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Swords of Sin 1.2: Maelstrom Island 『PLOT』「ari|Supes|Yuu」
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Post by Manami on May 31, 2022 3:27:06 GMT
Mana shrugged at Marigold’s response. It was ultimately her loss, but also her prerogative to decline her request. She approached Momo, who looked somewhat distraught at the moment. “Are you fine, little one? Withholding words when they should be spoken isn’t going to do you any good, if I say so myself! I doubt there’s going to be much backlash in exchange for honesty. And, if there is, it means that such interjection was needed in the first place!” Finding the adequate meaning to those words was probably not the simplest of tasks, but definitely worth it! Or something along those lines.
With that said, as Zack and company called towards the clearing, she nonchalantly walked in the clearing’s direction. Had the others reached the place by yet? Whether that was a thing or not, she made a point to gaze around and see if there was anything of interest by the shacks, and progressively entered them if nothing was found.
Of course, eventually Nami and the others would arrive, even though they didn’t seem all that surprised at what they found. If there were any shacks left to check, the younger Meicoomon would make it a priority to search them.
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Maia
Better Mod
Might Actually Be A Cat.
Posts: 627
OOC Name: Cheshire/Mai™
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Post by Maia on Jun 6, 2022 18:17:57 GMT
It was very lucky that Miki's communication skills were just so good with her fishies. It sure would be awkward if she misunderstood and ended up walking off a magically appearing cliff somewhere, or something. With their power of friendship, anything was possible! Unless it involved verbal communication, at least.
Another bright side, Marigold would soon become a lot less intimidating and made it clear that being a probably-murderous treasure hunter wasn't part of her planned career path. The trees she had beaten up on the way here would probably agree that it was a great backup plan, though!
Once everyone made it to the shacks, they'd find things fairly underwhelming. Nobody came out to greet them, and aside from a few random, old tools and questionable-quality chairs, there wasn't much to admire outside. Nobody even answered at Zack's call!
A certain couple of cats apparently decided silence meant they were permitted to investigate, though! Lucky for them (and the structures), the doors were in no way locked or barricaded!
The first shack appeared to be a shared bedroom, with two sleeping bags against opposing walls. Several mostly-melted, burnt-out candles littered the ground. Near the back, two large backpacks leaned against the wall.
The second shack was yet another bedroom, but this time only hosted one, fancier looking sleeping bag. This room had a small table with a locked drawer built into it. More melted candles sat upon the table and floor, and several bags were shoved into one of the corners.
Finally, the third building. The only thing that outwardly set it apart from the other two shacks was a long, horizontal gash across the wooden door. Upon getting closer to the building, the group would begin hearing static and crackling from within. A small pop! rang out, before the door could be opened, a mechanical hum growing louder. And then, a voice!
"Hello?Bzzt! Julius, are you there?"
Based on sound alone, it was fairly clear that the person speaking was not physically in the room at all. More specifically, it was coming from a clunky, large piece of equipment on the far side of the shack, resembling a radio. Twine held pieces of it together, and the whole thing seemed to be threatening to fall apart even just sitting by itself. It would take a far more gentle touch than most had displayed within the jungle to be able to utilize it! That is, assuming none of this was a trap.
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Post by Hotaru Inoue on Jun 6, 2022 21:59:48 GMT
Everyone eventually met up in the small clearing. Instead of going off her own way, Matsuri, Momo, and Arisa followed Zack, the newly rookie-fied Marigold, and Mana towards their destination. Or at least the next stop on this zany adventure!
Almost immediately Arisa floated her way into the 1st shack. "Yoo~hoo~ I am hoping there is nobody home because I am coming in now! Please be decent if you are!" She called out in a tone that implied she wanted nothing of the sort. Some Digi-sleeping bags and some backpacks, as well as stuff that implied they spent a while here. Or however long it took for those candles to burn out. There didn't seem to be anything else interesting, so the Morphomon took the opportunity to go their whatever was in their backpacks! They were right there, after all!
For the second shack, Matsuri immediately charged in, if only because as the second one, the one in the middle seemed like the most important. A little bit later, Elly would walk in, the Shoutmon looking as fierce yet nervous as ever. "Elly! Glad you can make it! Let's go through this person's stuff!" She proclaimed, pointing towards the bags in the corner. Then she held up a finger. "But we're only looking at it! It's wrong to steal other people's things unless you're really, really hungry, okay?"
Elly nodded in confirmation as she would begin to look through the bags. Granted, the 7-year-old Shoutmon wasn't the brightest little girl out there, and probably wouldn't have the slightest clue of what was important or not. If left to her own devices, she would just point out every single thing she found like it was just as important as the last. Meanwhile, the holosuited Agumon would turn to face the table. She didn't have any lockpicking tools, and she didn't even have any hair pins or the like, either! Darn... She would need to focus... She reverted back to her Agumon form. Maybe if she really focused, she could discover some magical lockpicking power! What are the odds... right?
But for someone awesome like Matsuri, those odds were 110... no, they were 120%!!!!!
Small, thin, vaguely lock-pick-like pieces of metal magically appeared in her hand, willed into existence by Matsuri's awesomeness and definitely not her own non-combat passive to manipulate and even conjure small metal objects! The Agumon got to lock-picking, though she was held back by one fundamental flaw.
Matsuri had no idea how to pick a lock, though the sheer confidence in her expression betrayed the reality of her competence.
Momo decided to swallow her frustrations and fears aside as she assured Mana that nothing was wrong. After all, no one else seemed to be bothered by it, so maybe Momo was the one that was being dumb! Yep... that had to be the case! Otherwise someone else would have said something!
Momo was joined up by Miki as the two entered into the third shack, completely oblivious to any traps or the like. She was a little concerned about the claw marks on the door, but apparently whoever had attacked it hadn't realized that the doors weren't locked! Yepyep, that was definitely it, the 8-year-old Momo reasoned!
They hadn't even gotten to explore anything before they heard the shabby-looking radio go off, asking for Julius. But Momo and Miki looked at each other. Miki's clawed fins and Momo's lack of arms didn't make for a gentle duo when it came to handling objects. They looked around helplessly towards anyone else that happened to be in the shack as well.
