Solo Leveling: Digispirit.

A/N: bonus Chapter, I didn’t expect it to reach the 600 power stones today, next Chapter at the 1000.

End of the note

Currently, Takuya and Pumpkinmon were sitting inside a McDonald’s, eating what could easily have fed five or more people.

Their table—meant for six—was completely covered with burgers, fries, chicken nuggets, and giant cups of soda.

The two of them ate without restraint, drawing plenty of curious stares from the other customers.

"So," Takuya said between bites, "start from the beginning. Tell me everything. Who is this Phantomon? Why did he attack your home? And why is he killing everyone?"

Pumpkinmon swallowed a mouthful of fries before answering.

"Well... he has an organization based near where I lived. But then he decided to invade us. He’s hunting Digimon to absorb their data, but he’s also recruiting followers, I think he Call it."

"He says he wants to reach the mega level, and everyone believes he’s close."

"When he came to our village, he killed a lot of Digimon."

"The ones he didn’t kill..."

"He offered them a choice."

"Serve under him."

Takuya frowned.

"I don’t get it. You said a lot of Digimon lived there."

"I know Phantomon is a strong Perfect/ultimate -level Digimon, but he shouldn’t be strong enough to defeat an entire settlement by himself if everyone fought together."

He pointed at Pumpkinmon.

"Even you’re a Perfect/ultimate-level Digimon."

Pumpkinmon nodded.

"That’s true, I’m one."said the digimon proudly.

"But. He has an organization."

"And all of them are trying to reach the mega stage."

Takuya’s expression immediately became serious.

"All of them?"

"So they’re all ultimate/Perfect-level Digimon?"

"How many?"

"And what species?"

That information was critical.

"Well..."

"There’s Phantomon, the leader. He’s the strongest."

"Honestly, even though we’re both Perfect-level Digimon, I never had any chance against him."

Pumpkinmon casually stuffed three burgers into his mouth before continuing.

"Then there’s a Soulmon, he is an adult but is tricky, and a giromon he is an ultimate/perfect."

Takuya blinked.

"Oh."

"I killed one of those, a soulmon, he was an adult? I thought he was a perfect. +"

Pumpkinmon looked pleasantly surprised.

"Oh! That’s good, yeah he is an adult, just that stronger than bakemon. I hope it was the same one that act as a guard of giromon."

"I doubt it," Takuya replied. "The one I fought evolved from a Bakemon."

Pumpkinmon stopped chewing.

"...Bakemon?"

He frowned as if trying to remember something.

"two weeks ago. One of the Bakemon in the organization entered a portal alongside me."

Takuya raised an eyebrow.

"...A two weeks ago, huh."

That was... interesting. So this pumpkinmon and the Bakemon came from the same place, probably even the numemons

"Right."

"Keep going."

"Who else is in the organization?"

Takuya asked as he reached for another burger.

""There’s this Giromon," Pumpkinmon continued. "He isn’t that strong, but he’s always with Phantomon and soulmon as I told you."

"There’s also Embarrmon. I only managed to escape because he wasn’t around at the time. He’s fast. Really fast."

"And finally, there’s Matadrmon."

Pumpkinmon’s expression became more serious.

"He’s very close to Phantomon in strength."

"Some even say he’s just as strong... or maybe even stronger."

"He just doesn’t show it."

"All of them are ultimate/Perfect-level Digimon..." Takuya muttered.

Yeah... this sounded really bad, if they found a portal and entered this dimension.. God have mercy.

There was one question he didn’t really want to ask.

"...Do they serve under a mega digimon?"

Pumpkinmon laughed.

"I doubt it."

"mega-level Digimon don’t bother with anything below their own level, that’s what stories said ."

Seeing Takuya’s curious expression, he continued.

"I guess you don’t know."

"They’re almost like myths in the Digital World."

"We live on the multiple Continents."

"But it’s said that when a Digimon reaches the Ultimate stage, it ascends to another layer of the Network."

"Some place beyond the Firewall."

Takuya quietly analyzed those words.

Another layer of the Network...?

Like progressing to the next stage of a game?

Or maybe a restricted part of the Digital World that only powerful Digimon can access?

"Is that actually true?" he asked.

Pumpkinmon shrugged.

"Nope."

"It’s just a myth."

"I’ve never seen a Mega-level Digimon."

Neither had Takuya obviously.

The strongest Digimon he had personally encountered were Perfects.

That didn’t mean megas didn’t exist.

He knew they did.

The real question was...

Why didn’t they interact with everyone else?

"In your village," Takuya asked, "were there Rookie- and champion-level Digimon too?"

"Of course."

"The only ones who weren’t there were Baby Digimon."

"They only exist in the Villages of Beginnings, like the island of the beginings."

"Once they reach the Rookie stage, they leave."

Pumpkinmon answered it so naturally that Takuya almost missed the significance of what he’d just said.

The Village of Beginnings.

So that place really existed.

That meant at least part of the Digital World’s structure matched the one he remembered.

And he said them, in the plural.

Well... wait a moment.

When he first arrived, hadn’t it all started there? Didn’t that mean the Plotmon he killed, and all the others, had only just begun...

"Oh god."

Well, there was nothing he could do about it now.

"So no one has ever seen an Mega? And... there are that many evil Digimon out there?" asked Takuya.

"Yeah, they’re pretty nasty. Most of the time you’ll see them trying to kill everyone. They rarely form groups among themselves, and when they do..." Pumpkinmon sighed before taking another bite of his food.

Meanwhile, Takuya thought about what to do.

"So what was your place like? A home? A village? You said you lived with other Digimon," Takuya asked as he munched on some fries.

