Chapter Hundred-forty-three
Behold the New God of Martial Arts! A King's Fury!
Beerus decided that he hated bingo. His bingo sheet was covered in completely unconnected dots, if the number Vegeta called out was on the sheet at all, and more than one human already had bingo! How was he supposed to get three first?! If he didn't know any better, he'd have suspected that Vegeta was intentionally not calling his numbers.
"If I don't get a bingo soon, I'm going to vaporize this planet," Beerus muttered.
Whis, who already had one bingo without even paying attention, calmly picked up his piña colada. "If that is your desire, Lord Beerus," he said with an amicable shrug. He took a sip from his tiny-umbrella drink and giddily kicked his feet at the flavor explosion happening in his mouth with an undignified squeal of delight. This was his second one so far. "Really, Lord Beerus, you must try one of these!"
"G-33!" Vegeta called. There was no G-33 on Beerus's sheet. Steam began to rise off of Beerus's scalp but he caught himself before he could make an enraged spectacle. Something had caught his attention, something no mortal could perceive. He turned to look back at the other guests before turning back to Whis.
"Whis," he said, "I think that child is trying to see my future."
"Which one, Lord Beerus?" Whis asked before popping a red bean mochi into his mouth greedily.
"The one with the three eyes," Beerus explained.
Whis looked back at Kani, seated at the kid's table. She wasn't looking at her bingo card at all. Two of her eyes were closed and the third one, the one on her forehead, was glowing like a lightbulb.
"Ah, yes," Whis said, "That does seem to be the case. How fascinating."
"What do you think, should I destroy her?" Beerus asked. Whis gave a dismissive wave and held out a mochi in the palm of his hand like a sugar cube for a horse. "I suppose you're right," Beerus agreed before chomping the mochi right out of Whis's hand. "How could a mortal comprehend the future of a God?"
Vegeta was sweating as he turned around to look into the tumbler and grab another ball. This was not going well. But what could he do? He couldn't see Beerus's card from here! It wasn't his fault that the God of Destruction had terrible luck!
'B-76,' an unfamiliar voice said inside his head, giving him a start. It was the voice of a little girl, which was particularly disturbing.
"Who the hell–" he muttered out loud before the voice cut him off.
'I'm Kani,' the voice explained. Vegeta was mentally silent. 'Tenshinhan and Launch's daughter,' the voice explained helpfully.
'Ah, I see,' Vegeta thought. 'I don't think I've ever actually heard your voice. What do you want?'
'I told you,' Kani said, 'Grab B-76. That's on Beerus's card.'
'How do you know that?' Vegeta asked. 'Are you seeing into his future to see what letters make him angry and kill us all?'
'A little bit,' Kani said modestly, 'But I'm also projecting so that I can see into his mind and through his eyes.'
'That… that seems far more impressive!' Vegeta thought in amazement.
'It probably is, but it's not like I can use my power to stop his body from moving like Uncle Chaozu can do,' Kani explained. 'So, I won't be much help if this turns violent. So, just say the letters I tell you to.'
Once upon a time, the idea of taking orders from a small child would have balked Vegeta or sent him into a murderous rage. Now?
"B-76!" Vegeta called out, holding the colored ball up for everyone to see.
"Ah ha!" Beerus cried triumphantly, stamping down enthusiastically on his card.
Gohan looked worriedly down at his bingo card, not all that concerned with how well he was doing with the game and more worried about what would come after. They could only stall Beerus for so long, right?
'Come on, mother,' he thought anxiously, 'Where did you and mom go?'
OoOoOoO
Goku and Suno appeared on the Capsule Corp property, specifically in the garden area. The aroma of flowers from every corner of the globe tickled their noses and the shade of the tall trees overhead was pleasantly cool. It'd be very nice if there weren't the looming threat of an Elder God about to destroy their planet.
"What are we doing here?" Suno asked, looking up at Goku.
"Well, we need the Dragon Radar, right?" Goku pointed out. "It's not like Bulma has it on her all the time. Plus," she continued, "The last time I came here from Bulma's folks' ki, I saw them doing something… weird," her expression was haunted. "I mean, weird by our standards," she explained.
"So, whose ki did you sense?" Suno asked while looking around. She felt something brush against her leg and looked down to see Scratch wrapping around and around their legs, purring softly. "...I love this cat but how is it still alive?" she asked. She remembered Dr. Brief having Scratch when she first showed up at Capsule Corp and that was, approximately, a million years ago.
Scratch gave a confident "Mrow!" and sauntered away, disappearing into the bushes.
"Okay, let's get a move on," Suno said, "Bulma usually keeps the Dragon Radar in her lab, so…" she flew off into the main Capsule Corp building and Goku followed after her. They waded through the organized chaos that Bulma's lab would probably always be in and Suno found the box where the Dragon Radar was kept. "Ah, there's a lock now," Suno remarked. "Probably from more people learning about Dragon Balls and stuff," she surmised with a shrug.
"Want me to bust it?" Goku asked, already raising a fist.
"Ah, no, don't do that," Suno assured her with a grin, grabbing Goku's hand and lowering it. "I know what it is," she tapped at the small keyboard, humming to herself. "Bulma Rocks, with an X, all caps, three exclamation points," Suno said. The safe lit up green and dinged, popping open with a hiss and a bit of white smoke. She snatched the Dragon Radar out of the safe and pushed the top button to activate it, feeling oddly nostalgic as the green screen lit up with life and seven yellow circles pinged onto the screen with a red triangle representing the two of them. "Let's get going," she told Goku, "Who knows what that Beerus jerk is up to now?"
