Fifty days.
That was all that remained until the arrival of Raditz and the change from OG to Z was made. Even if the movies were Canon, that was when things hit the haywire.
Fifty-three days of training.
Fifty-three days of preparing.
And it still didn't feel like enough.
Which was why I was currently floating several hundred feet above the desolate wastelands north of Mount Paozu at nearly midnight, stress-testing another technique instead of sleeping like a normal child.
The air was freezing this far up. The wind whipped against my new gi—colored orange and blue just like Father's, but customized with distinct violet accents along the trim. The gale tugged relentlessly at my brown, furry tail wrapped securely around my waist, though my Ki kept the chill from actually touching my skin. Beneath me stretched a dead landscape of jagged stone formations, deep canyons, and barren earth.
No forests. No villages. Nothing alive for miles. Even my home.
Perfect.
Or at least, it was for the purposes I was using it for.
Over the last fifty-three days, I had pushed myself and my family to the absolute limit, mastering control and growing in power. But knowing the future meant my mind refused to let me rest easily.
I closed my eyes, taking a deep, slow breath, feeling the rhythmic, heavy thump of my heart. I had run the calculations dozens of times. I had mapped out every conceivable variable, established every possible failsafe, and memorized the exact geographical coordinates of this wasteland to ensure that if my math was wrong, the collateral damage would be strictly geological.
In exactly one hour, the full moon would rise. And I would become an Oozaru, likely losing my mind in my first transformation. I didn't think I could master it with ease.
In my mind, I reviewed the contingencies:
Contingency A: The spheres of Ki that I had fired into the surrounding sky would let go as soon as my control slipped triggering a response from a secondary layer of Ki which would shape a barrier between the moon and myself making it so that I can't absorb the Blutz Waves. In the event that my Ki Construct is either destroyed, does not work the way I hoped it would, or both.
Contingency B: If A does not work, then my other option would be that my family, sensing my own Ki raise massively would come and arrive. After all, they shouldn't be in bed yet, simply because I was still training alone. Specifically Gohan. Gohan will transform and we will fight as uncontrolled Oozaru. Then Father, after getting over his shock and the sudden realisation of what he had done would cut our tails off.
After all, the thought process for that would be easy. In the process that he couldn't figure it out or couldn't cut our tails—something that I figured was impossible considering how vulnerable it was—the final option, Contingency C was simple.
Contingency C: Gohan and I fought till morning and the transformation faded. That was all. It was the simplest in that sense, contingent entirely on B going wrong and leaving no other option.
I was planning to do this for every full moon from today onwards until I mastered Oozaru.
Given that I had one hour between now and the time the moon would appear, I might as well explain that A bit. Even if I understood it fully, it was good to go over it once more.
The mechanics of the Oozaru transformation rely on a very specific biological trigger: the absorption of Blutz Waves through the retinas. These waves are essentially a unique spectrum of light reflected by a celestial body.
To filter out a specific spectrum of light, you need a precise refractive index.
Blutz Waves, fundamentally, are just electromagnetic radiation bouncing off a celestial body. Like any wave, they have a specific frequency and wavelength. If we designate the wavelength of a Blutz Wave as λB. The simplest way to negate its effect was to create a localized field of destructive interference.
That was what the fifty-two microscopic orbs of condensed Ki suspended in the stratosphere above me were designed to do. As long as I maintained conscious control, the orbs remained dormant—tiny, compressed points of energy invisible to the naked eye. But the moment my higher cognitive functions slipped the active suppression keeping those orbs contained would vanish.
Without my mental grip, the orbs were programmed to instantly expand and interlock, forming a dome of polarized Ki over this specific canyon. The dome wouldn't stop physical matter or even visible light, but it was specifically calibrated to resonate at an inverse frequency to the earlier designation λB.
The resulting wave interference would shatter the Blutz Waves before they reached the ground, effectively cutting off the biological catalyst and forcing my body to revert.
