We followed Zon through the dense, petrified woods of Zone 1 for an hour before the environment simply broke.
There was no gradual transition.
One step we were in a dead, silent forest, and the next, we crossed an invisible threshold into a biome that openly defied physics.
To our left, ancient trees were encased in thick, jagged layers of absolute-zero ice, the air so cold my breath instantly crystallized.
To our right, the forest was caught in a perpetual, silent blaze of bright blue fire that burned without consuming the wood.
“Wow,” Gammamon breathed, his breath puffing into white clouds on the left side of his face while the right side bathed in the warm, azure glow of the flames.
I tapped the black disk at my hip, summoning the Phase-Wolf in a wisp of green mist.
I needed our translator live.
The wolf padded silently beside us, its jade ears twitching.
Zon let out a series of low, respectful chitters.
<This is the Sovereign’s domain,> the Phase-Wolf’s deep, resonant voice translated directly into my and Gammamon’s minds through the Digivice link.
<Her power bleeds into the earth itself.>
We hurried deeper into the split-biome until we reached a massive clearing of blackened, frost-covered stone.
Lying in the center was the Glacial-Inferno Sovereign.
She was breathtakingly massive, easily the size of an elephant, with a coat of pure, iridescent white and a spiraling crystalline horn.
Her mane was a flickering torrent of blue fire, but right now, the flames were sputtering, reduced to weak, dying embers.
She lay on her side, her chest heaving with shallow, ragged breaths.
Chichi, the unicorn foal, let out a heart-wrenching whinny and galloped forward, nuzzling her mother’s massive face.
The Sovereign opened one heavy, gold-slitted eye and let out a weak, rumbling purr.
I approached carefully, my Observation Haki sweeping over her body.
The moment I focused on her wounds, my stomach dropped.
Deep, jagged bite marks tore across her flank, her right shoulder, and her hind legs.
But, the physical trauma wasn’t the main problem.
A thick, necrotic sludge had seeped deep into the muscle tissue, turning the surrounding flesh into a rotting, pitch-black mass.
The black veins were creeping slowly toward her chest.
“The Deviljho did this?” I asked aloud, knowing the Phase-Wolf would translate my words into concepts the animals understood.
Zon shook his head, squeaking frantically.
<The Great Hunger did not possess the venom,> Zon relayed.
<One of his vile followers exhaled the toxic mist before the battle, weakening the Sovereign.
The Great Hunger’s fangs merely drove the poison deeper into the muscle when they fought.>
“Victor?” Gammamon asked, looking at my grim expression.
“Can you fix it?”
I knelt down, hovering my hand over the necrotic flesh on her shoulder.
“I…
I can’t just pump Fa-Jin into her.
Kinetic healing accelerates cellular growth and massively increases blood flow.
If I flood her system with energy right now, it won’t heal the dead tissue.
It will just push the poison straight into her heart at ten times the speed.
It’ll kill her in seconds.”
Zon stepped forward, his small face tight with panic.
<Then what can we do?>
I swallowed hard, looking at the rotting flesh scattered across her massive body.
“The tissue is completely dead.
The poison is entrenched.
The only way my healing works is if we get rid of the poison first.
We have to…
we have to cut it out.
All of it.
From her shoulder, her flank, her leg.
We have to carve away the dead flesh until we hit clean, living tissue, and then I can force her body to regenerate.”
Chichi let out a sharp, terrified shriek, backing away from me.
Zon’s eyes widened in horror.
<Mutilate her?!> Zon protested, his mental voice translated with a vibrating shock.
<She is already dying!
The shock of carving her to the bone will finish her!>
“I know it sounds like butchery,” I pleaded, raising my hands.
“Is there any kind of local plant?
A numbing agent?
An anesthetic we can give her so she doesn’t feel it?”
The Sovereign let out a weak, rattling breath that sounded like grinding ice.
The Wolf’s voice echoed in my head, carrying her crushing, regal authority.
<Peace, Zon.
And to you, human…
no.
My biology rejects all foreign flora.
A medicine that numbs the body will simply be burned away by my internal fire.> She slowly shifted her heavy gaze to Chichi, who was crying soft, crystalline tears.
<I can feel the rot taking my heart.
I am fading.
If carving away my flesh is the only gamble…
then take the wager.
I would rather live the rest of my days as a crippled, scarred beast than die today and leave my daughter to this merciless island.
Go ahead cut the rot away.>
I stared into the Sovereign’s golden eyes.
Her absolute, unwavering conviction as a mother hit me like a physical blow.