OoOoOoo
"O-13!" Vegeta declared, just as Kani instructed.
"Ha ha!" Beerus cheered in triumph, jumping up onto his chair. "Bingo! Hahahaha!"
"Yes, Lord Beerus," Whis said, "Now, you still need bingo two more times," he reminded him. Beerus's ears flopped down and he sat down in his chair and grabbed his bingo sheet and his stamp.
"You never let me have any fun, Whis," Beerus grumbled.
"We're looking for the Super Saiyan God, aren't we?" Whis asked. "Isn't that fun?"
"Hey, you're right," Beerus said, "We are supposed to be–"
"I-22!" Vegeta called. Beerus's train of thought was interrupted and he gave another cheer as he stamped onto the mat.
OoOoOoO
In the arctic, Suno frowned as she and Goku looked down into the glacier they were standing on top of. The radar said that there was a Dragon Ball here and she could see it, several hundred feet down through the dark blue, nearly-glass ice.
"But that doesn't make any sense," Suno muttered. "How did the Dragon Ball even get down there?" she looked around the iceberg, searching for some kind of an impact hole that the Dragon Ball might have made and bore down through the ice. "There's no way that the rest of this ice could have formed up around the Dragon Ball, it's way too big." she put her back to the Dragon Ball and put a hand under her chin as she looked up at the sky in thought. "If I didn't know any better, I'd almost think that the Dragon Balls don't fly anywhere and they actually teleport to somewhere that would be the biggest pain in the ass… it would definitely explain some of the weird places we've found them."
While Suno was muttering and grumbling to herself, Goku looked down at the Dragon Ball and moved until she was standing over it, planting her feet.
"We can't just smash or blast our way through it," Suno continued, "We'd risk damaging the Dragon Ball. It's not like we've ever tested the durability of the Dragon Balls, I mean, if we did…"
As Suno rambled, Goku stuck her arms out and spun in a circle, quickly building up speed until she bore through the ice to where the Dragon Ball was. Once she got it, she grabbed the ball and flew back up to the surface.
"Okay," Suno said as she turned back around, "I think I know what we can…" she trailed off when she saw Goku standing there with the two-star Dragon Ball in her hand and shaved ice in her hair. She held in a snort of a laugh and pushed her hand through Goku's hair, taking the other Dragon Ball and putting it in her purse. "C'mon, six to go."
OoOoOoO
'Alright,' Vegeta thought, 'This is actually going really well. If we keep Beerus entertained long enough, he might forget why he even came here and just leave because he had a good time.'
'He's kind of like a little kid,' Kani remarked. 'Well, a normal little kid. …A poorly-raised little kid. Just keep telling him he's the best so he doesn't have a tantrum. Anyway, N-25.'
"N-25!" Vegeta shouted.
"Yes!" Beerus shouted victoriously. "BING–"
"BINGO!" another voice cut him off. Vegeta and Kani looked on in horror as Beerus slowly, ever so slowly, turned his head around to watch as Chaozu jumped up onto the table and danced a jig, making excited celebratory noises as he kicked his feet this way and that. He held his bingo card high overhead as he danced, showing that he had, in fact, gotten bingo three times, while Beerus only had two. "Yeah! Haha! Woohoo! Bingo! I won! Eat it!"
Tenshinhan and Launched cheered and clapped enthusiastically for their friend as he relished his victory. They couldn't remember the last time that Chaozu had won, well… anything, so why not let him have this?
'What was that?' Vegeta demanded. 'I thought you were seeing the future!'
'I was seeing Beerus's future!' Kani insisted. 'And I could only see his sheet, anyway, because I was looking through him! How was I supposed to know? I'm only ten!'
While Vegeta argued with a literal child, a vein throbbed in Beerus's temple as his paws clenched into fists. Only Piccolo, Dende, and Roshi could sense it but murderous intent roiled off of Beerus's body like the heat of a flame and he slowly began to raise one paw.
"Oh, Lord Beerus, you have to try this!" Whis said enthusiastically, either oblivious or uncaring of his master's boiling rage. He held up a plate of sushi eagerly with a smile, a small stack of empty plates beside him showing that Whis had already eaten quite a few rolls by himself. "They call it 'sushi'."
The rage seemed to subside for a moment as Beerus looked at the plate with idle interest before taking one of the pieces between his claws. He popped the piece into his mouth and chewed it, humming with approval before swallowing. Then he took the plate and tipped his head back before dumping the entire roll into his mouth.
'Wait…' Vegeta thought. 'That's a red plate! That's the spicy roll!'
The next few seconds seemed to take a hundred years. Everyone watched as Beerus slowly began to turn red from the stomach up, his eyes growing wider and wider, his pupils turning to slits, then hugely dilated circles, then x's, and finally swirling spirals. Smoke poured out of his nose, his ears, his half-open mouth, and as he finally turned red to the tips of his ears, his mouth opened impossibly wide and flame billowed from his mouth like a dragon's as he let out an ear-piercing sound. It was more like a train whistle than any sound a living person might make, so loud that it knocked Piccolo and Dende to the ground as every glass and bottle exploded. The flames shot high into the sky, high enough and blazing hot enough to turn the sky red.
