The squat blue Kai beheld the scene in a shock he hadn't known for an age, somehow drawn into a vision of a distant past. The dark youth before him frowned in disappointment and pain.

"I didn't know… I know who we… who I hoped would answer… But you're not him. You're not my father."

And who did she express this to, but the most unexpected visitor North Galaxy's arbiter could have imagined.

"Beerus The Destroyer…!" Vegeta breathed, his attention lost to anything else.

For a moment, he retreated further than the echo before him, deep into his own mind. The scene played out from his childhood memories on planet Vegeta, the sight of his father, the King, humbled and humiliated before the one being that stood beyond even Frieza. A god, true as could be, an impartial being of whim and power. It was so long ago he doubted the encounter had actually been real and not a mere dream, but his voice was as clear as his memory.

What did Beerus have to do with THIS?

Lord Beerus scoffed. "If nearly any other creature had said that, I'd think they'd gone mad… But you… who is your… 'father?' "

Oscar turned to see the tall, grey-haired, bespectacled man, barely taking his eyes off this strange meeting. He knew it to be the form of Ozpin the Headmaster, the voice in his head embodied. He wanted to say something, but it was clear this was too important to interrupt.

She turned her red eyes down. "The… humans… down there? They call him 'The Dark Brother.' I don't know his real name, but… I know he's like… you?" she finished, her own logic seemingly confusing to her.

The tall blue being stepped forward, staff in hand. His voice was gentle, his expression curious. "Hmm… And how do you know that?" he asked, beginning to circle her as the girl eyed him warily.

She raised her hands, and great black claws emerged from the earth around them. "S-stay back!"

In the trees behind them, Beerus and his associate saw shadows full of red eyes gleaming back at them. The whole forest beyond quaked restlessly. Calls and growls mirrored her sentiment, beasts on the verge of being provoked.

The blue man clucked his tongue, tapping the ground with his staff, and at once the claws vanished like smoke and the forest quieted. She recoiled in fear.

"Now now, no need for that!" he told her with a smile. "We merely seek to understand. How are you so sure your maker is like us?"

She froze, but shook her head. "Not you… him," she explained, pointing at the Destroyer, still eyeing her flatly. "I… I don't know how I know… I just… feel it. I never met my father… but I remember how he felt…"

Beerus sighed. "Oddly, that seems to stack up. Apart from that it doesn't. Your 'father' couldn't have been a Destroyer like myself. Destroyers create nothing. But… your energy… Whis, what do you make of it?" he asked, finally naming his partner.

Whis hummed, peering into her as she leaned away. "Well, she's not a god, but she straddles many lines… Hers isn't Divine energy, nor that of a Destroyer… Not even that of a demon, really… in fact I can't be sure I've ever felt this before. Her being is the opposite of Divine… an… Occult Energy if I might coin a phrase… a true Devil..."

The girl recoiled, scowling into the dirt. "They say that too… They hate… me," she managed, glowering out at the bustling civilization. "All of… m-me… us…? I… d-don't have the… words… Not used to 'words.' "

"They? You mean the humans?" Whis asked, also staring out at the city. "Yes, and I see that body isn't yours, you took it from them. I can feel her soul, scared and struggling inside."

She pouted, her arms wrapped around her middle. "She's MINE…! I NEED one of them… to… to think… Without them I can't… think…"

Beerus huffed. "You can't just recreate them like the others?"

She frowned, shaking her head as if the reason for this eluded her as well. "Just them… Are… are you going to make me give her back?"

Whis peered into her. He sighed. "No, her body is too frail now I'm afraid. She depends on you to survive. It would be kinder to let her perish, but for the purposes of this conversation we'll not touch your prize."

She seemed to let out a breath. "Really?"

Whis nodded. "It would be like slaying a snake to save the mouse in its belly… Either has a right to live, regardless of its nature… but it is the one's nature to consume the other. It can't be helped."

Beerus hummed. "Well, provided it's even a part of nature. What's your name?"

She blinked. "N-name? We… I don't have one… Father never gave me…"

Whis knelt down. "Well then, nameless one… We answered your call when we approached the planet, but I confess we did not come here for you."

"Yes," Beerus agreed. "We're investigating a great number of new worlds that have appeared recently."

"Or rather," Whis corrected, "dead worlds devoid of life, suddenly teeming with it! A great boon for the Universe to be sure… all with dominant species very similar in form! Suspiciously so..."

Beerus crossed his arms. "And with another wrinkle in common… None of them have any idea how they came to be there. As The Destroyer, if worlds are being brought about by some illicit means, it may be my duty to return them to oblivion."

Whis chuckled. "But first, we must track it to its source!"

She looked between them in true confusion. "W...world...sss?"

Whis' face relaxed thoughtfully. "Hmm, yes, I suppose it's unlikely you had anything to do with it. But all the same, where would they find the power?"

She turned to the cliff, leering at the city. "F-father, and his brother… gave them The Relics… They can do almost anything. I had to… hide… I used to fight them, but they used one of them on me and hurt me… I've heard… I've heard them talk about using all of them… to kill me…"

Her hands rubbed her elbows as she shrank in fear at the idea.

Beerus stared out as well. "Mortals gifted godly powers? Now it all makes sense…"

"Well… apart from the identities of these troublesome two," Whis noted. "The powers of Creation and Destruction in concert? I'm certain enough this wasn't the doing of your predecessor, my lord, but that makes it all the more a scandal…"

He motioned for the catlike god to follow him as the girl watched them with continued concern. Whis noticed this and his teeth gleamed as he smiled serenely, eyes pleasantly shut. "Excuse us a moment, dear! We'd like a brief word in private!"

The head of his staff whirled, and in a trice, the world beyond the two divines froze.

"So," Beerus began, unfazed, "this is meddling from another Universe? That makes these and their other worlds an invasive species… Looks cut and dry to my eyes."

Whis sighed. "T'would be a shame if so, the poor dear is so unique… A wonder what such a being might be capable of."

Beerus' huge ears visibly twitched. "Pray tell, what else could it be? One Destroyer to a Universe, that's the design."

Whis frowned. "Let us ascertain the facts, Lord Beerus… Now…" He peered into the sphere of his staff, as if through a microscope. "Where do we begin… My my my…! How fascinating…!"

"What?"

"This tawdry tale predates your tenure, my lord! And it begins at the highest peak of the Divine Realms…"

Beerus' yellow eyes shot open and he froze, teeth bared with concern. "You don't mean…?!"

"I do…"

Blake saw the world turn black and started, glimpsing around for any sign… but Whis' voice carried on as a strange, glowing ornament popped into being before her.

"A Universe… Ours is the seventh… a glorious, cosmic bauble suspended in eternity… A mortal world, an Otherworld, encapsulating all…"

"Our Universe…?" she breathed, looking closer. It looked like she could touch it.

It was like a snow globe with a pointed bottom, a halo encircling its lower half with a smaller peach bubble orbiting the whole. The lower hemisphere was inscrutable, but the top was brimming with cottony yellow mist above a red waste, and skimming the clouds were winding roads beneath a pair of earth-like planetoids…

But her ear twitched. "Wait… seventh…?"

"There are twelve Universes, but—"

"Why are you telling ME this?" Beerus' asked from the void, more tired than confused. "I already know all that…"

Whis clucked his tongue, scandalized. "There is an art to storytelling my lord! I promise that this is important…" He cleared his throat. "There are twelve Universes…"

Qrow nearly touched the little sphere before it whirled around him, leaving slightly different copies of itself as they surrounded him like hours on a clock. He reeled back in surprise.

"But there were once eighteen…"

Sun saw six more hovering overhead, whirling. Before his eyes, each simultaneously burst into particles of light, which fell away like dust.

"Whoa!"

"Why He was dissatisfied with them is unimportant, but that He WAS is the cause of this world's very existence…"

" 'He?' " Ruby asked, still laboring to contemplate Universes beyond her's, let alone the notion of whole ones being removed from existence.

As if in answer, the twelve remaining globes floated up in the dark, atop pillars of stone. They slid apart from each other as a great floating palace arose from the dark, a brilliant star field illuminating all. Its curved roof reminded her with a pang of Mistral. She'd have sworn it were in the shape of a symbol from some other language, but she couldn't be certain of what.

She squeaked as the doors flew open and she tore inside past white columns to see the back of yet another blue-skinned, white-haired being approaching a simple throne with a short bow.

"Grand Zeno, I have the daily life report! The only notable addition was Universe Five, but what an addition it is," he offered serenely. "Fifteen species to the new planet, consisting of four predators and three symbiotic flora/fauna relationships!"

There was a sigh of appreciation from the throne. "That is so many!" the voice affirmed excitedly. "On just one planet? Supreme Kai Ogma is truly amazing!"

"Indeed," the attendant agreed. "I sense you've something else on your mind, sire?"

Atop the throne, Ruby saw something as unexpected as she could have imagined. It was tiny, an oddly proportioned child with a squat body, wearing a coat of pink and white with numerous gold accents. But it was unlike any child she'd ever seen.

Blue-skinned like these others, the similarities ended with its melon-shaped head, bearing two large purple stripes on both sides. But its eyes were the alien part. Unblinking tiny spheres with huge black pupils set wide on its head…

"Grand Zeno…" Whis continued. "The Omni King… The maker of all things, who wields the fate of the Cosmos upon the winds of His whimsy… There is no higher authority anywhere… His word is law…"

"This thing… is GOD?!" Ruby demanded of the ether, uncertain it was possible to top this revelation.

King Kai took a step back in shock. As a mere cardinal Kai he scarcely had the right to look upon Grand Zeno…! He'd considered himself lucky to know about the maker Himself, but this felt like an intrusion…

Vegeta watched the thing on its throne grin slightly as it acknowledged the being who'd spoken to it.

"Yes!" Zeno agreed, his clear, high child's voice speaking so simply. "I have had an idea that is very good…"

The Prince could hardly believe his eyes. "This little freak…?! This has the power to obliterate everything! Is this some kind of twisted joke…?!"

"Would you regale us, master?" the taller being asked cheerfully, evidently on close terms with the diminutive deity.

"I was thinking about those other Universes and I think maybe they didn't know how to be because nobody showed them," Zeno swiftly posited. "I do not want the others to fail like that. I think we should make a very special place. The perfect place! A Universe that is exactly what it should be so the others will see it and do as they should."

King Kai watched as Zeno's Grand Minister seemed to light the room with his smile. He'd never heard of such a thing. Certainly it must have preceded his time as a North Kai.

"A means of guidance on the path to redemption," the Minister surmised, evidently pleased. "A most gracious mercy to mortal and divine alike! Shall we begin then?"

Jaune was startled again as the world returned to blackness just long enough to question…

But then a spark illuminated the darkness, its brightness mounting until it was overwhelming. Yet it did not sting his eyes. A shape, that same Cosmic bauble glowed into existence bit by bit in luminous filaments.

As it completed, it was clear this was different from the others. There was a symmetry to its interior, and the usual gilded surfaces looked instead to be some manner of platinum or white gold.

"And so, Lord Zeno's will was done, and the Prime Universe came to be. Its marvels plumbed the deepest reaches of His imagination, filled with mortals of every shape. But as all Universes do, it requires its Keepers… and Grand Zeno had a bold plan in mind."

Weiss watched as the little red globe circling the Universe rocketed towards her, trying not to flinch as she found herself alone with the tiny alien god and his Minister, staring at a lone, florid pink peach tree in an expanse of hilly golden grasslands, expanding forever into the horizon. The sky was a permanent sunset, watercolor splashes of orange, red and purple banding everything. It was as idyllic and pristine a vision as she had ever seen.

Gohan waited as the two watched, still as stone. Despite being as new as anything could be, the grand tree was adorned with great twisting wooden wind chimes, and as the breeze rippled the grasses, they clattered musically among the boughs.

And then he saw it…

"Oscar, the fruit," Ozpin whispered. The boy nodded, having noticed it too. A pair of peaches grew upon the same stems beside each other, and they had begun to swell in size until the supple branch they hung upon began to sink with their burden.

Raven beheld the affair in resigned fascination. Like something out of an old parable or poem, the peaches neared the ground only to be engulfed in that same purest light.

It was barely a silhouette against her eyes, but Ruby saw great luminous roots grow from the fruits towards the ground, which split into two before they truly met the earth. Another pair branched out from just under the round peaches as they rippled with change. It all rippled, and in a flash she realized: those were arms and legs.

Zeno gave a happy hum as he smiled, and the light finally faded as the two luminous beings took form before him.

Both crumpled, eyes shut tight, but stumbled into each other and caught a grip to become stable.

Ruby had been uncertain what puzzled her about the two beings and their proportions, but as the light receded she finally realized it: they were children. They couldn't have looked more than ten years old...

The one on the left was the taller of the two, each bearing the same peachy, human-looking skin… well… as the peaches they began as. He opened his red eyes in surprise, beneath copper hair that was tight on the sides but dominated the top of his head with lightly defined, voluminous spikes bending back.

She noticed the pointed ears on both with a start, and the odd earrings the first wore that the other did not. Below, a gold cape hung from his neck, and below that still was a white coat over puffy, matching violet shirt and pants, fastened together with a red belt.

The other was slower to open his eyes, one lid opening cautiously, dark lining them like ink or eyeliner. The olive-green iris met his fellow's red, and he recoiled for a moment, guarded as he staggered back to his feet, face pinkened as his face cast down, not losing sight of the first being.

This one was in altogether different garb, but Ruby had seen it before. The blue had been switched for a steely grey with a green belt, but it was the same strange regalia that Beerus had worn… though on a child's frame, it was strange indeed. His turquoise hair was almost the opposite of the first's in style, the thick spikes cast down into bangs that neatly avoided his eyes as they swept to his left, none of it passing below his neck.

The taller boy watched in fascination, before breaking out in the most excited grin. "Brother…" he laughed gently.

Ruby felt her heart melting as she understood, and the other froze, blinking in surprise as he tilted his head and considered. " 'Brother…?' " he repeated quietly.

Ultimately, his mouth formed a most intrigued 'O', before it turned into the slightest grin… but his eyes did the rest of the smiling as they sparkled. All at once, he threw his arms around his sibling, who laughed as he was nuzzled furiously.

The Grand Minister stepped forward, and suddenly Krillin noticed all manner of strange, similarly dressed figures had appeared, watching in reverent silence. "Rise, Supreme Kai Dehadikeh… Rise, God of Destruction Doyadano…"

They recognized their names immediately, turning to Zeno with a courteous, regal bow.

"Grand Zeno…" they muttered as one.

"Yes," Zeno nodded, smiling, "they're wonderful, they will be perfect for this new Universe!"

The Grand Minister gave a happy sigh, turning to the throng. "Then it is done… Friends of the Multiverse, your Omni King has created this, the Prime Universe as an exemplar for your own inspirations! And at its head, these twins. Look to their brotherly bond, and consider yours with your own Destroyer… with your own fellow Kai… This is the ideal for which you must strive."

"This was a long time ago," Beerus said from the ether. "I wasn't even Destroyer yet. Why are children the ideal gods?"

Whis chuckled. "I believe this is to do with our Omni King, my lord. He feels the perfect deity would reflect Himself."

"Right… and both of them are Kais? Can't say I've heard of a Destroyer God that was also a Kai."

"It had never happened before," Whis confirmed. "Nor since."

Beerus hummed. "I think I'm beginning to understand… Carry on, what happened next?"

Lie Ren watched as the vision swam before him. At last, the childlike gods were alone, outwardly pleasant, wandering the vast fields endlessly together. At all times, the sight of the other brought a joy to the brothers that made his heart glow with nostalgia. Always together, their place changed to all manner of astonishing vistas, doubtless different worlds within the Prime Universe. A dark world of purple crystals occupied by spindly beings made up of much the same… A world with a knee-deep ocean riddled below with coral-filled caverns… An alabaster paradise of squat, root-like bipeds who plucked their young from the ground like radishes and basked in the sun for sustenance…

"The divines of the twelve paid heed to Grand Zeno's wishes. They watched the twins from afar and took note of the worlds they kept," Whis continued.

"I'm feeling a 'but' coming," Beerus added, while Whis shushed him in annoyance.

He sighed. "Yes, BUT… it was soon apparent that there was little cause to 'tune-in' to their Cosmic foibles. 'Perfection' is a fickle thing, regardless if you believe it to be possible. By definition, to add to it or take from it is to introduce flaw… therefore, Perfection doesn't change much."

Weiss watched little cutouts in the sky, like windows framing the other Divines as they watched, slowly vanish one by one as time on the Sacred World passed in blinks and the twins grew slower in their ponderous idleness.

"Ultimately, they stopped watching at all, and Grand Zeno's example carried on, as it always had."

Beerus piped up again. "I just had a thought… Those gods and Kais from before didn't have attendants like you. Nor does this destroyer for that matter…"

"Astute my lord."

