November 3rd arrived without fanfare, bringing a cold, brittle edge to the morning sky above East City.
High in the upper atmosphere, two spherical pods tore through the clouds, encased in roaring sheaths of superheated atmospheric friction. Below them, the sprawling metropolis buzzed with the mundane routine of millions. Yet all of it was ruined as 2 pods barreled straight downwards.
The pods slammed into the concrete building destroying it completely as they landed. The shockwave shattered thousands of glass windows across a five-block radius, buckling asphalt and sending up a towering plume of smoke and pulverized stone from the impact of the landing. Screams erupted instantly. Pedestrians scattered in blind panic, diving behind vehicles and storefronts as the dust slowly began to clear.
A deep crater had been formed, some pedestrians gathered around the crater, watching the pods with interest. Inside the deep crater, the metal hatches hissed, unsealing with a heavy mechanical pop.
Nappa stepped out first, stretching his massive arms until his shoulders popped with the sound of snapping timber. He inhaled deeply, tasting the smog and ocean air, a cruel, predatory sneer spreading across his face.
"Aaah, smells like a prime target," Nappa rumbled, his voice echoing out of the crater. He raised his right hand, two fingers extended, his palm glowing with a sudden, violent flicker of crimson energy. "How about a little firework show to announce our arrival, Vegeta? Wipe this bug-hive off the map before we go find Kakarot?"
"Hold your fire, Nappa," a cold, authoritative voice cut through the air.
Vegeta stepped out of his pod, unfastening his white shoulder guards with measured, deliberate movements. He adjusted the glass lens of the red scouter over his left eye, tapping the side casing. The screen flickered to life, scrolling through streams of alien text and telemetry.
"Did you forget why we traveled across the galaxy for eleven months?" Vegeta asked, his dark eyes sweeping over the surrounding skyscrapers without a trace of interest. "We are not here to eradicate collateral property. Read the long-range telemetry."
Nappa grunted, tapping his own scouter. The device emitted a rapid sequence of high-pitched beeps, locking onto regional coordinates thousands of miles to the west.
"They're... they're still there," Nappa muttered, his bald head glinting in the morning sun as his brow furrowed. "Four massive heat signatures sitting right next to each other in a mountain range. But Vegeta... the baseline numbers on these scouters..."
"We verified the data before we left the colony world. Raditz was a weakling, but his scouter didn't lie. Those four signatures spiked over five thousand nearly a year ago. If you start vaporizing cities now, you risk destroying potential negotiations before we even start them, losing out on the training methodology Kakarot used to cultivate that strength. Moreover, we don't know if these pathetic worms helped in their training as unlikely as that is." Vegeta interrupted, his tone sharp as a razor.
Vegeta tapped his scouter once more, locking onto the strongest Power Level, reading at 600 currently.
"We fly directly to Kakarot," Vegeta ordered, rising smoothly off the ground into a dark aura of white-hot Ki. "Keep your power suppressed. We don't want them scattering before we present our terms."
Nappa sneered, though a drop of sweat broke out near his temple as he looked at the numbers scrolling across his lens. "Fine. But if the low-class trash tries to get cute, I get to break his legs."
"Do as you like to Kakarot," Vegeta replied, shooting into the sky like a bullet, leaving a sonic boom in his wake. "Just ensure his offspring remain intact."
Three hundred miles to the north, perched atop a frozen, jagged glacier in Deadman's Arctic, Piccolo's eyes snapped open.
He stood up so fast his white cape whipped against the howling gale like a cracking whip. He didn't need a scouter. His Ki sensing—honed through months of agonizing, spite-fueled solitude—picked up the two incoming anomalies the moment they pierced the planet's magnetic field.
"They're here," Piccolo rasped, his fangs grinding together.
He closed his eyes, extending his consciousness across the globe to track their trajectory. The sheer, heavy density of the two alien signatures was suffocating. One hovered at an immense, crushing baseline—far higher than Raditz ever dreamed of achieving. The other was slightly lower, but still heavy enough to flatten a standard army.
Piccolo's heart hammered against his ribs. He felt a familiar, bitter pang of fear, but as he tracked their flight path, his green brow furrowed in confusion.
They weren't stopping. They weren't attacking the major population centers. They were moving in a straight, uncompromising line toward the southern continent.
"They're heading straight for Son..." Piccolo whispered.
A dark, dangerous curiosity warred with his survival instincts. He knew, with absolute mathematical certainty, that if either of those two aliens spotted him, he would be erased. He was sitting at a power level of seven thousand five hundred—a massive leap from where he had been a year ago, achieved through sheer, agonizing self-mutilation and mental discipline—but against the cosmic freaks gathering in Paozu, he was still an outsider looking in.
"I need to see this," Piccolo hissed through his teeth.
Suppressing his Ki down to a microscopic ember—hiding his life force beneath the ambient noise of the snowstorm—Piccolo launched himself off the glacier, trailing the two aliens from thousands of yards behind, staying low to the terrain.
The morning air over Mount Paozu was calm, broken only by the gentle rustle of pine needles and the distant, rhythmic hum of a waterfall.
Outside the Son household, the clearing had been swept clean.
Four figures stood in a relaxed formation on the dirt yard.
Goku stood at the front, his arms crossed over his chest, wearing his familiar orange turtle-school gi with the dark blue undershirt. To his left stood Chi-Chi. Her gi was a customized, deep-crimson variation of the Turtle School design, fitted with flexible black vambraces over her forearms and a high dark sash tied tightly at her waist.
Beside Goku stood Gohan and Yuzu. Both children wore identical, perfectly tailored mini-gis matching their father's orange and blue colors. Gohan was shifting his weight slightly, looking up at the sky with steady, calm focus. Yuzu stood completely still, her hands resting at her sides, her eyes cool and assessing as she watched two dark specks break through the cloud cover directly above the mountain.
The sky tore open with a sharp double-sonic shockwave as Vegeta and Nappa descended, hovering twenty feet above the dirt yard before dropping smoothly to the earth.
Dust swirled around their boots. Nappa immédiatement raised his hand to his scouter, his eyes widening as the red lens began to blink frantically, displaying a series of low, unassuming numbers.
"What the...?" Nappa blinked, tapping the side of his helmet. "Vegeta, look at this. The scouter is reading them at barely six hundred each! Even the kids!"
"Quiet, you idiot," Vegeta snapped, though his own scouter was displaying the same suppressed readings. His dark eyes swept over the four figures standing before him, lingering on the calm, unbothered expressions on their faces. "They can suppress their power levels at will, remember the readings from Raditz's Scouter."
His dark, sharp eyes locked straight onto Goku, entirely bypassing the two children and Chi-Chi as if they were nothing more than decorative scenery.
"Kakarot," Vegeta spoke, his voice surprisingly smooth, yet carrying a jagged, dangerous edge that seemed to cut right through the crisp mountain breeze. "I am Vegeta, Prince of all Saiyans. And the mountain of muscle standing behind me is Nappa, an elite commander of our imperial vanguard."
Vegeta's gaze drifted from Kakarot's easy, grounded stance down to the two four-year-old children standing at his flanks. Both of them possessed tails wrapped neatly around their waists like furry belts. The girl—Yuzu, if the scouter logs from Raditz's transmission were accurate—was staring directly into his eyes with an icy, analytical calm that unnerved him more than he cared to admit.
"So," Vegeta began, his deep, resonant voice cutting through the quiet mountain air like a drawbridge falling into place. He folded his arms across his chest armor, smirking down his nose at Goku. "You must be Kakarot. You look remarkably like your father, right down to the ridiculous hair. Though I see you've traded your Saiyan heritage for the garish rags of this primitive backwater."
"My name is Goku," he replied, his tone even and relaxed. "And this is my home. You two flew a pretty long way just to land in our front yard."