Eventually, the heat subsided and Beerus, ragged and sweating, took several deep, gulping breaths to control himself. "Thaaaaat does it!" he screamed, eyes bloodshot from both his fury and the spice. "I've had enough! I came to this planet looking for a Super Saiyan God," he explained, shaking a furious fist, "And if I don't get one right now, this entire planet is going sky high!" he opened his palm intending to create a ki blast, but something stopped him. For a few seconds, Beerus's will was not his own.
Veins throbbed in Kani's temple as the light from her third eye went from white to red. A thin trickle of blood leaked from one nostril as she summoned all her willpower, all her magic, every little bit of the brief time Uranai Baba had trained her.
Those handful of seconds were all Goten and Trunks needed to spring into action. The pair were so in tune– though Trunks would vehemently deny it because it sounded uncool– that they didn't even need to look at each other before jumping onto the table.
"Fuuuu! Sion! Ha!" Their fingertips crashed together into an explosion of light and stars and the ki that flared around them, Bulma couldn't help but notice, was in the shape of a heart.
"That's right, everybody! Your favorite character is back!" Gotenks declared triumphantly, thumping a fist against their chest before pointing at Beerus. "Now, as for you! If you're looking for a Super Saiyan God, look no further!" they cockily turned their hand back to themself, pointing to themself with a thumb. "I've never been arrogant enough to call myself a god but I am a Super Duper Saiyan! Here goes!" They powered up to Super Saiyan 3 in an instant and tucked into a tight ball, spinning like a buzzsaw before launching themself at Beerus to collide with his face as Kani collapsed.
Gotenks drove a kick up under Beerus's jaw to launch him into the air, following up with a series of rights and lefts before launching him higher up with a devastating hook.
"Try this!" Gotenks cried out before sucking in a big breath, "Super Ghost Kamikaze Attack!" They put their hands up to their mouth like a blowdart and spit out dozens of Ghostenks, spitting out so many that they needed to take a breath before spitting more.
The Ghostenks army floated around Beerus, swirling around him in a circle as they surrounded him from all sides, making silly faces and taunting him with various "Ooooh!"s.
Beerus had managed to compose himself by this point and dusted himself off before putting his arms behind his back. His eyes narrowed as he looked at the Ghostenkses with, at most, mild confusion. "Boo," he said brusquely. The Ghostenkses all screamed in fright and flew into one another in their mad rush to get away from the God of Destruction. Obviously, this caused them all to explode on contact, which did nothing to alleviate Beerus's confusion.
Gotenks groaned and put their face in their hand in embarrassment, shaking their head. "This was not how I wanted my big comeback to start," Gotenks muttered to themself.
"That's the problem of making attacks that can think," Beerus said. "A ki blast doesn't get scared, after all."
"Yeah, yeah," Gotenks conceded, "I know but…" they stopped and pulled their hand away from their face, giving a startled cry when they realized that Beerus was right in front of them. At this close distance, they could see that the blows they'd landed on Beerus actually had no impact whatsoever. It was as if every attack they'd made had just bounced off of some kind of invisible wall. They couldn't even see a ki aura around him! They threw a desperate jab at Beerus but he deflected it with a finger before grabbing the side of Gotenks's face with one paw.
"I'll say this much, I've never seen a Metamoran fusion quite like you," Beerus said before grabbing the other side of Gotenks's face with his other paw. "But a Super Saiyan God? Hardly." He started to pull his paws in opposite directions as cracks of light began to appear all over Gotenks's body.
"But I… I just got here!" Gotenks protested before they suddenly glowed into a bright yellow light and split in half, the two halves turning into Goten and Trunks who dropped out of the air like stones before crashing painfully down into the water below.
"Now then…" Beerus began to say before Tarble and Vegeta flew up at him. The Super Saiyan siblings made their best attempt at an attack, throwing wild punches and kicks with Beerus in between them. The Hakaishin's movements were so fast and so subtle that their blows seemed to be passing through his body entirely. They pushed back through the air and brought their hands to their sides.
"Take this!" the brothers cried out in unison as they fired a barrage of ki blasts, hoping to catch Beerus between their attacks. Beerus didn't even acknowledge Vegeta's blast, turning to face Tarble and putting one paw, one claw, out. He sliced his claw through the air to send the ki blasts scattering across the sky before he flicked his claw forward with a kiai, launching Tarble through the air with a cry of pain.
"Tarble!" Vegeta called out, just in time for his younger brother to circle the planet and slam into him from behind. Vegeta gave a startled shout and was sent forward as Beerus turned around, driving him right into Beerus's outstretched finger and knocking the wind out of him. Beerus whipped around and struck Vegeta with his tail hard enough to knock him out of Super Saiyan 2, sending him falling down to the ship below after his brother.
With a hum of disappointment, Beerus floated idly back down toward the ship.
OoOoOoO
"Easy," Suno said softly, "Eeeaasy…" this was because she was reaching into a bird's nest for the three-star Dragon Ball. The bird's eggs were also orange and speckled with red spots. "C'mon, don't freak out," she gently encouraged the bird as it was sitting on her brood, giving several warning hisses and chirps. "You can tell it's not an egg. I've been there, you wouldn't think you pushed out more than you actually had. You can tell it's just a rock, right?"
She wasn't really concerned about the bird freaking out for her own sake– she was more than strong enough to not be bothered by a peck– but for the sake of the bird and her nest. After all, this nest was halfway up a mountain. If the bird freaked out and attacked her, it could jeopardize the eggs that were actually hers. Suno was surprised there were birds that lived in this hot desert climate.