It was an automated, fail-safe atmospheric lens. It was also highly experimental as I only had a guess as to what the reverse interference of Blutz Waves was. Which was exactly why I was currently pacing circles in the air.
I exhaled sharply, dropping into a traditional orthodox boxing stance. I couldn't just stand here; the analytical side of my brain was running too hot. I stepped off my back foot, throwing a crisp, mechanical jab-cross combination into the empty air. Snap, snap.
I shifted my weight, visualizing an opponent's guard. I slipped a phantom counter left, pivoting on my lead foot, and drove a liver hook into the void. The kinetic chain felt perfect—force generating from the ball of my foot, traveling up through my hip, and snapping out through my knuckles.
I transitioned from boxing to Muay Thai, seeking the heavy, exhausting rhythm of the eight limbs. I stepped forward, driving a teep—a penetrating push kick—into the chest of my imaginary foe, the sheer force of my unsuppressed leg carving a trench into the barren earth behind me.
I brought my leg down and instantly launched into a sequence of low, sweeping mawashi geri roundhouses.
My shins cut through the freezing air with the sound of a cracking whip. I threw an elbow, stepping into the strike to maximize skeletal displacement, followed immediately by a devastating knee strike that actually caused a localized sonic boom in the empty canyon.
My breathing was heavy, a plume of white vapor pluming from my lips with every exhalation. Sweat beaded on my forehead, freezing almost instantly in the high-altitude chill.
However, I remained like this. Simply training.
There were too many moving pieces, so I chose to do the one thing to put a stop to that. I trained. Plus, I needed to exhaust myself anyways.
A tired muscle reacts a fraction of a second slower; if I did lose control, that fraction of a second might be the difference between Dad catching me or me vaporizing a mountain range.
I checked my internal clock. Twenty-five minutes.
I looked up at the horizon. The sky was bleeding from a deep indigo into a bruised, pale purple where the earth's curve was preparing to reveal the moon.
Yet for the remainder of time. I trained. Trained until the top edge of the full moon crested the distant jagged peak. Not yet enough to trigger it but as I slowed to take a breath in and readied my own body.
Thirty seconds, my internal clock estimated. Maximum exposure imminent.
I dropped down to the canyon floor, my boots touching the cracked earth with a soft thud. I deliberately unwrapped my tail from my waist, letting it swish behind me like a heavy, furry pendulum. If Contingency B or C became reality, I needed my balance unimpeded.
I forced myself to look up, staring directly into the pale, brilliant center of the lunar disc.
The biological trigger pulled.
It didn't feel like a gradual shift. It felt like a chemical explosion behind my eyes. The Blutz Waves hit my retinas, and a massive, synthetic dump of hormones flooded my hypothalamus. My pupils dilated so violently that the silver moonlight turned into a blinding, white wash. A sharp, electric shock traveled from the base of my brainstem, down my spine, and directly into the nerve clusters of my tail.
Thump-thump.
My heart hammered against my ribs, the rhythm instantly doubling, then tripling.
Here it comes, I thought, bracing for the inevitable psychological fracture. I prepared for the cold, logical framework of my adult mind to be ripped to shreds by the feral, prehistoric bloodlust of the Saiyan race. I waited for the screaming to start in my head.
My bones began to snap.
The sound was deafening, echoing off the canyon walls like a rapid succession of small-arms fire. My muscles tore themselves apart and regenerated within microseconds, expanding outward with an impossible, rapid increase in mass. My jaw pushed forward, fracturing and re-knitting into a heavy, predatory muzzle as my teeth elongated into jagged, ivory fangs. Coarse, dark fur erupted from my skin, shredding the custom violet trim of my gi until the fabric hung in tattered rags around my rapidly broadening chest.
The air pressure in the canyon bottomed out. A volatile, swirling vortex of violet Ki exploded from my expanding frame, the sheer atmospheric displacement shattering the stone pillars around me into fine powder.
Fifty feet. Sixty feet. The transformation completed.
