Ch 16 whoa no title art we are getting right to it (Future Trunks' Past) What are we getting right to? Trunks being cool, of course! whaohaoahoh never expected to see trunks in a shin-type outfit!! PLEASE HAVE EARRINGS (spoiler: he doesn't have earrings :/ ) Shin applauds his sword skills. Why are they always teaching them sword skills? Like, with Trunks it makes slightly more sense because he apparently already had some, but we had never ever seen Gohan seriously wield any non-fist or -foot weapon. (I honestly don't remember ever even seeing him interact with one). Oh wait, the Z Sword was a thing, wasn't it? Everyone thought it was going to be the Sword To Save The Day. And I guess in a roundabout way, it did. Sort of. Shin is training Trunks to prepare him for the fight against Bobbidi. Kibito seems a lot more chill in this timeline about a non-god wielding the legendary Z Sword. I wonder what the timeline is actually like? I took the newspaper to be an indication that this is very shortly after the defeat of all the androids, but now I'm wondering if maybe the timeline is a closer mirror to the one we're more familiar with -- i.e., Bobbidi and Boo and such became a threat at about the same point after the end of Cell/android defeat in both timelines. In which case, Trunks would be quite a bit older, which he doesn't really look, but then again those damn saiyans are just kind of Like That. Trunks is getting near the end of his training, and Shin wants to speed things along. shin no (i was going to say "haven't you learned anything??" but... of course he hasn't.... this is Different Timeline Shin... apparently even without goku around to suggest this nonsense shin is still all about the "will Z Sword cut [x] thing???"-type content. shin starts a youtube channel featuring trunks trying to slice various materials with the z sword, gets 37 devoted followers but it never quite takes off like shin had hoped) TRUNKS NO But before we get the inevitable shattering of the sword, Kibito tells them that Bobbidi's made his move, so it's time for them to get going. The block of whatever-steel is left behind as they take off, Trunks bringing up the rear and asking for his regular clothes back. Oh well. They did suit Gohan a lot better than Trunks (maybe it's the hair), so I'm not as despondent as I might otherwise be, although I do love a good alternate outfit. Here's where we get the title splash and the actual chapter title and provides a convenient interlude for some tonal shifts, because the next thing we see is Shin and Kibito looking pretty beat up and Bobbidi cackling gleefully at his presumed triumph. Trunks is fighting Dabra so it's some good sword v. sword action until Dabra uses his spit attack to turn the Z Sword to stone. (Is... the sword Trunks' been using recently the Z Sword?) Shin manages to warn him in time and Trunks ditches the sword, which falls and breaks... and immolates itself? Not quite sure what happens but it is 100% gone and Kibito is very distraught. Shin is also distraught, but not because of the sword; he's worried about the whole Boo thing and declares that he won't allow it, even if it costs him his life. Oof. shin bby you are tiny and generally useless but despite beerus' claims to the contrary, i don't think you're a coward and that makes me kind of unbearably sad because... i don't even know. usually it's vegeta that triggers the "how dare make feel" reaction, but right now it's shin. i think the moral of this story is that if i draw a character i become unreasonably attached to them and shin was the last person i drew Bobbidi is even more tiny and useless than Shin, and, confronted with the Shin-missile speeding directly towards him, he shrilly orders Dabra to save him. Dabra deflects Shin with a fiery blast a bare second before he barrels directly into Bobbidi. a) sHIN BBY b) ... at least be CONSISTENT if you're gonna translate kaioushin as "lord of lords" or leave it in its original state. not that i dislike seeing it, lord of lords is really clunky in my estimation. "supreme kai" was a pretty fucking good choice now that i think about it. matches well with "king kai" and has a nice grand feeling to it. c) this was a bad chapter to get unreasonably attached to shin :( Kibito jumps in to defend Shin and gets... well, kind of disintegrated. Rather similar to his other demise at the hands of Dabra. Wonder if there's some sort of resonance between timelines, especially ones that are still pretty "close". (I don't even know if that's a reasonable way to talk about these things.) With Shin stunned and Kibito very certainly out of the picture, Bobbidi is extremely assured of his victory and decides the best thing to do is step on Shin's face for a while before levitating him and trying to choke the life out of him with his magic. Finally, finally, Trunks steps in to try to do something about this. i'm into trunks' motivations most of the time. A Good Boy Young Man Trunks punches the shit out of Dabra and then kicks him straight into Bobbidi. Dabra summons or makes a spear from nothing , but finds he can't throw it; Shin's recovered from the fireball and the choking and is stopping his movements. Trunks does that thing with his hands that he does (maybe I'll find a video) and completely obliterates not only Dabra, but also Bobbidi with a single blast. It's powerful enough he's managed to de-transform himself. LIKE I SAID A BAD TIME TO BECOME VERY FOND OF SHIN So that's how Alt Timeline Bobbidi and Dabra got dealt with, and also how Alt Timeline Shin (and so, too, Alt Timeline Beerus) perished. Great! No Boo! All right! Everything is cool now, yeah? N O P E so uhhhh... Goku Black (it's funny how the very many bugfuck wild names I've had to use in very serious contexts throughout this haven't made me feel as weird as that one) was/is... looking for a world (which I think he's using in the kind of same way I've been using "timeline") in which he won't have certain kinds of opposition? And also this kind of implies that Beerus is, like, especially annoying, even among his destruction god peers, which kind of endears him to me even more. Man, what is up with this dude though. Hanging out, apparently able to travel between worlds/timelines ("To think there is a world..."), looking like Goku, wearing a single Potara and having some terrible fashion sense and a really punchable expression. Trunks recounts all of this (probably without the bit with GBlack at the end) and Beerus and Whis come to the conclusion that this dude must be a god of some sort, because a) the whole kaioushin-hakaishin connection isn't widely known and b) he seems to be able to move across parallel timelines. Beerus laughs at that and calls it "impossible", then asks Trunks if he's sure that there's no God of Destruction in his world. Trunks is like "I have no goddamn clue, sorry" and Goku takes the chance to introduce them all formally and tells Trunks that both Beerus and Whis are stronger than "the two of us", and I don't know if he's referring to himself and Trunks or to himself and Vegeta. Very ambiguous! ahhh. there's that vegeta/saiyan influence. can't completely get away from it Bulma sends Future!Trunks off to get changed, but he makes a detour to talk to his younger self, which is cute, but then there's a Real Off-putting interaction with kid!Mai. I'm off-put, I'm sure you'd be off-put if I put caps in, but for sure Young!Trunks is especially off-put. And maybe a bit envious. Sigh. Not here for a puppy love plot, especially with strangely de-aged (???!??) Mai and Future!Trunks. Oh well, on I soldier. Future!Trunks leaves to get changed and is sad because at last glance, it really seemed like Future!Mai probably didn't make it out alive. Mai is all dazed because "he's [Trunks] such a looker!", which sends Young!Trunks into a spiral of despair. (bulma had just said that mai sounds like an old lady) i just like how people are all doing their own thing. trunks is having a crisis. beerus and whis are having tea. bulma's mostly interested in teasing a kid. goku's eating, which is fairly typical, and vegeta looks like he might want to do some punching, which is also fairly typical. vegeta how can you just wear that thing around like it's NBD Meanwhile, In The Future (in a different timeline), GBlack is wondering what happened to Trunks. This seems like the perfect opportunity to do whatever it is that he wants to do, because "the other" (!) kaioushin from other universes have been killed, and with them their corresponding hakaishin. There's not even a stray saiyan left to do something annoying, but even so, GBlack decides that he should wait and see what happens before he launches into whatever he's planning on. He takes off without causing any more damage. Inside the damaged but not completely destroyed Capsule Corp building, a cat (!!!!) finds Mai's body.