Weiss watched as they went silent. The twins were on their fronts in a cottony forest with blood red trees and grey fuzz in place of leaves. Or rather, Dehadikeh the Kai was hunched over, examining a porous fungus while Doyadano the god loomed over his shoulder confused.

In a moment, it was clear why, as a sort of amphibious hamster-like creature briefly poked its head out of the structure before skittering back inside.

Dehadikeh grinned toothily back at his brother, whose dark-lined eyes widened, and went back to peering inside the fungus to observe, searching for the little animal.

Weiss watched as the smaller god pondered, heart hammering as she remembered when she and Winter were girls. They'd never scrounged around in the dirt, but there was something so achingly familiar…

Finally, Doyadano extended a hand, and a searing purple glow split along three lines of the fungus, tearing it open.

The tiny animal squealed in surprise as it raced out and circled its damaged home angrily. The Kai's mouth slackened in surprise as both brothers could see robin-like eggs so suddenly exposed.

"O-oh no…!" Doyadano whispered in guilt, rearing to his knees as fingers crept toward his mouth. "I didn't… I just wanted to…"

"Doya, it's okay," Dehadikeh laughed. "No harm done…"

He waved his hand over the fungus' wound, and in moments the torn fibers reached out and sewed each other shut. Fearing more treachery, the little beast chittered as it raced back in to inspect its home.

Doyadano let out a breath he'd been holding. "I just wanted to help you see."

"I have omnipresent vision!" Dehadikeh reminded him with a melodious chuckle. "Oh wait…! Don't you?"

Doyadano sat on his knees and gave a sincere shake of his head. "Is that another Kai power, like Kai Kai?"

He nodded. Doya leered suddenly with a pout.

"If you can see everything inside anyway, why were you trying to peek with your eyes?"

Dehadikeh shrugged. "I prefer to see with my own eyes," he admitted. "It's hard to explain… but it's the difference between looking out a window, and being there."

Doyadano frowned. "That's kinda weird, Deha… If I could see anything I wanted, I'd just sit in one of these trees and be comfortable. Would've been nice with that planet that has all the pollen…" he added ruefully.

"We itched for so long," the Kai agreed…

"All over…" Doyadano finished, collapsing backwards. "I've never destroyed a planet, but that one…"

Dehadikeh snorted. "You still wouldn't. You hate seeing life get hurt… even more than I do."

Doyadano sighed. "Yeah, I wouldn't."

"You're a Kai," he said simply. "It's just our nature."

"Y...yeah," Doyadano muttered, not meeting his eye.

"I used to do that though," his brother admitted. "You remember how I would meditate? I'd look all over. But when we started visiting, it just wasn't enough anymore."

Doyadano listened intently, but also pointed a finger at the stem holding a ripe red fruit in the trees above. He caught his prize, and with a tap of his finger the core at its center was obliterated, leaving a cooked, hassle-free snack steaming in his hands. He split it in two and wordlessly tossed the half to his brother.

Dehadikeh flashed a grateful grin and took a bite. He hadn't quite swallowed before he continued. "But y'knowff… it does let me see things my eyes can't. Like this…"

With a gesture, Bulma saw him form images like neon in midair, specifically the familiar shape of a double helix as its base-pair "rungs" grew and shrank according to the Kai's subject of focus.

"...What is it?"

"It's the core physical chemical that makes life possible!" Dehadikeh expressed. "A molecule that makes copies of itself."

"Do we have it…?"

"No, Kais don't reproduce naturally. We're born gods, unlike Destroyers."

He grimaced as Doyadano winced. "Unlike most Destroyers… It's really amazing though! Four nucleotide bases and unlimited possibilities! It looks like such a tangled mess, but if you look close enough there's order to it! I can't even imagine what I'd make if we needed a new world… My designs wouldn't live up to the Prime Universe…"

He sighed longingly, smile fading at last as he fell onto his back and stared up at the passing clouds —difficult to discern from the feathery canopy just above them— and swirled his fingers as those same clouds churned miles above.

"I'm… I'm not ungrateful," he said, guilt in his eyes. "Grand Zeno left us such a wonderful place… a place where we have no troubles, and every day is as good as the last… and…"

"He gave me you…" Doyadano added, shrinking slightly as his twin met his eye.

The grin returned, warmer than ever. "Yeah… that more than anything else."

Ruby watched them with an understanding she'd have never expected to share with a god. The love she felt in their shared gaze, like the mere sight of each other made everything better. Not an attraction, but a security and a joy. It was the same thing she felt fill her to the brim when she saw Yang at Haven after all those months. Little did she know, at the same moment Yang herself recognized the protective fervor in the larger twin, the eagerness to shelter the meek twin painted on his face.

"Ugh…" Beerus retched. "Is this in line with the Omni King's wishes? It's so saccharine I feel the need to rinse my mouth out. Is there a rest stop on the way to the POINT?"

"Patience my lord… I promise, all of this is quite necessary," Whis offered with exasperation. He coughed. "But despite their blessings, what was traded for their life of ease was something instilled in their very being: purpose. To create was unnecessary. To destroy was unnecessary. The Prime Universe didn't even need them."

Suddenly, Deha got a mischievous gleam in his eye as he stood up. "Though to keep me, you'll have to keep up!"

Qrow flinched as the cottony branches rustled, the tiny Kai taking off like a shot into the horizon. The smaller Destroyer stood up, face alight as he knelt down like a sprinter. If Dehadikeh had been a gust, then Doyadano was a hurricane. Dust, twigs and the cotton of the wood tore after him as he split the air in a snap that echoed across the land.

Goku gawked in shivering awe as the chase ended in barely a second, crossing endless plains before Doyadano tackled his brother to the ground, blasting dust like a carpet bombing as they ground to a stop, laughing hysterically as the smaller twin hugged him from behind.

"I… I think that's the fastest you've caught me, Doya!" Dehadikeh praised. "You need to start giving me a head start, you've always been the faster one… and the stronger one."

Doyadano raspberried. "I did give you a head start!"

Goku still reeled. He was shaking! He'd never seen anything move that fast. It was so far beyond anything he knew to be possible! He could hardly imagine what would happen if he studied under either of these kids...

Doyadano helped his brother up, turning around and gasping. "Oh, Deha, your clothes! I'm sorry…"

Indeed, there was a great multicolored set of smears on his front. A deep, remarkable, blotchy stain. "It's fine, I can clean it in—"

But Doyadano clapped a hand to his mouth, stifling a laugh.

"What is it?"

"It looks like a map!"

Dehadikeh blinked, freezing before he could wave the mess away and strode to a nearby pond, staring at his reflection. "You're right… it does."

Ruby walked around the boy as he leaned, and her mind blanked as she tried to see what they meant. Indeed, the splotches seemed to form continents.

It looked… familiar…

Krillin watched him stare into the sky, at those same puffy clouds.

Dehadikeh's eyes narrowed as he watched. "Like shapes in the clouds," he whispered. "Order, woven from chaos…"

Whis weighed in. "Like so many things, it all started so small. With a flash of inspiration, events were set in motion fit to make the Cosmos quake."

"Deha? Are you oka—"

Dehadikeh turned on the spot and hugged his brother in utter surprise, beaming. "Doya, you're a GENIUS! That's it! That's what I'll do! That's what we'll do!"

"D-do?"

"The chemical I talked about," Dehadikeh began, letting him go as his hands went manic, gesticulating wildly, "It has limiters put on it by Grand Zeno, blockers to keep a species from changing too much and breaking… fixed code the rest of it references, but… what if they don't break?"

Doyadano frowned. "But… they'd be changing outside the design. Wouldn't parts of them stop working?"

"Maybe, or maybe they'd work better! Or… or… maybe they'd find another use for those parts!"

"But they're not alone, they all depend on other kinds for food or to cooperate," Doyadano argued, concerned.

"Then we take a lifeless world and start from scratch," the Kai suggested. "They'll form their own relationships and change to fit their environment. I've seen it before, scaled-down."

Doya's head shook and he shuddered as though he'd been poked. " 'Scratch? ' So… you mean like… germs?"

"Maybe… but with the raw code changing, it could become anything, even full-sized animals!"

Doyadano wilted. "But the ones that change and hit a dead-end… they'll die, won't they? If they become something that can't survive?"

This broke his brother's smile. "Y-yes… That could happen. But there could be so many of them! They all start with a chance… Would it be better if they don't exist at all?"

"I mean… I guess not… B-but… it doesn't matter anyway, we can't just change stuff and make new things!"

Dehadikeh smiled, shutting his eyes for a moment. "Not here."

Bulma sat, fascinated, as the children discussed evolution as a hypothetical. Because apparently that wasn't how gods usually did things. It was clear the lively Kai was in the grips of an idea he could barely express with words, but had a clear image in his head.

Doyadano recoiled. "Y'mean… another Universe? But, Deha… that's forbidden! We can't meddle with their worlds!"

"We won't… we'll make one of our own," Dehadikeh argued brightly, "Just one, a gift from us! Nothing changes here anyway, nobody will even notice!"

Doyadano's regalia jangled as he nervously shook. "Deha, this… It's scaring me! You want to go behind Grand Zeno's back? Invade another Universe? I… I don't understand why you want this so much—"

Dehadikeh's face screwed up in pain as he grabbed his brother's shoulders. "Because it's the only thing I've EVER wanted, and I can't STAND it anymore!"

The outburst surprised even him. Jaune understood that desperation all too well. The sense of who he was against who he should be, the reckless bid to sneak into Beacon to change that, to fulfill an expectation he alone had for himself. The feeling that he was failing to live up to his blood, his ancestry. It was such a strange thing to relate to a god…

"Doya…" his voice quivered, "...I don't know why I'm here anymore… what I'm for… I have the power to create, but I'm not allowed to use it! And I know you feel something like I do!"

Doyadano couldn't meet his pleading eyes, closing his own. "I-I hate destroying! You know that! I… I don't know what I feel, it's just… empty… except for you…"

Dehadikeh froze, his intensity diminished. "I'd never make you hurt anything. But we can find your purpose too! You'd be helping me bring new life… Before Creation comes Destruction. I can't do it by myself."

Doyadano opened his eyes, still filled with uncertainty, but the gentle squeeze of his shoulders was a comfort once more.

"Please… Help me… I need you, brother…"

They stood for a while. Krillin remembered when he and Goku were kids. They weren't blood, and Goku was always too tough for that… but he was a brother to him. And if he ever came to Krillin with a plea like that, he'd be powerless to resist.

"I don't know why you want this so badly," Doyadano admitted, "but… I want to understand… I'll try for you."

Dehadikeh's eyes glistened as his smile returned with full force. "Okay!" he burst, letting out a relieved, grateful breath he'd been holding. "So… here's how we'll start…"

Whis' voice returned. "So it began, a grand plot took shape. And all the while, little Doyadano listened…"

I met a man…

He had a dream…

I tried to understand,

but nothing was what it seemed…

Sometimes…

that's how gods roll...

Oscar and Ozpin beheld time passing in earnest, the world's Sun tracking across the sky as Doyadano listened to his brother's frantic excited plans and explanations. He drew symbols for protein chains in the clouds as they lay on their backs, chattering away about enzymes and chemosynthesis and allele frequencies and every manner of thing the childlike Destroyer could only politely listen to in bafflement and awe. Then Dehadikeh would become too energized and stand up, racing around and miming wildly.

Ozpin was stunned silent by his own howling thoughts, and Oscar watched him, quite aware of it. The stain… but they couldn't be, this didn't fit the stories! One was an elder, the other hated life… Was it all just wrong?

We'd sit for hours…

He'd share his plans

to build a Universe

and make every part by hand...

A big scheme…

With an infinite goal…

"We'll make it in the Seventh Universe," Deha proclaimed brightly.

So I would watch and listen

and try to learn…

"...Why the Seventh?"

...as the pieces and bits

became whole…

"The Sixth and Seventh are twins, like us!" the Kai explained, projecting symbols of the different pairs as explanation.

"Oh…" Doya intoned, legs kicking the air idly.

But there was more going on

than the work at hand…

Doya pondered. "But… why the Seventh?" he repeated.

What I learned had to do

with the strength of the soul…

Deha fell beside him on his elbow, beaming at him as the loose grass flew into the air.

"For luck…"

Ruby felt that strange disorientation once more, as everything receded into blackness. But in moments she could see the twinkle of starlight as what could only be described as an ancient, rusty red burnout of a star glowed feebly before her. Its brightest points burned orange, but most of it was pockmarked with dull red, like campfire embers.

There's a light that shines...

Above her floated the twin gods, staring at it in the dim light. Doya looked to his brother in question. There would be no going back after this...

Deha nodded, stepping back.

And its power is mine!

Doya clenched both fists before his eyes in concentration, and outstretched his hand to the dim star.

"Hakai…"

Though our body's weak

and breakable…

A mulberry flash blinked from the star, brighter than anything else in the black sky, and Ruby Rose beheld the awesome sight as bright spots bubbled onto the pockmarked giant, and its surface swayed in collapse. Faster and faster the mass brightened with movement, as stellar material shifted with gravity and shrank towards a single ultra-dense point.

…the spirit is Indomitable!

The Brothers' clothes flapped in stellar winds as Ruby's eyes were engulfed in light. She'd barely glimpsed the star's mass fly through its own center to the other side before it all picked up speed as the celestial ashes bathed everything nearby for billions of miles in every direction.

When Gohan's eyes had adjusted, the dark corner of space had become a vast nebula of every conceivable color drifting through the void, clouds and arches of shaded fluff forming a sculpture that was also a painting that was grander than any imagining.

Doyadano beheld his own work in awe and surprise, catching his brother's eye as he nodded approvingly, as if to say 'I told you so…'

So step by step...

But now it was Dehadikeh's turn, and with a whirl of his finger the stardust began to form an accretion disk around its center, small bulges of dust growing larger as they accumulated the mass around them. The beginnings of a solar system.

...and frame by frame...

With only the second whirl, directed at a spot more precise, he nudged one of the closer protoplanets into a stable path as the surrounding dusts collected in a steaming molten ball. He tapped a passing planetoid with a wide orbit into being captured by his new subject of interest, the cloudy world acquiring a sizable moon.

...a world created…

His red eyes sparkling with passion, Deha's hand hovered over his front, and the inspiring smear lifted off his vest and was shaped to encircle the globe like some enormous decal.

Ruby, nor Ozpin, nor any who witnessed this true literal miracle could deny it any longer, as they watched Remnant take shape before their eyes… at the behest of the fabled Brothers.

…its map fashioned from a stain…

Just dream big,

then work till it grows…

They soon found themselves plunging into the impenetrable clouds as the divine stencil bade the endless ocean to churn with the uplift of mountains, islands and indeed continents as they erupted out of the depths to bubble and boil at the water's edge.

But they sank under the waves, into the crevices of new land as the world settled, into the places too dark for anything but the glow of frothing, virgin volcanic vents. The twins stood over one of them, and as they watched, their perspective shifted as they shrunk so the little gods seemed as titans, and the Kai's extended finger was like a lightning strike as he imbued the waters with something unknowable.

A fuzzy-looking strand wriggled aimlessly, but began to steadily accumulate smaller fuzzy pegs with luminescent red and green globules as it spiraled along. Then it faded within an amorphous sack of jelly. Another fade had encased that sack within a more complicated sack, an organism that split itself again and again as the waters began to crowd.

I learned this lesson...

They raced away, and the differently shaped blobs accumulated into larger and larger colonies, which took on more and more unique shapes as multicellularity took the reins.

We can evolve!

Writhing annelids and segmented invertebrates with spines and tiny armored crustaceans flooded the oceans. There was a momentary lull where the seas went green and it all seemed to empty, only for new life to explode even stronger and more numerous than before as they adapted to the toxic oxygen the algae pumped into the air.

Achieving anything

as long as our hearts resolve...

They followed a fanciful, undulating jellyfish as it swept through the blue void, before some armored predatory shrimp snatched it and fluttered away.

Believing…

...will make it so!

They climbed the continental slope towards the shallows as they passed sponges and armored fish employing familiar and bizarre designs. Life was feeling out every pore of possibility as it thrived and changed and grew.

Ultimately, the waters ended against a rocky beach leading up a hill towards a gap between two black sea cliffs, upon which, the Brothers beheld a fascinating development as they cheered-on a curious beast in silence.

And though our lives are limited

by years on Earth…

...our dreams won't be bound inside...

It was a chimera of opposing features that Bulma couldn't help but find charming. A six foot long tetrapod with a long, fish-like scaly body, tail, with a bony crocodilian head that almost seemed to pleasantly smile. Its four fin-like feet labored to drag it ashore, gills useless in the air, yet its chest expanded as it filled lungs from the slits in its snout regardless. A trailblazer seeking the land.

But exhaustion finally took the creature, which collapsed, its ribs prominent as it rattled and its lungs emptied for good.

Crestfallen, Doya leaned over the body, arms around its muscular neck as he squeezed in comfort and the light left its eyes.

The goal's not to live forever…

'Cause eternity loves

the creations of time...