"Hey," Goku remarked, "I think I can see Baba's palace from here."
"Huh," Suno said as she looked back over her shoulder, "I think you're– ahhh!" the scream came from the fact that the fat, red, dusty-plumed bird had lunged for her face and started to peck. Suno fell backwards with the Dragon Ball in hand as the nest fell from under the bird. Goku moved quickly and caught the nest and the eggs without letting any of them crack, carefully putting them back on the perch they'd fallen from. The bird flew back onto her nest and hissed at Suno, who hissed right back. "C'mon," she told Goku while shoving the ball into her purse. "Just three more."
OoOoOoO
As Beerus floated back down to the deck of the ship, Gohan was also returning after he and Piccolo had fished Goten and Trunks out of the sea. He glared at the intruder and took off his sunglasses. He still couldn't get a read on his ki but he knew that he had the best chance of doing any damage to their new enemy.
Which was why he stared in utter disbelief as Roshi walked up in front of him to stand in front of Beerus.
Beerus eyed Roshi with just a hint of actual amusement. "Who, exactly, are you, young one?"
Roshi smirked at that and gave a chuckle as he took off his sunglasses and then his shirt, showing off the surprising amount of muscle on a 300-plus-year-old body. "Eh heh heh. Been a long time since anyone addressed me like that," he said as he raised his hands and brought his fists down to his sides. "I am Roshi! God of Martial Arts!" he moved slowly through a series of fighting stances that none of the others had ever seen before, each movement showing the muscles and precise movements only developed over a lifetime, multiple lifetimes, of training. "I am skill and strength. Power and perseverance. Hard work and heart." To the shock of everyone who knew him, they noticed Roshi's ki growing as he moved and spoke.
This drew a genuine laugh from Beerus. "Are you, really?" he asked, his yellow eyes glowing with malevolent power. "It seems a proper introduction is in order, then," he said as he held his hands splayed out at his side, the faintest purple ki aura forming around him. "I am Beerus, God of Destruction. I am volcanos and tidal waves. Earthquakes and hurricanes. Supernovas and black holes."
If Roshi was frightened by this display or the ki that he could sense, he didn't show it. His mortal ki and Godly ki had both grown together through focus and meditation, through greater cosmic understanding. Now he had a chance to prove his mettle. "I am the knowledge and skill of a thousand masters. Ten thousand, a hundred thousand. Every man who has made a fist and every woman who has practiced a form. Their knowledge lives in me," he said as he moved into his final stance, body pivoted tight to one side to make a smaller target, legs bent but held firm, one arm raised with a clenched first and the other fist held closely to his side. "They wish to teach you a lesson."
"I am the death of a billion souls," Beerus retorted. "Ten billion. A hundred billion. Within me are their dying screams, their pleas and their cries. Their death throes, their final fears." His eyes shone with malevolence. "They shall tell you how foolish it is to challenge me."
Roshi's hands moved in a series of intricate gestures, moving through the air and fingers sometimes interlocking. "Keikouketsu!" he called out as yellow bolts of electricity shot from his eyes and the veins below his skin became visible with yellow light as well. He moved his fingers into another series of gestures and signs and slammed his fists together. "Hada no Tetsu!" he shouted, and his body instantly turned shiny and silver. One more time he moved, each time his limbs moved it was now accompanied by the soft hum of metal slicing through the air. "Jaakuryuuhi!" with that, purple-black flames appeared on his arms and legs, dancing and crackling over his body.
To this display, Beerus offered nothing. He still did not move into a fighting stance of his own and still regarded Roshi as nothing more than an amusement.
Then, Roshi lunged.
To nearly everyone at the party, what followed was a blur of motion punctuated by bursts of light and sound. But Lazuli, Piccolo, Goten, Trunks, Vegeta, Kani, Gohan, and Whis were able to follow along, each one seeing more and more of the battle with Whis and Gohan able to understand it all.
Roshi leaped toward Beerus with a hand pulled back to prepare a strike as Beerus flew backwards, both of them going off the side of the ship and taking to the sky. "Sendokujato!" Roshi cried out as he attacked, his hands a blur of spear strikes that Beerus dove and weaved through. Roshi was faster than he'd ever been, more alive than he'd ever felt, his own attack speed bolstered by the Keikouketsu technique, just as the Hada no Tetsu boosted his strength and durability. But the true danger was the Jaakuryuuhi. One of the most deadly and, without question, evil techniques ever conceived, the flames attacked neither body nor ki but a being's genki. Even if Beerus blocked the attacks, the effect would still be felt.
Perhaps Beerus knew that, as Roshi tried to gauge the look in the God's eyes as he sidestepped an axe kick from Roshi. Beerus moved around Roshi's guard and drove a claw into his chest causing the metal coating over his skin to shatter but he was surprised to see Roshi still standing. That half-second of hesitation was all Roshi needed. He expelled all the lightning from his body with a roar of exertion and a blinding flash of light, more intended to disorient Beerus than damage him. While Beerus was– hopefully– stunned, Roshi called upon the wisdom and power of the ancient elemental masters, moving his arms in smooth and graceful motions before thrusting his hands up to the sky. A massive geyser of water rushed up from the sea and surrounded Beerus, forming into a cube that froze instantly, trapping Beerus in a massive block of ice.
