Ten seconds?
The androids stood frozen in disbelief.
However, Raditz didn't give them time to process the threat. With lightning reflexes, he grabbed the arms of Androids 13 and 14, twisted with tremendous force, and shattered both limbs entirely! Android 17, who had been positioned behind him, suddenly found himself launched skyward by a devastating ki blast that exploded him in mid-air!
The androids in this distorted timeline were fundamentally different from those in his original reality, and Raditz felt no obligation to show mercy to these murderous machines.
"Number 13!" Android 18 shouted desperately toward another unit near Trunks.
But Trunks had already transformed into Super Saiyan and closed the distance. His legendary sword traced elegant arcs through the air, dismembering the artificial being in brilliant flashes. Electric sparks and blade light danced together as the radiant display momentarily blinded their vision.
"No. 14!" "No. 18!" Two voices cried out in rapid succession before shattered mechanical bodies crashed to the ground with metallic thunder.
"Retreat! Fall back immediately!" The surviving androids roared in panic, fleeing in the opposite direction at maximum velocity.
They possessed tactical reasoning, and once they recognized mortal danger, self-preservation became their primary directive. But escape was impossible.
Raditz and Trunks swept through their ranks like a devastating storm, eliminating every android without mercy or hesitation. Battle cries and explosive detonations merged into a symphony of destruction across the wasteland, but when the billowing smoke and dust settled, only two figures emerged victorious.
Ten seconds had passed, and every android lay destroyed.
They had been formidable opponents, but unfortunately they had encountered vastly superior warriors.
"That should serve as adequate warm-up exercise. Let's send Towa a clear message that we've arrived," Raditz casually discarded a severed mechanical arm and brushed dust from his clothing. With that declaration, both fighters took to the air, leaving the corpse-strewn wasteland behind as they flew toward the nearest urban center.
"Is being so conspicuous really wise?"
"I suspect Towa detected our presence the moment we arrived. She's a master of spacetime manipulation, after all. But she didn't flee, nor did she interfere during the recent battle. She must be orchestrating something significant." Raditz raised one finger thoughtfully. "There's a warrior named Mira supporting her operations—perhaps he represents her true trump card. I may have been too impulsive before, but now I'm beginning to suspect this isn't as straightforward as it appears."
"Mr. Raditz, do you think she deliberately lured us here?"
"It's entirely possible, though I still can't comprehend what Towa hopes to use against us. Her attempt to corrupt Broly ended in failure. Could Mira possibly be stronger than the legendary Super Saiyan?"
Trunks felt equally bewildered. Their mission to hunt down Towa seemed to have been turned against them—it remained unclear who was truly trapped.
"What's our next move? Continue searching for her?"
"As long as the Supreme Kai of Time maintains position and uses spacetime energy to prevent her escape, she'll surface eventually. What concerns me is those androids.
Just as he pondered these implications, Raditz's thoughts were interrupted by the devastating scene stretching before them.
Mountains of debris covered the scorched earth, construction rubble blanketed the ground, and the sky hung oppressively gray. Cold wind howled through the desolation, wrapping both warriors in an atmosphere of inexplicable despair and abandonment.
"Is this supposed to be a city?" Trunks widened his eyes, inhaling the bitter air.
The sight triggered memories of his own timeline's android-dominated years. His world had been equally devastated—filled with deserted, collapsed buildings and massive bomb craters scattered everywhere. The barren landscape had been unable to support life, and even breathing carried the acrid taste of gunpowder. The sky had been as dark as black iron, suffocating in its oppression.
Now he felt that familiar sensation of being strangled, with muffled thunder rolling in his throat.
"This appears to be a world where androids have achieved complete victory. If Towa has distorted the timeline, she's likely altered the original outcome entirely."
When Towa and her allies manipulated timelines, they often changed a single crucial point, causing cascading alterations throughout the entire sequence of events and creating divergent spacetime branches.
Every city they passed, large and small, lay in ruins. Some remote mountain villages remained structurally intact, but their buildings had long since been abandoned and the countryside left barren. The entire world seemed devoid of human civilization, fallen into complete desolation and misery.
The sky remained perpetually overcast, as if undispellable clouds shrouded everything overhead—possibly the gray smoke of endless explosions that had blotted out the sun itself.
Even West City had suffered brutal destruction. Skyscrapers had toppled, vehicles lay as twisted scrap, roads were torn apart, and even Capsule Corporation had been reduced to smoldering ruins.
Trunks stopped in mid-flight, his expression changing dramatically as his breathing became labored.
"This looks exactly like my original timeline!"
"Are you certain?"
"I could never forget what Capsule Corp looked like after its destruction." Trunks confirmed with grim recognition.
"Let me investigate more thoroughly," Raditz extended his senses across the planet, and the results deepened his frown considerably. "Trunks, there should be many survivors in your timeline, correct?"
"But I can't detect a single living energy signature anywhere on this planet!" Raditz stared at Trunks with wide, alarmed eyes.
Both warriors suddenly felt ice-cold dread running down their spines, as dark wind moaned like weeping spirits and made their scalps crawl with unease.
Raditz possessed the most acute perception abilities among all fighters—no matter how weak someone's ki, it couldn't escape his mental detection. Yet this entire planet registered as lifeless?
Wait! Raditz's psychic senses swept across Earth and detected numerous moving objects approaching their position at tremendous speed. Were they living creatures? But they emitted no detectable life energy.
More androids? How could there be so many?
The nearest contacts were almost upon them, and Raditz could clearly see humanoid figures in his vision—definitely artificial beings.
The shocking realization struck him as his mental probe detected more and more moving entities, none registering any life force. These machines were distributed across the entire planet. In other words, the whole world was populated exclusively by androids.
No wonder they had encountered Numbers 30 and 51. If organized numerically, there could be countless thousands!
"Mr. Raditz, this is..." Trunks also sensed something fundamentally wrong.
In the distance, androids raced toward them in vast numbers. They varied tremendously in appearance, resembling every conceivable type of human being, and their massive scale resembled a mechanical army.
"So these are the two who eliminated Numbers 13 and the others?" their leader observed Raditz coldly.
"Those obsolete early models always boasted about their supposed superiority. About time they were scrapped."
"These are unmodified humans!" one android declared, pointing at Raditz and Trunks with obvious fascination.
More and more androids gathered, some proposing to convert Raditz and Trunks into mechanical beings, while others advocated for immediate termination.
"The Doctor has arrived!" Suddenly, the android ranks parted respectfully. They fell silent and turned their attention to the approaching figure.
Raditz recognized this man all too well—Dr. Gero, the twisted genius responsible for creating the android menace.