I held my breath, keeping my eyes squeezed shut. I waited for the instinct to smash, to roar, to destroy. I waited for the absolute loss of self.
One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.
I opened my eyes. The world was remarkably, absurdly small.
I blinked, looking down at my hands. They were massive, leathery paws tipped with thick, blunt claws, covered in coarse brown hair. I flexed my fingers, expecting a lag in my motor functions due to the sheer scale of the biological shift.
They moved perfectly. I rotated my wrists. Flawless articulation. I rolled my massive shoulders, feeling the immense, crushing weight of a ten-fold increase in physical mass, but there was no sluggishness.
I looked at a mountain ridge three miles away. I could see the individual cracks in the stone with terrifying, crystal clarity.
"What the fuck?" Was my very intelligent response to realising that all of my plans were useless. Because apparently I had control over the Oozaru form.
I sat down on the canyon floor, the massive impact sending a violent tremor through the wasteland, and crossed my enormous legs. I rested a massive claw against my chin, my analytical brain completely bypassing the awe of the moment and diving straight into diagnostic mode.
Why?
In the original history, Goku was a mindless engine of destruction. Gohan was a liability. The only Saiyans who demonstrated complete, articulate control over the Oozaru state was Vegeta, an elite Saiyan. The common consensus among fandom circles was that it required being an elite or specific training I was going to try and attempt.
But I didn't have elite blood. I was an Earth-born hybrid toddler.
My mind flashed back fifty-three days, recalling the agonizing, paralyzing torment of the tail-conditioning training. The hours spent forcing my nervous system to override the short-circuit that occurred whenever the appendage was squeezed or standard kinetic pressure was applied.
'That's why,' I realised suddenly, my massive red eyes widening slightly in the dark.
Only Saiyans with Tails could transform into the Oozaru, in that sense, it was an exposed extension of the central nervous system, wired directly into the brainstem. The Oozaru transformation used that exact same neural highway to transmit Blutz Waves from the eyes down to the tail, which acted as the biological amplifier for the mass expansion.
If a Saiyan hadn't trained their tail to withstand extreme sensory overload, the sudden, cataclysmic influx of Blutz Wave data essentially fried their higher cognitive functions. The brain, unable to process the sheer volume of biological input, suffered a massive executive short-circuit, defaulting entirely to destructive impulses of the Saiyans themselves.
But because I had systematically desensitized my tail's pain receptors and trained the weakness away… I had inadvertently bypassed the psychological barrier of the transformation.
"Fascinating," I mumbled underneath my breath. I raised my hand, calling back all of the orbs I had and dissipating the energy one by one. There wasn't a need to keep them around if I could control this form. So the energy was re-absorbed into me.
Then suddenly, a massive spike of energy registered on my internal radar. Not one, but three distinct, powerful Ki signatures were cutting through the upper atmosphere from the south at Mach speeds.
Father. Mom. And Gohan.
Of course they had felt it. I wasn't suppressing my power right now in the event of Contingency B.
Three streaks of light—orange, white, and blue—tore through the night sky, decelerating violently as they crested the canyon ridge. They hovered in the air about two hundred yards away, tiny specks against the dark sky, dwarfed by my sheer size.
Father was the first to move. He didn't just drift forward; he shot ahead of Mom and Gohan coming to an abrupt halt a hundred feet from my face, his hands raised in his classic fighting stance.
His jaw was locked, the muscles in his neck standing out like steel cables. His eyes were wide with a profound, visceral terror that he was desperately trying to convert into rage.
He was looking at me, but he wasn't seeing his daughter. His emotions as well as the mom's and Gohan's seemed to inhibit his ability to sense Ki, or maybe my Ki was different?
Still I couldn't blame him, he was seeing the monster that haunted his childhood. He was seeing the beast that had crushed the only family he had ever known.
