"Ken, are we going to find Universe 7's Supreme Kai next?" Merus asked.
"Let's go take a look," Ken said with a nod. "After this long, that guy should be awake by now."
"Yeah."
"I can send you there," Fuwa offered.
"Then I'll leave it to you, Fuwa-sama," Ken said.
"I'm not going," Bier suddenly said. "I've been out for too long. I'm going home."
"Can you even find your way back on your own?" Ken asked with genuine concern.
Bier instantly glared at him and raised a fist.
Merus quickly grabbed her arm and pulled it back down.
"He's level 70," Merus whispered. "We're almost twenty levels below him. Don't pick a fight with him."
Bier deflated at once.
That was true. The gap was over twenty levels.
If she actually swung at him, he'd pin her to the floor and grind her into dust.
"Do you want Fuwa-sama to take you back?" Ken asked with a faint smile, not bothering to hold her attitude against her.
"Really? Supreme Kai can take me back?" Bier asked excitedly.
"Fuwa-sama doesn't mind, right?" Ken said, blinking at him.
Fuwa looked a little lost. "Should I say that I mind?"
If Ken hadn't given him that look, he would have just taken her.
But now that Ken had winked at him, he genuinely didn't know how to answer.
"You mind," Broly suddenly said.
"Y-Yes... Great God of Destruction," Fuwa said, nodding repeatedly. "I mind."
Bier's chest rose and fell in anger.
How petty.
"Forget it. You should still take her back," Ken said after a moment's thought. "If she can't find home after being gone for four years, that's kind of pitiful."
"Hmph!" Bier snorted.
"Very well... I'll escort Bier-sama back," Fuwa said, not objecting.
"Bier, don't go wandering off again next time. You'll get lost." Ken patted her on the shoulder.
Bier puffed out her cheeks, clearly unhappy.
Then Ken smacked her hard on the backside.
"You... what are you doing?" Bier cried, glaring at him.
"No wonder Zeno-sama likes horseback riding," Ken said, studying her thoughtfully. "I kind of get the appeal myself."
Bier clenched her teeth in fury.
He actually wanted to ride her like a horse?
This wasn't over.
"You... you believe I'll bite you?" Bier growled through gritted teeth.
"All right, all right. Stop messing around. If you want to go home, then go already." Ken waved her off.
"Hmph. Once I get back, I'm going to train properly. One day my level will surpass yours." Bier clenched her fists and thumped her own chest.
"Good luck." Ken looked utterly unconcerned.
As if that would ever happen.
So many Angels had trained for over a hundred million years and still couldn't reach level 70. No matter how hard Bier trained, even getting to 69 would probably be incredibly difficult.
"Well then... Bier-sama, hold on to me. I'll take you back now," Fuwa said.
Bier nodded and placed a hand on his arm.
"Kai Kai!"
Fuwa chanted the technique.
"Merus-nii, I'm leaving." Bier waved to Merus, then gave Ken one last huff.
In a flash, Fuwa and Bier vanished from the spot.
Moments later, Fuwa brought Bier above the God of Destruction Realm of Universe 12.
The familiar sight of the realm made Bier burst into tears.
After four whole years, she was finally back.
"Bier-sama, I'll take my leave," Fuwa said, and vanished immediately.
Bier slowly descended from the sky.
"Bier? You're back?" Martinu hurried over and looked her over from head to toe. "Let me see... You do seem a bit more mature."
"Martinu-nee-san!" Bier threw herself into Martinu's arms and started sobbing.
"What happened, Bier? Did someone bully you?" Martinu asked gently. "Was it that trainee Angel named Ken?"
Bier didn't know how to answer.
Even if she said yes, could Martinu-nee-san beat him?
Even Righty wasn't a match for him.
Martinu-nee-san had better not go looking for trouble.
"So it really was him," Martinu said with a smile. "The next time I see him, I'll teach him a lesson for you."
"No, Martinu-nee-san, don't!" Bier panicked and waved both hands frantically. "Please don't go pick a fight with him!"
"What is it? Did he threaten you? Angels shouldn't treat each other that way." Martinu took Bier's hand, her voice growing even softer.
"He didn't threaten me. Really, he didn't. We actually got along fine," Bier blurted out, afraid that if she answered too slowly, Martinu would leave right away to find Ken.
And Bier definitely couldn't keep up with her speed. Besides, once she left the God of Destruction Realm, she got lost easily.
"Is that really true?" Martinu asked skeptically.
"Martinu-nee-san... I should just tell you the truth." Bier's voice dropped.
"The truth?" Martinu blinked. "What happened? Lately I've been helping the God of Destruction and Supreme Kai develop the universe, so I haven't been paying much attention to what you've been doing."
"Martinu-nee-san..." Bier asked with a bitter smile, "do you know what level Ken is?"
