"You two are a pair of absolute disasters!"
It wasn't Keisuke's voice; even the usually serious Leomon couldn't help but snap at Erika and Wormmon.
"How could you forget to mention something so important?!"
With a swift draw and slash of his sword, Leomon, who had previously battled an Eater, was deeply aware of its terrifying nature. He knew running now would only turn him and Keisuke into that monster's meal.
So, Leomon didn't plan to escape; he was prepared to risk everything to protect his companions.
—Lion Sword!
Immediately employing his strongest move, three powerful blades of wind tore through the air, rapidly taking shape.
Leomon could tell clearly that this Eater attempting to invade Kowloon Lv. 5 was no ordinary variant. It had already absorbed enough data to evolve into a mutated form.
Last time, even a base-form Eater had almost wiped them out. Who knew what strange powers this evolved form might have? Thus, he decisively launched a preemptive strike before anything else.
Though Leomon steadfastly followed his principles, he was no fool.
Especially when his companions' lives were at stake, his decisiveness rivaled even the fiercest virus-type Digimon.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Just as Leomon expected, the Eater, having just stretched out one of its tendrils, instinctively curled inward, assuming a defensive stance against the three enormous blades of wind.
Clang!
The sound of metal clashing reverberated sharply, the resulting shockwave echoing clearly even a hundred meters away.
"Go!"
Not daring to linger, Leomon decisively grabbed Keisuke and sprinted off in another direction after momentarily repelling the unidentified Eater.
There was never just one entrance into Kowloon Lv. 5. Their priority now was to leave through another exit, temporarily evading the Eater that had managed to drive off even Piddomon.
Indeed, Leomon was certain Piddomon hadn't been killed by the Eater. If it had been, the creature's strength wouldn't have been this manageable.
"Leomon, something's off."
But just as Leomon started pulling Keisuke away, Erika—still scanning the surroundings—was first to notice something strange.
"Huh?"
Prompted by Erika's observation, Keisuke, who had remained vigilant, was the next to sense something unusual.
"That Eater isn't chasing after us?"
Hearing this, Leomon froze mid-step, turning back to observe the Eater still holding its defensive posture.
"What's going on?"
Unlike the Eaters they had previously encountered, this evolved form didn't pursue them as aggressively as Leomon had anticipated.
Instead, it continued extending its tentacles, carefully probing around itself, appearing genuinely preoccupied by something else.
This behavior was abnormal because Eaters had no conscious intent. Their instincts were solely to assimilate and consume every bit of data they encountered.
They seemed especially "fond" of human mental data, always prioritizing humans as their prime targets.
That was precisely why Leomon had instantly chosen to flee with Keisuke—Eaters were simply too dangerous to humans.
"It's reconstructing the 'past' data of that area!"
Seeing this, Wormmon, who had spent time in the Digital World, immediately recalled similar phenomena and realized what the Eater was doing.
It wasn't just a superficial scan like Erika's current methods. Instead, it was recovering previously deleted or hidden information from residual data, effectively "peering into the past."
Even in the Digital World, Wormmon had only seen similar powers exhibited by perfect-level Digimon adept in data manipulation and magical abilities, such as Piximon or Wisemon.
"It's searching for Piddomon's whereabouts."
After a brief hesitation, Erika swiftly displayed her abilities worthy of being called a genius hacker, quickly extracting enough data samples from the Eater.
From these data samples, it became clear that the Eater was employing something akin to "hard drive data recovery" to reconstruct information from that specific area.
The most prominent of these recovered traces were unquestionably the flaming, incandescent feathers left behind by Piddomon's attack.
"It's heading for the Digimon Black Market."
Using the information shared by Erika, Keisuke quickly determined the Eater's objective—it was currently trying to break into the Digimon Black Market using its unique methods.
"The Digimon Black Market?"
Leomon, rarely showing obvious displeasure, frowned at the mention of the "Digimon Black Market."
Due to the unique circumstances of Hudie, both Keisuke and Leomon had frequented the Digimon Black Market several times. Keisuke even possessed a stable UDL link obtained from one of its merchants.
"Erika, I don't like that place."
Just like Leomon, Wormmon—born as a Digimon—clearly despised a place that sold members of its own kind.
If Wormmon hadn't encountered Keisuke and Erika by chance, it believed that given its current abilities, it would have likely ended up as one of the "products" in that market.
"I know. I don't like that place either."
Rarely agreeing wholeheartedly with Wormmon, Erika, having spent considerable time alongside Wormmon and Leomon, had long since ceased treating Digimon as mere "programs."
Thus, in Erika's eyes, those merchants who dealt in Digimon were no different from slave traders—utterly contemptible.
...
Kaka… Kaka…
Elsewhere, completely ignoring Keisuke and Leomon who were right before it, the Eater began acting solely upon its instincts, reconstructing fragments of data from the surroundings.
Its entire body gradually flowed from Kowloon Lv. 4 into Lv. 5 through this process.
Kaka… Kaka…
Only then did the Eater's true, distorted humanoid form fully appear before Keisuke's group.
Its body, wholly composed of twisted, intertwined tentacles, advanced forward with a disturbingly unnatural gait.
The writhing tentacles, vividly painted in stark black and white, lent the Eater an even more unnerving, unsettling air.
Kaka… Kaka…
That inexplicable mechanical clicking echoed continuously, while the eerie humanoid Eater continued observing the area's "past" data through its single, emotionless, seemingly indifferent eye.
Boom—Crack!
In the next moment, the humanoid Eater reached its tendril toward an entirely unknown space, attempting to tear through it as easily as it had ripped into Kowloon Lv. 5.
Unfortunately for it, this time the Eater's previously unstoppable "invasion method" failed utterly.
Boom!
A powerful firewall immediately sliced through the Eater's tendril, and a massive torrent of data instantly pushed it back into Kowloon Lv. 4.