Meanwhile, Emmy decided to climb up to a high spot as she surveyed the surrounding area. She was curious and wanted to investigate as well, but there was someone supposed to be out there and it was making the golden Terriermon more than a little nervous. It would be a shame if they got snuck up on while everyone else was out investigating. Or if the residents of these shacks were to return to discover the group going through their stuff.
Granted, Emmy was a bright yellow and beige bunny rabbit that probably stuck out like a sore thumb. Anyone passing by would notice her and probably realize that something was up. Not that the young Emmy realized this, of course!
Present: Matsuri the Agumon (Investigating 2nd shack)
Miki the Gomamon (Investigating 3rd shack)
Elly the Shoutmon (Investigating 2nd shack)
Momo the Pomumon (Investigating 3rd shack)
Emmy the Terriermon (Keeping a lookout)
Arisa the Morphomon (Investigating 1st shack)
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Post by supesman on Jun 8, 2022 13:14:21 GMT
"I don't like this. I do not like this even one little bit." Zack said, crossing his arms over his chest and tapping his foot as his considered the evidence that was in front of them. "Three shelters, pre built on an island that until recently was under a hundred million tons of sea water, all three of them showing signs of being attacked and abandoned in a hurry and yet not a single one of them was locked or barricaded in any way." he said, talking loudly and clearly enough in the clearing in front of the three houses so that the rest of the group would be able to put this together in their own minds, he didn't want to be operating with information that nobody else had or had noticed. He was getting down to his last nerve with the rest of the group but that didn't mean that they weren't all in this together by now. "Some kind of forward camp? What the hell is buried on this island that people would bring this much supply...and what ELSE is on this island that would scatter them all without a trace?" Zack said, still keeping his head on a swivel. he knew he had seen something rushing into this clearing but he had yet to see it again. Some kind of ghost? Someone invisible who hadn't accounted for human eyes? Maybe some kind of message meant to lead them exactly here.
"Agreement. The entire arrangement of this is illogical. Any constructed sequence of events with current evidence is broken by one or more pieces of observable reality. Constructed permanent residences conflicts with the islands being underwater. The attack marks against the door conflicts with there being no sign of locking or forced entry. Multiple instances of supplies left behind conflicts with the lack of any other observed presence on the island." Violet said, drifting from one shack to the next, their scanning beam drifting from one cabin to the next, taking in every detail, every depression in the ground around the area trying to see if they could pick up tracks. If anything all of this was starting to build even more on Zack's nerves.
"Wait...something's..." Marigold heard the crackle of the radio in the third house, buzzing through the door and her antennae drift and point toward the sounds. "Nobody touch it, that thing's held together with literal string...lucky for us I know how to handle fragile string." Marigold said, using her four front leg parts to grip the machine. The larger front two to hold it together with a gentle firmness and the more dexterous and smaller pair to grip at any button or receiver that would hopefully allow her to speak to the voice on the other side. Despite her lack of fingers, she had a grace and a gentle motion to every move she made, a lifetime of knitting, stitching miniscule threads together gave her a soft hand that hopefully wouldn't disturb the damaged and delicate machinery. "Hello? Hello come in. I don't mean to startle you, we've come upon the cabins you have set up in the clearing. Nobody else seems to be present at the moment to receive your message. If you would be so kind, we're sort of running off of incomplete information here. If you need help, we're more than willing to provide it. We just need to know your location and maybe some of the details." Marigold said, trying to emulate her father's grinning heroic gentleness and confidence over the line. She didn't know how the voice on the radio would react to hearing an unfamiliar voice on the other end of the line, Marigold just prayed that they would listen for long enough to get talked down.
Zack continued to pace back and forth with Violet tied around his waist, the gears in his mind turning in a lot of directions, not many of them he liked. The gashes on the door implied a struggle, someone trying to stop whatever expedition required the backpacks? The radio message implied that someone was meant to be here to receive it and yet those same supplies had been left propped up against the wall like their owners had vanished into thin air. The radio was damaged by...something and yet not a single one of the homes had any signs of defenses set up. His mind just kept swimming.
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Post by Manami on Jun 15, 2022 18:21:29 GMT
The group had, no doubt, stumbled into a very interesting scene, after the initial search conducted by the cats and their rodent companion, it seemed like everyone had found something to do, and that they were pretty thorough with it! The group of eager girls, if anything, seemed like, even if not possessing the highest degree of finesse, were more or less evenly split and pretty enthusiastic about their self-assigned tasks.
Where that left the Meicoomons and the Tutomon, then? That was a good question. After the initial check-up, they were not-quite surprised by the arrival of En-En, who had finally closed the distance between the first group they had met and the scouting party; with any luck, that wouldn’t cause alarm on the Terriermon that was currently holding lookout! Both Mana and Nami gave the Weathermon a wave, while Marina found more fitting to close the distance and give her a tight hug. “Ain’t that either my favorite or second favorite sister in the whole wide Digital World! Thought you’d get lost or something!”
Luckily, being part cloud made scurrying away from unwanted physical contact fairly easy. “As warm as ever, aren’t you?” The sarcasm in the digimon’s voice was fairly obvious, yet Marina didn’t seem to be unaffected by it nonetheless. “Can’t say I agree with the company here, but at least it seems like they’re doing something productive nonetheless. Gonna look for something to get busy with.”
With that said, the idea of being lazy being as far as she could from the undesirables while also observing things from a vantage point quite resonated with her. Thus, she flew up high in hopes of noticing somebody, or at least help the Terriermon in doing so. “Not feeling like joining the others?” She asked, mildly curious. “Can’t say I’m a fan of the ruckus below.” Conversation could go either way, but it was worth the risk, right? Maybe.
Everyone seemed to be so busy down below, especially when it came to the third-shack situation! It had obviously proven to be where the most concise clue was, and that seemed enough to attract the trio’s attention. On one hand, Mana was listening attentively to the voice calling for ‘Julius’, even if the message ended up being fairly short and uninteresting. Marigold’s answer, on the other side, wasn't!
