At the dining table of Kame House, Krillin was staring blankly at his own arm.
The skill he had just absorbed from Master Roshi, Muscle Control (Beginner), was far more subtle than he had expected.
This was not the shallow muscle flexing of a bodybuilder meant for show. It was microscopic regulation of physical density itself.
With a thought, he activated it.
The biceps that had been bulging like solid rock slowly compressed beneath the skin, flowing inward like water being drawn back into a container.
Visually, his arm circumference shrank by a full size.
The exaggerated bodybuilder look disappeared, replaced by sleek, streamlined muscle lines. It looked far less intimidating, yet the hardness contained within had multiplied several times over.
"Compress," Krillin murmured to himself.
Like a spring forced to its absolute limit.
In this state, both durability and instantaneous explosive speed increased dramatically.
"What are you doing?" Bulma asked through a mouthful of tuna, her words slightly muffled.
"Your arm keeps getting bigger and smaller. It looks kind of gross."
"Just adjusting my state," Krillin replied casually, picking up his chopsticks.
Crack.
A crisp sound rang out.
The specially made hardwood chopsticks exploded into splinters the instant they touched the fish.
Silence fell over the table.
Master Roshi froze mid-reach, chopsticks hovering in the air. His eyes widened behind his sunglasses.
"Krillin, you…"
Krillin stared at the two broken halves in his hand and twitched.
His strength had overflowed.
The fusion with the Saitama template was still progressing. Combined with his newly acquired muscle control, his body felt like a barrel packed full of explosives.
Even the smallest motion could set it off. He had only meant to pinch the chopsticks lightly.
"That's the third pair," Bulma said, rolling her eyes as she tossed her fork at him.
"Use this metal one. If you crush that too, I'm cutting you open for research."
Krillin caught the fork.
This time, he held his breath and treated it like fragile porcelain, carefully controlling every muscle fiber in his fingers.
[Muscle Control Proficiency +1]
So that was it.
Not just combat. Every mundane movement in daily life was training for muscle control.
If he wanted to truly master this unreasonable bald power, control had to be etched into his bones.
After dinner, night fell.
Waves crashed softly against the shore.
Krillin did not sleep. He stood in the open space outside Kame House as the countdown on his system panel began.
[Saitama Training Method, 7-Day Endurance: Day 1]
Push-ups: 100/100
Sit-ups: 100/100
Squats: 100/100
10 km run: Completed
It looked simple.
No. The real torment was just beginning.
The system's cold voice echoed in his mind.
[Host has completed Day 1 of basic training. Deep fusion with Saitama template initiated. Cellular reconstruction will occur during sleep. Pain suppression: None.]
Pain suppression… none?
Before Krillin could even ask what that meant, searing pain exploded from the depths of his bones without warning.
"Ghn!"
He let out a muffled groan and collapsed to his knees in the sand, fingers digging deep into the ground.
This was not the pain of injury.
It was the pain of growth.
It felt as though countless tiny hammers were smashing his bones apart, then reforging them into something denser and stronger.
Every muscle fiber was torn, stretched, and forcibly healed.
His body burned. His temperature spiked to a level hot enough to cook an egg.
The sea breeze struck his skin, instantly turning into rolling clouds of steam.
"So this is… the price of breaking the limiter?"
Krillin clenched his teeth, veins bulging on his forehead as sweat evaporated the moment it surfaced.
In the original story, Saitama had endured this inhuman torment before going bald.
He had started bald, but the suffering had not been reduced at all.
He curled up on the beach and endured the entire night.
At dawn, when the first ray of sunlight touched the pink walls of Kame House, Krillin crawled out of the sand pit.
He rolled his neck.
Crack.
Instead of exhaustion, he felt terrifyingly energized.
He glanced at his arm. The skin looked even smoother.
But when he pressed it, the texture felt like ultra-dense military-grade rubber. Unbelievably resilient.
One night of growth was worth three years of normal training.
Krillin pushed open the door to Kame House.
"Morning, everyone."
He casually reached for the doorknob.
Click.
The round brass knob deformed like clay in his hand, then tore free along with the internal lock mechanism.