KITTY ARE YOU A DESCENDANT OF SHOULDER CAT??? Or maybe the same kitty, although that would be a pretty old cat! esp. considering shoulder cat seems to not have changed since, like, before Namek. in the present: kitty smells a good smell and goes to investigate (bulma's dad gives kitty a treat) Even while eating, everyone's still talking business. Beerus has a hypothesis: maybe this mysterious guy isn't limited to Future!Trunks' timeline. Whis suggests talking to "the" kaioushin (which I'm guessing is Shin, but who the fuck knows, it's not like they ever differentiate them for my benefit despite the fact that there must be at least one per universe, which means at least 12) about whether he knows about any gods that might possibly turn evil. Presumably they do this, but the next shot we get is of a very Kibito-looking dude (maybe it is Kibito??? WHO KNOWS!!) fighting with what looks like an extremely bishounen version of Shin: taller, less goofy, sharper nose, less eyeliner, etc. The fight goes on for like four pages and goes back and forth, but eventually the Shin-looking prettyboy gets the upper hand. He raises his arm and brings his hand down, flat and stiff, as though to break Kibito's back. (Shin is in a panel on this page so I'm pretty confident in saying that this is Kibito.) Some other older kaioushin (mohawk!!) tells him to stop, and the younger one does, just before making contact. Apparently Shin brought Kibito here in order for him to spar with this other one. alright cool got a name for the bishounen: zamas (THIS MAKES 0.000 SENSE TO ME I THOUGHT KAIOUSHIN WERE MADE FROM SPECIAL FRUIT???) Shin is pretty impressed with his fighting skills, but U10 kaioushin doesn't seem too happy about his personality: it's "too serious". Zamas compliments literally everyone from U7 and they talk a bit about Shin and Kibito's involvement in dealing with Boo "a few years ago", which I guess helps cement the timeframe we're working with. Shin demurs and says that they didn't do it on their own; they had help from Son Goku and his friends (lol), and would have been destroyed without them. lookit them dead eyes. zamas creeping me the fuck out Kibito tells him it's not only possible, it's the reality of the situation. Shin says that at least none of them are stronger than U7's God of Destruction (yeah you support your weird mirror-version!), and that it's probably for the best that Beerus has kind of taken over all of that kind of stuff. COOL ALRIGHT OKAY THAT'S NOT THE HUGEST FUCKING BRIGHT RED FLAG Shin and Kibito peace the fuck out after this, and U10 kaoushin tells Zamas they need to "polish up what's inside of [him]". Zamas is like "????", which just goes to show that he's super super not qualified to be a kaioushin: he has no idea that statements like "every unnecessary being should be eliminated" are not cool! U10 kaioushin takes him to a kind of observatory, where they see some dino-creatures whacking each other with clubs. Zamas is horrified and thinks that they should all die; U10 kaioushin tells him that's something to leave to the gods of destruction. He suggests they observe them for 1000 years or so to see if they get better. Zamas is unsatisfied with this plan of action, and finally the U10 kaioushin decides to take him to 1000 years in the future and show him what's happened. He brings out a box with several rings in it and Zamas exclaims, "Isn't that the ring of time?!", which is a magical artifact that allows free movement through time. Hmmmm. Suspicious. But at least at the moment, the ring is going to be used to convince Zamas not to jump to such immediate (and destructive) conclusions.
Ch 17 there was a half-finished post here, but it's gone now >:[ (Zamas: The Next Lord of Lords from Universe 10) Hey. Hey manga. Heyyyy. Hey manga! Why do you keep doing this to me? I think I kind of have something resembling a grasp on how the world works, and then you do something like this. I think maybe I kind of get how gods work, but nope! Nope! We were told in the last chapter that he was just a kaiou-type deity, but now he's gonna be a kaioushin. I'm going to tear my hair out, I stg. Also I'm especially upset because my draft didn't get saved. Bye previous reactions to Ch. 17! I'm sure I had some great insights and very moving commentary on shit like this dino-alien dragging his dinner home by the tail. he's from planet Babari and he has a massive fish and a terrible case of edema in his ankles. i'm going to call him forb. forb needs medical attention Forb is on his way home from fishing. He caught a fish! He caught a huge fish. He's making his way along a roughly-carved mountain path. Rockslides are definitely a danger in this part of the world. Forb doesn't care, though. He's looking forward to caviar and fish fillets. He may even be humming a little song in his head. That's all about to end, though, because Forb is ambushed by two others presumably of his species: a stocky one and a wiry one, both wielding rough clubs that look like they may have been made from trees. They have a single goal: Steal. Forb's. Fish. Forb goes on the offensive to defend his fish. He charges on all fours and the stocky dino readies his club as though it's a baseball bat. With a single swing, the stocky opponent scores a savage hit right in the side of Forb's head. Forb hits the cliffside and slumps unmoving at its base, while the wiry adversary stomps at him. The stocky one goes to grab his prize, when the largest and most fully-clothed dino-alien makes an appearance and kicking a boulder down the cliff. Both stocky and wiry foes are crushed and the newcomer starts eating the fish spine-first right there in front of god and everybody. Forb's tale truly is one of heartache and loss and the cruel vagaries of life. It's a moving epic that shows just when you think you've got the best of the world ((fish)), everything can be taken from you in the blink of an eye. Zamas is not impressed. In fact, he's pretty disgusted by the whole thing and calls the "Babari mortals" (couldn't just call them babarians huh) savages. The U10 kaioushin takes a more moderate stance: they may be very different in a thousand or so years. Why don't the go see? They can use the Ring of Time (my capitals because the font is all caps, but I think I'm making a pretty safe bet) to take a leisurely cruise to 1000 years post today and see how they've changed in the meantime. Zamas seems interested in the Ring, and that makes sense because he's never seen one/it before. It's got incredible powers, but also some strict limitations. You can travel between the future and the now, but not go back in time (absolutely verboten). In the box that the Ring of Time lives in, there are four other rings that are the... result? of people messing about and changing the flow of history through time travel. The U10 kaioushin is surprised to see that there are four of them, because last time he checked there were only three. Whoops! Someone hasn't been keeping a very close eye on what's going on vis a vis people creating new parallel universes. Which are... separate from the 12 universe setup we've been introduced to? Maybe it's like U1A and U1B or something like that. Anyway. U10 kaioushin gives Zamas just so much information about what's up with these fancy rings. (First earrings, now rings, next it'll be bracelets.) Speaking of, U10 kaioushin pops off one of his earrings and passes it over to Zamas. who makes these earrings and what are they made out of? Apparently the earring lets U10 kaioushin temporarily grant Zamas kaioushin-type powers. With that they can go see what the Babari mortals are up to 10^3 years from now. FISTBUNP In the future their are houses! U10 kaioushin is excited about this and hops down to look at them more closely. Zamas is more reserved. While U10 kaioushin pokes around other people's belongings and wonders what they are, he follows the sound of something and gets a shock. oh... finally a relatable zamas U10 kaoushin hustles over to check it out when Zamas calls for him. Predictably, there's a whole group of dino-aliens beating the shit out of each other in much the same way as the four from earlier. Of course this confirms all of Zamas' worst fears/biases: most mortals are ugly (rude!) and terrible and have no place in the universe. U10 kaioushin notices something while Zamas is busy declaiming that These Mortals Shouldn't Exist: something's happening down below that makes the dino-aliens stop fighting. However, Zamas never gets a chance to be shown that things aren't completely terrible, because an alien attempts to clobber them from behind. Big mistake for the alien because Zamas is some fucking hot shit at the fighting arts. U10 kaioushin tells him they need to get the heck out, but Zamas and the alien are having a moment with each other. as you can see. <3< Zamas readies his energy-katar as the beast charges him. Despite U10 kaioushin ordering him not to, he slices the alien neatly in two, right down the line of bilateral symmetry. Zamas is super pleased with himself for his feat of strength, being a god in his prime and killing a single alien, but U10 kaioushin is pretty upset. Zamas is like "What??? What'd I do??" U10 kaioushin tells him the could have just left. No need to kill the poor thing. Zamas bitches about how they were just ruining the planet's environment, so maybe he needs a new term to describe what he hates, because the planet's environment contains a bunch of mortals. Like plants, which absolutely count as "mortal beings", but that Zamas doesn't seem to hate. Maybe "sentient mortals"? U10 kaioushin counters with his own philosophy, which is that there's no such thing as a worthless being, then asks why Zamas hates mortals so much. Zamas doesn't really give much in the way of clarification, just repeats that sentient mortals do nothing but destroy the environment. U10 kaioushin tells him that they're not there to do things like "crush evil" or whatever. They're there to watch over and to (maybe?) guide people to a better way if they're going around disturbing universal peace. To do otherwise is the work of the hakaishin. A kaioushin isn't defined by battle prowess, but a "calm mind" and a "gentle spirit". Well, Shin might have one of those. Zamas is pretty downcast because what the fuck was he doing becoming so swole and mighty if it's not even important for a kaioushin? U10 kaioushin tells him to view it as an effort to "balance his heart" and then asks for tea because time travel is thirsty business. ABRUPT SCENE CHANGE: IT'S TIME! FOR DB KART 64!!! awww hell yeah I do not know if this is supposed to be reality or a representation of playing a kart game without just showing people sitting around an entertainment system. Hmm. I'm split 50/50 on this. Not sure which I believe it's gonna turn out to be. Vegeta sucks and takes a turn too fast because of course he does. Goku gives him some friendly advice about braking on the turns, but I'm sure it falls on deaf ears. Young!Trunks is in the lead with a very competitive Beerus not far behind. Seeing an opportunity when Y!Trunks gets distracted, he zips ahead, but YKNOW THIS DOESN'T NECESSARILY CLARIFY WHETHER OR NOT THIS IS A GAME BECAUSE I FEEL LIKE THIS IS A THING THAT COULD DEFINITELY EXIST IN DBWORLD Beerus gets totally shelled and spins out. can't hate it, seems like the easiest path to take if you're a little kid and future you shows up and I guess technically this isn't quite future this trunks anymore huh? GAME! there's not much i don't like about this
It's bedtime, but first some very important bickering about who's going to go and face down G!Black. Of course Vegeta is being stupidly combative for no good reason, but when F!Trunks says he's going to come along, Vegeta sort of mellows out a little bit and says that he'll train him. F!Trunks is very :D! at that. Meanwhile, Zamas is on his crystal ball-manual typewriter hybrid computer (!!!!) and watching Goku fight Hit. (Who was recording it? Was it televised? Was Champa making money off of it? I wouldn't be surprised, but also, what use could a god of destruction have with money???) anyway look at this shit I REFUSE I WON'T I CAN'T WITH THIS (so I'm guessing in the original it was something having to do with nico nico douga and not youtube)/alt comment: "netflix" Of course Zamas is all salty about how mere mortals are almost as strong as a god of destruction, wah wah wah. U10 kaioushin totally just blithely prattles on and gives Zamas info on a) Goku and b) the dragon balls, which seems like a bad idea. totally not the face of anyone who might be getting some ideas Next morning on Earth, Vegeta's busy training with Trunks, Goku is pulling a total Piccolo and doing the floating-meditating thing, and Beerus wants beer. my shitpost doodle may come true (please come true) Shin shows up because Beerus' called him over to talk to him about something important, i.e. any gods he knows who might have a "dangerous ideology". You know, like someone who hates mortals, or maybe despises mortals, or loathes them, or....? Shin has a bit of a think and comes up with someone, but can apparently only remember his outfit? Which is a fat lot of help because all those fucking kaioushin wear basically the same thing. JESUS SHIN Well, he at least has something approaching a reason for saying it: Kibito hasn't been particularly hospitable to mortals. Beerus latches on to this idea in about .2 seconds, but Goku says that it's a bit of a logical leap, and besides, he and Kibito don't look alike. They're about to go off and question Kibito anyway, but Whis gets a call on his staff from the "High Priest". well it almost came true Apparently Zenou-sama wants to talk to Goku. oh no shin There's a kerfuffle because it would take Whis at least two days to transport Goku to where Zenou is, but Shin douses the potential flames by offering to take Goku there teleportation-ways. Beerus admonishes Goku to be good, please, for god's sake, just be good. And also not to tell them about G!Black. Finally, he's got something to say to Shin. i mean one would think it would go without saying given that their existences rely on each other's Teleport! And then they're at what's apparently Zenou's palace, which is shaped like the kanji for "everything", if I'm remembering rightly. There's a Whis-looking kid there waiting for them. I guess he's the Grand Priest? Goku immediately makes Beerus' fear come true by not being polite to him. Well. Not a surprise.
