Forgotten Virtue - Digimental Hunt (Mana, Finished)

Mana knew that her curiosity would be her downfall one today. But until then, oh boy… it surely was fun.

She wanted to see with her own eyes the place where her brother and his friends had fought “A teddy bear who seemed to came out from a horror film” or something like that. I couldn’t have been that bad, she believed. Even if she had a deep respect and admiration for her older brother, she just knew that he was somewhat of a scaredy cat and that maybe he was just exaggerating stuff to make her to not to go to that “dangerous place” on her own… or maybe she was just too reckless, but she discarded the latter thought almost instantly. She was like the most careful person she knew.

“No, you are not” her partner said, as if reading her mind “You would run into a rampaging Monochromon headfirst just to say ‘your horn looks cute!’” she actually was pretty good at mimicking her squaling voice, Mana thought. If only Ayaka was a human, she would make a pretty good actress. Maybe there's a strange stuff that makes digimon look as if they were human? That would be a pretty neat thing to have... but at the end of the day, it was only wishful thinking.

“I only would do it if I thought his horn was actually cute!” the girl retorted, not really knowing what a Monochromon was and entirely missing the point her partner was trying to make “Anyway, this forest just seems to be your everyday digital forest, so maybe we can make a little picnic and return home… and you should be actually happy about it, Ayaka, I thought you loved forests” She was happy too. Finally she could be in a place that reminded her of her long-missed hometown, and if there wouldn’t be anything interesting to do, at least she would enjoy the sight while she could. As she was about to sit in a soft parchment of grass, she saw a patch of violet fur at the distance. Her curiosity piqued as she approached it, finally distinguishing what it was.

“FOXY!” she squealed as she ran towards the small digimon, while Ayaka tried to keep with her partner’s quick steps. But what Mana hadn’t seen as she tried to pounce and hug the little purple foxlike digimon was… that he was with a human. As Ayaka finally caught up with her tamer, the only thing she could do was to mentally facepalm as she deeply bowed as an apology to the pair. “I’m deeply sorry for my partner’s behavior” she apologized “I’m sure she meant no harm to anybody” she could only hope that Mana’s antics were not found offensive by the pair of strangers.

As Ayaka apologized to the pair, Mana noticed Foxy’s tamer. He was a boy that she thought was more or less his brother’s age, but at least had a funnier expression.

She waited until he finished reading the message, and then, she tried to catch his attention.
Hi! Sorry for not noticing you earlier! The name’s Tsumura Mana and her’s Ayaka” she then made a contemplative pause, regarding DORUmon with care, but immediately smiling afterwards “Can I hug Foxy-san? Pretty please? He’s just so cute! How come you’re so cute Foxy-san? You’re even cuter than Ryouta’s Babydmon! and he was already a ten in my scale of cuteness! That means you’re an eleven? Maybe I should check the scale again. Eh, nevermind”

As Ayaka invisibly facepalmed again at her partner’s antics, she tried to salvage the situation
“What Miss Mana is trying to say is ‘what brings you two fine gentlemen to this forest?’. She’s here on her own accord because she wants to see with her own eyes the place her brother fought against a giant bear, even when that’s against his wishes. I couldn’t stop her, so I decided that the best course of action was joining her. You two seem to be rather hurt, maybe I can help you?” she offered “I’m not that accustomed to doing it, but I guess that would be a fine way to apologize at my partner’s intromission”

Sure, these guys seemed to be friendly enough, but they both seemed somewhat jumpy at their environment. Maybe they were searching for something? Or maybe something was searching them? It was a really good question in Mana’s mind, and she didn’t seem to mind asking it.
“So, you two seem to be really into something. Maybe we can help? I’m sure we’ll have tons of fun! Ayaka can do some pretty neat stuff with her branches. You should totally show them, don’t you think, Ayaka?”

“A lady is not a meant of entertainment to anybody, miss Mana” said the Kodamon with a dead serious tone “If my skills are ever needed, I’ll use them, otherwise, we should stop talking and just hear these fine gentlemen out”. That seemed to somewhat settle Mana. Even though she was doing her pouting face, Ayaka knew that if she had her way, she would just become her unbearable self, so it was better to nullify the problem from the start. and salvage the not-that-bad impression they had already made to the two strangers.

Mana hugged the Dorumon tightly “Aw, you’re so cute and fluffly foxy-san. Your fur’s so soft! I wish I could make a plushie out of it! She then heard the boy talk about someone called Tsumura-san. His brother, maybe?