Vegeta sneered, taking a slow step forward. The gravel crunched beneath his armored boots. "I have no interest in mundane pleasantries, Kakarot. We monitored the planetary transmission from Raditz's scouter before his signature went dark. We know he was killed here. We also know that you and your bloodline possess a latent combat efficiency far exceeding the pathetic baseline of a low-class soldier."
Nappa stepped up beside his prince, his massive frame casting a looming shadow over the clearing. His hand hovered near the scouter on his temple, his thick brow furrowed as he glared at Chi-Chi and the children. "Look at them, Vegeta. They aren't even wearing battle armor. They look like a family of mountain farmers."
"Shut up, Nappa," Vegeta snapped, never taking his eyes off Goku. He tilted his chin upward, addressing the entire family with a cold, regal air. "I am Vegeta, Prince of all Saiyans. What you see before you is the total surviving authority of our race. I did not come to this backwater to avenge Raditz—he was a fool who allowed himself to be slaughtered by low-level scum. I came for the potential of your bloodline."
Vegeta gestured broadly with a gloved hand toward the surrounding forest. "Our species is on the brink of extinction, working under the thumb of an absolute tyrant who views us as nothing more than disposable hounds. With your strength combined with mine, we can establish a vanguard. A force capable of reshaping the hierarchy of the galaxy. You will join us, Kakarot. You, your woman, and these offspring will serve as the heavy vanguard under my royal command."
Chi-Chi's eyes narrowed into sharp, dangerous slits. She took a single step forward, placing herself slightly in front of Gohan and Yuzu. Her customized crimson gi shifted with the fluid grace of a coiled predator.
"Let me get this straight," Chi-Chi spoke, her voice dropping into an icy, unyielding register that made Nappa's brow twitch. "You land on our planet, break into our yard, and start making demands like you own the place? You talk about hierarchy and vanguard as if my family is some kind of livestock for your little space army."
Vegeta's expression darkened. "Watch your tongue, woman. You are speaking to the sovereign ruler of your bloodline. A low-class female has no standing to speak in matters of war."
"I don't care if you're the Prince of the Moon," Chi-Chi shot back. "You come onto my land, talking down to my husband and eyeing my children like tools for your violence, and you expect us to bow? You've got a lot of nerve for a little man in plastic armor."
Nappa's jaw dropped in sheer disbelief, his face flushing a furious crimson. "Why you arrogant little bitch—!"
"Nappa!" Vegeta barked, though his own jaw was tight with rising irritation. He looked past Chi-Chi, locking eyes directly with Goku. "Is this how you run your household, Kakarot? You let a low-born woman make decisions for warriors? Speak up. Give me your answer."
Goku uncrossed his arms, letting them hang loosely at his sides. He looked at Vegeta, then at Nappa, his expression devoid of anger, replaced instead by a profound, disappointed calm.
"I don't conquer planets," Goku said plainly. "I don't kill people, and I definitely don't take orders from someone who thinks strength gives them the right to push others around. I don't know who this tyrant you're running from is, but if you came here expecting slaves, you made a very long trip for nothing. You should turn around and leave Earth while you still can."
A heavy, suffocating silence settled over the Mount Paozu clearing.
500 metres to the south, concealed within a brush, Piccolo crouched with his breath held tight. He had completely erased his Ki signature, suppressing his life force to absolute zero. His Namekian hearing, however, caught every single word exchanged in the yard.
'They aren't even flinching,' Piccolo thought, a cold bead of sweat running down his green temple. 'The big one's baseline energy is heavy, but the small one... his quiet pressure is absurd. And Goku's family is standing there treating them like trespassers on a farm.'
Back in the yard, Vegeta's smirk completely vanished, replaced by a cold, murderous disgust.
"You reject your heritage?" Vegeta whispered, the air around his boots beginning to ripple with a dark, suffocating pressure. "You choose to play farmer on a dirt rock instead of standing beside the royal bloodline?"
"We choose our own lives," Yuzu chimed in, her voice breaking her silence for the first time. "Your concept of royalty is an obsolete social construct built on physical tyranny. You have no leverage here, however."
Nappa roared in pure, unbridled fury, unable to contain his rage any longer. "That is IT! I'm going to rip the tongue right out of that mouthy brat!"
Nappa didn't ask for permission. He launched himself off the dirt with explosive violence, the ground beneath his boots shattering as he tore across the clearing. His massive right fist cocked back, surging with a dense, crackling aura of yellow Ki aimed straight for Yuzu's head.
"Die, you little freak!" Nappa bellowed.
Yuzu didn't even blink. She didn't move a single muscle.
Before Nappa could cover half the distance, a crimson blur intercepted his trajectory with terrifying, silent velocity.
Chi-Chi appeared directly inside Nappa's guard. Her movement was so blazingly fast that the giant Saiyan's scouter didn't even register a spike until her palm was already pressed firmly against his solar plexus.
"Don't you dare lay a hand on my daughter," Chi-Chi said softly.
Thump.
A localized shockwave exploded out of Nappa's back, tearing through his cape and shattering his shoulder pauldrons to dust. The raw kinetic impact bypassed his thick armor entirely, striking deep into his internal organs. Nappa's eyes bulged out of his head, the air driven completely from his lungs in a sickening gasp of pure agony.
Before he could recoil, Chi-Chi pivoted on her heel, her movement a masterclass in weight distribution. She caught his extended right arm beneath her shoulder, leveraged his momentum, and drove a vicious, rising elbow directly into his elbow joint.
CRACK.
Nappa let out a blood-curdling scream as his arm bent backward at a grotesque, unnatural angle. But Chi-Chi wasn't finished. Continuing the fluid rotation of her customized Turtle Style, she snapped a low, sweeping kick around, her boot lacing through the air with a razor-sharp wave of compressed Ki.
FLASH.
A thin line of crimson sprayed into the air as Nappa's brown, furry tail was cleanly severed from his lower back.
The giant Saiyan collapsed onto the dirt like a felled oak, clutching his shattered arm and his bleeding lower spine, thrashing in the dust, completely dismantled in less than three seconds.
Vegeta stood frozen, his dark eyes wide, his hands clenched into tight fists at his sides. His mind struggled to process the sheer absurdity of what had just occurred. Nappa—a elite veteran who had conquered dozens of worlds—had been broken and dismembered by a human woman using zero telegraphed energy blasts.
Chi-Chi casually stepped back, wiping a speck of dust from her forearm, her breathing completely unhurried. "Goku, pick up that trash and throw it out of our yard."
"Sure thing, Chi-Chi," Goku said, strolling over to the groaning Nappa, grabbing the giant by his unbroken ankle, and casually dragging him across the dirt like a sack of discarded potatoes.
"I could have handled it, Mom." Yuzu was completely unbothered by everything.
Vegeta slowly reached up, his gloved hand trembling slightly as he pressed the manual recalibration switch on his scouter. "N-No... this is impossible. The scouter's internal dampeners must be malfunctioning."
He pointed the lens directly at Chi-Chi, then at Goku, then at Gohan, and finally at Yuzu.
BEEP-BEEP-BEEP-BEEP!
The red glass flickered rapidly, the numbers scrolling at a dizzying speed before locking into place.
TARGET 1 (FEMALE): 9,000
TARGET 2 (MALE): 9,000
TARGET 3 (CHILD 1): 9,000
TARGET 4 (CHILD 2): 9,000
"Nine thousand?!" Vegeta hissed, his teeth gritting so hard a vein bulged on his forehead. 'Every single one of them is sitting at a suppressed baseline of eight thousand?! They're synchronizing their energy to fool the sensors! We knew they could hide their power level but to make a complete mockery by deliberately syncing..'
He glared at the four of them, his aura beginning to flare with a dark, terrifying purple light that sent shockwaves vibrating through the bedrock of Mount Paozu.
"Stop holding back, you cowards!" Vegeta roared, his voice echoing across the heavens. "Show me your true strength! Show me what low-class trash thinks gives them the right to stand above the Prince of all Saiyans!"