Roshi could see a purple light glowing from inside the block so he knew that this would, again, do little more than stall the God of Destruction. That was fine, he could stall with the best of them. Still pulling from the ancient elemental powers, he swirled his hands overhead until the sky turned into one singular black cloud that rumbled and flashed with lightning. He gave another cry of effort as he brought his hands down hard, right as the block of ice exploded into snowflakes. Beerus looked up in time to see a gargantuan bolt of lightning streaking down toward him. He swatted the lightning into the sky with his tail but this meant taking his eyes off of Roshi yet again.
The God of Martial Arts was all around him, having split himself into a multiform. They were all useless for trying to attack Beerus directly but the singular ki source being shared among them allowed a master of the multiform technique to attack him at once from multiple angles, drawing on the same strength.
"Kumowana!" the Roshis called in unison as they threw their hands forward with outstretched fingers. Beerus looked around in bafflement as razor-thin strands of silver-white ki zipped past him, connecting one Roshi to the other, and the Roshis spun around him in a circle until he was completely ensnared in their webbing. The Roshis disappeared, leaving only one Roshi even higher in the sky, up above the clouds. He dug deeply into the reserves of his strength as bright light shone along the edges of his upraised forearms. "Yamasaku!" he roared as he dove down, swinging his arms forward like he was swinging an axe. An enormous wave of silver-white ki shot down from his forearms, hundreds of feet long and as thin as a blade.
Beerus burst free of the ki web like a butterfly of death, quickly raising up a forearm to deflect the attack. It burst harmlessly against his aura but he watched with mild intrigue as a single one of his purple hairs floated down into the ocean below. He turned to look up at Roshi and finally seemed to genuinely regard him.
He rewarded this with a thumb into Roshi's chest that made him cough up bloody spittle and grabbed his face, flying down to the ship with enough force to use Roshi's body to crack the ship in half.
With just enough of his wits to remember the technique, Roshi made another series of intricate hand signs and turned into smoke, dissolving through Beerus's grip and appearing behind him before they would have impacted with the ship.
"Alright then," Roshi panted out, his body drenched in sweat. "Think I got one more trick. Here's one of mine!" he called upon the last reserves of his strength as he brought his hands forward, wrists touching, palms facing Beerus. "Kaaameee…" Blue-white light filled his palms as he slowly brought his hands down to his side. "Haaamee…" With a great effort, Roshi flung his hands forward with a scream. "HAAAA!"
Having already been familiarized with this technique, Beerus was ready. He smacked the attack up into the sky with an upward motion of his tail and swatted Roshi with a downward motion.
"Jeez," Krillin muttered while Whis gave a politely delighted golf clap, "I guess Roshi's back in the game. We better start training again, huh?"
"I'll tell you this much," Beerus said as he picked idly at the dirt underneath one claw, "You have promise, Godling. You'll survive the destruction of this planet so keep training. In a century or two, you might actually be worth my time." He paused for a moment before a thought struck him. "That technique of yours, the Kame-whatever… is Son Goku a student of yours?"
Roshi chuckled into the wood before pulling himself up and wiping the blood from his nose. "Heh, yeah. She's my best."
Beerus gave an approving nod. "Now then. Is there anyone else–"
He'd barely finished the question before Gohan's knee came crashing into his face. "Yeah," Gohan growled, "Me."
Beerus staggered back as Gohan spun with a roundhouse kick that caught him on the side of the head, actually staggering him. Although Gohan didn't realize it, he was the first person here to actually touch Beerus's body with an attack. He closed the distance quickly and smashed an elbow up under Beerus's jaw, snapping his head back. Beerus finally stopped Gohan's attack by holding a punch back with two fingers, his other hand rubbing at his jaw with a groan.
"Who… what are you?" Beerus asked, half curious and half offended.
"My name is Son Gohan," Gohan declared proudly as he pushed away from Beerus's fingers and got back into a fighting stance. "I am the son of Son Goku and Son Suno! Defender of Earth!" Even in such a dire circumstance, he couldn't help but let just a little bit of Great Saiyaman show.
Beerus smirked at that, narrowing his eyes with interest. "Ah, I see. So, you're the one Goku mentioned. The strongest Saiyan," he held out a hand and beckoned for Gohan to attack him. "Let's see what you've got, then!"
Gohan roared as he unleashed his full power, his ki aura raging around him like an inferno. The thin purple aura returned to surround Beerus as he waited for Gohan's attack.
Gohan seemed to throw out a punch that Beerus sidestepped easily but then something struck him from behind as Gohan pulled his fist back. The punch had actually been little more than a feint, a way for him to throw out a ball of invisible ki, which he recalled to strike Beerus from behind. The Hakaishin was sent forward into a perfectly-timed thrust kick that smashed into his stomach, causing Beerus to cry out not in pain as much as shock. Gohan pressed the attack, linking his hands together to swing an axehandle blow up into Beerus's chest, again using invisible ki to put extra speed and force behind the attack to catch Beerus flat-footed. Beerus flipped through the air, end-over-end, and managed to make himself stop with a grunt of effort, throwing his arms and legs out.
"Come on," Beerus snapped, "Stop screwing around! Change your hair color! Turn into a Super Saiyan!"
"Don't need to," Gohan explained with a smirk, "I've always got full access to my power. Like this!" He raised his hands up over his head with fingers interlocked. "Masenko!" He fired a massive blast of yellow ki that Beerus shoved away with a forearm, though it took far more effort than any other ki attack he'd deflected so far. Gohan flew at him with a dropkick, trying to make sure Beerus didn't have a moment to breathe.
