Chapter 1745: with translation of chapter title

NO. 359: You should first reflect on yourself.

Speaking of both sides, Aomo's puppet side is fine now.

It's pretty good.

Although the development of the exit key disappearing left little Aomo stunned for a moment, for a while he wondered whether he had logged into the dark area of the Digital World or Sword Art Online, but this place is neither a game nor indeed just playing around.

After all, the swift withdrawal everyone made was precisely to escape the demon king's army that was about to arrive.

And now, they have arrived.

The vanguard feral ghost beast and zombie dragon beast were stopped by the Bellstar Beast, which, by firing its double shotguns simultaneously to create a buffer and halt the charge, then turned and rushed back, piercing their bodies with the second wave of fly-shot pellets.

And the Death's Claw wrought by the demon beast and female demon beast of the second echelon, as they charged, was also shattered by the black-colored heel.

The graceful arc of the spinning kick, enveloping bullets, makes it hard to say whether the data prototype, aside from the cowgirl and Beelzebub, also mixes in Bayonetta from Bayonetta, but this is one of the Bellstar Beast's three major innate talents engraved in its data core: Hurricane Volley.

By firing the gun hidden in the heel of the boot while employing various leg techniques, and pairing it with the dual guns in hand, a stylish, splendid vortex of bullets and kicks — the Death Vortex — is formed.

Yes, the Death Vortex.

For most Adult and Perfect Digimon, Ultimate stats are like a heavenly chasm—except for Light Beasts with astonishing stats or Holy Angel Beasts with super‑move mechanisms; usually Adult and Perfect levels are like dual blades in Monster Hunter Wilds desperately scrubbing themselves clean, not even matching a single sword of a master's Ultimate.

This is the result of having both stats and control: in an instant it stalled the originally ferocious demon king's army several meters outside the vortex, and it made Aomo's puppet stroke its chin in amazement.

"Yo, you're back already?"

"Cut the crap, I didn't leave!" Bellstar Beast, spinning gun flourishes in hand, landed before Aomo, gripping her dual guns, slightly bending forward to stay alert around, and asked, "Why didn't you leave? Did the puppet have an accident?"

But don't keep harping on the accident……

Having acted together many times, the fact that 'the plan always goes wrong' has become a classic joke among acquaintances teasing Aomo, the master planner, so even in this tense moment he couldn't help but wryly smile.

"The puppet didn't have an accident, but the system did. Do you know how to handle the exit key being deducted? Start running! Don't just stand there!"

The vortex's intimidation lasted only a moment, while the demon king's army replenished at a visibly rapid pace, so there was no conflict, no hesitation; after Aomo finished speaking, the two simultaneously turned and ran, while still keeping an eye on the pursuing skills behind them.

At that moment, Aomo's puppet's specimen body, with its slightly superior physical qualities, was perfectly displayed.

Able to keep pace with Bellstar Beast's running steps and intersperse equally agile, crisp movements that are somewhat handsome, the pair resembles less a human and Digimon team and more a gathering of Digimon.

——Of course, when Aomo stands still in place, he still looks like that Dark Beast guise.

But once he starts sprinting, the unstable simulated data distorts and blurs, though not to the point of tearing apart entirely, creating an image like an unstable version of a human and fighter spirit making contact, as if inheriting the fighter's spirit.

To many book‑loving crowds in the black market, this seemed quite reasonable, and for a moment they genuinely believed Aomo was the successor of the Dark Fighter rather than a failed mimetic 'human'.

"Shall I kick you through the door into the real world?"

But Bellstar Beast knew full well that this so‑called 'partner' in front of her wasn't even human.

It is not even a former demon, but a puppet built from Aiblon cells that have been technologically adjusted and forcibly stabilized; when necessary, there's no need to be polite—treat it as a fragile human.

Aiblon cells, once built into monsters, are specially enhanced biological entities that can trade blows with Ultraman Diga; even taking a kick from an Ultimate Digimon is fine as long as the tissue remains viable, allowing the partner to culture another puppet, right?

But there is a problem in this.

Originally, Aomo's puppet was not his main body entering the Digital World, but rather a theoretical 'soul' drawn by machine; considering that puppet control has no soul to speak of, this actually amounts to extracting Aomo's mental consciousness that overlays the puppet.

Then……

Can the digitized mental consciousness, by taking a more violent, direct route back to reality, return normally to the puppet?

This is a problem, perhaps worth trying, but right now, as the main body, Aomo happens to be in a little Aomo form.

