Chapter 24: The Unwelcome Sage
The wind on the high peak was a constant, keening lament, scouring the black rock and whipping around Kakarot's solitary form. He stood like a statue carved from the mountain itself, his eyes fixed on the horizon where the planet's sun was bleeding out in a final, violent display of orange and purple. The silence was a physical weight, broken only by the wind and the low, almost sub-audible hum of his own power, a new and constant sensation thrumming just beneath his skin.
He did not hear the approach. There was no sound of footsteps on stone, no rustle of cloth. One moment he was alone, and the next, he was aware of a presence beside him, a calm, green pool of energy disrupting the chaotic flow of the wind.
Kakarot did not turn his head. His lip curled into a silent snarl. "I didn't invite an audience, slug."
Moori, the Namekian, stood a respectful distance away, his robes barely stirring in the gale that tore at Kakarot's remaining armor scraps. His large, dark eyes were not on the sunset, but on the Saiyan's profile.
"The mind is a curious thing," Moori began, his voice a calm, deep counterpoint to the wind's shriek. "Especially one that has endured such profound trauma. It can become like a sky after a storm, clear in places, yet hazy and fragmented in others. Tell me, Saiyan, do you remember the crash? The moments before your… long sleep?"
Kakarot let out a derisive, harsh laugh. "What is this? A therapy session for the damned? I remember everything. The metal melting. The fluid boiling. The taste of my own cooked flesh. I remember your little friends dragging my body into their hole. I remember it all with perfect, painful clarity. Is that what you wanted to hear? Does it excite you?"
His words were meant to be weapons, to disgust and drive the creature away. Moori simply absorbed them, his expression one of quiet, unshakeable observation.
"I ask not to provoke, but to understand," Moori replied. "The body can be healed. The spirit… that is a more complex injury. There is a turmoil within you. A conflict that has nothing to do with your physical power. It screams into the void around you. I can feel it."
"You feel nothing," Kakarot spat, finally turning his head to glare at the Namekian. The setting sun cast his face in deep shadow, making his eyes seem to glow with their own inner fire. "You're projecting. You see a monster and you want to believe there's something more because the alternative, that the universe simply creates things like me for no other reason than to break things like you, is too terrifying for your peaceful little mind to comprehend."
"Is that what you believe?" Moori asked, his head tilting slightly. "That you are a random act of cosmic violence? Without purpose beyond destruction?"
"Purpose is a luxury for philosophers and weaklings," Kakarot sneered, turning back to the view. "Strength is its own purpose. I am strong. Therefore, I am. That is the beginning and the end of it."
"And yet, you are here," Moori stated softly. "Alone on a dead world. Your strength has won you… what, exactly? A kingdom of ashes and a handful of terrified subjects who fear you more than they fear the slow death of starvation. A curious victory."
Kakarot's hands clenched into fists at his sides. The air around them crackled faintly. "Watch your tongue, alien. My patience is thinner than the atmosphere up here."
"You radiate anger," Moori continued, undeterred. "But it is a directionless anger. It is at your Prince, yes. At the Emperor. But it is also at yourself. For failing. For being weak. For surviving when you believe you should have died with honor. You are angry at the very cells in your body for healing because they denied you a clean end. This is the haze I speak of. You are at war with everyone, including yourself."
"I don't need your psychoanalysis," Kakarot growled, the words grinding out between clenched teeth. The Namekian's words were striking chords he didn't want to acknowledge, poking at wounds that had nothing to do with bones and muscle.
"What will you do now?" Moori asked, changing tack. The question was simple, yet immense.
"That," Kakarot said, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous rumble, "is none of your concern. My business is my own. You would be wise to remember your place. You are a temporary visitor in this world. A curious specimen. Nothing more."
"A world you massacred," Moori pointed out, not with accusation, but with the flat tone of a historian stating a fact. "Its people are your business. Their survival is now intertwined with your… business."
"Their survival is a byproduct of my whim," Kakarot corrected him, a note of cold arrogance returning to his voice. "They exist because I allow it. They will provide me with sustenance. They will stay out of my way. That is the extent of our relationship. They are livestock. Useful, for now."
"And when the new colonists arrive? The buyers Lord Frieza has found for his… cleansed property?" Moori pressed. "Will your business include them? Or will you hide in your caves while another wave of strangers lays claim to the graves of the people you have designated as your livestock?"
Kakarot fell silent. The wind howled, filling the void left by his lack of an answer. Moori had expertly pinned him down. His grand declaration of ownership was meaningless if he couldn't enforce it against the wider galaxy. To be a king meant defending his territory.
"My business," Kakarot repeated, but the words lacked their previous conviction. They were a shield against a truth he was still processing.
Moori sensed the shift. He took a half-step closer. "The turmoil I feel… it is not just anger. There is something else. A question you will not allow yourself to fully form. It is the question of 'what if?'."
"What if what?" Kakarot snapped, exasperated.
"What if strength was not only for domination?" Moori said, his voice barely louder than the wind. "What if it could be used to build? To protect? You have seen the other side of that coin. You have been the one dominated. You have been broken and discarded. You know the taste of that particular ashes. The question in your mind, the one you refuse to voice, is whether you wish to be the one holding the hammer forever, knowing its ultimate cost, or if you might… choose a different tool."
Kakarot stared at him, a look of utter, bewildered contempt on his face. It was the most ridiculous, naive, pathetic thing he had ever heard. It was a philosophy of such profound weakness it made him feel physically ill.
And yet.
A memory, unbidden and unwelcome: the feeling of Vegeta's boot on his chest, the utter contempt in the Prince's eyes. The cold dismissal of the Ginyu Force. The absolute indifference of Frieza's empire.
He had been the nail. The thought of being the hammer suddenly felt… empty. Predictable.
He violently shoved the thought away, burying it under a fresh wave of fury. "You talk too much," he snarled, turning his back on the Namekian. "Your words are meaningless. Your philosophy is a disease of the weak. Get off my mountain before I decide to use you for target practice."
Moori did not react to the threat. He simply bowed his head slightly. "The offer to listen remains, Saiyan. For when the storm in your mind becomes too loud to ignore."
With that, the Namekian turned and walked calmly to the edge of the cliff. Instead of climbing down, he simply stepped off, plummeting silently into the misty abyss below.
Kakarot stood alone once more, but the silence was different now. It was filled with the echo of the Namekian's infuriating, probing questions. *Turmoil. Haze. What if?*
He roared in frustration, a raw, primal sound that was torn away by the wind. He unleashed a wild, unfocused ki blast from his palm, which screamed into the sky and exploded harmlessly high above him.
The questions were a virus. He couldn't answer them. He could only try to drown them out with noise and power. But he knew, with a cold certainty, that the green-skinned philosopher had seen something true within him, a conflict he himself had refused to name. And that was perhaps the greatest insult he had ever endured.
[A/N: Can't wait to see what happens next? Get exclusive early access on patreon.com/saiyanprincenovels. If you enjoyed this chapter and want to see more, don't forget to drop a power stone! Your support helps this story reach more readers!]