A body of a tanned martial artist wrapped in yellow cloth flew past multiple rows of his disciples and slammed into a large Buddhist statue. King Chappa fell down on his bottom and looked up at the ghoulish, pale boy floating up in front of him with a submissive stare as he knew that he no longer had the stamina to get back up nor the will to fight this mysterious opponent.
"King Chappa! They beat King Chappa!" a rustle spread amongst the disciples, inviting the honored martial artist to then rise back on his feet and wipe the blood drooling off over his lush beard.
"You've cheated. This was no honorable martial arts fight!" King Chappa declared. "I cannot allow some mystical cheater to claim the gem that the Bodhichapati holds in his eight arms!" the martial artist pointed back at the massive statue looming behind him that he had just slammed into and left some cracks by the statue's knees. Cradled in all eight of the hands of the divinity that the statue portrayed was a Dragon Ball.
"This is total rubbish! You got beat and you know it!" Bulma pointed at King Chappa with an accusatory tone. "Now hold your part of the deal and hand us the Dragon Ball!" she demanded perhaps a little bit abusing the welcome that the monastery in which King Chappa raised and trained his pupils as well as performed his spiritual duties showed the Dragon Team.
"Was it just because I used my telekinesis to fight?" Chiaotzu bent his head to the side like a curious puppy. His lips swirled like a boiled string of pasta as he had blamed himself for the fact that the Dragon Team lost out on the opportunity to obtain their fifth Dragon Ball. "Because I can fight without it…"
"You foul monster! Look at you floating over the ground, you'd still cheat as you're doing right now!" one of the monks appeared to buy into King Chappa's hogwash, displaying himself as quite the trustworthy piece of ragged cloth for his master.
"B-But that's how I normally walk…" Chiaotzu leaned back in mid-air, landing on the floor and trying to get used to walking around normally. Judging from his unnatural movements down on the floor, he'd be at a great disadvantage fighting this way.
"Forget it…" King Chappa said. "This is pointless anyway. Now that you've weakened me with your foul mystical powers I could never fight you fairly as this competition demands it. Begone from my monastery and feel glad that you were shown the welcome you've experienced here."
"I still don't understand why I didn't get to fight…" Muten Roshi scratched his bald head. "I don't float and I could have given you more than you've bargained…"
King Chappa turned to Muten Roshi with a square look but did not reply, likely because he couldn't word his worry over confronting the world-renowned Muten Roshi in a martial arts competition over a Dragon Ball to make himself sound honorable in front of his students.
"Do you have anything useful to add?" Bulma turned to Launch who just gasped, in her blue-haired form.
"M-Me? Oh my… I… I'm not a fighter… Gee… I don't even…" she gulped and panted in anxiety over being spoken to by another human being.
"You must understand, if we don't get our hands on this Dragon Ball, the whole world will be in trouble!" Puar floated over to King Chappa who just crossed his arms over his chest and stared up at the floating kitten with a swollen left eye at the spot where Chiaotzu kicked him during their short scuffle. "Demon King Piccolo intends to kill all martial artists and take over the world as he's done in the past!"
"I have heard of this Demon King you speak of. He was sealed into a rice cooker, everybody knows that!" King Chappa dismissed Puar's attempts at reasoning with him. "You're just trying to frighten me into giving you the gem and that will simply never happen. The martial artists of this monastery will not be frightened by any enemy."
"I'm surprised you even know what a rice cooker is…" Bulma crossed her own arms and looked away with a pout, she was just inches away from growling and clawing at this annoying poser's face. He was a respected martial artist and a powerful one too, but now, in the face of adversity he couldn't measure up to, he was acting like a real diva.
"Of course we know what a rice cooker is, all of the generous donations of the village go toward the Rice Cooker Fund, one day we will have a rice cooker of our own to cook our rice in!" one of the monks declared proudly for all to hear, a few of the monks cheered on the bold declaration of the monk.