LIKE SEVERAL WEEKS BEFORE I READ THAT CHAPTER I DOODLED A BEDRAGGLED SHIN WHICH I NEVER POSTED AND MIGHT HAVE RECYCLED??? I just remembered that and wondered if mayhaps I am psychic
Ch 18 Oh wow I am getting real tired of my half-done posts disappearing! (Goku Black's True Identity) So. Zenou's place. Large. In space? Has that kanji motif going on, the one that means "everything" if I'm reading it right. Now I have to check if I am or not. 全 - yep, that's it, that's the one. Thanks Dragon Ball for giving me an opportunity to practice my kanji reading. Shin apologizes for Goku's attire, but the Grand Priest says it's okay... because it's probably the nicest that Goku owns, right? (WRONG I have reason to believe that he owns at least a single suit.) Goku goes right along with that assumption, and I can't fault him for that. I guess Shin and Whis are acceptable as-is, which implies that... either they're always in their best clothes, which seems terrible to me, or that gods/godly attendants get a pass. Or maybe they're just nice enough as-is and only mortals are expected to get fancied up. Enough about clothes, it's time to go see Zenou (I assume, now I can't remember if that was stated or not). This involves going through an apparently vast and rather empty room, except for two parallel lines of floating columns. They're arranged as if flanking a road or walkway. I guess if you're a god of everything you can afford to have a room that is huge and empty and lit eerily from below with two rows of floating columns for people to walk down, rather than, you know, a simple hallway. There's not much to do but think about the Grand Priest, who looks like a small Whis/Vados-type being, although this time his ring is in more of a traditional halo place. What are those anyway. Are they.... decorations? Accessories? If they sleep (which is a question in and of itself), do they take it off beforehand or have to awkwardly figure out a way to lie where the rings aren't, like, digging in anywhere? They seem impractical! I can't remember where Vados' was, but Whis' seems very annoying and I'm sure if I had one I'd get stuff on it all the time. Goku's been having different thoughts about him: he seems strong, way more so than he looks! (Small and childlike.) Whis confirms: the Grand Priest may be the "mightiest" being in the universe. i'm begging you here, please make the slightest effort to not. learn to live with curiosity Whis, instead of doing something to dissuade Goku, just tells him that not even he (Whis) stands a chance against him, which of course is guaranteed to basically just make Goku that much more gung-ho about doing something dumb. He takes a moment to be excited about Strong People Existing, and then realizes that hey, if this Grand Priest is so strong, then maybe asking him for help with G!Black would be a good idea. Seems like there's a lot of issues with this (like the whole time-travel BAD thing), but Whis has an explanation that nips all thought of the Grand Priest helping in the bud. YOOOOOO SO MY HALO COMPARISON EARLIER WAS MORE ACCURATE THAN I KNEW!!! i feel like i should have suspected this but it honestly took me by surprise. a whole new mysterious class of being for me to wonder about. I guess it would make sense for those rather, uh, impetuous gods of destruction to need someone to watch over them and make sure they don't get completely out of order and destroy recklessly or needlessly, and who better than an angel? And then Whis goes on to say that if Zenou knew about the shit that's been going down, he'd destroy their universe and everyone in it. Not the best outcome, so Goku agrees to keep it under wraps. Zenou is super into seeing Goku again. oh boy. putting goku aside for a moment, though, it's interesting how differently shin and whis are in their bowing. just based on posture, shin seems to be more subservient, even though just based on, like, position in the pantheon*, i'd generally rank shin higher than whis. maybe there's something going on with the neutrality thing? shin as a kaioushin may need to show more respect because he's more... directly under zenou's rule? not sure if it even means anything or not but if it does, i'd like to know Zenou called Goku all the way here because he wants to make friends with him. Goku's like "...Okay?" but doesn't quite know what that entails. Apparently, Zenou wants to play, and when Goku asks if that's the whole reason that he got called out here, Zenou wonders if that's bad. I feel bad for them, being subject to the whims and fancies of an apparently unreasonable and omnipotent being. At least with Beerus, it seems like there's a possibility for talking and understanding and such, but here's it just... everyone gives the impression that Zenou has to be completely appeased in every way or Else. It just makes me kind of hate him and not in a fun way. I guess maybe in some ways it's a good representation of the world, because there are things you can't reason with or make understand or have any affect on BE NICE TO MY OTHER SON (?) Shin shuts up. There's a slight diversion to discuss names when Goku tells Zenou that just "Goku" is fine, no need for the full name, and Zenou requests a nickname. Of course, the nickname decided on is "Zen-chan". The two pointy-headed guards with the high collars get kind of twitchy at this and so does Shin. my poor boy.... i probably should not adopt another deity son but he gives off those STRONG "baby. baby boy" vibes. DO NOT WORRY OMNIPOTENT (?) BEING FOR I, SARO, HAVE NOW DECIDED THAT I AM YOUR PARENT AND WILL KEEP YOU FROM HARM The guards with the funnel hats get real bent out of shape when Goku tries to reschedule the playdate for another time, because he's kind of really busy right now. There's a lot going on. He'll definitely come back when stuff is dealt with, so, uh, can Zenou just wait until then? One of the guards gets snappy and Zenou threatens him with annihilation, so he backs the fuck off. Goku promises not only to return once business is done, but also to bring someone who Zenou'll get along with even better. I'm not sure if there's actually a plan there or if Goku's just saying stuff to get back to the matter at hand. Zenou gives him what basically amounts to one of those Staples "Easy" buttons, except it immediately summons Zenou instead of saying "That wasy easy!" or whatever. Goku grabs Shin who has not managed to regain consciousness and they take off, back through the hall with nothing but floating columns. I guess Shin must wake up at some point, because he's their transport, but it's not really made clear. Scene change to a rather peaceful one with the U10 kaioushin who's doing some calligraphy, or maybe just some writing, but in any case, he wants tea as he finishes up. Unfortunately, there's no Zamas to be found anywhere, and so no tea for U10. Zamas is, in fact, visiting Zunou (not to be confused with Zenou) -- the kiss-demanding knower of everything. And he seems to have been asking about dragon balls, everyone's favorite topic for asking questions. Zunou tries to cut him off after whatever number of questions he was granted, but Zamas bullies him with his status and gets answers to a lot more questions, such as "How long would it take me to gather these dragon balls?" and "Where, exactly, are they?" Meanwhile, Beerus is impatient. and just hanging out possibly in space or maybe just in the very furthest reaches of the atmosphere (obligatory "aww, were you worried?") Goku, Whis, and Shin pop out of nothing nearby (was Shin homing in on Beerus or what? Because it doesn't make much sense otherwise) and they all descend back to more reasonable places of habitation (e.g., the planet's surface). Goku tries to get Beerus to agree to going along with him to hang out with Zenou next time, and decides to worry about it later when Beerus refuses flat-out. (Guess it was just a bluff.) Then it's right back to more G!Black investigations. Shin feels a bit in the dark about all of this and asks Goku for the details. okay it's real hard to see but... shin freaking out good Anyway, I guess Bulma's been looking for them (don't know if there's a specific fraction of them or not) because they've got company. It's Kibito and the elder kaioushin! Looks like Trunks and Vegeta have been keeping them company, which is kind of an interesting scene to picture. Kibito's got something important to tell Shin, but of course, Beerus immediately goes on the attack based on what Shin said earlier (with very little understanding of the situation or the reasons for asking). not much to say here but i just like this stupid misunderstanding and shin being all "hey hey hey let's all just calm down for a hot second" Basically: after being bullied, Zunou contacted, I guess, something akin to the Kaioushin Complaint Desk about the person who came in asking so many questions about the super dragon balls (and also being a huge dick about the whole thing). Of course, Shin recognizes the name (Kibito should too, but doesn't seem to). There's more discussion of GodTube (the video of the tournament was illegally (!!!!!) uploaded there) and finally Kibito reveals that in particular, a certain question was pretty worrying: if it would be possible for a god to swtich bodies with a human. HMM. HMMMM! HMM. poor shin hasn't had a very good day today