“I think that asking somebody those kinds of questions right off the bat wasn’t going to have the most positive of responses.” The cat said, a bit confused. But trying to wrestle the radio off Marigold's hands was probably not something smart either. Sides, the situation seemed inherently risky so she preferred for things to remain that way. Was there even space for her to pipe in? If there was, the next words would be easy enough. “That aside though! Julius doesn't seem to be here at the moment. If you could give us a description of him and the message, maybe we could relay it to him! You can be as vague as you want if it’s supposed to be a secret or something.”
Nami, on the other hand, was pondering the situation. Zack and Violet had made some points, sure. But she had her own takes regarding the situation. “Hypothesis. I don’t think that the existence of these buildings necessarily conflicts with the underwater nature of the island; I wouldn’t be surprised if they just were a landmark or a feature.” Wouldn’t be the first time, nor the weirdest thing the Digital World produced by a long shot. “As for the gash itself, I think it’s a fair assumption to think it wasn’t produced with violent intent. Otherwise, this place and the construction themselves would show more signs violence; it might be a far-fetched thought, but I think it is meant to be a sign or a message.”
What was it supposed to signalize or convey? She didn’t know, but at least it seemed more plausible to her than an impromptu raid of sorts. She gave a look to Miki and Momo afterward. “Query. Do you have any thoughts regarding this situation? I’d be delighted to hear them.”
What about Marina, then? She finally found it opportune to send a message to her sister. “Detectives sound like a fun activity to do, and even though I have no idea what is Scooby Doo, tell them that their praise is definitely well-received! Say, Mori! We found three shack-house-things in a clearing of sorts. There’s a strange radio here, and somebody is asking for somebody named Julius or something. Anyone in your group with that name? Tell them they’re looking for him. Other than that, a cryptic message and exactly one gashed door, among other junk lying around, there seems to be nothing of interest. At least at plain sight! Maybe the others will find something interesting in the meantime. From your favorite sister, kisses!”
There was a lot going on at the moment; the true question was if they were going to find any answers here, paradoxically enough.
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Maia
Better Mod
Might Actually Be A Cat.
Posts: 627
OOC Name: Cheshire/Mai™
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Post by Maia on Jun 22, 2022 23:56:40 GMT
It was smart that Violet and Zack showed concern about the shacks, and their current state! But, Nami also provided good insight. It really was only that single, lengthy cut in one door. Everything else was unharmed, albeit not the prettiest to look at. There were no signs of struggle across the site, and despite things falling apart, nothing appeared to be done with malice! That probably didn't make things feel less unsettling, however. An abandoned camp was still an abandoned camp, after all.
Inside the shacks, there would be a lack of violence, also! Even when Arisa let herself into one of them without giving any residents enough time to cover themselves! Good thing nobody was home, anyway.
For the first shack, and its first bag, Arisa would find nothing over-the-top in the shininess department. In fact, it seemed to just be personal effects! A plasticky cape to shield from rain, pens and pencils though nothing to write on, a pocket watch, and a little picture that appeared to depict very crudely drawn 'family' portrait of a Gryzmon, Frimon, and Mojyamon! Or, at least, it probably looked like those digimon if anyone cared to squint hard enough. The second backpack would most definitely be a trap, considering the moment she opened it, she'd be glad she had no nose! The odor of rotting would immediately fill the little building. Rotting what, exactly? Well, if she cared to look, it would mostly seem to be fruit. But, bones poking out of the mess would imply the owner of this was not a herbivore.
The second shack earned more attention, having a whole two Digimon working to look through its contents! Even if only one of them was sorting through the bags. Which was going to be quite the task! They were heavy, and upon opening them, they were full of varying items. The bags seemed to have plenty of things that really fit the 'treasure' category. Gold and silver jewelries, coins that probably held either extreme value or zero value due to age, a branch full of jewels, and other odds and ends that likely led to this being considered their loot thus far. One bag, tucked underneath some of the others, was notably lighter. Inside were much cheaper looking items, lockets with random pictures or mementos tucked within, fancy pens, rings of varying sizes. Nothing that really seemed to belong to a single Digimon. At the bottom of the bag, a silver orb, just the right size to fit in the palm of a Shoutmon, rolled among the mess.
In the same shack, Matsuri's nifty magical abilities would have a chance to shine! Maybe, at least. While she had yet to gain success, the longer she worked at raising her lockpicking level, the more she could feel and hear the little clicks of the locking mechanism moving into place. It was a pretty old lock, and probably wouldn't be too hard to figure out. There was no luck on this post for getting it open with her skills, but there was probably a good chance if she continued to fuss with it, that it would open soon.
Finally, the third shack! Unfortunately for Momo and Miki, there wasn't much exciting in this room for those who lacked fine motor skills. No traps had seemingly triggered, and the 'ghost' had yet to reappear, so they might be safe! The only other thing within the room seemed to just be a folded up blanket, probably to help make the Digimon comfortable that was responsible for replying to the mystery voice!
Speaking of...
After Marigold and Mana tried to communicate, white noise only crackled in response. The static would persist for an almost concerning amount of time, before a long beep echoed through the shack. With the dead air destroyed, the stranger finally returned to the line. "Took you long enough!" Rude. "You ain't another of those strays he likes to collect, are you? I told him with the last one that he's got to stop grabbing stragglers." This person clearly either didn't believe the duo, or didn't understand the part about Julius not being present at all!
Reception cut out briefly, only to crackle back with a proper response to at least one of the things said so far! "Help?" The stranger seemed to mull for a moment. "I don't need help; are you asking for help?" It must be that the signal was bad! Unfortunately, there wasn't anything obvious that could fix something like that. Unsurprisingly, that made for only more mixed signals at Mana's offering to pass a message along. "He's got a message?" Without waiting for confirmation or clarification, the voice continued, "does that mean he finally figured out the door?"
While every group did their own thing, it would be rather peaceful for the two on lookout duty. Nothing seemed to disturb the surrounding area at all! Some sections of tall grass were bent away, indicating that at some point, they may have been pathways, but nothing looked even remotely recent. Otherwise, the jungle surrounding the area was too thick to get a good reading of interesting stuff, even from the rooftops!
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Post by Hotaru Inoue on Jun 23, 2022 7:11:04 GMT
"Oh, this is very most disgusting!" Arisa groaned, covering her noseless face with her arm as she flew away from the foul-smelling rotten sack. "I have been smelled many smelly sacks but this is the worst!" She complained, floating her way out of the first shack. Nothing in there seemed very important enough to take.