"Oh? And what if we gave you a rice cooker for that Dragon Ball? I have a capsule with one…" Bulma began burrowing in her case of capsules. "Can you seal Demon King Piccolo into something else than a rice cooker, if need be?" she wondered, looking at Muten Roshi.
"Yes. A jar, a pot… Just about anything of a similar shape." Muten Roshi nodded.
"Don't even bother! What would be the point of a rice cooker if we didn't earn it ourselves? How can we taste the bland and ascetic texture of boiled, white rice if we didn't bust our nails and break our fingers collecting scraps to afford it!?" the monk declared, yelling at Bulma as if he was talking to an ignorant foreigner who insulted their beliefs.
"Ugh! I can't believe it!" Bulma ground her teeth.
"Ooooh!" a rumbling moan resonated through the monastery, all of the monks turned their attention to the statue while King Chappa took a leap backward, taking a fighting stance to confront this mysterious moaner. A massive hand reached out from behind the statue, then another and another, until a grand total of eight hands appeared from behind the statue and helped a living avatar of the divinity that the statue portrayed emerge from behind.
"Oh my!" Launch gasped. "Let's run away, has anybody seen Oolong!?"
"Ooooh!" the divinity moaned again as if it had just awoken from a deep slumber and pointed one of its index fingers at King Chappa. "I, Bodhichattarmalatti have woken from my slumber after hearing you deny these humble travelers this gem! Have you not heard that they need it to save the world? I, Bodhiservelatti, am very disappointed in you, my disciples!"
King Chappa leaped up and drove his palm into the core of the looming divinity, sending it crashing down on the floor in a cloud of smoke as dust of the monastery and the natural smoke that accompanied Oolong's transformation, expanded into a much more massive cloud now that the shapeshifting piglet attempted to transform into something so massive, spread throughout the hallowed halls of the monastery.
"You dare besmirch the name of our spiritual leader, Bodhichapati, impersonating him without even speaking his name right? There is no honor amongst you knaves, begone from this monastery at once!" King Chappa clutched his fist in front of himself and growled.
"You're the one who has no honor, you…" Bulma let the anger boiling inside her free all at once, sadly she did not have the opportunity to complete her declaration of what exactly she thought King Chappa to be, in her opinion, for a subtle and wet sneeze interrupted her. Normally, Bulma would not be the one to be interrupted by a mere sneeze but, given the full knowledge of whom she fostered in her group, it was a sound she had learned to dread even when woken up in the middle of the night.
"Yer welcome," Launch smirked at the rest of the group as she played around with an automated pistol that she rolled around in her hand, once in a while she stopped her playing and clutched her fingers around the handle and took aim at some blank spot before snickering to herself and resuming her spinning routine.
"We are very grateful that you helped us get that Dragon Ball, Launch-chan but… Were the hand grenades really necessary?" Muten Roshi scratched his sweating, bald head.
"It was really dangerous for Launch-san to lash out like that, King Chappa is a formidable martial artist, he might have hurt you…" Chiaotzu pointed out.
"That's why you two were there, to soften 'em up for me!" Launch smirked.
"Plus, it's not like that insufferable buffoon would have started any trouble with Muten Roshi around, he was really frightened the whole way through…" Bulma smirked and let her bag slip off of her shoulders only to gaze into the ever-increasing load she carried around which resided inside.
"So, Bulma, where's the next Dragon Ball?" Oolong sent a wayward look Bulma's way.
"Oh… Let's see…" Bulma pulled out her radar and zoomed in. "Huh… It seems to be underwater, I think… No… Wait… It's moving, yes, definitely moving slowly towards the east in the North Ocean."
"The North Ocean, huh?" Oolong sighed. "That seems like it's going to be a hassle, really cold and we'll need a pretty strong gadget to have our jet break through the ice and insulate us down under. Maybe let's snag the other ball now and leave this one for the last?"
