Vegeta's boots dug into the sand, his smaller frame swaying for a second as the aftershock of the transformation rattled through his bones. Gone was the mountain of fur and fangs. Gone was the roar that had drowned the desert. What remained was the man—compact, cut with fury, lean as a knife—and he was smiling.
Blood ran down his face, thick and hot, streaking his ruined eye. His armor was cracked, one shoulder plate broken. His breathing came fast, but each breath was deliberate. He did not pant. He refused.
The crater glowed faintly, molten lines cooling into glass around him. Above, the false moon still hung, untouched, but his severed tail lay in the dust like an insult written in flesh.
He looked at it once. Then he laughed.
"Did you think cutting this made me less dangerous?" His voice carried differently now—not thunder, but steel scraping stone. "All you did was strip away the excess. Now you face me."
The System filled his vision with cold logic:
[Form Collapse Stabilized]Power Level: 18,500 (Base; post-Oozaru reduction)Stamina: 47%Structural Damage: Severe (left eye, ribs, forearms)Projected Recovery (post-battle, Zenkai): +22,000 → 24,000 PLSuper Saiyan Progress: 49% (Milestone within reach)
[Priority Targets]1. Yajirobe (Blade — threat to recovery)2. Krillin (Ki Disc user — moderate threat)3. Son Gohan (Emotional Catalyst; eliminate or exploit)4. Kakarot (Rivalry Node; brink-state. Termination = +Ascension Yield)
Krillin's eyes darted between Goku, crumpled and barely holding himself upright, and Vegeta, who looked like a man carved from broken pride. His voice cracked. "He's still… he's still strong."
Yajirobe was pale, sword still slick with blood from the tail. He tried to back away, muttering to himself. "Nope. Nope. I did my part. That's it. I'm not—"
Vegeta blurred.
One instant he was standing at the center of the crater. The next he was in front of Yajirobe, a phantom of motion. His fist slammed into the fat man's gut with the kind of precision that suggested he'd chosen the exact organ he wanted to punish.
Yajirobe folded, sword clattering from his grip. A scream tore out of him, ugly and human.
"Coward," Vegeta sneered, lifting him by the hair. "You crawl from shadows and think yourself a warrior?"
He hurled him across the crater. Yajirobe's body skidded along the glassed earth, leaving a red streak in his wake. He didn't get up.
"YAJIROBE!" Krillin shouted, voice cracking into desperation. His aura flared and he dashed forward, palms already sparking with desperate ki.
"Krillin, no—!" Goku's warning was a cough more than a roar. His body shook, Kaio-ken fire gone, every limb heavy as stone. But his voice carried: "Don't fight him head-on!"
Krillin didn't listen. He couldn't. The sight of Yajirobe broken and Goku down, the smell of blood in the sand—it snapped something inside him.
"Destructo Disc!" he shouted, hurling the whirling blade of energy forward.
The disc shrieked, cutting through the air with a scream sharper than steel. It carved the ground beneath it just by passing over it, slicing glass into powder. It soared straight for Vegeta's head.
The System pinged.
[Threat Detected: Krillin's Disc]Trajectory: lethal (cervical spine)Countermeasures: Lateral displacement, Ki hardening, or feint exploitationRecommendation: Exploit. Demonstrate superiority.
Vegeta smirked. He waited until the disc was close enough to lick the sweat off his cheek, then dropped flat to the ground. The blade whistled past his hair, missing by inches, and vanished into the horizon, still screaming.
He rolled, sprang to his feet, and appeared behind Krillin in the time it took the monk to gasp.
His hand closed around Krillin's skull. He lifted him off the ground, fingers digging into his scalp. Krillin's feet kicked uselessly, his cry muffled by Vegeta's grip.
"Not bad," Vegeta said, tightening his hold until Krillin's vision blurred. "But you think tricks make you my equal?"
He slammed Krillin into the ground hard enough to shatter glass beneath him. Once. Twice. A third time, until the smaller man lay sprawled, barely conscious.
Gohan screamed. His aura erupted golden-white, not transformation but fury. He charged, small fists glowing with desperate ki.
"Leave them alone!" he shouted, his voice cracking but loud enough to echo.
Vegeta turned his head, his ruined eye narrowing. For a moment, the smirk faltered. The boy looked too much like him—like what he had been before Frieza's shadow. Pride and pain tangled in his chest.
The System spoke into that hesitation:
[Catalyst Active: Son Gohan]PL: 4,500 → 6,000 (rage surge)Threat Level: MinorExploitation: Induce trauma → Super Saiyan Progress +6%
Vegeta clenched his fist and smiled again. "Fine then, cub. Let's see what roar you really have."
He met Gohan's charge with brutal efficiency. His knee drove into the boy's gut, folding him in half. His elbow crashed against Gohan's back before the boy could fall. He seized him by the collar, lifted him high, and sneered in his face.
"You have spirit," he admitted, shaking the child like a rag. "But spirit without strength is only meat for kings."
"STOP!" Goku's voice shredded itself into the night. His body was broken, but his heart threw itself against the walls of his chest.
The System hummed.
[Critical Brink Event Detected: Kakarot]Stress Response: MaximalProjected Output Spike: Possible (Kaio-ken rebound + emotional catalyst)Ascension Yield (if rival terminates cub): +15% Super Saiyan Progress
Ethan's soldier whispered beneath the rage: If you break the cub, you break the father. If you break the father, you break the wall.
Vegeta raised his arm high, ki flaring around his palm. Gohan dangled, eyes wide, blood dripping from his lip.
"Your death," Vegeta said softly, almost reverently, "will be the hammer that forges a god."
Krillin coughed blood into the dust, half-blind, but still alive enough to see what was about to happen. His broken voice cut through the heat. "No… you bastard… not the kid…"
Goku roared. He stood—or something stood inside him, using his body as a mouth. His aura flared crimson again, brighter than before, whipping dust into a storm.
"DON'T… TOUCH… HIM!"
The ground quaked beneath his step. His muscles screamed, his veins bulged, but he kept moving forward, toward the prince who dared to hold his son.