Deha saw the sadness in his brother for yet another potential dead-end to a species. It never got any easier despite how many species there were here…

But then he glimpsed the silver lining, and tapped Doya's back to gain his attention. The confused Destroyer gave a withering look before following his brother's pointed finger up the beach. Another of the species was flopping confidently over the sand, doing something with its gait more efficient than the dragging of its fellow.

Their perspective swept past the beast as time bore on, up the sandy hills and cresting the craggy canyon to the sweeping valley on the other side...

There's a light that shines...

And its power is mine!

Though our body's weak

and breakable…

…the spirit is Indomitable!

The sunrise revealed a sprawling, fern-filled rainforest now brimming with enormous creatures grazing and preying as smaller reptilians scurried underfoot. Massive insects buzzed and all had developed their own meshing rhythms and partnerships.

The little Kai's vision had come true, beyond his wildest hopes…

But streaking across the sky was a blazing omen of doom, a massive, burning rock leftover from formation, crackling through the air and causing panic among all species as it hurtled towards the surface.

Protectively, Doyadano extended two fingers to destroy it…

...But his brother took hold of that hand and looked him in the eye, offering comfort with his smile. They'll be okay…

Don't be afraid…

Time sped forward again as the asteroid struck, and the lifescape around them seemed to vanish in a flash… then covered in smoke… The valley was a dark, charred waste… but green sprang from the cinders, bright and new.

Get up

get going!

A step every day!

I'll meet you there!

The twins continued on their endless trek, past the blasted lands and boiling waters.

But as everything settled into a new normal, new, more compact beings sprang up out of hiding to inherit it. Scurrying, fleshy, furry things scampered below while the titans from before the Armageddon had survived by shedding their mass and taking to the skies.

Climbed upon a stone pillar, the childlike gods beheld in wonder as the colorful, flapping things spiraled up and around them from below in a vortex. The Sun beamed, peeking through the murky clouds.

The look Deha gave his twin said everything: Life was resilient.

When we strive

we transcend!

Even death cannot halt our climb!

"What began as a modest experiment had spiraled into something apparently unstoppable. What had taken billions of years in the start was being outshined in mere millions. And while the little planet would shift and change, its denizens would change along with it. The childlike Kai's grand scheme was a success…"

The pair watched in the snow as a herd of mastodons grazed the tundra… though one of them was distracted.

"And yet, little Doya the Destroyer had learned something that distressed him greatly after all these years. That emptiness that lived in him, that unspoken want… he understood it now."

"I don't think I'll ever tire of that appendage on their faces," Deha laughed. "A shame it hasn't caught on yet."

But Doyadano wasn't listening. He had uncovered a lingering purple thistle in the snow, a true find in this desolation, and he was concentrating quietly.

"You see, Doyadano had realized his deepest desire as his brother worked and fulfilled his… for they were the same. Little Doyadano wanted to create life all his own."

His fingers shook as he focused on the little lavender bloom. This wasn't Creation… but perhaps it could be a start?

His gaze intensified. He bit his lip. He could do this… he could—

Like a lit fuse, purple raced over the bulb and stem down to the root, the thistle twisting as it turned ashen and disintegrated. The boy froze, the pain and disappointment in his eyes palpable even from a glance.

"Oh, Doya," Deha offered sadly as he heard the disturbance and saw its result, "Why did you do that?"

Doyadano stood up, teeth bared in agony, before he took off like a missile, tearing the frozen lands apart, disturbing the beasts and splitting the waters as he stole away. His brother recoiled in shock.

"Doya! Brother, WAIT!"

"Dehadikeh gave chase, but his brother had always been the faster one. For the first time, Doyadano hid from his twin's omnipresent vision… He hid in the darkest corner of the little blue planet, where neither Deha nor all that he'd made could see."

The little Kai's feet clapped against the shale as he ran, deeper and deeper into the tight black cavern. Deeper than the light of life could cast its glow, darker than the crushing abyss of the waters. If not for the Relic making it so, even Blake nor Sun could have seen the smaller brother's form collapsing to his hands and knees, hunched over and visibly crushed.

His breaths echoed as he shook, eyes slamming shut.

"Stolen away from his Brother and the world, Little Doya did something he'd never done before… The God of Destruction prayed."

"P-lease…!" Doyadano begged, to whom or what he didn't know. "Please…! I'm BEGGING y-you…! Just let me have one thing… One thing and I'll never wish for anything else! I'll be contented for the rest of time…!"

Ruby watched his hands clasp together as his voice broke… as did her heart.

"It can be small, it can be hideous, anything will do…! I just c-a-n't keep living with this hole in my he-eart! Why was I made this way…?! Why was I made to want this if I never could? Please…!"

He waited in the dark, only the hum of the cave and the drip of water within it for answer. Slowly, he stood to his knees, and stretched his hands out before him.

"He plumbed every vestige of his being as he tried again, his desire stark and sincere, the love for whatever he might bring overflowing in his soul…"

The violet power flared again, humming in the dark, throbbing and bright. He focused, eyes screwed up in effort and hope. The mote brightened and shrank, growing denser and more potent for it. His heart pounded as it poured into it...

And then it blew out in sparks like a bulb before his shocked green eyes.

"...But his prayer was swallowed by the darkness... and he found himself more alone than he had ever felt before."

Doya sat, frozen, for what seemed an eternity. He shuddered constantly. He shook his head. But he had his answer… and his little heart broke.

The dark lines of his eyes seemed to swell, and then two black drops rolled down his face. He sniffed, and shuddered, and gasped, and still more tears ran down his face like nonexistent mascara.

He leaned forward, hands clutching his heart as his face screwed up in pain, and he let the tortured sobs of silent eons fill the caverns as his tears formed a puddle beneath him. He cried, harder and harder, mourning those he would never bear, never cherish. He cried for them… He cried for himself… He cried until the floor reflected his whole body, like he stood upon a mirrored world, such was the volume of his grief that it soaked the floor.

But at last, panicked for his distress, Deha had found the cave and followed the wails of his brother.

"DOYA!" he called, stumbling over the scattering rocks as they scraped over one another. "DOYADANO!"

At last, he found him, the floor rippling with every step as he raced over and knelt down. A hand rubbed over his back. "Brother, I was sick with worry! Why did you run from me…? W-why are you crying? You've never cried before! Is it… is it something I've done? What's hurt you so badly…?"

Doya gasped and choked, and couldn't bear to look at his twin. "W-Why, Deha…?" He swallowed and sniffed. "Why did Grand Zeno make me a Kai… if he wanted a Destroyer…? Why did he make me want to create life so badly?"

"H… he wanted me to be your brother," Deha said, quietly. "Doya… how long? How long have you wanted this? Did I…" He froze, his own eyes shimmering. "Did this world blind me to you, suffering all this time…? B-brother, I'm so sorry…! I… I thought of the life here as ours! I couldn't have done this without you! They wouldn't exist without you! I thought you understood… But you just suffered in my shadow… Th-this has all been my own vanity!"

If the death of his dream wasn't hard enough to bear, his brother's guilt was much too much.

"D-don't say that!" Doyadano ordered, sitting up and grabbing his hands. "I'm happy that you're happy… I love them too… I just… wish I was happy for me…"

At last, a somber smile returned to Deha's face.

"I think it's time I show you something," he whispered, clasping the hands that held his. "I waited for this to be a surprise, but… I think you need this, Doyadano. I need your help with something. Please, let me take you from this terrible place…"

Dehadikeh waited for his brother's answer, thumbs rubbing the back of his hands. At last there was a nod. He took a breath. "Kai Kai…"

The still pool rippled as they vanished in a curtain of streaks.

They appeared in the morning light of frosty, rolling green hills, amidst scattered forests between the grand mountains. Deha bid his brother to kneel behind the bushes. He was confused, but obeyed. Together they waited… waited until the far brush rustled.

Doya gasped as several tall primates lumbered into the clearing, clothed in furs. Dark skinned, broad faced, not quite human, they filtered quietly through to pick fruits and nuts off the nearby plant life. Their rigid posture was already a gait far more human than other apes.

"Homo heidelbergensis," Oobleck whispered. "Fascinating…"

Doyadano's mouth gaped. "Deha… are they…?!"

"An Alpha kind," Dehadikeh confirmed, his soft grin tempered with a love his brother only saw directed at him, "true, budding Stewards!"

Doya couldn't keep his mouth shut. Of all the sights and all the wonders they had seen and made, this was the one he legitimately had believed impossible.

"I've watched them from afar the last few million years," Deha admitted. "In one more, I was going to show you… but… I think now is the time."

Doyadano found his voice. "What… what are they like?"

A mother and her child lingered, the child lifted high to grab the highest fruit with a rough laugh.

"They are so amazing, Doya…!" he gushed, his lip quivering. "When the skies fill with thunder, or dance with color, I see a light in their eyes… A fear, but also a wondrous thirst to understand… They see the wonders of the world and wish to know them better."

The child reached too far and grabbed a branch too thin. The mother cried out as it snapped and she fell… but one of the other females had seen it and caught them in a harmless heap, and all parties huffed with relief as they picked up themselves and their treasures.

"But so much greater than their minds alone..." Dehadikeh began again. "They had many cousin species. They grew and changed as well, and there was one even smarter than these… but they died. All of them. They sacrificed so much for their minds… They cannot overpower their predators… can't outrun them or chase down prey. They're not built to live in the trees like their ancestors… and cleverness alone is not enough."

Doya sat, fascinated, as he whispered. "What made them different?"

The quiver in the Kai's lip was in tune with the shimmer in his eyes. "I-it's not strength in numbers like the ants, not alone… They care about each other… lift each other up, shoulder the others' pains. They are so… kind! Their power lives in each other, in their bonds. It's Love, Doya…!"

Doya stared at his brother, somehow more surprised. "Love…"

"I thought it was impossible," Deha admitted. "Of what we've seen here, what creatures survived without fighting, or hiding? Many cannibalize each other, or care only for their own children. But… from raw chaos, after all this time… Love became a way of life… and with it, they will inherit this world as its true masters! They will create and do such amazing things, Doyadano…! They… who by simply existing, have proven that Love was not invented by the gods… With enough time, the Cosmos demanded it must exist on its own…"

Krillin balked at it all. There was something so strange… yet so affirming to hear their kind appraised in such a way. Bulma understood the emotion in Dehadikeh's voice. How much more special was Love and intellect if it wasn't merely handed to them? How much less hostile was a Cosmos where kindness was a winning strategy by its own merits?

The Brothers watched in silence for a long while, before Doyadano finally spoke up.

"You… said you needed me for something?"

"Yes. I want to bestow a Blessing upon them… from both of us."

Doya blinked. "You mean… the Spark?"

He nodded. As did King Kai.

All beings by the nature of their lives carried a spark of divinity within them that tied them to the divine realms. But the masters of their worlds held something more still. Not merely a soul, but a piece of the true essence of godhood itself.

"Take my hand, Doya," the Kai asked. As he did, their clasps glowed a brilliant violet and gold. "Being our only, I think we can afford to grant them the best, don't you?"

Taiyang's back bristled as he remembered. It had only been flashes before, but now all was clear…

"Knowledge… to never fear the unseen, or the invisible…" Deha began, a sphere of light sealing over their hands. "To Create, OR Destroy…" he continued, giving his brother a smile. "THEY will have the Choice…"

Doya smiled back as gold and lavender burned between them.

It all flew out as a wispy orb, soaring into the back of the unsuspecting child that lingered. She started, but sought the source to no avail, returning to her kind to unwittingly spread her gift to all.

"And one day, we will bestow the means to harness that power… when they are ready."

"Bleurgh!" Beerus added at last. "Oh my ME, could this be any more sap-drenched? The brotherly fawning, 'the transcendental power of Love?!' "

"Oh SHUT UP!" Nora shouted at the sky, impotently. "It's incredibly sweet, and you're a jealous mean old cat!"

"I am merely relaying what happened, Lord Beerus, I am not responsible for the content. But frankly, I find it astounding that true altruism could arise within beings with no moral dictates. That they would come to be so with no otherworldly prodding is quite encouraging to my mind…"

"Whatever… It's going to take a LOT to save this world from me after that… Let's move on."

"And so Dehadikeh and Doyadano savored something altogether new, as the time saw fit to slow again from the millions of years to the thousands… yet still the beings that became their beloved Humans found ways to make the most of even THAT time."

They watched as the tiny tribe grew so gradually, and its people changed bit by bit, until suddenly one day the glow of flames illuminated the center, and the changes began to come thrice as quickly.

"Fire, agriculture, writing, art, money, society… As life exploded in the early days of the world, so did the reach and power of these little apes as they perfected the art of cooperation. Soon the fear of falling to the beasts of the wilds turned to the inevitability of TAMING that wild. They expanded to every corner… but Deha and Doya saw fit at last to return to the place where their legacy began."

As Gohan watched, the twins came out of hiding and crossed the log bridge in silence to the city entrance. As they approached, they gradually drew the eyes of the people. At once it was like they couldn't be certain what they were seeing, yet knew exactly what they saw.

The city guards held their spears aloft, but shot glances at each other constantly. The oddly dressed beings were clearly not human, yet posed so little obvious threat. The two smiled at every eye that found them, as surreal to walk among them as their visit certainly was to them.

Wordless, the townspeople trailed them. In time, it was the children alone that were brave enough to walk side by side with them. Doyadano was floored as a young girl took his hand. A boy did so with the other. In moments they were all arm in arm, and the bashful god blushed as he smiled at the floor.

When they reached the town center, a hushed crowd had formed to encircle them at a respectful distance. The Brothers strode to the center and looked to each and every one of them.

"At last, mankind was ready to receive their next gift."

Dehadikeh extended his palm as if in welcome, but reached for a rusted oil lamp hanging from a nearby pole. Its nature shifted, gleaming inch by inch into nothing less than the blue and gold lantern floating into his hand.

"The Lamp of Knowledge…"

The crowd froze and muttered in trepidation at the decidedly supernatural display, but quieted as the Kai wandered the crowd. At last, he found a stunned beggar in a corner beside a shop, who stared as the lantern floated into his cautious hands. He stared between it and the childlike Kai, who only nodded warmly to the bafflement of all.

"The Stave of Destruction…"

Doya wandered the crowd as well, settling on a city guard barely more than a teenager. Scrawny, malnourished, his hide helmet ill-fitting so it sat crooked on his head. Doya reached for his weapon, a modest pike, which the guard gave him with caution.

In Doya's hands, the pike's shabby wood was transformed into shimmering gold, its iron point blooming into a perfect blue crystal.

Doya twisted both ends of the staff, and it magically grew and lengthened to something more appropriate for the boy's size. Like the beggar, he and the crowd around him were struck with awe, confusion and jealousy.

"The Sword of Creation, and the Crown of Choice…"

As before, the gilded Relics found homes in the most unlikely of people. The sword found itself formed out of a long chisel in the hands of a surprised mason, and the crown upon the head of a little girl with copper hair, who had previously worn a circlet of woven flowers. The confusion was palpable, but at no point on that day or any other would the townspeople challenge the owners for their bequests, or pilfer them in the night.

Indeed, the unspoken understanding of this visit was largely complete. Their creators had come to help them.

"I'm sorry…" Beerus chimed in. " 'Sword of Creation?' "

Whis laughed. "Yes! You see the logic, of course? One made for a contradictory, antithetical purpose? I believe this might be little Doyadano coming to terms with his nature…"

Less understood was the Kai's attitude. Once the four gifts had been assigned, the townspeople made to humble themselves, kneeling and falling on their hands in worship. Doyadano merely beheld the reverence in surprise, but Dehadikeh found himself deeply distressed. He shook his head fervently, found those on the floor and bade them to rise, taking their hands and pulling them until they found their feet.

At first it seemed as though these people were being chosen, but he was constantly saddened by the sight of any who would genuflect in their name. He could barely look at them until they were upright once more. The mood was awkward at first, but once the others followed, he seemed visibly relieved. He went through the crowds, brushing his hands across theirs as he passed. He palmed the cheeks of the children that found him. Some of them were bold enough to embrace him and received his comfort. Doyadano trailed him, finding others expecting the same of the Destroyer, who meekly emulated the warmth of his brother, but preferred the distance.

"Eventually they made their way out of the town, and the distraught humans found they could no longer follow until the twins had warped away, leaving their Relics and an eternity of questions behind them."

The twins looked over the town years later in silence. Dehadikeh saw the onyx and marble representations of themselves in the town square with a sigh.

"The town had blossomed with the power of their Relics. It was simple at first, the structures perfected, solid. Higher quality tools, more imaginative architecture, better record keeping. They had barely plumbed the possibilities of their newfound power. Yet Supreme Kai Dehadikeh had regrets…"

"I think showing ourselves might have been a mistake," Deha admitted. "I think they misunderstood why we came."

"Is this about them bowing?" Doya asked, feet hanging over the cliff.