But a God didn't need to breathe.
Beerus sidestepped Gohan's attack and swatted him down with his tail, watching as Gohan's body crashed down to the beach below in an enormous cloud of sand. He flexed the claws of his paw for a moment before looking back toward the ship. "Well, that was almost something but I suppose I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up. Better wrap this up and head for planet Vamp-Aagh!" his words were turned into a cry of shock as Gohan shot back up out of the sound and grabbed him from behind.
"I dunno who you thought you were dealing with," Gohan grunted as he and Beerus flew straight up into the sky, "But if you think I'll go down that easily, you were way off!" They flew up high enough that the sky began to change from blue to black before Gohan suddenly flipped them both upside down and shot back down like a rocket, fighting against the struggling God of Destruction all the while to keep him from breaking free. They dove through the ocean and hit the seafloor hard enough to make a massive crack. Swelling waves endangered the coastline worldwide and the ground shook for miles from the impact.
Gohan staggered away from the crater and shook his head to try and clear it, thankfully still able to breathe from the amount of air he'd managed to catch in his ki aura. That air was quickly driven out of him as Beerus burst out of the crater and kicked him in the ribs. Not a poke with a claw, not a smack with a tail, a real kick. Gohan let out a rattling wheeze as all the air was knocked out of his body before he was launched off of Beerus's foot and was sent hurtling back into the air, tumbling through the sky before Beerus caught up with him and drove two fingers into his back with a chop to send him hurtling down to the ship. Gohan went through two floors of the ship before he came to a stop, groaning as he struggled to stay conscious.
Beerus floated back down onto the deck with a cluck of his tongue, putting one hand on the side of his neck and cracking it. "I really was expecting better," he scoffed. "You're certainly stronger than the rest but I'm still… disappointed." As he was talking, Goten, Trunks, and Vegeta were getting back to their feet.
OoOoOoO
"Here," the pig grumbled as he held the seven-star Dragon Ball up to Goku with his head bowed, "Just take it, I don't want any trouble." The Dragon Radar had led them to the tail end of the Papaya Island chain, which was relatively quiet and empty compared to the crowded, touristy nature of the rest of the chain. Even when the Budoukai wasn't running, the islands were basically a Hercule theme park.
Suno watched with no small measure of confusion as the pig grumbled and groused back to his tiki bar, pushed a button that turned it into a capsule, and jammed it into his pocket before hopping into his speedboat and driving away from Goku as quickly as possible.
"What the heck was that about?"
"I think I met him when me and Bulma were kids," Goku said with a shrug as she handed the ball to Suno.
"Why did he freak out when he saw you?"
"Oh, I tried to eat him," Goku explained nonchalantly.
"Goku!" Suno exclaimed, aghast.
"He was a pig, what was I supposed to do?!" Goku asked defensively.
"He can talk!" Suno pointed out.
"Yeah, Bulma said the same thing back then," Goku admitted. "I mean, it's not like I've tried to eat anything else that can talk since."
Despite her initial shock, Suno couldn't help but snicker and shake her head at her ridiculous wife. "Okay," she said, "That's all seven of them. We should hurry and get back to the others, it seemed like things were getting pretty crazy."
"Yeah," Goku agreed, "We should go." Despite this, they weren't moving. In fact, Goku moved to stand behind Suno, arms looping around her waist.
"Uhhh… Goku?" Suno asked.
"Just… just a second," Goku murmured as she rested her chin on Suno's shoulder.
"Goku, what… what are you…" Suno's voice listed as she felt Goku's lips against her neck. Clearly, it was only now that Goku had decided to appreciate her wife's beach party attire. And there was certainly something beautiful about the locale, Suno had to admit. Almost magical, really. The white sand beneath their feet and the crystal clear water lapping at the coast in gentle waves. The smell of the flowers and the ripe summer fruits, a cool breeze wafting off the ocean that mingled with the hot island air. It was so quiet, so peaceful, and they were completely alone. Alone like they hadn't been in weeks, with Suno prepping for the party and Goku helping Krillin with training the Turtle students, not to mention the time they spent raising Goten…
"Suno," Goku said breathily, lifting a hand to her wife's chin so she could turn her head for a kiss.
"Mmm… no Goku, come on," Suno protested weakly even as she turned to face Goku and gripped the front of her gi passionately. "We… we really have to go," she insisted against her wife's lips while backing her up against a palm tree, reaching one hand down to grab under Goku's knee, guiding her leg to wrap around her waist. "It's… it's important." Despite this, they were already taking off each other's clothes.
OoOoOoO
Goten, Vegeta, and Trunks were all powered up to Super Saiyan 2 as they surrounded Beerus, along with the recovered Tarble as a Super Saiyan. They attacked him with a furious barrage of punches and kicks, attempting to pin him in from all sides and give him nowhere to escape. Though Roshi was still out for the count, even Piccolo and Lazuli had entered the fray, trying their best to have some kind of impact, even as much as a distraction.
After a certain point, Beerus simply stopped trying to dodge, letting their attacks bounce harmlessly off his aura. This left him open, however, to the one being who'd actually made contact. Gohan came roaring through the group with a punch to the back of the head that staggered Beerus forward. This brought him right into a combined uppercut from Goten, Trunks, and Vegeta that pushed against Beerus's aura hard enough to send him reeling backward, right into Gohan's grasp again. Gohan grabbed Beerus rather unceremoniously by the ears and began to swing him around and around, turning them both into a purple tornado before letting go with a roar, sending Beerus high up into the sky.