Goku looked at Yuzu and nodded softly. "Alright. If he wants to see it, let's give him a clear look."
Without dropping into a stance, without screaming, and without a single wasted movement, the Son family released their suppression.
The atmospheric pressure across the entire continent plummeted instantly.
The sky above Mount Paozu darkened as if an eclipse had passed over the sun. The air turned heavy, thick, and suffocating. Rocks floated into the sky around them but strangely the ground remained perfectly fine.
Piccolo was nearly knocked out of his tree by the sheer, overwhelming gravitational weight of their released power. He clamped his hands over his ears, his teeth chattering as he stared at the southern horizon in utter terror.
'They've... they've gotten even stronger!' Piccolo screamed internally. It's absurd! It's utterly absurd! Son Goku, just how much more are you going to surpass me by? And that daughter of yours is still stronger... Why? Why am I...'
In the clearing, Vegeta's breath caught in his throat. His knees actually buckled a fraction of an inch before his pride forced his spine straight. The invisible pressure pressing down on his shoulders was immense and crushing. His scouter beeped with the new numbers.
Chi-Chi's power locked at 14,800.
Goku's power swelled to 15,500.
Gohan's power burned bright at 16,100.
And Yuzu...
Yuzu stepped forward, locking her baseline at a staggering 16,800.
The difference of numbers was barely a factor but Vegeta was well aware of his own strength, his own level of power. He checked it every time he recovered from battle. Every time he got somewhat stronger. Two people here were stronger than, barely stronger, but the difference existed.
"A female child..." Vegeta rasped, his voice trembling with a mixture of sheer disbelief and toxic, suffocating rage. His gloved hands clenched into tight, leather-popping fists. "Low-class garbage... playing tricks with energy numbers!"
"No tricks," Yuzu said plainly, her voice carrying no arrogance, no malice, and no pride. She simply stood in a neutral stance, her hands resting loosely at her sides. "You asked us not to hold back. This is my baseline."
"Baseline?!" Vegeta screamed, his composure completely snapping.
A violent, jagged purple aura erupted from his body, the pressure tearing a three-foot trench into the dirt around his boots. He dropped into a sharp, low fighting stance, his right arm pulled back, his eyes burning with a murderous, elite pride.
"I am the Prince of all Saiyans!" Vegeta roared, launching himself forward like a railgun projectile. "I will show you the difference between a true warrior and a spoiled brat!"
"Chi-Chi, wait," Goku said softly, his palm catching his wife's shoulder just as her boots left the earth.
Chi-Chi's customized crimson gi swished as she landed, her eyes burning with maternal fury. "Goku, she's five! I don't care if he's a prince or a pauper, no adult is laying a hand on—"
"Look at her, Chi-Chi," Goku interrupted gently, a warm, absolute confidence in his eyes. "Yuzu's got this. From what I can see, she wants to test herself fully."
Vegeta didn't listen to their domestic banter. He was a streak of blinding, violet kinetic force, tearing through the atmosphere at hypersonic speed. He closed the distance in a fraction of a millisecond, leveraging his taller frame and sheer physical weight to drive a devastating, heavy right hook straight at Yuzu's face.
BOOM!
The ground beneath Vegeta's right boot pulverized into fine powder as his hook carved through empty space.
Because Yuzu was significantly shorter—standing at barely three-foot-ten compared to Vegeta's five-foot-four frame—her lower center of gravity allowed her to drop underneath his broad strike effortlessly slipping inside his shoulder arc. Her small frame vanished beneath his sightline.
'Fast!' Vegeta's internal alarm flared, his battle instincts developed over two decades of galactic conquest instantly kicking in.
Before his extended right arm could even fully lock out, Yuzu pushed off the dirt with her toes, launching herself into a steep, rising aerial spin, she inverted her body directly above him. Her small boot snapped down toward his collarbone in an uncompromising, sharp heel-drop.
Vegeta reacted with brutal elite instincts. He snapped his left forearm upward to intercept the strike.
CRACK!
The impact echoed across the mountain valley like a cannon shot. The shockwave stripped the bark off the nearest pine trees and left a three-foot crater under Vegeta's boots, but his arm held. He snarled, using his superior arm reach and raw physical weight to drive a heavy, mid-air left knee straight into her exposed ribs.
Yuzu didn't attempt to block the long reach with her arms. Floating in mid-air, she used her shorter profile to arch her back, letting his knee graze her orange gi before she snapped her body around into a fluid back-kick. Her boot struck Vegeta square in the center of his chest armor.
THWACK!
Vegeta was driven backward fifty feet, his boots carving deep, smoking trenches through the soil before he dug his heels in to stop his momentum.
He wiped a thin line of sweat from his forehead, his dark eyes burning with manic disbelief. The numbers on his scouter hadn't lied. Her power level was slightly higher than his, but her execution was far worse than pure numbers—it was a chaotic, shifting tapestry of styles he had never encountered across a hundred conquered worlds.
"What is this nonsense?!" Vegeta barked, launching himself back into the air. "A shifting, erratic stance? You lack the disciplined form of a true conqueror, child!"
He closed the gap in a fraction of a microsecond, utilizing his greater height and limb length to keep her at absolute bay. He unleashed a ferocious, rapid-fire sequence of orthodox elite Saiyan striking—heavy, devastating jabs coupled with low, sweeping kicks designed to keep her shorter limbs from finding purchase.
Vegeta's longer reach forced Yuzu onto the defensive in mid-air. Her smaller arms couldn't comfortably reach his head or torso without putting herself inside his primary strike zone.
'Height advantage gives him superior range control,' Yuzu evaluated coolly, her mind processing the spatial vectors while her hands parried his incoming jabs and kicks with sharp, precise centerline deflections. 'He's using his leverage to keep me on the perimeter.'
Vegeta saw her retreating in the air and grinned savagely. He feinted a high right cross, drawing her guard up, then dipped his hips to drive a devastating, long-range side kick straight at her abdomen.
It was a textbook execution of range management. But Yuzu didn't try to back away.
Yuzu—adopting Bruce Lee's foundational principle of the intercepting fist—she stepped directly into the line of fire, utilizing her smaller profile to duck under the trajectory of his leg. She closed the distance before his kick could reach maximum extension, placing herself inches from his torso where his superior reach was useless.
Before Vegeta could retract his leg, Yuzu's hands moved as a blinding blur.
PATA-PATA-PATA-PATA!
A series of devastating, zero-inch chain punches and short-range elbow strikes slammed directly into Vegeta's ribs, sternum, and solar plexus. Each strike carried zero telegraphed motion, exploding off his chest armor with terrifying kinetic frequency.
"Gah—!" Vegeta choked out, his lungs burning as he swung a desperate, wide-arc backfist to clear her out of his personal space.
Yuzu didn't just dodge the wide swing—she rode the air pressure of his arm, flipping backward over his head and landing lightly on her feet behind him.
Vegeta spun around, panting heavily, his white chest armor cracked and spider-webbed from the relentless barrage of micro-impacts. His pride was bleeding far worse than his body. He was the Prince of all Saiyans, being systematically out-fought, out-maneuvered, and short-ranged by a five-year-old child using a style that fluidly mutated every single second.
"Enough..." Vegeta rasped, his voice trembling as his aura flared into a blinding, violent shade of dark violet. "I am done playing games with a toddler!"
Yuzu didn't drop into a defensive stance. She simply looked up at him, her eyes cool, calm, and entirely unbothered.
"You're relying on your height and physical reach to dictate the pace," Yuzu said softly, her voice carrying across the quiet clearing. "It's valid, but range doesn't matter if you can't hit the target or your strikes can't cause damage."
"What did you say?!" Vegeta roared.
