*(Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, or Dragon Ball GT. All characters and places associated with the Dragon Ball series belong to their own respected creators and I have not used them to make any profit in any shape or form.)*
Daimaō slammed into the ground on his back from being hit by Nail's punch to his face. The reason why he didn't recover quickly was, because he was still in shock at the fact that his opponent's quick attack had actually hurt him.
Nail on the other hand wasn't letting up on his attack. He appeared above the Demon King was going to slam his knee in the Daimaō's face.
The Demon King brought his hands up to cover his face from the attack, but despite the attempt at guarding, his hands were still pushed into his face and down on his forehead.
Nail then lifted his right arm to rest it besides the left side of his ribcage and was gathering energy into his open palm.
Daimaō saw what was going on and brought his leg up to hit Nail in the shins making the younger Namek stumble.
Daimaō lifted his leg up almost 180 degrees and kicked Nail in the chin sending him into the air giving Daimaō enough time to get up and recover from the attack.
Nail soared twenty feet in the air and then recovered himself. He saw the Demon King raising right arm being supported by his left hand.
'The Explosive Demon Wave? How does he-oh right Piccolo must've learned that from his father before developing the Masenko and passing it on to Gohan,' Nail thought to himself quickly.
Thankfully Nail still had the energy gathered for the attack he was going to use before being launched in the air. He then extended his arm releasing his own variation of the signature Full Power Energy wave down toward his target.
The beams met with bright light shining from their epicenter. Both combatants struggled for dominance. Neither side was willing to give up. Slowly though the Demon King was gaining ground. Bit by bit his beam was overcoming Nail's. Nail knew that he wouldn't be able to win this one so his only options were to quickly retreat before the beam got closer or just ride it out and pray that he doesn't get hurt too much.
Nail decided to jump ship while he could so he powered up a bit more to push the beams more toward Daimaō and then dashed out of the way.
The beams soared up and up till they seemed to have hit an invisible wall where they exploded.
Suddenly the whole area started to shake below and an earthquake happened. Even the Demon King was looking around confused as to what was going on. Finally the shaking stopped and everything was calm.
"What the Hell was that?" Daimaō asked out loud.
'Damn, I have to be careful. I can't afford to make any mistakes. That must've been the backlash of the attack Daimaō had on Piccolo's mind. I'm not sure Piccolo's regeneration will be able to work as fast here in his subconscious, as well as it does with the rest of his body…' Nail thought to himself.
"No matter, I'll be sure not to do that again. I don't want Junior to be too damaged. I may need him earlier than I first planned now that I think about it," Daimaō said to himself.
"You do realize that talking to yourself a lot is the first sign of insanity, right Daimaō?" Kami called out sarcastically from below.
Daimaō only glared at his counterpart for a minute before he went back after Nail.
Both of the Namekians had started a blow exchange with each other and were repeatedly punching and blocking each other's strikes.
"I don't think that comment helped Kami!" Nail called out trying to keep up with the Demon King.
"Couldn't help it," Kami called back before continuing trying to revive Piccolo.
Finally they broke off the blow exchange and pushed each other back. Nail was breathing heavily and Daimaō looked a bit haggard.
"You can't possibly keep this up forever boy, if Dr. Gero and Babadi weren't poking around all over my son's body causing him pain and Kami spending half of your pitiful shared strength to revive Junior, then maybe you could beat me. I'm offering you one last chance boy. Give up and you won't be harmed…much," The Demon King told him.
'He's right. Every blow I take also saps away any strength Kami has as well. Everything is shared now that we're merged inside Piccolo. Looks like I'll have to give it all or nothing…' Nail thought to himself.
Nail took a deep breath and steadied himself. He was going to have to end this soon.
Outside in the conscious world Dr. Gero and Bibidi were monitoring Piccolo's body. He seemed to be at peace, but every now and his brain activity would spike a bit and his body would shake. Daimaō also would sometimes spasm out as well. Thankfully his body would shake only a little so he still stayed in the same standing position. Babadi had his eyes closed and seemed to be just relaxing.
"If I have to guess I'd say Daimaō is fighting some form of Kami or perhaps Nail in Piccolo's subconscious that would explain why they both are spazzing out at random intervals," Dr. Gero commented.
"So do we just wait here for Daimaō to come to? Or should we keep trying to access Piccolo's subconscious?" Bibidi asked.
"I'd say we try, but not too much. I don't want to accidentally trap Daimaō in his son's mind thus making his physical body an empty shell," Dr. Gero told them.
"Why do you care if he's trapped? I for one wouldn't mind this one being dead. Then I could get out of here and have Buu do whatever I want as it was meant to be," Bibidi said.