"No. If this Dragon Ball has already been found, we are best to obtain it as soon as we can. If it's been found by somebody who's not Demon King Piccolo, we cannot trust that it will be safe in their hands, if it's been found by Demon King indeed… Things will get complicated." Muten Roshi spoke in a husky tone, oppressed by the weight of the possibility that the Demon King might have had a Dragon Ball making the task of collecting all seven infinitely more dangerous.
"Hello, King Enma, we're here for a favor." Fortuneteller Baba declared as she floated up to the bottom of the massive table which King Enma sat behind, floating right past the line of disgruntled ogres about to hand in their work to their boss who just kept on stamping on sheets of paper, occasionally taking a breather to switch the stamp he would drive onto the document.
"Oh? You're back again? Haven't seen you in a wild… Hmmm… Is that Chayote!?" King Enma sat up in his chair, straightening his back and instantly beginning to sweat. "Please don't tell me that Chayote has died, this is a very, very bad time!"
"Oh? No, not for seven more years, at least…" Fortuneteller Baba chuckled. "We're here about a soul that has passed on into limbo. A young martial artist slain by a member of the Evil Tribe."
"Wha!? So this is the Otherworld!?" Goku looked around, displaying the befitting amazement of a child who's wandered into a place too grandiose for him to be there at the moment. "Everyone who dies comes through here!?"
"That's right, Goku-san." Upa nodded with a polite smile on his face. He's learned plenty about the Otherworld from Baba in the last couple of years of training but this was the first time that Chayote knew about that Baba allowed him to accompany her here. "Everybody, usually they don't get to keep their body though, those right there are the souls lined up to be processed by King Enma and directed to Heaven or Hell. Those that don't deserve Heaven get sent to Hell where they must redeem their sins until King Enma chooses to reincarnate them in the machine."
"Can you two can it for a little bit? I'm trying to concentrate here…" King Enma grumbled while flipping through pages of a book as thick as Baba if she sat atop of Chayote's shoulders. "Ah, yes… A more recent victim, it seems. Not too many of those, I've expected a lot more, given that troublesome guy. You'd wonder why Earth has a guardian, to begin with, huh?"
"You know how Kami-sama is with Demon King Piccolo…" Baba mumbled. "It's not like something can be done."
"Huh? Is that Demon King Piccolo guy really that much of a problem? Maybe we should go beat him up right after this?" Goku contemplated out loud.
"Under no circumstances. Two little monsters like you would end up killing him and that cannot be allowed to happen." Fortuneteller Baba turned toward the pair.
"Wait, you're saying we can't kill him?" Chayote scratched her head. "Why not?"
"Well… It's tough to explain, it would fly right over the heads of you two so just trust me and don't do it!" Fortuneteller Baba shook her fist over her head. Chayote just shrugged.
"If he tried hurting Krillin again, or anybody else, I'm going to knock him out!" Goku declared. "It's his problem if he can take it or not."
"See what we're dealing with on a daily basis down there?" Fortuneteller Baba sighed with a look at King Enma that may as well have demanded to be mercy-killed.
"Hmmm… Yes… Well… You are aware of the grave circumstances of anything at all going wrong, right? If Demon King Piccolo dies, if Chayote dies… It would thusly be for the best if the two stayed clear of one another…" King Enma suggested. "Now, about that limbo-guy. What do you want to do with him?"
Chayote jumped onto King Enma's table, making Fortuneteller Baba's jaw drop that her own student would act so carelessly and rude toward the king of all ogres. Chayote pulled out the Free Return Ticket from her coat pocket and handed it to King Enma.
"I want Krillin to come back to life using this." Chayote declared.
"Huh? You had this thing with you all along and you're using it on some Earthling? That's… You do know that if you die and Zeno-sama realizes… Our entire universe will go to waste…" King Enma stroke his sweating forehead.
"Hmmm… You were right… I've got no idea whatsoever about what's going on…" Goku complained after looking at Upa.
