-Chapter 38-

...

<Digital World Piximon Pocket Dimension> <POV - Third Person>

Suddenly, the room went completely silent as each child read the pop-up message from their Digivice. Finally, a large hologram of a familiar inverted structure was projected in the middle of everyone.

The tense silence was broken by an incredulous murmur from Izzy as he stared at the image of the structure in detail with obvious confusion. "...an inverted pyramid? It has some kind of anti-gravitational device?"

Without another word and ignoring Izzy, Mimi turned around and started walking toward the exit when a nervous fairy stood in her way.

"Where do you think you're going?" Piximon exclaimed loudly before looking at Mimi like she was dumb.

"Oh! I'm going to go buy a new dress... of course not! Where else would I go? I'm going to go rescue Noah!" Mimi replied sarcastically as she folded her arms. She wasn't going to leave her best friend in the hands of that unsightly and ugly, self-proclaimed king. "Usually it's a handsome knight who rescues the damsel in distress, but I guess a pretty girl knight going to save a handsome prince isn't bad at all"

"What she said! I'm going to save... a handsome prince!" Palmon exclaimed loudly as she copied Mimi's pose, much to the amusement of the girl, who seriously doubted Palmon understood what he had just said.

"I'm coming too!" TK exclaimed as he raised his hand, attracting everyone's attention. Matt looked like he was about to say something, but that little blond spoke before his brother. "If it wasn't for Noah I-...I don't think I could have survived this long, he was the one who protected me! So now I have to return the favor!"

"L-let's not rush" Izzy said with an uncomfortable chuckle as Mimi glared at him. "Piximon is right, barely if we could fight against some of Etemon's minions, it's mathematically impossible for us to fight and win against that lunatic!"

"Sooo... what do you suggest? Because I refuse to stand idly by."

Izzy grimaced at Mimi's cutting voice. Sure, he wanted to save his friend too, but it was suicide to go to Etemon's base and hope for the best. This was like playing Pokemon, you can't face the gym leader without proper preparation, and even then you can have unforeseen complications.

But doing such preparations took some time. Time they didn't have to prepare properly, which left only one viable option in the short time they had.

"I..." Izzy looked around the room at everyone in the room with slight anxiety before letting out a resigned sigh. "I suggest we use the power of the Emblems."

Bam!

A loud bang drew the group's attention to the goggle boy, who had risen from his seat and was now glaring at Izzy in blind rage.

"To hell with the Emblems, we don't need them!" Tai shouted loudly as he glared at Izzy with such anger that it caused Izzy to hide behind Mimi, causing said girl to give him a blank stare. "You saw what those damn Emblems did to Agumon! And you still want to use them?! Are you crazy?! What do you think will happen to Tentomon?!"

Making an ugly grimace on her face, Mimi took a step forward, facing Tai directly without a hint of fear as she glared at the enraged boy with disdain. The goggle boy instinctively took a step back before looking up slightly to meet Mimi's piercing eyes.

Even though the girl was a year younger than Tai, she was still taller by an inch. Add that to the fact that she had a huge hat on her head and towards the illusion of being just as tall as Joe.

"Look, Tai, the truth is, I've had enough of this whole moody mood you're in. Ever since what happened with Agumon, you've been nothing but grumpy and a jerk to everyone. You're always making excuses that what happened was Etemon's fault, that the Emblems are cursed, and that this and that! Is it really so hard for you to accept that you made a mistake?"

The atmosphere in the room quickly became tense as everyone watched dumbfoundedly as Mimi pushed Tai back with every step she took. None of the kids in the group had ever seen Mimi this angry before. Well, Izzy did remember a couple of occasions, but they were still pretty rare, and it was definitely unusual behavior for the normally aloof girl.

Not in the least bothered by the looks she was getting, Mimi continued to face the boy directly until Tai slammed his back against the wall.

"Agumon is now a monster who is suffering because of that mistake! And instead, what are you doing to get Agumon back to normal? Because you're just being a lout who doesn't contribute anything to the group beyond complaining and yelling!" Mimi touched her finger to Tai's chest with an accusing look that left the boy speechless, looking at the girl in the hat with glazed eyes.

"I...I..." Tai stammered wordlessly as his hands clenched into fists. He wanted to scream at Mimi and tell her to stop framing him for absurd things.

But for some reason, no words seemed to want to come out of his mouth.

"Tai-"

Before Sora could say anything, Tai pushed Mimi out of his way with a shove, causing the girl to almost fall to the floor before leaving the room without saying a word.

Sora scowled at Mimi, but the latter didn't care as she snorted in annoyance. While the other children just looked at everything awkwardly, not knowing what to say so as not to provoke a catfight.

BlackGarurumon on the other hand, stared at the girl in the hat with suspicion and absentmindedly remembered a girl Noah used to mention from time to time in their conversations about what life was like in the Human World.

'I remember him saying that she basically forced him to become her friend somehow, I think I understand now how...' the wolf thought to himself as he imagined the lazy Noah being forcibly arrested by the girl in the white hat. For some reason, he felt a small smile form on his face before he quickly wiped it off.

Shaking his head, the wolf got the conversation back on track to the original topic, ignoring the tense atmosphere. "... While I agree with the thought of using Emblems, we are back to the same problem as before, we don't have time to search for Emblems. And the only one who has an Emblem is-"

"Tai" Finished Izzy with a grimace on his face.

The room descended back to the tense silence of a moment ago as the minds of those present scanned to form some solution. They didn't have time to form as elaborate a plan as with their fight against Devimon because of the lack of time, but because of that same lack of time, they wouldn't be able to search for the Emblems or become strong enough to face Etemon on equal footing.

And Tai, who was the only one with an Emblem in his possession, did not agree to use the Emblem.

...

..

.

Finally, the silence was broken by a murmur from Joe.

"But we just have to rescue him, don't we?"

Joe's question made everyone look at them simultaneously.

"I-I mean, we don't need to take on Etemon, we just need to get Noah out and get him to safety. We don't need to defeat Etemon, just stall him long enough before we take off with Noah."

Izzy blinked twice before slowly nodding his head. "You... you're right, but that won't be easy at all. I highly doubt Etemon won't have his base up to his eyeballs in minions and intruder traps, not to mention then we have to get out of there with Etemon on our heels."

"Right..." Joe muttered as he adjusted his glasses.

"Hey Piximon! Couldn't you create a portal directly to Noah?" Palmon exclaimed as she looked, hopefully, at the fairy.

"Nop, my portals only work if I've been to said place before, pi" Piximon shook his head to Palmon's disappointment before floating over and sitting on BlackGarurumon's head. "Besides, I don't want to reveal this place since even though it's my private dimension, it doesn't mean that the other Digimon can't invade it once they know of its existence, pi"

Muttering a few brief insults at the fairy, BlackGarurumon let out a grunt before proposing his plan. "I propose that one group head to the pyramid to search for Noah, while another group will try to keep Etemon and his possible minions distracted for as long as possible so they don't notice the group inside the pyramid. We need a flying Digimon to wait for us outside to pick us up and take us out once we have Noah's lazy ass with us."

"It's not a great plan, but it's the best plan we have" Izzy let out a nervous sigh before looking at the one person who had decided to stay silent. "What do you think, Matt? You've been a little quiet through all this."

Matt grimaced as he felt the gaze of everyone in the room fix on him. Watching each gaze closely, and he couldn't help but be a little surprised to see the fire in each of them, Matt realized that even if he refused, they would still leave with or without him.

Letting out a resigned sigh, Matt knew he only had one option here.

"Fine, let's go rescue this idiot."

...

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