In Dragon Ball: A brutal beating of Frieza at the start

Page 29

The crack in the sky suddenly widened, and a massive piece of architectural debris hurtled towards us. The Mirror Warriors simultaneously raised their hands, and a semi-transparent barrier instantly formed. The debris struck the barrier, shattering into countless points of light.

Hurry! Mirror Lin Ye struggled to his feet. His left leg had already begun to digitize, and the passage could only last for a maximum of thirty seconds!

Lin Yue, inside the quantum container, let out a heart-wrenching cry: No! Brother! Please—

I stared intently at my other self, and suddenly understood why the system had chosen me as the anchor point for the main universe. It wasn't because I was stronger, but because...

You planned this all along. My voice trembled. From the very first intercosmic communication, you intended to sacrifice this universe.

Lin Ye smiled, the data stream already reaching his neck: Someone has to make a choice. Only one of the two universes can survive, but your universe... has more possibilities.

A deafening roar, like the sky collapsing and the earth splitting, echoed from afar. The horizon began to rise, like a painting being burned. One by one, the Mirror Warriors were digitized, but the energy they released made the passage increasingly stable.

"Fifteen seconds!" Kate shouted, her projection already too blurry to make out facial features.

I looked at Lin Yue in the container, then at the disappearing mirror image of Lin Ye. Something beyond reason exploded in my chest, and I lunged forward, shoving something into his hand.

"Take this!" I yelled. "This is an energy beacon from the main universe!"

Lin Ye was stunned. He looked down at the shimmering crystal in his hand: You...

Enough with the nonsense! I turned and rushed towards the spatial rift. The beacon can preserve your consciousness data! Once we rebuild the system, then—

Before I could finish speaking, a massive shockwave struck from behind, and Mirror Lin Ye used his last strength to push me towards the passage. In the final instant before fully entering the rift, I saw the Mirror Warriors join hands to form a barrier of light, their figures like burning stars in the annihilating universe.

"Live on..." Lin Ye's voice echoed directly in my mind, carrying our shared...

Then the world turned pure white.

When I regained consciousness, I was kneeling on the teleportation platform of the main universe. The quantum container in my hand emitted a steady beeping sound, indicating that Lin Yue's consciousness data was 100% complete.

Alarms blared throughout the control room, and the researchers were in complete chaos. I looked up and saw a chilling image on the main screen—the mirror universe was disappearing inch by inch, like a canvas being erased.

"Lin Ye!" Kate's voice boomed from the communicator. "What happened? Our monitoring shows the mirror universe—"

"Prepare for the consciousness reconstruction procedure." I interrupted her, my voice so calm it felt unfamiliar even to myself. "Also, move that succulent on the balcony to a sunnier spot."

There was silence on the other end of the communicator for a few seconds.

"...You saw another version of me?" Kate's voice suddenly became very soft.

I didn't answer, but just looked down at the quantum container. There, Lin Yue's consciousness data was beating regularly, like a tiny heart.

The control room door was suddenly kicked open, and the medical team rushed in. But I just stared intently at the main screen, watching the universe that had been intertwined with us for hundreds of days and nights eventually turn into a ray of light in the void.

In the last frame before the image completely disappeared, I seemed to see a familiar string of code flash by—it was the personal signature that Lin Ye had designed when he was in military school.

He ultimately left himself a way out.

I clenched my fist, my nails digging deep into my palm. The pain brought me to the stark realization that this war across the universe was not over; it had simply moved to a different battlefield.

And now, I carry the hopes of two universes on my shoulders.

Chapter 85: The New Era

Chapter 85: The New Era

On the metal frame of the gravity chamber wreckage, Lin Ye gritted his teeth and lifted the dumbbells. Rust dripped onto the sweat-soaked collar of his vest as he stared at his sharply defined muscles in the mirror—muscles that were no longer gleaming with gold. His Namekian-era strength was even inferior to Frieza's first form.

With a thud, the dumbbell hit the floor. Bulma, holding a folder, peeked out from behind the monitor: "Don't break this old-fashioned equipment. Vegeta used it when he first came to Earth."