"Kamehameha!" he, Lazuli, and Goten cried out.
"Galick Gun!" Vegeta and Trunks called as they stood shoulder to shoulder, beams united.
Tarble grabbed his wrist and tucked in his elbow, red light gathering on his fist as he held his arm out straight. "Liberty Cannon!" he yelled, his red beam firing between the blue and purple blasts.
"Makankosappo!" Piccolo cried, both hands interlocked as he fired the drill blast from both index fingers.
Beerus put one hand out and caught the various energy blasts, spinning his arm in a tight circle, making the ki wrap around his arm like he was making a ball of cotton candy. He then whipped his hand away and let the multicolored ball of ki launch off into the horizon, with only he and Whis knowing that it vaporized a planet half a galaxy away.
Before any of them could react, Beerus was on them again. Trunks and Goten were each taken out with a flick of his finger, crashing through tables and chairs before collapsing in a heap. He simply had to glare at Piccolo, Lazuli, and Tarble and the accompanying kiai dropped them like flies. Gohan and Vegeta were the last ones standing and barely had time to make fists. Beerus allowed Gohan the dignity of dropping him with three palm strikes that rippled and reverberated through his body before he collapsed before Beerus turned on Vegeta.
"You know you're going to die," Beerus told him coldly, eyes narrowing.
"I'll admit, I don't like my chances," Vegeta said. He didn't think he was about to die, but still… where the hells was Kakarot?! "Still, if I must meet my end, I'm glad it took the God of Destruction to kill me."
"Yes, yes," Beerus said with a roll of his eyes and a dismissive wave of his paw. "You Saiyans and your pride." He held that paw out in front of Vegeta's face and his eyes began to glow with a malevolent purple light. "Hak–"
"Alright, that's it!" Bulma shouted, breaking Beerus's focus as she stormed over and put herself between her husband and the God of Destruction. "It's bad enough my sister couldn't be here because she's in the 'dark zone of the universe' or whatever but this is enough! I don't know what a Super Saiyan God is and I don't care!" she jabbed a finger against Beerus's snout while Vegeta could only watch in horror. "You ate way too much of my food, you've made my guests upset, you were a lousy winner and a sore loser at bingo, you attacked my family, and now I have to pay for this boat!" her face was red with fury as she just kept pressing her finger against his nose. "You have ruined my forty-fifth birthday party!"
"Oh, hey, that's how old she is," Krillin said off-handedly.
"I coulda told you that," Yamcha reminded him.
Beerus just gave Bulma a condescending smirk, which was the exact wrong thing to do. Without another word or a second thought, Bulma hauled off and slapped Beerus right across the face.
Vegeta's mouth fell open in shock, Dende's eyes nearly popped out of his head, and Whis dropped his fork in shock as Beerus's head whipped back from the slap. He blinked twice and rubbed his cheek in utter disbelief before looking at Bulma and striking her in kind with a slap across the cheek. Bulma cried out in pain as she hit the deck hard. For a moment, she was too dazed to move. So dazed she couldn't even breathe.
Despite the pain he was in, as soon as Trunks saw his mother get hit, an anger boiled up inside of him that pulled him to his feet and he cried out as he powered up to Super Saiyan 2. His anger continued to build and he tried to push further. But the anger of a boy for his mother was nothing compared to the rage of a king for his queen.
At first, Vegeta was too enraged, too furious, to even speak, only letting snarls pass between his clenched teeth. "Y… y… you!" he finally spat, eyes nearly bloodshot with rage. "How dare you?!" This was an anger beyond any semblance of personal pride or dignity, more akin to a sort of animal response to the ache deep in his heart. He no longer looked at Beerus as the God of Destruction, a cosmic being of impossible age or unknowable power. All he saw was the stupid bastard who'd put a hand on his wife. "That's my BULMA!" he cried out, throwing his head back with a scream. It was only the mildest interest that stayed Beerus's hand as Vegeta's power continued to climb and climb, his muscles bulging out and his hair slowly starting to grow.
The wind howled and the waves lifted the cruise ship high into the air as hurricane gales and thunder clouds seemed to sweep over the world. Windows shattered, mountains trembled, and people ran screaming through the streets as the whole world seemed to have gone mad with a scream of fury carried on the wind.
There was nothing inside Vegeta but this anger. Nothing had ever made him this furious before. Not Boo, not Perfect Cell, not Freeza, not Kakarot. The anger was greater than fear, greater than his pride, greater than this searing pain that shot through his body. The pain was nothing, it was blocking the way to more power. Enough power to make Beerus pay for his transgression! Vegeta screamed anew, pushing past the pain as his body began to glow with a golden light.
OoOoOoO
On the Daikaoiu's planet, the picnic had concluded and Pikkon had been passing the time with a book when he sensed a rising ki that caught his attention. He stopped to focus on the power, holding his finger on the page.
"Finally," he said, "Another power worth my time besides Goku."
OoOoOoO
"Whoa, that's a really high ki coming from Vegeta," Goku pointed out as she poked her head up from the bushes. "Maybe we should–"
Suno's hand shot up and grabbed the back of her head. "I never want to hear the name 'Vegeta' coming out of your mouth when we're naked," she told her sternly.