She was willing to endure unimaginable agony without a drop of painkiller just for the chance to stay with her child.
I set my jaw, pushing the doubt entirely out of my mind.
“You aren’t going to be a cripple,” I vowed, my voice dropping to a hard, absolute register.
“I’m not going to let that happen.
Zon, take Chichi and back up.”
Zon hesitated for a fraction of a second before nodding.
He gently nudged the sobbing foal backward, moving to the edge of the clearing.
I tapped the black disk, dumping a measured fraction of my kinetic reserves.
“Summon: Widow-Maker.”
The massive jade spider materialized in a cloud of green mist.
“Suspend her,” I ordered.
“Be gentle, but keep her entirely off the ground.
I need access to all the wound sites.”
The spider moved with surprising grace, weaving thick, Haki-softened cables of silk under the Sovereign’s massive torso, neck, and legs.
With a heavy heave, the spider hoisted the unicorn three feet into the air, exposing the rotting, poisoned flesh across her body.
I drew the Jade Wings, shifted them into precise, razor-sharp surgical daggers, and turned to Gammamon.
“I need a surgeon, and you’re too small,” I said.
“Evolve.
I need Betel’s strength for this.”
Gammamon didn’t argue.
He channeled his own energy, glowing with a blinding crimson light.
His form stretched and hardened into the red-scaled, athletic build of BetelGammamon.
He stepped forward, his yellow eyes dead serious, and took the black handles of the Jade Wings from my hands.
“Where do I cut?” BetelGammamon asked, his voice deeper, raspy.
“Everywhere that’s black,” I said.
“I need one hundred percent of my mind and my body focused on channeling Fa-Jin into her system.
I have to act as her life-support.
If my focus slips for a millisecond while the flesh is being removed, she’ll go into shock and die.
Don’t hesitate.”
I stepped beneath the suspended Sovereign and placed both of my palms flat against the uninjured white fur of her chest.
I closed my eyes, tapping into the massive, deep well of Fa-Jin I had built up over a month of 10x gravity training.
“Start at the shoulder,” I grunted.
“Carve until the blood runs bright red.”
BetelGammamon stepped up to the necrotic wound.
He raised the daggers and plunged them in.
The Sovereign threw her head back and unleashed a deafening, agonizing howl that shattered the ice on the nearby trees.
The sound tore through the clearing.
Chichi screamed, her eyes wide with terror, and tried to bolt forward toward her hurting mother.
But Zon was ready.
The small ferret slammed his paws into the dirt.
The physical shadows stretching from the trees suddenly whipped upward, forming solid, black tendrils that wrapped gently but firmly around Chichi’s legs and torso, holding the frantic foal safely in place.
“Keep going!” I yelled over the howling, sweat pouring down my face as I pushed kinetic energy into the Sovereign’s heart, desperately keeping it beating against the unimaginable pain.
BetelGammamon worked with brutal, terrifying efficiency.
The Jade Wings sliced through the black sludge on her shoulder, carving away chunks of ruined muscle.
Without pausing, he moved to the massive bite on her flank, his arms moving in a blur as he dug the poison out.
Dark, toxic blood rained down on him, sizzling faintly against his red scales, but he didn’t stop.
He moved to her hind leg, his jaw set in rigid determination, ignoring the horrific sounds of the mother’s agony.
“Almost there!” BetelGammamon yelled, his arms coated to the elbows in dark gore.
“I’m hitting clean tissue!
I see red!”
“Cut the rest and get clear!” I ordered.
My vision was beginning to blur at the edges.
Holding her heart together while it was under this much physical trauma was draining my reserves exponentially.
With three final, vicious slashes to her hind leg, BetelGammamon carved away the last remnants of the Deviljho’s rot.
Massive, horrifying craters had been carved into the Sovereign’s body, exposing bone, but the blood flowing from them was finally pure, bright crimson.
BetelGammamon staggered backward, dropping the daggers.
Exhausted, the crimson light fractured, and he devolved back into his small, white base form, panting heavily.
I took a deep breath, feeling the last dregs of my energy pooling in my core.
I needed absolute focus.
“Friction to heat.
Heat to life,” I chanted aloud, the mantra stabilizing my wildly fluctuating adrenaline.
“Flow.”
I pushed my output into absolute overdrive.
I took every single ounce of kinetic energy left in my cells, every bit of friction, every drop of stamina, and violently shoved it into the Sovereign’s chest.
The reaction was instantaneous.
Beneath my hands, the massive beast’s biology went into hyper-drive.
The bright red blood coagulated in seconds.