"Stay back, Chi-Chi! Gohan, don't come any closer!" Father commanded, his voice tight, lacking any of its usual warmth. He lowered his center of gravity in mid-air, preparing to launch an assault against a creature ten times his strength.
He was going to attack me.
That made sense, honestly. He was staring at the "monster" that killed his grandfather. However, I wasn't going to let that happen.
"Father, wait!" I didn't mean to yell but my vocal cords were currently the size of tree trunks.
The words tore out of my throat like a localized hurricane. The sheer acoustic force of my voice slammed into him, actually blowing his hair back and forcing him to brace against the displaced air.
Father froze. The aggressive flare of his energy sputtered, his defensive stance faltering. He blinked, his eyes darting frantically from my massive, glowing red eyes to torn clothing beneath.
"Y-Yuzu?" he stammered, his voice cracking.
Mom flew up beside him, her eyes were equally wide with shock. "Yuzu? Is... is that you in there?"
"It is me, Mom," I rumbled, trying to pitch my voice as low and calm as I could. I carefully lowered my massive body, sinking to my knees so the impact wouldn't shake the canyon walls. "I turned into this after looking at the full moon. Also can't you just sense my energy, right?"
Father stared at me, his fists still clenched, his chest heaving. His Ki was a turbulent, vibrating mess. Even though my energy signature was unmistakably mine—just magnified ten times over—the primal, visual trigger of a giant ape was screaming at his instincts.
"The energy... it is yours," Father whispered, his voice trembling. He floated down a few feet, his eyes locked onto my massive, furry face. "Grandpa Gohan. He told me never to go outside when the moon was full. That a terrible monster came out when it was full, I thought… I thought I was just asleep when the beast killed him..
He understood instantly, in battle, but he had no time to fully stew on what he had done. Here, he did.
Dad dropped to his knees in mid-air, his hands coming up to cover his face as a ragged, agonizing sob tore from his throat.
And just like I had planned, Goku would break. This is the kind of stuff I needed for him. After all…
"Goku..." Mom whispered, her own eyes filling with tears as she wrapped her arms around him, pulling his shaking frame against her chest.
I stood there, a fifty-foot engine of destruction, feeling entirely helpless.
"Goku, look at me," Mom urged softly, her voice steady but thick with emotion.
Dad looked up at her, his face tracked with tears, his expression a portrait of profound guilt and grief. "Chi-Chi... it was me. I was the monster. I killed Grandpa. I didn't mean to, I swear I didn't, but..."
"You didn't kill him," she stated firmly, her dark eyes locking onto him. "You were a child. Your mind was overridden by some genetic mutation, a power triggered by the moon. There was no intent, Goku. That wasn't you. It was what the beast is."
This was a side of him I had never seen of both of them. Not in the show, nor in my current life. One could even say it was my curiosity that drove me to this.
Gohan landed gently next to Mom, his small face pale. He looked at me, then at Dad, entirely confused but deeply affected by the heavy grief suffocating the canyon. "Dad? Why are you crying? Is Yuzu okay?"
"I'm perfectly fine, Gohan," I rumbled softly, trying to draw their attention away from the despair. "Just now a giant monkey. I am completely in control, see?"
To prove my point, I picked up a small boulder with two fingers, spun it delicately like a basketball, and placed it back down on the earth, however the boulder cracked, which I did not want. "Okay, so getting used to my new power isn't going to be instant. Of course."
Goku took a ragged breath, leaning against Chi-Chi as he stared up at my towering form. The weeping had stopped, replaced by a profound, hollow exhaustion. "How, Yuzu? When I turned... I don't remember anything. Just waking up and everyone then lying to me about it."
Dad had realised it, Krillin, Roshi, Bulma, Yamcha all of them outside of a few had lied to him. Of course, mom had no idea until today either, nor did Tien. But still, most of his friends knew about this. They didn't tell him. That betrayal would shatter most men. Not my father.
But that wasn't close to the truth. My curiosity wasn't why I was doing this.
"I didn't mean to," Dad whispered again.