Elly still had no idea what she was looking at. All the treasure looked really pretty and stuff, but she wasn't a thief, and Matsuri said not to take anything. The silver ball she found looked interesting, however, if only because the maisterious narrator made a note to point that out. Elly was a good girl and she wasn't going to steal it, but she held it up, making sure to rub it a bit to make it shiny and sparkly. People were supposed to leave stuff better than they found it, right? Elly thought she read that on a poster somewhere.
For Matsuri, however, things were just getting started. Things seemed to be going, but Matsuri had no idea if what she was doing or not! But Elly was right behind her, and since she was the leader, she couldn't look like she had no idea what she was doing, right? Otherwise everyone else would get scared or something! And if she wasn't useful in this adventure, then she'd be an even worse leader! Her friends... no... the entire world was counting on her!
...Just kidding!
But really, if she found a bunch of cool stuff on this adventure, and everyone had a really fun time, then she could shove it in Sakura's stupid face! Also, that helmeted human with the soft shins and his bug-lady buddy were kind of bossy, and she wanted to find something really cool to show them all up! So Matsuri had no choice but to do something she had no idea how to do in order to succeed! She gripped the little metal pins that she created out of thin air, moving them around with her mind.
But wait... didn't that mean that if the lock itself were made of metal, then couldn't she just...?
Matsuri slipped the lockpicks into her wrist bands, and touched the lock with a claw. Then she simply willed it to unlock itself.
Miki and Momo had no idea what they were doing here, but it seemed that everyone else had things under control. And when asked by Nami Momo shook her head and giggled. "We aren't Query, silly! I'm Momo, and this is Miki!"
"N-no, Query's not a name, it's a word that means..." Actually, Miki had never heard that word before. But context and whatnot. "Like... a question, or something...?"
"Oh! I have a few questions!" Momo responded almost immediately. "Who's that on the radio? Who's Julius? Who do all these little houses belong to? Why is there a big scratch mark on the door? Are we going to get in trouble for walking into their house? I forgot to wipe my feet when I came in... should I go do that right now?"
"Momo... She was asking us a question..." Miki answered, patting the Pomumon on the head and chuckling. Clearly, Miki and Momo had a lot to contribute at the moment! She faced Nami and shook her head. "I don't think I'm thinking anything that anyone else isn't already thinking," She admitted. "I'd like to ask them who they are, what they're doing here, and why this place showed up all out of the blue, but interrogating someone after you met them is a little rude... especially when it's not face-to-face. Maybe we could ask to meet up and talk things out? It'd probably be better than if we bumped into each other by accident! And that radio doesn't look so good! If this were a movie, that radio looks like it would give out right when they were about to give out crucial information..."
And finally, for Emmy, there was the welcome addition of En-En, who was no doubt a respectful and pleasant person to be around! Marina and the Meicoomon sisters greeted her, and relieved the Terriermon's concerns. If an enemy had shown up, then she honestly had no idea what she would have done! Then again... what constituted an enemy? Technically they were the ones trespassing, so wouldn't it be natural that someone might approach with a degree of hostility? Wait... were Emmy and everyone else the bad people here? Wasn't treasure-hunting, and exploring... basically just Breaking & Entering: Nature Edition? As Emmy pondered her newfound moral quandary, En-En had spoken up.
"Huh? Oh... Umm..." The Terriermon stammered in place nervously. "I don't have any complaints one way or the other..." She finally managed to sputter. "Everyone else was so excited to explore down below, and so I just wanted to make myself useful in another way... though..." She lifted her large ears to gesture towards the trees around. "I guess there's only so much a lookout can do in a place like this... And I'm probably a little too slow and useless to be a good lookout..." She shrugged as she gave a sad smile, before her face returning to a friendly smile.
"Anyways, that's enough about me! I'm Emmy, and it's nice to meet you!"
Shack 1: Arissa the Morphomon (Exiting)
Shack 2: Matsuri the Agumon (Lockpicking) Elly the Shoutmon (Being a good girl)
Shack 3: Miki the Gomamon (Saying Words) Momo the Pomumon (Being Confused)
Keeping Lookout Emmy the Terriermon (Talking to En-En)
Shake Shack Hotaru and Co.
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Post by supesman on Jun 23, 2022 14:48:52 GMT
"No I...I don't think you understand. There's nobody here. The shacks we found were abandoned. We have no idea where we are, where you are, anything about a door. We're flying totally blind here it's why we're asking you give us some context." Marigold said, the tone in her voice already audibly frustrated by either the ignorance of the other person over the line or the bad connection making communication a chore at best.
Zack visibly snickered as he heard his daughter's frustrated voice from inside the shack she was investigating. His daughter could have more than a bit of a short fuse when it came right down to it. He thought about going in to try and help her, maybe see if he could come up with something more clear to say into the receiver that might get them some answers but there were already too many cooks stirring that particular pot.
"There's one mystery we know is here that's already unsolved. None of the digimon could see it but I would bet my Figuarts collection that I saw something trying very hard to stay out of sight bolted in here. I thought it was trying to run away from us as we crashed through the jungle after it but...maybe it was trying to lead us all here instead. It doesn't add up though. Why would it lead us wherever we wanted to go and then stay hidden, leaving us high and dry to figure it all out for ourselves?" He said, tapping his foot against the ground and rubbing his chin. His eyes kept scanning the clearing, keeping a special eye out at the corners of walls or along the line of tall grass that surrounded them on every side. If he was the only one who could see it then he might be able to catch whatever "it" is off guard and at least try to get some information to work from.
"Suggestion: I will hover up as high as I comfortably can I commit to a scan of the surrounding area. If the invisible being is possible to locate with my sensors then I will report back." Violet said, floating idly up in the air. Making Zack grunt and stumble in surprise as one of Violet's tendrils was still wrapped around his waist, meaning he almost got pulled right off of his feet by the rising machine. he hurried to undo the quick knot he had made of one of the tendrils, grunting as he landed on both feet against the ground.