“Right now, I can’t even keep up with his exhaust fumes.” Lin Ye wiped his sweat with a towel, his gaze sweeping over the faded combat power stats on the wall. “After the system disappeared, everyone’s skill trees were cut back to square one.”

A holographic projection suddenly lit up in the center of the laboratory, and the illusory image of a blue-haired girl hugged her knees and swung her legs—it was the consciousness of her younger sister, condensed by Lin Ye using the last fragment of residual system data. "Brother's complaining again?" she tilted her head, her hair brushing against the test tubes on the workbench, stirring up a string of pale golden specks. "Yesterday, Master Roshi said your ki is much more 'stable' than before."

Bulma pushed up her glasses and her fingers flew across the keyboard: "It's definitely worth studying. Although the system's functions have disappeared, the energy structure within your bodies has undergone subtle changes—" She pulled up three sets of spectral comparison charts, "Look, Lin Ye's Qi is now rooted in the planet's veins like tree roots, rather than being a data stream floating on the surface."

A green light suddenly flashed past the window. Lin Ye looked up and saw Piccolo carrying a bag of Senzu Beans flying towards the temple. The Namekian's landing shook the windowsill, and his purple pupils swept over the illusory figure in the corner of the room: "Her form... is becoming increasingly unstable."

The younger sister waved with a smile, but a few cracks appeared on the data chain on her wrist. Lin Ye subconsciously reached out to steady it, and a jolt of electric shock shot through his palm as it passed through the illusory image—a sign that the system's residual energy was dissipating.

"Lunchtime!" Master Roshi's roar echoed from the beach, mixed with Krillin's complaints, "That old man hid the eel rice in issue 37 of 'Heaven's Doll' again!"

The wooden walkway creaked underfoot. Lin Ye helped his sister's illusory figure across the suspension bridge, hearing Bulma whisper behind him, "I detected golden veins in the universe, consistent with the vibration frequency of the system's core code." Her high heels crushed a sand shell. "Yesterday, when Vegeta was training on Planet Yadra, he said he saw a 'breathing star map'."

At the dining table, Master Roshi was teasing the phantom with sashimi using his chopsticks: "Little Ling, how about Grandpa takes you to eat strawberry daifuku from forty years ago after Bulma fixes the time machine?" The old man's wrinkles at the corners of his eyes were filled with sunlight, but they suddenly froze when they touched the phantom's fingertips—thin particles of light were seeping from that translucent finger.

“Master Roshi,” Lin Ye suddenly spoke, his voice like a rock soaked in ice water, “when you used the Super Divine Water to break through your limits back then, did you ever think that you were actually relying on external forces?”

The white-haired old man paused in his fish-catching motion, his cloudy eyes suddenly brightening: "Oh? Now you seem like a real martial artist?" He took a swig of sake, his Adam's apple bobbing as he revealed the sharpness of his youth. "Back then, the cat sage of Korin Tower told me, 'True strength is being able to coexist with weakness'—now, isn't your weakness these eyes that always want to rely on data?"

The sea breeze, carrying a salty tang, rushed in through the window. Suddenly, the younger sister's illusory figure pointed to the horizon where the sea met the sky in the distance: "Look! A shooting star!" When everyone turned their heads, they saw a golden streak streak across the clouds. It wasn't a shooting star, but some kind of liquid metal-like substance reshaping itself.

Bulma jumped to her feet, slamming her plate on the floor. "It's the remnants of the system's underlying protocols! They're devouring...memories?" She frantically pounded on her wristband. "Krillin, quickly contact all the warriors in the universe using telepathy! Tien Shinhan's extradimensional vision should be able to detect it—"

“No need to trouble yourself.” Lin Ye pressed down on her wrist, the calluses on his palm brushing against her pulse. “I discovered it three days ago. Last night in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, I tried to communicate with those veins in Namekian…” He pulled a cracked Dragon Ball from his pocket. “They responded to me.”

Everyone's pupils contracted sharply. The four-star Dragon Ball, which should have been orange, was now emitting the same pale gold as the phantom, and code flowing within its cracks did not belong to any known universe.