Yuzu closed her eyes for a split second. She took a single, quiet breath before she compressed her Ki fully. The energy pulled inward, shrinking to a microscopic, hyper-dense layer that flattened tightly against her entire body, blanketing it.
'Kōga-jutsu: Zenshin.' Yuzu vocalised in her thoughts.
Although Yuzu was acting calm, she couldn't help but feel a rush of excitement; this was the first true test of Kōga-jutsu, all that time she spent perfecting it. Would it be worth it in the end?
Vegeta didn't wait. Infuriated by her calm demeanor, he tore through the air, utilizing his superior reach to drive a heavy, downward-driving axe kick aimed straight for her skull.
Yuzu didn't duck. She didn't dodge. She raised her left forearm directly into the path of the descending heel.
CRACK-BOOM!
The impact sent a violent kinetic shockwave tearing outward, flattening the surrounding trees and gouging a twenty-foot crater around her boots. But Yuzu's arm didn't yield an inch. Her small frame stood completely rigid, unbothered by the sheer weight of the strike.
Vegeta's eyes widened in sheer shock. The force of his own strike bounced back through his leg, sending a sickening rattle through his hip joint and knee. It felt like he had driven his foot into a solid block of Katchin.
Vegeta barely had time to register the failure of his axe kick before Yuzu took advantage of the opening and thus, her fist promptly buried itself into his ribs.
The impact sounded like a sledgehammer striking an anvil. The force of the strike shattered the remaining side-panel of Vegeta's armor, sending white fragments flying into the dirt. The Prince choked on a mouthful of air, his eyes bulging as he was launched horizontally across the clearing, skipping across the earth three times before crashing into a rock face.
"Vegeta!" Nappa coughed out from where he lay paralyzed on the dirt, watching in absolute horror.
Vegeta exploded out of the rock pile, his dark violet aura flaring violently. His face was bloodied, his chest armor in ruins, his hair matted with dust and sweat. "Damn you! DAMN YOU!"
He launched himself into the air, abandoning all tactical range management. He descended on Yuzu like a meteor, hurling a tempest of desperate, heavy-handed strikes. High hook, low knee, spinning backfist, downward elbow—a wild, relentless flurry driven by pure, unadulterated humiliation.
Yuzu didn't move her feet.
She stood inside the storm, her short profile completely still, her arms weaving through his guard to absorb every blow.
Crack! Thwack! Bang!
Every time Vegeta's fists and shins made contact with her small body, a sharp, sickening recoil vibrated back through his limbs. A heavy right cross to her cheek did nothing to turn her head; instead, it split the skin over his knuckles. A brutal roundhouse kick to her thigh felt like kicking a mountain face, sending a shockwave of agony straight up his femur.
Vegeta pulled back, his hands trembling, his knuckles bleeding onto his torn gloves. He was gasping for air, his chest heaving as he stared at the small, orange-clad child standing before him. Yuzu hadn't sustained a single scratch. Her gi was pristine. Her expression remained entirely cool, her breathing undisturbed.
"Are you finished?" Yuzu asked softly, her voice carrying over the whistling wind. "Because you're swinging wide, and your balance is completely broken."
"I am the Prince of all Saiyans!" Vegeta screamed, his voice cracking with pure, manic fury. He flew upwards into the sky. Yuzu's eyes widened, as if she had remembered something.
'I completely forgot, canon Vegeta's arrival coincided with the time of a full moon for Earth, he deliberately planned this. However, in the original Piccolo destroyed the moon, but due to the changes I have made...' Yuzu flew ahead, her realisation made her aware of just how dangerous the situation could be if she did not do the same thing.
The cold wind of the upper atmosphere tore past Vegeta's face as he rocketed straight toward the heavens, his dark aura leaving a violent, violet wake across the clouds. His lungs burned, his shattered chest armor pinched painfully against his ribs, and his heart hammered a frantic, desperate rhythm against his sternum.
Outmatched by a child. The thought was a venomous spike driven directly into his brain. A five-year-old girl—a low-class mongrel raised on a backwater rock—had stood inside his finest combinations, absorbed his elite martial strikes like gentle rain, and dismantled his pride without breaking a sweat.
"I am the elite!" Vegeta roared into the thinning air, his voice cracking with pure, unadulterated madness. "I am the pinnacle of the Saiyan race!"
He broke through the dense cloud layer, shooting past the troposphere into the dark, freezing void of the upper stratosphere. The Earth curved beneath him, a vast, blue marble suspended in blackness. And hovering directly above the horizon, cold, brilliant, and completely untouched, shone the full moon.
Vegeta's blood surged. A savage, desperate grin split his bloodied face.
The moon is intact. He hadn't needed to waste half his Ki forging an artificial power ball after all. The natural Blutz waves were pouring off the lunar surface in absolute abundance, waiting to unleash the ancient, unchecked majesty of his bloodline.
"Let's see your cute little martial tricks stand up to this!" Vegeta screamed, throwing his arms wide and opening his eyes to drink in the full, unshielded moonlight.
"Not so fast!" a sharp, clear voice echoed through the vacuum-like cold.
Vegeta's eyes snapped down. Breaking through the cloud deck below him like a miniature orange comet, Yuzu was closing the distance at terrifying speed. Her eyes were set alight.
"You're too late, brat!" Vegeta cackled, his heart beating with a deafening, thundering pop as the Blutz waves hit his retina, triggering the hormonal cascade in his tail. "Witness the true form of the Saiyan master race!"
Yuzu didn't try to pull him back down. Instead, as she rocketed into the same orbital plane, she uncurled her own tail from around her waist, letting the brown, furry appendage whip freely in the thin atmospheric wind, and looked straight up into the pale, brilliant face of the moon.
'If we're doing this, then let's do it right!' Yuzu thought, a thrilled almost manic smirk appearing on her lips.
Simultaneously, high above the blue curve of the Earth, two hearts slammed against their ribs with the force of hydraulic presses.
THUMP-THUMP.
The hormonal surge was instantaneous and violent. In both Saiyans, the glands at the base of their tails flooded their bloodstreams with massive, concentrated doses of raw genetic code.
Vegeta's jaw elongated first, his fangs tearing through his lips as his mass expanded exponentially. Dark, coarse fur erupted across his skin, ripping his remaining armor to shreds. His spine snapped and stretched, his frame ballooning into a towering, mountain-sized titan of absolute destruction.
Beside him, Yuzu's transformation was just as sudden and explosive. Her small, three-foot-ten frame surged violently outward. The orange fabric of her tailored gi stretched, groaned, and instantly disintegrated into useless, floating tatters as dark fur blanketed her skin. Her chest expanded, her skull reshaped into a brutal, lupine snout, and her dark eyes melted into two vast pools of glowing, crimson rage.
Two colossal Great Apes hung in the vacuum of the upper stratosphere, bathed in the silver light of the moon.
Vegeta threw his massive, fur-covered head back and let out a roar that literally vibrated the upper atmosphere, sending shockwaves rippling through the thin air.
"HA-HA-HA-HA!" Vegeta's booming, distorted voice rumbled through the ether, his glowing red eyes locking onto Yuzu's giant form. "Foolish girl! The Oozaru form turns low-class garbage into mindless beasts! You've doomed yourself! Only the royal bloodline possesses the absolute mental fortitude to control the—"
Yuzu didn't scream. She didn't beat her chest. She didn't lose herself to the red haze of primal instinct.
Instead, the massive, thirty-foot Great Ape dropped into a flawless, perfectly balanced Capoeira stance, floating effortlessly in the low-gravity fringe of space. Her crimson eyes were bright, razor-sharp, and entirely lucid.
She offered Vegeta a massive, fanged grin, raising one giant, clawed hand in a mock "come at me" gesture.
Vegeta's towering form froze. His giant jaw actually slackened. "W-What...? You... you're conscious?!"
"Of course I am," Yuzu's deep, resonant Great Ape voice echoed out, dripping with playful mockery. "Did you really think you were the only one who could tame a instinct?"