"What level?" Martinu smiled. "How high could a trainee Angel possibly be? At most, maybe two levels above you."
"Uh... multiply that by ten," Bier replied.
Martinu's plump face changed instantly. Her staff slipped from her hand and hit the ground with a sharp crack.
...
Universe 6, outer space.
After returning to Ken's side, Fuwa brought Ken and the others into the space of Universe 6.
This was the exact area where Cell had self-destructed earlier.
Ken looked around, but there was no sign of the Supreme Kai.
"Ken, the Supreme Kai isn't here," Merus said after thinking it over. "My guess is that he woke up early and returned to Universe 7."
Ken laughed. "Do you really think he has the ability to make it back to Universe 7 on his own?"
Merus fell silent.
After thinking it through, he had to admit that sounded impossible.
After all, Universe 7's Supreme Kai didn't even know other universes existed.
Merus raised his staff and carefully searched for Universe 7's Supreme Kai.
It didn't take long before he found him.
"He's currently on an uninhabited planet," Merus said, projecting a holographic image from the staff at once.
Ken and the others turned to look.
Shin was standing on a planet covered in yellow-green weeds, staring blankly at the sky.
Who am I?
Where am I?
And why did this universe feel different from the one he knew?
He remembered this planet being called Planet Scrag. The grass here wasn't supposed to be this tall—it used to just look scraggly, which was where the name came from.
And there were supposed to be mortals living here.
So why was the planet in the same place, yet completely different?
Why was there no one here now?
With the civilization this planet had, there was no way its people could have migrated to another world on their own.
Shin simply couldn't make sense of any of it.
Right now, he was completely lost.
After thinking for a while, he turned and looked toward the Supreme Kai World.
"Isn't that my Supreme Kai World?" Shin muttered, bewildered all over again. "Why does it feel different too?"
How long had he been unconscious?
Hundreds of years? Thousands?
Still, at least Majin Buu had finally blown himself up and died.
So the trip hadn't been a total waste.
Whatever the case, he should go back to the Supreme Kai World first.
In a flash, Shin teleported and appeared in the Supreme Kai World of Universe 6.
"Kibito! Kibito, are you there?" Shin shouted.
No one answered.
"Looks like I really was unconscious for hundreds, maybe thousands of years," Shin sighed. "Even the Supreme Kai World has changed."
He muttered to himself as he walked, shaking his head in disbelief.
Everything had changed.
No, that wasn't even the right way to put it.
The whole place just felt wrong.
And what was this? There was even an extra palace here now.
"So Kibito built himself a palace while I was gone?" Shin said as he stepped inside and went straight to the master bedroom, where he found a luxurious bed.
He stared at it thoughtfully and sighed again.
Kibito really knew how to live.
In all the years he'd been gone, the guy had even gone and bought a bed.
And the room actually felt pretty cozy too.
"Maybe Kibito prepared all this for me..." Shin said, rubbing his chin.
A few seconds later, he gave a light hop, landed on the bed, and started rolling around on it.
"This bed is amazing..." Shin marveled. "Why was old me so bad at enjoying life?"
The view slowly pulled back to outer space, where Ken and the others were watching.
Fuwa's face had grown darker and darker.
That was his bed.
What was Shin doing rolling around on it?
Was Universe 7's Supreme Kai missing a few screws?
"Fuwa-sama, send him back to Universe 7 first," Ken said, shaking his head. "Let's not have him embarrassing himself in our Universe 6."
"I can do that," Fuwa said, "but Ken, weren't you planning to train him into a mount?"
"Even if we are, it should be done in Universe 7," Ken said after some thought. "If we leave him in Universe 6, I feel like he'll lower the average IQ of the whole universe."
"I feel the same way," Fuwa said with a firm nod. "Better to send him back and let him plague Universe 7 instead."
Merus chose not to speak.
Ken, that was going too far.
Your roots were in Universe 7 too, remember?
Then again... maybe he finally understood why he couldn't measure up to Ken.
Was it because a Supreme Kai like this had dragged down Universe 7's collective intelligence?
Honestly, that wasn't impossible.
How tragic. How did Universe 7 end up with a Supreme Kai like this?
"As for training Shin into a mount..." Ken said after a moment's thought, patting Buu on the shoulder, "Buu, you handle it yourself. I won't need to intervene."
Buu nodded eagerly.
"You spent three years with Zeno-sama," Ken said. "So when it comes to dealing with Shin, I trust you won't make any major mistakes. I only have one rule: you're training a mount, not killing him. And absolutely do not turn him into chocolate. Understood?"
Buu nodded hard again to show he understood.
"You'll have to fly there yourself," Ken instructed. "After all those years traveling between universes, finding Universe 7 shouldn't be hard for you."
Buu nodded repeatedly.
"Go on, then."
