A thunderous loud of applause and whistles came from the thousands watching the tournament and after a deep breath she continued to walk, from her behind she heard Son Goku say, "Be careful." in a serious way but she knew that she couldn't underestimate anyone after that last fight. She had to be serious.
So she took a step and the loud noises of the crowd disappeared from her mind, another step and she stopped seeing anything outside of the ring and another step to forget that the rest of the world even existed.
She stepped on the ring and the outside world started looking like a grey goo that extended forever, there was only her and Son Gohan, she got into a fighting stance against the man who stood still with a serious expression on his face and opened her ki sense, as the outside world didn't exist, she couldn't be overloaded by what could be there.
With the tournament announcer's shout, she forgot about his existence as well and rushed towards Gohan. She didn't have a distinct and powerful fighting style like Sharpner's rhythm nor did she have Erasa's cunning however there was a reason why upon seeing their strength her reaction was surprise rather than worry, that was because she knew she could beat them.
Thanks to her ki sensing, she knew how Gohan was going to move. He was going for a hook, his stance was terrible and that punch had no power behind it, it was slow and left him full of openings. She could stutter her steps for merely a moment to catch him completely off guard and maybe even finish the fight right now. But that wasn't her style so she got even faster.
Gohan's punch did indeed land on her and it did indeed hurt but her counter punch, hurt even more as Gohan grunted a bit and shook himself to cope with the pain.
Even though it became clear that he didn't have Erasa's freakish pain resistance, his even scarier recovery speed made up for it, he came with a kick this time, it had a sad form that didn't belong in the knockout rounds of the World Martial Arts Tournament but she didn't have the time to even try and take advantage of it this time because it had speeds befitting the finale of the World Martial Arts Tournament.
So she continued with her original plan and intentionally got hit by the kick before retaliating with an uppercut to his chin and a knee to his stomach but his recovery allowed him to hit her back with a punch.
Taking a step back wasn't something that even crossed her mind before she punched Gohan. They traded punches but none of them were calculated, she didn't think why she was punching, where she was punching, if this punch would give any openings or anything like that. She needed to hit more than she got hit, she needed to hurt more than she got hurt, she could give the flesh but she needed to take the bone.
The man she was seeing with her eyes turned bloody and the ki she was sensing fluctuated but this stalemate was suddenly broken as Gohan changed his tactics and tried to grab Videl.
And suddenly Videl who bravely faced every punch and every kick head on practically ran to the other side of the ring. From her perspective it looked like she zoomed out of Gohan in a moment.
The reason she created this gap wasn't that she took too much damage, she knew her body, she could take much more punishment but despite how it looked like, she wasn't fighting like an animal, this wasn't merely a dogfight. This dogfight was something she specialized and excelled in, she did this to the point where she didn't need to calculate the trades anymore, she knew who was going to come worse off.
So she also knew that fighting against a good grappler was a losing fight for her style. One proper grip and she would lose in that moment. However even though she had other plans against grapplers, she didn't have to use them because she had a huge advantage, Son Gohan wasn't a good grappler, he wasn't even a grappler at all. He just tried to grab, it might have been just a desperate move but it didn't matter.
However Gohsn was finally showing a bit of his intellect, she realized that he became aware of this weakness of her too and started chasing her. He somehow felt much more comfortable chasing, his movement felt much more practiced and efficient.
If he had a weakness that Videl would try to fix first if she were in his position was the footwork. He handled his balance well and he used his core balance to stay on foot despite stretching into absurd shapes to try and grab her.
Each fighter had a unique point about them and a large part of their strength came from utilizing that unique point as well as possible and cultivating it to its peak. For Gohan, what she saw so far was that his main attribute was his excellent body. He was fast, strong, flexible and durable.
He did excel in that too, he didn't have any technique or experience but he was already this strong and she knew that he wasn't going as fast as he could and he wasn't punching as hard as he could be.
It was such a shame that grappling required technique. After letting him grab her from an angle that wasn't really favourable for him and used the weird angle of his arm to twist it and pin down Gohan in one smooth motion. He was strong and he was smart but he didn't have any experience. This fight was his loss.
His screams of pain started as she twisted it more and more while he was struggling to get out of her hold to no avail. He was strong but he couldn't use it. Like a fish out of water in its last breath, Gohan was flailing around but he had no chance.
Suddenly however her ki sensing told her to run away as far as possible, that it wasn't safe here and her life in danger. So she ran to the end of world, she touched the edge of the ring and waited to see what would happen.
After that momentary spike in power, Gohan's power went down significantly however it was still higher than how it used to be, their roughly equal powers changed to an overwhelming dominance for Gohan. She couldn't continue to trade punches anymore.
She didn't know where this came from but her first guess was adrenaline. Under pain unfamiliar to him, Son Gohan's fight or flight instinct kicked into overdrive and he picked to fight. If that was the case, this strength would be fleeting, a few minutes and he would be left weaker than even before.
But there was a reason she didn't believe this, her ki sensing told a different story, his previously calm and pure energy changed completely. It was now aggressive, fast, pulsating and it had a sharp texture pointed right at her.
He quickly moved towards her with a punch and due to his sheer speed, Videl had no option other than to try and block it but as soon as she put her guard up, a grin appeared on Gohan's face and without stopping his motion, he changed his punch to a grip and slipping past Videl's guard, he caught her throat.
