Tokyo, Japan, 2019. City’s edge, where the swaths of buildings give way to green trees, rolling hills, and cutting rivers. In the early evening, the sun’s light cut through the leaves and onto the twisting pathways that led to the bird sanctuary on one side, and the cemetery on the other. In the distance, the typical sounds of the city could be heard: car engines rumbling, distant music, wind rushing between the buildings, and very, very distant chatter of human voices.

It was on one of these pathways that the wind kicked up. Old leaves and underbrush were kicked up as several of the trees bent sideways to accommodate the presence that had not been there just moments ago. There was a huff, not unlike the sound of an engine turning over. The beast that had manifested shook itself off, sending dust, dirt, and foliage flying around it and showing off its dark green scales. Steam hissed from the metal pipes extending from its forearms as its claws twitched. The arms on its back slammed down onto the ground, massive ruby claws curling into the dry soil. Brilliant garnet eyes surveyed the darkening land as the beast’s tail twitched, felling a tree.

It was lost. And it was hungry.

All six limbs propelled the carnivorous beast forth in search of a good meal.

---

In the bird sanctuary, a scarecrow hung off a pole, inked eyes staring blindly ahead as a crow and an owl seemed to be sharing a meal. Of course, there was a lot more wrong with the picture than a scarecrow failing to scare off some birds: for one, the crow was clearly made of felt, still somehow managing to hold a lit cigarette in its beak as it pecked at its sandwich. For another, the owl was using their wings - tipped with claws, no less - as hands to pick up their sandwich and eat.

There was a mutual shudder throughout the group, and the scarecrow turned down to look at the ‘owl’. “Did you-” The owl had already stood up, quickly polishing off their sandwich. “Stupid question. Let’s get a secure perimeter first.” The crow landed on the scarecrow’s shoulder as the scarecrow dismounted the pole and flicked the cigarette into the quiver at its side. At least, the scarecrow mused, there shouldn’t be anyone around this time of day.

“I’ll call it in.” The owl didn’t mince their words, responding at such a speed that it seemed a miracle that they didn’t choke on the last scraps of their sandwich. “We have clearance for alerts, if Homura can make it out here I can help push it back.”

“Might as well tell ‘em it’s a tornado.” The scarecrow pulled out a bow, glancing towards the darkening skies. “Sure feels like a storm is heading our way.”

A young man was in a cemetery in rural Tokyo, old tape recorder in hand. "... Sun is just setting. If rumors and reports are correct, things should get very interesting, any minute now..." He half smiled to himself, although beginning to sweat from nerves. "S-spirits often linger and haunt within the area of their final resting place. Usually they repeat old patterns, as though retracing steps they took in life-"

He jumped and snapped his attention when he heard a growl, like an animal! "Oh!- Th-th-that, uh, was definitely not a bear! Ghosts usually don't vocalize, though, of course, though they can definitely strike objects. Afterall, the German 'Poltergeist' means 'Noisy Ghost'..." He paled as he could just make out trees moving in the newly dark sky. "That seems, uh, unexpected, though. I'll have to research local legends; perhaps the region is experiencing, uh, some overlapping manifestations?"

After watching it pass and continue for a minute or two, he gulped hard. The recorder was shaking visibly in his hand, "I may have... Mischaracterized the events taking place? My Japanese isn't so good, after all, but... I should attempt a visual confirmation, if for no other reason than to better inform and focus follow up research-"

He almost dropped his tape recorder when he felt a sudden chill, and his recorder started scrambling noise! "eiufbfbrh-ey, keep it down, will ya? You don't want him coming back, trust me." Brian turned blue in the face, yet his eyes lit up!

"huwah? C-contact!" He almost lost hold of the device, but recovered as he tried to begin questioning the apparition. "H-hey, um, do you, uh, have some kind of purpose-"

"Kid, you have no idea." The voice came out surprisingly clear; not distorted like it always did on tv. A gravelly voice, rough. "Look, we've only got a short window of opportunity, and I promise, you want my help!"

Another hard gulp, "Uh, and, you are?"

"I used to go by 'Ogremon', but together? We could be so much more... I've had my eye on you, Brian! You want to prove there's more to your world, right? Well, I can help you! But first, you've got to agree to help me, do you get it? If you agree to a contract with me, you'll see a lot more than what you can catch in old film! You might even find out what's really going on!"

