Mutenroshi was immortal.  He could not be killed by any natural means.  Old age meant little more than just another wrinkle and more things seen.

Time was when he was once considered the most powerful and skilled martial artist on the planet.  After having trained under Mutaito, he took the title as the world's finest martial artist after his master's passing.  Since then, he pulled himself from the public's eyes and found himself a nice isolated island and spent much of his eternal life there.

On his island, he also trained a few martial artists.  Roshi recalled fondly his very first student, Gohan.  He showed little potential, but worked fiercely hard and showed an intuitive grasp of skills.  Roshi knew, if nothing else, Gohan would become a fine trainer for another fighter.

His second and third students were Goku and Kurilin.  As fate would have it, Goku was the adopted son of Gohan, and much of the techniques that he'd taught Gohan was likewise practiced by Goku.  He and Kurilin were his best students, and they never failed to amaze him through their unhindered work ethic.  Although Goku would ultimately progress to leave Kurilin in the figurative dust, thanks mostly to his Saiyan blood, the two always pushed each other to their best.  Goku, especially, exhibited great capacity for learning and even greater power.  In 300 years of his existence, Roshi had never seen such a talent, and he never thought would see a greater talent.

            How wrong he was.

            Kail was an absolute beast.  In the first three weeks of training, Kail had blasted through all the exercises that Goku and Kurilin struggled to complete in over three months.  After the second month, Kail had completed all of Roshi's training.  Hope had personally come over a few times a week while Kail still resided on Roshi's island and sparred with him.  Kail was quickly catching up to even Hope's level.  Roshi had never seen in such a child such potential, all at the age of twelve.  I don't even have heavy enough clothing for him to wear.  I've taught him all I know and some that were only experiments and he ate them up like so much ramen.

            Roshi noticed the disinterest in Kail's attitude.  He knew Kail still respected him, but Kail often appeared bored.  In the first few days, it seemed that Roshi's program challenged the young boy, but in the space of just weeks, Kail had begun to challenge Roshi's ability to come up with new innovative training regiments.

            And that was what Roshi was doing right now.  He was hard pressed to think up new techniques, although he was almost certain Kail could learn whatever Roshi could think to throw at him and in a short period of time, make it better.  So, he was sitting on his couch in his library, racking his brain to come up with another technique, when he felt it.

            It was a shift in ki, the likes of which he'd never sensed before.  Roshi quickly pinpointed the source and ran out the of house, to the spot where the ki was emanating.

            And there was Kail, holding himself in the air.  He was manipulating the sea water beneath him.  He drew up spires of brine and twisted and contorted them into such complex patterns that Roshi found it hard to even conceive of such shapes.  At the same time, Kail had levitated several pebbles from the beach through the force of his mind.  He spun them in an infinity loop before shooting them off, quicker than the eye could follow, into the distance.  Kail than followed the rocks with jet streams of the salt water.  Each fine stream struck the pebbles, pulverizing them on contact.  He did all of this with not a trace of strain on his youthful face.

            Roshi found himself completely baffled by the extent of the young boy's power.  For all I know, this child has not even scratched the surface of his true power…

            Kail must have sensed his presence, because he froze the water and the rocks in the air in their respective position and turned to his sensei.  He stared down at his master evenly, his head cocked to one side in a quizzical manner, his face full of expectation, as if he dared Roshi to challenge the extent of his powers.

            "Sensei?" Kail said quietly.

            Roshi sputtered before finally gathering himself.  "Can you do more?"

            Kail's lips curled up in an almost contemptuous sneer as he turned away from his master.  He appeared to be concentrating for a moment before he raised both hands above his head.  Almost disdainfully, he let his hands fall in a downward slicing motion and emphatically spread his arms to the side.

            Nothing prepared Roshi for what happened next.

            Starting at Roshi's feet, wet in the surf, the water began to split.  The crevice in the water soon grew exponentially large as the sea separated, pulled forcefully apart by pure ki.  The water splashed up angrily as it tried to fill the growing gap, but Kail gave it no chance.  The gap continued to grow, until finally, the sea was split into two, a deep canyon running deep into the horizon, with walls of water held up on either side only by the strength of Kail's ki.  As Moses had parted the Red Sea with the power of the western God, Kail had likewise done so, on his own.

            Roshi looked up at his student – though only in name – and gasped in amazement and fear.  Amazement for the prodigious feat achieved on that day, and fear for the realization that when Kail reached his full potential, he could easily lift the whole mass of water on the entire planet into the air without breaking a sweat.

A few days later, Kail found himself standing outside Master Roshi's house, eagerly awaiting the arrival of Hope.  He took that time to reflect on the past two and a half months.

            Kail had begun training under Master Roshi full of hope and excitement.  Roshi, admittedly, ran an extremely tough program.  Kail, in response, pushed himself to his limits and far beyond, motivated solely by the prospect of bringing justice to the monsters who murdered his mother.  He worked everyday harder than he did the day before.  Roshi's house was never want for any food, so the daily schedule was reduced to train, eat, train, eat, train, eat, train and sleep.

            And over the next few weeks, he had progressed quickly through the exercises Roshi had set for him.  Sensei started mixing in some techniques along with the strenuous exercises.  Kail spent day and night learning them and perfecting them and it was not long before Roshi had run out of stuff to teach him.

            Master Roshi worked hard to further challenge his student, but Kail found out soon enough that nothing Master Roshi could plan would even come close to giving Kail any difficulty.  Despite Roshi's best, and sometimes admirable, efforts, Kail soon found himself getting bored.