Deha sighed again. "I'm not mad at them… I'm happy they accept us… but they want to worship us… I… I love them, Doya. The only thing I want is for them to be happy. And I can't… stand to see them lower themselves! I don't understand why that's what they thought we wanted to see. Do they think so little of themselves?"

"We're deities, Deha," Doyadano reminded him with a smile. "They think we're so far above them."

Deha sighed again, shaking his head. "That's not how I feel. I want them to be capable of true greatness, even godhood of their own."

"They will be," Doya told him. "But for now, that seems worlds away to them. All children see their parents like gods. Eventually, they learn their own strengths."

Deha turned to him in surprise, smiling again. "You're right… You've been paying attention."

"You've had a lot to teach me."

They smiled at each other a moment, that brotherly warmth not lost, even after untold eons.

Deha seemed to remember something. "Did you hear what they've been calling this world? They gave it a name."

Doya smiled, nodding, letting it out with a sigh: " 'Rhema…' I really like it."

Dehadikeh grimaced. "It's a beautiful name… Though it means 'the spoken word,' " he explained, reserved. "Our word… I'm not sure how I feel about that… but it's their world. Rhema it is."

Bartholomew Oobleck hummed. He'd heard this dredged up in ancient texts, but never had this exact perspective. 'Rhema,' almost certainly became corrupted after the cataclysm that rocked mankind, from then on becoming 'Remnant.' It was a common belief, among archaeologist circles, but only speculation.

Doyadano kicked off from the cliff and floated idly. "I think there's an expedition happening today. They want to explore the deserts to the east."

Deha stood up as well, following as his brother led the way up the hill. "They're becoming fearless!" he laughed. "I assume they're bringing the Sword… I hope they reach the red coasts, they'll do a lot more with all that iron for—"

Doya was turned back towards him, floating backwards, when Deha's face turned ghostly pale all at once as he froze. He landed… and turned towards the one fear they'd held for ages and ages.

I wasn't ready…

Four figures stood before them, waiting. Two preposterously tall blue beings clad in purple and gold flanked the Grand Minister… and Grand Zeno himself.

You can't prepare

for the unthinkable,

for something that's so unfair…

It's cruel, but

that's how life goes…

Both brothers threw themselves upon the ground, barely daring to meet their eyes.

"Grand Zeno!" they both cried.

"It was my fault! Don't punish him, it was my idea!"

"No! He couldn't have done it if I refused!"

"Doya, stop! I'm trying to protect yo—"

"Please be quiet," Zeno ordered, and Qrow could have sworn nature itself had gagged the vicinity.

The Grand Minister's expression could barely be described as 'concerned,' while the Omni King himself was flat, if expectant. The wait for whatever happened next was torturous.

At last, Zeno continued. "This is not where you belong. Why did you leave the Prime Universe and make a world somewhere else? This is very bad."

Dehadikeh waited a beat before answering. "G-Grand Zeno… forgive me…! The Prime Universe, I wanted so badly to create and care for life, like I was made to… but the Universe doesn't need me. It doesn't need my brother. The ceaseless idleness… We only came here to care for one place all our own, a gift to Universe 7! We meant no harm!"

Zeno blinked in surprise, eyes widening. "The Universe doesn't need you? I do not understand…"

The Grand Minister stepped forward. "I'm afraid you're wrong. Every Universe is made with its Supreme Kai and Destroyer as a lynch pin to its very existence. Without them, a Universe will decay."

The brothers glanced at each other in shock. "D-decay…?"

"Not instantaneously," the Minister elaborated, "it takes an exceptionally long time. You brothers were absent from the Prime Universe for billions of years."

Before them, a window opened to shot after shot of worlds in the Prime Universe. Dehadikeh and Doyadano leapt to their feet as they recognized world after world, moldering and dim. The lifeforms were twisted or dying. Everything appeared to be flying apart in defiance of gravity or the nuclear forces. Bleak, strange skies filled all as the laws of nature themselves broke down.

The Otherworld was no different. Hell was smearing through the clouds above and abominations were touching the heavens. Souls were merging together like drops of water and flooding the judgment station like undead hordes. Even the Sacred World was a dusty husk of rock barely held together as the roots of the tree that birthed them struggled to retain what order remained.

Dehadikeh's horror was beyond his ability to speak as he shook his head over and over again. "No… no, please no…! I didn't… we didn't mean for…" His brother just stood frozen in shock.

"Trillions of souls, living and passed, are beyond all hope," the Grand Minister told them. "The Universe is past mending, and will need to be entirely remade."

Doyadano finally found the words. "You mean… destroyed."

He nodded sadly.

"...With us…?" Doya probed, bracing for the answer.

There was a silence.

"No," Zeno said at last, to the shock of the twins. "I made you to love life an awful lot. You broke the rules to make more life to love. I did not think you would leave for so long to do this. That is my fault…"

Of all the blows they were taking, the twins stared at each other as this next tidal wave rolled over them. Grand Zeno was accepting the blame?

"We'll change things the next time," he continued, "and you won't have to leave."

It sounded too good to be true. They knelt.

"Thank you, Omni King…"

"Your mercy humbles and astounds us, sire…"

"...But if we don't leave, what will become of this world?"

Zeno's massive head tilted with confusion. "Huh?"

The Grand Minister's countenance fell. "This world is a result of meddling between Universes. It was made in conflict with the will and laws of the Omni King. Such a thing cannot be rewarded… There must be a cost."

Dehadikeh froze. He stood there, sweat dripping from his forehead as he contemplated. He swallowed as he considered. His eyes watered.

"Then I'll take the punishment!"

There was a collective shimmer through the group as the statement hit them.

The Grand Minister took a measured breath. "The punishment is erasure."

Doyadano looked to his brother as though he were crazy… and as though that madness was beginning to make sense to him.

Deha shook, gritting his teeth. "I-I'll take the punishment…" he repeated.

"Noo…!" Weiss gasped to herself, a sadness in her tone that surprised even her.

Even the tall guards broke composure to stare at each other as the Grand Minister's mouth fell open.

Zeno himself lifted off the ground and soared to float immediately in front of the Kai, surprise all over his face. "You would do that?"

Dehadikeh met his eyes. "Yes… Omni King, I love them… If I must give myself to spare this world, I'll gladly do it!"

"For a single world?" The Grand Minister asked, plainly perturbed.

"My Omni King… this is a special place, unique throughout the Multiverse!" he explained. "There are billions of species here! We made life that changed and grew all on its own over the ages, splitting and shifting into the most abundant and beautiful things, beyond even the imagination of divines!"

Zeno floated a step back. "Bill...ions…?"

"There even arose a dominant species, a thinking, learning, loving master to cultivate it all! Please, your permanence… surely your eyes can see that this place is unlike any other…?"

But through the sadness…

Thousands of tears...

We see his message,

sparkling and crystal clear:

Our work is larger than we know!

Zeno straightened himself, and slowly wheeled around, as if he'd only just now paid any mind to the world he now took part in. His tiny eyes wandered across the horizon and beyond, glimpsing the tiniest insects, the greatest leviathans in the seas… Ecosystems exploding with competing and cooperating lifeforms. But nearby his attention was caught by the simple, beautiful form of a tiny rose bush, flowering brightly against the verdant hills.

But then the winds picked up, and a number of beige objects spun by. Zeno plucked one from the air, mid-flight, examining the little wonder.

It was a seed, blown from a tall, red maple nearby. The seed had evolved to grow a curved, thin blade on its stem that served as a sort of wing to catch the air. They spun like propellers, letting them spread far and away from the trees that spawned them. It was a wonderful, unique strategy…

Even the Grand Minister snagged one, idly inspecting it with enthused curiosity.

"Yes," Zeno said at last, with a smile. "It's amazing! Really really AMAZING!"

The Minister sighed as he released the seed into the wind. "Even so, you cannot decide this in a vacuum. The life of a Supreme Kai is bound to the life of the Destroyer."

Deha looked to Doyadano, who was frozen, eyes locked open in fear. Their eyes met. His heart sank.

"Brother… I could never ask you to—"

"We have to!" Doya cried, as though his own words terrified him.

"Doya…"

"We h-have to save them, D-Deha," he affirmed, shaking. "Or it's all been for nothing!"

Dehadikeh walked to his brother, taking his hands. "You're absolutely sure about this?"

Doyadano's green eyes stared as he breathed, heart pounding. He turned to Zeno. "Can I do it?" he asked. "Use my power… to…?"

Zeno stared. "Uh huh…"

Dehadikeh seemed all the more surprised, and guilty. "Can you really go through with that…? That means you have to…"

The childlike Destroyer's face withheld pain as he nodded. His brother couldn't stop himself as he grabbed him into an embrace so firm and warm it was like they were trying to merge into one another.

"I feel better that it's you…" Dehadikeh confided. "It's okay… y'know? We've loved life… but death is a part of life… Maybe now I'll understand all of it."

They said nothing for a while. Deha opened his eyes. "You're shaking."

Doya hid his face in the crook of Deha's neck. "I-I'm scared…"

"Y-yeah…" Deha laughed, nervously. "Doya…?" His lips sought an ear to whisper. "Thank you… for being my brother…"

He squeezed Doyadano's shoulder pointedly… the one against his own back.

Ruby Rose felt her mouth go dry. It couldn't be they'd let them do this… Why wasn't Zeno stopping it? It wasn't necessary…! They had to stop it… They just had to…

Doyadano squeezed even harder. The hand on his brother's back shook…

And when the word was uttered, voice breaking, Ruby knew he was really saying 'I love you…'

"H-Hakai…!"

Dehadikeh recoiled in pain as the purple flames erupted from his back… and began to swiftly consume him. His lower body began to drift away in mulberry sparks as it spread. Doyadano reared back to see his brother's shocked expression as he was steadily unmade. The arms that squeezed him began to fade as the flames licked them and approached the nape of his neck.

Despite his pain, Deha found the strength to give his brother one last smile as the tears came at last.

"Th-they're going to be okay…"

But those arms holding him drifted away, and at last that face he'd stared at fondly was encircled by the creeping flames… and in an instant was gone. Supreme Kai Dehadikeh had been erased from existence.

For the first time in his billions of years of life, God of Destruction Doyadano was alone. He trembled, frozen stiff. His chest heaved. Distraught for the loss of his brother… Terrified in the understanding that he would soon join him. His arms crossed as he hugged his own chest.

And then it came for him.

"Nnnggh!" He groaned, as the flames sprouted from the same spot on his back. His mouth dropped open as he wailed at the pain in slowly burning away. Like his brother, it crept to his lower body, holes forming in his being as he saw himself drifting away as sparks. He couldn't keep still… It was agony! He could feel himself becoming smaller… lesser… With a start, he looked to see his hands vanishing as well, and a panic took him.

A thousand doubts, and fears and pains and affirmations crossed his face as the fires engulfed it, a true last gasp of pain, fear and surprise escaping his lips before the last of the sparks escaped into the air… and Doyadano's existence came to an end.

The silence that followed was total, if not for the soft cries of birds in the distance.

The other three looked to the Omni King, who seemed almost confused by the sight. He looked to that same rose bush and pointed to it as it glowed in response. His other hand pointed at the spot where the brothers had disappeared… and a grand vine topiary of roses twisted into existence in their shape, still lovingly embraced.

This done, Zeno's head dipped. "I don't want to be on this world anymore…"

The Grand Minister nodded solemnly as the two guards flanked Zeno on either side, taking his hands. In a stream of color and light, they lifted off into the expanse, and at last all that remained was Rhema, left to its own devices… ignorant to the fate of its makers.

Ruby didn't understand it. She'd never even heard of these two by name before this. All in all, for what it represented, she hadn't even been aware of them for an hour.

...So then why had she burst into tears?

Was it her existing emotional exhaustion? Was it that she'd seen them born and watched them die? Was it that they gave themselves for the world she called home, despite how much they feared the abyss that took them? Was it really as simple as the form they'd taken as children?

Regardless, there she was, sat on her knee, hand over her eyes as she fought to stem the tears.

"P-please… miss… Don't cry…" a familiar voice bade her, startling her as she struggled to see. She only made out a blotch of golden light before her… before she felt a small hand on her cheek, wiping away a tear.

"Wha…?"

"It's okay… We chose this… Please, there's more you need to see…"

The light faded, and Beerus' voice returned.

"I don't understand. Wasn't this meant to explain that creature wearing the girl? Where does that come in?"

Whis tutted with amusement. "Ah, but you missed it, my lord! That already happened… Let's see just what occurred in that cave after the twins left, shall we?"

Deep in the darkness, Doyadano's tears remained pooled, the blackest thing of all. Waiting, this lacrimal essence remained still, yearning, pining in silence.

But one day, something ventured near. The cavern echoed with the clatter of tiny hooves as a broad-faced, spindly-legged ungulate separated from its antlered parents and raced in playfully, heedless to any danger the darkness posed.

Its parent called with a hoarse cry, but as the calf's ears and body swiveled to heed it, the poor beast slid upon the shale and fell with a cry into the dark drop-off waiting just out of sight.

The calf tumbled from one drop to the next as the cave swallowed the light, and indeed seemed to claim the poor creature as well.

Having come to a stop, it scrambled as pain shot through its broken foreleg, struggling to stand as it called with a high grunt for its mother. There was a call in reply, but its parents would not venture in. They knew better.

Whimpering, the calf stepped more carefully, minding its leg as it braved the darkness in search of a means to return.

Instead, the poor creature only managed to stumble its way to irretrievable depths, blind and injured, its panic making it thirsty. Inevitably, it followed a scent of water to the pool of tears, sniffing the strange substance with distrust.

The blackwater erupted suddenly as strands and tendrils grabbed the calf. Not with hunger, but desperation… The poor beast floundered as it was dragged to the center, kicking and bellowing in fear before it was dragged under the surface… never to rise.

Instead, minutes later, something else dragged itself, awkward and knob-legged from the ink, its own body black as pitch. Its red eyes glowed in the darkness. The gleam of bony white armor on its head and hooves was lost in the black. It paced in interest. It glimpsed around every corner as if expecting to see something, or someone.

Ultimately, it decided that what it sought was not there, whimpering before it began to climb its way to the surface.

Cautiously, it approached the mouth of the cavern, having never seen the light. It stepped into the moon's glow and to the tall forest outside.

It called out again, sharply, its voice echoing through the trees. It waited.

Silence greeted it again. It tried another call, in the other direction.

This time, something called back. The ungulate family stormed over the hill, slowing only when the black calf was in their sights.

But the parents skid to a stop, wary. The mother approached carefully, sniffing the creature that looked like their calf.

But at once it recoiled, shoving the fake with its snout before the parents circled the other calves, stamping and snorting in threat as the creature crept back in fear and confusion. Ultimately it ran into the woods. Those weren't what it sought anyway. Those creatures wouldn't quell the need in its being…

But there was an orange glow this time, only a few trees ahead. It rounded them to come face to face with five two-legged creatures towering over it, carrying pointed bits of wood.

It did not understand the noises the creatures made, but there was a plain agitation in the group.

"By the gods, what is it?"

"It looks like a moose, but… its eyes…!"

"It's possessed! Possessed of an evil spirit!"

"Don't let it escape!"

The black calf cowered as they advanced, but the savage thrust of the spears was too fast, too ferocious for it to anticipate. It was slain in seconds, and drifted apart like ash. There would be no meat, no trophy to accompany the hunters' tale tonight.

Meanwhile, back in the cave, the black calf scrambled out of the pool again, twisting around for its attackers, only to find safety in the darkness that birthed it. The creature lied down on its knobby legs and sighed, lost and alone.

"In the years to come, the stygian mass seeped into the low places of the world as it grew, consuming and twisting any creature foolish enough to fall within its grasp. But what it sought, it never found. Armed only with the minds of beasts, it sent its countless avatars out into the world in search. Inevitably, they crossed paths with humans, their dwellings and their creations. Alarmed and distrustful of these unnatural beasts they would dub the "Creatures of Grimm," the humans would slay them where they could, certain they were an ill omen or curse."

Ozpin watched a vigilant, fearsome Beowulf minding itself on an overlook, to the terror of a town below its perch.

Most remarkable was the utter lack of aggression in its posture. These were not the same beasts that plagued their modern wilds. Had humans been the first aggressors? Had simple fear of the unknown made a dire enemy where none existed?

"Tainted by its first encounter with these two-legged beings, it didn't take long for Doyadano's creation to consider defending itself, as it acquired the templates for beasts more fearsome and powerful. However, this act of prudence was taken as proof positive of the Grimm's vile nature. Correctly, the humans guessed them to be the work of their 'God of Darkness,' but then exaggerated his timid nature to cast him as a furtive, jealous foil… A sower of chaos who created an adversary to the life provided by his brother… An adversary to mankind itself."

Blake's ears folded down. "Sounds familiar."

"Then, one fateful day, the prince of an island nation accompanied the princess of another land to seek her father's blessing. The long carriage ride through the wilds was merely greater excuse for the adoring pair to indulge in the other's company. But the night had other plans…"

The carriage dropped heavily, and skid less than a foot through the dirt as a front wheel spun off its axle. The crash rattled the driver and rocked the pair inside. The white horse pulling it spooked and whinnied as it tore off down the moonlit road.