"Father, you seem to forget that we're in a castle full of demons that are loyal to Daimaō only. No amount of persuading from any of us through words or force could turn them against him. Even if we did somehow trap him they could retaliate against us. At this point I'd say only Buu could hold some of them off and escape. Dr. Gero has yet to upgrade his body along with Android 19's to be able to handle the amount of strength that most fighters have now," Babadi told him parent.
"You know more of these demons than any of us. Pray tell if we did kill Daimaō right now, what would happen. Would another civil war erupt? If we could sneak away with the Colds and Cell, perhaps we could leave here unscathed," Dr. Gero asked the younger wizard.
"If Dabura was still in charge or his predecessor I would agree; however, there's something different about this place. It's more structured and these Demons aren't constantly killing each other every now and then," Babadi said.
"What do you mean? This type of atmosphere isn't normal for this part of Hell?" Dr. Gero asked curiously.
"A couple of hundred years ago during my travels, I happened across some Demons standing around on an asteroid. At the time I was recruiting followers to help me revive the first Majin Buu. Using my instruments from my ship I found out that they were very strong. I had the thought they could be useful to my cause and if they were more, they would surely be a great asset. I stayed back to see why they were standing around in the middle of nowhere space. Suddenly a door opened out of nowhere and they went through rather quickly. I followed them through and slipped in behind them. I found myself on the other side of door and found a dead Demon at my feet," Babadi told them before taking another deep breath.
"Thankfully no one else was there so I followed them quietly to this place. I used a spell to have light shift around me to make myself look invisible. Eventually I found myself outside the throne room. I slipped in and found Dabura sitting on that throne shouting at others. I quickly judged that he was the leader of this place and revealed myself to him. He was of course enraged at the fact that I dropped in unannounced. I quickly told him of my plan of unleashing Majin Buu, but he only scoffed at me. I was resorted to forcing him to become my slave. He put up a little struggle, but I had him. His power increased a little and I believe he was a match for Cell before his latest power-up based on what I've seen him do. After that he chose a steward to lead his realm until his return," Babadi said finishing his long tale.
"That's an interesting story, but you still didn't explain how this place is in more order than before," Dr. Gero said.
"I was getting to that, just please let me finish my story. At the time I could sense that these Demons had no purpose and most of them acted on pure instinct. From what I saw Dabura had to flex his muscles a little so to speak to get them in line every now and then. Daimaō on the other hand just had to either speak or glare. I'm not sure what he's done exactly, but he's been able to have the entire Demon populace follow him without question," Babadi said.
Everyone in the room was silent except for the occasional grunt from Daimaō and the heart rate monitor beeping in the background.
"I say for now we just bide our time and wait for an opportunity to strike. Daimaō was able to face Cell head on without flinching. I can only imagine how powerful he is now that he's been through that stupid dance that the Elder Kai did to him," Bibidi said.
Dr. Gero nodded. At this point he knew his body wasn't strong enough to fight against those unconscious in the room. He would have to upgrade himself before making any serious plans for the future.
Suddenly there was a massive spike in brain wave activity causing the monitor to go off. They turned toward the two Nameks and found Daimaō grunting. They looked closely and found the tips of his fingernails digging into his son's skull causing them to bleed a bit.
"I think we should halt this discussion for now. For I think Daimaō has just finished what he needed to do," Dr. Gero said standing behind the Demon King.
Nail charged Daimaō with a frenzy. Daimaō was prepared, but he wasn't expecting Nail to go all out this early in the fight. Nail charged the Demon King using a powerful knife hand strike to the side of the Demon King's head. Daimaō spun twice from the sheer force of the attack before staggering and almost falling to the ground. Nail picked the elder Demon Namek up and punched him three times, once in the stomach, once in the chest, and once in the head. The last punch sent the Demon King flying back. Daimaō tried to recover by trying to plant his feet in the ground. He looked up and saw that Nail disappeared.
The Demon King looked side and did not see him till he sensed something behind him.
Just as he was turning to confront his opponent, Nail had sent a massive energy wave that engulfed the Demon King. Daimaō's screams could barely be heard by the onrushing energy wave. He thought he saw something move inside the beam, but dismissed it when nothing came out of the energy wave. Nail fired just enough for the attack to stop before it hit the boundaries of Piccolo's mind and causing another tremor.
When the attack dissipated Nail saw Daimaō's unconscious body in the middle of the clearing. His hands were on his knees and he was breathing very heavily. He didn't mean to spend so much of his strength, but he had to hurry since the more time he spent fighting, the less of a chance Piccolo had of escaping.