"All right, I'm off. Once I finish training that guy, I'll come back to Earth and find you all." Buu grinned.
Broly gave a small nod.
Without any further hesitation, Buu waved goodbye to Ken, Broly, and Ai.
Light burst from his body, and he shot away as a streak of brilliance toward the edge of the universe.
Merus felt like he'd been stabbed in the heart again.
The guy didn't even look at him before leaving.
He had trained Buu for so long, and Buu couldn't even spare him a goodbye.
Merus was genuinely speechless.
What kind of people had he been raising?
Every single one of them was more troublesome than the last.
"Merus, what are you planning to do next?" Ken asked.
Merus didn't know how to answer.
What plans could he possibly have?
The first God of Destruction he had trained got poached by Ken.
The second one got poached by Ken too.
Had he just been raising Gods of Destruction for Ken all along?
"Merus, how about going out and finding a new God of Destruction?" Ken asked with a smile, patting him on the shoulder.
Merus pressed a hand to his forehead, feeling like he was about to lose his mind.
Train another one, just so Ken could poach that one too?
No thanks.
Thankfully, his Supreme Kai hadn't been poached yet.
"For now... I'm not planning to train a new God of Destruction," Merus said at last after a long silence.
"Don't say that, Merus." Ken's face turned serious. "You need the spirit to lose, get back up, and then keep going even if you lose again."
Merus fell silent again.
"When it comes to training Supreme Kais, I absolutely won't lose to you," he said in a low voice.
But even as he said it, he felt his confidence weakening.
Goku had clearly gone off track in his training before, yet somehow he had ended up back on course again.
Life really was unpredictable.
"Didn't Zeno-sama tell us to hurry up and raise a qualified Supreme Kai?" Merus said after a moment's thought. "When it comes to training Supreme Kais, at least I still feel like I'm accomplishing something. And if all else fails, I can use this chance to raise another one, so Zeno-sama has one more candidate to choose from."
Ken looked at him. "What? You only started thinking about that now?"
Merus blinked. "What do you mean?"
"Four years ago, when Goku and the others were fighting Frieza," Ken said.
Merus froze.
"Don't tell me..." he said slowly. "You were already looking for a new Supreme Kai back then?"
"Didn't I ever mention it?" Ken said with a sigh. "My plan was always to raise Gohan as a new God of Destruction and Piccolo as a new Supreme Kai. There are still several universes missing both Supreme Kais and Gods of Destruction."
Merus rolled his eyes and said nothing.
And whose fault was that?
"Merus, what kind of look is that?" Ken scolded him with a straight face. "I treat you like a brother, and you're roasting me in your head?"
"Ah? No, no... absolutely not." Merus hurriedly denied it, shaking his head hard.
"So that's it," Ken sighed. "You don't want your brother to struggle, but you still want him racing ahead."
"Racing ahead? What does that mean?" Merus asked, unfamiliar with the phrase.
"It means leveling up fast," Ken explained simply.
Merus looked embarrassed at being seen through.
A brief silence followed.
"I'm sorry... Ken. I really was being narrow-minded," Merus said, lowering his head like a child who had done something wrong.
"Forget it. I won't hold it against you," Ken said, letting out a long breath. "It can't be helped. With how fast I level up, people envying me is only natural."
Merus turned that sentence over in his head carefully.
Why did hearing that make him feel even worse?
"Anyway... I really should get going," Merus said quickly, changing the subject. "Come visit me sometime."
"Sure, sure. Off you go." Ken waved him away.
Merus tapped his staff lightly against empty space for show. Starlike light bloomed around him, dazzling and brilliant, and in the next instant he vanished without a trace.
"Ken, should I send Shin back to Universe 7 now?" Fuwa suggested. "You're right. If someone like that stays in our universe, he'll definitely drag down the collective intelligence."
"All right. I'll leave it to you, Fuwa-sama," Ken said with a nod.
At the same time, Ken calculated that by the time Fuwa sent Shin back to Universe 7, Buu would arrive there not long after.
That was more than enough to keep Shin busy.
Didn't Shin love observing Buu?
Well, now Buu could keep him plenty entertained.
"Then I'm off." Fuwa waved and chanted under his breath.
In an instant, he returned to the Supreme Kai World of Universe 6 and appeared inside his palace.
The moment Shin saw Fuwa by the bed, he jumped upright in fright like a startled kitten.
"Y-You... who are you?" Shin asked warily.
"I am Supreme Kai Fuwa," Fuwa said with a snort.
"You're a Supreme Kai too?" Shin suddenly lit up. "I get it! You must be one of Kibito's descendants! Was it Kibito who raised you to become a Supreme Kai?"
Fuwa fell silent.
His face darkened on the spot.
So in Shin's mind, he was just the descendant of a mere attendant?
[End of chapter]
[100 Power Stones = Extra Chapter]
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