"IMPOSSIBLE!" Vegeta bellowed, his colossal pride shattering into a million jagged pieces.
Driven by pure, unadulterated humiliation, the Giant Ape Vegeta lunged forward, throwing a massive, continent-crushing right fist straight for Yuzu's head. The shear wind generated by his colossal strike carved a visible trench through the clouds three miles below.
Yuzu didn't try to block the giant fist head-on.
Using the open, weightless space of the upper stratosphere as her canvas, the giant orange-furred ape inverted her massive body in mid-air. She executed a sweeping, acrobatic spin, letting Vegeta's mountain-sized fist glide harmlessly past her ear before she brought her colossal left heel down in an inverted, sweeping axe kick right across his giant jaw.
CRACK-BOOM!
A blinding shockwave of compressed kinetic force exploded at the point of contact, sending a visible ring of vapor shooting across the sky. Vegeta's massive head snapped sideways, his towering body spinning wildly through orbit from the sheer momentum.
"GAAAAAH!" Vegeta roared, thrashing his massive limbs as he stabilized himself. His crimson eyes burned with a terrifying, apocalyptic rage.
He didn't bother trying to fight her in close-quarters movement anymore. He opened his giant, fanged maw, and a blinding, crackling sphere of dark violet energy began to coalesce inside his throat. The raw power radiating off the mouth blast caused the temperature in the stratosphere to skyrocket, turning the night sky into a bruised, purple twilight.
She saw the mouth blast charging and didn't back down. This was it—the ultimate test of output.
She opened her own massive jaw. Deep within her chest, a brilliant, supercharged highly condensed column of blue Ki ignited.
A massive, mountain-wide beam of apocalyptic violet energy tore out of his mouth, vaporizing the thin air as it surged straight toward her.
Yuzu's beam unleashed with azure, condensed power. An overwise giant beam of apocalyptic might, made much smaller but far far stronger from sheer concentration of energy,
BOOM-FLAASH!
The two gigantic columns of energy collided in the center of the stratosphere.
The impact was blinding. The sheer light flooded the night side of the planet below, illuminating the oceans and continents in a vivid, flickering wash of violent blue and terrifying purple.
The beam clash didn't linger in a slow, tedious tug-of-war.
Vegeta's energy was massive, raw, and roaring with wild, unbridled fury. But Yuzu's beam was compressed and dense.Her azure light pushed his back with overwhelming power.
"WHAT?!" Vegeta's giant eyes bulged in absolute horror as he saw his ultimate mouth blast being cleanly bisected.
The hyper-dense blue column sheared straight down the center of Vegeta's mouth blast, splitting the dark energy into two ragged, detonating arcs that burned harmlessly out into the void of space. Before the Prince of Saiyans could even register the loss of his strongest attack, the blue beam slammed directly into his massive, fur-covered chest.
BOOM!
The force of the impact sounded like a dying star detonating in the upper atmosphere.
Vegeta's giant Great Ape body was hurled backward across the black horizon, spinning violently through orbit. The sheer kinetic shock blew the remaining oxygen right out of his massive lungs, leaving him gasping and clawing uselessly at the vacuum as he skidded through the cold fringe of space.
"Gah... ARCH!" Vegeta roared, a sound of pure agony vibrating through his massive fangs.
He thrashed his gigantic arms, thrusters of frantic, violet Ki bursting from his boots to arrest his wild momentum. He managed to force his towering frame upright, his glowing red eyes wild, bloodshot, and frantic as he searched the star-speckled dark.
"Where... where are you?!" Vegeta bellowed, his deep ape voice trembling with a terrifying blend of rage and creeping panic.
A shadow fell over him.
Yuzu didn't attack from the front. Using the zero-gravity environment like a trampoline, she had propelled herself directly off the curve of the blue planet below, ascending into his blind spot with terrifying speed.
Vegeta swung his giant head upward just in time to see the colossal orange-furred Great Ape dropping out of the starry void right above him.
Yuzu's massive crimson eyes weren't filled with mindless bloodlust or animalistic fury. They were bright, alive, and blazing with pure, unadulterated exhilaration. A fierce, wild grin stretched across her giant fanged jaw. She was loving this. For the first time in her life, she was pushing her limits against someone who could actually take the weight of her power without instantly snapping in half.
She didn't give him a chance to recover.
Inverting her giant body mid-flight, Yuzu locked her massive hands together into a double-axe hammer. She channeled a sudden, blinding flash of condensed blue energy into her knuckles and brought both fists crashing down straight onto the crown of Vegeta's head.
BANG!
The impact was catastrophic. A ring of white shock-waves exploded across the stratosphere, visible to satellite arrays thousands of miles below.
Vegeta's eyes rolled back into his head for a terrifying fraction of a second. The colossal blow sent his thirty-foot frame plummeting straight downward, accelerating out of low orbit like a massive, burning meteor.
"NO!" Vegeta roared, his mind snapping back to consciousness as the roaring wind of re-entry began to tear at his dark fur. "I AM THE PRINCE! I DO NOT FALL TO LOW-CLASS TRASH!"
Desperate, humbled, and pushed to the absolute edge of sanity, Giant Ape Vegeta flexed his massive back muscles, firing a wild, omnidirectional wave of dark purple Ki blasts from every angle of his body. Dozens of glowing, mountain-destroying spheres rained upward, painting the night sky in a deadly, crackling blanket of destruction.
Yuzu plummeted right after him through the storm of energy.
She didn't bother blocking with brute force. Floating down through the upper atmosphere, the giant brown ape moved with an impossible, ghostly grace. She twirled, slipped, and rotated her massive frame through the narrowest gaps between his energy blasts, letting the screaming purple spheres skim past her dark fur without touching a single strand.
She closed the distance in a heartbeat, dropping straight into the pocket of his wild descent.
Vegeta tried to throw a desperate, heavy right hook, but his broad, giant arm swung wide, his balance completely compromised by the rushing wind and his own wild panic.
"Too slow!" Yuzu's deep, booming voice echoed over the roaring gale.
She caught his massive extended wrist with her left claw, using his own downward momentum against him. Pivoting in mid-air, she swept her giant leg around, driving a heavy, rising knee straight into his solar plexus.
THWACK!
Vegeta bent double in mid-air, a thick spatter of dark saliva flying from his fangs. Before he could fall away, Yuzu spun on her axis, her long furry tail whipping through the air like a steel cable, wrapping tightly around his neck and locking him in place.
She pulled him close, her giant crimson eyes glaring straight into his terrified, bloodshot gaze.
"You talked big about royalty and absolute control," Yuzu sneered, her massive voice carrying a sharp, dangerous edge of pure satisfaction. "But when things get tough, you turn into a screaming child throwing a tantrum. You're not a prince, Vegeta. You're just a bully who's never been hit back!"
She released her tail's grip, cocked her right fist back, and let a blinding, microscopic point of azure light ignite over her giant knuckles.
She drove the punch straight into the center of his chest.
CRACK!
The localized kinetic force exploded through Vegeta's spine. The sheer shockwave shattered the surrounding cloud deck for fifty miles in every direction, blowing a massive, circular hole right through the overcast sky.
Vegeta screamed—a raw, broken sound that echoed across the heavens—as he was catapulted downward through the atmosphere, hurtling toward the Earth at blinding, hypersonic speed.
Down, down, down he fell, tearing through the stratosphere, through the mesosphere, and plummeting straight toward the dark, jagged peaks of the mountain range below.
As he plunged beneath the thick, dense blanket of lower storm clouds, the Blutz Waves that had been so abundant when staring at the moon vanished. He could still see the silver, celestial body but soon...
His massive, thirty-foot Great Ape body began to violently convulse and shrink. The dark fur retreated back into his skin, his massive fangs dissolved, his frame collapsed inward, and his towering mass dissolved in a flash of dying light.