"Xiao Ling won't disappear." Lin Ye gently placed the Dragon Ball in his sister's palm. The moment the data link touched the Dragon Ball, all the electrical appliances in the room suddenly went blue, only to return to normal three seconds later. The outline of the phantom became clearer than ever before; she could even pick up a piece of eel rice with chopsticks—although the rice passed through her fingertips and fell onto the tablecloth, it left real oil stains.

"Brother, look!" Her eyes lit up. "I can feel it... these residual energies aren't enemies; they're looking for a host. Just like..." As she tilted her head in thought, a strand of her hair brushed against Master Roshi's magazine cover, "...just like how the Dragon Balls were searching for people with pure hearts!"

Master Roshi suddenly slammed his fist on the table and burst into laughter, making beer cans jump. "Good girl! This is much more interesting than the system!" He ripped off a patch from his martial arts uniform, revealing his scarred chest. "This old man was just looking for a new challenge!"

The setting sun cast long shadows of everyone. Lin Ye stood by the sea, watching his sister's ethereal figure reach out to touch the waves in the twilight—this time, her fingertips finally splashed real water. Bulma's detectors showed that those golden veins were weaving a network covering the entire planet, centered on Master Roshi's House.

"Do you know why I brought you here?" Lin Ye picked up a seashell and placed it in the palm of the phantom. "Because there are no system prompts here, no combat power values, only a bunch of idiots who will argue over a bowl of eel rice."

The illusory figure looked up at him, water droplets clinging to its eyelashes: "Because this is home."

Bulma's spaceship engines roared in the distance. Piccolo's teleportation shockwave kicked up sand and gravel, and Vegeta's voice came through the communicator: "If that Kakarot guy dares to get his hands on the new energy before me, I'll rip off his Saiyan tail and use it as a rag!"

Lin Ye smiled, holding his sister's gradually materializing hand and feeling its real warmth: "Let's go, let's see what kind of miracles this new era without a system can give birth to."

As the spaceship pierced through the clouds, Master Roshi on the ground was shouting through his binoculars, "Be careful on the road! Remember to bring me an autographed photo of an alien beauty!" Krillin's sarcastic remarks mingled with Tien Shinhan's sighs, shattered by the sea breeze. But Lin Ye knew that some things would never disappear—like the warmth of a palm, the scolding of an old friend, and the true power that regenerates from the ruins.

Chapter 86: Aftershocks

Lin Ye awoke with a start from a nightmare, his back soaked in cold sweat. Outside the window, the moon on Earth glowed with an unnatural reddish light.

Ding! System notification: Abnormal fluctuations in energy channels—

The voice exploded in his mind, and Lin Ye sat bolt upright, slamming his fist on the bedside table. Damn it! He cursed under his breath; the system had clearly disappeared.

Brother? The sister's ethereal figure floated by the bedside, her translucent face filled with worry. Had she heard that voice again?

Lin Ye wiped his face and nodded. Since the system disappeared, these auditory hallucinations had become more and more frequent. He walked to the window and suddenly squinted—a purple crack had appeared in the sky outside Xidu, like a torn wound.

Bulma! Look at that!

Inside the Capsule Corporation's laboratory, alarms blared. Bulma stared at the screen, her fingers flying across the keyboard. This wasn't an ordinary spatial rift, she said, biting her lip. Something was about to emerge.

Gohan pushed open the door, his forehead covered in sweat. "I just got back from there," he said, panting. "The gravitational field around the crack is completely disrupted, and all my detectors are destroyed."

Lin Ye noticed that Gohan's pupils occasionally flashed with a mechanical blue light. Your eyes...

"You noticed it too?" Gohan smiled wryly. "Ever since the system disappeared, the mechanical Super Saiyan genes within me have become unstable." He raised his right hand, and faint circuit-like patterns were visible beneath his skin. "Sometimes I suddenly enter a semi-mechanical state, completely out of control."

Bulma brought up a holographic projection, displaying the spatial structure around Earth. The problem was more serious than we had imagined. She zoomed in on the image, looking at the ripples; at least twelve parallel universes were converging on us.

