IT LIVES.
P.S. Elements from the manga, anime, and movies will mix.
-YARN
Broly fist knocked Kurai back when suddenly Broly felt a wave of fatigue as the distorted time energy suddenly abandoned him. Kurai felt the decrease in Broly's power and smirked as he regained his footing and rammed into Broly with a full-bodied tackle. Broly went flying into the surrounding mountains and began coughing up blood from the severe amount of damage that he had accumulated from fighting all the Z-fighters one after another and then having to contend with Goku and Kurai actually powering up to fight him. He had been able to keep fighting with the time energy soothing away the worst of his pain; now he only had his own power and while it was still a monstrous amount, it was not going to be enough if he didn't figure out something quick. He suddenly saw a barrage of ki heading towards him and threw his arms out as he formed a sphere of green ki around him to defend himself from the blasts raining down on him. When the barrage ended, he dissipated his force field and saw Kurai on the ground, walking towards him while still engulfed in that white aura.
"No… NO!" The Saiyan roared, "I won't let it end like this!"
Broly blitzed into the air and landed on a nearby cliff while called upon all of his rage and remaining power, causing a gust of wind and wave of energy to buffet the area. Broly gathered his energy into his Gigantic Meteor that was stronger than the one he used against Gohan and Goten in his timeline as Kurai sent out a spray of ki spheres in orbit around him and got into his stance. The spheres around him flew back into his cupped hands as glowed around a blue center of ki. Kurai's eyes flitted to where Broly's aura wasn't just rising, but focusing all on the energy blast he was making; he was too angry to play anymore. Broly wouldn't hold anything back in this attack, even when he fired his attack at Gohan and Goten in that alternate timeline, he had played around with the two demi-saiyans — and Goku when he arrived — when he could have ended it.
Broly wrist flicked out and the small green spark of his attack drifted towards Kurai.
Kurai didn't underestimate it.
'I don't know if you know how much this'll mean to me after so long Broly…' Kurai thought in his head, 'But killing you is going to feel great!'
"Convergence Kamehameha!"
The attack erupted from Kurai's hands and slammed into the spark of ki that Broly had released as the spark immediately expanded into a massive sphere of green ki. The two blasts pushed into each other as the clouds parted and the earth shook, the light from the clashing attacks illuminating the area around them. Kurai grit his teeth as Broly didn't wait and fired a barrage of ki blasts into the back of his Gigantic Meteor, trying to force it forward to envelop the former time patroller. Kurai scowled as the amount of power he was outputting had the ground crumbling beneath him around him as he poured more power into his attack. Even with the loss of time-distortion energy, Broly was no pushover and his power seemed to alway amp up when he was desperate or angry. This time he was both and the fact he wouldn't let up on the barrage of ki blasts he was firing into the back of his attack showed he was not holding anything back. Kurai heard a bubbling sound and blanched as he eyes flitted to the earth and he saw lava bubbling up from crevices that the shockwaves were making.
This was not good, if this kept up the ground would give way to lava and Kurai would be swallowed up and die by default.
"Kamehameha!" Gohan's voice rang out over.
A massive blue stream of ki flew past Kurai and hit the Gigantic Meteor, clashing and aiding Kurai's attack. He turned his head and his eyes widened to see Gohan behind him, eyes narrowed and hair gold and growing long as the half-saiyan slowly transformed Super Saiyan 3 as he as the other Z-fighters landed around him. Kurai hadn't been aware of Gohan having reached that level as he mostly trained with Vegeta, Xtrunks, and Goku to get them to that height (though Xtrunks preferred the less strenuous Super Saiyan Rage Form) . Regardless, even though The Z-fighters weren't fully healed, they began to power up, charging up their signature attacks to aid him. As their intertwined into his attack, their combined might began to push the Gigantic Meteor back even as Broly howled his fury and tried to force it down. Broly roared in fury as he kept on firing into the beam struggle, trying to destroy the Z-fighters even as he knew he was outmatched.
"Together!" Gohan shouted, "All of us!"
They all collectively roared as they all poured everything that had as hard as they could, the blast broke through the Gigantic Meteor and plowing through the barrage of ki blasts Broly had been using to force his attack down with. Broly eyed widened as he was hit the blast, being lifted up as he was blasted straight out of the Earth's atmosphere and into space. They all watched as the glow of their combined attacks glimmered even as it traveled further and further into space. Kurai finally let go of his mystic form and fell flat on his back, his exhaustion finally catching up with him as the battle frenzy and adrenaline ebbed from his system. The other Z-fighters all let out a collective breath and powered down as there was no sign of the berserker flying back and with his ki signature fully disappearing from their perceptions. Gohan transformation faded as he reverted back into this base form before he collapsed face first to The Earth, completely and totally unconscious.