The armored chevaliers escorting them leapt off their mounts to see to their sworn charges, bec de corbins set aside to free their hands.

"Are you well sire? Lady?"

Brushing past him was an athletic woman in an understated green gown, her long blonde hair set in braids above her crimson eyes. "Well don't let the mare run off! Never mind, I'll get her…"

Without hesitation she vaulted upon one of the chevaliers' steeds and rode after.

"My lady, caution please!" The first chevalier pleaded as the prince strode out, his chestnut hair bouncing at his ears.

" 'Ette, there might be monsters!" he called as she rounded a bend in the trees and out of sight. "Damn! Fasten that wheel, I'll bring her back."

"Prince Siegfried, please to allow me—"

But he'd already mounted the last beast and torn after his betrothed, leaving the three on the road.

"Pour l'amour de Frères," the chevalier swore.

"Fearless and foolish," the driver remarked. "As a pair they will be the death of Brocéliande…"

The princess, an accomplished rider, chased the mare around the corner to a moon-soaked glade. The silver light was dreamlike as it illuminated the dark pond at its center.

Her steed tramped around the glade to a stop. She stared every which way, but the mare had no place to go. It couldn't have gotten past her…

Yang leered at the dark pond, her eyes widening. "Aw no… Don't go near that pond…" she urged, pointlessly

But then with a gurgle, the surface of the pond rippled and broke. She raced to the water's edge as the mare struggled to escape. It must have been some tar pit, or quicksand the beast had fallen prey to, or—

She froze as the mare… or what had replaced it… opened a great, glowing orange eye, its face and haunches white and bony. It was Grimm.

The beast reared onto its hind legs and gave off a beastly neigh, before running clear out to leave her alone in the glade, the clap of its hooves fading into the night.

Before she could register what she just witnessed, something wrapped around her ankle and pulled her feet out from under her. She hit the floor with a scream, but only had a moment to wail in horror before the waters came alive to drag her in. Her perfect nails dragged ruts in the mud as she resisted, but in moments she was afloat, at the mercy of whatever force clawed after her so desperately.

"Siegfried!" she shrieked, struggling and paddling at the waters before they swelled and sucked her under. She broke the surface, head above the water as her arms reached out, a mortal fear in her eyes. "HELP ME!"

But one final tug brought her down as the water turned unearthly still.

Jaune stared, a chill running down his back. What an awful fate. What would even happen to her?

The glade returned to its unnatural quiet, the pond like a mirror, indifferent of the girl it just claimed.

But then, not a ripple breaking the perfect stillness, the princess' head surfaced. She seemed to stand as though she'd been sitting in the pond bottom, waist deep in the black water as the girl's fear was obliterated from her features. As she blinked, all was replaced by a serene curiosity.

The being's hands twisted and fanned in front of it, and swept over the unfamiliar body. She… 'Yes,' it decided…! 'SHE…!'

SHE stared beyond herself, beyond the trees and the earth… Her gaze drifted higher, to the stars she'd never noticed before as any other creature. She reached a finger to the shining moon, wondering for the first time what it was. A thousand threads and questions and wants began to untangle as her mind finally had a worthy medium to work through. It was as though she'd been asleep, dreaming her entire curious existence, and was now awake. A gestating embryo, born at last.

She could feel beyond this body to the disparate parts of her that dotted the world. It was all so overwhelming…

Ruby beheld the being curiously. The change that overtook Odette was visible… but subtle. In this light, anyway.

She remembered Whis and Beerus discussing how Salem had overtaken a girl… but this was a different girl from her. This wasn't like the horse, broken down and remade. Odette was still —thankfully— wearing the clothes she'd been taken with, and not reborn, naked. She had been… changed, not replaced.

Siegfried rode around the corner and slid off his horse, only mildly startling the steed his bride had abandoned.

" 'Ette! Why are you in the pond, you'll catch your death, my love!"

Her gaze lowered. Instinctively she stepped back… but one of these creatures had never approached her so calmly before… Nor had she ever understood the chattering of their feverish mouths.

"The mare is lost then?" He sighed with a smile. "One day this sort of thing is going to get both of us in trouble, you know?"

And of course… this meant she shared this gift of voice as well. He expected her to reply…

"A-ah…!" she croaked, abiding the body's instincts as she tested her voice. "Wh-what…" She stopped, sighed, frustrated with herself. "Want… to… find… something."

"Dear, are you alright? Yes, you were looking for the horse."

She shook her head, not realizing at first what the gesture meant as she did it, but approved as the connection was made in her mind. "No… Trying to find some...one…?"

She exercised great willpower as he approached her with concern. She didn't want to consume this one. Several of the unseen watchers winced as his feet contacted the black ichor…

He waded into the waters to reach her, taking her hand, palming her cheek and looking over her head.

"Did you hurt yourself? Yes, 'Ette, we're going to see your father… remember?"

Her eyes lit up. Hairs stood on end all over her bodies. Her mouth parted, and finally he had her full attention as her human heart pounded. The word brought joy and focus and voice to the one and only desire she had ever had. "Father…? Father…! Yes… yes…!" Her hands finally gripped his. "Father…! You… You know… our… my…?"

Bulma felt her heart glow, and she was hardly the only one. Weiss too felt an immediate shift in how she regarded this being, as the sparkle in her red eyes held no malice or ill will, only the pure, loving innocence of a child.

Ruby's eyes watered again, heart still bruised from the Brothers. Her affection for what was certainly Salem soared for sharing her own quiet yearning...

"Of course," Siegfried said, truly concerned by now. "Come, let's go. We'll go to him and have someone look you over."

A squeal of unrestrained mirth escaped her as an enormous smile seemed to engulf her being. She threw her arms around him, bouncing on the balls of her feet as he stumbled in surprise. She let go in a single motion and dragged him by the hand out of the water. "We'll go?! We'll go now?!"

Exasperated, he laughed as he regained the lead. "Yes yes… I suppose it might be dangerous if you try to ride now…"

He tied the two horses together and stepped up onto the lead mount. Her hand still clasping his, he helped her into the saddle… though she opted to do so backwards, facing him instead. He laughed once more as she wrapped her arms around his middle and stared between him and the forest all around in joy and fascination, like she'd never seen any of it before.

Qrow stood conflicted as he watched them ride off. Their enemy, ages old, so free of hate… And yet, in her wake, already, a life claimed. Trapped. Was she even aware of what she'd stolen?

The ride back to the carriage was short, but by the time they arrived to see the driver forlorn in wait atop his seat, the chevaliers had finished the repairs. They beheld the princess' strange position with an air of scandal in their eyes. Meanwhile, the girl stared at the carriage with polite fascination.

"Monsieur Dubois, I'm afraid your horse will need to haul the carriage," Siegfried sighed as the heavier of the men smirked beneath his mustache.

"It will be so," he agreed.

"Afraid the Lady isn't feeling her best. We must make up for lost time," the prince continued, dismounting before helping the girl down. "Are you opposed to a seat in the carriage? We can't wait for anyone on foot, least of all someone armored."

"Only if the lady objects, sire."

She tried following the conversation, torn between it and the ornate mode of transport, and ultimately fixed the chevalier with her gaze. For a moment, he swore her eyes glowed…

She nodded with a smile.

"Very well, let us make haste. Monsieur Renard, hang back if you would. Wouldn't do if we were followed."

They set off on the final leg of the journey. The being posing as their princess could scarcely sit still. She caught the eye of Dubois.

"We are going to meet Father!" she told him, bouncing slightly in her seat.

Dubois flashed a smile as he nodded politely. His eyes caught Siegfried, who shared the concern on his brow. "Spare a thought for your mother as well, my lady."

This made her pause, the surprise evident in her eyes. The word was known, but it held no meaning to her… Did she HAVE one of those?

She puzzled, but ultimately gave a slight shake to her head. No… There was only Father, she was certain.

Krillin sat beside her, numb to the lacking space or bumpy ride. As a foundling, he'd known all too well what it was to pine for a parent, to wonder who they were, to sift through blurry visions for the slightest glimpse of memory. He could see Odette's captor bouncing in her seat, with that sweetest smile. This was Remnant's dreaded enemy…?

Little did he know, Goku was having similar ponderings. Orphans, both… raised by others, for better and worse. Salem didn't even get that much…

After a few short hours, they arrived at the city. None traveled the roads but guards in the late evening. The place had yet to be blessed by the Relics and sat as a basic example of timely design. Half-timbered houses dotted the streets, with no continuity of design to their symmetry, or lack thereof. It was a small sea of steep rooftops and cob walls with nary a stone even used for the roads. That was reserved for the castle and cathedral near the city center.

She clung unconsciously to Siegfried as they entered the streets. In the past she'd always avoided places like this for fear of the humans and their weapons. A thousand little encounters flitted through the back of her mind. But now they saw her as one of their own… Being them was wonderful!

There was movement at the castle as they approached, information being called out that she couldn't quite hear. But as they reached the castle steps, the heavy doors opened, and a number of guards and servants poured out to attend the dignified stride of the older monarchs they accompanied. The first, a middle-aged goodly man in robes with salt-and-pepper hair and beard, not quite humbled by age, his stout paunch neither thin nor rotund. His wife, a tired-looking taller blonde, less energetic in step despite plainly being the junior of the pair by many years.

The guards formed ranks along the steps in practiced grace as the footman stood beside the carriage. "Presenting now, Siegfried, Prince of Avalon… and Princesse Odette Le Cygne de Brocéliande…"

The couple linked arms as they stepped out, the being glancing around excitedly, but happily being led up the steps… if cautious of the unfamiliar footing.

Gohan watched on. It was like something out of a storybook. But unlike those he'd read, he suspected this one wouldn't end happily…

Torchlight was little better than the moonlight for casting an even color across them in the evening, but the palace doors let out a clearer source of illumination that flooded the steps nearest the elder royals.

"Mon petit nénuphar!" The king boomed, arms open in welcome. "It is too late, too long! We had begun to worry!"

"Inexcusable delay, Majesté," Dubois apologized. "We threw a wheel."

"Bah, not to worry, all is well now…"

The queen leered at her daughter. "Sacré dieux! Odette, come into the light, you look so pale…"

She blinked, but obeyed, stepping closer as she still stared around in puzzlement… but at last all was laid bare. There were gasps and mutters all around.

"Qu'est-ce que c'est?" The king demanded, stepping back. Even Siegfried froze stiff.

The moonlight and firelight had hidden it well, the princess' blonde hair and existing red eyes hadn't changed in a manner that was immediately obvious, but in the harsh light it was clear. Her skin was white as a sheet, and her golden hair bleached to match it. Even the red of her eyes was more vibrant, glowing back not like a cat or for some trick of the light, but from some hidden force within.

She only looked all the more confused, though looked over her own hands briefly, only mildly surprised. She found her voice again. "S…" she began, plumbing the girl's thoughts, "Sieg...fried? Where is Father? Don't… feel anything…"

He froze an instant more. " 'Ette, he's right there, standing… by the gods, what's happened to you…?"

She turned her attention to the king, her confusion only deepening as she shook her head, tinged with an intense disappointment. "N-not Father…! Not Father!"

"Ma fille," the king said, hand to his chest, "what is this you say? I am your father, ton père!"

"NOT Father…! Not Father not Father not Father not…!"

"What have you done?" the queen demanded of the prince. "She is not who she was!"

The being saw the lot of them, the negativity in their hearts darkening, all moving in on her. At last, she hit her breaking point. "You're not my FATHER!"

At once, black limbs erupted from every surface to grab hold of them, and chaos erupted as the guards armed themselves.

"Devilry!" One of them cried.

"C'est un monstre! C'est le Grimm!"

As they hacked away at the black claws, the queen screamed as the king clutched his heart, face puce as he lost the strength to stand. "Etienne! Etienne! Help him!"

"Stop it!" Nora begged, pointlessly. "She's just scared!"

The girl, astonished at her own work, aggrieved with disappointment and distressed by the lot of it, fled down the steps and past the shouts of guards. She ran past the towering cathedral and around the corner into the courtyard.

And there she stopped dead in her tracks.

Before her was a pair of statues nearly as tall as the cathedral itself, of two nondescript human figures painted white and black rather than having been made from less abundant precious materials.

The white one was caped, tall, carrying a sword in one hand and guiding the way with a lantern in the other, the lamp itself functional as a bright flame lit the courtyard on its own. The black one was shorter, clad only in pants with a more weedy build, and he stared at the other from behind with a dark countenance on his carved brow. His fist closed around a staff in one hand, its hilt planted in the ground. The other limply carried a crown beside his hip.

She was struck at once by the familiarity of it, and how much she was certain was wrong. Though the father she sought was little more than a feeling within her, she knew what he wasn't.

The ears were wrong, and she couldn't say why. The proportions were changed too, she was certain they were more stocky… or smaller?

The dark one's demeanor was strange, vaguely hostile. It didn't seem flattering, and rang as false as anything… Yet, she couldn't escape the certainty that this represented the person she was looking for. Every blot of her being was screaming the truth within her.

Oscar saw the gleam in her eyes. "She knows… She recognizes him. Even like this…"

She heard the enraged cries of the guards again, and the clap of hooves beating the dirt and sought the only safety she could conceive of. Near the statues were a number of tall trees with strong branches, and with grace she didn't know she possessed, she climbed up as the guards ran past in all directions, and the boughs hid her as the last of their footfalls fell away to the night.

She returned her gaze to the statue and climbed to reach the limply held crown. She stepped within the circlet and sank down on her knees in the trough of its arc, like a cross of a hammock and tire swing. She caught her breath, uncertain what was next… but turned her gaze to the facsimile of enormous fingers gripping the crown she sat in.

She reached out, and ran a hand over one of them.

As the meaning of it all struck her, she felt a warmth and pain behind her eyes that was unfamiliar. The more she thought about it, the closer she leaned against the hand, bringing her face against the smooth stone, and the more intense the sensation became.

All at once she felt the warmth trickling down her face, as if something inside her had overflowed. She shuddered and gasped as this new feeling overcame her… comforted her… She imagined her father was cradling her, keeping her safe up here. Her sobs only became more violent, and she did nothing to stem the tears whose name she didn't know.

Ruby, sitting beside her, couldn't help it. Her heart broke, for the second time. She wanted, so desperately, to wrap an arm around her shoulder. "I'm so sorry," Ruby whispered through her own tears, though Salem couldn't hear her. "It's not your fault… You poor thing…"

Ruby couldn't possibly have felt closer to the creature who was, ostensibly, her enemy. Alone, mourning a loss buried so deeply in her heart, for someone so impossibly important to her. They were the same.

"F-Father… where are you…? Don't hide anymore… Please…"

"Demon…!" a voice hissed from below. "Of course…"

Ruby whipped her head towards the voice. "No…"

Her red eyes were blurry, but she looked up to see Siegfried staring up at her, a gleaming blade in his hands.

"Go away…!" she cried in fear and frustration.

He remained still. "It all makes sense now… you're Grimm! A monster!"

The word was strange to her ears. Neither were good, but monster…

"N-not a monster…!"

"Leave her ALONE!" Weiss cried, her conviction surprising even herself.

"You've possessed Odette! Taken her, or replaced her! You killed her father! Give her back, witch!"

Another bitter word. She hid her face, closed her eyes. She wondered what he meant, and this name that he and the others had given her. They weren't attached to her memories, but the ones from before. The ones ascribed to the body.

Weiss' countenance fell. She'd almost forgotten… Siegfried, for his lack of pity, wasn't wrong. The real Odette was a victim too. Salem just… didn't understand…

Then the being blinked. Of course, the body belonged to something else before her… this was what they all thought, that she was this other.

Her heart sank all the more as she thought of it. The humans hadn't changed their feelings towards her… they believed she was one of them. Now they understood, and they wanted to hurt her again! They wanted her to give up this body, all these new thoughts and feelings!

She shook her head violently. "L-leave… us… me… alone!"

Siegfried bared his teeth as he considered his next move. "I see the truth at last! The Grimm are the spawn of the God of Darkness! HE is your real Father!"

She lifted her head. The title 'God of Darkness' felt wrong, but she was sure he was speaking of the right thing regardless.

"Poor lost wretch!" he mocked. "Orphaned spawn of Hell! The gods abandoned the world! Grimm, men, beasts, we are forfeit as failures in their eyes! You search for one that has forsaken you, bred you only to destroy us!"

Her hands covered her face as she shook her head wildly, a fear like she'd never known gripping her heart. "NO! No no no no no no no, Father loves me! Lie…! You're LYING!"

Ruby could only shake her head, as the inevitability of history came to pass. Ozpin was frozen, helpless. As hard as his heart had become, this was agony to behold.

Other guardsmen had taken notice and began to surround the area. Siegfried scoffed. "Love…! You speak of love, creature? You, who so naturally destroy and consume! You, who took MY LOVE, and pose in her form! You, who so simply murdered her father, the king! Your 'love' is a mockery!"

