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P.S. Reviews are appreciated.
-YARN
Piccolo and Bojack crashed into each other in a blur of arms, legs, and ki blasts as they battled across the wasteland where Bojack had been beating the human Z-fighters. Both fighters has seemed to be evenly matched as neither seemed to be able to get the edge on each other. As time went on, Piccolo's regenerative factor kicked in and the wounds he had were slowly healing over the fight even as he sustained more attacks. The fight fell more out of the blue alien's favor as they dragged on and despite his bravado, he knew it. They both hit each other with a fist and disengaged as they both let the force of the cross-blow move them away from each other to land on the ground.
"This is fantastic!" Bojack laughed despite the fact he was making less headway against Piccolo, "I never expected a namekian to be strong enough to give me a real fight! It truly is commendable for you to be this strong, but unfortunately that just means I'll have to make sure you're captured so we can drain you. Zangya will have to double back once she has taken care of your allies and makes sure the lamp isn't damaged."
Piccolo scoffed at that, "You make it sound like you've already won this fight. In case you haven't noticed, you're beginning to tire and I still have more than enough power to keep going like this."
Bojack sneered, "Then lets kick it up a notch, shall we?"
He roared as his muscles bulged and ripped his shirt and coat; his hair that had been orange darkened into a blood red and lengthened as his skin turned green. The area around him cratered under the weight of his power and he drifted higher into the air. An aura of green ki surrounded him as he crossed his arms and smirked imperiously down at Piccolo, noting the way Piccolo's eyes narrowed in wariness.
"Well Namekian?" Bojack boasted, "Still so confident in your victory?"
Piccolo didn't answer but simply removed his turban and shoulder pads, before tossing them aside to create craters where the weighted gear landed landed. Piccolo cracked his neck and rotated his shoulders before powering up himself and floating up to Bojack's height. Bojack raised an eyebrow at the Namekian, but still looked forward to this even as Piccolo had once again leveled the playing field.
"You may be strong," Piccolo growled, "but you sold your free will to gain it. Regardless of whether you win this fight or not, you will never be more than a slave to someone who — above all else — is weaker than you."
Bojack smirk immediately vanished, replaced with an ugly scowl, "I am simply taking advantage of the wizard! Once he has hatched his monster I will destroy it and then kill him! Do not make the mistake that I am a slave to anyone!"
Piccolo frowned, "You say it as though you are invincible, maybe I should you exactly how wrong you are!"
Bojack let out a roar of rage and blitzed towards Piccolo who rushed at him from his position.
The Z-fighters who had just dealt with the androids felt the spike in ki from the two aliens and immediately tensed looking towards the direction it was coming from.
"What the..?" Gohan muttered, "Who is Piccolo up against?"
Vegeta scowled, "Someone far more entertaining than these useless buckets of bolts!"
Goku scowled as well, "That's so unfair! Why didn't I know about him? I wanna fight him!"
Kurai frowned but remained silent, 'Why is Bojack here? King Kai's planet wasn't destroyed in this timeline, is it that demon realm guy? 17 and 18 were never as strong as Bojack even with the majin boost, so why use them?"
Kurai's eyes widened, "Shit!"
Several pair of eyes swiveled to him, "They aren't going to drain us! Not directly! They've been using the ambient power that the fighters they branded to fill Majin Buu's power gauge! The more of our opponents we fight the more ki gets sent back to Buu when they die! We need to find Babidi before he gathers anymore energy!"
It made sense, after Gohan half-filled Majin Buu's power gauge, Vegeta and Goku simply clashing and damaging each other emitted enough energy to power up the rest of the gauge. Kurai knew that the Z-fighters had increased in power — Gohan hadn't trained in 7 whole years and still was able to fill up half the gauge at Super Saiyan 2 — and most of it because of it was because they were wished back to life after they had been doing nothing but train while in otherworld and in the subsequent years after. If that guy kept pulling out foes from timelines and then Babidi kept marking them, then Buu's gauge would be filled rapidly as they fought.
And that was the best case scenario, who's to say that they couldn't simply adjust the majin symbol to bleed off energy to gather it more effectively from their hosts AND opponents? Bojack was stronger than he should have been and Kurai could sense the clogged and murky corrupted energy that Towa has used when she was still alive tainting his ki.
Kurai supposed it was a good thing that they brought all the Z-fighters back to life and had relatively decent amount of peace. Vegeta was unlikely to let himself fall under Babidi's control since he didn't have a time limit in which to fight Goku and settle their rivalry. Plus, Vegeta had far too much pride in his power now to march to beat of anyone's drum but his own; his death and living most of his life before that under Frieza's thumb to ever allow that to happen again. Regardless of however much power he would gain, he would never be anyone's slave or servant. Vegeta's intention now was that he would beat Goku with his own power, and he would win on his own merit and own effort.
"Well I suppose that I should tell you that your earthling friends have followed on of the mind-controlled Zangya to the ship." A smooth voice interrupted.