Nail walked over to Daimaō's unconscious body and examined it. He was still breathing so he didn't kill him. He had best finish the job now before he awoke.
Nail brought his hand up poised to separate Daimaō's head from his shoulders. Normally Nail would have left the pitiful creature to either live or die by nature's will, but the stakes were too costly and he couldn't afford to let him go. For all he knew Daimaō may return at a later date. He wasn't sure what this would do to Daimaō specifically, but Nail for one didn't care.
Just as his hand was coming down Nail heard an anguished scream and suddenly felt a massive pain all around him. It wasn't just him, but the entire area seemed to ache and felt sick. Nail seemed to feel the pain of the area around him. The green field was quickly turning a nasty brown, the sky seemed to be turning black, the sun disappeared, and the little river that fed from the waterfall was drying up.
Nail turned toward Kami to see if he was okay when his heart almost stopped at the sight before him.
Kami was on the ground facing away from Nail. He looked closer and saw that Kami's arm had been torn off. Daimaō was standing over Piccolo with his hands seemingly embedded into his son's mind. His hands were oozing a purple cloud and some black liquid was dripping from Daimaō's fingers into his son's head.
Daimaō knew that if he was to get to his son he would have to do so soon. While his attacks were slowly weakening Nail he didn't want to take too much time in bringing him down. Also he didn't know if time passed differently in his son's subconscious and in the real world. He didn't want to waste too much time. So when Nail was executing a variation of his Mystic Flasher, he decided to try an old technique his son uses to train with himself.
He had to time this perfectly to get it done unnoticed. After Daimaō felt Nail's presence behind him and felt the heat of an energy ball, he knew that he had seconds to act. Just when Nail released his energy wave at him, Daimaō quickly used the Multiform technique to split himself into two people. While the clone stayed to take the brunt of the blast, the real Daimaō quickly ran using his speed to get to his target. Kami had his back turned to him and didn't hear him coming. By the time he was behind the old Namekian Nail had just finished the attack. He had only seconds to act.
Daimaō used his right hand to cover Kami's mouth. He then hit the old Guardian on the neck twice. For a moment Daimaō almost gave in to his base desires and almost ripped Kami to pieces, but he regained himself and just ripped the old Namek's arm off and threw both the arm and his good counterpart away from him. He raised his hands that started oozing a weird black liquid and pierced his son's skull.
Nail tried flying toward Daimaō with whatever speed he had left, but every second his strength was sapped away by something. By the time he reached Daimaō he could barely stand. He grabbed onto Daimaō planning to punch him, but he found that he couldn't raise his fist. He fell to the ground groaning with the area being eaten away by some black void.
"Well I'd love to stay and watch you writhe in agony, but I think it's time for me to leave now. It's unfortunate that our battle was very short. I would've enjoyed beating the tar out of you and the old man, but I believe this works just fine," Daimaō said grinning evilly.
The Demon King quickly flew off toward his clone and the unconscious body sprung up and merged with its host.
Daimaō then flew off laughing at the sight before him knowing his work was complete.
Nail tried to get Kami up, but the old man was unconscious as well. Piccolo's body faded away and Nail just couldn't keep his eyes open any longer.
'I failed you Kami. I'm so sorry. Piccolo, my brother, please forgive me,' Nail thought before he slipped away into unconsciousness as well.
Daimaō had stirred and felt a massive migraine in his head. He saw he was back in his lab.
He looked at the others and nodded saying they could continue their work with his son.
Piccolo was dreaming…this much he could tell. He felt like he had been out for hours. He just couldn't remember what happened. Suddenly images and memories started playing before him.
He was standing over the dead body of Raditz. Piccolo had finished him off with the Special Beam Cannon and Goku had just gotten out of the way. Both fighters were in bad shape and were lucky to be alive. Piccolo had one arm missing and was thinking about regenerating it. Both he and Goku had heard that other Saiyans would arrive in one year looking for the Dragon Balls.
Suddenly Goku raised his voice.
"I'm a little sorry it has to be this way Piccolo, but the world matters more than you," His rival said.
Before Piccolo could even ask what he meant, Goku rushed forward and using whatever strength he had left, he punched Piccolo in his chest and pulled out his heart.
Piccolo couldn't even react. He couldn't believe that he let his guard down long enough for that idiot to kill him. He was furious! He should have seen this coming once they heard other warriors are coming for the Dragon Balls.
"Kami agrees with me. With you dead the Dragon Balls will be gone and those Saiyans won't have any reason to come to Earth. Goodbye," Goku told him before walking away.