Muscle fibers snapped together like thick, woven ropes, building rapidly over the exposed bone of her shoulder, flank, and leg.
Fresh, pure white hide stretched aggressively across the new muscle.
The agonizing howling slowly tapered off, replaced by deep, heavy, exhausted breaths.
I kept pushing until the wounds were completely sealed, leaving only faint, hairless scars where the rot had been.
The moment the tissue was finalized, my tank hit zero.
My legs gave out completely.
I collapsed backward onto the frost-covered stone, staring up at the canopy, entirely unable to move a muscle.
The world spun in dizzying circles.
“Down,” I wheezed to the jade spider.
The Widow-Maker gently lowered the Sovereign to the ground before dissolving back into green mist and returning to the disk on my hip.
For a moment, the only sound was the crackle of the blue fire in the woods.
Then, Zon released the shadow tendrils.
Chichi galloped across the clearing and buried her face into her mother’s newly healed flank, crying out in absolute joy.
The Sovereign raised her heavy head, wrapping her neck around her foal, her blue fiery mane flaring back to life with a brilliant, warm intensity.
Gammamon walked over to me, looking like he’d just taken a bath in a slaughterhouse, and collapsed onto his back right next to my head.
“We did it,” he panted, staring at the sky.
“Yeah, Doc,” I rasped, offering him a weak fist bump without lifting my arm off the ground.
He bumped his bloody paw against my knuckles.
A shadow fell over us.
I tilted my head back to see the massive Sovereign standing over us.
She looked down, her golden eyes shining with profound emotion.
She let out a long, melodic whinny.
<I have no words to encompass this debt,> the Wolf translated, the Sovereign’s intent ringing with crystal clarity.
<You have returned my life to me, and my future to my daughter.
Ask whatever you desire of me, human.
It is yours.>
I let out a tired breath.
“I told Zon earlier.
I don’t make deals for lives.
It was our duty to help if we could.
Consider it a freebie.”
Zon trotted over.
He looked at me, then up at the massive unicorn, and began to chitter respectfully.
The Phase-Wolf dutifully translated the exchange for my benefit.
<My Sovereign,> Zon conveyed, his tone deferential.
<This human, Victor, possesses an ability.
He can forge a stone avatar of a beast using their blood.
It allows him to wield their strength to survive this brutal place.
Earlier today, he asked for my blood.
Not as a conqueror, but as an ally.>
The Sovereign tilted her head, listening intently.
<He forged a copy of my shadow without taking my life,> Zon continued.
<He preserves our essence.
He refused to hold your healing hostage for power, but he needs power to survive.
I offered my blood willingly, and the bond was beautiful.
Perhaps…
you might consider doing the same.>
The Sovereign’s eyes widened in understanding.
She didn’t hesitate, letting out a warm snort.
<If my strength can serve as your shield, Victor, then I offer it with honor.
Take my blood.>
“No,” I croaked, trying to push myself up on my elbows and failing miserably.
“Absolutely not.
We just put you through absolute butchery.
I am not stabbing you to take your blood right after Gammamon practically carved you like a turkey.
It feels gross.”
“Victor,” Gammamon sighed, rolling his head to look at me.
“Don’t be an idiot.”
“I have morals!” I argued with the bloody dinosaur.
<Victor,> Zon chittered firmly, the Wolf translating his exasperation.
<Do not insult her gratitude with stubborn pride.
You saved her.
Accept the gift.>
<It is not a toll, Victor,> the Sovereign added gently.
<It is a bond.
A willing one.>
I looked at the massive unicorn, then at Zon, and finally at Gammamon, who was glaring at me with tired, bloodshot eyes.
I groaned, letting my head fall back onto the stone.
“Fine,” I yielded.
“I accept.
Thank you.
But I literally have zero energy left in my body.
I couldn’t forge a paperclip right now, let alone a clone.
I need to rest.”
<Then you shall rest with us,> Zon declared happily.
We spent the next four days at the ferret burrow.
It was the first actual vacation I had taken since waking up in this world five months ago.
Without the constant, grinding pressure of Zone 2’s gravity or the threat of predators hunting us, my body finally had a chance to deeply recover.
I washed the blood off my clothes in a nearby stream.
Gammamon spent hours scrubbing his white fur clean until he didn’t look like a tiny serial killer.
During the days, we wrestled in the moss with Ron, Jon, and Don.
We played an intense, highly competitive game of hide-and-seek where the ferrets used their shadow-skipping to cheat relentlessly, much to Gammamon’s vocal outrage.