Gohan looked between them, his lower lip trembling. He didn't understand the history, but he could feel the crushing weight of Dad's grief. He stepped closer to Mom, his tiny hand reaching out to touch Dad's back.
"I know, Goku. We know."
"Dad," Gohan said softly. "It's okay. Yuzu's right here. She's not hurting anyone."
Dad slowly pulled his face away from Mom's shoulder, wiping his eyes with the back of his arm. He looked up at me, his gaze lingering on my massive muzzle, then drifted down to my tail resting quietly on the dirt.
"Your tail," Dad breathed, the realization hitting him in pieces. "You didn't lose your mind because... because we spent all that time squeezing it? Training it?"
"Yeah," I rumbled, keeping my voice as soft as my giant vocal cords allowed. "When you grabbed my tail before, it shut down my whole body. It felt like a wire short-circuiting. I think when the moon changes us, it sends that same crazy energy straight through the tail. Because we forced our bodies to get used to the pressure, the shock didn't fry my brain. I just... grew."
It was the simplest way to put it without sounding like a medical textbook. I didn't need to explain nerve pathways or biological triggers. It was just a wire that didn't break this time.
Dad stared at his own hands, then looked back at Gohan. Gohan still had his tail, too. We both did. For the last fifty-three days, I had made sure Gohan went through the exact same brutal conditioning I did. He had cried, he had thrashed in the dirt, but he had pushed through it until his tail was just as numb to the paralysis as mine.
"Gohan," Dad said, his voice dropping to a low, serious tone. "Look at the moon."
"Goku, wait," Mom said, her hand tightening on his arm.
"No, Chi-Chi, I need to see," Dad said. He wasn't ordering Gohan out of malice; he needed to understand the truth of what we were. He needed to know if his son was safe from the beast that had taken his grandfather.
Gohan looked up at Mom, who gave a hesitant, slow nod, and then he turned his eyes toward the pale white disc hanging in the night sky.
The change hit him exactly the same way it hit me. Gohan's eyes went wide, the dark irises washing into a deep, glowing red. His tiny frame shuddered as his heartbeat violently accelerated, echoing through the quiet canyon like a drumbeat. Then came the snaps—the rapid, concussive cracking of bones expanding, muscles tearing and rebuilding themselves into monstrous proportions. Coarse brown fur tore through his small gi, his jaw pushing out into a heavy, fanged muzzle.
Mom stepped back, her feet digging into the dirt, her hands instinctively coming up in a defensive guard. Dad didn't move. He just watched.
Within seconds, a second fifty-foot giant stood in the wasteland.
Gohan blinked his massive red eyes, shaking his head slightly as if waking up from a heavy nap. He looked down at his enormous hands, then looked over at me. He didn't roar. He didn't smash the canyon walls.
"Whoa," Gohan rumbled, his voice a deep, echoing boom that mirrored mine. "I'm... I'm really big."
He sat down right next to me, the impact sending a dull thud through the earth. Two giant apes, sitting cross-legged in the dirt, completely calm, just looking down at our parents.
Dad let out a long, ragged breath. The last remnants of his terror seemed to drain out of him, replaced by a profound, echoing quiet. The monster wasn't a demon. It wasn't a mindless curse meant to destroy everything he loved. It was just a part of us.
"It really was the tail," Dad whispered, looking up at both of us. "All this time..."
He stood up, his boots leaving the ground as he floated back up to our eye level. He looked exhausted, the skin around his eyes red from crying, but the turbulent storm in his Ki had finally settled into something stable.
"I need to talk to Kami," Dad said suddenly, his face hardening with a rare, quiet seriousness. "He's the one who cut my tail off and he would know the most about this power. That said, you two need to detransform."
"Pretty sure that's impossible so long as the moon is there. Unless we destroy the moon right now." I spoke on it as if it was such a trivial things, like the tides going wack wasn't an issue.