Basically: it seems pretty obvious at this point that something happened and this Zamas managed to take over Goku's body in the other timeline, through a combination of wish orb magic and fancy Time Rings. Trunks confirms that he's got a Potara earring, and that it's apparently of a color that only kaioushin can wear. (Brings up some questions about the elder kaioushin's earrings and the whole fusion thing, but let's just set it aside for right now.) Whis is worried about the safety of the U10 kaioushin. Zamas is not a full 100% legitimate kaioushin yet, and so he'd need access to the current one's earrings and rings to do the stuff he needs to do (travel to another timeline, presumably, and to the past). So there's stuff to be done. could maybe people not abuse my other son for two minutes? Beerus is all ready to go off to U10 and do some damage control right this very second, and completely steamrolls over Shin's objections (which are along the lines of "hey that might create yet another timeline, aren't we trying to avoid that?") Goku wants to go, but that gets shut down pretty quickly. Shin offers to do his teleportation trick and get Beerus there quickly, but Beerus has other plans for him. Whis takes him instead, leaving both Goku and Shin behind. oh vegeta. (maybe he's not a fan of your incredible hair) The time machine's ready to go, so the three saiyans make their preparations for going into the future. Whis and Beerus get to the U10 kaioushin's place, make small talk, and decide to wait for Zamas to make his appearance. Going future-wards: a success! Except that Goku gets "sea"sick. Vegeta takes off without waiting for Goku to recover a bit (Trunks, being a nice young man, stops and helps him out). Luckily, this doesn't take very long, because G!Black, who's hanging out in quite a nice alpine cabin and having some sort of hot drink, realizes that there are some new and strong ki signatures about in short order. The black cat shows up again while they're trying to find a place to ditch the time machine where it hopefully won't get destroyed and leads Trunks into the ruined Capsule Corp building, where Mai is still alive. (Q: Apparently it's long enough after Trunks left for G!Black to wander off and make coffee or tea or whatever, but not long enough for Mai to have expired, so what was the elapsed time between departure and return?) He requests and receives a senzu from Goku and does the classic mouth transfer. a) it should be obvious, b) give them some frickin' space, jesus h. christ, c) this isn't the time to be worrying about things like that STILL NOT THE TIME TO HAVE THIS CONVERSATION vegeta aren't you like 50+ years old, this shouldn't be such a Thing. weird old man YEAH LETS JUST PUT THIS WHOLE THING TO REST Anyway, while all That was happening, Mai got all nicely healed up. Trunks explains what's up and also that this Goku with the slightly better (?) fashion sense isn't evil; he's the original version and isn't interested in killing everyone. He also introduces Dad, who swiftly takes over the situation. He orders Trunks to stay put here with Mai. They'll ask for his help if they need it, but he wants them to stay safe and protect the time machine. Moreover, if things go completely south in the worst way, he wants them to escape to the past. (While Vegeta's distracted by something, Goku remarks to Trunks that his dad's changed quite a bit from before. Trunks agrees.) oh! a classic. good Goku and Vegeta take off. Trunks, watching them go, tells Mai that he believes in them. They'll be able to defeat G!Black. Speaking of, G!Black is hanging out in midair and trying to figure out what is up with these two ki signatures. Goku and Vegeta find a place that looks like it used to be a park, so it's slightly less likely to generate huge amounts of infrastructural damage as fighting right in the middle of the city. They don't have to wait around very long, because about two seconds after choosing this place to fight, G!Black shows up and is like "What are you doing in my backyard?" a dream come true. beating up goku without actually, like, beating up goku.
Spoiler: Just like having a terrible sibling Lol I got no idea what their actual height differential is
Ch 19 I was planning on some huge and overblown thing here with themes of resurrection/rising from the grave, but eh, fuck it! Let’s just do the thing. By which I mean, I’ll just do the thing. (Another Zamas) Basically: G!Black is hanging around in Future!Trunk’s timeline and being a menace (while maintaining a pretty nice residence in an alpine cabin somewhere). Future!Trunks went back in time yet again and fetched his Slightly Less Angry Dad and Goku to try to rout him in the future, despite some stern warnings (“It’s illegal!”) from Beerus and Whis about time travel. Shortly after their arrival in the future (but not shortly enough to prevent some truly bizarre kissing talk), G!Black shows up with a smirk. Vegeta seems pretty happy to see him, due not in small part to this being a Goku he can punch without any issue or complication. Despite Vegeta being all like “Step off, Kakarot, I’m gonna fight this dipshit,” last time, this chapter starts off with a bit of exposition talk. who figured this out?? man it’s been a while G!Black is somewhat disconcerted or nonplused by this statement and looks down at Goku with his mouth open. Goku shouts that they know he used the dragon balls (of the super variety, I assume) to switch bodies. G!Black finally comes down to their level, which is only the polite thing to do when you’re talking to someone. He’s a bit put out by the fact that Goku/Vegeta/whoever else already figured some of this stuff out for themselves. Possibly he was interested in a big reveal or something. He confirms that yeah, that’s what happened, and Goku asks what happened to the him that was transferred into the Zamas body. G!Black (Zamas!Goku? … I’ll just stick with my original naming convention) smirks and says he took care of that ages ago. pppft what a thing to be indignant about G!Black is curious about their existence here. They both died a long time ago in this world, so what gives? Vegeta tells him they’re not obligated to answer any of his questions. G!Black ignores this and asks about Trunks, which I would think is at least a little bit of a trigger for Vegeta by this time. (Quoth DBZA, “My baby boy!”) In any case, Vegeta’s not here for this back and forth at all. He goes SS2 (… I think. Usually they give us screentone if it’s any of the godly forms) and leaps into action. G!Black knocks away his first attack but Vegeta springs right back at him, undeterred. After a bit of sparring, they separate for a little bit of sizing each other up. vegeta decided that last chapter. look i know it’s been almost two months but get with the program G!Black declares himself happy to have someone to fight besides Trunks and demonstrates that he, too, can do the SS2 thing. So… does your soul have to pure to do this, or what’s the deal? It must be at least partially biological. His hair looked really weird to me and I wondered if maybe it was parted on the opposite side from Goku’s so I flipped around a few pages and found that Goku’s hair just parts on whatever damn side it wants! Not that surprising, I guess, but it would have been one of those kinda fun details if it were consistent. G!Black has an unpleasant, un-Goku-like smile on, one that I kind of hate. Vegeta doesn’t care, probably because he’s ecstatic to have this opportunity. They get back to it. G!Black takes a chance on what looks like a kamehameha when Vegeta flies out of melee range to avoid an attack. Vegeta just zips around the beam and barrels straight into G!Black with both fists and the whole of his momentum, which predictably sends him skating over the ground for hundreds of feet and destroying a good chunk of architecture as he goes. Vegeta’s pleased about this but it certainly reads to me like the setup for a turn of the tables. G!Black powers up out of the wreckage and Vegeta flies to meet him. Goku watches with hands on hips from fairly close; from a greater distance, Trunks and Mai are observing with binoculars. Mai’s optimistic because it looks like Vegeta has the advantage (warning sirens), and besides, they have Goku, so they’re gonna be okay (WARNING SIRENS). Hoo boy, this is gonna go bad, isn’t it. Vegeta socks G!Black in the face, throwing him back into the city rubble, then rapid-fires enough to create a shock that forces Goku to protect his face. Vegeta lobs a final charge which causes a catastrophic explosion. He lets the smoke billow away a bit before landing to survey his handiwork. He’s not too happy with what he sees. hey are you a mew? you a mew?? what’s with that shield ball? The shield dissipates. G!Black seems even more put out now than he was earlier and asks which era’s Vegeta this Vegeta is. Of course, Vegeta doesn’t answer. Instead, he hypothesizes that the body G!Black is using comes from a future version of Goku (so, not the one that died in this timeline, presumably) and thus G!Black must be able to go blue. “Just do it,” he taunts. “C’mon, I know you can.” vegeta used provoke! After a brief pause, G!Black says that he “can’t become that yet”. Vegeta seems to interpret this as “G!Black can’t go blue at all and SS2-maybe-3 is his best”, but it seems to me that he’s saying he’s waiting for something specific to happen before he can do that. In any case, Vegeta gets right back into it and punches G!Black directly in the pit of his stomach. Oof. Before throwing him off, Vegeta has something to say about the body he’s using. startlingly poetic He tosses G!Black up and does an impressive split-kick that sends G!Black high up into the air. hey goku, you got a compliment! G!Black, instead of getting a compliment, gets Vegeta’s fists in his back, and then in his front, in the form of everyone’s favorite, the double axe handle. Vegeta kind of ruins the compliment a little bit by saying that the only one who can bring out the body’s true potential is a “naïve idiot like [Goku]”, so. Oh well. G!Black smacks into the ground, hard, sending Goku hopping back to avoid the impact. he’s wearing the terrible underarmor/turtleneck combo, don’t worry, he’s nothing like you G!Black isn’t done yet. He flies at Vegeta, and just before they meet in the middle – HARD CUT to U10 kaioushin’s place. Zamas is just entering through the kanji-shaped gate, only to see the U10 kaioushin hanging out with Beerus and Whis. Beerus has his feet on the table in a totally uncouth way. HOLY SHIT U10 KAIOUSHIN HAS A NAME AND IT’S GOWAS!!!!! WOW! Gowas introduces Beerus and Whis. Beerus cuts right to the chase and asks if Zamas if he was at Zunou’s. Zamas admits that yes, he was there, asking about Goku (just curiosity after seeing the match on GodTube, that’s all!). Beerus demands to know why he was asking about gods and mortals switching bodies. More curiosity, Zamas says, but Gowas has gotten a bit perturbed by this time and tells Zamas to explain himself. Shin interrupts before he can by appearing out of nowhere. Beerus complains that he’s late. Shin defends himself by saying that he had to travel through a lot of dimensions and it took a while. He’s wearing a Ring of Time and confronts Zamas, telling him he’s witnessed his future. that’s a pretty good expression