This was too weird, he thought to himself. But what this... 'Ogremon' seemed to imply, it was everything he was after! Maybe he'd even find- "Hey, are you still listening to me? Hurry up and follow that Gr- uh, that 'dragon'; we'll form the contract, but first we need to wait for the opportune moment, when the energy is high! Now get moving!"

Brian jumped again, adjusted his glasses, and got to joggin in the direction that... Whatever it was had gone, snatching up his recorder so he could get further instructions. If he'd studied more things like faeries and demons, or at least put more thought into the exchange, he might have told this entity to kick rocks, but no, now he was leaving the cemetery and following the rather large trail the beast left in its wake...

The sun was setting. According to reports, the activity would start up soon. Word on the forums said that near the bird sanctuary in this part of the city was frequented by a massive, unidentified bird, as dark as the night sky. This was the kind of phenomenon Riku enjoyed looking into. His mom worried about him going out at odd hours, but she encouraged his hobby, even if it was one she found odd. "Your father always liked the weird and unexplainable, too," she'd say.

Riku adjusted his baseball cap, and turned on the GoCam clipped and velcroed to the brim. A quick glance at his phone's screen confirmed that it was recording. "This is Azuma Riku, log entry number four-oh-seven. I'm currently looking into stories about a giant bird seen near Hinode Wild Bird Sanctuary. While this is possibly some kind of misidentification of a known species, such as the Japanese golden eagle, reports from witnesses indicate that it may be some unknown phenomenon, such as a UMA or something related to spiritual activity.

"As of this recording, there have been no photographs or recordings of what I will from here on out refer to as the 'Hinode Mystery Bird'." He began moving along the trail. "Hopefully our feathered friend will show up long enough for me to get a good shot of it with my GoCam. If I do, I'll put it up on MeTube and share it on the forum. If not..." Riku sighed. "Then I'm just someone who's going to spend the next two hours or so talking to a camera for nothing."

---

Unbeknownst to the young man, a pair of emerald green eyes were watching him from among a pile of rocks and sand. The creature had been following him for some time, ever since encountering him in what the humans called the "Foo-koo-ee Prefecture". He was odd by human standards, but he was looking into weird phenomena all the time, phenomena that the creature was related to. Maybe there was a chance this Riku bloke could help him out.

A young brunette walked through the streets of Tokyo slowly. She was only in the city for a short while, there to visit her parents, and was quite lost. Normally she wouldn't be wandering aimlessly like this, but she had heard of a bird sanctuary nearby and wanted to check it out. Besides, the city was way too loud for the girl in the Mametchi shirt, and the buildings and people made it too hot for her to comfortably wear her scarf around her neck. Instead, she chose to wear it around her waist like a belt, which had actually gotten her in some slight trouble with the locals. They thought she was in a gang of some kind! As if she didn't have enough trouble with people...

Finally arriving, she stopped just outside the sanctuary, looking at the cemetery across from it. Music played through her headphones too loud to hear if anyone else was nearby, but something felt wrong, somehow. It didn't take long for her to give in to the feeling and take one of the random paths through the area. She didn't know where it would lead, but she didn't really care. It was more important to get rid of that feeling. So she turned her music up a little louder and kept walking, not noticing the damage on the other path.

One week ago…

At that moment the world seemed to be frozen in place. Kana looked forward as a giant knight kneeled down in pain, their body being broken down into digitalizes particles, as if they were just as much of a distortion than the ripple in space that they came from.

“Human, please confirm or deny the contract. Destabilization is eminent, there is no more time and as a reminder the threat to your life will arrive in 3 minutes and 27 seconds.”

The knight like distortion stated in an almost mechanical way, as it broke her out from her trance as it reminded her of imminent demise by giant monster.

“Alright, if we’re doing this, then yer power is mine to use and yer going to help me, understand?”

“These conditions, are acceptable.”

“Alright then, I accept. My name is Kana, what should I call ya?”

“Chaosmon.”

Present day

“The Digimon’s signal is two miles west and is moving.”

Chaosmon stated like the voice of a GPS towards Kana, who was leaning against the wall with her phone.

“Let’s see, that’s should be around the old bird sanctuary.”

Kana had pulled up a map to triangulate the position of her target. Meeting of Chaosmon had not changed her usual plans of trying to find her friend, it merely made it more precise her method of going about things was to try and find the Digimon that was on the photo, it was her only real lead and finding it could finally give her the truth that she was looking for. The delinquent girl got off the wall and started to run towards the monster.

