Sacred World of the Kais
Gohan sat cross-legged before the Elder Kai. The old god muttered a string of arcane syllables, circled him once, then settled down again, both palms raised to Gohan's chest.
"Don't feel a thing," Gohan said quietly, eyes shut, combing through his body for the smallest change.
Nothing. No tingle, no spark. He kept still anyway.
Time ticked by.
Supreme Kai Shin stood off to the side, ramrod straight, not daring to fidget. Kibito only glowered at Gohan, hatred written all over his face.
At this rate, he wouldn't live long.
"…There it is."
An hour later, Gohan's concentration snagged on something an odd current welling up from deep inside him. His raw, feral Saiyan power bucked against it; for a heartbeat the two forces snarled like beasts. Then his S-cells stirred like a natural regulator, their peculiar traits knitting the opposing streams together.
Gohan felt his body change by degrees denser weave, better spring, even his organs running cleaner and hotter. The fused energy suited him perfectly. And from the depths, potential poured out like a spring that knew no drought.
That "odd" energy was his bottomless, unfathomable potential.
Broadly speaking, Saiyans split into two lines. First: purebloods Vegeta, Goku. Second: the legend-type like Broly, who could tame the Great Ape's might in his base body. That second type was one-in-a-millennium rare; Universe 7 birthed Broly, Universe 6 would someday birth Kale though not yet.
But Gohan… Gohan was something new.
Pureblood Saiyans were brutal, violent, ruthless. Mixed with Earth's gentler stock, he'd sanded off those rough edges. He could hold a Super Saiyan's volatility in check, keep his emotions level and blade-keen. And Earthling genes raised in peace were a greenhouse for S-cells, the very stuff that made Super Saiyans possible.
Add it all up birth and chance and training and you got Gohan: a prodigy with no visible ceiling.
What the Elder Kai was doing now was drawing out all the potential Gohan's body could safely use for the moment.
Remember that: for the moment.
Potential is your reserve; drain it to the last drop and you hit your wall. You've heard the stories: a mother flips a bus off her child, only to burn out her own life. That's potential blown in a single blaze.
But the Dragon Ball world breaks rules for breakfast.
Across its history the Saiyan legend never stops legend-type, Super Saiyan, Super Saiyan God, Ancient Saiyan, Primeval Saiyan… Every titled form is monstrous, absurd, beyond limits. In detail: a Saiyan's potential his reserve accumulates. Reach today's peak, then harden your body, widen the vessel, and tomorrow it holds more ki. Even the death-and-rebirth Zenkai surges are just another way the race pries open its own lid.
Back to the mountain.
The Elder Kai flipped through a certain glossy, questionably tasteful magazine with one hand, while the other kept the rite flowing.
Gohan, unlike the impatient kid in the "original script," dug deeper into himself. The well kept surging. There was no bottom.
His small body couldn't stay small. As potential flooded out, his frame grew to meet it. In ten minutes he shot from a child's height to a teen's roughly from one-twenty to one-fifty in centimeters. His features sharpened; muscle cut fine lines under the gi; an eight-pack sat like carved stone on his abdomen.
He'd leapt clear over childhood and landed square in adolescence the spitting image of the Gohan who faced Cell.
"That's enough for now," the Elder Kai said, cutting the flow.
"Huh? Elder Kai, keep going. I can still feel it coming, more and more "
"Easy, boy. Haste makes waste; you know this. Take a look at yourself." The old man conjured a mirror out of thin air and tossed it over.
"Is that… me? I look awesome."
In the glass a sharp-featured teen stared back, arms bare under a martial robe, definition like coiled rope along every line. Even the world looked taller well, it was; he'd just gained thirty centimeters.
"Is that the point?" the Elder Kai groused.
"Ahem right. So what happened?" Gohan sobered. This was exactly the face he remembered from his teenage years. He wasn't even six yet; the big Saiyan growth spurt didn't hit until ten. How did he jump to this?
