don’t understand the purposes of, but it’s a good example of a normal Digimon—which is to say, it’s very different from you in a number of ways. Look here at these pieces.â€
Ken highlighted large sections of the block.
“This part is the same for most Digimon. In all of the older Generation’s partners, it’s identical, and there are barely any differences between it and normal Digimon. But for you it’s completely different; you might as well have been written in a different language. I don’t know why and I’m not sure what it does, but I discovered something else that was interesting.â€
Agumon’s window closed and five others appeared. One by one, Ken highlighted the same section that he’d shown before, and each and every single one was the same.
“These belong to the Digimon V-mon, Hawkmon, Armadimon, Patamon, and Tailmon, each of which shows the same modifications on the base level as you do. They are, in a way, very similar to you, but I don’t know why. And that’s the thing—there are many things I don’t understand. Even if I can view your base code, there are many parts of it that are nothing but gibberish to me. This data is what composes your entire body—any strengths and weaknesses you possess have their origins right there in that wall of text. And if I could figure out what it meant and how to write it, I certain I could modify it and give you the power we need. But without understanding it, I’m sure to mess up if I just go it blind, but the only way I can learn how to do this properly is with trial and error.â€
“Then us me!†Wormmon said without hesitation. “If it’s you, I’m sure you’ll understand it in no time, so don’t worry about me. Just—“
“No,†Ken stopped him. “It’s too dangerous. If I messed something up in the wrong place, I could kill you. How could I risky my own partner that way? No, we’ll have to do this another way. And aren’t we lucky? There just so happens to be five others to choose from. Let’s get to work, Wormmon; we have a busy day ahead of us.â€
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