“You mean Yuu, right? Yeah, I’m his sister… Oh, you were with him? Whoa, it seems that you got a raw deal in there” she then became somewhat concerned for her brother. She hadn’t seen him in that detail, and although this boy’s wounds were superficial, he had a good deal of them. But this stranger had helped Yuu, so the most natural thing for her was helping him too. It was the least she could do.

“You’re not imposing anything on me Friendofmybrother-san” she tried to be polite with him, although he hadn’t said his name yet “I’m choosing to help you on my own accord. And before you keep doing your macho-talk let me tell you that I’m no pushover. If you ever thought Yuu had an attitude, well, I can give him a run for his money. And Ayaka… well, let’s say that she gives me a run for my money”. And it was actually right. Since she had evolved into Kodamon, Ayaka just seemed to be way less tolerant to things she saw as impolite, and if her books were right, refusing the help of someone who was freely giving it was very impolite.

For the one of the first times in her life, Ayaka actually smirked
“Threatening a person with the wrath of a lady is impolite, miss Mana” she started “But, she is more or less right, Friendofherbrother-san. If she is saying that she will help you, better to give her a real excuse and not some bland and overused speech to dissuade her, that is even more impolite that what she had just done. So… are we going to help you, or not?”
At the end of her partner’s speech, Mana placed Dorumon back in the ground and started to pet him. He really seemed like a nice guy.

Mana blinked at Yuuki’s words, Oh my god, this guy is just as boneheaded as they come, couldn’t he just understand like the simplest thing ever?
“As I said, you’re not pulling or pushing me to anywhere” she repeated for what she felt was the thousandth time “I’m going because I want to help you, Yuuki-san. Seriously, it isn’t even that hard to understand. And you can maybe say that you don’t want to involve anyone, but you have already involved Foxy-san! Maybe you just wanna believe that’s your problem, and that’s alright, but then I will just have to make sure that nothing bad happens to him! He’s just too cute to be hurt by some random evildoer that I could have stopped!

As she made sure that she had made her point, she began to hear the boy’s strange history. His past self? A Crest? And a false one to boot… and a somewhat disturbing message.
“Well, the voice has its degree of truthfulness, actually” Ayaka commented absentmindedly “Do not get me wrong, the message’s obviously disturbing, but there’s strength in numbers, and in bonds too. Think of it as a tree. One leaf can’t photosynthesize enough to feed the whole tree, but when all the leaves work together, they can nurture even the greatest and most majestic trees. So, Yuuki-san, what do you propose we do? We don’t have that many hints, and you were the one to experience all the weird stuff, so maybe you can use your leverage on the situation to think about a possible solution. Otherwise we will just wander this forest until nightfall"

Mana made as she hadn’t heard Yuuki’s complaints about Dorumon, daring speak only as the boy said what he planned to do about this weird situation.
“Well, as they say ‘No risk, no reward’” she then smiled when Yuuki decided to confront her past-self’s challenge “Okay! Let’s just find your past self, then! I’m pretty sure that everything will be alright, I mean, we have both Foxy-san and Ayaka! They can just deal with almost anything than we could come across!”

But then, it seemed that they didn’t even had to search for younger Yuuki, because he had the manners to appear in from of them out of thin air. Mana blinked at the static-like younger boy with something akin to surprise but then returned his smile with an even bigger one of hers.
“Yuuki smiling that way is definitely cute!” she then giggled at the Yuuki “Do we follow him? After all, it’s your choice”
As she waited for Yuuki to make his choice about younger Yuuki, Mana wondered what could have changed his boy that much… he seemed genuinely happy and carefree, and the actual Yuuki… well, he wasn’t the total opposite, but he seemed to be a lot more… jaded, to say the least.

Mana did the most obvious thing everyone would do about a teleportin’ young version of a boy that she had just met and that was leading them to a dark, deep and unknown cavern. And that was following him, of course! Smiling people never had bad intentions, that was like common sense 101! But even then, Yuuki seemed to be deeply affected by his happy counterpart. He started screaming at it, and suddenly Mana was sad about the boy… oh and a little afraid too, but a deep sadness about what had happened to Yuuki was the prevailing emotion on her head. Bitter? He’s only fifteen! Why he would have a reason to be bitter?