The child‑type soul, already retracted for yin‑yang balance, might not withstand this attempt either; after all, if a part of the condensed state goes wrong, the gap when reverting could become even larger.

After weighing all this, Aomo pondered briefly and then continued: "That's a last‑ditch resort when there's no other way—first try to shake this system's core, and wait for Xiangyu Tuohai and the others to arrive!"

"How long do we have to wait!" Bellstar Beast frowned and asked, meanwhile firing a bullet that shattered the Sin Claw flying toward the partner's impending trajectory.

That was the attack of a new demon beast.

His appearance also signified that the demon king army's pursuit level had entered the second stage; while a sky‑covering Perfect‑level assault loomed, Bellstar Beast's running, dodging, blocking, and counter‑attacking motions began to show abrupt mistakes.

"Bei zi?"

One hand trembled, one foot slipped; not only did it fail to precisely shatter the attack flying toward the partner, forcing the partner to resort to monster power to block—it even nearly got the user hit by a Skeleton Satan Beast's 'Claw Bone' skill, which can cause Digimon data anomalies and destruction.

The reason it missed was that Aomo, while giving a tug, also flung out the cards of Ultraman Belial and the Red King card previously tossed by the Strategist Beast before it left.

Although the summoning method is somewhat rigid—equivalent to controlling a puppet to control another puppet, with no classic monster‑tamer instance control to show—a monster and a Dark Ultraman still count as major figures in the Ultimate tier.

Especially the latter, whose ability to draw negative energy from the dark zone manifests almost like a demon king bearing a sin trait, instantly causing the shadowy figures behind the army to rise, and a large‑scaled giant claw shadow to spring up at once.

At the same time, Bellstar Beast, which Aomo had pulled into his arms and, after two instantaneous teleports, had distanced to the side of a house, staggered again, leaning in his embrace and panting: "It feels… not quite right……"

"That's not just 'it feels like'," he said, raising a hand to cover her forehead, then frowning as he touched her visibly flushed cheeks, the demon's expression subtle: "No fever, but her face is indeed hot, like another kind of fever."

By now, even a battle‑scarred demon would consider this experienced, yet he didn't think it was a good thing that could take advantage of the Digimon partner.

"... What… is that?"

Leaning in the partner's embrace, having sniffed something, she unconsciously rubbed her legs, prompting the partner to quickly steady her, then immediately release and pull back, while making a phantom claw swipe:

"For Digimon, this state is premature; first try to see if degeneration can refresh the data."

This was originally the Digimon Soul handed over by the other party to the partner's grasp, which Aomo seized without resistance and instantly compressed.

The 1.75‑meter Bellstar Beast instantly shrank to a one‑meter‑tall witch beast on a broom; although her cheeks remained flushed, her inherent pallid face, black eyeliner, and vivid red lipstick—hard to pull off—made the change less noticeable.

Moreover, she no longer needed two feet to support her combat balance.

"Good… seems okay, not so hot anymore."

Behind her, a black cat as light and long as a paper bag floated up, met her gaze, and then both turned to look at Aomo.

"That's good; this time it's become obvious to this extent, which counts as a gain."

"What counts as a gain?" the witch beast lifted a hand to adjust her hat brim; compared to her Ultimate form, her personality and thought processes differ, so she could instantly ascertain her condition from the data she'd seen in her mind.

"Did you discover that Digimon get amorous toward people?" Although still a bit weak, the witch beast, in a playful mood, raised her broom a bit higher so she could look down and tease.

"It's confirmed a certain trend," Aomo said indifferently, "plus the wait you asked about earlier—it's about over now."

As soon as his words fell, both saw the whistling sound from above again and that data hollow filled with bird song and floral fragrance.

Moreover, for no apparent reason, many Dark Digimon charged toward that hollow.

They're here.

"What about the original goal?" the Witch Beast asked again, lowering its head. "Was that guy's data all for nothing?"

"Then we need to ask the guard robot beast; I think it should be fine—only I'm the one who might screw up..."

Looking at the descending digital beast, it seemed not only had it changed persons, but even added a double distant view; Aomo's puppet also began to act like an old man on the subway fiddling with a phone.

"How come even the appearance of the Holy Maiden Beast is okay, but there are also the Lilith Beast and the Monarch Beast?"

Did Ami also come?

Your lineup is meant to provoke the other few demon kings to come out... Can the positive-negative war break out in such a remote corner of the black market?

(End of chapter)