We ate roasted fruit, slept deeply, and let our bodies naturally replenish the massive Fa-Jin reserves we had spent.
By the morning of the fifth day, I was standing outside the burrow, stretching my arms, feeling my muscles hum with absolute, one-hundred-percent capacity.
A soft crunch of hooves on dirt announced her arrival.
The Sovereign walked into the clearing, Chichi trotting happily at her side.
The mother looked magnificent, her coat gleaming and her blue fire burning with a steady, majestic warmth.
The scars where BetelGammamon had carved away the rot were faint, covered in a fine layer of new white fuzz.
She let out a soft whinny.
<Are you ready, Victor?> the Wolf translated.
I nodded slowly.
I drew the right Jade Wing dagger and stepped forward, holding the blade out horizontally.
I expected her to ask me to make the cut.
Instead, the Sovereign gracefully bowed her massive head.
She brought the razor-sharp tip of her crystalline horn down to her own hind leg and made a tiny, precise nick in her hide.
A single drop of bright crimson blood welled up.
She lifted her leg over the Jade Wing, allowing the drop to fall.
The moment it touched the jade, the world bathed in emerald light.
Just like with Zon, there was no vacuum.
No pain.
No hostile friction.
My Fa-Jin flowed from my core into the blade like water down a perfectly carved channel.
It was a flawless, symbiotic transfer.
The energy wrapped around the Sovereign’s willing gift, pulling her magical essence, the fire, the ice, the telekinetic majesty, into the alchemical stone.
The light flared brilliantly, and the crystal-clear CLICK echoed in my mind.
Replacing another slot
I retracted the blade, clipping it back to my hip with a satisfied sigh.
We walked back to the burrow, where Zon, Pon, the kids, and Gammamon were sitting around the remnants of a morning fire.
I dismissed the Phase-Wolf, taking a seat on a log next to Gammamon, but kept the Digivice link active for translation.
The Sovereign rested on the grass nearby, folding her long legs.
<You have forged the bond,> she whinnied softly.
<What is your path now, human?
Where do you take this strength?>
“The original plan was to build an Elite Deck,” Gammamon explained around a mouthful of berries, my voice carrying the translation out to them.
“We have the Gorilla for muscle, the Spider for traps, Zon for support, and you for the magic.
We still need our transport and our ultimate.
We were going to hunt for a Bird and the Rainbow Dragon.
But now that we know about willing blood…
we want to ask for it.
Not fight for it.”
The moment the words “Rainbow Dragon” were translated, the temperature in the clearing seemed to drop.
The ferret pups stopped playing.
Zon’s ears pinned back against his head in visceral fear.
<The Grand Sky-Swimmer…> Zon chittered, genuine terror bleeding through the Wolf’s translation.
<You cannot ask the Dragon for a bond,> the Sovereign warned, her golden eyes grave.
<It does not operate on the logic of mortals.
It is arrogant, ancient, and entirely unreachable.
If you approach it and demand its power, it will not negotiate.
It will unmake you.
You are strong, Victor, but the Dragon is a god.>
I rubbed the back of my neck.
“Yeah, I kind of figured that was the endgame boss.
I’m not suicidal enough to try and casually chat with it yet.
But what about the bird?
If we want to leave this island, I need flight.
If I can make a deal with it, I’d rather do that than try to shoot it out of the sky.”
Zon looked doubtful, but the Sovereign’s expression shifted thoughtfully.
She let out a low, rhythmic series of sounds.
<The Sky-Rift Roc should be ideal for you it is incredibly territorial, strong and should be the ideal for you> the Wolf translated her musings.
<However, unlike the Dragon, the Roc is highly logical.
It understands equivalent exchange.>
I leaned forward, my interest piqued.
“You think I can make a deal with it?”
<I do,> she confirmed.
<The Roc has ruled the high peaks of Zone 1 for centuries.
But recently, a problem has taken root in its nesting grounds, an infestation of an invasive, parasitic entity that the Roc’s sheer size and supersonic speed cannot properly combat.
It is driving the great bird to madness.>
The Sovereign looked directly at me.
<If you and your new companions can climb the peaks and eradicate this infestation for the Roc, I guarantee it will willingly offer you its blood in return.>
I looked at Gammamon, a slow, confident grin spreading across my face.
I tapped the black disk at my hip, feeling the immense, combined power of the Gorilla, the Spider, the Ferret, and the Unicorn resting quietly within.
“A pest control quest?” I laughed, standing up and cracking my knuckles.
“Sounds like the perfect warm-up for the new team.
Point us to the mountain.”
Word Count: 3285
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