When the choking clouds of dust finally settled, what had once been a bustling city was nothing but scorched earth.
It took Goku and the others less than a minute to arrive on scene.
"You bastards! You're unforgivable!!"Goku's fury made his ki surge ever higher.
Normally controlled and precise, his energy now swelled with his anger.
8,500… 10,000… 15,000…Beep-beep! Crack!
Both Vegeta's and Nappa's scouters exploded simultaneously.
"Impossible! You're just a low-class warrior! There's no way you could have this kind of power… no way…" Vegeta could hardly believe his eyes.
If he'd read it correctly in that instant before the scouter shattered, the number had reached 25,000.
The sheer force of Goku's power had just crushed the prince's pride.
Nappa fared even worse backpedaling in fear, as if terrified Goku might explode forward and kill him on the spot.
"You both deserve to die!!" Goku took one deliberate step after another toward Nappa.
Piccolo, Gohan, and the rest stood silent.
Krillin and Tien, however, couldn't hide the tension on their faces they could sense it clearly: Nappa and Vegeta's ki were far beyond their own, on a completely different level.
Whoosh!
Raditz arrived just in time.
"Kakarot, if you can, spare their lives!" he shouted.
"Raditz… you're alive?!" Vegeta's surprise pushed his tension aside.
"Brother," Goku said, "for your sake, if they stop their evil ways, I can let them live but they'll have to pay for what they just did."
Though Goku's anger burned, killing was not his way.
"Arrogant wretch! Kakarot, you're just a low-class warrior how dare you challenge the Prince of all Saiyans! Nappa take him down!" Vegeta roared.
"Prince Vegeta, I…" Nappa hesitated, too afraid to move forward.
"Coward! Then kill Raditz instead. Anyone who betrays me dies. Kakarot is mine to deal with personally!"
Vegeta's pride refused to acknowledge fear. In fact, part of him was excited the chance to duel such a strong opponent had rekindled a long-dormant battle lust.
"Yes, Vegeta!" Nappa exhaled in relief and shot toward Raditz.
"Gohan…?" Raditz looked to the boy, uncertain.
"Go ahead. Just… take it far away. If you get your clothes dirty, I'm not washing them," Gohan replied coolly.
"Understood!" Raditz burst forward.
One punch sent Nappa flying hundreds of meters.
He followed with high-speed movement, appearing right beside the larger Saiyan.
"Pah! Raditz, you dare fight back? Don't forget you're a low-class fighter, while I am an elite mid-class warrior!" Nappa spat blood, glaring.
"Nappa… these four months may have been short, but they've felt longer than my entire life. Listen to me surrender. You and Prince Vegeta are no match for Kakarot. Even I can defeat the two of you with ease now. You know as well as I do our true enemy is Frieza. And you know better than anyone: it was Frieza himself who destroyed Planet Vegeta. Give it up."
Four months of structured training had completely transformed Raditz's combat power.
"Raditz, you've grown arrogant. Just four months on this backwater planet, and you dare speak against Lord Frieza?!" Nappa's simple mind still clung to some vestige of loyalty to the tyrant.
"Enough talk, Nappa come at me!"
"Die!!"
Nappa roared, exploding his ki. Muscles bulged, white energy flames erupting around him.
His massive fist smashed toward Raditz's face.
CLANG!
Raditz didn't dodge. He didn't even block conventionally he took the punch head-on.
"Yes, with my face," he said calmly. "Still don't get it, Nappa?"
"N-no way… no way…"
Nappa launched into a frenzy punches, kicks, elbows, knee strikes.
Sweep kicks, spinning backfists, whip-like roundhouses blow after blow.
In seconds, he'd unleashed over a hundred strikes, his movements so fast they left afterimages, kicking up a choking storm of dust that swallowed them both.
Bam! Boom! Thud!
The sound of impacts echoed from within the haze.
"Gohan… he's gonna be okay, right?" Krillin asked nervously.
"Are you that weak and that dumb? Can't you sense his ki hasn't dropped even a fraction?" Piccolo cut in before Gohan could answer.
"…Uh…" Krillin had no comeback.
Back in the dust cloud.
"Huff… huff…" Nappa backflipped out of the haze, panting heavily.
That flurry had cost him a huge chunk of his stamina.
"Raditz take this! Mouth Blast!"
Nappa sucked in a deep breath, condensing all his energy into his mouth before firing a massive golden beam straight into the dust cloud.
BOOOOM!!
The explosion was even more spectacular than before.
"Heh… Let's see you look down on me now, Raditz. No one survives that," Nappa snarled.
Without more energy to sustain it, the dust began to settle.
A silhouette emerged in the center.
"…Impossible!!"
Raditz stood there, completely unharmed his feet hadn't moved an inch.
His left hand was raised, palm still shimmering with residual heat. He had caught the Mouth Blast barehanded.
"Raditz… what have you been doing these past four months? Don't tell me you used those Dragon Balls I heard about to get this strong!" Nappa demanded, for once using his brain.
He guessed wrong.
"I didn't use the Dragon Balls," Raditz said, shaking his head. "Kakarot trained me for four months, that's all. Give it up, Nappa. I wasn't even using my full strength."
"I don't believe it!!" Nappa growled, teeth grinding.
The rigid Saiyan class system had poisoned him too deeply he could not accept the idea of bowing to so-called "low-class" warriors.
"Fine. Since you don't believe me then see for yourself! Haaah!!"
Raditz's ki surged white flames whipping into a raging cyclone around him.
His full power soared to 100,000… and kept climbing.
120,000… 130,000… 150,000… 180,000!
"Kaio-ken!!"
Raditz roared muscles swelling, white aura igniting into blazing crimson.
The sheer shockwave forced everyone present to stagger back.
Everyone except Gohan… and Piccolo.
Off to the side, Vegeta's eyes widened in shock.
Goku, on the other hand, stayed perfectly calm.
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