Shin reveals to Gowas, who’s moved from perturbed to distraught, that he’s seen the terrible deeds Zamas will commit in the future. Beerus is 100% prepared to do his destruction thing, especially now that Shin’s brought him confirmation that yep, Zamas is kind of a bad apple, but Gowas is having a hard time accepting this and asks if this is all, somehow, a mistake. “Evil deeds?” Zamas asks. whoahohohoahoh alright there tone it down my dude HARD CUT back to the android-wrecked future timeline and G!Black hauling himself up after being punched through a building. He’s fucking pissed and this is the perfect time for a little bit more expositioning talking! “Mortals fucking suck,” he says. “You ever seen a mortal? Always killing each other and destroying things,” he says. “They’ve gotta go. They’re the actual evil in the world,” he says. “I’ll be the one to balance things,” he says. “I’m –” hell yeah! but naaahhhh He attacks Vegeta with a kind of ki-blade (….heheheh) that he forms on his right hand. Vegeta just kind of bobs and weaves to avoid it, then snags the wrist and squeezes it. “We don’t give a shit about that,” he says, and for like the third time today, flings G!Black away. G!Black seems kind of incredulous that he’s been brought to this point. He killed all the other gods, so he’s the only god left! Goku butts in and tells him to hold up, didn’t he just kill the kaioushin? That means that he didn’t actually defeat the gods of destruction, they just disappeared when their counterparts died! His conclusion? G!Black played dirty. G!Black doesn’t care; he’s still the only god around now. Vegeta still doesn’t give a shit, and G!Black tries to establish himself as the supreme ruler of this world by throwing ki charges at Vegeta, who dodges. Man, come on, guys, why don’t you just take him out now? Stop talking, start the beatdown! Vegeta’s like “Knock it off, we aren’t interested in what you’re selling,” and G!Black flips the fuck out. HARD CUT back to U10. Beerus tells Zamas that he’s delusional. Zamas takes this as his cue to get all stabhappy; he makes a ki-blade (…pfft) just like G!Black’s and declares that if Shin saw him doing terrible things in the future, he must be alive in the future to do them, so it’s time for him to murder everyone here and go about his nefarious business. Before he can do any murdering, Beerus grabs his wrist. that’s maybe a little unfair. i think he wasn’t so zealous at first… i think there was a slow transformation that lead to this. i’m sure he wasn’t quite so judgment-obsessed or anti-mortal as a normal kaiou In any case, Beerus sticks his other hand in Zamas’ face and does his destruction thing. Not an explosion, not this time; Zamas turns into sand. Gowas has gone from distraught to profoundly confused and upset. Shin consoles him a bit and tells him he’ll explain it all once he’s taken Beerus and Whis back to Earth. whis throwing some serious shade beerus is much more straightforward Shin tells Beerus to quit it with the intimidation, because they have to get going in a hurry. Beerus seems confused that Shin is standing up to him, but Shin’s apparently got something important that needs relaying to Goku et al as soon as possible, so he wants to get going. HARD CUT back to future Earth – Trunks and Mai have hurried over to Goku. Trunks seems worried and tells Goku that G!Black’s super saiyan form is stronger than before. It’s making him nervous, and he thinks they should end things as soon as possible, despite it looking like Vegeta’s got everything under control. (Since when has Vegeta ever really had anything under control?) Goku sees probably sense and agrees. Of course, the way he chooses to do this is to tell Vegeta just to finish him off already, forget about giving him (Goku) a turn! Vegeta’s pretty okay with that. Yet again throws G!Black like some sort of targeting practice clay pigeon and prepares for something I don’t think we’ve seen for a while. hey you have some named attacks too don’t you Of course, this looks like it’ll be the end. But… oh motherfuck. The FF goes shooting off harmlessly into space (well, at least harmless for Earth; maybe it’ll cause harm somewhere else….) and G!Black’s savior lands on a nearby roof with him. Back in the past, Shin reveals his news, although not to Goku et al, but to Beerus and Whis. And that’s that G!Black, as we’ve just learned, isn’t working alone. He’s got a partner. A compatriot. An accomplice. oh wow who could it possibly be The accomplice is wearing a kaioushin outfit and heals G!Black, so it seems pretty fucking obvious, but. Just in case there was any doubt. THIS IS SOME FUCKING ALT TIMELINE BULLSHIT RIGHT HERE OR SOMETHING. also zero mortal project…. well good job you two you’ve just killed this one mortal right here on contact so
Ch 20 there is two of them (The Zero Human Project) So which is it? Zero Mortals or Zero Humans? Anyway, the Mystery of the Two Zamasses isn’t much of a mystery. Finding that Goku, Vegeta, and Future!Trunks have already gone forward in time, Shin explains that there’s probably another Zamas because the one who took Goku’s body went to a different timeline/world and found a different Zamas there. A different being, but with apparently the same feelings and predilections. Vegeta proves that he’s put at least a few points in INT by figuring this out too, without the aid of Shin. Trunks gets what’s going on, and while Goku’s not quite on the same page, at the very least he gets that there are two people to defeat now. This Zamas takes a moment to wonder where the heck Goku and Vegeta came from. G!Black is a little testy because Zamas took a while to get back from wherever he was, but Zamas had the same issue Shin had: checking parallel worlds takes a while. He pops a ring off and materializes the box in which all the rings are stored, and discovers that yet another Ring of Time has been spawned, suggesting that yet another parallel timeline has splintered off. may have to… reevaluate vegeta stat distribution. also creeper vegeta strikes again Of course, saying that revealed at least a bit about what the deal is with them. Good job Vegeta! I’m not gonna reevaluate, no, you’re staying at mid INT. G!Black, despite being nearly defeated by Vegeta just a few minutes before, has gone all cocky and “I’m going to annihilate you with my own hands!” Vegeta says “No you” and attacks. Things don’t seem to be going so great right from the beginning. Vegeta misses a kick early on and ends up in a kind of undignified pose and G!Black uses the momentum from his dodge to drop him to the ground. He chases him around with ki blasts briefly and baits Vegeta into melee range and then hits him with some sort of status-effect beam. make his hair go up even more than normal! G!Black rambles on a bit about how he thought he’d be super strong just by getting ahold of the Goku body while Vegeta struggles against the beam and Goku and Trunks do absolutely nothing. Like, there are two of them now! It’s perfectly fair for at least one of them to get in on the action. Oh well. It wouldn’t really be DB if we just defeated people without some stakes being raised a couple of times. Vegeta breaks out of the beam, but this seems to have taken a bit out of him. G!Black reveals that he couldn’t even do regular super saiyan back in the beginning, but now he’s figured that out, and something else as well – the true nature of a saiyan. It’s the return of the game-breaking race abilities! With the combo of this world’s Zamas’ healing abilities (which I guess he has, kind of like Kibito, or Dende) and the stolen saiyan body, Zamas has a pretty good recipe for getting real strong, real fast. Vegeta gets kicked out of the air. Goku hurries over with a senzu. Battlefield Medic Goku to the rescue! Vegeta perks right up after chomping it down and dives right back in. Unfortunately, it only takes a page for him to get knocked down again. hey wait excuse me? no one ever said that was a possibility! but I guess it might be an attempt to explain why it wasn’t just the go-to solution for any problem back in the day G!Black gives Vegeta a thumbs-up and declares him the perfect level for grinding EXP with. Priest!Zamas comes down from his building top (where NO ONE THOUGHT TO EVEN ATTEMPT TO FIGHT HIM SMDH) to heal G!Black. G!Black takes a moment to luxuriate in the feeling of soul and body becoming more as one, I guess. Which comes with some perks! Like reaching a “whole new level”!! One that will make any resistance useless. Personally, I’m hoping for a combo-breaker and for hair to go down for once. Wouldn’t that be a shock? Just like a new transformation that makes you look like a drowned rat. Probably no good for intimidation, which is my personal hypothesis for the hair go up thing. Saiyans are basically cats that saw a raccoon on the other side of the screen doors in terms of their hair. (Also at least Vegeta had the poofy anger tail going on, so. I’m calling that one 100% canon.) Anyway, yes, this new level is, in fact, a transformation, but the hair is a pretty typical transformed-Goku style, so no luck for me and my hopes. It is also screentoned, so I’m going to say it’s not blond, and Goku confirms. so that’s black, blonde/yellow, red, blue, and now pink. just need a few more colors and we’d have a full spectrum covered. a green would be nice. just sayin. aaaand this panel just made me laugh because. I mean. fucking perky zamas being all “ooh nifty” while G!Black is all >:D Zamas thinks that the pink is the result of the incredibly niche situation in which an actual god, in a saiyan body, manages to surpass