“Kana, are you alright?”

Chaosmon asked their partner, who while keeping up stoic expression, had a slight tremble to her hand. One week ago, she had nearly meet with death after her attempt to find a Digimon went horrifically well. For that response, the rather grumpy delinquent responded back.

“I’m fine. What are ya, my mother?”

Kana growled out as she clenched her hand. ‘It’s fine, I’ve got the power to fight back, it won’t end up like last time.’ Kana reminded herself.

“I do not believe I am your material figure. We are two different species, so it would be an impossibility for us to have any familial relation. Much less one of mother and child.”

Kana sighed as she quickened up her pace, this ghost that she allowed to haunted her for exchange for power had absolutely no sense or understand for sarcasm whatsoever. Though that was a small thing to deal with in exchange for being able to find her friend and fight back against Digimon.

“You are coming up in to the area where the digital signal is located, be aware of your surroundings as a combat encounter could occur at any time.”

“Thank you Captain Obvious.”

Kana snarked as she climbed the chain link fence of the sanctuary, before landing gracefully like a cat on the other side.

“The compliment has been noted, however, I would like to point out that my name is Chaosmon, I do not see why you occasionally call me Captain Obvious, as I do not have the title of Captain. Nor is my name Obvious. I would like to ascertain as for why you use such an incorrect designation.”

”Well, it sounds correct to me.”

“As I have pointed out previously, that the designation of Captain Obvious is clearly incorrect, please explain why you feel otherwise.”

Asahi hated the fact that his parents didn't want him to leave the house for anything but school, ever since he came back form the Digital World, but while he had made plans to sneak out he never acted on them. He understood why his parents worried after all. So with nothing to do he was sitting in his room, doing his homework . "Ughh, I have been studying for 45 minutes already, surely one quick game can't hurt."

"Don't lie to yourself, you've been only been working for about 30 minutes and spent 15 minutes looking at pictures of those creatures you call cats." Jewelbeemon did his best not to sound too harsh, as he knew Asahi's true issue was feeling locked up, he had heard the human complain about that often enough after all. "That said a five minute break might get you to focus."

Feeling five minutes was too short Asahi wanted to complain but his partner had a point. Misclicking he opened a
news site instead of the game he wanted to play. He didn't really follow the news too closely but ever since finding out about the Digital World he kept an eye out for strange things going on

Feeling that he didn't have enough time to play the game he wanted anymore Asahi decided to just check out if there was interesting going in the forums. It turned out there might be something, apparently some weird noises including a falling tree had been heard nearby Toyo, but so far no one living nearby had gone out to look and it was stated that it was probably nothing. Still, Asahi saw this as an excuse to not spend another evening in his room. "What do you think JB? Worth checking out?"

The Spirit knew exactly what his partner was thinking, but as a guard he also knew better than to ignore a potential threat. "Fine, but if it is nothing we will come straight back."

It was a simple hop over the outer wall of the cemetery, and a few jogging steps until he was on the path left by the beast. He paused, seeing only the shape, barely, in the darkness.

"Hey, uh, 'Ogremon'? are you sure this is a good idea?"

"Are you down wind of it?"

"I... Think so, yeah."

"Alright, you're probably fine, than."

Brian made a face, 'P-probably'?

"Alright, step one for making this deal work- I need you to draw something on the ground, and stand in the center of it." Ogremon talked him through drawing up something that looked like a summoning circle, but the markings consisted of 1's and 0's instead of runes or something he would have expected.

As he was finishing as quickly as he could, he asked, "And this will bring you onto the mortal plane, right?"

Ogremon made a noise Brian could only assume was a chuckle, "Sure, you could say that. Now, hurry, stand in the center and repeat after me: Initiate-Download/cmnd/Digital-Spirit-Contract;Ogremon. This last part of important, so listen carefully! To finalize the contract, the magic word is 'Execute'! Got it?"

Brian did as he was told, standing in the center of the circle as he recited the "incantation". "Uh, Initiate download slash command slash Digital Spirit Contact; Ogremon-" The circle lit up as he did, by the end being a full, ghostly green glow! The wind seemed to gust around him, giving a rather spooky effect on top of the under-lighting from the circle.

"Don't stop, hurry! 'Execute', say 'Execute'!"