By the time he broke through the lowest cloud layer, he was no longer a towering titan of destruction. He was just a bruised, broken, five-foot-four Saiyan in shattered, ruined armor, falling helplessly toward the dirt.
Vegeta gasped for breath, his heart hammering against his cracked ribs as he looked up into the dark sky. His vision was swimming with red and black spots, his pride lying in ash, his mind completely broken by the sheer, unexplainable reality of what had just happened.
A five-year-old girl had out-fought him. She had out-maneuvered him. And she had controlled the ancient, primal power of the Great Ape with an ease that made his royal heritage look like a joke.
"Impossible..." Vegeta rasped, his voice barely a broken whisper against the rushing wind. "It's... impossible..."
A sharp whistle tore through the air above him.
Yuzu dropped out of the cloud layer like a striking hawk. Having willingly cut off her own exposure to the lunar light as she descended, her giant form had already collapsed back down to her small, three-foot-ten frame.
She shot through the sky, closing the distance to the falling Prince in a fraction of a second.
Vegeta looked up, his dark eyes wide with shock as he saw her flying down toward him. He tried to raise a gloved hand, tried to ignite a single spark of purple Ki to defend himself, but his body refused to obey. His energy was completely spent, his reserves dry, his limbs heavy as lead.
Yuzu drifted right alongside his falling body, matching his terminal velocity effortlessly.
Her dark eyes met his. There was no hatred in them, no malice, and no cruelty—just the cool, quiet satisfaction of a martial artist who had tested her craft against the absolute best the galaxy had to offer and come out on top.
A small, confident smirk touched her lips.
"Good fight, Prince," Yuzu said softly.
Vegeta hit the earth with the sound of a falling meteor.
The impact carved a crater twenty feet deep into the rocky hillside half a mile from the Son home. Plumes of dust and pulverized granite billowed into the morning air, settling over the shattered landscape like ash.
Yuzu descended from the clouds, her boots touching down with a quiet, weightless crunch at the lip of the crater. The rush of adrenaline that had fueled her through the upper atmosphere was slowly ebbing, leaving her muscles pleasantly warm and her lungs drinking in the crisp mountain air.
Testing her full strength against a warrior like Vegeta, pushing herself to her limit, had been the most thrilling moment of her short second life. A genuine, small smile lingered on her face before she smoothed her features back into her usual calm composure.
At the bottom of the crater, Vegeta lay on his back in the dirt.
His white chest armor was completely gone, reduced to scrap metal and dust. His dark blue body suit was torn, stained with dirt and his own blood. He was gasping for air, his chest heaving painfully against fractured ribs. But worse than the physical damage was the look in his eyes.
He stared up at the sky, his dark pupils wide, bloodshot, and hollow. The royal pride that had defined every second of his existence had been stripped away, leaving behind a raw, bleeding void.
"Kill me..." Vegeta rasped, his voice a broken, raspy thread. Blood bubbled at the corner of his lips as he gritted his teeth, glaring up at Yuzu with pure, unadulterated venom. "Go on, you little monster... finish it. Prove how superior your low-class blood is..."
A heavy thump echoed behind Yuzu as Goku landed gracefully at her side, followed closely by Chi-Chi and Gohan. Then Nappa followed, heavily wounded still but after seeing his prince so defeated... he could only stare in shock.
Chi-Chi's eyes swept over her daughter first, checking every inch of Yuzu for blood. Seeing none, she let out a long, shuddering breath, her hands relaxing from their tight fists. Gohan stepped up beside Yuzu, looking down at the broken Prince with a mixture of awe and quiet pity.
"Goodness gracious, Yuzu!" Chi-Chi exclaimed, rushing forward. Before Yuzu could even open her mouth, Chi-Chi had unclasped her own thick crimson sash and draped it securely around her daughter's shoulders, quickly wrapping the heavy fabric around the five-year-old's small frame as an improvised cloak.
Yuzu flushed slightly, her cheeks dusting a soft pink as she pulled the warm fabric tight around her chest. "Thanks, Mom. I kind of forgot about the clothes part."
"Honestly," Chi-Chi muttered, though her voice was soft as she gently brushed a bit of crater dust out of Yuzu's messy black hair. "Next time you decide to turn into that, remind me to buy you some of that ridiculous space fabric."
Gohan giggled softly, though he quickly straightened his posture when Yuzu threw him a brief, warning look.
At the bottom of the pit, Vegeta lay broken, his eyes fixed on the sky in hollow horror. His chest heaved painfully beneath his cracked ribs, every breath rattling in his throat.
"Kill me..." Vegeta rasped again, his voice bleeding pure, bitter venom into the cold mountain air. "Go on... stop staring at me like I'm some pathetic stray. Finish it, you brat. Prove how superior your low-class bloodline is."
Yuzu stepped toward the edge of the pit, the long ends of her mother's sash trailing behind her in the dirt. She looked down at the Prince of Saiyans. There was no mockery on her face, no cruel triumph, and no lingering anger from the fight.
"I'm not going to kill you, Vegeta," Yuzu said softly, her voice carrying clearly over the whistling wind. "And frankly, begging for death doesn't suit you."
Vegeta let out a ragged, blood-choked laugh. "You think... you think you can pity me? I am the Prince of all Saiyans!"
"You're a Prince of a dead race, Vegeta," Yuzu cut in directly, her words sharp and unvarnished. "That title you carry with so much pride is meaningless. Who are you ruling over? Nappa? The empty space where Planet Vegeta used to be?"
Vegeta flinched as if she had struck him across the face with a iron bar. His dark eyes widened, bloodshot and frantic. "Shut up..."
"Look around," Yuzu continued, leaning slightly against a smooth rock at the crater's lip. "There are only a handful of us left in the entire universe. You, Nappa, Dad, Gohan, me... and maybe a few others in the cold dark of space. That's it. That's the entire Saiyan race."
Vegeta growled, a thick spatter of blood flying from his lips as his clawed fingers dug into the dirt. "You... know nothing... about my life, girl..."
"I know you hate serving the tyrant you mentioned earlier," Yuzu countered smoothly, taking a slow step down into the sloped lip of the pit. "I know you came to Earth hoping to find a shortcut to power so you could cut your own chains. And I know that right now, lying at the bottom of this hole, you have zero options."
She stopped a few feet from him, resting her hands loosely beneath the folds of the sash.
"We don't care about your royal title, and we certainly don't care about your space empire," Yuzu continued, her tone dropping into a firm, pragmatic register. "So why not treat each other as proper comrades in arms? Because if you ever want to see that tyrant dead, you need our knowledge of how to grow stronger. And if we are ever forced to deal with his empire, we need your knowledge of the universe."
Vegeta's eyes snapped wide, his bloodshot pupils locking onto her face with sheer, wild shock. "How... how do you know about—?!"
"You brought up the tyrant yourself when you landed," Goku cut in, stepping down into the crater beside his daughter. He had dragged Nappa along by his uninjured ankle, dumping the groaning, tail-less giant onto the dirt near Vegeta's boots. "You said you were working under the thumb of someone who treats your people like disposable hounds. Sounds to me like you're fighting a fight you can't win on your own."
Vegeta gritted his teeth so hard a sharp crack echoed from his jaw. The humiliation was a physical weight crushing his chest, far worse than his fractured ribs.
Here he was—the elite of the elite, the Prince of all Saiyans—being offered an olive branch by a low-class warrior and a five-year-old child who had just beaten him into the dirt with a giant ape kick. Every fiber of his royal upbringing screamed at him to reject it, to fight until his heart burst, to die before lowering his head to mongrels.
But beneath the blinding fog of bruised pride, Vegeta was a survivor. He was a tactician who had spent two decades navigating the bloody meat-grinder of the galactic frontlines. He looked at Goku's calm, relaxed stance. He looked at the girl whose power level had eclipsed his own without a single drop of wasteful energy.