SSG. Okay then, glad you’re such a fuckin’ expert on all this shit, can you explain some other stuff for me maybe? G!Black decides that he’s going to call this particular state of being “super saiyan rosé”, which is maybe a good name for a wine made from grapes grown by saiyans but an absolutely terrible name for a transformation. Oh well. “maybe” . . . . . . . . “maybe”. “maybe” “lol sure” says zamas Zamas comes at powered-up Goku with his hand blade, but being just a god and not a saiyan (or a god in a saiyan’s body, or a saiyan using the power of a god, or anything like that), he certainly seems like a bit of a pushover. (Sidenote: if we’re gonna be painfully honest and pragmatic here, shouldn’t Vegeta and Goku switch opponents? I mean, at the very least, Vegeta’s not in peak condition after getting smacked around earlier, sooooo… send him after this one, yeah?) Zamas next tries some ranged attacks with various articles of debris in his vicinity. Most of these just kind of pass by Goku harmlessly, except for one that Goku reflects. Straight into Zamas. dot dot dot is right you asshole. not like there’s any chance of this being an actual lethal wound or anything but it is certainly briefly satisfying. Goku gives an ultimatum (make everything how it was before), which of course Zamas isn’t gonna do because there’s basically 0% probability that this has done any kind of lasting damage to Zamas. Maybe he’ll just heal himself, or maybe… hmm. Could this be a burner body? I guess some sort of weird psychic projection is technically a possibility as well. Zamas just rips the thing (street sign pole, maybe?) out of his abdomen and tosses it aside like it’s NBD. Which it is, because there’s no wound to be seen. Just some greenish (he’s green, like Shin is a nice lavender shade), unbroken skin. And it’s not any of the things I posited! He’s completely fine because * drumroll * he used the dragon balls to make himself immortal! FINALLY SOMEONE ACTUALLY DID IT!!!! Frieza failed and Vegeta just kind of… forgot about it or something, but Zamas actually did the thing. I can’t believe it took hundreds of chapters and a whole new series for it to actually happen. I’m kind of proud of him in a weird way. Goku, on the other hand, thinks this is super unfair. Even more unfair is when Zamas uses his other (apparently?) godly powers to gank the senzu bean bag right out of Goku’s shirt, which I guess is a place to put that. Is there a pocket in there? Anyway. Zamas immolates them and then casts paralysis on Goku, citing his godly ways. Man why couldn’t fucking Shin do any of this shit. Or is it a U10 thing? Maybe all the universes have their own quirks, and the kaioushin/kaioushin-adjacent gods can do different things. Like maybe teleportation is a specialty of U7! That’d be kinda fun. I’m into it. Anyway, how’s Vegeta faring? oh, not good! that’s some body horror right there G!Black’s all accustomed to his newfound power and has a good time punting Vegeta into unconsciousness. Of course good son Trunks runs over to him, exposing himself (more than he already was) to G!Black. He yells at (still paralyzed?) Goku that they’ve got to get the heck out of there. Zamas teleports (oh goddamnit, my hypotheses fall apart so quickly) over to G!Black and tells him to just get rid of Trunks already. G!Black, like all villains who’ve duped a hero, takes a moment to thank him for how much he’s helped out, which makes Trunks feel like shit but does give him time for… HELL FUCKING YES IT’S GREATEST HITS THIS CHAPTER There’s some universal rule in DBverse that says that everyone has to fall for taiyou-ken, even if it seems like they shouldn’t. G!Black and Zamas get blinded and look around dumbfounded when their eyes clear. It’s too late; Trunks, Goku, Mai, and the semi-conscious Vegeta have already escaped down some sort of sewer access. Yuck. Things seem hopeless, but Goku has an idea, and it’s something we haven’t heard about for a very long time. Potentially since vanilla DB? It’s the fucking Mafuuba, baby! Seal away evil (in a rice cooker, which is actually addressed here… I don’t think it was in vanilla DB, possibly because of the assumption that English-speaking readers wouldn’t be familiar with electric rice cookers). Roshi might be relevant for a hot minute again! Outside, the villains are trying to locate the escapees, and manage to track down Mai’s ki. They do the teleportation thing (speaking of, does G!Black have that ability?) and see four figures hurrying along at street level under sheets. Awfully reminiscent of your typical ghost costume. G!Black is ready to blast them and Mai hauls out some sort of combat shotgun, but Zamas stops G!Black, telling him something’s wrong – and at that moment Mai kicks one of the other “ghosts”, reveal that it’s a mannequin. (Guess there was some time between them in the sewers and setting this up, huh?) Trunks ambushes Zamas and stabs him through the chest (2nd time today!) and gets a good surprise crit on G!Black. Goku and still seemingly out-of-it Vegeta are in the time machine, with Goku at the controls (oh lord). Trunks manages to keep G!Black and Zamas distracted enough for Goku and Vegeta to presumably get away safely, or as safely as they can, considering the situation. Chapter ends with Trunks in kind of a bad situation, pinned to the ground by a vengeful G!Black. I guess with a time machine Dad and Goku could be back basically right away? So maybe he’s not in such a bad place after all. (wowwow a single post for a chapter it's a gotdamn miracle)
Ch 21 this is actually getting pretty close to where we stopped watching super and husband has asked me not to read past… so I may have started again just to go into another long hiatus. well. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it (Last Chance for Hope) Back in the present. Bulma is hanging out with Beerus, which is kind of an interesting combo. She could just be keeping him preoccupied so he doesn’t get it in his head to go off and be destructive somewhere in the vicinity of Earth, I suppose, but personally I would like them to be enjoying coffee or something. Trunks is training with uh, what’s his face, Pilaf. (Still don’t know what’s up.) He and the rest of the “kids” are the ones to notice when the time machine makes its appearance. (Sidetrack: Trunks is wearing at least 2 pieces of Capsule Corp branded clothing. Is it company loyalty or is this just all that Bulma gives him?) Everyone hurries out only to see Goku hauling the still-unconscious Vegeta out of the cabin. Bulma and Young!Trunks hurry over to help out and Bulma notices something still in the machine. the big black cat snuck back in time! maybe it’ll become its own progenitor o_o The saiyans get senzu’d up. Vegeta is understandably pretty pissed at Goku about leaving Trunks behind. Bulma takes Goku’s side and tells Vegeta to knock it off. (Goku’s super apologetic through all of this.) Not sure if Vegeta relents or not, but at the very least he’s probably not going to try to rip off Goku’s head in the next minute or two. Goku has the same thought that I had last chapter. Oof. That makes me think it might have been a bad thought because usually Goku doesn’t get to be the smart one. oh well okay thanks for making me look like a dummy bulma Not only that, a span of time spent in one timeline means that the same span has passed in the other, and it takes at least a day to get enough fuel to power the thing. And, as if that weren’t enough already, the connection between this reality and the other one is weakening, to the point that Bulma thinks there can only be a single future trip between the two. No one’s happy to hear this, but Shin seems especially upset by it, enough that he bangs the table as he stands up. Very un-Shin-like behavior. Beerus notices, but Shin plays it off, saying that he’s just remembered he promised Gowas that he’d return and explain things to him. Whis eases his departure but seems to harbor some concerns, or maybe suspicions. What do you know, Whis. Share it with the class! Whis keeps his own council, however. Beerus lets the rest of them know that he’s going to have nothing to with the future. He did his part here, and the rest is up to them. Future!Whis is also unavailable, based on the presumption that Future!Beerus is dead. Well, fuck. Goku’s plans haven’t really changed, though: Mafuuba mastery. What about Vegeta? jesus Christ who sneezed in your cereal? Vegeta reacts as though someone asked him something quite a bit more personal than “What’s your plan, Vegeta?” But my guess is that this is a pretty bog-standard Vegeta reaction to having gotten soundly defeated. Good job transferring that aggression to Goku, who for once wasn’t even really doing anything to warrant it. He takes off through an open window in high dudgeon and goes flying off towards the Lookout. Hmm. Probably not to hang out with Piccolo or my best son Dende or the problematic Mr. Popo. So my guess is HTC. Maybe you should give that a second thought, old man, because at this rate, you’re gonna eat up a lot of years that way. “Back in the future”, man, how many times have I said that? G!Black is unhappy with the situation and Trunks in particular, because he’s not being appropriately contrite while pinned to the ground. He has the audacity to smile, which gets on G!Black’s last nerve. The healthy response here would be to leave the situation for a bit until he’s calmed down, but instead he slams Trunks’ head into the ground. Several times. Mai clubs him several times with her combat shotgun (don’t @ me I don’t know guns it might be something else entirely). G!Black glares with such force that she’s thrown backwards. This is Trunks’ cue to fire two blasts, one with each hand, at point-blank range into G!Black’s face. Despite the godliness and everything, this is enough to let Trunks get away. He’s about to use the taiyou ken again (!!), but is almost impaled with his own telekinetically thrown blade. Zamas is, of course, back to full health. His clothes must regen too, because they end up the same as they were before. (Or maybe