Krillin stared at the mangled chunk of metal, then at the black hole left in the door, falling into deep contemplation.
Inside the house, Bulma, still in her pajamas and yawning, and Master Roshi, who was hurriedly stuffing something under the couch, turned their heads at the same time.
"Well…" Krillin raised the broken doorknob and smiled awkwardly.
"I think the lock quality might be a bit questionable?"
...
Over the next three days, Kame House fell into a strange atmosphere.
Master Roshi thought his disciple had gone insane.
The old Krillin trained hard, sure, but it was always for flirting or showing off.
Any free moment and he would lean over with a lecherous grin and whisper, "Master Roshi, can I borrow that collector's edition Bunny Girl Weekly?"
Or he would grab binoculars and drool at the sea.
But now?
Roshi lay on his deck chair, holding the latest swimsuit photo book, unable to focus.
His gaze kept drifting out the window.
The bald kid was doing push-ups.
That was normal.
What was not normal was that he was supporting himself on two fingers, with a gigantic boulder weighing at least five tons placed on his back.
Sweat poured like a waterfall, soaking the sand beneath him.
Krillin's eyes were frighteningly focused as he counted each rep.
The hunger for strength radiating from his very bones made even Roshi feel unsettled.
What was worse, the night before, Roshi had tried to tempt Krillin into resting by offering a limited edition swimsuit special.
Krillin had glanced at the cover once, then calmly turned around and resumed squats.
Roshi had dropped the book in shock.
Was this really the same perverted little monk?
Had some martial arts god possessed him?
"This kid…" Roshi stroked his beard, his gaze deep behind the lenses.
"Is he really trying to surpass the limits of humanity?"
On the other side, Bulma's attitude was shifting as well.
Because of a malfunction with her aircraft, or rather because she did not want to leave, Bulma had stayed at Kame House for three days.
She sat on a folding chair with an iced drink, claiming to supervise, though her eyes never left Krillin.
Under the sun, Krillin trained shirtless.
Thanks to his improving muscle control, his physique no longer bulged uncontrollably like the first day. Instead, his muscles formed perfectly balanced, razor-sharp lines.
When his back muscles contracted, they looked like a fully drawn bow, packed with explosive power.
Bulma sipped her juice, eyes unfocused.
She was a looks person, and more importantly, she admired strength.
Krillin had no nose, and no flowing hair.
But this raw masculine presence felt… strangely pleasing.
"Is this really Krillin?" she murmured.
Her thoughts drifted to Yamcha.
That womanizer barely trained unless there was a tournament. Most days he played baseball or chased girls.
Boom.
Krillin finished a set of squats and casually tossed the massive boulder aside. The ground shook.
He wiped the sweat from his head and walked toward Bulma.
Backlit by the sun, his body seemed outlined in gold.
"Water," he said, voice rough.
Bulma reflexively handed him a towel and a canteen.
He tilted his head back and drank. His throat bobbed clearly.
A few droplets ran down his chin, across his chest, and disappeared beneath his waistband.
Bulma's face flushed red. She quickly looked away and raised her voice to cover it.
"Hey! How long are you going to keep training? You've eaten everything in the house. That food was supposed to last a week!"
"Sorry," Krillin said, setting the canteen down and looking at her naturally.
"My growth rate is high. The consumption is heavy. Since there's no food left…"
He paused, glancing toward the distant primeval forest.
"I'll go hunting. I want to test my fists anyway."
"I'm coming too!" Bulma jumped up immediately.
"It's boring here. That old man only reads dirty magazines."
"And I need rare minerals for experiments!"
"No. Too dangerous," Krillin refused instinctively.
There were plenty of prehistoric creatures in that forest.
"I have capsule weapons! And…" Bulma stepped closer.
Her blue eyes stared straight into his, playful and challenging.
"You're strong now, right? Don't tell me you can't even protect me?"
Krillin froze as she stood inches away.
[Host is facing a choice.]
Option A: Refuse Bulma and hunt alone. Reward: Straight-Man Attribute +10
Option B: Bring Bulma and demonstrate reliability. Reward: Affection increase opportunity, random equipment drop
Was there even a choice?
Krillin smiled, white teeth flashing beneath his bald head.
