In the vast expanse of the universe, countless stars scattered across the void like precious gems set against a curtain of infinite black velvet. Raditz awoke slowly on the edge of a galaxy's spiraling arm, his body drifting weightlessly through the cosmic void.
Everything was quiet. Impossibly, profoundly quiet. The space around him radiated with an ancient, timeless quality that felt fundamentally wrong somehow.
His memories gradually reassembled. At the final moment, he'd detonated his entire energy reserves in a desperate explosion, forming a three-way collision with Zamasu and Android 21. The catastrophic impact had shattered the fragments of fractured space-time that Zamasu had become, scattering all three of them to unknown destinations.
But where am I?
Raditz recalled Zamasu's final mad declaration—that he would drag Raditz to "the end of time and space." But what did that actually mean? What was the "end" of anything in an infinite cosmos?
The universe spread before him, familiar yet alien. Raditz extended his mental awareness, scanning the nearby galaxies with his godly senses. Strangely, he detected very few inhabited planets. The signatures of sentient life were sparse, weak, barely registering at all.
Am I at the edge of the universe? The thought troubled him. He expanded his search radius, casting his consciousness farther and wider.
Even after spreading his awareness across nearly a quarter of the observable universe, he found only a handful of planets supporting life and civilization. The distribution was completely inconsistent with what he knew. The universe he remembered teemed with countless species, sprawling empires, and thriving societies across every sector.
This world was not the world he knew.
"Let's investigate more closely." With that thought, Raditz vanished via Instant Transmission.
He materialized on a nearby planet, and immediately understood the problem. The world retained its primordial state—the atmosphere hadn't fully formed yet, making it unsuitable for complex life. Though Raditz had ascended to godhood and could survive in any environment, even he found the planet's nascent, unfinished state unsettling to witness.
The next planet supported humanoid life, but barely. The inhabitants had only recently discovered fire, their technology ancient and crude. They lived in primitive shelters, wore animal hides, and foraged for sustenance. Their civilization existed in its absolute infancy.
To a god who'd lived for eons, this stage of development might seem like the blink of an eye. But Raditz had walked the path from mortal to deity himself—he understood intimately just how long this period of history actually lasted. Hundreds of thousands of years, minimum.
No, I need to look further. Closer to galactic centers.
He teleported across sectors. The closer he traveled toward the universe's heart, the more developed the civilizations became. Some had achieved basic machinery and could harness light and electricity. Their inhabitants were stout and cumbersome, shaped like tree stumps with limited mobility, but they possessed remarkably flexible, innovative minds.
Other planets had developed martial traditions, complete with combat techniques and warrior cultures. Some worlds boasted average power levels exceeding one thousand—impressive for mortals, but still far below what Raditz knew from his own era.
After touring dozens of systems, although countless worlds remained unvisited, Raditz could draw a definitive conclusion: this universe existed at a drastically lower level of development than the one he knew. Civilizations lagged behind by what must be millennia. The entire cosmos possessed a primitive, unfinished quality.
The whole of space radiated a powerful ancient atmosphere, as if—
As if I've traveled backward through time itself.
The past?!
The realization struck like lightning. Raditz froze mid-flight, his mind racing. Of course. In the chaotic turbulence of that space-time vortex, swept up in Zamasu's distorted energy, there was no telling where—or when—he'd been thrown. During their violent collision, the established trajectory had been completely disrupted. Landing anywhere, at any point in history, was entirely possible.
A single destination could provide answers.
The Sacred World of the Kais!
If he could reach the Supreme Kai Realm, he'd be able to determine exactly when and where he'd landed. Raditz focused his ki, locked onto the divine signature of that sacred dimension, and executed Instant Transmission.
FLASH!
"This place... it looks exactly the same." Raditz materialized in the Supreme Kai Realm and swept his gaze across the familiar landscape. Lush green grass stretched toward the horizon, and the ancient tree—that eternal guardian—stood exactly where it always had, its branches reaching toward the star-filled sky.
It seemed that the Sacred World of the Kais existed outside conventional time. Supreme Kais rose and fell across generations, but this realm remained forever young, forever unchanged.
Beneath the canopy of infinite stars, two figures stood staring at Raditz with expressions of absolute shock, their eyes practically bulging from their sockets. One was rotund with a gentle, honest face. The other appeared elderly but radiated vigorous energy. Both wore the traditional robes of Supreme Kais, complete with Potara earrings glinting at their ears.