he’s just good at clothes, like Piccolo.) G!Black thinks that Trunks & co. shouldn’t have any hope left, and Trunks says that they’ll “always hold on to hope” Even if they die. Well. There’s the signal for G!Black to hit Trunks with one of his paralysis beams and kind of yoyos Trunks around the area, bashing him into the ground, buildings, etc. This seems to have been just some playing around, because after causing grievous bodily harm to Trunks and grievous property damage to some of the miraculously still-standing buildings, he decides it’s time to end this. Mai grabs Trunks’ sword, pulls it out of the wall it got stuck in, and despite the fact that it seems to be pretty heavy and hard for her to wield, dashes forward as though she’s gonna swordfight G!Black and rescue Trunks. Trunks tells her to GTFO, G!Black prepares to blast him, and things are looking generally pretty grim, but – this genuinely surprised me! deus ex… what’s the latin phrase for “other universe”? considering I took three years of the stuff I should probably be able to figure it out buuuuuut Gowas tells Trunks to take his hand. Shin makes his appearance beside Mai and instructs her to do the same. They teleport away, leaving G!Black and Zamas like “Thought they were dead? Really thought they were dead.” Shin and Gowas take them to the deserted kaioushin realm of the future, where Gowas apologizes too profusely for Shin and Trunks’ comfort. Apparently, this place is safe from Zamas and G!Black, so the plan is to hang out here until Goku and Vegeta show back up again. Speaking of, no idea what Vegeta’s up to, but Goku is practicing the Mafuuba. probably better to practice with a pot, rather than the rice cooker, but is there actually an ideal container for the mafuuba? didn’t kami get sealed in a tiny bottle or something? the rice cooker thing is very funny to me for reasons I can’t adequately explain Roshi goes off on Goku for being too rough. Goku, kind of snarkily, says that if he’s so bad at it, maybe Roshi should be the one to go to the future and do the darn thing. Roshi says no, fuck that, he doesn’t have the kind of physical strength required, and if he failed, he’d die. Like he did before, apparently. goku: “yeah yeah gramps I’ve heard this one before” Roshi goes inside to make the paper talisman necessarily to finally seal the vessel after getting whatever’s going inside inside, and demands patronage at a hostess bar for payment. Zamas and G!Black discuss their plans in their alpine cabin. If Zenou hears about this, their shit is probably fucked, so they decide to light out for the territories the following morning, but first, there are the rest of the humans on earth to take care of. Over in kaioushin-world, Shin has put Trunks and Mai to sleep with some “herbs”. I completely get the intent behind all of this but I readily admit to being a total ass and laughing about it in a stupid way. On a more serious note, Shin and Gowas are both considering the implications of their powers and how they might be misused. Kind of surprising it hasn’t ever been an issue (or at least not an issue of this scale) before. Musing is interrupted by the sudden shock of lots of death, which is, of course. Zamas and G!Black being huge dicks. Gowas decides he’s had just about enough of that, and takes off for earth to try his hand at dissuading them again. poor shin. I feel like he’s often getting thrown into these kind of hopeless situations where people don’t listen to him and doing the reasonable thing means he has to probably feel like a callous asshole Gowas appears on earth just before they finish killing all the humans (:/) G!Black and Gowas have a conversation. It doesn’t go super well, but at the end Gowas entreats G!Black to come back to U10 with him, apologize to Zenou, and start over. G!Black is suspicious but seems like he kind of wants to, at least a little. Zamas is all ready to step in and mess things up, but Shin appears before him, with Mai and Trunks in tow. Shin makes his own overture to Zamas, but it goes over like a lead balloon. Trunks gets out his sword to challenge Zamas, but it’s kind of a moot point, because despite the “maybe kind of into the idea of starting over” – how many old men have to die before you’re happy??? Some brief exposition form G!Black, who explains that this is the third time he’s killed a Gowas, what could possibly have made anyone think that he’d hesitate this time around? And then he tosses the body aside. HARD CUT to him (presumably that door needs to be there, vegeta, don’t knock it down! dumb asshole.) MY SON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <3 <3 <3 <3 snail son (snon) Vegeta doesn’t even say sorry for knocking down the door, he just jets away. Rude! At least put the door back so that my son doesn’t have to figure out how to do it. >:( Meanwhile, on the Kame House island, Goku has managed to at least once get the beam inside the pot, so he’s good to go as well! Might have to tie Vegeta up because he seems weirdly super deadset against this particular solution to the problem. Just because he wants to defeat a Goku? Hmm. Maybe a combo of that and also his Pride (tm tm tm) has been injured once again, so he must get revenge.
So it's still gonna be soon but not quite as soon as I was hoping, due to some circumstances beyond my control :/ But! This week! >:3c
Ch ???? * breaks down wall like kool-aid man * OHH YEAHH!! (????) I'm back! It's been like... a long time, so I'm rusty as hell! Hopefully it won't take me long to get back in shape! Long story short: husband decided that watching Super probably wasn't gonna happen, and so now I'm free to go buck wild with the manga. The really exciting thing (for me, maybe not for anyone else) is that now this means I have 0 idea what's gonna happen in the story. (Okay, well, not 0 idea, but it's not like the DBZ part of things where I had very intimate knowledge of What Happen.) So this is gonna be absolute first-time reactions to shit, like back when I was reading vanilla DB. God, that was some primo stuff. Like the time Goku stuffed a rat in his mouth (and then later handed it off to Krillin)? Oh, I was in such hell. Good times. I loved the hell out of doing the DBZ part of it (how could I not), but it's pretty fun to actually be experiencing stuff for the first time in a liveblog/let's read/whatever the fuck this is. So, without further ado... Ch 22 where's the "Last time on Dragon Ball" narrator when you need him? (Zamas's Final Trump Card) oh right. i myself am my own "last time on" narrator. i could just... read my last post. Geez, I did not get far into Super. I mostly blame the combination of the chapter length (sometimes 40 pages!) and the inbuilt limitations of Kintsugi re: number of images one can upload to a single post. Now, however, I have my own new skill: uploading pictures to another service and then linking them, for a total of 20 images per post! (Allegedly. I haven't tried it yet so let's see if it works with this post first.) Now I know it doesn't matter if I make multiple posts about a single chapter, but I hate doing that! It interrupts my flow and I don't like it! So I'm hoping having more images will let me feel less anxious about that aspect. Anyway, it looks like Gowas is dead. Was he... on the battlefield last time? (I did not read my last post.) I think I remember that. He came around and was trying to get Zamas to reform and repent and generally stop being a judgemental asshole, if I remember right. Guess that failed pretty spectacularly. From context clues, I'm betting it was G!Black who did it. He's smirking quite a bit from the top of one of the many ruined buildings as Trunks, Mai, and Shin (! who I forgot was around) cluster around the fallen Gowas. shin is pissed And with good reason! But the thing about Shin is that when he's pissed, he often does... inadvisable things. Like, in this case, immediately taking off after G!Black. This is dumb in very many ways, because not only would G!Black just straight up wreck his shit, Zamas is literally right there, and, well. ;_; i'm still inordinately fond of shin apparently Zamas adds insult to injury by calling Shin a "weak god who can't protect anything in their own universe", which, ouch. Meanwhile, Trunks is trying to rouse the (presumably?) dead Gowas, who's really not looking great until the next page where he startles the fuck out of my by suddenly starting to breathe again, holy fuck. He coughs a lot (and I almost spelled that "koffed", because of course the SFX render it with a "koff"), and Mai calls to Shin, telling him Gowas is still kickin'. Not the best of moves, because of course literally everyone in the vicinity hears her, and G!Black is all grumbly and like "well looks like I fucked up the first time, now I hafta do it again". He jumps down off the building and approaches ominously while Trunks tries to get Mai to GTFO on a motorbike with Gowas while he holds him off until Vegeta and Goku get back. (... from the past, maybe? Man, I really should have read my last post.) Trunks takes out the sword to fight him, and before I even move onto the next page I'm gonna have a little bit of a fit about why the fuck Trunks would ever use the sword, except I guess against Frieza and Frieza's dad, but they were about a million years ago. G!Black has already proven himself to be more than a match for even Goku, so, like. Why. Why would you bring the sword out. Anyway. G!Black just smiles and there's a flash and a scene transition. the boys!!!! And yep, the hand in the shirt is Goku tucking away the time machine capsule for safekeeping (does he have a pocket in there?) They're relieved to sense that Trunks and Mai are still alive, but Trunks is in a bad way, and so off they teleport to where he is. Not a moment too soon, either. just like when you turn on the lights suddenly and your cats are doing something Bad and just look at you like "what. what are you gonna do about it". or maybe when you turn on the porch lights and there are raccoons stealing your tomatoes Goku's a bit surprised to see that Shin's here, but Vegeta's