"A tiny bit of warning next time?" He said, looking up at his ward as they rose up, maybe three-ish stories off the ground and let the red light of their central scanning "eye" turn into a wide sweeping beam. Violet began to spin slowly in the air, the vision of that crimson beam sweeping over the entire clearing in waves and then in outward rings starting with the lines of tall grass to every edge of the campsite
Zack turned to Nami and chewed on the thought they presented, walking up to the door again to examine the gash that had been slashed out of it, running his gloved fingers along the mark. If he could find some clue as to what in the world had made the gash, find some scrap or gram of he material used it might shed some kind of light.
"What kind of message could someone send with a gash in someone's front door that's not explicitly a threat?" he said, turning over his shoulder to face Nami and the new pair of voices that had joined them. He considered them, but not especially closely. This wasn't exactly a situation rife with distrust in the first place. He and his family had come here to try and get AWAY from all the crazy BS that Digimon get up to and yet, as was the nature of the Digital World, he seemed to have stumbled directly into the crazy BS as a consequence of trying to avoid it. Like trying to dodge an iron bullet with a magnet strapped to his chest. "Also uhh...Miki was it? Don't quote cliches like that out loud. It has a bad habit of manifesting them at the worst possible time." He said, sighing and grumbling to himself, knowing he had broken his own rule by stating it out loud. Pointing out the convenient timing of cliches was in and of itself something of a cliché. He wasn't a superstitious man by nature but now he was one hundred percent sure that there was nothing Marigold could do that could AVOID the radio in her front limbs turning into a sparking, fizzling, smoking mess the second she started to actually get somewhere with the person on the other line. Again he wanted to go inside and see if there was anything he could do about it but there were already two other members of their assembled...party that were making things difficult directly in Marigold's ear. Adding one more stressor into that collective pot might make things worse.
"I better not have just heard somebody say...!" Marigold shouted through the door to where she heard Miki's voice coming from, but was cut off by the reply from the radio.
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Post by Manami on Jun 30, 2022 13:43:51 GMT
En-En was undoubtedly being the rudest, meanest, evilest digimon ever. As a matter of a fact, Emmy was lucky to even be alive at the moment; the Weathermon gave her a look, but let her finish speaking before saying her piece. “Not one that favors self-esteem. I see.” Her tone was a bit dry, but not precisely unfriendly. “Dubious usefulness is preferable to outright uselessness, if you ask me. Even if you’re right, at the very least, you’re not getting into anyone’s way by doing what you’re doing right now.” Not the same could be said of certain flesh-based beings.
After heaving a sigh, the digimon continued. “You can call me En-En, and I guess I can keep you company for the time being; did you see anything suspicious on your time up high? Chances are that if there’s anything interesting, it’s probably coming roughly from the direction of the island’s heart.” It was true that this trip hasn’t been quite normal, but some things tended to remain the same as far as places went; for example, that their locus of power seldom changed, and even less so in a sudden fashion.
It was only then that she noticed the pathways, and proceeded to point at them. “That seems promising, whether as the place where whatever everyone was following went, or maybe as a clue on the possible whereabouts of the inhabitants of this place. It’s probably convenient to tell the rest once they’re done doing… whatever that is they’re doing.” The person hereon dubbed as ‘Julius-Seeker’ was definitely proving to be fairly useless, which meant that Mana probably had to extricate what made sense from the rest of the useless blabber. It was also good that she had a fairly high tolerance to things as just being casually disrespected! Had it been other kind of heroine, being called a stray would’ve been terribly offensive. If deductive reasoning had any teachings to give, the fact that Julius-Seeker hadn’t understood it the first time they told them he wasn’t here, then subsequent times were liable to have the exact same results.
And that made her consider the words to follow. “Yes! He’s asking for help! You see, he completely failed at figuring the doors out, but spoke about missing a ‘clue’ or something. Maybe you found it near where you are? Anything you see right now?” Those words weren’t all that likely to accomplish much, but re-trying an approach that hadn’t yielded results at all didn’t seem like something intelligent to do.
Nami thought long and hard. So long and hard, that she even found the strength to not get exasperated at Miki and Momo’s… cluelessness; yeah, that was a good word. There was something more than what meets the eye here, and the simplest solution to what was happening here seemed, in a way, a lazy way to don’t care about it anymore. After a good fifteen seconds of thinking, she finally answered. “Ponder. It’s true that it can be a threat, but it can also be a signal, or a message. Does a long horizontal line mean anything in human language? I’ve seen you have extremely weird symbols in your language at times.” A bit hypocritical considering how digimon speech went, but it was nonetheless a valid concern, wasn’t it? Just a single gash on a single door was just too suspicious; there had to be more to it.
With her piece said, she gave a look to the not-bird and the seal. “Thesis. I doubt we’re getting any of the answers we’re looking for. This method of communication seems unreliable at best and misleading at worst. It’s fairly foolish to think anything positive will come out of it, but it’s also nonoptimal to not keep on trying, as this is our best bet at having a stroke of luck and gaining valuable insights on the nature of the island.”
Unlike everyone present, she had no issues with people quoting future possibilities as far as detrimental scenarios went, as those barely did anything to influence those outcomes in actuality, and getting worked up for that seemed a tad on the pointless side. “Opinion. It’s probably going to break apart even before any chance at potential information is unveiled. I wonder if the others have found anything worth examining.”
Speaking of which! Since Marina hadn’t gotten a reply back from Mori, she’d wander to the second shack and observe the situation. Very loudly. “Say, girls! Anything interesting in this place? Everyone else seems too busy with a beaten up radio and somebody who wouldn’t even chat in good faith with them. Ain’t that the worst?” Given the fact that they were dealing with a slightly conspicuous silver ball and what seemed like an intensive session of lockpicking, hopefully something interesting would happen fairly soon.
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Maia
Better Mod
Might Actually Be A Cat.
Posts: 627
OOC Name: Cheshire/Mai™
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Post by Maia on Jul 8, 2022 0:08:39 GMT
With the Morphomon being gassed out of the first shack, that only left two shacks to be addressed!