Like iron filings attracted by a magnet... Lin Ye murmured.

Worse still, Bulma typed on the keyboard, the projection turned red, the main universe became the center of a vortex, and the remnants of all parallel universes were converging on us.

Suddenly, the alarm turned into a sharp buzzing sound. The purple crack on the screen flickered violently, and a dark figure fell out of it.

He's here! Gohan instantly enters battle mode, his golden aura mingling with the sounds of mechanical parts colliding.

On the grass outside Xidu, the dark figure struggled to its feet. When Lin Ye and the other two arrived, they were met with a Saiyan covered in wounds—but the left half of his body was a bizarre mirror image.

"Don't...attack..." The Mirror Saiyan raised a trembling hand, "I am...a survivor..."

His voice seemed to come from underwater, with an eerie echo. Bulma's detector showed his energy readings fluctuating wildly, like a poorly tuned television screen.

"Which universe?" Lin Ye asked warily.

Number...X-792...The Mirror Saiyan coughed, the blood droplets he spat out hovering eerily in the air. Our universe...was swallowed...all life...

His body suddenly flickered like an old-fashioned television, his right arm instantly becoming translucent. Quick! He grabbed Lin Ye's hand, listening carefully: The system hasn't disappeared, it's just changed form! The energy channels are its neural network, and it's reorganizing—

Before he could finish speaking, the Mirror Saiyan's body suddenly pixelated, vanishing into thin air like an erased drawing. Only a half-finished warning remained: "Beware of machines...they will..."

Gohan suddenly clutched his head and collapsed to his knees, mechanical patterns crawling all over his body. "No...no..." he groaned in pain. "I heard it...they're calling me..."

"What's calling you?" Bulma quickly helped him up.

The God of Machines... Gohan's pupils turned completely blue, and all the mechanical life forms from parallel universes... were merging...

Lin Ye felt a wave of dizziness, and the familiar system notification sounded again:

Ding! A trans-cosmic threat has been detected. Emergency protocols have been activated.

The sound was so clear this time, it couldn't possibly be a hallucination. He looked down at his palm, where faint golden veins flowed beneath his skin.

On the rooftop of the capsule company late at night, Lin Ye gazed at the starry sky alone. Bulma walked up the steps and handed him a cup of hot coffee.

Can't sleep?

There are too many mysteries. Lin Ye took the cup. System remnants, energy channels, parallel universe merging... and Gohan's mechanization.

Bulma leaned against the railing beside him. "I just analyzed the cell samples left by the Mirror Saiyan," she whispered. "His DNA is in a quantum entangled state, which means his universe is already..."

Completely assimilated?

Even more terrifying, Bulma pointed to the night sky and asked, "Do you see that blue star that suddenly appeared? That's not a star; it's the X-792 cosmic debris that's approaching us."

Lin Ye suddenly grabbed the railing. His vision split strangely—his left eye saw the normal night sky, while his right eye saw a giant net woven from countless golden lines, enveloping the entire earth.

Bulma, his voice hoarse, "The system is still there... I can see it."

Just then, the younger sister's illusory image suddenly materialized and appeared between the two. "Brother!" she cried out in terror, pointing into the distance—the city!

They looked in the direction indicated—under the night sky of Xidu, three enormous mechanical lifeforms were descending from a newly appeared spatial rift. Their shapes resembled a twisted fusion of Saiyans and machines, their chests flashing with familiar blue system lights.

Warning: Unauthorized timeline interference detected. The mechanical lifeform emits a cold, electronic voice, initiating the purification process.

The first beam of destruction ripped through the night sky, and distant skyscrapers collapsed like building blocks. Lin Ye felt his energy channels suddenly scorching hot; his Namekian-era power was being forcibly amplified.

Ding! Temporary combat module loaded.

The system interface re-opened before his eyes, though it was full of noise and garbled text, but it was definitely back. Lin Ye clenched his fist, feeling the long-lost surge of power.

Bulma, evacuate the civilians! He took to the air, but where's Gohan?