"We're really going to Fire Mountain?!" Bulma complained, "I heard that the Ox King cuts up anyone who gets near and fries them over the constant witch-fire burning around his castle."
Kakarot rolled his eyes. They'd been on the road for the better part of a day straight since the little incident with Kakarot's grandpa. Restless, the young Saiyan was currently running alongside the car, one arm slung inside the window to help force him to keep pace.
The boy rolled his eyes, "You're overreacting, you know. And it's called Frypan Mountain. Fire Mountain is just a nickname." He reminded the blue-haired teen.
"You're right. There's no way that he paid a witch to create some never-ending fire around his castle. It's probably all just a legend." She said, relaxing a bit. It was insane, right? A never-ending witch fire?
"No, I can believe that part. I've seen some pretty weird things." Bulma went pale at Kakarot's casual admission, "I just can't believe that Master Roshi would train somebody mean enough to cut people up and eat them. Mr. Ox King is probably just a misunderstood guy who likes to keep to himself." Kakarot explained, "Once we explain what we're looking for, I'm sure he'll love to help us out!"
Bulma shook her head, unable to shake the sinking feeling in her gut as they eased closer and closer to Frypan Mountain with every rotation of the car's tires.
"Whoa! Maybe it should be 'Fire' Mountain!" Kakarot exclaimed as they finally made it within eye range of the mountain that belonged to the Ox King.
And a beautiful mountain it was.
The giant flames covering the entire thing like a massive layer of concentrated, tangible fire served to only enhance the sight of the gigantic, opulent castle at the summit, which was also wreathed in flames.
"I wonder how he gets inside? You think he flies?" Bulma asked, stopping the car and looking up at the mountain in a bit of awe.
Her first theory was that it was some sort of natural gas fire, burning at a pace controlled by the oxidation of the gas. Those fires could theoretically burn for years straight, in the right conditions.
But those fires… they burnt trees down.
These fires… they almost seemed to be nothing but decorations. The trees burnt, but the leaves didn't fall, the bark didn't blacken. It was beautiful… and clearly not natural.
If she couldn't currently feel the heat from the fire, she'd honestly think that the flames were somehow 'added' to reality after the fact, like some sort of hologram.
Meanwhile, Kakarot was feeling something completely different.
Not the heat from the fire. No, he was feeling the air shifting.
As a gigantic double-bladed axe sliced through it on a direct path toward his face.
The axe missed Bulma by around a foot. Luckily for all involved, it'd been thrown at the bigger threat out of the two of them.
The fact that the Ox King immediately knew that the clearly younger one was the bigger threat made Kakarot smile.
This guy was the real deal. A Master Roshi-trained martial artist. One of the best in the world. And he attacked Kakarot without holding back even a little.
On instinct, the boy ducked the axe, which continued onward, plowing through several trees behind Kakarot, while Bulma screamed in surprise and no small amount of understandable terror.
Kakarot made eye contact with the hulking behemoth, a man so large that he genuinely gave that 'Tater' guy a run for his money in sheer size, for a moment before the man disappeared.
Inhuman speed. The man left an afterimage in his place.
Kakarot's eyes easily followed the giant's form as he moved through the trees to retrieve his axe in what seemed to be the span of a single second.
The boy had already distanced himself from the car with Bulma in it, for her safety, by the time, around two seconds after the axe had originally flown at his head without warning, that the Ox King was swinging at him with incredible speed, skill, and an almost reckless abandon.
Naturally, Bulma was still screaming.
The axe swung high first. Kakarot ducked. Then it went low. Kakarot jumped. Then a downward slice, so powerful that it shook the wind, creating air pressure strong enough to completely blow away a small child, were they to get too close.
Kakarot merely stepped to the side, hands still at his waist, as the air ruffled his hair a bit.
Down, up, left, right, diagonal, other diagonal, a foot, Kakarot dodged it all with a wide grin on his face, only moving his lower body, not his upper.
The Ox King was actually fast enough to give the boy a pretty good workout, given Kakarot held back a bit.
Exactly what Kakarot had gone on this trip looking for. His Saiyan blood boiled with excitement as he faced the hulking behemoth down, making a conscious effort to not move his hands at all if he could help it.
With every swing, the Ox King made Kakarot back up just a bit more. By the time a few seconds had passed, and the sounds of Bulma's screams echoing off of the trees had faded, the bandit king had managed to push the boy all the way into the forest, making Kakarot's eyebrow twitch up.
The boy readied himself to change directions, if the trees began giving him an unnecessary advantage, when the Ox King's axe started slicing through tree trunks like they were air.
Still, the fallen logs were quickly beginning to get into the senior pupil's way. The axe was beginning to slow.
Unfortunate. Even the great Ox King couldn't keep up an attack that ferocious forever. With a small sigh, Kakarot realized that it was time to end the fun while it was still fun.
He waited for a horizontal swing, aimed directly at his midsection.
Then, the boy jumped. Faster than lightning.
His feet left the ground, and landed lightly on the axe mid-swing, using the weapon, that was already moving at speeds beyond what the average person's naked eye could follow, as a springboard to launch himself higher into the sky, so quickly that it only barely shifted the axe's trajectory.
Then, the boy did three frontflips midair, and landed, casual and light, between the horns of the Ox King's helmet, as if he'd always been there.
"...What?" The giant paused, extremely confused. His eyes had, partially, caught a movement, but his brain completely blue-screened at the sheer speed and skill required to pull off a trick like that.
Immediately, the axe head clattered to the ground, the bandit king's will to fight completely extinguished in lieu of Kakarot's awesome feat, as his body realized the sheer scale of the difference in power, when compared to that of the boy currently sitting casually on his head.