The scene changed and he saw King Yemma above yelling at him for the evil he committed since he was born. Nothing he could say would deter the massive red ogre otherwise. Kami was next to him shaking his head at Piccolo. When Yemma sentenced him to suffer in Hell, Piccolo tried to break out, but he felt his body being sucked down a hole.
He landed on his head in Hell. When he got up he cursed himself for letting his guard down, Goku for killing him, Kami, and anyone else he could think of. He was about to walk away when he heard Raditz's voice behind him.
The cocky Saiyan was pissed that he had died from Piccolo's attack so he decided to spend eternity punishing the Namek.
They began fighting and Piccolo found he was having tough luck defeating the Saiyan. In the middle of their brawl a figure called out to Raditz telling him to leave Piccolo alone.
A figure surrounded by four others hovered above. The tallest of them landed in front of Piccolo. Piccolo recognized the person as his sire of old. The one that gave him life and purpose. The others floating in the air were Piano, Tambourine, Cymbal, and Drum.
Daimaō warned Raditz to leave Piccolo alone again. The Saiyan only laughed at him and said he would not be denied his revenge.
Daimaō then held nothing back as he proceeded to beat the living tar out of Raditz. He lured the Saiyan into thinking he was weaker than Piccolo since he was his father. Eventually the tables turned and Raditz was a bloody mess on the ground.
His father asked him to accompany him to a part of Hell where Raditz wouldn't dare to enter, not without being brutally beaten even worse than the one he just received.
Piccolo followed his family onward. On one hand he was glad he was at last reunited with his father and brothers, but felt horrible for failing in the one mission his father charged him with.
When they landed Piccolo apologized to his father for failing, but his father forgave him saying he had bigger plans. He asked if Piccolo wanted to be part of his plans for revenge against everyone that wronged them. Piccolo agreed immediately if it meant he could beat Raditz and Goku.
The scene changed again showing Piccolo fighting with his numerous siblings over the years. Everyone was training for the big take over that Daimaō had in mind. He made huge leaps in gaining strength. Eventually Daimaō held a tournament to decide who would be his right hand man. It took many days and nights if time were actually measured in Hell. Piccolo had fought with no remorse. He alone was charged with killing Goku specifically after his father's demise and he saw that he needed to redeem himself in the eyes of his father.
Eventually Piccolo found himself in the final round against his elder brother Drum. It was a tough fight. Drum was able to take a beating and dish out heavy attacks. Piccolo pulled through; however, using his tactical mind and his superior speed. His father came to him and acknowledged him as the right hand man. He would be second only to him and Daimaō promised that one day he would be a greater Demon King than himself.
A month later they attacked. Daimaō had planned it when some creature named Majin Buu was released on Earth. It was a hard battle, they besieged the castle and it took them a week to break down the main gates. Finally Daimaō lead the charge into the castle to take down the last of Dabura's supporters. After a grueling day Piccolo had witnessed his father's ascension to the throne when he held the steward's head in his hands before throwing it in the air for all to see.
Daimaō had made big changes in the Demon Realm and after waiting over three decades. His father had begun his plan of revenge. The last thing he saw before everything fading away was Kami and another Namek that looked like he could be mistaken for Piccolo's twin. Both of them slowly shrank away from him. Before departing he could swear he heard them say something.
"When you need to know the truth, seek out Gohan," He heard them whisper before waking.
Piccolo slowly awoke and found himself in the lab the wizards' had been using for the creation of their creature. He slowly stood up wondering how he got here when he remembered getting into a fight with a demon from rival clan that still supported Dabura three days ago.
He saw his father in the corner watching over him. He looked at him and nodded affirming he was ready for whatever his father was going to assign him.
Daimaō flashed an evil grin. After all these years his son had come home. Now at last he could begin his rule. With his son at his side nothing would stand in their way. Together they would crush all resistance till they worshiped Daimaō as their God. All of Daimaō's plans were ripening. The first half of his plan was complete. The Demon Prince had returned.
*Jason9000: Well that was fun wasn't it? I know Nail's fight with Daimaō was short and was rushed, but I wanted that out of the way so we could focus on moving on. I feel like I've been dragging this part on since I haven't updated as much. I'm getting my laptop looked at so I wanted to quickly get this chapter done and updated. On the plus side, on Friday I'm done with college so when I get my computer back I'll be able to hopefully update more often again. So we got a look at what the wizards and Dr. Gero really want. I wanted to give them some screen time since they haven't had as much time. Also I threw in Babadi's speech there, because we don't know how he found Dabura and I wanted to give a small explanation that relates to this story. As for what happened to Piccolo during the operation before and after Daimaō came in, just use your imagination. Some things are better left up for the reader to decide. Well that's all for now. I hope you enjoyed R&R please.*