Using super amazing, entirely-not-cheatsy 'lockpicking' skills known as a Passive, it was only a matter of time before Matsuri cracked this lock! Maybe literally, based on a horrible snap that came from the keyhole only seconds after she attempted to unlock it in this manner. Oh well, the chances that any of these Xros partners intended on re-locking the drawer was probably pretty low. Within was a small notebook, thin and tattered. It appeared that most of the pages had been ripped out of it, but a few still remained within the book.
Good girl, Elly, had some fancier looking prizes to deal with! Even though she wasn't going to steal any. Except maybe that silver ball, if she could get it shiny enough. And, conveniently timed with Marina checking in with the duo in this shack, Elly would have dusted the orb off enough to reveal there was a seam, cleanly wrapping around it. Also conveniently, exposing the seam to the air seemed to do... well. Something.
How could they know this?
The orb gave one long warning beep.
Outside, there were other parts of the group seeking answers. The first question sent Violet into the air, to scan the area. While it was hard to determine if it was lucky or unlucky, nothing would draw any attention to the Proto Gizmon. No strange movements, no shimmers of existence. If anything, this was only going to mean that Zack's Figuarts collection was in danger. If a creature had led them here, it was either long gone, or had found a very good place to hide.
The second question directed attention to that mark in the door. Was there a language that the human might know, which fit the bill? Could a single line be spun into letters or words? When running a glove against it, not even splinters would catch on it, turning up entirely clean. No fibers, odd particles, not even a piece of stray digi-fur.
And how were things going within that very same cabin, which absolutely had not been jinxed by two separate Digimon during the posting round? Based on Marigold's tone, it probably wasn't all that productive. "You're flying?" The voice inquired, clearly unsure what this had to do with their topic or how anyone was flying and talking to them on a static radio! Then, there was a pause while the stranger listened to Mana's attempt at getting further information. Soon to follow, Marigold would feel the radio heating up rapidly, and probably her limbs that were gripping it, too! "If you all knew Julius, you'd know I ain't on your island."
The temperature increased further, but not quite enough to start burning anyone touching it. "What did you do to-"
With a sudden clank, and a flaming chunk of plastic ejecting itself from a random crevice on the radio, the stranger went silent, and the radio dead. Hopefully, those who had given some foreshadowing felt proud. Also, hopefully someone would put out the flaming plastic that landed on the ground before the whole shack caught fire. Jungle fires were no joke.
Maybe, it was good timing for them to lose connection, considering the voice on the other end seemed quite angry at the realization that Julius truly wasn't associated with anyone present! Now, nobody could get yelled at over a misunderstanding!
But not all hope was lost. A few moments would pass, and while those within the shack wouldn't feel it, if Violet was still doing their task, the small building would begin to vibrate just enough that it might pick up on their scans.
Emmy had hopefully been taking advice off of the human-eater, En-En, at that same time. While the radio died and the shack gave off weirdly literal vibes, if someone had surprisingly large bunny ears and was placing any focus toward the heart of the island, something could surely heard. Very faint and only for a moment, distorted humming could reach the bun. Maybe being the only one to hear it would help her self-esteem somehow.
And just as the humming and vibrating stopped, the radio crackled to life again, cooling to its regular temperature while emitting a sound similar to a tape being rewound. Any inspection of the device would prove that there were no tapes, and it was in absolutely no condition to try to rewind something even if it had the option. Immediately after, a voice would chime out an all-too-familiar message.
"Hello?Bzzt! Julius, are you there?"
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Post by Hotaru Inoue on Jul 9, 2022 7:13:39 GMT
Thanks to her powers to cheat, Matsuri practically ripped open the drawer and pulled out the notebook in triumph! "Victory!" She declared, holding her prize up in triumph. She flipped open the book and didn't see anything immediately interesting. "What's all this stuff? A whole buncha pages are ripped out and stuff..." Even so, Matsuri looked through the pages that remained. Admittedly, she wasn't a very good reader, so she probably wouldn't understand too much if there weren't pictures or if the words were really big and stuff.
As for Elly, the silver ball letting out a beep as she let out a yelp and nearly threw it up into the air in shock. But she managed to catch it before it flew too far. Whatever she did caused it to beep like that and loud beeps were bad and she should instead be really quiet or else she might bother Matsuri! She was trying to read, after all!
So the Shoutmon with the mind of an amnesiac seven-year-old did the only thing that made sense to her. She stuck the ball in her mouth, then covered up her maw with her hands in order to silence the tiny orb to the best of her ability! So when Marina came in and asked what was up, she simply turned back to the Tutomon and shrugged as if there were nothing wrong, despite it being clear that something was wrong.
Miki gave Zack and Marigold a level look. Were they really pulling this silly superstitious stuff? She hid her annoyance with a smile and stated, "I was just saying that we should hurry up," Miki stated in an almost patronizing tone, as if Zack were the same age as Momo.
Speaking of, Momo looked like she was clearly lost as things progressed. Then, all of the rewinding rejiggery when on, and the poor Pomumon's brain seemed to practically fry. "Eh? Eh? Eh?" The fruitbirb went into a panic as she practically vomited up a sickly sweet nectar that would hopefully douse the flaming plastic.
Meanwhile, Miki frowned in confusion and frustration as the radio seemed to just... repeat like that.
But a certain Morphomon, goodness knows where she came from, seemed not to be bothered too much as she flew right up to the radio, even gently handling it herself if she had to. "It is nice to be meeting you! What is your name? This is a bad radio that is catching on fire so would you please be able to be pointing us where he is at?"
Emmy gave En-En a thoughtful nod. "Not everyone can be useful all the time, but that doesn't mean that I still can't try, right? And sometimes, even if you're not useful, you can still get lucky somehow! But giving up takes away such an opportunity!"
Inspirational platitudes aside, Emmy took another look around, her large ears quivered as she noticed the thing that the DM seemed to want her to notice... whatever it was. And she definitely did do that! She turned towards En-En, clearly jittery. "There was a big noise thingy... that made a noise thing!" She stated, pointing deeper towards the island.
Shack 2: Matsuri the Agumon Elly the Shoutmon
Shack 3: Miki the Gomamon Momo the Pomumon Arisa the Morphomon
Keeping Lookout Emmy the Terriermon
Beach Party Hotaru and Co.