"Well, it was kind of a village. I lived there with a lot of Digimon. It was weird. One day, things similar to the ones in this world just started popping up. Well, that always happens, but we used those places to live. That’s why I like this street so much—it reminds me of home, just without the food," exclaimed Pumpkinmon.

"Hmm... you talk about it pretty fondly," Takuya observed.

"Well, duh. It was my home," Pumpkinmon replied.

"In that case, we have to find a way back to the Digital World. We’re going to pull an Uno Reverse on those bastards," Takuya declared.

"Uno Reverse? What are you talking about?" Pumpkinmon asked.

"If they want to absorb data to evolve, then we’re going to be the ones taking their data. By the way, what would you like to evolve into? Do you even know what you can evolve into?" Takuya asked. "After all, you said the Ultimate level was basically a myth."

"Well, it is a myth. No one had ever reached it where I lived. I’d need a lot of data—so much that I’d probably be reborn before ever reaching it. I don’t know what I’d become. They’re so far beyond me that I have no idea what my Ultimate evolution could even be," Pumpkinmon explained.

"But how are we supposed to get there? The portal closed, remember?" Pumpkinmon’s question made Takuya pause.

Indeed, he was stuck in the human world without any reliable way to return to the Digital World.

"Hmm..." Takuya muttered as he pulled out the D-Scan and began browsing through its options, something he did quite often. For all intents and purposes, it worked like an incredibly advanced smartphone. Better yet, it had fused with him, so using it felt almost instinctive.

The problem was that this D-Scan couldn’t open portals to the Digital World.

At least, as far as he knew.

Which was strange. The Digivice was supposed to be an incredibly powerful device, yet it couldn’t perform something that fundamental. He had tried everything he could think of. He had even connected it to the internet—or at least attempted a direct wired connection—but nothing happened.

Of course he had tried before. After all, the best source of data would be hunting directly in the Digital World.

Yet nothing had worked.

There was one difference this time, though.

He wasn’t trying to return just to grind for data anymore. Now there was someone who genuinely needed to go back. Maybe... just maybe... the D-Scan would cooperate. After all, it wasn’t merely a tool anymore.

It had become part of him.

"I have an idea. Finish your food and follow me," Takuya said.

Both of them finished eating and headed downtown. Their destination was a district well known among gamers, filled with internet cafés. They were especially famous in Japan, but Seoul still had plenty of them.

Takuya entered one of the cafés with Pumpkinmon following behind him and asked for a private room with two PCs, the fastest machines they had.

Being an A-rank Hunter now, he had money to spare, so spending a little wasn’t an issue. If anything, his income would only continue to grow. But now wasn’t the time to think about that.

The two entered the room, and Takuya immediately connected the D-Scan to one of the computers. The second PC he left untouched for the moment.

He had rented the room for forty-eight hours. As long as someone kept paying and ordering food or drinks, there was effectively no time limit, making it the perfect place to disappear for a while.

Why not just do this at home?

Simple. He didn’t want to risk his uncle getting caught up in whatever might happen. Here, in the center of Seoul, emergency bunkers and evacuation facilities were nearby in case a Gate suddenly opened. His home was much farther away.

Once he connected the D-Scan... nothing happened.

Then Takuya looked at Pumpkinmon.

Digivices had a habit of being absurdly convenient devices. Maybe... just maybe... he needed something besides himself.

"Pumpkinmon, could you hold this for a moment?" Takuya asked, handing him the still-connected D-Scan.

Pumpkinmon took it.

Nothing happened.

"...That’s disappointing."

For nearly two hours, the two of them experimented with different ways to activate the D-Scan. Pumpkinmon didn’t understand most of what Takuya was trying to do, but he happily played along while eating whatever snacks Takuya ordered from the café staff.

Then a thought crossed Takuya’s mind.

It was something he hadn’t wanted to try because, frankly, it would make him look like a complete idiot.

Up until now, he had limited himself to what he knew about the D-Scan from Digimon Frontier. At least, the parts he remembered.

But if he considered the other Digimon series—or rather, the other universes—the methods of reaching the Digital World were completely different.

In Adventure, the children were suddenly swallowed by a mysterious phenomenon. Later, after the Dark Masters appeared, they simply pointed their Digivices toward the sky.

In Adventure 02, they pointed their Digivices at a computer screen.

In Tamers, random portals appeared, much like Gates, but they were completely unreliable.

And in Frontier...

Trailmon.

"...Now that I think about it... let’s try this."

It was stupid.

But he had to try anyway.

Takuya stretched out his hand dramatically and declared,

"Gate to the Digital World... open."

Nothing happened.

The D-Scan didn’t even react.

The only response he received was a strange look from Pumpkinmon.

"Okay... Adventure methods eliminated," Takuya muttered.

The Tamers method technically worked, but there was no way to reliably find a random portal.

Which left...

Trailmon.

"Okay, let’s go. If the D-Scan’s apps and basic logic don’t work, then we’ll try the crazy ideas."

With that, Takuya and Pumpkinmon headed toward the Seoul subway station. It was only a short walk away, and they arrived within minutes.

The station was crowded.

They waited together on the platform for the next train.

Takuya had to admit...

He felt incredibly stupid doing this.

Still, gripping the D-Scan tightly, he stared at the approaching train and sighed.

"You’re part of me now... so please, work. Take us to the Digital World," Takuya muttered as the train slowed to a stop and the doors opened in front of him.

The moment he and Pumpkinmon stepped through the doors...

The noise vanished.

The chatter.

The footsteps.

Everything.

Takuya looked around.

He and Pumpkinmon were the only passengers inside the subway car.