"Ah, uh, Execute! >_<U" The glowing sigils rose up and formed what looked like pixels, and began swirling in the air around him! "Agh! W-what's going on? S-somethings- eurgh- making... me..." He seemed to be struggling against something that couldn't be seen, frozen in place except for his head, turning to look straight up as the ghostly pixels rose higher, swirling closer together. "Ggggghhhh-gggghhhh!!" He couldn't even scream properly, his jaw seemingly locked! An onlooker might see his eyes filled with terror, as the pixel storm suddenly streamed straight down, into his eyes!

Once it had fully entered him, there was a large flash of that same green glow from his eyes, and in his hand (the one that held the tape recorder).

It faded as quickly as it'd flared, and the circle was gone when he dropped to his knees, panting, and sweating. His terror turned to confusion again as he noticed something was wrong. "H-hey, what...? My recorder- a-and that...??"

He jumped and fell back as a ghostly... He recalled something, it sounded like... Owe-knee? Some kind of... If not a monster, than the pixelated ghost of one! "Relax, buddy, now you and only you can see and hear me! It's all on account of that newly coded D-tector you've got, there, a manifestation of our Contract! Now, it's time to get moving again!" It raised it's great arm, and ordered, "After that GrounDramon!"

"I... No! This is bogus, man! What'd you do to me!? And what am I supposed to do when we catch up with- mmmm!" His jaw locked again, cutting him off as he seemed to struggle and fail to part his lips.

Ogremon stepped in front and crouched to look Brian in the eye. "Can it, will ya? Too much noise and he'll notice us, and we're gonna need the element of surprise! So if you're not going to cooperate, than make room in the drivers' seat!" And with that, he moved into the same position and posture as Brian, both of their eyes taking on that same glow as before! Both spoke at the same time, now, but it was clearly Ogremon calling the shots, "Haha, alright; it feels great having a body, again! Pedal to the metal!" Just like that, they were off to a sprint, the ghost and the mortal moving in unison, with a smirk that didn't seem natural to the mortal...

Riku began moving forward, slowly scanning the trees. "While there have been no reports of the Hinode Mystery Bird attacking people," he continued narrating for the camera, "some people speculate that some property damage might have been caused by it. And if this is an actual animal, it's obviously had to eat something. Given that this is a bird sanctuary, it might be preying on the residents. If those are too small... well, I'll be looking into missing dogs and cats in the area when I get home tonight."

The area was beautiful. Though the wildife was winding down for the night he could hear plenty of birds singing before the sun went down. "I'll have to come back here when I'm not looking for anything," he commented. "Bring a bento, do some sightseeing, maybe get a souvenir or two." Riku cleared his throat. "Back on topic: evidence points to this being connected to certain other phenomena I've looked into, including the Silver Kitsune sightings and the reports of haunted jack o'lanterns.

"On a note that may or may not be related, it feels like something or someone's been watching me for a while." Riku continued slowly sweeping the GoCam over the trees. "Maybe I've been at this too long, imagining ghosts and monsters and urban legends like Hanako-san..."

A short distance from the situation unfolding at the edge of the wilderness, the telltale signs of the beast’s incursions had yet to disturb the everyday goings-on of the city. Nonetheless, within the otherwise serene and peaceful setting of Takiyama castle, a scruffy young man jolted out of his early-evening funk with a start at a sudden noise.

“Christ-” Only narrowly managing not to spill a cup of coffee so dark that light itself struggled to escape its surface, he winced before raising a hand to the improperly-calibrated earpiece that had scared him half to death with its caterwauling. That much was one thing, but if it was playing up this badly, he already knew the coffee was the least of his concerns-

“-ura, are you there? We have a situation.” This time as he pressed a few buttons on the earpiece, the communications came through loud and clear.

“Yeah, guessed as much.” he grumbled, getting up from the bench. Figured that something big enough to scramble the line would come through on his day off. He took a deep sigh, before taking a big swig of his coffee and continuing with a somewhat more committed: “Right, I’ll call it in and head over.” He didn’t ask for details, choosing to trust the considerably keener senses and instincts of his partner- “If we wait for HQ to send someone out we could be looking at a worse situation, so I guess we’ll have to handle it for now. You and Nora going to be alright until then?”

“Not sure. No visual yet, but whatever it is, it’s big. Smells like… dramon.”

To the untrained ear, the way the voice coming over the line lingered on those last few words would sound ominous, even somewhat fearful. The young man knew the creature on the other end well enough, however, to recognize the predatory desire brimming beneath them.