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Post by supesman on Jul 9, 2022 12:41:09 GMT
"Can a SINGLE dash inset in this door mean something? Sure, it could mean about forty eight thousand different things in fact. Problem is is that if it's a message, it's a message that we got left without very much of a key. Functionally it could mean anything or nothing at all unless we get a clue that's pointing us in the right direction..." Zack said, still closely observing the door as he tried to piece together what it could mean. There wasn't a single ounce of wood that was out of place. It was if the sliver that the slash had taken out simply popped free like a lego brick and was carried off without a fuss. If anything the lack of signs of struggle was bothering him more than signs of a real fight would have.
"Hold on just a second, we didn't do anything to- EEP!" Marigold tried to speak to the voice on the line even as she felt the receiver heating up in her hands. holding the receiver at the end of her armored leg parts made it more bearable for her in particular but she WAS startled by the sudden popping out of a chunk of burning plastic. She flinched backwards on instinct and looked down at the receiver as if prepared it yell at whoever was on the other side only to instantly realize that the gesture would be pointless at that moment. She tossed the receiver idly onto the table next to the fried radio, turning away from the radio.
"Observation: One of these buildings is vibrating at a high frequency but with a low amplitude. My sensors were barely picking up the displacement in motion." Violet said, floating back down toward Zack as he stepped away from the door, rubbing the back of his head in confusion.
"And whatever the hell was going on with that radio just pulled a groundhog's day. It seems like the more we look into this place, the more weird and Twilight Zone it gets. A broken radio setting itself back into place, a gash in the door that's smooth enough to have been carved in by a laser, the entire place starting to shake with such a low intensity that nobody standing INSIDE the building seemed to notice at all." Marigold said after all the factors that the trio had discovered were explained to her. It just didn't make any sense and even without knowledge of the silver, beeping ball that one of their travelling partners was currently halfway to eating wouldn't have exactly explained things either.
"The repeating message could mean any number of things. Most likely it's either some kind of recoding left for whoever finds this place, but it'd have to be one hell of an advanced recording to reply to people like that. Or whoever or whatever is on the other end is stuck in some kind of very unfortunate loop. The more we look into things the only thing we seem to collect is more questions. Zack said. He obviously wasn't able to pick up the droning hum that was drawing them toward the center of the island but he felt called in deeper by the mystery nonetheless.
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Post by Manami on Jul 19, 2022 0:15:01 GMT
The first sight Marina found when entering the shack was… quite the sight, to say the least. She hadn’t gotten any response to her question, sure, but at least there was an explanation for it. “I don’t think that anything in this place is edible.” She wondered the reason why the Shoutmon was doing what it was doing while the object in her mouth was still beeping. “But if that thing’s good, let me know! Finding food is probably more worthwhile than trying to work with a dishonest radio, anyway.”
Giving a wide berth to that small scene in favor of the thing she could actually see was probably for the best. She approached Matsuri and gave the book she was holding a look. What was written inside, anyway? Maybe she’d finally find something interesting in this place. The situation with the radio seemed to be similarly pointless, at least as Mana was concerned. As the whole overheating-then-rewinding process occurred, the only question that sprung to her mind was whether this was pre-recorded in the strict sense of the word, or whether the thing would adapt to whatever was asked to it. As things stood, she didn’t even need to remain there to have that question answered,
She, however, was moved by sheer magnanimity when it came to the relatively clueless Pomumon’s plight; throwing up, no matter the situation, wasn’t something fun. Slowly, the Meicoomon approached and attempted to rub the panicked digimon’s back. “There, there. It’s fine.” In between the motions, she looked at the flaming piece of plastic, just to make sure it wouldn’t start a fire despite being bathed in what looked like low quality apple juice. She then extended a high-polymer plastic cup filled with water in the bird’s direction. “Drink some water, it’ll make you feel better.”
When surrounded by a bunch of impressionable kids, it was only fitting to be an adequate role model, wasn’t it? For sure, the mystery didn’t look like something that’d be solved right here. Or at least immediately, anyway. There was a sudden, sharp turn in Zack’s reasoning! Nami gave him a look, and then decided to address him calmly. “Answer. I think that sign has meaning. Exaggeration aside, this situation feels like one big puzzle; if we keep collecting its pieces, maybe we will be able to make sense of the whole picture instead of focusing on its individual pieces. If there’s nothing of importance left in this place, we should probably advance once everyone has satisfied their curiosity.” It seemed like this collection of cabins was holding more secrets still, though; hopefully it wouldn’t take much for everyone to be done so they could be on their way. Nami wasn't sure on how to procceed in this situation, but this was more of an evidence of lacking information than anything else. “Usefulness is a weird metric. Every being has a function, and if it feels useless, it’s probably because it’s trying to do something outside its area of expertise. Even humans have their uses. Besides being on-demand filth, I mean.” After the exclamation, En-En gazed at Emmy, almost as if she had grown yet another ginormous ear. She looked in the direction of the sound, but didn’t see much at all, and her hearing was definitely not as acute as the bunny’s.
“Speaking of being useful. Why don’t you go down and tell the others? I’ll fly a little higher and see if there’s anything in that direction from a better perspective.”
It sounded like a plan, right? Hopefully they’d finally be able to move forward. This place didn’t seem like a fun place. Or a safe one, in the long run.
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Maia
Better Mod
Might Actually Be A Cat.
Posts: 627
OOC Name: Cheshire/Mai™
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Post by Maia on Jul 27, 2022 19:27:23 GMT
Victory, indeed! Now, if only Matsuri could read. Lucky for her, there were occasional scribble-drawings in the margins, and more importantly, Marina was present. The first page in the notebook still remained, though it wasn't particularly interesting. There were no drawings on that one, and it was a pretty standard "we made it here, yay!" sort of message. Then a few ripped pages. And then the rest was stuffed into a spoiler code in case it was too much text for people to want to see every time they skimmed this post! Now onto... a page! With words! "Jungle keeps feeling like it's changing, but haven't seen any signs of people livin here. First route we took ended up a dead-end. Will try a new one tomorrow. Jack found a sack full of dust and hasn't stopped sneezing since. Nobody'll get any sleep if he doesn't shut up."