Kurai panted softly as he pushed himself off his hands and got to his feet as he turned to his allies, "Thanks… I appreciate the help. But we should talk about why he came here and what I know about the situation."
There was a tense air as they all gathered on Kami's Lookout to discuss what was coming based on Xtrunks and Kurai's intel. Even the humans of the Z-fighters were there, even if they weren't as strong as the saiyans or namekian of the Z-fighters they didn't mean they were of worthless and didn't deserve to be excluded.
"So what exactly is the problem after that… Legendary Super Saiyan?" Trunks prompted, glancing on his older counterpart.
"Let's discuss what the problem is with him showing up." Kurai replied while Xtrunks frowned as he contemplated what to do, "His arrival here is a much bigger deal than you know."
"So explain then!" Vegeta demanded, "If it means more powerful opponents, then I don't care except to show how much more power I will have to obtain."
"It involves timelines and alterations in history father." Xtrunks said, "That version of Broly only exists in certain timelines, but he was not supposed to be here in any capacity."
"Imagine if Krillen killed you all the way back after you first travelled to Earth. Imagine if Goku wasn't able to best Freiza all the way back at on Namek. Imagine a world when Gohan died to the androids. Imagine a world where Trunks was killed instead of Gohan, and Gohan lived to kill the androids. Some of these events happened and are generally set in stone in their timeline and that's good, it's a necessary part of history for things to stay in order; when someone changes events, that can have catastrophic effects on the time stream." Kurai explained, "This timeline in and of itself is an alteration created when Xtrunks refused to let Gohan go alone while his past self was still recovering. I convinced one of the people of who oversaw the time-stream to let it go and she watched to see if this timeline would be a problem. While unique and a change it wasn't actually causing too much damage because this is an altered timeline in and of itself, and therefore didn't cause significant issues."
"Why do that?" Krillin growled indignantly, "Why stop XTrunks from helping Gohan destroy the androids?"
"Because in the original timeline, Gohan was murdered, which was the catalyst for Trunks own transformation." Kurai said sharply, "If things progressed as they normally did, Trunks would be toyed with and beaten, and no matter how many Zenkai's and recovery helped him, he was still not enough. Humanity would've kept dwindling until the construction of time machine and even then he wasn't helping his future."
Gohan already knew, but he still couldn't help thy way some of the blood drained from his face at the thought.
"Let's focus." Xtrunks interrupted, face pained, "We need to discuss what's wrong."
"Fine." Kurai muttered, "Someone is pulling enemies from timelines where it won't cause significant changes to arrive here. Normally, I don't think it would be a problem because we are decent enough fighters, but we are far from the top and there are beings out there who would lay all of us on our ass without too much effort. The power that Goku let out when he transformed from Super Saiyan 3 was basically a sign to anyone looking for a fight that there are opponents here that are strong."
That may have been the wrong thing to say as even as most of the fighters assembled there traded unhappy and uneasy glances only for Goku's eyes to light up as he grinned and Vegeta to smirk in glee.
"Really?!" Goku said happily, "How much stronger?! How far are we from the top?"
Kurai sometimes forgot how much of a battle-junkie Goku when it came to strong fighters whereas Vegeta was just as much a junkie. They both loved to fight for different reasons. When it came to Goku, fighting powerful opponents was the best way to grow and keep reaching new heights, he strove to keep getting better and better. Vegeta — on the other hand — fought to prove he was the strongest and never was willing to let Goku surpass him. He supposed no matter which iteration he encountered or timeline he found himself in, the core of the person never really changed.
Either way, maybe a reality check was in order.
Kurai walked to Vegeta and whispered, "Beerus will come, and he may not be kind enough to give us a chance to explain before he kills us."
Vegeta's smirked died and his eyes widened in fear.
Trunks noticed and frowned, "Father?"
"He comes here?" Vegeta demanded, forcibly trying to contain his fear, "He can't come here! We'll all die!"
"Who?!" Gohan said, startled by Vegeta's uncharacteristic fear.
"We have time." Kurai replied, "A lot of time, but let me put it like this. The person we are talking about flattened Super Saiyan 3 Goku with a flick or a finger and a neck chop."
Goku smashed a fist into his palm with a determined smile, even though that sounded like a problem, he couldn't wait to meet someone like that. At least he now had some idea of how far he had to go to even have a chance, he'd have to get so strong that his now Super Saiyan 3 power level was peanuts to what he would have to be.
"Leave him out of it for now." Xtrunks said, not wanting to have to deal with the God of Destruction, the first time they fought — with his original partner to prove they should be the ones to handle Demigra — had been a very painful experience, "According to our knowledge the next biggest event to happen occurs during the world tournament."
Gohan frowned, "What happens then?"