"Did… did not! Don't… understand…! Not hurt! Not kill! Y-YOU kill… YOU hur—"

But she was struck suddenly from behind as a faint whistling filled the air. The arrow split upon contact, but she fell from her coronal cradle all the same in a heap.

The guards didn't hesitate, swarming upon her with a war cry and stabbing at every inch of her they could reach…

But they all cried out at once as black limbs erupted from below to lift every one of them high, a small forest of them like palm trees with human tops.

She stood upright, unharmed, red eyes burning as her dripping eyes contrasted with her bared teeth. She let out an inhuman scream as her head pitched back to the sky… and the forests answered. Black, armored beasts stormed the streets and enormous corvids tore over the skies, snatching and catching every human they could reach as the city filled with screams.

Siegfried alone was drawn back to the ground as she stepped nearer, fear and anger fighting for control as he stared into her burning eyes.

"Nothing will ever love you, creature!" he spat defiantly as the black limbs held him.

Her only answer was to summon a hundred more limbs to grab at the holy statue, which cracked and quaked as they pulled. With a screech, one of the massive birds planted against the back of its head with its full weight, claws spraying stone as it took off again, and the monument began to list.

The last thing Siegfried of Avalon saw in this world was the black god hurtling towards him, and those same fiery eyes boring into him with a hate they had never known.

"The orphan of Doyadano tumbled through the pages of human history, lost and utterly alone. Blessed with the awareness of herself, she could finally begin to make sense of it all. Even when her stolen body wore down and she was returned to her amorphous form, she retained most of what she took and sought a new, always female host. Her perspective and her mind were refined with every new face."

Ozpin reeled with it all. He recalled that first fateful meeting with the being he dubbed 'Salem.' He could never have imagined. "Alas…" he sighed.

Oscar turned to him. "It's not your fault… You didn't do this to her."

He shook his head. "No… but we made her what she is, nonetheless. She was a mirror held to the world, and what we showed her was the ugliness of fear…"

"All the while, the same questions hurtled through her long-suffering mind. 'Why...? Why had her Father left her? Why had he chosen these humans over her? Why couldn't they be together?! WHY?!' "

Ruby shook with the unfairness of it all. Salem had only sought to return her father's love, but she could NEVER meet him…

"She knew from successive lifetimes that the gods had visited the humans… granted them the boons of their Relics. The longer she watched from the shadows, as humanity became stronger and stronger, the more she conceded that her maker had cast her aside in favor of THEM. She was unwanted… unworthy…"

Ruby shook her head. "No, he'd have loved her more than anything…!"

"She threw herself upon the gates of man, struck at them and their creations, in jealousy, in hate, but always they struck back with unexpected force and inexplicable will. Greater weapons, new powers… Humans were resourceful, and they evolved constantly with successive generations to rebuff her. At last, however, she was simply outmatched, as their sprawling burgs turned to cities, and their eyes turned to the stars…"

"And… that's that," Whis said, somewhat lamely. "We're all up to date."

Beerus reclined in midair, throwing his head back petulantly. "Finally! So she's the inexplicable creation of a Destroyer God that was also a Kai. If these humans can be a match for her, Relics or no Relics, I'm not fussed about her."

Whis gave a conflicted glance to the creature as her frozen eyes watched them with suspicion. "Do you suppose we should correct her? Tell her what really became of her maker?"

"Paaaaaass!" Beerus drawled, mouth wide as he declined. "This is far more involved than we ever get to begin with. That's beneath our concern…"

"Of course, my lord," Whis sighed, closing his eyes sadly. "After all, that's not quite why we're here. Should we probe her for a few questions regarding the humans?"

Beerus floated lazily back to his feet. "Very well. Grand Zeno sparing this world makes me hesitant to destroy it, but if they've truly unsettled the balance of this Universe…"

With a tap of his staff, the world began to move once more. The girl blinked, having only seen them instantly change positions between seconds.

"The humans," Beerus began, "have they done anything particularly wrong."

She gave a surprised breath, but nearly found her voice again.

"To be clear," Whis interjected, "we mean more than things they've done to you."

Her eyes widened, head tilted as puzzlement filled her face. It was as though such a thing had never occurred to her.

"M-more…?" she repeated.

Beerus nodded, leering over her. "Yes. Anything they've done to violate the natural order, interfere with other worlds, plans to dominate the Universe, attempts to subvert the power of the gods?"

She had a hard think, looking over the vista to the floating city. "They use the Relics… to… change themselves… their… blood…? Made themselves like… animals… Made themselves magical, or…" She seemed to sweat. "Some are… full of… light? They're like Father, but… wrong! Their… eyes… I don't like their eyes…"

"Hmm…" Whis put the sphere of his staff between his eye and the city, as one might use a magnifying glass. "Yes, yes, I see it now…"

He painted a vast circle in midair with the staff and within they could see humans in lustrous, simple robes harnessing the four Relics as one, a mix of blue and violet power coursing between them as they circled each other.

"Their power has eclipsed all contest their world might once have provided. Food and water are plentiful, disease and famine eradicated. The daily bread is provided to them, their safety all but assured. Theirs is a society of art and culture in, which great thoughts and philosophies flow as water, exhausting nearly all but the greatest fantasies and mysteries left to them."

"Well, la-dee-da…" Beerus sighed, arms crossed.

"Eventually they learned the power of the gene, and used the Relics to breed certain castes with different traits. Most popular were those who desired to be closer to nature, —or otherwise simply enjoyed the look— who were changed to adopt the traits of other animals. Far more interesting than to be merely human, or so they believe."

It hit Blake like a pallet of bricks. "No!" she said to no one. "No way! The faunus… are just some fashion statement?!"

She felt sick. The irony was unbearable. It sounded like this society considered faunus to be a status symbol in and of themselves, just to stave off the boredom of life… But so much later, those things that once made them special would be used as an excuse to divorce them from humanity as a whole. To justify being hunted for sport, stripped of rights and cast down as second class.

"Oh my god…!" she gasped, hands on her head. "Oh my GOD…!"

Whis carried on, heedless and ignorant to her plight. "But within that little divine spark they were gifted, is where they found true power. Bit by bit, they bred and bolstered those with an affinity for magic until the precious skill of wizardry was drawn out."

Through the ring, they saw visions of the Relics and their power being brought to bear against women with swollen bellies, again and again, each time the glow of power becoming more pronounced with successive generations. Ozpin's gaze was rapt.

"Rarer still, those anointed with the grace of divinity deep within. Never born gods, but with a nature and potential that could be conjured… cultivated… The power to translate their mortal power into true Divine Energy… They call them the 'Silver Eyed Warriors.' "

Ruby froze stiff as the visions showed them an exhausted new mother being handed a crying, newborn child with eyes that burned a light between closed lids, a light that couldn't be dimmed. She beheld a courtyard full of serene people in pure white cloaks being instructed by a golden paladin, before each of their eyes erupted in practiced precision with the glow, and trailing from their eyes, that light formed wispy, limb-like trails… claws, bat wings, gorilla arms…

'What was she, then?' Ruby wondered. A demigoddess?

Beerus' eyes narrowed. "A race of them… The arrogance…"

Whis raised a brow, seeing where this was headed. "It was little Dehadikeh's wish. They can hardly be blamed for meeting it out. It was all a bit too easy though… In fact, the great flaw in their paradise is just how little strife they endured in attaining it," Whis continued. "Even the mysteries of this Universe are laid bare with the creation of this realm they call 'Evernight.' "

Qrow's head shook like a dog as he, Ozpin and the surviving members of STRQ became somehow more rapt with their attention in recognizing the name of Salem's ethereal dread-fortress.

"Combining science and magic, they constructed a boundless realm of a billion doors, powered by a unique little power source driven by the world's core. It fuels the realm, which can open to any place a human resides, and thereby transmit power to any spot on the planet."

Doyadano's orphan listened closely. She didn't dare venture near enough to know the details of this, and any she snared these days were too low on the rung to know real secrets…

"You said the mysteries of the Universe were laid bare," Beerus noted, a dangerous gleam still in his yellow eyes as his foot unconsciously tapped and his tail spasmed at random. "Not merely the world."

"Yes, indeed," Whis agreed. "You see, with the Relics substituted as an unlimited power source, the reach of Evernight's many doors becomes limitless, constrained only by the mortal realm and the bounds of the Seventh Universe itself."

Beerus hummed. "I see… These other species we've been finding on these new worlds are more of their genetic tinkering. More offshoots built to survive the worlds after they use those Relics to make them habitable."

"And to exemplify the traits its volunteers most valued!" Whis added.

"Hmm? Traits?"

Whis nodded. "Indeed, rather than colonizing other worlds… though some colonies do exist… you might recall none of the inhabitants of the places we visited had any knowledge of Rhema, nor humanity."

" 'I might recall?' It's the only reason we're here, Whis…"

"Yes, well… It would seem some humans have grown so desperate for a fresh try at life and civilization that they have banded together in groups of like minds. Not merely to create a society in their own image, but to remake themselves in keeping with those values, and cast off all memory of the life they lived before."

Beerus brought the tip of a claw to his own chin. "And what do they so value? I can tell you're waiting."

Whis smiled despite himself. "Well let's see… The Shatsu embody mercy and discipline… the Kabocha favor a sort of anarchist society… the Saiyans of Sadala are similar, but bow to strength as a virtue in itself… Obviously there's more in regard to them; so complicated for such a simple lot..."

Vegeta's jaw went slack with the shock. He was speechless. The specificity was inarguable. Meanwhile, Bulma nodded with a smugness that seeped through the walls of reality.

"The Brench seem to favor a diversity of language and culture… The Banan want a nomadic culture among the stars… The Konatsians want to preserve chivalry and the old ways… and the Earthlings honor the tenets of humility."

Rocked from his rigors, Vegeta exploded into laughter.

" 'Humility?' " Beerus repeated. "How's that work?"

"They've opted to shun much of what made humanity strong. Most were unchanged but diminished, some chose such communion with nature that they took on more animal traits than human ones as to be all but feral beasts."

Krillin stood dumbfounded. There it was, on a silver platter. " 'Humility?' No wonder we never kept up with Goku! Hamstrung from the start…"

Beerus leered at the city. "To be clear," he said, not altering his gaze, "these Silver Warriors are not part of these other worlds?"

"No, my lord. They are an ongoing experiment, even if some have been deployed in defense against this one here," Whis said, indicating the girl.

The Destroyer's eyes narrowed. "They've set their sights on godhood… and they won't stop until they've attained it. This could destabilize the balance of power in the Universe, possibly even the Multiverse… and then Grand Zeno might take drastic measures to correct it." He seemed to be talking himself into something. "They are a threat to the natural order, and must therefore be purged…"

His palm out, he took aim, thumb curled back…

Her eyes lit up. "You… You're going to destroy them?" she asked, half giddy at the prospect, and half terrified to be without her most treasured hosts.

Beerus didn't look at her. "You won't benefit much from it… the planet goes with them."

Her eyes went blank. "Th-then… what…"

Whis sighed. "Honestly, Lord Beerus! Should we not be a trice more circumspect about this? You've annihilated the last five worlds we've dealt with without recourse, and this one saw favor with Grand Zeno himself! Destroying it might be just as upsetting as a race of competing gods."

Beerus finally turned his head. "Then what would you have me do? Am I the Destroyer or not? A handful of mortals attaining the power of the gods isn't a problem, but a breeding population is a slow-building storm, and I'll not be here to reap the whirlwind!"

"I am not proposing inaction," Whis clarified, "only an alternative. Perhaps one that averts culpability on your part, and offers the humans a route to redemption."

Beerus lowered his hand. "Make it quick."

Whis smiled. "Firstly, we hide from them their greatest source of power."

The girl looked like she was about to interject but then time stopped again. With a flash, the two divines found themselves within a guarded chamber flooded with runes and trip-lasers. The four Relics sat behind a cylindrical case, orbiting each other.

With but a nod of his staff, they glowed, and both beings popped within a great underground cavern.

Whis hummed merrily as he formed a great green seal around the four. "That should do… Will prevent the dear creature from reaching it before the humans, but also require a magical talent to remove."

Ozpin was rocked by his memories, recalling this place all too well.

"What are you doing now?" Beerus asked with resignation as Whis began painting the cavern walls with words of light.

"Well, you see," Whis preened, "this is a twofold little trick. A warning against those that might take them, that to separate and gather these Relics will incur The Time of Judgment… Sufficiently disarming, I should think."

"Uh huh," Beerus intoned. "And what really happens?"

"It alerts us of course! Upon which time we can nip on down to see just what sort of society they've rebuilt, and whether it has earned the right to continue."

" 'Rebuilt?' " Beerus noted, ears flicking.

Without a word, they flashed back to the surface, and Whis pointed his stave at the moon. "This is where you come in, if you agree. On that moon, the humans found a unique, power-magnifying element, and created a station on its surface, mining it greedily. The moon was forged during the supernova and captured by the planet, per Deha's interference, so it is made of materials foreign to this world. Unpowered, this crystalline material is non-volatile… but… if ignited by a sufficient power source..."

Beerus grinned darkly. "Well… accidents happen every day…"

Remnant's champions beheld as Beerus cautiously extended the tip of a claw. There was a bright, purple flare somewhere on the moon's surface… and then, silently, it spread as flaming spiderweb cracks along an entire hemisphere of the satellite.

There was a flowing flash that rippled across the sky in a rainbow of color, and then chunk by chunk, pieces of the lunar crust calved off to drift into the infinite, trailing cosmic fire and grey dust.

Time returned as the thing that would be Salem watched in awe, and felt the fear gripping the planet as man and beast took notice of the silent omen of doom as chunks miles wide took aim at their world. She too felt fear, huddling helplessly as a shower of multicolored meteors streaked through the skies. Some sizzled out, others exploded in midair to flatten trees. The worst of all loomed, blackening the sky as the atmosphere burned it in turn. Crystalline formations on its underside detonated with the heat, and the gargantua succumbed as it split, but it had merely changed a solid slug into a shotgun blast.

Across the planet, the sound of klaxons filled the air, and black doors opened all across Rhema as Evernight became a lifeboat for the species. It was always the plan, a means to preserve themselves. Schematics, logs and histories spanning the ages were long stored within this metaphysical vault. The greatest minds and most essential persons were preserved to represent the necessary skills to jump-start their world.

As moonfall struck, obliterating most cities and transforming the landscape in a holocaust not seen since the days of their gods, Whis and Beerus the Destroyer departed. The poor girl howled as she was crushed by flame and searing ash… but as always, it was not the end.

It was nearly a month before the ash had dissipated enough for Evernight to open and deposit the survivors of man back to their homes. The Relics were lost in the chaos, and it seemed that a new dark age had visited them. The few colonies that existed beyond Rhema were inaccessible now, and soon their inhabitants would starve, having relied heavily upon the direct transit of resources from the homeworld. Having enjoyed the simplicity of instantaneous travel, physical ships to travel the stars with had never occurred to them.

They returned to find their cities not merely burned or damaged, but infested with the Grimm, or destroyed by them in their absence. In a twist of fate, those left behind to face the cataclysm, the few cities of the least import that survived it all were in the best position to fight back. Not the least because the dead cities could not be linked to Evernight, not without a human presence nearby. Humanity itself had turned fledgling overnight, squeezed into a few select meccas.

Evernight was the key to it all. Without the Relics, a full recovery was impossible, but they might still retain what they had. The leaders remained close-knit, using Evernight to coordinate their efforts and using it as a new capitol. A slight mercy, the moonfall came with an abundance of that rare resource they called Dust. It was now embedded into the planet's crust in impossible volumes, ready to power any technology they might conceive of.

But at last, it came time to check on the great city, the birthplace of Evernight, and the continent they knew the least about after it became ground zero. There hadn't been any human presence since the impact… yet somehow, they suddenly had regained access.

Tasked with this mystery, the researchers stepped through to a blasted land, barren and red. Nothing grew. Black pools dotted the hellscape in the little flat land that remained. The earth was heaved up from the collision, slabs tilted at angles to form jagged spears, while all else bristled with huge crystals of gravity Dust. The ruddy color hung in the sky as to tint even the broken moon.

What they found, shaking and weak… was a girl. Her veins were pronounced, and her hair had turned white like she'd aged decades in spite of her years.

As she saw them, she feebly begged them to run, to beware… She had set a trap.

But it was too late. Doyadano's orphan emerged from the rocks as an inky mass, having abandoned her host to serve as a lure. She consumed one of the women researchers, and slunk into the doorway as her monsters descended upon the rest.

That day, man's greatest knowledge, most capable leaders and most powerful tools were lost to them. Evernight never obeyed another human's call. Lost and scattered, what remained of humanity had only scant legends to inspire them, living and told...

Ruby Rose watched it all turn black, the story told, feeling a numbness. When nothing more happened, she wheeled around at the sound of sharp breaths, as though someone were… crying.