The next legible page of the journal was missing a thin strip at the bottom, but otherwise read, "Kid's acting weird, claiming to see fairies or something like that. Think the stress is getting to him. Said the fairies told him about a 'code.' It's just dots and dashes. What'm I supposed to make outta that? Asked Cas for advice on Jack, but they said, "that's what you get when you go collectin' strays." Ton of help that was."
Following, the sheets were randomly scribbled drawings, which was great because Matsuri might be able to keep entertained! Doodles of treasure chests, many of the rare flowers from the jungle, a familiar compass, a vine-covered door with an ornate knocker, the radio pre-decay, and a beautiful doodle-portrait of Mojyamon with a sword, looking very triumphant. It was definitely important to detail, okay? Especially because the next page with writing on it seemed less than great. "Jack's lost it. Robin caught him digging a stripe into one of the doors last night, all weird and repetitive-like. Had to have been at it for hours before we woke up. Thought he was sleepwalking at first, but who does that? When I asked, he said somethin' about codes again. Put him in his bed, but I don't think I'll be sleeping again tonight."
Then, the final log: "Jack's gone five days. Robin two. Think Cas is keeping something from me. I keep asking what, but they're avoiding me. Won't even answer half the time. Maybe they cut a deal with the others for the treasure? I'll bury their chances of opening that door without me. Teach them to stab me in the back." Well, that was fun! Time to change topics, onto someone sticking things into their mouths that they shouldn't! Who ever could that be? After the long warning beep, there was a moment of silence. The seal would break, and poor Elly would have to deal with a very unpleasant gust of wind bursting from the seam of the orb, right into the back of her mouth. She probably wouldn't want to do any sort of shouting for a while, with the sore throat it was going to give her! If her maw wasn't perfectly closed around the orb, others nearby would probably be subjected to a portion of the gust, too. Which, considering it was Elly-mouth-air, seemed less than ideal. After a brief moment, the orb would settle down, and seemingly sealed itself back up. It was hard to say if a different shack was more peaceful than the windy one, considering how noisy a radio could be. At least the "Julius-seeker" seemed calm for the time being. Arisa had taken over for Marigold, who luckily hadn't been harmed in any radio-work, and Momo was... extinguishing fires. While probably not a great experience for the poor Pomumon, it was at least efficient! With Arisa at the wheel, would she have any better luck? "What? Julius didn't tell you about me?" The voice gave a scoff, and then a sigh. "Let me guess, you're one of those strays he loves collectin'?" It was a shame Marigold hadn't kept the conversation too! Maybe it would have been rewarding in the long run! There was still a bad reception, though, so maybe it really wouldn't be. "You're on fire?" Oh, no. "Honey, stop, drop, and roll! You can't be on fire unless you're s'posed to be!" At least they were worried about the well-being of Julius's strays! But now, they were onto the next part to address. "He didn't leave you, on fire, to go play with that door, did he?" Still not super useful for directions, but so far Arisa hadn't failed her speech checks! Maybe she could keep passing them! Or, phone a friend for help to do so. Whichever worked best for her! There wasn't much else to note on the noise that a Terriermon had heard at this time. No new sounds had occurred, and nothing was about to jump out of the trees and jumpscare them! ...Yet, at least. Unfortunately for En-En, she wouldn't find anything that Emmy hadn't already been able to see. Being a lookout sure was boring!
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Post by Hotaru Inoue on Aug 1, 2022 19:30:28 GMT
Though she may not be the bestest reader in the whole world, as the bestest leader in the whole world, even Matsuri realized that she would have to do stuff that was boring. Like reading someone's journal... which wasn't even interesting. There weren't sexy vampires, or space pirates, or giant robots involved at all... oh, maybe they were on all the missing pages... yeah, that seemed to make sense to Matsuri. Why else would someone keep such a boring journal of "Yo my peeps be turning craycray!"
And as for Elly, she definitely wasn't comfortable after the little ball inside of her went off like that! But sure enough, she kept her mouth shut as she held back the pain, the only sign of something going wrong was the tears welling up in her eyes from the sudden shock, confusion, and of course, the ouchies. But Elly was a good girl, and she wasn't going to blast everyone with a bunch of air that was mixed with bad breath!
And it seemed like Matsuri had noticed something as well, as she looked up from the journal and towards her comrade. "Hey, is something wrong? You don't look so good!"
But Elly couldn't admit that she did a bad, though! So she vehemently shook her head in denial, and was about to say no, but didn't want to speak with her mouth full! So she accidently swallowed the orb so she would be free to speak. The orb felt horrible going down her air-blasted throat, however, and made her almost cry all over again.
Clearly there was something wrong with Elly, but if she wanted Matsuri to know that there wasn't anything wrong, then as a leader Matsuri should trust her, right? Wrong! Matsuri had to know what was going on! She moved closer to press the yellow Shoutmon for information before Emmy came swooping in from above, calling out with a concerned tone.
"Matsuri, Elly, Marina! While I was keeping watch, there was this shockwave thingy that came from the center of the island! I don't know what that's supposed to mean, but I wanted to let everyone know that! I'll go inform everyone else!" Emmy ran off, presumably to inform everyone else, while Matsuri turned back to Elly.
"Elly... we should go check out that whatever-thingy!" Matsuri declared. "That sounds way more interesting than sticking around this boring place!"
Momo nodded weakly as she drank from the water Mana had offered her. Everyone was being so nice to her for some reason. Was it because she did a good job in putting out the fire? That must be it! She should definitely do it again if a similar situation comes up!
And as for Arisa, there was an idea forming in her head. If this guy was so prone to misunderstanding things, then maybe leaning into that could prove to be effective! "Oh, that is so right! Julius has left us on fire, but we have done the stopping and have dropped our rolls, so now we are fine but very-very mad! Are you knowing where this door is so we can be giving Julius pieces of our mind? I will let him know what you are wanting to be saying to him as well!"
It was at that point that Emmy came in, informing everyone of the thingy-thing that had transpired, but in a more reserved, hushed tone. There were people on the radio, after all!
Shack 2: Matsuri the Agumon Elly the Shoutmon
Shack 3: Miki the Gomamon Momo the Pomumon Arisa the Morphomon Emmy the Terriermon
Fighting the Endless Zombie Horde Hotaru and Co. Bruce Campbell
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