"Fine. Stay close and do not wander."
Bulma blinked.
For a split second, she felt a sense of security she had never known before.
Like even if the sky collapsed, this bald guy could hold it up.
"Tch. Like I need your protection," she snorted, but her body honestly ran off to grab her capsule case. A smile tugged at her lips.
Compared to Yamcha, who only said "Bulma, stop messing around," this Krillin felt far more… manly.
The primeval forest was hot and humid.
Giant ferns blotted out the sky. The air reeked of rot and animal waste.
Bulma drove the off-road vehicle while Krillin sat cross-legged on the roof.
He did not dare sit inside. After crushing the doorknob, he was terrified of ripping the door off or collapsing the seat.
"Krillin! Look! Is that the purple-gold ore I need?"
Bulma slammed the brakes and pointed toward a cliff.
"Careful!" Krillin's calm voice rang out above her.
The ground trembled.
The bushes near the cliff exploded outward as a Tyrannosaurus, over ten meters tall, charged out.
Its gray-brown hide glistened with saliva dripping from its fangs.
"Aaaah! Dinosaur!"
Bulma screamed and fumbled for her capsule gun, but the vehicle rocked violently under the roar.
The dinosaur lunged, jaws opening wide.
Shadow swallowed Bulma as she shut her eyes in despair.
"So noisy."
A flat voice spoke.
No roaring power-up. No ki blasts.
Just a dull, fleshy impact.
Pop.
Like swatting a mosquito.
Bulma opened her eyes and witnessed a scene she would never forget.
Krillin stood on the hood of the vehicle, arm extended in a casual punch.
The dinosaur's body remained mid-charge.
But its head was gone.
From the neck up, it had been obliterated into a mist of blood and flesh, sprayed evenly across the forest behind it.
The massive headless body swayed twice and collapsed.
"Th… this…"
Bulma's jaw nearly dislocated.
One punch?
That hide could deflect bullets!
Krillin looked at his fist and frowned.
"Still not enough control."
"I only meant to knock it out. Used too much force. The head is ruined. Shame, that was good meat."
He muttered to himself.
[Ding! Ancient Tyrannosaurus defeated.]
[Devouring System activated.]
[Passive Skill Fragment obtained: Beast Instinct (1/3).]
Krillin shook the blood from his hand, jumped down, and grabbed the dinosaur's tail with one arm.
He dragged the dozens-of-tons corpse like a rag doll.
"Dinner is settled. How about roasted dinosaur meat?"
Bulma nodded stiffly, heart pounding as she stared at his not-so-broad back.
This guy was absurdly strong.
Back at Kame House, the dinosaur became the ultimate barbecue.
The air was thick with sizzling meat.
Krillin ate heartily. High-energy food was exactly what he needed.
Then Bulma's communicator rang.
She glanced at the screen and stiffened.
It was Yamcha.
After hesitating, she answered.
"Yamcha?"
"Bulma? Where are you? No one's answering at your place."
"Tonight's date is off. Puar is sick. I need to take care of it."
Bulma's eyes turned cold.
Sick?
Puar almost never got sick.
In the background, faint laughter and the crack of baseball bats could be heard.
"You're at the baseball field?"
"Huh? No, no. I'm home. Anyway, gotta go. Busy."
Beep.
The call ended.
Bulma's knuckles whitened as tears welled in her eyes.
In the past, she might have yelled or cried alone.
But this time, she looked up and saw Krillin.
He held a skewer of roasted meat and looked at her quietly.
Firelight reflected off his bald head and his calm, steady eyes.
He had heard everything, yet asked nothing.
No cheap comfort. No mockery.
He simply smiled and handed her the best, most tender piece of meat.
"Eat something," Krillin said softly.
"You need strength to throw garbage away."
Bulma froze.
Throw the garbage… away?
She stared at him, then suddenly stopped crying.
She took the meat and bit down hard.
[Ding! Bulma's affection toward host has increased.]
Current Affection: Ambiguous (75/100)
Krillin did not look at the system.
He gazed up at the starry sky.
The seven-day training period was nearing its end.
The fusion with the Saitama template was approaching its first critical threshold.