In the blink of an eye, an entire morning passed.
"Finally, I'm full!"
After evolving into Koromon, Chen Ze had spent the whole morning constantly eating.
Having exhausted every last morsel of food in the refrigerator as the price, he finally accumulated enough energy and data to stabilize his current form.
"You really eat a lot."
Beside him, Mimi had gone from initial shock to numb acceptance. Now she was just mildly curious how Koromon's tiny body managed to fit so much food inside it.
But of course, what made Mimi most curious was how Chen Ze had turned from YukimiBotamon into Koromon, as well as what that strange glow emitted from her own body had been earlier.
"It's because I Digivolved. I needed food to replenish myself."
Noticing Mimi's obvious curiosity, Chen Ze didn't mind indulging her questions.
"I'm a Digimon, a form of life born in the network world. I can change my form based on the data I absorb. We call this process 'Digivolution.'"
Chen Ze explained this naturally, as if he really had always been a true Digimon.
"But a newly evolved form isn't stable right away. Without timely replenishment, it'll quickly revert to its original state."
Chen Ze wasn't sure how other Digimon maintained their forms, but that was how his current body worked.
Theoretically, unless pushed to exhaustion, Chen Ze could maintain this Koromon state for quite some time.
He even believed that after specialized training, he could remain in his current form permanently without devolving.
But that brought a new problem.
Staying in his Fresh and Rookie stages might be fine, but once he reached Champion-level, obtaining enough energy to sustain his bodily functions would become challenging.
After all, Champion-level Digimon who were both compact and powerful were very few. Most Champion-level and above Digimon were huge, requiring extensive hunting to feed their large bodies.
Besides, simply maintaining such enormous forms was challenging enough, let alone acquiring enough data for further Digivolution.
As for repeatedly Digivolving and then De-Digivolving, like those "main character" Digimon who had protagonist halos?
Never mind whether one could successfully Digivolve again after De-Digivolving—just the randomness and uncertainty in Digivolution alone was enough to make most Digimon give up that idea.
Constantly hunting and gathering food might be exhausting, but at least it offered the possibility of continued upward Digivolution.
On the other hand, repeatedly Digivolving and absorbing inferior data, except for those blessed "main characters," usually meant most Digimon became weaker and weaker until they ended up as Numemon or Sukamon—completely useless forms without any further Digivolution potential.
"You can change your form? So you mean you'll become prettier?"
Blinking her large eyes, Mimi apparently only understood Chen Ze's first sentence.
"Then will you become a flower fairy? You know, the kind that flies around in the sky waving a magic wand!"
Chen Ze stared silently at Mimi, wanting very much to tell her that her future partner was precisely that kind of fairy—Lilymon, who flew around wildly firing Flower Cannons everywhere.
But considering he might evolve into something similar himself, Chen Ze lost any desire to continue talking.
"Why aren't you saying anything? Don't you like flower fairies?"
Just as Mimi was about to continue questioning him, the front door suddenly rattled.
"Mimi, Mama's home."
Mrs. Tachikawa's voice soon followed from the entryway.
"Mama! I found a future flower fairy!"
Mimi immediately jumped off her chair, paying no attention to Chen Ze's panicked expression as she shouted excitedly toward the door.
"Although it's not pretty right now, it will definitely become a flower fairy in the future!"
Under Mrs. Tachikawa's thoroughly confused gaze, Mimi dashed into her arms, still yelling cheerfully.
"A flower fairy?"
Looking in the direction Mimi pointed, Mrs. Tachikawa saw no sign of this legendary "future flower fairy"—only a mess on the table and empty snack bags scattered everywhere.
"Mimi!"
Mrs. Tachikawa's voice suddenly spiked, accompanied by a fiercely stern glare toward her daughter.
"Even your father won't be able to save you this time!"
"That was close!"
It took Chen Ze less than ten seconds to snap out of shock and sneak into the study, fully displaying a Digimon's superior physical abilities.
However, hearing Mrs. Tachikawa's sharply raised voice, Chen Ze silently offered condolences to Mimi while feeling immense relief at avoiding discovery himself.
Unlike a sweet little girl brimming with innocence, an adult who'd been tempered by society wouldn't be fooled so easily.
If Mr. and Mrs. Tachikawa really found out about him, Chen Ze couldn't guarantee how they'd react.
In the best scenario, perhaps they'd accept him—but more likely, it'd end in outcomes far less friendly.
Chen Ze had no intention of gambling on such a slim chance. Rather than passively accepting an unknown bad ending, he preferred hiding in the shadows.
This was a hacker's instinct, and also Chen Ze's judgment about his current situation.
Aside from Mimi, who'd already shown him kindness, nobody else in this world could be trusted.
"Sorry, Mimi."
Quietly whispering an apology toward Mimi in the living room, Chen Ze turned and hopped toward the computer in the study.
From his earlier conversations with Mimi, Chen Ze had already coaxed out all the details of what happened after he'd become a Digi-Egg—including his initial emergence from the study's computer.
Of course, maybe "coaxing" wasn't quite accurate here.
Because Chen Ze never really asked much; Mimi eagerly spilled out everything she knew.
Thus, both to avoid Mrs. Tachikawa's return and to seek out Renamon, who was still somewhere in an unknown network space, Chen Ze decided to replicate the "reverse digitization" process, returning himself to the digital world.
"Digitization, huh?"
As he recalled how Renamon had first taken him into cyberspace, Chen Ze's internal Digital Core began reverse-decoding the process.
Pseudo-protein program deconstructed, digitization state restored, connecting to the internet port…
Whoosh!
In the next moment, Koromon's snow-white form vanished from the study.
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T/N: poor mimi...