"Y-yes, ma'am," Goku said just before she was yanked back down.
OoOoOoO
On the other end of the universe, Cooler calmly sipped his tea as his cruiser sailed through the stars. He sensed the surge of enormous power but, for once, he didn't care. Everything was going to be fine.
OoOoOoO
Vegeta was panting, hunched forward, throat raw from the effort. His eyebrows were gone and his hair reached the backs of his knees. He was so angry he couldn't even register the pride in what he'd done. He'd finally pushed beyond.
Vegeta was a Super Saiyan 3.
The others could only stare in astonishment at Vegeta's transformation and power. Gohan seemed particularly gobsmacked. 'No way,' he thought to himself. 'Is Vegeta really…?'
Bulma slowly stirred and picked her head up off the ground. "Ve… Vegeta?" she asked as her vision stopped swimming. She gave a gasp as she looked up at him in awe.
The mild interest Beerus had shown before disappeared when the light faded. "Oh," he scoffed, "This again. Honestly, what makes this time any–" he was cut off as Vegeta slugged him hard across the face.
"You bastard!" Vegeta bellowed, his voice an octave lower, and hammered Beerus with another hooking punch, then another, and another, each blow snapping his head back. He kicked Beerus hard in the ribs, then grabbed him by the ears and yanked him into a headbutt. Beerus actually had to shove Vegeta away with both hands but Vegeta tackled him off the side of the boat, staying on him like a wild animal as he continued the attack. Vegeta hammered away with punches and kicks, knees and elbows, even biting Beerus, and to his own shock, Beerus actually started having to block. This was… starting to hurt!
"Enough," Beerus demanded as he held up a hand. Vegeta charged heedlessly forward and Beerus balled his hand into a fist. "I said enough!" he threw a right hook with such force that it ripped the clouds out of the sky that smashed Vegeta right on the jaw… and Vegeta kept coming forward. Beerus was genuinely stunned, allowing Vegeta to close the space between them and press both palms against Beerus's snout.
"Final…" Vegeta growled, "FLASH!" The blast caught Beerus squarely in the face, a titanic of yellow and orange like Vegeta had never achieved before, as if he was shooting a star directly at Beerus.
OoOoOoO
On the complete opposite side of the world, Hercule peered over his sunglasses at the light on the horizon and quickly pulled his sunglasses back on, rocking himself in his hammock with renewed energy. He was grateful that he and Miguel had decided to take this anniversary vacation on the same week as Bulma's birthday. That looked like the exact kind of mess he wanted to be far away from.
OoOoOoO
"Who's dumb for missing the party now?" Lapis texted as he and his family watched the light in the sky like fireworks. He added a smirking emoji.
"Still u," Lazuli texted back. "Wuz sum awsum teriyaki" and then a chicken emoji.
"Damn it," Lapis muttered aloud, "I do love teriyaki chicken."
"Huh?" Amy asked, her fluffy green fox tail wrapped around one of his legs.
"Oh, nothin'," he told her with a shrug. "Just… thinkin' about dinner." That was assuming his friends didn't wind up blowing up the planet before the delivery guy could get to their property…
OoOoOoO
Vegeta slowly lowered his arms, panting for breath, the initial surge of adrenaline leaving his body. He tensed as the smoke cleared, Beerus's infuriatingly undetectable ki meaning that he had no idea how much damage, if any, he'd actually done. He could feel the intense drain of Super Saiyan 3 already eating away at his ki and knew that if he was going to continue fighting, he'd need to think of something fast.
Beerus dismissed the smoke with a wick of his tail. His face was covered in singe marks and his ears were blown back. He was positively fuming. But more importantly than any of that, there was a single trickle of blood running from a cut just above his eyebrow. He rubbed his thumb over the wetness and gave a perplexed look as he rubbed blood between thumb and forefinger, as though it had been so long that he didn't even recognize the substance.
"Congratulations," he told Vegeta, his tone a mixture of genuine approval and unvarnished contempt. "They will write books of poetry about your death." In a flash of movement, his claws raked across Vegeta's chest, tearing through his shirt and his body, flinging ruby droplets across the horizon. Vegeta gave a stuttering gasp of pain before Beerus drove an elbow into his stomach, digging the point into one of Vegeta's open wounds, before delivering a roundhouse kick that dropped Vegeta out of Super Saiyan 3 and sent him back onto the ship with a sickening crash. "I'll admit, you have all given me a bit of amusement," Beerus said as he floated back down toward the party. "But I didn't come here for amusement, did I, Whis?"
"No, Lord Beerus," Whis agreed as he floated up to stand beside his master. He had taken one of the party goody bags and crammed it full of delightful Earth desserts as he doubted anyone would be making more of them ever again.
"No," Beerus nodded, "I came here for the Super. Saiyan. God. And I have not found the Super. Saiyan. God. And no one here can tell me where to find the Super. Saiyan. God. So, I don't see any reason why this planet should continue to–"
"Wait!" Suno cried as she and Goku suddenly appeared on the deck between Gohan and Videl, Goku's hand on Suno's shoulder and the Dragon Balls nearly spilling out of Suno's bag. "We can tell you how to fight the Super Saiyan God!"
Vegeta pushed himself to sit up even as Dende and Bulma tried to keep him laying down to be healed. "Where… where the hell have you been?!" he demanded, looking directly at Goku.
Goku gave an embarrassed grin and scratched the back of her head. "Well…"