“Riiight. Nora’s probably already working on a perimeter, so help her with that and don’t do anything stupid until I get over.” Reaching into his pocket, he grabbed out a beat-up smartphone and set about handling his own end of affairs. “Calling in a wildfire might be too conspicuous and I’ll be damned if I’m ever talking to seismologists again after that one time in the G-Cans, but this time of year we might just get away with a tornado warning.”

He only hoped that and the efforts of the two already at the site would be enough to prevent a real disaster.

---

The area was brimming with meat, the dragon-like beast rapidly discovered. A disappointing amount of it was airborne, chirping and twittering as the feathered animals flew to safer grounds from the bending and groaning trees. These, it didn’t even bother to try catching. Others were too small, not even as long as a claw and bursting like overripe berries when the beast bit down, leaving it decidedly unsated.

A growl erupted to its right, and it looked to see a peculiar creature. In some ways, it reminded it of Grizzlymon, but it was without the armor plates and massive claws. The color looked all wrong as well, a deep, deep brown almost as dark as a cavern. The creature rose to its hind legs and growled again, much louder, sharp canine teeth visible. The scaled beast delighted in growling back and sensing the confusion and fear the not-Grizzlymon gave off. Well. It was much larger than the other animals seen so far.

The six-limbed beast rushed at the not-Grizzlymon, toppling trees as it tackled its newest prey with all four arms. The not-Grizzlymon roared and swiped its claws - so it did have claws, just much smaller - across the beast’s face. They bounced off the ore-augmented scales, leaving only a slight trail through the dust that had long settled and caked onto the beast’s body. The beast snarled and lunged for the not-Grizzlymon’s neck in retaliation; the prey was not a Grizzlymon, but the space between any creature’s head and torso was often a weak point and a good way to disable prey. It also didn’t appreciate the creature’s attempts to fight, no matter how harmless they were. It was hungry, and it didn’t feel like having to fight for its food. Its claws sank into and cleaved the flesh between the creature's arm and body from the force the beast used trying to hold the creature still. The scream that sundered the night air made the earlier treefalls seem downright prosaic.

The creature’s scream jumped into snarls, then a roar, and then whimpers before those too finally died out with it. The beast gave it a light sniff and a poke with its snout, as if to confirm it would no longer struggle, before diving in. Hot blood oozed from the carcass and from between the beast’s teeth as it tore into the meat. It was better than the small creatures, to be certain. The white bone-like protrusions in the prey were easily avoided, and the fluid flowed from the meat into the ground where it couldn’t taint the taste. A few more of these, the beast decided, and that would be enough before it established a shelter to stay in and sleep off its meal. Well, a few more of this stature - it still didn’t feel like having to put up even with an ineffective fight.

With a final tear of the meat from bone, the beast resumed its hunt once more. It barely cared for stealth, only trying to move quietly out of habit. Its only remotely-satisfying prey had come to it, after all. Who was to say it wouldn't happen again and, if so, why not leave a trail to lead it directly into its waiting jaws?

That was when it saw the smaller creature.

It was less than a quarter of a kilometer away, mostly a blur to the beast's less-than-developed eyesight, but its ability to detect vibrations made it clear that the creature was walking perpendicular to the beast's current route. The beast crept closer, squinting to better make out the creature's appearance. This one was definitely smaller than the not-Grizzlymon, reminding it a bit of a D'arcmon. Of course, the not-D'arcmon's coloration was also all wrong. Perhaps more importantly, though, this one lacked the wings and staff that made D'arcmon such irksome prey. If the beast was more cognizant, it might have thanked the Host for delivering unarmed prey into its new territory. It wasn't even looking its way, and it could feel the vibrations emanating from the tool on the creature's head. It didn't recognize them as any sound it knew, but did that matter? What mattered was that it seemed like the creature was more focused on those vibrations than its surroundings. Its tongue licked along its sharpened teeth, blood-tinged drool dripping to the ground as it tensed its muscles. It then galloped at the creature, ready to tackle and devour it in one fell swoop.

Violet found herself humming along to the music blaring through her headphones, closing her eyes as she translated in her head. She'd barely gotten to hear the second verse when she felt herself being knocked to the ground.

---

In truth, Violet hadn't chosen the pathway she had of her own volition. Subconsciously, she was following the onibi that could barely be seen down the path. Of course, once she had closed her eyes she broke from the spell, and it was at that moment that the giant green beast decided to attack her.

Unacceptable.