XTrunks turned to the newcomer and gasped, "Supreme Kai!"
The Kai landed with Kibito and approached the group with a smile, "It's good to finally meet you all."
Krillin, Yamcha, and Tien all crouched low and suppressed their ki in order to spy on Zangya as she approached the short lizard-like creature — who was definitely Babidi based on Kurai's description — and the orange skinned individual in a blue outfit — just the power alone made them think that he was the Demon King Dabura — as she approached with the lamp. Next to them was a person who matched the person Kurai and Xtrunks had described who intended to mess with the time stream. They could sense how strong Dabura was and knew rushing the group would only end badly for all of them. That aside, they could at least get some intel and then let everyone know where Babidi had hidden their spaceship.
"Bojack was locked in combat with one potential energy candidate after defeating three lower potential energy candidates." Zangya said as she held the lamp in her hands, "I am sorry I wasn't able to gather any energy from them."
"Not to worry!" Babidi cackled, "Fuhai tweaked the Majin symbols so that even if our majin warriors can't damage our targets, the damage they accumulate and energy they expend gets transferred to Majin Buu regardless. Just the androids alone charged Buu to ten percent, and Bojack's opponent has been steadily increasing the gauge as his fight drags on. You need not fret about failing my dear, you do hold some loyalty to Bojack and you wouldn't have been able to beat his current opponent anyway."
Zangya seemed relieved and the three hidden Z-fighters watched as the foursome walked back into the spaceship.
Half of the Z-fighters were making their way over to Piccolo who was still locked in combat with Bojack while the other half went to the ship. Before they separated, the Supreme Kai had gone over most of the most pertinent information — most of the Z-fighters didn't want to tell the Kai they already knew most of it for themselves — about how dangerous Babidi and Buu were. Kurai was sure any single one of them could take Dabura without too much trouble, but he didn't think it would really matter. Kid Buu was the threat to worry about if he was created, if that could be avoided it would be better for everyone as Super Buu literally killed every single person that wasn't on the lookout. Kid Buu always seemed to be stronger than Super Buu to Kurai as he battled them both over the course of his missions. Kid Buu was only ever losing out in power to Super Buu when Gohan got cocky and was absorbed into Buu. Kurai could even see Kid Buu edging out a victory against Buu when he absorbed Gotenks and/or Piccolo, Gohan's massive power was what tipped the scales and required the fusion of Vegeta and Goku.
Yeah. Killing Innocent Buu before too much went wrong was better than letting Good Buu be created and possibly lose to Evil Buu.
Kurai just hoped that the corrupted time ring wouldn't cause too much of a variance, the last thing he needed was Buu empowered or turning into Kid Buu like he had before.
It was worrying enough that the group that went to the spaceship had Goku, Vegeta, and Gohan they were the original three even if Xtrunks was there to chaperone.
Piccolo smashed Bojack into the earth before punting the once-upon-a-time conquerer across the land. Bojack growled and righted himself just in time to skid across the earth before falling to one knee and panting in exhaustion.
How much power had that Namekian been hiding?
"What's wrong?" Piccolo mocked, "Is this all you can do?"
"Shut up!" Bojack roared, tapping fully into the dark reserve of ki that Babidi had give him as purple interlaced with his green aura, "I'll crush you!"
Piccolo scowled and got into a ready stance, "I don't think you can. Kaio-ken!"
His skin tinted red as the red aura of the Kaio-ken overtook his usually white aura, shrouding him as his power spiked. Bojack stood up and smirked at the Namekian using that technique that the others had used.
"That technique?" Bojack jeered, "You do realize that it's only good for short bursts? I'll outlast you far before you could even hope to kill me!"
Piccolo smirked, "If you are so sure, then come at me."
Bojack rushed forward only for piccolo to duck under the fist and smash a fist into Bojack's stomach and quickly pivot into a roundhouse that sent Bojack flying back. Piccolo exploded from where he was to rain a barrage of blows on the alien, each one stunning the alien conquerer anew before Piccolo fired a ki blast into his face that blew the alien straight into the earth. Piccolo waited for a moment and leapt back as Bojack rose into the air, rubbing the back of his hand across his lower jaw to wipe away a trickle of blood. He glared venomously at the Namekian and his corrupted aura flared as he blitzed forward and hit Piccolo with a two-handed sledgehammer that sent him flying sideways. Bojack began to launch a barrage of ki blasts at Piccolo before the Namekian could right himself in the air to block or dodge it. Piccolo gritted his teeth as he felt the ki blasts impact him; The Namekian let out an explosive wave that gave him the instant of delay to slip out of the way and fly to the side as he weaved through the barrage of ki blasts.