What she found, sat upon the floor, hiding his face in shame… was Dehadikeh. He glowed gold, not a trace of any other color in him, but it was unmistakable.

She walked closer, perplexed, uncertain she wanted to set eyes on yet more grief.

"Doya… I'm s-so… sorry…!"

She knelt down. What part of the story was this? But when she reached a hand out, she jumped as the apparition shuddered, and she realized she'd touched something remarkably solid.

"W-wha…?! Y-y-y-you-u… but… I saw...! I…" She calmed, heart stricken by his grief. She dared to put an arm around his back. "A-are you okay? It… It's alright, you're not alone…"

He looked up with surprise, sniffing. "A-After all that, you would comfort me…?" His eyes glimmered, caught between sadness and fascination. "You're so… kind…"

He wiped his sodden eyes and turned to her with difficulty. "I… My b-brother… we are gone. What you see before you, all that remains is an echo… a shadow…"

"I-I… I don't under—"

"Your Ozpin once told you the Relics carried our will," Dehadikeh clarified. "That is what I am. I, in my Relics of Knowledge and Creation… His, in Choice and Destruction."

Ruby balked. "H-how do you know Ozpin?"

He granted her a pained smile, tapping his temple. "Relic of Knowledge, remember? I know… He was… well, when he found us, Doya and I changed him, tried our best to tell him what he had to do, but we could not commune with him as we are now."

She blinked. "Right, you… you made him reincarnate, and…"

"Yes," he admitted, the pain in his eyes returned. "He's suffered so much for it."

"I-I'm sorry, this is all a lot to take in," Ruby told him. "W-why can you talk to me, but not Ozpin? How… I thought the Relic could only show things people knew; you weren't even alive to…"

She stopped, realizing that underlining his death was probably insensitive.

But he was smiling at her, as if impressed… or with pride?

"I'll admit, I took advantage of your situation. You were linked by mind to a fellow Kai, and therefore to the divine realm. From there I could expand my knowledge…"

That expression hadn't left his face.

"Ruby… Ruby Rose…" he said aloud. "It's such a pretty name… so lyrical. I think you know why we can speak this way. You are like us, my daughter," he told her, hand on her arm. "Your nature is mortal, but also divine…" His voice crept to a whisper. "You are everything I dreamed…"

She couldn't contemplate the feelings running through her as he fixed her with an expression so loving it shook her to her core. It was a look she only remembered from one face so long ago, when she could barely stand or speak. She didn't even realize her tears had slipped, but already his palm was on her cheek, brushing it away.

After another moment of silence, he took a breath and sat back. "I-I'm sorry. I don't mean to bring you disquiet. It's been… such a long time, and to see you've survived as you have, no worse for what has befallen you… I've become emotional…"

"That's okay," she told him, gently, chastising herself mentally for still treating him as the child he seemed.

He grinned, but steeled himself. "My brother's creation… His daughter… The one you call Salem… If only I'd realized it then!" he groaned, staring into the floor. "She's suffered greatly… and she's lashed out at you."

Ruby felt a guilt she didn't deserve. "But… we caused it, didn't we…? She could have been anything, she didn't have to become what she is… It's our fault."

Deha looked at her sadly. "Fear is nearly as powerful as love. It's a tragedy, but not a surprise. She needed us… She needed him."

She nodded, still stung by the injustice of it all.

He continued. "Ruby… you are all in grave danger, more than you realize. This Frieza is a threat beyond anything you're ready to face, but all the same you must… and she… If she acquires our Relics, she will use Evernight as a conduit to spread to every corner of the Seventh Universe! You must complete the task we gave your wizard friend all those years ago… You must send her home to us… to oblivion."

Ruby recoiled. She saw his pleading eyes, but wasn't sure what to make of his request. "Destroy her…? But… w-we can tell her the truth! Maybe change her! It doesn't have to end like this!"

He smiled sadly. "Of course you'd wish to save her… you have a good heart… but I'm sorry… All she's ever known is pain… and how to inflict it. Hers is a wound that cannot be healed, Ruby. The hole in her heart she fills with her hate for humanity, and it can never be satisfied, not even if she swallowed the Universe itself. She will not believe you, she can't… She has cut herself off from Doya… b-believes she lives to spite him now."

"I-I have to try," Ruby told him.

He nodded. "I know. Despite how she will seem to you, I promise you… she is in pain."

They were both silent for a while. They watched each other, each sharing a fascination for what stood before them.

"I… thank you," Ruby said at last, wincing, "for all you did for us. We wouldn't be here if you—"

He sighed. "Is it so unusual? Technically I didn't make that choice, but… it's nothing you wouldn't have done. Your friends, your father… they'd have done it for your sake. The only thanks I want, is that you'll find happiness, and do all you can to ensure it wasn't in vain."

She couldn't argue. It wasn't something she wanted to think about.

"So I'm grateful to the Destroyer, Beerus," Dehadikeh said, smirking.

She frowned. "Grateful?"

"I know he pruned you in your prime," he said, "and he seems pitiless… but I don't think so. Even if he was acting in his own interests, he chose a form of mercy. Perhaps my ambitions for you all were… short-sighted."

"Do you think we'll ever be like we were before?"

Deha laughed. "No, not in that way. But that's a good thing… Nothing on Rhema was ever still, it was always changing. Yours was just the latest… You're not a broken people, Ruby. You don't need to be made whole. If I've learned something from all our time here, it's that potential is never truly lost… it merely transforms…"

It was… a wonderful perspective. Even in all her own positivity, their society was one of pessimism. They were less than they should be, recessed, forgetful and tattered…

...But should they desire what there was before? Certainly they had problems now, but was humanity as a whole healthier for their struggles? Before the moonfall, humans were bored of life, so bereft of change and challenge that a vast number of them chose to forget, changed themselves and started new worlds to tackle new struggles.

In a way… was the shift from Rhema to Remnant a blessing in disguise?

She was getting sidetracked. There were more pressing things to ask a god...

"So… the Relics," Ruby began. "Can they stop Frieza? After seeing what he's done, I… I don't know if we can…"

He gave a slow blink as he nodded. "He's far worse than anything you've seen, but together our Relics can fell even something like him. But I would not rely on that. You must be prepared to face him yourselves, by your own power."

She let out an exhausted breath. "Is that even possible? You said he was worse than we saw, but what we saw was something that could destroy worlds! I don't even know if it's possible for us to do the sort of stuff Gohan, his dad and their friends can do…"

He smiled knowingly. "You've never had a need before. And now you have the knowledge in them. And I'll tell you a secret…" He leaned close, hand by his mouth as he whispered conspiratorially. "You're all so much stronger than you know!"

She leaned back, grimacing, in spite of his sincerity.

"It's in your very nature, Ruby," he continued. "Lean on each other's strengths, work, learn, and fight with everything you have and more! When the time comes, if you never stop moving forward, you'll have all the power you need!"

"You… You're wrong," she told him, slamming her eyes shut. "At Haven, I froze! My friends needed me then, and I couldn't save them! A-at Beacon, I couldn't even get past Mercury in time! Pyrrha… I was too late to…"

He let out a sigh of laughter. "Why tell me your doubts? It's so unlike you. We both know it doesn't matter… because you're not the type to lie down and die."

She froze. "I'm scared. I don't know how to face this! If I'm not enough… I… I…!"

"I know what it is, you know? To fear something so terribly, but know in your heart that you'll face it anyway… because there's no other choice."

She stared into his eyes. She knew he wasn't lying, she'd seen that moment herself...

"No one, no hero, no legend, was ever perfect. Certainly not me, and I'm a god," he laughed. "Even Grand Zeno himself is fallible. Those you've lost… those who made your heart ache… they're what drives you! They become your power, make you strong when you ought to be weak. They don't blame you… They're at your back, always."

She just stared at him, uncertain.

"But if you don't believe me," he said, glancing sideways, "you should ask yourself why your friends believe in you so much… Because they do… more than you know. If you won't believe me, maybe you'll believe them?"

She stared down, allowing herself a smile. "You… really believe in us, don't you? You wouldn't have shown us the truth if you thought it was hopeless…"

His eyes turned sorrowful again. "Yes… and… I'm sorry…"

At once, she gasped as they both began to fall, the invisible floor vanishing into the darkness. They drifted apart as he covered his eyes.

"Deha!" Ruby cried. "What's happening?!"

"I'm out of… time! The Relics are unlimited together, but by themselves, showing myself like this, the Lamp can't go any longer!"

"W-why are you sorry? What did you mean?"

He shook his head, eyes still closed as she tried to swim through the air towards him.

"I'm sorry you had to see so much pain, and death, and misery!" he told her, hands over his face in shame. "I'm sorry I failed Doyadano, his girl, Grand Zeno, our Universe! It's my fault you've suffered, you and so… so many…! I should be forgotten! I'm sorry you have to know me…!"

The wind howled as it rushed past, and her lip quivered as she shouted the only thing she felt in her heart.

"But I WANT to know you!"

In an instant, the wind, noise and rush of gravity ceased. Dehadikeh looked up, his face pained, teeth bared… but the corner of his mouth fought to smile back at her as tears fell down his face.

He reached her, arms around her neck as he spoke into her ear. "But… you already know me," he said, a hand over her heart. "Just trust yourself… like I trust you…"

As the light faded, Ruby found herself back in her home, tears rolling down her face. She glanced around. The Relic had slipped from Bulma's hand as she sank to the floor like she'd been overcome by low blood sugar, but the lamp remained floating supernaturally. The others were blinking, shaking, catching each other's eyes.

Bulma leaned on a chair as she labored to stand. "D-did anyone else see…?"

"Yeah," Qrow answered first.

"Yep."

"Uh huh," King Kai affirmed.

Goku turned. "Vegeta?"

Some of them followed his gaze to the kitchen, where they suddenly heard the door to the outside slam closed.

"He saw it," Krillin droned. "He'll be back."

Ruby sat on her knees. She caught Weiss' eye. Her eyes were red, and she too had drying trails under them. She inhaled sharply, squeezing her eyes shut as her lips pressed together, but she couldn't stop a fresh pair of drops from falling. Ruby leaned forward and hugged her. Finally she spoke. "I might've seen a little more than the rest of you…"

Ruby explained her encounter with the creator's countenance, —at least the less personal parts— his warning, and his hope.

Ozpin's stare spanned miles. "I always saw my fate as a punishment for lacking resolve… Instead, I see I was a desperate instrument of mercy from a bereaved father. In Salem, I always saw man's adversary, but now… Thank you, Ruby."

"Seems you were part right, old man," Raven added. "The Relics will bring something here… but if those two feared an all-powerful Remnant, I think we're probably safe under the circumstances."

"Yes… it's reassuring."

Goku had his own priorities.

"Wow…! Twelve Universes… I thought we'd seen it all by now! I wonder who their best fighters are…?"

As did Oobleck.

"As a truth-seeker, I'm floored, ecstatic, energized! ...But as an archaeologist… it is upsetting to merely be given the answers…"

Blake turned. "You were right, Bulma. We're the same… all of us."

Ruby stood up. "And we were brought together for a reason… We're the best hope there is."

"And if that isn't terrifying," Yang joked, "then maybe we even have a shot?"

Qrow rubbed a hand over his face. "Speaking of shots…"

Both his nieces wilted. "Uncle Qrow…"

But Taiyang approached with a curious expression. "Y'know what? After a day like this? All you kids've been through? I'm heading to the cellar and busting open the cabinet, and everybody's getting something to calm their nerves, and age isn't a factor."

"Whoa, Dad, seriously?"

"Well I'd offer dinner, but…"

"I'll drink to that," Bulma sighed happily.

"Doctor's orders!" Oobleck barked, getting a few laughs.

Ruby and Weiss glanced at each other, unimpressed with the proceedings. But at last, Ruby thought of something.

"First though… I've gotta go do something outside."

And indeed, before the glow of twilight had faded from the sky, Ruby's labor was done. A pair of new headstones were added to the fallen, for the unsung twins that walked their world so long ago.

A/N: I've wanted to show this to you all for so… so long…

Unless you hated it, but… I put my everything into this as justification for the premise, the crossover, and things to come. I've refined this origin to a fine point, and I truly think I've done something worthwhile here. It's certainly special to ME.

First though, since it's timely —he says, a month later— let's talk about Volume 8. Spoilers in the marked space below, if somehow you haven't seen it yet.

I think Volume 8 is easily the best paced, most eventful, artful, grand, impactful season of the show to date. We got spectacle, we got a status quo constantly in flux. We got conflicts of immense difficulty being settled in incredibly clever and resourceful ways in surprisingly little time. By the time we're fighting Cinder in an otherworldly limbo dimension, vaulting infinite chasms between golden paths, you really look back and say, "man, this was a JOURNEY…"

And I'm INCREDIBLY excited for the infinite possibilities of Volume 9, with half the cast assumed dead and dunked into a strange realm beyond Remnant, and the other already in Vacuo with the weight of IMMENSE —perceived— loss to tangle with.

I have some hangups about the reactions of certain characters to certain events… Cinder finally duels RWBY and talks trash, yet SOMEHOW, not a single one of RWBY says a single damn word BACK to her… Remember how I said fights are often a DEBATE as well as violence? Yeah, they really don't do that, and it robs the combat of something…

Oh yeah… and Penny.

...I had to put up-front just how much of this season I adored and how it all comes together by the end in this beautiful misery of an Act 2 finale… so you wouldn't think less of me when I say the manner in which Penny was handled was something I can NEVER forgive CRWBY for.

I was so disappointed… and broken.

See, I'm not like MurderofBirds, Puns of Damage or Kat from AllAgesofGeek. I never had a big sobbing reaction to Pyrrha in Volume 3. Hell, apart from the shock of how brutal her death was, I knew it was coming after she kissed Jaune, and I also knew that it was an excellent springboard for the series to change and the story to expand. Actually, I've never shed a tear for ANY RWBY character's death, apart from sweet moments here and there that tease a drop or two. Even Penny's original death was sad, but she wasn't developed enough to do much.

While the credits of V8 played out… I simply sat there, seething in anger. I was uncomfortable, I didn't want to do anything. I didn't know how I could write RWBY again, my feelings were so compromised.

But then, while trying to sleep, I remembered the credits song about Penny was called "Friend," and the line "You called me 'FRIEND!' Am I really your friend…?" cropped up in my head… and then I burst into tears.

See, Penny was the one character I feared for since she came back, and the ONLY non RWBY member of the cast I couldn't STAND to see lost. And again, I HATE how they handled her. Even if Taylor McNee had other career stuff to do and only agreed to be back for two seasons or some crap behind the scenes… I HATE how they handled her.

It stems from a couple things. First being that they brought her back just to kill her. I have NO RESPECT for that. It feels like emotional manipulation and makes you wonder why they bothered to begin with. Not to say Penny wasn't finally given a bunch of development… after all, I finally felt something real for her character… but it's like you're double-dipping your tearjerker stuff. It stinks, and it gives off the impression like the character is some kind of forbidden fruit that IF brought back MUST be put back in the ground… for some reason.

And what infuriates me is that this isn't the first time Rooster Teeth has held this attitude towards a character. At the end of RVB's original Blood Gulch series, Tex gets blown up and goes missing. Then the series got more serious and tried to retcon all its wacky concepts, and suddenly Church being interested in Tex's wellbeing —an opinion shared by the audience— is basically treated like something he shouldn't do, like he's obsessive and she shouldn't be brought back.

Then she IS brought back, for like a season, only to get taken away for a final time.

I'm just saying… this is WAY too familiar.

Then let's add just how unsubtle the foreshadowing wound up being, with the innumerable threats against Penny's life and the grave decisions she kept making ushering her closer and closer to peril… The death flags were so densely packed, I was certain this was a case of "the lady doth protest too much," and CERTAINLY they were going to subvert all this by jumping the track of fate...

But no. You'd have to be a fool not to see this setup, and yet they still did the most obvious thing they possibly could have done. It was a serious blow to my respect for the storytellers.

Then there's just how wasteful it is. Seriously, they swing for the FENCES, putting REAL WORK IN to rules-lawyer Penny turning human so it made sense and even a hard-core RWBY hate-train would have trouble criticizing it… and yet Penny only survived less than an hour after that.

What an absolute WHIFF… We don't get to see or hear ANY of Penny's observations and first experiences of living, breathing humanity apart from the heat-content of hugs. Her father never gets to see it. In fact, KNOWING they couldn't work Pietro into the rest of the season after Chapter 5, they did a mini version of Penny's death for him so he was allowed to have pretend-closure. That's why they had her talk like she was choosing to risk her life and he spoke of fearing to lose her, and we got to see him believing she'd died falling from Amity. It's because OTHERWISE they weren't going to present him the opportunity to know anything that happened.