Kyubimon broke through the foliage and slammed into the scarf-wearing human, a matching red one wrapped many times tightly around its front right leg. The tackle sent Violet falling to the ground several feet away but mostly uninjured, knocking her headphones off of her head.


The yellow fox digimon had managed to save the human girl from the dragon, like a knight in shining armor saving their princess, but in doing so took the attack meant for the girl. The Groundramon's fangs bit through Kyubimon's neck and left leg in one singular crunch before twisting its neck and throwing the fox digimon to the ground on top of Violet.

---

It had been a tough week for Kyubimon. She had once again found herself in a world other than the one she called home, and in unfamiliar territory. She had taken shelter in the forest near where she arrived and observed what happened nearby. There were more of those strange creatures here, not unlike the one that had given the fox her lucky fabric, going about to observe avian creatures and stone monuments on the edge of the tree line. But despite her fascination with these creatures she was losing hope of finding her way back to where she called home, and her hunger was slowly building. It was just as she was getting too hungry to move that a disturbance in the area appeared, bashing down trees and revealing itself to be a digimon. Kyubimon was about to challenge it when she noticed a human nearby, a suspiciously familiar one at that, who clearly was not aware of the larger monster's presence. So she did what she could to get the human out of harm's way. She made an onibi to draw the girl towards her, towards safety... But it was too late. The dragon digimon had noticed the girl, and now Kyubimon found herself in a familiar situation. Without even thinking, she leapt towards the human and pushed her aside.

---

Violet didn't have time to open her eyes before she was struck with a large weight falling on top of her and winced heavily from the impact. She rolled over and out from underneath the weight. She was dreaming, right? There was the dog from several months ago, back in the shrine. Only it was clearly not a dog. It was some form of giant fox with many tails. A kitsune? But nine-tailed foxes were just a myth... This couldn't be real. But there was something different, some of its skin and fur had been torn away to reveal a sort of wireframe, and the sight of it shocked her back to her senses. The fox was hurt, badly, and standing a short ways away was what appeared to be some form of dragon. It must have done this.


She reached down to the fox, finding it wearing her scarf around its leg. She carefully tried to pet it, to reassure it that things would be okay, but it spoke!

"You need to get away! Now!" the kitsune shouted at Violet.

What? How could she just run away? Especially considering...

"I-... I can't." Violet stood up and reached into her pocket, retrieving her knife and holding it shakily in front of her. This was the creature that saved her life that day, and now it saved her again. The least she could do is fight for it. She slowly placed herself between the two digimon, shivering and shaking from fear as she did. Just as she was about to lunge forwards, there was a bright flash from behind her. When she looked back over her shoulder, the kitsune had changed. It was now much more humanoid, and had only a single tail. The damage that had been done to its neck had shrunk to a smaller portion of its body, but its left shoulder was still heavily injured.

"You're just going to get yourself killed if you fight it. Please, run away. I'll hold it off." Kyubimon, or rather Renamon now, had managed to save herself from death by degenerating, but not she had even less power to fight the enemy with. Still, she'd protect this human. She had to.

"Can you go see what my parents are doing?" "Sure." While Jewelbeemon was out of the room Asahi grabbed his D-Scanner, which he had hidden in plain sight with several videogames and a few cheap electronic toys and clipped it to his belt. "They're watching tv." that was to be expected given the time but it never hurt to be sure. "How engrossed are they?" "Not that much." Sneaking out of the front door was out of the question in that case but there were other options.

Quietly Asahi exited his bedroom and entered his parents' room. Opening the window he climbed out, using the ivy covered lattice as a ladder. He knew he had to hurry cause it wouldn't support his weight long but he made it down without issue. He considered taking his bike from the shed but he didn't want to stay in the backyard for too long and instead just left.

The city's edge luckily wasn't that far but it was still a fifteen minute walk. Since neither of them actually expected there was anything serious going Asahi treated it as a simple walk. "I should have known it was just a trick to go out." Jewelbeemon wanted to argue with his partner but a deal was a deal and his training as a guard meant he couldn't leave a potential threat unexamined, especially since as far as he knew they were the only ones who could do anything about hostile Digimon.

After about twenty minutes they arrived close to the spot Groundramon appeared in but didn't see any sign of the Digimon. "There is definitely something going on here, be careful Asahi." "No need to worry, we can handle this." Jewelbeemon wanted to point out that combining might not be such a good idea since they would terrify any humans around and they had no concrete evidence that there was a Digimon around but Asahi had already taken out his digivice and while pointing the scanner at his partner pressed the button on it's side. "Jewelbeemon manifest as Stingmon. Execute!"