They possessed something fundamental—a secret to growth that allowed low-class trash to pass the elite barrier effortlessly.
"Comrades...?" Vegeta rasped out, a bitter, self-deprecating sneer curling his blood-stained lips. "You expect me to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with... with farm-dwelling defectors?"
"I don't expect anything," Yuzu replied flatly. "I'm offering you a logical transaction. You want vengeance against the monster who very likely destroyed the Saiyan homeworld and keeps you on a leash. We want to keep our planet safe from off-world threats. Our goals align, whether your royal ego likes it or not."
Chi-Chi landed softly at the edge of the pit, her arms crossed tightly over her chest as she glared down at the two galactic invaders with an uncompromising, sharp gaze.
"If we're talking about a truce, then let's get one thing crystal clear right now," Chi-Chi spoke up, her voice ringing across the mountain clearing like a steel blade. "I don't care about galactic politics, space empires, or royal bloodlines. If you two stay on this planet to heal and train, you live by my rules."
Nappa, barely conscious and clutching his shattered arm, let out a ragged wheeze. "You... crazy human woman... you don't command the Prince..."
Chi-Chi didn't even look at Nappa; she simply shifted her foot an inch, sending a microscopic wave of compressed kinetic force through the dirt that kicked up a sharp spray of gravel directly into Nappa's face, shutting him up instantly.
"Rule number one," Chi-Chi continued, ignoring Nappa's choked sputtering. "No flying around destroying cities, no blowing up mountains, and no picking fights with ordinary people. Rule number two: if you need food, you hunt it yourself or you help around the property. And rule number three..." She leaned over the edge, her dark eyes narrowing into dangerous slits. "...if I catch either of you looking at my children with anything other than respect, I won't just break your arm like I did to the bald one. I will personally throw you into the sun."
Goku chuckled nervously, rubbing the back of his neck. "She means it, Vegeta. She's really strict about house rules."
Vegeta lay in the dirt, staring up at the three of them. His mind was spinning, his shattered body trembling with a mixture of agony and utter surrealism. A human woman—a housewife—was laying down domestic conditions for the Prince of all Saiyans, and he didn't have the strength left to raise a finger in protest.
"You're all mad..." Vegeta rasped, resting his head back against the dirt. He closed his eyes, taking a long, shuddering breath that rattled against his broken sternum. "Absolute lunatics..."
"So?" Yuzu asked, leaning down slightly. "Do we have a deal, Prince? Or do you prefer sitting in this hole feeling sorry for yourself?"
Vegeta opened one dark eye, glaring up at Yuzu with an unyielding, bitter fire. "If I accept... you will teach us. You will show us how you suppress your energy... how you eliminate the leakage... how you reached these numbers."
"We'll train together," Goku corrected warmly, offering a broad, genuine smile. "That's how martial arts works. You push us, we push you. It's much faster than training alone."
Vegeta remained silent for a long moment. The silence hung heavy over the crater, broken only by the whistling mountain wind and Nappa's ragged breathing.
Finally, Vegeta let out a low, venomous sigh. "Fine... A temporary alliance. But understand this, Kakarot... the moment I surpass you, the moment I reclaim my rightful place..."
"Yeah, yeah," Yuzu interrupted with a slight wave of her hand, a small, knowing smirk touching her lips. "We'll cross that bridge when your ribs heal. Welcome to Earth."
Before anyone could take another step, a sharp, piercing sound tore through the quiet morning.
KRRRRZZZZT-BEEP-BEEP-BEEP!
The noise didn't come from Vegeta or Goku. It erupted from the cracked, battered scouter still strapped to the side of Nappa's head. The red glass lens was flickering violently, casting a harsh, strobe-like light across the dirt of the crater.
Nappa's eyes went wide with pure, unadulterated terror. "N-No... the comm-link... it was active..."
Vegeta's face drained of what little color it had left. "Nappa, turn it off! Disconnect the feed!"
"I can't!" Nappa panicked, scrambling uselessly with his uninjured hand. "The manual switch is fused! The crash damaged the internal relays!"
The static on the scouter suddenly died, replaced by a smooth, chillingly polite voice that oozed out with a cold, aristocratic cadence.
"My, my, my..."
The voice carried a quiet, terrifying weight that seemed to instantly drop the ambient temperature of the entire mountain range.
"What a fascinating little theatrical performance I've been listening to," the voice purred through the speaker, accompanied by the faint, rhythmic clinking of a wine glass in the background. "I must admit, Vegeta... when Raditz unveiled the existence of three other Saiyans and then your pod's telemetry showed you veering off course to visit Kakarot's backwater rock, I assumed you were merely collecting missing assets. I certainly did not expect to overhear such... treasonous poetry."
Vegeta couldn't move. His breath hitched in his throat, his dark pupils shrinking to pinpricks as a cold, paralyzing sweat broke out across his forehead. "F-Frieza..."
Goku's smile vanished instantly. His posture shifted, his easygoing stance hardening into the sharp, watchful guard of a true master. Chi-Chi stepped closer to Gohan, placing a protective hand on her son's shoulder, while Yuzu narrowed her eyes, watching the glowing scouter with icy focus.
"To think... my prized royal hound was plotting a little rebellion behind my back," Lord Frieza continued, his tone light, almost amused, yet carrying an underlying malice that made the air itself feel heavy. "And all because a family of low-class monkeys managed to cultivate a few unimpressive numbers on a backwater dirt pile. Nine thousand? Fourteen thousand? Sixteen thousand? How delightfully cute."
A soft, cruel chuckle echoed through the static.
"Did you truly believe that those pathetic little spikes would be enough to alter the balance of my empire, Vegeta? Did you honestly think a child's parlor tricks could threaten ME?"
Vegeta gritted his teeth, his voice trembling with a mixture of deep-seated trauma and sudden rage. "Frieza... you monster..."
"Oh, save your breath, Prince," Frieza dismissed smoothly. "I must thank you, actually. You saved me the trouble of hunting down Kakarot's line myself. But now... I'm afraid this little comedy has run its course."
The polite warmth completely drained from Frieza's voice, replaced by a dark, suffocating venom that vibrated through the tiny speaker.
"Listen to me carefully, you filthy monkeys," Frieza declared, his voice cutting through the air like a death sentence. "You better count your last days in MY universe well. Enjoy your little mountain, enjoy your foolish dreams of rebellion... because this is the last year you'll have. I am coming to Earth personally, and when I arrive, I will turn your precious rock into cosmic dust."
The transmission ended with a sharp, echoing click, leaving behind only the low, ambient hum of the mountain breeze.
Silence fell over the crater. Nappa was trembling violently, his face pale as a ghost, while Vegeta stared blankly at the sky, his hands clenched into tight, shaking fists.
Goku didn't hesitate. He stepped forward, reached down, and cleanly unclipped the flashing scouter from Nappa's ear. He held the device in his palm for a fraction of a second, staring at the blank screen with a calm, unyielding intensity that radiated absolute confidence.
"You can try, but you're going to fail." Goku said softly as if speaking directly to the tyrant watching from light-years away.
CRUNCH.
Goku closed his hand, the scouter was instantly crushed.
Goku turned back to his family and the Saiyan lying in the pit. The tension in his shoulders hadn't turned into panic; it had transformed into the quiet, burning resolve of a martial artist who had just been handed the ultimate challenge.
"Looks like we've got a deadline," Goku said, a small, determined grin breaking through his serious expression. He looked down at Vegeta. "You still want to stand there feeling sorry for yourself, or are you going to get up so we can get to work?"
Vegeta looked up at Goku, then at Yuzu and finally at the sky where Frieza's shadow now hung over their world. The fear in his chest didn't vanish, but for the first time in his life, it was eclipsed by something far stronger: the crazy, impossible hope of a warrior who was no longer fighting alone.