"No need to go that far, Son Yuzu." A calm, old voice echoed from a sharp ripple of energy materialising him on a flat stone just a few yards away from Mom. He wore white robes, carried a wooden staff tipped with a gnarled organic growth, and his green skin was lined with the deep, heavy wrinkles of centuries of life.
My true intent was this. Drawing his attention… was a critical aspect to my plans.
Kami of Earth. And behind him stood Mr. Popo, his dark face unreadable but his eyes wide as he took in the sight of two fully controlled Oozarus.
"Kami," Dad breathed, his voice still ragged. He didn't look up at us, his eyes glued to the dirt between his knees. "You... you came down here."
"I did, Goku," Kami said softly. He stepped off the stone platform, his sandals making no sound against the cracked earth of the wasteland. He walked right past Mom, who had lowered her hands but still looked incredibly tense, her eyes darting between the old god and her two giant, furry children. "I came down to meet these two. After all, the power of your children has caused quite a stir in the world. And to confirm your suspicions. Yes, Goku. It was you. Or rather, it was the power hidden within you. That is why I cut your tail."
Kami let out a long, heavy sound.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Dad's voice cracked, a desperate, angry edge bleeding into his tone. "Bulma, Roshi, the others... they knew, didn't they? They saw me change at the tournament. Why did everyone keep it a secret from me?!"
"Because they cared too much to hurt your feelings like that." Kami said gently, taking a step closer to him. "The truth would have hurt you. It was misguided for all of us, but for me, I had more pressing concerns than simply telling you of what you could do. Emotional turmoil can weaken the strength of your Ki and could affect your training going forwards so I elected to not tell you in order to give you the best training possible."
"It doesn't change anything," Mom said, her voice cutting through the freezing desert air like a sharpened blade. "He was just a boy. He didn't know what he was doing. And all of you left him to carry that weight alone."
"Perhaps it was an error," Kami murmured, his grip tightening on his wooden staff. "It was a heavy choice, Chi-Chi. One I do not expect you to forgive. But looking at what stands before me now... it seems the past has caught up to us in a way that defies everything I thought I knew about the universe."
He turned his old, deeply wrinkled face up toward me. Those dark, ancient eyes looked deep into my giant, glowing red ones. "Two giants with the minds of toddlers, holding back this horrifying power with nothing but a thought. Goku... when you changed, your mind was entirely gone. How are they doing this?"
"Because we fixed the tail, Kami," I rumbled out. I consciously slowed my breaths, keeping my vocal cords from vibrating too hard. "When Dad's tail got squeezed before, his whole body froze up. It was like a broken wire making the whole system short-circuit. The moonlight just shoves a giant wave of energy down that same wire all at once. Since Gohan and I spent a day pulling and squeezing our tails until they didn't hurt anymore, the wire didn't break. The energy just flowed through, and we got big. That's all it is."
"A broken wire..." Kami repeated slowly, looking up at the massive expanse of my furry chest, then over to Gohan, who was currently trying to see if he could balance a small, sharp boulder on the tip of his giant snout. "Wait, that means if Goku had transformed in that tournament he would have remained in control. Because if that's all it takes he would have had it controlled."
Father wiped his tears, realising that fact for himself right this second. If all it took was our tail being this way, then he too could control it.
"Can you turn us back now?" Gohan's deep voice boomed, interrupting my thoughts. He scratched his giant, furry ear with a single blunt claw. "I'm really itchy. And my clothes are all ripped up."
"The transformation persists as long as the lunar light feeds the biological source. However..." He raised his hand, a soft, pale mystical white light glowing at the tip of his fingers. "I can temporarily shroud this entire valley in an illusion of daytime. It will sever the connection safely, without requiring the destruction of the moon."
"Do it," Dad said. He was standing up now, his voice quiet but incredibly steady. He looked up at me and Gohan, the horror in his eyes entirely gone, replaced by a deep, protective resolve. "We need to go home."