Videl suddenly panicked, with Gohan's strength if she let him, he could break her neck in moments. Her life was in danger, 18 was correct all along.
Immediately she kicked off the ground and tried to rotate herself around Gohan's arm using it as an axis. It even seemed like she was going to succeed for a while but before it was too late, Gohan threw her to the ground, if she didn't see something similar in the last fight, she would let Gohan spike her to the ground.
Though she protected herself a bit, it still hurt all around her body regardless. She stepped back as fast as she could to give herself as much as possible. This fight was still winnable but she had to act fast.
For the first time since the fight started she opened her mouth and said, "You didn't hesitate at all going after my neck. You are still green so you might not know how dangerous that was." with a smirk.
Gohan slowly walked step by step saying, "I know exactly how dangerous it is." confirming all of Videl's suspicions. She was up against someone who wasn't stable mentally, a criminal who couldn't think straight and had to fight thus.
She put her guard up once again and said, "You should know me by now. I have a natural advantage against lowlife scums, you are already one step behind. It is insolent of you to think you can do anything against me." first step in winning was putting up a brave front to convince both your opponent and more importantly yourself that you were in control of the situation.
Although he didn't say anything, thanks to his increased pace and annoyed facial expression, she knew the second step succeeded as well, he had to make wrong choices for her to win. That was the only option and the way to do it passed through messing with his mental state.
However in the short term, the anger would make Gohan faster and stronger. She needed to survive until Gohan made a fatal mistake. Now that she was more used to his strength and speed, dodging the next few hits from him weren't impossible but she realized something that froze her blood. He was copying her form perfectly, it was as if she taught him how to fight for years.
As if she was rewatching one of her fights in 3d, a perfect hook came towards her but since this was her perfect hook, she also knew the way to avoid it but showing that he didn't only copy the punches, he approached her with footwork copied directly from this fight.
Videl had to continue her plan, Gohan was using his intelligence to fight, realizing that his DIY fighting style wasn't enough and being able to copy hers to the each minute detail was scary, she needed to stop him as soon as possible, "I really thought you were smart Gohan. Why do you think copying me will solve anything? You are going to fail this fight just like your exams at this rate."
Pace of the fight picking up made her realize that she had succeeded in making him angrier but right now, Gohan was so fast that she might not even have the time to open her mouth or do any unnecessary move at all without getting hit. This was her limit so she prayed that this was Gohan's limit as well.
With his faster speed, she could either only barely dodge the attacks or had to choose to get hit by the weaker one. Her time was running out. So she chose an attack to get hit by and bet it all on that.
"Your entire identity was given to you by a kid half your age. If you didn't meet Trunks Brief, Son Gohan wouldn't exist. You have been a nothing until that moment." she said while getting hit in the gut and puking out blood. Her head was getting light, she was running on fumes too.
However the face of Gohan getting clearly and visibly contorted in anger and his breaths each became deeper and faster until it almost sounded like he was hyperventilating.
He started attacking again with speeds she never saw before, landing punches with strength she never felt before. She was barely standing and was about to fall down herself but finally Gohan made a mistake.
One had to know, the punch of a relatively short and thin woman and a tall, muscular man would be completely different. So when Gohan was copying her moves, she knew something like this would happen but the gaps weren't that big because of her form using strength to fight.
However Gohan just used one of the few moves in her arsenal that wouldn't work on people with larger physiques. A simple straight punch that used the full rotation of the waist to commit fully into the action. A move that was only safe thanks to her smaller frame.
She immediately leaped into action, this was the only chance she had of winning this fight. She whipped up a kick straight towards his chin. Her waist, her knee, her ankle and even her toes rotated as much as possible to make this kick the most powerful it could be.
This was the most powerful hit she put out in her entire life. A large sound of an explosion came before she even hit Gohan but she sped up regardless. At the moment of impact, a shock wave sent both her and Gohan flying towards the other edges of the ring.
Videl immediately got up, weirdly she wasn't feeling any pain but when she looked at her foot she used to kick, it was mangled, the moment her adrenaline ran out, she would probably be crying from the pain and the sadness of losing a foot but she needed to win, no matter the cost.
Her opponent was laying on the ground, his eyes seemed to be closed, his chin was also heavily bleeding but it didn't seem to be destroyed. She counted in her mind, '4, 5, 6' he was still out, she was winning, '7, 8, 9' but then suddenly he jumped up.
His expression seemed to be completely blank, beyond anger and calmness but there was something weird in his forehead, a silhouette, it was blood that splashed maybe.
Son Gohan started to talk, "Where did you learn to fight?" he asked.
"From my father. Can't relate?" she mocked. She was losing, might as well go with style, she thought to herself.
The weird silhouette on Gohan's forehead turned opaque and it looked like a tattoo. A tattoo of the letter, 'M' and said, "I knew I made the right choice." while getting ready to attack her.
She closed her eyes waited for the punch to land while her ki sensing was going crazy telling her to run away. She lost, she had the accept the will of the winner.
Suddenly right as his punch was about to land on her, someone broke through the walls of the world she put up in her mind and held the punch. The intruder with the golden hair that had sparks all over it said with a calm voice, "Are you really going to make me discipline you?"