Bojack finally took notice that the Namekian's aura was still red as the Namekian had somehow managed to keep the Kaio-ken from degrading his abilities as he fought. Bojack stopped firing his barrage drifted back to bait Piccolo into charging him which worked like a charm. Piccolo tried to land a flurry of blows as Bojack let himself be pushed back only to flip back to slam his foot into Piccolo's chin and send him back. In the brief pause, Bojack drew out more of the corrupted time ki as he now had streams of sliver slipping into the dark purple aura he had used. Piccolo noted the increase in power an frowned in annoyance at his opponent, he was really starting to get on his nerves.
It was bad enough if that woman he sent the lamp with was anywhere near his power-level before he transformed. Krillin, Tien, and Yamcha would not stack up to her even if they used all of their training and Kaio-ken levels.
Time to kick it up a notch.
"Times two!" Piccolo declared.
The red aura around him surged and flared erratically, his power level doubling from his initial boost.
Piccolo fired a barrage of powerful ki blasts, all of which Bojack managed to just tank through or avoid as he rushed at Piccolo.
Piccolo didn't let Bojack's new speed throw him off as they were suddenly clashing, punches crossing, ki blasts flying, and kicks colliding as they refused to give each other an inch. Bojack was snarling, face set in a hateful mask as he bore down on the Namekian who — by rights — wasn't supposed to be able to fight back let alone beat him. That damn lizard swore that he would be impossible to beat in any capacity, he would just need utilize the mark's full potential. Well he just did and he wasn;t even fighting the Saiyans he had been told lived here, but the Namekian! He wasn't foolish enough to think that if given the adequate amount of time and training their power could match if not surpass the renown warrior race, but Bojack had fought and easily killed both of these supposed battle-trained species before! This should have been no different! That damn lizard, the supposed demon king, and that third lackey were going to pay with their lives once he managed to kill this bastard, he'd make sure of it!
He was knocked back by a kick and sent flying gritting his teeth in pain.
Ke skidded to a stop in midair only to realize there were suddenly surrounded by dozens of glowing spheres of ki, all either still or orbiting around him. He turned to look and realized the Namekian was smirking while firing more ki spheres into the area and Bojack realized he had been suckered. The ki blasts that he had avoided after he powered up hadn't been meant to hit him in the first place, a few had landed, but that was a ploy to act as a smokescreen. All of it was done to trick the conquerer into a position where he wouldn't notice the setup of this attack.
Or be able to stop it.
"Goodbye." Piccolo mocked, "HELLZONE GRENADE!"
The Namekian crossed his arms and the ki blasts all converged on Bojack, he fired his own blast to try to mitigate the damage but he was still at the epicenter and there were simply too many blasts heading his way, there was no way out. The blasts all struck at once creating a massive explosion that completely destroyed Bojack and vaporized him. Piccolo waited until the smoke cleared and his smirk widened at there being no trace of Bojack left.
He dismissed his Kaio-ken and floated down to the ground just as the backup arrived, "You're a bit late."
Babidi cackled as the energy meter ticked up to 45% energy, "Oh, only a bit more and soon Buu with be ready to destroy everything at my behest!"
Whoever this Fuhai fellow was, recruiting him had probably been one of the best decisions he had ever made! He had no idea how he was able to tweak his own magic, but he was able to pull out strong fighters that were wonderful fodder for him to use to bring Buu up to full power! Fuhai himself smiled as he said they only needed two or three more subjects and Buu would be ready!
Fuhai smiled as he opened the portal and a perfected bio-android came out before a Majin symbol branded himself on his head and he let out a cry of pain and rage. In addition another figure cried out in agony as he clutched at his head, dark hair lifting as it turned gold in a reaction to the pain of the symbol now marked on his forehead without his consent. The final figure groaned as his dark skin didn't hide the mark that now adorned his forehead as he staggered to his feet. Soon all three members stood tall as they looked to their new master, the lingering pain already dissipating from the marking. Babidi cackled in delight as he took in the three figures now in front of him, they were strong and better yet fully marked and ready to do his bidding.
"Who are you?" The saiyan demanded, "What did you do to me?"
"I simply wished to help my new allies with some more power!" Babidi said smoothly, lie easily coming to his lips, "As a sign of our alliance, I simply have given you a mark that bestows some of the power I possess to bolster your abilities. After all it is a gift freely given for you to use, I simply require some assistance."
"So it's a trade?" The bio-android inquired, hand coming up to rub at his forhead, "Once we are done helping you we lose the power you gave us?"
"Oh not at all." Babidi waved him off, "It is yours from now till the day you perish."
The dark-skinned saiyan flexed his arms and smiled, "Why question this? I can already feel this new power flowing under my skin!"
"May I be given your names?" Babidi simpered.
"I am Turles, who drained dozens of worlds for the Tree of Might."
"I am Cell, the perfect life form created by Dr. Gero to surpass all of his other creations."
The saiyan scoffed at the underwhelming claims of the other two but chose to introduce himself as well.
"My name is Kakarot. I am the saiyan who fulfilled the prophecy and became The Legendary Super Saiyan after destroying my enemies!"