"Chayote is a very special kind of Saiyan. She has a very rare type of cells within her blood which makes her a very valuable person, she gives our universe a higher score and… Let's just say we need to have a high score. If Chayote would ever die… Well… Our universe would become endangered." Upa tried explaining it to Goku in terms he could understand.
"Wow! Chayote's a person like that!?" Goku yelled out in shock. "No wonder she's so strong!"
"Hmm? No, by Saiyan standards Chayote would actually be someone considered "low-class", it's not that she's exceptionally talented or that her genes make her a freak of strength, it's more that cells like hers are very rare. In fact, Saiyans like that are only born once in a thousand or so years and, right now, our universe is lucky to have two of them." King Enma joined in on the explanation. "For that reason alone, our universe is currently safe from too harsh of scrutiny."
King Enma took the ticket from Chayote's hand and tore it to pieces. Chayote's jaw dropped as her eyebrows began to twitch, she had thought that the king of ogres had just destroyed the ticket but then the ogre king stood up and began going through sheets of documents inside his drawers. King Enma slammed a pile and began browsing through it, picking up his telephone and ringing up a number he noticed on one of the sheets.
"Yes… Hen-san, I'd like to see you in my office. Yes, right now, please…" King Enma spoke before hanging up and weaving his fingers together. After a few moments, the king of ogres began tapping his table and whistling a delightful tune.
"Ummm…" Chayote raised her finger, about to inquire what was going on but King Enma jumped off his seat.
"Get off my table, mortal and wait until Hen-san gets here!" he yelled out and Chayote followed his orders despite being a little bit lost.
"Who's Hen-san?" Chayote looked to Fortuneteller Baba.
"He handles limbo. You see, limbo is technically located on the earthly realm, think of it as another dimension, it's a place from which ghosts appear before mortals, that's how thin the lines between the two are." Fortuneteller Baba explained.
"Ah… I see…" Goku hammered his palm with his fist.
"You didn't understand thing Baba said, did you?" Upa looked at Goku with an inquisitive stare. Goku laughed out and leaned back on his arms bent behind his head and shook his head.
Just a few moments later, an odd rumbling noise as if a roar of a very puny engine came from somewhere remote, Chayote and Goku ran up to the long line leading up to King Enma's Check-In Station all the way from the beginning of the line. They peeked through the exit and the line of souls queued up to witness a red scooter burst forth from the yellow clouds underneath and jump onto the line, slowly fumbling around the souls and carrying a puny ogre with glasses and clad in a leather bodysuit roll up to the Check-In Station only to perform a skid with his back wheel in front of King Enma's table and raise his hand up, as if his pathetic scooter skid was in any shape or form meant to be cool.
"Yo!" the ogre Hen muttered. "I'm Hen."
"Hen-san, you have a soul in your possession, a young boy named Krillin, Fortuneteller Baba's apprentice would like to cash in her Free Return Ticket to bring that boy back to life." King Enma explained.
"Oh… That's how it is… Well…" Hen jumped off of his scooter and let its handle slam down on the floor while he ran up to the folks with a slow jog and grabbed the top zipper of his bodysuit. Before anyone could demand that Hen would not do whatever perverted deed he had in mind, Hen unzipped it and opened the leather bodysuit up, exposing a whirly and very mind-bending view of shifting dimensions located underneath his bodysuit. Hen leaned down and stuffed his head inside the kaleidoscope-like dimensional shifts.
"Krillin! Is there a Krillin in there!" he yelled out. Something must have answered for the slim ogre stuffed its hand inside the rift underneath his bodysuit and pulled a bald boy out by his collar and then placed him onto the floor of King Enma's office right in front of everybody before zipping his bodysuit back up.
"There he is, Krillin, thank you very much!" he yelled out and hopped onto his scooter before blitzing in full thirty-five kilos per hour around the queue of souls and taking a rather sad-looking nosedive into the yellow clouds underneath.
"W-We were meant to be thanking him, I think…" Upa scratched his cheek, bewildered by what he had just seen while both Goku, Chayote, and Krillin were still getting accustomed to their reunion.