Japanese Title: The Last Armor Evolution
XV-mon’s attacks don’t lay a scratch on BelialVamdemon, but Daisuke insists on pressing on, absolutely certain that they’ll win. XV-mon suddenly finds himself gaining a burst of power and manages to knock BelialVamdemon down. Before XV-mon can continue, however, BelialVamdemon has one more trick up his sleeve, and releases an attack that causes all of the Chosen Children to fall into illusions based off of their deepest desires.
In Takeru’s dream, Takeru returns to his house only to find his mother, father, and Yamato waiting at the table so that they can eat together as a family. Patamon appears to him, however, and asks if he’s all right with this, and the images of Takeru’s family around him begin to fade. Takeru realizes that it was all an illusion, and Daisuke appears in front of him to pull him back to reality.
Miyako’s dream has her with a table full of cakes in front of her, which are made just for her and for her only. Hawkmon appears to her and asks her if she’s truly enjoying herself by eating alone, and Miyako realizes that although sometimes she wants to be alone from dealing with her three siblings, she doesn’t want to be alone forever. She tells Hawkmon that he knows her so well and asks him to tell her more about himself, but the conversation is interrupted by XV-mon, who’s come to get them.
Iori’s dream involves him able to take a walk through the Digital World with his father and show him around. As he and his father look over a cliffside, Armadimon appears to Iori and tells him that this whole situation is wrong. Iori’s father walks off the cliffside, causing Iori to lose grip on his hand, and disappears. Iori, realizing what’s going on, sadly bids goodbye to his father and decides to introduce Armadimon to his mother when he returns home. They’re shortly after retrieved by Fladramon, who appears in front of them.
Hikari sees a world in which every child gets to have a Digimon partner, and in the dream she tells a boy that his Nyaromon will evolve if he treats it well. However, as Hikari takes in the peaceful sight of children playing with their Digimon, Tailmon tells her to look closely as the image dissolves around her, and Hikari realizes to her dismay that none of it is real. Lighdramon comes to retrieve her, and Tailmon tells Hikari that if they want this dream to become a reality, they have to defeat BelialVamdemon first.
Ken’s dream has him walking through a sandstorm in the Digital World before he comes across himself, as the Digimon Kaiser, tied to a stake in the ground. The Kaiser is surrounded by the Digimon that he had tortured and killed, who yell at him for having caused so much pain and humiliation to them and beat him to death as a stunned Ken watches in silence. Finally, the images of the Digimon and the Kaiser disappear and Ken’s late brother Osamu appears in front of him, saying that he’s finally paid for his sins. Ken gets on his knees, happy that it’s all over, but then Wormmon appears and tells Ken that he shouldn’t be stuck in the past when there are things he has to do now. Ken realizes that he still has to help the children that were implanted with the Dark Seeds and defeat BelialVamdemon instead of standing there in regret of what he’s done as the Kaiser.
The other Chosen Children, accompanied by Daisuke, come to retrieve him, encouraging him and telling him that he’s worked his hardest up until then, that even if they can’t change the past, they can change the future, and that they’ll fight together as partners to defeat BelialVamdemon. With the Chosen Children’s will to fight restored, the illusion breaks up completely, revealing BelialVamdemon in front of them.
Daisuke continues to fight, and the other Chosen notice that he’s somehow fighting with all of V-mon’s evolutions simultaneously. Daisuke says that somehow they managed to appear all at once when Daisuke thought hard enough about wanting to defeat BelialVamdemon. The kids, realizing that the world they’re in turns emotions into power, declare their ambition to fight, which causes all of their Digimon to split into all of their possible evolutions, and the kids follow up by having all of their Adult-level Digimon Jogress evolve into their respective forms, while Paildramon Ultimate evolves and mode changes to Imperialdramon Fighter Mode.
The kids realize that they wouldn’t have been able to make their emotions into such power if it hadn’t been for Daisuke’s blind faith that they would succeed, and BelialVamdemon demands to know why his illusions didn’t work on Daisuke. Daisuke reveals that he has no true dissatisfaction or worries in his life right now and is perfectly happy with his friends and family, and his only desire is to defeat BelialVamdemon for having used the power of darkness to corrupt everyone else’s troubles in life.
BelialVamdemon flees into the Digital World and the kids chase after him, causing all of the split evolutions to return to just the three Jogress Digimon. Now that he’s back in the Digital World, BelialVamdemon is able to accumulate the darkness around him to his will and makes himself larger. BelialVamdemon is easily able to knock down the kids’ Digimon without a second thought and begins to create a dark hole in the Digital World that leads to the Real World’s Earth. He then begins to channel darkness into the Real World, hoping to unify the two into a world of darkness so that he can rule it as its king.
Tropes:
- Cliffhanger: The episode ends with BelialVamdemon beginning his plan to engulf both the Digital World and Earth in his darkness.
- Death Seeker: One of the very, very many interpretations of what Ken saw in the Lotus-Eater Machine.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: The Kaiser, tied to a Dark Tower and being crucified, with the dialogue about "atoning for sins." Uh-huh.
- Foreshadowing: When MaloMyotismon first casts his illusion and the kids are surrounded by the bright light one by one, Davis is the only one whose eyes don't glow white.
- Living Prop: What Holy Angemon's appearance amounts to. He's the only one who does not attack BelialVamdemon, and is essentially present only to show off the gimmick of evolving into all forms at once.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The Chosen end up blasting BelialVamdemon out of the mental world and through the barrier into the Digital World, where he is able to begin his plan to seize both the Digital and Real worlds.
- No-Sell:
- With his crush on Hikari, interest in soccer and as revealed next episode, plan to develop a noodle cart business, Daisuke is still able to overcome BelialVamdemon's illusions.
- Could still work if you believe the illusion would only work on someone's greatest desire, given that that would be defeating him.
- Shout-Out: The dub title is a reference to The Last Temptation of Christ.
- Stock Footage: About an eighth of the episode is comprised of nothing but stock footage as the kids’ Digimon evolve into all of their forms.
- When Dimensions Collide: BelialVamdemon's master plan, with him spreading a veil of darkness over both the Digital World and Earth, intending to unify them and allowing him to rule over both humans and Digimon. As Takeru and Hikari note, this is the same goal he had when they fought him three years ago.