Vegeta let out a low, rough laugh, pushing himself up onto his elbow despite the agony tearing through his ribs.
"Get me out of this hole, Kakarot," Vegeta rasped, his dark eyes burning with a fierce, dangerous light. "We have an emperor to kill."
Goku reached a broad hand down into the pit, offering it without a trace of hesitation or superiority.
Vegeta stared at the calloused palm for a long, agonizing second. His royal pride screamed at him to swat it away, but his shattered ribs and empty energy reserves offered a harsh reality check. Gritting his teeth so hard his jaw creaked, the Prince reached out and grabbed Goku's forearm. Goku hauled him out with an easy, fluid grunt, slinging Vegeta's arm over his shoulder to support the wounded Saiyan's weight.
Yuzu pulled her mother's crimson sash tighter around her shoulders, letting out a breathy, contented laugh that bubbled straight from her chest. Her heart was still thumping with the lingering rush of atmospheric combat.
"I have to admit," Yuzu grinned, her dark eyes sparkling with a mix of residual exhaustion and pure, unadulterated thrill, "that was the absolute most fun I've had in my entire life. Even if I shredded another perfectly good gi."
"Don't make a habit of it," Chi-Chi chided softly, though her hands were surprisingly gentle as she stepped up to help steady Vegeta from his other side. "I don't mind tailoring custom clothes for you kids, but space-battle casualties are going to get expensive."
Gohan giggled, jogging over to pick up a stray piece of Nappa's shattered armor from the dirt. "You were floating in space, Yuzu! That was so cool! I could see the blue light all the way from down here!"
"It felt even cooler," Yuzu admitted, throwing Gohan a playful wink.
"You... lunatics..." Vegeta grumbled between heavy, painful hitches of his chest, though there was no real venom left in his voice. "You're all... completely out of your minds..."
"You get used to it," Goku chuckled, adjusting his grip on Vegeta's waist.
Before they could take a single step toward the house, a sudden, heavy rustle echoed from the dense pine tree line at the edge of the clearing.
"You always did know how to attract the worst kind of attention, Goku."
The voice rasped out from the shadows—deep, jagged, and dripping with a thick, familiar malice.
The branches parted. Piccolo stepped into the morning light.
His white cape was torn at the hem, his turban was gone, and his purple gi was dusted. His onyx eyes were narrowed into razor-sharp slits, his chest heaving slightly as he tried to maintain his intimidating aura despite the massive sweat-drop forming on his green temple.
Goku didn't drop into a guard. He simply turned his head, a broad, easygoing grin breaking across his face. "Hey, Piccolo! I thought I felt someone watching us from the trees!"
"Watching?" Piccolo growled, his fangs bared in a fierce sneer as he crossed his arms tightly over his chest. "I was evaluating. Watching two galactic fools get thoroughly dismantled by a housewife and a toddler."
Nappa, currently lying on his stomach in the dirt, let out a raspy, offended choke. "W-What did you call us, you damn Namek—?!"
"Quiet, baldly." Chi-Chi shut Nappa up.
Piccolo crossed his long arms, his white cape fluttering in the morning breeze as he fixed Goku with a sharp, unblinking glare.
"Evaluating, huh?" Yuzu asked, stepping forward while holding her mother's sash around her shoulders. A faint, knowing smile played on her lips, her dark eyes glittering with residual excitement. "You know, for someone who spent the last few months freezing his cape off in the arctic, you sure made good time getting here, Piccolo."
Piccolo's brow twitched. A faint green flush crept up his neck, but he quickly covered it with a scowl. "Quiet, brat. My training methods are none of your concern."
"I'm not criticizing," Yuzu replied, her tone genuine and surprisingly warm. "I can feel your Ki. It's almost half of Mom's. That's incredible discipline."
Piccolo stiffened slightly, his golden eyes widening just a fraction. He had prepared himself to be mocked or looked down upon by this family of freakish anomalies. Instead, the girl was looking at him with earnest respect—not as an enemy, but as a fellow martial artist acknowledging the grit behind his gains.
He cleared his throat, turning his face away with a gruff hum. "Hmph. It's still not enough. Not against them."
Vegeta, whose head was propped awkwardly on Goku's shoulder, forced his bloodshot eyes toward Piccolo. His dark pupils shrank in sudden, sharp recognition. "A Namekian? What is a Namekian doing here?!"
Piccolo's eyes snapped wide, his sharp Namekian ears twitching violently as the Prince's words echoed through the quiet clearing.
"Namekian...?" Piccolo rasped, his voice faltering for the first time. The jagged, terrifying authority he usually projected cracked wide open, revealing a raw, bewildered core beneath. He took a slow step backward, his boots crushing a pinecone into the dirt. "What... what did you just call me, alien?"
Vegeta let out a short, pain-racked scoff, his ribs groaning under Goku's supportive arm. "Don't play dumb with me, green skin. You're a Namekian. A race of pacifistic beings. Though what one of your kind is doing hiding out on a backwater dirt pile is beyond me."
The mountain wind suddenly felt freezing.
Piccolo stared at his own green, clawed hands. The pink patches on his forearms, the sharp fangs, the pointed ears—all the physical traits he had carried as the dark legacy of the Great Demon King... were just the biological markers of an off-worlder?
"An... alien?" Piccolo whispered, his golden eyes searching the dirt as if the ground itself might offer an answer. "I'm not a demon...? I'm just... from another world?"
Goku looked at Piccolo with a soft, empathetic expression. "Hey, don't sweat it too much, Piccolo. I didn't know I was a Saiyan until Raditz showed up either. Doesn't change who you are right now."
"Shut up, Goku!" Piccolo barked, his head snapping up, though his voice lacked its usual sharp bite. He gritted his teeth, his jaw clenching tightly as he processed the revelation. He was an alien. Just like Goku. Just like the bloodthirsty invaders currently lying broken in the mud.
He took a long, deep breath, forcing the violent storm in his mind to settle into a cold, hardened resolve. He raised his eyes, fixing the group with an uncompromising, sharp glare.
"It doesn't matter where I came from," Piccolo rasped, his voice dropping an octave, heavy with dark, prideful authority. "This planet isn't going to be conquered by some cosmic real-estate tyrant named Frieza. If anyone is going to rule this world, it's going to be me."
He crossed his long arms tightly, his white cape snapping in the breeze as he looked directly at Goku, then at Yuzu.
"I overheard that alien's transmission," Piccolo continued, his eyes narrowing into deadly slits. "One year. That's all the time we have before this 'Frieza' arrives to turn the Earth into ash. I refuse to let some pampered space emperor destroy my world before I've even had the chance to conquer it."
Goku's smile returned, broader and brighter than before. "So... you're saying you're in?"
"It's a temporary truce, Goku!" Piccolo growled, pointing a long, sharp claw at the Saiyan's nose. "Don't mistake this for friendship! I am joining this absurd alliance for one reason only: survival. Once this tyrant is dead, I am coming back for your head!"
"Fair enough," Goku chuckled, completely unfazed by the threat. "We could really use your help anyway, Piccolo. Your precision is awesome."
"Welcome to the team, Piccolo. Twelve months isn't a lot of time to prepare for an emperor, but with all of us working together, we'll make it count."
Piccolo scoffed, turning his back to them with a dramatic whip of his cape, though the faintest hint of satisfaction flickered in his eyes.
Yuzu watched the scene, unable to hide her smile.
The morning sun finally broke through the clouds over Mount Paozu, bathing the small, bizarre gathering in a warm, golden light. A human martial artist, two Saiyan children, a broken Prince, a defeated elite, and a Namekian Demon King—all standing together on a patch of mountain dirt.
'And the fact that I will no longer have to hide my past life. Because Gero's bugs are finally destroyed.' Yuzu's plans saw fruit, and finally, she had been rewarded for her patience.
The Cold War had just begun after all.