"You... who are you?!" The older Kai found his voice first, though it trembled with confusion. "How did you reach the Sacred World of the Kais?!"
Both deities looked utterly dumbfounded. In all their eons of existence, no one had ever simply appeared in this sanctuary without invitation.
This was sacred territory, a dimension that only Supreme Kais could access by right. Raditz's sudden arrival marked him as an intruder, a foreign element in a place that should be inviolate.
"This is... well..." Raditz scratched his head sheepishly. "It's nice to meet you both. I'm also a Supreme Kai."
He paused, trying to find the right words. "From several generations in the future, I think. The exact count is a bit unclear."
"Wait a moment." Raditz studied the portly Kai more carefully, recognition dawning. "You... you look remarkably similar to the Grand Supreme Kai from the generation before Shin." His eyes widened. "That's it—you are the Grand Supreme Kai!"
"You, you, you—what are you saying?!" Both Kais looked completely lost, their confusion mounting with every word. Future generations? Multiple Supreme Kais existing simultaneously? Raditz's explanation was making their heads spin.
Raditz struggled to find a way to prove his identity. After all, claiming to be a time traveler from thousands of years in the future would strain anyone's credulity, wouldn't it? At least he'd confirmed the era—this was the period of the previous two generations of Supreme Kais. But as for how far in the past he'd traveled... that remained frustratingly unclear.
Seeking to clarify matters, Raditz removed his Potara earrings and held them out for inspection. Then, methodically and carefully, he explained his identity, his timeline, and how he'd arrived here.
In truth, the moment Raditz produced authentic Potara earrings, both Supreme Kais had begun to believe him. But the notion that he'd traveled here from the distant future left them speechless, their minds struggling to process the impossibility.
"So... you truly are a Supreme Kai from the future?" The chubby trainee Kai's eyes practically sparkled with excitement. "And in your era, there's more than one Supreme Kai serving the universe simultaneously?"
Well, didn't YOU start that tradition? Raditz thought wryly, but kept his mouth shut.
"Ahem." The elderly Supreme Kai cleared his throat with stern authority, his expression hardening. "However, even for a Supreme Kai, traveling to the past is a severe violation of universal law. It's classified as a felony of the highest order."
"I need to know what era this is," Raditz explained patiently, "and whether the Supreme Kai of Time exists yet. In my era, I can communicate directly with Lady Chronoa through my Time Emblem. But since arriving here, that connection seems... severed."
In his own time, Raditz could reach Chronoa through the Emblem of Time, even teleporting directly to the Time Nest when necessary. But after being cast into this temporal displacement, he felt completely cut off from that sacred space. Though Supreme Kais and the Supreme Kai of Time held equivalent rank, they operated through entirely different systems. The Time Nest existed at the apex of temporal reality—reaching it required mastery over time itself, not merely space.
The old Supreme Kai shook his head disapprovingly, his gaze boring into Raditz. "You've violated the fundamental laws governing the universe and committed a grave crime. And you still expect an audience with Lady Chronoa?"
"You weren't listening," Raditz said, fighting to keep his voice level. "This wasn't intentional. Someone pulled me into a space-time vortex. I had no control over where or when I'd end up."
But the elderly Kai simply shook his head again, more firmly this time. "You have committed a felony—"
CHOP!
Raditz's hand moved faster than thought, the edge of his palm connecting with the old Kai's neck. The elderly deity's eyes rolled back, and he crumpled unconscious to the grass.
The portly trainee Supreme Kai immediately dropped into a defensive stance, his hands raised warily. "W-what do you think you're doing?!"
"He was being insufferably verbose and wouldn't let me finish explaining." Raditz took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. "My apologies. I sometimes have... limited patience."
To his surprise, the chubby trainee actually laughed—a warm, genuine sound. "Honestly? I feel that way about him sometimes too. Haha!"
Raditz froze, staring at the jovial young Kai in disbelief.
These two really are a perfect master-apprentice pair, he thought, torn between amusement and exasperation.
The Future Grand Supreme Kai's friendly smile never wavered, even as his mentor lay unconscious at their feet. In that moment, Raditz glimpsed the kind, gentle soul who would one day sacrifice everything to protect the universe from Majin Buu—and whose essence would remain dormant within that pink demon for millennia.
Some things, it seemed, transcended time itself.