"An evil wizard named Babidi stashed a creature on this planet named Buu. Majin Buu." Xtrunks replied, "He came to Earth to harvest the energy to revive him as he went about destroying planet after planet, but The Earth didn't have nearly enough power to revive him so Majin Buu stayed dormant. But that isn't the case they are going probably going to try to drain our ki to revive Majin Buu."
"So we just stop him before he revives Buu. Simple." Gohan replies, "Not sure why he is a big threat when we just destroy Babidi before he unleashes his monster."
Kurai sighed and decided to say his piece, "I gonna admit, it might be possible to befriend him, make him our ally."
"That's risky." Gohan replied flatly, "You can't guarantee he won't turn on us. It's best we deal with him before we take chances."
Kurai sighed again and nodded, "I know… It's just wishful thinking on my part really, things probably won't play out the same way."
After all, in the timeline that led to Goku Black — which was this one before Xtrunks' selfish decision to save Gohan — The Supreme Kai and Kibito had already taken Trunks to train with the Z-sword.
They had to wait, Kurai's knowledge was only vaguely useful here, there were too many variables that were now in play to accurately plot anything. General power levels were useful to know, but this timeline was too warped to predict anymore.
Trunks clashed with Gohan while both stayed at the Super Saiyan 2 level as Goku, Xtrunks, Kurai, and Vegeta waited on the sidelines, watching the bout with interest as the two fought each other. Gohan may have not needed to train Trunks with Vegeta and Xtrunks more than willing to teach, but he enjoyed working with Trunks and they both still bonded over it even so many years later."You know…" Kurai started, "I didn't think Gohan had achieved Super Saiyan 3 and stayed at Super Saiyan 2. The power output that usually comes from that transformation is kinda hard to miss if it can be felt from practically anywhere so why did I miss it?"
Goku smiled, "He may have started studying to be a great scholar, but he was adamant that he never feel helpless against foes like the androids ever again. Every time he managed to get a free day break from his regular training and studying, he asked me to help him train in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber. We spent a few hours in there every now and then and so he was able to keep up pretty well. Still, he had only just achieved the form in our most recent session so he wanted to refine it before actually using it. He must have wanted to make sure that Broly was gone for good and didn't hold anything back. He's only just started with it but I know he'll go far with it."
Kurai nodded at that new bit of information, mentally filing it away for future consideration and how it might affect the timeline.
Would Gohan have his potential unlocked by Elder Kai in this timeline?
The first thing was the Elder Kai being sealed in the Z-Sword which Dabura spit on in Trunk's battle to kill Babidi and Dabura before the release of Majin Buu. Kurai was reasonably sure he could prevent that from occurring and gently nudge Goku and Gohan or whoever the wielder of the Z-Sword would be to play the Kai version of Baseball.
Maybe even try it himself.
Putting aside the thoughts of the Z-Sword, every single one of the Z-fighters — Saiyan, Namekian, or Human — wanted to get stronger just in case Majin Buu somehow got released and they had to fight him. The tournament was just a week away and the Earth's Special Forces had thrown themselves into training with admirable dedication and tenacity as they didn't want to be a liability. Goku had traveled to King Kai's planet and — as added bonus to help his friends — badgered King Kai into teaching all of them the Kaio-ken to help bolster their abilities and they all traveled into the Hyperbolic Time Chamber for one day. It wasn't anywhere near the boost that a Super Saiyan transformation, but it was still better than nothing. Surprisingly Piccolo also decided to join them in the chamber as well as learn the Kaio-ken since he figured he might be able to take better advantage of it while also making sure to whip everyone into shape. Piccolo's Namekian healing would help him immensely to make it much more feasible for him but the technique took a significant toll on the body, Goku could attest to that. Kurai was under no delusions if it came to a fight between Majin Buu and all of the Human Special Forces though, Kaio-ken or not.
Buu would obliterate them with little trouble regardless; the Kaio-ken wouldn't even be able to decently the Majin Buu if he wanted to kill them.
Would the Kaio-ken give them better odds to survive the encounter and run away?
Sure.
Win a direct fight?
Not a snowball's chance in hell.
Then again, maybe they would grow much stronger in the year in there, Kurai was basing his opinion on the past/future that really no longer applied.
"So what makes Majin Buu such a big threat?" Goku inquired idly.
Kurai scowled, "Do you want to start with the fact that he can absorb people to gain their skills and power? Or that he has an ungodly fast regenerative factor due to his body? Or maybe with the actual ability to turn practically anything into literal food."
Everyone except Xtrunks froze and turned to look at Kurai incredulously.
"What?" Gohan said faintly as he and Trunks stopped fighting to hear this out.
"Oh yeah, some of the stuff that he can pull is mind-boggling. Absorption is just the tip of the Iceberg with him." Kurai sighed, not looking forward to having to discuss the Majin he would probably have to kill.