"Your child's body couldn't carry what we were waking up," the Elder Kai said. "I used a Supreme Kai's life-craft to mature your vessel to a stage that could. Your potential is deep as the sky; I can't see the bottom. But what we've pulled today is already the limit your current body can bear so I stopped."
"I see. Thank you, Elder Kai." Gohan's manners clicked in without effort; to kindness, he returned kindness.
The sudden shift from fierce to courteous left Shin blinking. Two faces in one person.
"Also, boy," the Elder Kai added, "once my heart stopped racing, it hit me you conned me a bit. Even if Beerus had paid you a visit, he wouldn't have told you where I was, much less how to free me. Where'd you really learn it?"
"I work with the Galactic Patrol. Found a record in their archives," Gohan said, offering a very serviceable cover story.
"The Galactic Patrol? Is Shiras still in charge?" the Elder Kai asked.
"Shiras? Never heard of him. Don't know the current king's name, but he looks a lot like an octopus," Gohan said after a beat.
"An octopus… likely Shiras's line," the Elder Kai mused.
"Who was Shiras?" Gohan asked.
"The Shiras clan founded the Patrol. Its zenith was under Shiras himself," the Elder Kai said. "He wielded power and talent rivaling a Super Saiyan's; a master of arms, unbeatable with his signature staff, and he possessed a host of terrifying psychic arts."
"That strong? The current Grand Galactic King doesn't look like much," Gohan said, dubious.
"Never judge by looks. What you saw was his base form. In battle he transforms four limbs unfold, and those octopus tendrils gather up on the crown, like your hair," the Elder Kai said dryly.
"So Universe 7 still hides monsters like that." Gohan's eyes kindled with battle lust.
"You know the Twelve Universes, do you? Well, if you know Beerus, I suppose that follows," the Elder Kai said. "Enough talk. Try your strength."
"Right." Gohan drew in a breath. "Haaaaaah!"
A silver-white surge blasted out of him, a pillar spearing the sky. Ki shook the Sacred World to its core. His hair shot up, one razor strand falling to his brow; his gaze went utterly calm and absolutely sure.
The Elder Kai tumbled end over end in the gale. Shin's eyes lit with something like relief.
"Thank goodness… there's hope. He can beat Majin Buu."
"He's only a mortal," Kibito hissed, jaw tight, hatred curdling his words.
He'd always lorded his status over "lesser beings." Gohan had not only shattered that pride; he'd nearly killed him. The crack in his heart had gone septic.
It had been different in the "original run" Buu's threat had crowded out petty grudges, and no one had ground Kibito's face in the dust quite like this. Not now.
"Kibito," Shin said quietly, raising a hand. "From this moment you're no longer my attendant. I'm reclaiming what I gave you."
A ripple of divine force tugged powers unspooling out of Kibito like threads.
Shin might be weak by godly standards, but he was not a fool. He'd seen that hatred burning.
"You'd cast me aside for a mortal?" Kibito snarled. "I've served you faithfully for ten million years!"
"Leave the Kai Realm. Your instantaneous movement will work once more," Shin said, voice flat.
"…Fine. I'll remember this." Kibito didn't bother with threats; stripped as he was, they'd ring hollow. With a flicker, he vanished.
Gohan kept climbing. Ki geysered out without end.
Ten billion. Twenty. Thirty. Forty. Fifty billion.
From a base of roughly one hundred million, he'd vaulted to fifty billion a five-hundred-fold leap.
For reference: Super Saiyan ×50; Full-Power Super Saiyan ×80; Super Saiyan Two ×100; FP SSJ2 ×150. Super Saiyan Three? ×400 on paper, though outside the afterlife's special rules Goku had never truly held its full draw; Gohan guessed FP SSJ3 would top out around ×450 if your body didn't break first.
But this Mystic Form this fusion of his awakened potential and tempered Saiyan ki hit ×500, with negligible drain. If he wasn't fighting, he could hold it for a very, very long time.
"Strong… too strong," Gohan breathed, half laughing at his own awe.
"That's enough! Enough!" the Elder Kai shouted over the storm.
Gohan blinked, then reeled the tide back in. The trembling world stilled.
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