Whether he wanted to or not Jewelbeemon's consciousness retracted into Asahi's D-tector and a silhouette of his body overlapped with Asahi's. At the mention of their combined form's name the silhouette changed into a wireframe Stingmon which became more and more solid while Asahi's body faded away.

Riku turned his head again until he saw a young woman. What was she doing carrying around a stuffed bunny? And a weird looking one at that? He took his phone out and paused the recording. He normally didn't approach girls, but this was for the sake of his research. He waved to her, drawing closer. Once about four or five meters away he spoke. "I'm sorry to bother you, ma'am," he said, "but I was wondering if you might know some information about phenomena happening in this area?

"Specifically, I'm looking into sightings of a huge bird." Riku glanced down at the stuffed rabbit. Wow, it looked so lifelike. The fuzz looked soft, and the little black eyes looked like a real rabbit's. I wonder where you can get something like that? he thought. He looked back up to the girl's face, doing his best to smile in a reassuring manner.

@Mole

"They" caught up to the GrounDramon quickly.

"Alright, guy, pay close attention, because I'm not going to do this for you twice!" A new circle of 1's and 0's appeared, spinning on the ground before spiraling up and obscuring him from the view of onlookers.

Thrusting out his empty hand, a ring of code sigils began spinning around the palm. He moved like he was making an exaggerated strum of a guitar, swiping the sigiled hand across the scanner of his newly formed D-tector, where it met resistance! It flashed that ghostly green light, casting shadows across his face (like when you shine a flashlight under your face, to look spooky), and he cried out, "Execute; Spirit Evolution!!"

His whole body turned into code, as the "shadow" of Ogremon did the same, the form changing as the masses of code began swirling together! As they reformed, they seemed to break free from the code circles, first the right hand, swinging a heavily knotted wood club, then the left, flexing a clawed hand, and finally, a very big foot stomping the ground once, and that seem to blast away the rest. He threw his head back and cried out in an eerie howl, before taking an intimidating pose and loudly declaring this new Digimon's name to the world, in a completely new voice, "Sasquamon!!"

And just like that, the sigils were banished, and the beast had appeared where a young man once stood. "Alright, time to get the drop on 'im!" He glanced over the larger opponent, (Sasquamon only a bit larger than Ogremon, who was hoping to have a closer match in size to the enemy than he got), then eyed a tall tree close by. "Alright, I think I'm getting an idea-" Turning and taking a few bounding steps to the tree, he then machine-gun punched it, causing splinters of wood to scatter as he destroyed the trunk! "Pinewood Pummel!!" The tree fell, and looked on course to smack down on the GrounDramon!"

It didn't take long before Stingmon heard something that sounded like a tree falling and he flew into the air, until he was the height of the nearby houses' roofs and started flying in the direction the sound came from. After just a little bit he spotted what looked like a Groundramon fighting a sasquatch. Not knowing who the agressor was he decided to observe the fight for now.

Since he had desire to waste energy or being seen Stingmon backed off a bit and landed hopefully unnoticed in a tree a few meters away from the fight. While his coloration made camouflage easier he wished he was the same size as Asahi so that he would fit easier instead of heaving to awkwardly crouch. Unfortunately he choose a weak branch and shortly after he landed it broke off, as unprepared for this as he was Stingmon actually ended up falling to the ground despite his wings.

@BenG85

As the draconic digimon pounced upon the strange D’Arcmon-like creature who had so generously and obliviously offered themself up as their next meal, it had dimly expected an experience much like that of the other strange beast from before. Digital prey was hardly unsatisfying, but as their taste lingered the dragon’s ravenous hunger deepened; there was something about these creatures that spurred it to go beyond and eat its fill.

That rapture, however, was disturbed as something moved with breakneck speed into the path of its attack; and as its jaws snapped shut, what was torn from the creature before it was not the intoxicating meat of before, but something more mundane.

The beast ran its tongue over the torn flesh to confirm, and as it dissolved into code in its very mouth, it growled and narrowed its eyes to focus its struggling vision upon the being that had put themself between it and its meal. Once the sudden obscuring light about their form faded, there was no mistaking the wounded Renamon for anything else, nor the severity of the wound left upon them even as the attack forced them to revert. So it wasn’t alone in this strange space. The other Digimon seemed to have taken an interest in the creature it had tried to snap up; perhaps they had been stalking the creature themself, and wasn’t content to let their prey go without a fight.