more focused on G!Black, of course. Because he was just tormenting his precious only (well, currently) child. He orders Goku to tend to Trunks and Shin, and do the whole Mafuuba thing to seal Zamas, while he deals with G!Black. He cracks his neck meaningfully at G!Black, who seems to understand that it means that they're gonna fight (or maybe he just overheard the conversation), and they take off for a different section of ruined city. Zamas tries to stop Goku giving out senzus, but Goku just grabs Trunks and Shin and teleports away (man, that skill is so fucking broken). I wondered who he would teleport to, and my question was answered next page, because he nearly causes Mai to crash her bike by popping into existence right in front of her. She screeches to a stop and Goku greets her cheerfully. * squints * didn't... you meet him? i thought? god several months is too long Vegeta and G!Black have managed to find a very wasteland-ish area to fight in, and have some pre-fight banter. Summary: Vegeta finds G!Black's face distasteful and G!Black wonders where all the confidence comes from. G!Black does his fancy transformation, certain that nothing Vegeta does will be able to rival his power. Vegeta just smiles slightly and then.... wh... what's this magical girl transformation???? with the whooshing/concealing wind/magic/force???? vegeta? hello??? G!Black is also confused. THIS LITERALLY IS A MAGICAL GIRL TRANSFORMATION!! SPARKLES!! FOCUS CLOSE-UP SHOTS BEFORE THE FULL REVEAL!! CHANGED HAIR/EYE COLOR!!! .... oh my god. this is the shounen version of magical girls. how did i not realize before. I guess this is... regular god form, so a red-haired Vegeta. But not the blue-haired, super saiyan version. (Nongod: black --> gold (3 levels); god: red --> blue (mulitple levels? maybe?)) G!Black has gotten over his momentary surprise, only to laugh at Vegeta. Does he think that form is going to work? It's not even SSGSS! Vegeta merely says that he figured out that this was the form he needed to defeat G!Black and laughs, which makes G!Black angry enough to fire a beam off at him. Vegeta just nudges it aside and then gets to do a cool pose when it explodes behind him harmlessly. well. depends on your threshold for "cool", i suppose, but it surpassed mine because i'm a dork This whole time, Vegeta has had the same kind of half-smile expression, and it's really getting under G!Black's skin, because why doesn't Vegeta just acknowledge that there's nothing he can do and that this form is going to be useless?? He hurls another blast at Vegeta, who shows off how agile he is by leaping swiftly out of the way. He lands in front of G!Black and charges him. G!Black is discombobulated by both his speed and strength, which he doesn't believe are possible with this form. Vegeta just continues smiling and kicks G!Black straight through several buildings, into the hospital (! which is possibly meant to be the same one Goku recovered at after Vegeta's first, memorable, appearance). G!Black ends up in the lobby and, angry, makes the hospital explode. "mr. rose" Meanwhile, Mai is gazing towards where the sounds of the distance battle are coming from while Goku sits with the three recovered. It's great that everyone's alive, but whoops, now there's only one senzu left. Oh well, everything'll be fine! As long as Vegeta manages to take out G!Black and Goku succeeds with the Mafuuba and seals Zamas away. He hands off the capsulized time machine to Trunks, then proudly shows off the pot he's going to seal Zamas in. Apparently Master Roshi was using it store (or maybe to pickle) pickled plums? Ooof. That's quite the thing to be sealed in for all eternity. (Man. I was hoping for a Zojirushi rice cooker, personally.) Something behind Goku explodes. It must be the hospital, because Goku&co are treated to an up-close look at the fight that was just in the distance a few moments ago. This is a convenient moment for Goku to explain what Vegeta's up to. SSGSS is nice and all (blue!), but it's super energy-intensive, Conversely, just normal god form is pretty balanced and more energy-efficient. Cool! And also, he switches to blue the moment he attacks. Kinda reminds me of early stuff with the kaio-ken. Although you would think that someone would notice the flickering hair color. Oh well. (This chapter would greatly benefit from being in color, that's all I'm gonna say.) G!Black catches on, finally, and stops the fight for a second to complain about it. ("You're cheating!") This gives Vegeta a perfect moment to be distracted with some witty comebacks and for Zamas to make his reappearance. and this is why we don't stand around like assholes and brag YEP THAT GUY! Goku appeals to Zamas' better (?) nature, or maybe more accurately his sense of honor, and says that he shouldn't interfere in the G!Black/Vegeta fight, because that's not cool in terms of the warrior code. He, Goku, will fight Zamas instead! Zamas is easily swayed by this, and faces Goku and Goku's second, the pickled plum jar, which Goku's just kind of... set down beside him. Super obtrusively. G!Black sees it and seems suspicious of it until Vegeta drags his attention away with some rapid-fire blasts. He takes off after Vegeta, leaving Zamas to face Goku (and jar) alone. Zamas is still pretty cocky because he's immortal, and wonders aloud how anyone could ever think that they'd be able to beat him. this is a pretty cute goku but that won't distract me ((too much)) from being disapproving about even mentioning anything related to your strategy, especially when like... you kind of get one shot at this? like.... ................ once you tip your hand, it's gonna be real hard to get him in the vicinity of an appropriate sealing vessel, i'd imagine Without much preamble, Goku goes what I'm tentatively guessing is SSGSS then just goes for it. Zamas looks shocked, but whether it's because he understands what might happen or because he just doesn't know what the fuck Goku is doing isn't really clear. And, surprisingly at least to me... things seem to be going good! (I'm pretty sure we saw this before, right? Didn't Kami get mafuuba-ed into a little jar that then some Piccolo swallowed? Or am I confusing myself? Man it's been a minute since I read DB Vanilla.) Zamas gets stretched out like taffy and swirls around miasma-like, until Goku finally slam-dunks him into the pickle jar. (Humiliation. oh the humilation) HELL YEAH NOTHING BUT NET shin bby Goku dives for the pot to cover it, which I guess would be pretty important, and calls Trunks over to help him put the talisman on. Trunks does, and MOTHERFUCKER look i know i should have known something was up but i really wasn't expecting this Zamas pops out, panting (and probably smelling like pickled plums). Vegeta notices that Goku fucked up (well, TBF, Master fucking Roshi was the one that really originated this fuck-up, but Vegeta doesn't know that right now). Zamas is in a real terrible mood after being shoved in a tiny jar (used for pickled plums, the shame) and vows to "obliterate" all of them. Goku just kind of shrugs and goes "oh well!", then turns red (too much energy spent in the failed Mafuuba) and says that this form is more than enough for Zamas. He tosses Zamas about a bit and, like before, all the damage vanishes. He turns confidently to Goku, all like "See? You can't --" and then Goku socks him right in the gut. satisfactory Zamas is all "What the fuck was that for, don't you know I can't take damage?!" and Goku's just like "Well, maybe you'll give up eventually, so I'mma keep punching you until then." Which, alright, why not? Goku also thinks that Vegeta's nearly finished with G!Black, and wonders if Zamas is gonna keep on with what he's doing if there's no one to help him out. Because, really, the way he is now? Weaker than Trunks (wow, talk about damning with faint praise), and insinuates that G!Black is just using him. Zamas tries some sort of underground attack that Goku easily evades. He retaliates by ki-pushing Zamas over by G!Black's feet. i sense some discord in the ranks Zamas recovers from the Goku-inflicted damage, gets up, and grabs G!Black's shirt and then yells at hi for three panels straight. (Goku asks Vegeta if they're fighting, and I'm like, Goku, you literally instigated this 30 seconds ago.) Vegeta ignores him and gives the two (once) gods a choice: he'll kill them, or they can kill each other. Of course, he shouldn't have fucking stood around talking because G!Black disentangles Zamas' hand from his shirt, calls him "brother", and reminds him that they've got some final thing they can try. Vegeta's still invested in his whole choice thing, but Goku's concerned about this "final trump card", which, of course, isn't a card at all, but THAT'S RIGHT MFING POTARA EARRINGS WHAT ELSE WOULD IT BE oh my god i cannot wait to see this fucking fusion Goku, having realized what the heck is going on, tries to prevent it by hurling a blast at them, maybe to destroy one/both earrings, maybe just to disrupt the process somehow. There's a very large explosion which leaves a super perfect cloud of dust and debris for someone to pop out of. Vegeta is completely oblivious to what's going on because he is being especially dense this chapter. shin knows what's up, he's been there It can be! The fused version of G!Black and Zamas hops out of the concealing cloud and reveals himself. (Themself?) And I am extremely disappointed! Oh well. I suppose Vegeto wasn't a particularly inspired design either, plus I was spoiled by the dance version of fusion that results in fun clothes. yeah yeah yeah okay fusion is fun and cool and fusions always come out super arrogant and ready to Fite (tm) so just get over yourself already Aaaaand wow! That was quite a chapter I stopped right before. Feels like I kinda chose a bad place to stop! Oh well, it was certainly a bang to jump back in on. (Also this chapter was 45 fucking pages long and took me a thousand years to do.) Anyway, hopefully I can make this part of my routine again and not end up staying up till 1:30 doing it! God I hope the image links work.