            Bored and disappointed.  He had hoped Roshi's program would be more difficult.  He wondered why Roshi could not challenge him further.

            And out of that disappointment, grew impatience.  Kail was repeatedly frustrated by the endless wait; the wait for things to come but could not come soon enough.  Kail believed himself to be ready.  He knew he could make a difference.

            The only tolerable part of the wait was the training with Hope.  They had sparred numerous times and Kail knew he was quickly improving.  As good as he had become, however, Kail could not defeat Hope.  He knew he was nearly as powerful as he was when it came to pure strength and ki-capability, but Hope had years of experience in battle, whereas Kail had none.

            But Kail looked forward to this day especially because Hope had promised that they would begin his weapons training.  Hope had given Kail his choice of weapons, and while there was a large and interesting array, Kail had selected the double edged sword, just like the one Hope carried.  Kail's heart raced in anticipation of the new training.

            It was not long before Hope arrived.  Hope was always punctual.  Kail smiled eagerly, as a child would smile in anticipation of his birthday present.

            As soon as Hope landed, Kail raced up to him.

            "We're starting sword training today.  Right, Hope?"  Kail questioned.

            Hope chuckled benignly.  "Yes, we are, Kail.  Are you ready?"

            Kail's grin grew even bigger.  "You bet."

            The two walked to the forest behind Roshi's little house.  Roshi had taken the day off today and had gone out to town, no doubt to visit some adult stores.  Kail had quickly found out about Roshi's dirty hobby, and sometimes hassled him about it.

            When they had reached a secluded area in the forest, Hope bent to the ground and picked up a tree branch about a meter and a half long.  He gathered a small amount of ki into his hand and in seconds had carved broken branch into a wooden imitation of a sword, just over a meter and a third long..

            Hope smiled mischievously.  "Neat little trick, especially if you find yourself in a fight without a weapon and you really need one."

            Hope looked at Kail and tossed him the wooden sword.  Kail looked up at his mentor quizzically.

            "This is a fake sword," Kail exclaimed indignantly.

            "So not only are you incredibly powerful, your powers of perception is also mind boggling."  Hope responded.

            Kail shook his head.  "Why don't I get a real sword?"

            Hope looked at him evenly.  "Because until you are fluent with the sword, you're more of a danger to yourself and you friends than you are to your opponent."

            Eyes filled with indignation, Kail threw down his wooden sword and cried out at his mentor.  "I can do it!  I know how to handle a sword!"

            Hope raised an eyebrow.  "Oh, really?"  He seemed to be contemplating a thought for a moment before he shrugged.  "All right.  Let's see."

            Hope sauntered over to pick up the discarded sword and glanced it over before disdainfully tossing it over to the side.  He walked over to a nearby tree and broke off a skinny, willowy branch, just barely over a meter long.  Nodding his head as if satisfied, Hope drew his own sword from its scabbard slung across his back.

            "If you can catch me with that sword, than you get to train with a real one," Hope said.

Kail looked at Hope as if he were crazy.  "Are you kidding?  I'll kill you."

Hope shrugged.  "You might.  I mean, all I have is this little branch.  But you probably won't even touch me with it.  So, go ahead, give it your best shot."  He nonchalantly tossed the sword to Kail.  Kail reached confidently to grab it, but as he did so, he was pulled to the ground by the sheer weight of it.

            Hope snickered.  "That is, if you can pick it up off the ground."

            Kail glared hard up at his companion.  With great effort, he pulled the sword from the ground and charged at him.

            Holding the sword like a baseball bat, Kail swung to bat the pitiful branch out of the way and slice deep into Hope's smug face.  He missed.

            Hope simply stepped back from the swipe and pulled his branch back.  He flicked the tip out and tickled Kail's ear.

            "How's that feel?"

            Grunting with exertion, Kail heaved the sword up and brought it down in an overhand slash.  Hope casually sidestepped the strike and kicked the overbalanced Kail on the rear.  Kail stumbled forward before catching himself with one hand.  He pushed himself up and faced Hope again.

            Kail pointed the tip at Hope and drove forward.  He thrust forward the deadly blade, but Hope gracefully spun away from the thrust and along the blade and the outstretched arm.  As he completed the spin, he came shoulder to shoulder with Kail, his left shoulder meeting Kail's right.  Hope reached out with his right hand, grabbed Kail's wrist and locked his elbow against his own.  Hope pivoted, sending Kail in a circle.  Kail, driven by the pain in his right elbow, had no choice but to follow.

            Hope stopped abruptly, reached up and grabbed Kail by the back of his shirt with his left hand, the tree branch long dispensed with.  He pulled hard, at the same time throwing his right hand, and with it Kail's right arm, upward, overbalancing Kail and making him fall backwards.  As Kail fell, Hope stepped around in front to face him, and replaced his grip on Kail's arm with his left hand.  With his right, he reached in for the inside of Kail's elbow and punched it, forcing it to break.  Hope followed Kail to the ground, straddling him, his left hand holding firmly Kail's grip on the blade.  The tip buried itself in the ground, and the blade held just inches above Kail's neck.

            "See?  You're not ready yet."  Hope commented lightly.

            Kail only smiled in return.  "But I got you."

            "What?"

            Kail pointed to the tear in Hope's jacket.  "I got you.  Now you have to get me a real sword," he said triumphantly, breathing hard from exhaustion.

            "B… but."

            Kail shook his head.  "No buts.  You made a deal.  I got you.  Now you have to pay up."

            Hope chuckled sheepishly.  "All right.  A deal's a deal.  Tomorrow, you start your training with a real sword.