A low sound halfway between the growl of a prehistoric beast and the rumble of an engine rolled out from its jaws, challenging the Renamon to take what it had claimed-

"Pinewood Pummel!!"

In the past, the beast had been hit numerous times by trees as it rammed through the vegetation, with them falling upon it as they were bent and snapped from their trunks by its rampage, but they had done little but tickle its thick hide. This managed a little more than that; this time the splinters of wood that came flying at it from a distance came with sufficient force to embed themselves between oily scales and sting into the flesh beneath.

With speed unbecoming of such a vast form and sufficient force to kick up a dense cloud of debris with the tremorous impact of its claws against the ground, the dragon turned with a snarl towards the interloper. This digimon was... different. It was reminiscent of an Ogremon, but something about its coloring and proportions were all wrong. It snapped its jaws in irritation at the new digimon, only to then register something large and heavy hitting the ground nearby, past the not-Ogremon. Yet another digimon.

Bloodlust briefly abated, instincts superseding the beast’s desire to gorge upon the strange meat of the D’Arcmon-like creature. Regardless of the alluring flavours still dancing upon its tongue, this was wholly too much of a struggle for such a meagre meal. Were it more desperate, it’d be happy to tear these other digimon to shreds and feast on them after setting upon the peculiar morsel. Was it desperate yet? It closed its eyes, focusing on the minute tremors of the ground and smashing its tail into the ground to kick up further debris and dust for cover. What else was around?

There. To the south. At least two moving forms that seemed unaware of its presence. And though it couldn’t be sure, the way in which their movement disturbed the ground beneath them was much like that of the D’Arcmon-like creature.

Without a single moment of hesitation, its second set of arms stretched, flinging the log off towards the Renamon and D’Arcmon-like entity through the debris cloud. The others could have them, provided they were willing to scrape their pulped remains off the ground and the tree’s bark. Both sets of arms flexed before it began to dig.

By the time the dust settled, the Groundramon had left only a massive crater of a hole in the middle of the trail.

--

For a digimon literally made to burrow through bedrock and caverns, the real problem was digging deep enough to prevent collapse before it reached its prey. The path had already begun to collapse behind it, and the lizard-like monster adjusted itself. The sources of the vibrations had yet to move away, and it picked up speed, readying a charge-

Behind Riku, Ryan, and Terriermon, the ground exploded in rock, dirt clumps, and dust. The earth shook, and a fissure, maybe 12 meters long and 4 meters wide, now blocked the trail from the rest of the city. One well-muscled arm swatted at Riku as if he were little more than an insect. Another curled behind Ryan and Terriermon as an enormous jaw snapped at the two.

Everything seemed to slow down around Riku. It was as if the very world around him was exploding. It took a moment for his brain to process what was happening. A giant, clawed hand had burst from the ground. It was covered his thick, green scales, and the claws were red as blood. A single thought went through his head: Move, you idiot!

But Riku's body didn't listen. His muscles had frozen in fear. All he could do was watch as the massive hand came towards him. He was briefly aware of the scales and claws swatting his body, sending him flying into the air. It felt like he'd been hit by a bus.

Everything went black when he hit the ground.

---

No, no, no, no! This stupid little ratbag! Why had he just sat there while Groundramon attacked? Maybe he'd made a mistake. The human definitely wasn't the full quid. Damn it all! He's got kangaroos loose in the top paddock, but he's my only chance at getting home! The Digimon emerged from hiding, sprinting towards the crumpled body. "Oi! You got a gutful of piss? Wake up!"

---

Riku opened his eyes. Oh God, everything hurt. "You can't cark it yet, ya fruit loop!" He turned his head. The hit must have knocked his brain loose or something, because there was a lizard covered in sand talking to him. It seemed flickery, like a fuzzy channel on an old TV. "Crikey, you look like you been in a bingle. Look, I've been followin' ya fer a while now, mate. You been lookin' in on Digimon, right?"

Digimon? What the hell is a Digimon? Is this a hallucination? Am I going to die?

"You're one weird stickybeak, but you're the only one I've been able to find who can help me." The lizard took a breath. "Look, you don't wanna die, right?" Riku nodded. "Right. Then I think we can help each other. We can make a contract. You don't bite it, and I get the ability to manifest whenever I want in the world. That sound all apples, mate?"

@Mole