Data reserves

"Damn it, how are Tai and the others drifting so fast?"

Zhou Zhu swam with every ounce of strength he had, but even with a physique on par with a Rookie Digimon, he still couldn't keep up with the speed at which Tai and the others were drifting!

This won't work. Candlemon is still over there. At this rate, I'll be stranded alone! As Zhou Zhu felt the distance between them growing rather than shrinking, his heart sank.

His body was merely on par with a Rookie Digimon's. He didn't actually possess any of their special attacks. If he ended up alone, the consequences were unthinkable...

"Tai, Zhou Zhu needs me!"

Meanwhile, the Candlemon clone hurriedly said a few words to Tai, then jumped into the water.

Under the circumstances, since his original body couldn't catch up, he had no choice but to leave Tai behind.

After all, Tai not only had plot armor, but also had Agumon to protect him. His original body, on the other hand, had nothing.

"Huh? Candlemon!!!"

Still caught up in his grief over Leomon, Tai watched Candlemon drift away. Even if he wanted to reach out and haul him back aboard, it was already too late.

Oh, crap! I forgot Candlemon is afraid of water, and his body isn't suited to swimming, either! No, I have to swim faster. Sensing Candlemon's condition, Zhou Zhu picked up speed again.

By the time Zhou Zhu reached Candlemon, Candlemon had already choked on several mouthfuls of water.

And that was despite Zhou Zhu drawing on his own swimming experience to barely keep Candlemon afloat on his back.

The main section of File Island!

"Huff... huff!"

He had finally made it ashore!

Since this main section of the island was the only land left nearby, Zhou Zhu had no choice but to swim back with Candlemon.

Fortunately, this main island was large, so he didn't have to worry about Devimon finding him anytime soon. At worst, he could keep a low profile and lie low until Tai and the others returned.

Bzzzt...

Just as Zhou Zhu lay down to rest for a while, Candlemon's body beside him began radiating dazzling light.

"What's this? Is he about to digivolve? Because of the data he absorbed earlier?" Seeing Candlemon's condition, Zhou Zhu hurriedly steadied his mind and sensed what was happening inside him.

Candlemon... digivolve!

&... (BGM: Brave Heart)

Wizardmon!

(Profile):

Wizardmon is an advanced demon-man Digimon who came from the Another-Dimensional Digital World. Aspiring to become a Great Wizard, he appeared in the Digital World to train. His special attack summons "Thunder Cloud" to unleash a powerful lightning strike.

As the light faded, a Digimon dressed like a child appeared before Zhou Zhu!

Through his perception of the evolution just now, Zhou Zhu discovered that Candlemon had as many as eight evolution branches.

One of those routes could even ultimately lead to Piedmon.

But that wasn't the most important part. Compared with two of the other evolution routes, Piedmon wasn't all that impressive.

After all, there were Wizardmon's final evolved form, Dunamons, and BurningGreymon's final evolved form, Gankoomon, to compare him with.

Not only did Piedmon's appearance fail to meet his aesthetic standards, but his strength was also a tier lower.

What an unexpected windfall. He hadn't imagined that a background Digimon like Candlemon could have evolution routes connected to two of the thirteen Royal Knights.

Sensing the large amount of data still remaining inside Wizardmon, Zhou Zhu knew that Champion wasn't his endpoint. The only reason he hadn't digivolved again right away was that he needed time to fully absorb the data inside him and make it part of himself.

Presumably, Leomon in the original story had been in the same situation.

Looking at it this way, though, the events in the original story made sense.

The reason Agumon hadn't remained in his Greymon or WarGreymon form all the time wasn't that his own strength was insufficient.

Rather, all that data was stored in Tai's Digivice. Agumon and the others only borrowed it temporarily, without actually absorbing it and making it their own.

Leomon and Candlemon, however, were different. They weren't bound to Tai's Digivice, so naturally, the data they absorbed couldn't be taken back.

In truth, the enormous amount of data absorbed this time had been a huge help. Otherwise, with Zhou Zhu's knowledge of Digimon, he wouldn't have known which route Candlemon should take next.

At most, through the current evolution, he could see the various Champion branches available to him. As for which Perfect forms those branches would eventually lead to, Zhou Zhu had no idea.

But with enough data to reach Ultimate as a reserve, the instant Candlemon digivolved into Wizardmon, Zhou Zhu sensed that every subsequent branch had lit up.

All that remained was to wait for Wizardmon to fully digest the data inside him.

Based on the percentages, Zhou Zhu had made a rough numerical estimate of the data reserves within him.

Judging by the current evolution progress, the minimum data threshold for digivolving into the Rookie Candlemon was one thousand, while the minimum threshold for the Champion Wizardmon was five thousand. Above that, the threshold for the Perfect Wisemon was ten thousand, and finally, digivolving into the Ultimate Dunamons required a data volume of one hundred thousand!

By that comparison, an ordinary Perfect Digimon's minimum baseline was ten thousand data points. If an ordinary Champion Digimon reached ten thousand data points without encountering a bottleneck, they could digivolve into a Perfect Digimon.

And judging by the subsequent progress bar, the range extended from ten thousand all the way to one hundred thousand data points before reaching another dividing line. So that's how it works. Is this the reason for the gap between Myotismon and MetalGreymon or WereGarurumon...?

Even if they were all Perfect, pitting ten thousand points against ninety thousand was practically serving yourself up on a platter.

There was also that Piximon in the original story. Despite his small size, his data reserves must have been infinitely close to one hundred thousand points. Otherwise, he couldn't possibly have helped the whole protagonist group escape while facing the Dark Four Dark Masters.

Still, Piximon wasn't an Ultimate yet. Digivolving into an Ultimate required at least one hundred thousand data points.

With such an enormous gap, no wonder Perfect Digimon were utterly helpless before Ultimates. (Gold Sukamon didn't count!)

Fortunately, he had already gathered enough data this time for Wizardmon to digivolve into an Ultimate.

Wizardmon alone had over sixty thousand data points inside him, and with the nearly seventy thousand inside Zhou Zhu himself, there was more than enough for Wizardmon to reach Ultimate.

Presumably, Leomon also had close to seventy thousand data points inside him by now? Still, that wasn't enough for his later evolution into Gold SwordLeomon. What truly gave him enough data to reach Ultimate was probably the later scene in which Tai and Matt joined forces to purify him with their Digivices.