And no… I don't CARE that she chose what happened, that CRWBY tried so hard to lessen the blow by making it an act of sacrifice, that Jaune would have failed to heal her before Cinder had dealt with Weiss, or that they so heavily suggest she was at peace with her decision and left her final frame smiling brightly…

I don't… care…

It's a waste, and Cinder working that shot in was contrived by the writers. There were so many potential ways for that fight to go, ways to beat Cinder outright, ways for Cinder to win outright… you could have done anything with that fight scene. She just as easily could have fallen after the others and Cinder would have been deterred, because she sure wasn't risking that…

And the fact that THIS is the only reason Penny GETS an actual voiced song after all this time? Insult to injury… I'm just glad it was a happy song and not a eulogy like "Cold."

So… what RESTORED my desire to write?

Hair of the dog that bit me.

Yes… Volume 8's finale INSPIRED me, and within two days of that utter malaise… I'd come up with something really special for this story. A Reclamation of sorts. This is where my looser understanding of Act 2 becomes a blessing, because there's room to wedge HUGE things into it that weren't originally there… and now that I've had time, I can't imagine the story without them.

And what character most benefits from this course-change?

Bulma, of all people.

...Weren't expecting that, were ya?

Yeah, what I have in store is so sweet… so RIGHT… it's already made me weepy more times than I can count. Not to reveal anything, but basically I explore something in Bulma that Toriyama never bothered to, something he glossed over. A point in Bulma's life where something changed, and she grew as a person. Something CANON even.

The moment it happens, I'll include this line: "Suddenly, in that instant, Bulma realized something…"

...and if you're anything like ME, the six words that follow that ellipses will leave you weak. I'm going to resist my urge to tease, and call it quits here...

Okay… so… this chapter.

God, where do I even START? Well… maybe with the gods?

It was obvious from the beginning that the original, boring, jerkass, archetypal gods of Light and Darkness of Remnant had no place in the Dragonball Universe. Some have even pointed that out in comments, little did they know… And at any rate, I was ALWAYS unimpressed with how rote and basic RWBY's cosmology ultimately was. I appreciate that the God of Darkness wasn't made an outright villain, and oddly seemed to gel with his brother most days… and intended or not, making BOTH gods into holier-than-thou assholes who are big believers in punishing UNTOLD numbers of people for the offenses of a handful… is at least SOMETHING to get away from the Kingdom Hearts cliches.

But I wanted to do things differently from the start. I wanted gods that weren't the usual stock of entitled downtalkers. It was easy enough to make the God of Darkness a God of Destruction… but Beerus and Shin were boring answers too, and why care about THIS world?

I liked the idea of brothers though, so maybe they're twins? But wait… wouldn't the Destroyer be a Kai? Can you DO that? What would happen? They do opposite things…

...And that's where this thing REALLY took off. Salem was ALWAYS the embodiment of the Grimm, but HER origin was the next cool thing.

I really hated the idea that the brothers were also rivals, so instead… I made them loving. The Destroyer would only hate HIMSELF in a way, for being a god of life that could only destroy. There was the possibility of jealousy brewing, but that too seemed boring, typical.

And of course, between his own personal doubts and just the idea that the stronger of them being small and meek was appealing… it was a nice change for the dark one to be the least dominant and the most emotional.

The idea that they were CHILDREN was a later change than most, which I felt made them more endearing, and made their more irresponsible acts feel more hapless than malicious. Zeno being the orchestrator of all this only made more sense given the idea of a perfect Universe being imperfect because of Zeno's strange, childlike ideas.

Something perfect by definition can't BE perfect if anything is added or removed, so as gods they have nothing to do, no purpose. It slowly drives them insane. They NEED to fulfill themselves. How do they choose U7? Well, we have brother Destroyers in Super already, with established couplets of Universes… Six and Seven are twins, and seven is lucky… They're children after all. I actually got goosebumps writing Deha explaining that…

Obviously our Destroyer needed to make the Grimm… but they'd be an accidental creation, a misfire of his nature… yet he'd believe he failed.

The pools of liquid Grimm were always a curious concept. XMan came up with a really interesting notion once of Grimm behaving like a water cycle. You could never exhaust them because when you killed them, they evaporated only to eventually precipitate and pool together to spawn more Grimm.

I was tempted to steal it, but it got me thinking. What if the Destroyer was so distraught from it all that he wept, and those tears formed the pools of Grimm, dragging in lifeforms and providing it a blueprint to give itself form?

The notion of a god crying tears that spawned some greater life felt like something out of an actual creation myth or fairytale… and I absolutely fell in love with it.

Add the tragedy of their actions coming back to haunt them, leaving Salem to exist in a world where the only thing she ever wanted was gone before she could form words…

Salem, who became so much more in this retelling… Something that shouldn't be, something with the OPPOSITE of a soul, an anti-god, a devil… and yet she wasn't evil. On the contrary, she was only what her creator wanted... something so full of love that it alone would forever satisfy his desire to create and nurture it. Instead, she's driven feral by the belief that she's been abandoned... And what else could she have become?

Hmm? Those names?

I'm always really happy when I come up with something with virtually no Google or Youtube hits, and this is one of those times.

You see, in Super, the Supreme Kais are all named for deities of more minor real-life religions, so I wanted to follow suit with the two I invented. There aren't too many twin gods out there.

Ultimately, I stumbled onto an entry for a pair of Iroquois creator gods. Twins, a god of life and creation, and a god of death and destruction… Dehadikeh and Doyadano.

It was too perfect… Complicated names, but they were kids, so they could shorten them sometimes… Deha and Doya. And the shorter names would be used more by the characters and the narrative as the reader better got to know them...

...Okay, so technically I think "Dehadikeh" is the name for both of them, and "Doyadano" just means "the twins" or something, but whatever.

Hmm? Is that ALL…? Why did I put "Indomitable" into the scene of Remnant being created and life evolving?

Well… you got me. Deha and Doya are also meant to be references to Akira Toriyama and Monty Oum. Neither is exact, and in a way each is a little of BOTH, but how could I not? Right down to the tragedy of the Brothers not merely leaving, but dying? Okay, Monty never sacrificed his life for the show, but work with me here… the creation outlives the creator.

Deha is definitely the most Akira though, and Doya is the most Monty… he even has the same hair. Mainly though, not to denigrate Toriyama's talent or work, but for him, the phenomenon of Dragonball feels like a happy-go-lucky wave of whimsy he rode from start to finish. Creation always felt like second nature with him, and his success was immeasurable despite how much he fumbled and forgot.

For Monty… not that he ever complained, but IMMENSE work is felt in his creations, and it feels like he's had to fight and strain for every bit of recognition he's ever received. And despite Dragonball as a whole being equally as flawed and haphazard, RWBY has always been the one crucified for it.

So on top of everything else, this was a sendup… and how could I NOT use "Indomitable" to create that mood when its lyrics are so perfect for it? I mean… despite stuff like "to build a Universe and make every part by hand" when much of Deha's big plan was to invent evolution in spite of lifeforms being traditionally designed.

And Remnant's map being a stain on Dehadikeh's shirt that inspires the whole thing, in pairing with the story of how Monty made the map with a napkin and a bunch of ketchup and mustard stains? There's a point where this stuff writes itself.

Oh yeah, and the evolution stuff.

Apart from wanting to track the course of life evolving on Remnant, I wanted what Deha and Doya did there to be unique. I noticed in DBZ that most alien worlds are really barren, only having a few limited ecosystems alongside the patented barren wastelands with a handful of creatures. Well… maybe Kais created lifeforms to be one thing and never change, with every part and feature and ecosystem hand-crafted? So maybe they could only make so many given how complicated it was?

Thus, Zeno gets a report of a new planet being made with all new lifeforms… all TWELVE of them!

This makes Deha's idea bold and different, unchaining the potential of life and letting it flow as it will. It might even explain why planets like Earth have amazing food, if they're made from planets and creatures cultivated by nature and not crafted by gods.

Also it's a reference to Gurren Lagaan, Monty's all-time favorite anime, because the power in that series was called the "Spiral Power," which was to say, like the double-helix of DNA. Spiral Power was "the energy of evolution," so… there you are.

Oh, and I know it wasn't the ACTUAL creature that transitioned from sea to land, but I couldn't resist the tetrapod that Doya comforts as it dies crawling onto land being none other than Tiktaalik Roseae, one of phylogeny's greatest hits, because it's awesome… Plus ROSEae! Rose iconography!

I'm a huge f*ing nerd!

God, there's so… so much here…

And then I show my hand as an atheist by how I portray Deha's attitude towards his creations.

For me, the twins are far from perfect… but the only sort of god I would respect. The sort who wouldn't want you to kneel… the sort of god who couldn't bear the SIGHT of you on your knees. Not the sort of "love" of contemporary gods, who demand something in return or threaten you to obey them… a god who is more of a loving parent, which doesn't seem the least bit unrealistic. Who only desires you to be happy, and would give up their very soul to protect you.

Deha and Doya's deeds are thankless. By the time RWBY and co exhume their tale, none in living memory on Remnant even remembers their names. They had the choice to abandon their creation and start a new, more fulfilling life, but instead chose to give up their very existence out of love. A TRUE sacrifice, in which they lose everything… unlike certain other gods who "died" for their creation, only to lose nothing whatsoever, turn around and rule everything while trying to guilt you into absolute obedience.

Deha and Doya are fallible, and made mistakes that cause untold damage and suffering… but they are still better people by a mile than any god of any religion I can name… as if it was hard.

Getting off my soapbox, we come to the confirmation… Remnant's people became so powerful so quickly they ran out of challenges aside from what they offered each other. They altered themselves, altered other worlds. We see how magical persons and Silver Eyed Warriors came to be, and why they're so rare. We see —as some guessed— that the power of Silver Eyed Warriors is the power to harness divine energy —or "god ki" as some call it— which gives our little Ruby… quite the potential, to say the least.

And it is this power that actually scares Beerus enough to tip the scale and send Remnant back to the stone age, fearing an ever-growing race of divines who might try to wrest the Universe from their control. The Silver Eyed Warriors caused the devastation of mankind… if inadvertently.

Evernight is not merely some lonely castle in a Grimm-soaked waste, but a pocket dimension which, if powered by the Relics, can take Salem to any place in the Universe… and a potential means of coaxing Frieza into cooperation.

And of course, in the process of starting anew, many humans chose to become something else and begin again on another world, leading to the Earthlings, the Saiyans, and so many others…

And I know... going into DEEPER lore in the wikis I found I'd embedded some inaccuracies… The Kais aren't actually made individually but exist as a race unto themselves from a SPECIFIC tree, and the best are uplifted as Kais… and only live between tens of thousands of years to a few million years…

...This would make Dehadikeh and Doyadano being BILLIONS of years old unlikely, along with other aspects of their origin, but… frankly, I don't even know where that information CAME FROM, because it certainly wasn't in any part of the series or manga. I know I've taken things like the multi-part Ki from deeper lore, but frankly, if it wasn't actually in the show, I reserve the right to ignore stuff I have to go WELL out of my way to even know about.

That being said… this is it, guys and gals.

I consider this the point in Transposition F where the story drops the pretenses, opens up and bares its heart to you. This is where you're meant to know what's finally, truly going on and be prepared for the journey ahead. This IS Transposition F… this is my hopes and dreams laid before you, and I did my level best to make it as unique, as interesting and as heartfelt as I could to tie everything together and cement Remnant as a FIXTURE in the Dragonball Universe along the way. The lores are now one.

Actually, speaking of Hopes and Dreams… I won't lie, it was pretty funny when I realized how much this started to feel like a spiritual successor to that part from Undertale, which was also about two siblings and the tragedy that befell them… I promise any similarities here are coincidental.

Oh! And if you want to know what the Brothers actually LOOK like…

Imgurcom / qC7aIlQ

Comments!

Qazse: Order? No, and she wouldn't presume to. Also… Salem doesn't work like canon, with the whole splattering with every hit… She just kinda no-sells.

Wolf1741: Yes =)

Cmedina1: I don't think Beerus is THAT volatile…

Son Kenshin: They will have semblances, yes! Thank you! Also, really flattered, though not sure how that crossover is based on my premise with Star Wars… I'm really a layman when it comes to greater Star Wars lore, so I doubt I'd be much help to you, but if you have specific questions, ask away.

Guest1: I think I just had a stroke…

TimsonShay: Yep! Yeah, it's hard to feel TOO bad for canon Salem. I think I can guarantee THIS one is more sympathetic. Tai was just saying stuff, founded only on how long the war with Salem had been running. Also, no worries about the posts, sites be wack.

Imperial Stormtrooper: Well, early as in pre-history…

Nliochristou: I think this entire chapter is the answer to your question.

X3runner: Well, we've already had Ruby and Gohan discuss his general approach to things, and it won't be the last chat they have in that respect. Shin's definitely not involved here, but I hope you found my alternative satisfactory!

Metal4k: Thanks man!

: BLACKLISTED. You were warned.

TF2 Crossover Man: Thanks dude! From the past, can't wait to show you guys this…

Bejammin2000: I mean, given Salem and the Grimm are one and the same…

Scott Kanouse: I'm hoping door number four gave you an even BETTER answer, though that might be subjective.

Bertoti: Er… you do you, man. Cutting the size either means splitting them into parts, which depends on the content… or cutting content, which I'm not big on. It's sorta the big advantage of writing.

RadBman21: Hey, not gonna tell you what the music is… unless I do in fact insert a song, but that's rare. I listened to the title theme of "Outer Wilds" while writing those scenes to get me in the mood. Glad you liked it, I really wanted it to hit hard.

Guest2: Do love a good, shocking cliffhanger…

Kage-kitsune9001: Er, hopefully you mean "being looked down on as" a lesser being. Also, nope, first form. He changed back in the first scene.

Jackalope89: He wasn't! K-thx-die X-)

I'dMakeANameButIDon'tWantTo: Dear god I love long reviews… Yeah, I've always been decent at emulating character dialogue, and with combat, it's DEFINITELY about getting the point across as cleanly as possible. Some things I like to be super detailed to communicate a cool move, and some attacks have such dramatic impacts that you need to switch to "awe" and become granular with exactly how something is splitting apart, what's heard, what's smelled, the way light filters through smoke and fog. And otherwise you have a lot of quick moves that have impact, but you describe them and people get the idea. Move along, move along… If you're too granular, you slow the fight in the reader's mind and it stops being action.

Yeah, there was NO way I was missing out on characters sufficiently reacting to stuff this big. It annoys me when RWBY brushes over something big, like Ruby seeing Penny alive in V7. WAY too little payoff to that…

And yeah, poor Chiaotzu… I only left him out really because I felt like if ALL OF THEM said something in turn, it would feel like a curtain-call, artificial and cringe. I'm VERY aware of things like that.

Fun fact? There were a few parts I pre-wrote to be teasers before the story was actually released. The last of those? The Frieza/Salem scene. Had that in my back pocket from the very start.

I'm really interested to see how you respond to this chapter specifically…

Mr.J316: Glad you had a good time, and while tragic… I hope that connection Salem has to Doyadano satisfied…

SortaCore: Let me amend what I was saying… Doing the right thing should not be PUNISHED, it should result in the best outcome possible… though what's possible might be extremely limited. Terrible things can still happen, but never as a direct consequence of one's virtue. Those should be a matter of circumstances that couldn't have been planned for or avoided.

In the long term, I've absolutely struck that balance you speak of. I really don't want this story to be that "gritty," I just want something as extreme as death to have a consequence, and therefore an IMPACT.

Saiyanwarrior22: Does… Does Toriyama sound like Japanese Vegeta's VA? I feel like your thought pattern was a bit fractured there, but it was nice, so thank you!

SuperSaiyanFever: Welllllll...

But no, the Super Dragonballs do not exist in this version. They're not relevant anyway, but they're a stupid idea and I hate them… and I don't want erasures to be undoable. Let SOME form of dead actually MEAN dead…

Alex Bloodbane: I think we pm'd and figured this out…

G119: Agreed! I love crossovers for stuff like this…

Er… I'm not sure if Pikkon exists in this… Actually, I'm not sure if the other cardinal Kais exist either, but I'm rolling with that at least.

Also, PSYCH! Magic isn't divine energy… but Silver Eyes is… And yes, Buu is a big example I go to for magic and Ki being a potent combo.

Salem doesn't have magic though.

I'm really glad so many people liked the Weiss/Winter stuff…

Also, sorry, but no… I'm not including ANY GT elements in this story.

Soccerjam: Stories worth telling have costs and consequences. Only Saturday morning cartoons drag perfect happy endings out of everything. That doesn't mean it needs to be a bloodbath, but continuing from the endpoint should mean some things were irreparably changed. Jeez, even the original Power Rangers understood that.

Monster King: Lolthanks

King of Fans: I can't possibly respond to all of these, but I'm honored and fascinated that someone actually chose to review each chapter on their way through. I only have a few questions:

1: Is "Good character" an observation, or a signature?

2: You seem well spoken, but your posts tend to be full of a lot of wrongly-chosen words or other oddities. Are you like X3Runner and making these with a voice recognition program to dictate?

3: Why did you review literally every chapter but 13?