Kami raised his wooden staff, the pale white light at his fingertips intensifying until it was almost blinding. He swept his arm in a wide, slow arc across the sky. The world didn't change, but the light did. The silver, piercing glow of the moon abruptly warped, shifting into the warm, golden hues of early afternoon sunlight.
The biological connection snapped instantly.
The massive, artificial influx of hormones vanished from my system. My bones cracked and shifted again, the violent expansion reversing itself in a rapid, agonizing compression. My vision blurred as the world rapidly expanded around me, the sheer scale of the canyon rushing back into normal perspective.
The violet Ki around me sputtered and died. I hit the dirt with a heavy thud, gasping for air as my lungs fought to remember how to process oxygen at a normal volume. My muscles ached, a deep, pervasive soreness that settled into every fiber of my being.
I pushed myself up onto my hands and knees, my custom violet-trimmed gi hanging off me in shredded, useless rags. Beside me, Gohan was already on the ground, curled into a tight ball, his tiny shoulders shaking as the residual adrenaline bled out of his system.
Mom was there in an instant. She threw a thick, wool blanket over Gohan's shivering form, lifting him into her arms with practiced ease. She looked at me, her eyes sweeping over my torn clothes and exhausted posture, before wrapping a second blanket tightly around my shoulders.
"You're okay," she whispered, pulling me close. "You're both okay."
Dad landed gently beside us. The hollow, haunted look was gone from his eyes. The quiet resolve had settled into his features, a solid, unshakeable foundation. He didn't look like a man who had just confronted his darkest demon; he looked like a father who had just realized his children were stronger than the nightmares that plagued him.
"You guys did great," Dad said softly, reaching out to gently ruffle my hair. He looked over at Kami, who was leaning heavily on his staff, the illusionary daylight already beginning to fade back into the natural indigo of the night sky. "Thank you, Kami."
Kami nodded slowly, his ancient eyes still unreadable. "It was the least I could do, Goku. You have raised extraordinary children. To master such a volatile power at their age... it speaks volumes of their potential, and your guidance."
He turned slightly, his gaze lingering on me. "But remember this, young ones. Power is a tool, not a solution. The beast within you is tamed, but it is not gone. Do not rely on it lightly."
"We won't," I replied, my voice steady despite the bone-deep ache radiating through my limbs. I pulled the blanket tighter around myself, meeting the Guardian's gaze without flinching. "It's just another option on the table. We needed to know we could use it if things went wrong."
Kami's expression remained impassive, but a flicker of something—perhaps understanding, perhaps wariness—passed through his eyes. He tapped his staff against the stone.
"Mr. Popo," Kami said, his voice quiet.
"Yes, Kami," the djinn replied, stepping forward.
"We are returning to the Lookout. There is much to consider." He looked back at Dad one last time. "You have broken the chains of your past tonight, Goku. Do not let them bind you again."
With a sharp ripple of energy, Kami and Mr. Popo vanished, leaving the five of us alone in the freezing, silent wasteland.
The illusionary daylight faded completely, and the harsh, silver light of the full moon returned. But it didn't matter anymore. The trigger had been pulled, the weapon tested, and the fear conquered.
"Let's go home," Mom said, her voice firm. She adjusted her grip on Gohan, who was already fast asleep against her shoulder. "I'm making hot chocolate. And nobody is training tomorrow. That's an order."
"Yes, ma'am," Dad chuckled softly, though the exhaustion was clear in his voice.
I felt my lips twitch into a smile and moved. "Come on, then. Race you 3 there."
And like that, I took off like a speeding rocket in the starry twilight sky.
Phase 1: Success.
(A/N: And that is a wrap. Try and figure out what stage of Plan ZA this is . And why it required phases. Why did Yuzu choose to master Oozaru this early or attempt to try? Ah and my method of doing it? I just think it's the easiest way to write Oozaru mastery since no one really knows how, plus if the tail is such a major weak point and is key to the form… the tail has to have something to do with mastery over Oozaru).