She decided to stand silently at the boy’s side, trying to find out what was the cause of the boy’s bitterness. His younger self made a sad grimace at them at started talking, albeit his voices undoubtedly sounded special. It was cryptic and deep stuff that Mana couldn’t understand clearly, but it seemed that someway, ghostly Yuuki said to real Yuuki that he didn’t have the friends he had, and mentioned Karin’s and Ryouta’s names too. It made sense, Mana guessed… even though ghostly Yuuki wasn’t as lucky as real Yuuki in that regard and he had lost the chance to make friends with that group, he didn’t surrender and tried to make friends nonetheless. Mana smiled at him when he told them he had succeded

He then told them that even he tried to reject his partner at first, but the digimon didn’t give up on him, and that was had made him accept the partnership eventually. Ghost Yuuki then said the real Yuuki was actually more fortunate that him that he had friends and that was stronger than him… and that he had no reason to not to trust them already, but that just seemed to affect Yuuki even further. He yelled at ghost Yuuki, saying that he actually trusted them, but even Mana could see that he wasn’t as sure as himself while doing so and ghosy Yuuki was really fast to correct his real counterpart.

It was kind of sad seeing real Yuuki so conflicted, even when most of what ghost Yuuki said seemed to be right. Mana’s hand reached for his shoulder, trying to cheer him. Even if he would pull everyone away, she’ll stand by his side. That was who she was, even if she had to say rough things like in the forest, she just knew that the boy needed her help. Hell, who doesn’t need help here and there? Most things are easier and funnier when done with company. If Yuuki could just understand that instead of just shooing away everyone, Mana was pretty sure that he would be way happier than now.

As ghostly Yuuki finished his speech, Mana began to feel nervous. Yuuki was at a moral crossroad. Will he choose to trust or just to keep with his normal lifestyle? She knew that she had no say in the matter, but that didn't prevent her from looking at Yuuki warmly, as if trying to soothe his troubled mind.
“Look Yuuki, I won’t force myself in your business anymore. If you want me to go away right now, I’ll be on my way… But, I think that your ghost self is more or less right. I don’t know if I’m the most appropriate person for you to trust, but believe me when I say that I want to help you with this thing”

And she thought that real Yuuki was boneheaded. Goddamn, he was much, much more than that. He just seemed to be untrustful until the bitter end, but that didn’t meant that they had to talk about her as if she wasn’t there at all, because she was there, and she could hear them!
“Hey, who you call too much?! Maybe you’re the spirit of the past Christmas of the guy I’m trying to help out, but that doesn’t give you reasons to be disrespectful!” The ghostly Yuuki seemed to ignore her complaints and just started talking about Foxy-san. He too seemed to care a great deal about his partner, and even called forth a Foxy-san of his own!

This was just too weird… and new ghostly Foxy-san was lecturing real Yuuki too… his words about friendship, happiness and common hardships just touched the girl deep down and without realizing it, the tears were streaking on her cheeks. She sobbed silently, but noted that even at those words… Yuuki remained doubtful. So ghost Yuuki did what any ghost of your past will do in his place. He changed into his older version, made ghost Foxy-san evolve into a badass black knight and said knight threw a white light at them… and they vanished.

Mana had dealt with his fair amount of strange things during her life, but this one definitely took the award at the weirdest. They then appeared in what seemed to be a school’s pool and Alphamon —the badass black knight— was still behind them. He told them that this was an illusion, maybe a flashback, of Yuuki’s past. The knight said that this was his trial, but how could he take it, if he just couldn’t affect this illusion? This thing was just too weird…

She then saw even-younger-Yuuki with a stopwatch cheering at what seemed to be her older sister, as he called her nee. She seemed to be rather happy about her performance, and was mostly sure that she could win her competition tomorrow. Mana smiled at the girl’s cheerfulness, and then looked at Yuuki, who seemed sadder than ever. She’ll lose because of him? Uhmmm
“Yuuki-san, I know that I’m interfering with your memories" she said without noticing her teary eyes "But you shouldn’t dwell in the past! Everybody can make mistakes for one reason or another! That’s what makes life worth living, Yuuki-san! Don’t you see? Even from the worst of the mistakes, there’s always something we can learn about them, and that’s what makes us grow as people! I’m pretty sure that whatever your sister did or didn’t do that day, she did it without regrets! You should think the same way as her, Yuuki-san! Even that black knight guy said it! You can't change the past, so the best we can do is learn to deal with it and move forward"

She geniunely hoped the boy would understand.