Whis glanced over with interest, seeming to find the innocent little fellow rather amusing.
With everything settled, Whis clearly had no intention of delaying any further.
He rose gracefully and gave Vitelli a slight nod. "Then, shall we be off?"
"Just a moment, Mr. Whis."
Vitelli turned to Bulma. The smile had faded from her face, and her eyes were full of reluctance, with a hint of hurt.
She stepped forward and gently took Vitelli's hand.
"Are you... leaving already?" Her voice was a little subdued.
Vitelli squeezed her cool little hand in return, then gently ruffled her short blue hair with his other hand. His eyes were full of reassurance.
"Don't worry, Bulma. Have you forgotten that I can use Instant Transmission? I'll come back often. I won't make you wait too long. Once I've figured out the situation over there, I'll take you on a trip. We can stay there for a few months." He leaned close to her ear and lowered his voice.
His last words made Bulma giggle, and her sadness and reluctance eased a little.
She sniffed and glared at him, pretending to be fierce. "Hmph! If you take too long to come back... just see what I'll do to you!"
"Yeah. I... I'm off."
In the end, she let go and didn't try to stop him.
Vitelli gave her a reassuring smile, then turned and walked over to Whis.
Whis had already extended his unusual Scepter, indicating that Vitelli should place a hand on his back.
Vitelli took a deep breath and gave one last look at Bulma and the home where he had been staying for the time being. Then he gently rested his hand on Whis's peculiar clothes.
There was no earth-shaking commotion, nor the slightest stir of air.
The crystal ball atop the Scepter in Whis's hand glimmered faintly, and a soft yet dazzling light enveloped them both!
The light shone like a mass of sparkling stardust, yet carried an indescribable sense of holiness.
The next second, it transformed into a slender shooting star with a dreamlike tail of light and silently shot into the sky!
From Bulma's perspective, it was only a dazzling streak of light cutting across the azure sky. In an instant, it vanished into the vast reaches of space, as if it had never been there.
The dining room, which had been bustling moments earlier, was suddenly left with only Bulma.
She gazed up for a long time at the patch of sky where Vitelli had disappeared. Only a few wisps of cloud drifted lazily there.
The afternoon sunlight streamed through the enormous floor-to-ceiling windows and fell on her, but it couldn't dispel the sudden emptiness in her heart.
From the kitchen came the faint, cheerful sound of Goku rummaging around for food, making the silence here feel even more pronounced.
"Idiot..."
Bulma murmured softly, unsure whether she meant Vitelli or herself.
She sighed, then finally looked away.
Chapter 18: Kami's Choice
In the God of Destruction Realm, deep in the universe, time seemed to flow more slowly than anywhere else.
The air was filled with energy of the purest kind, so every breath felt like a massage for the nostrils.
The Oracle Fish floated contentedly in its fishbowl above a patch of grass, enjoying a rare moment of peace.
Its little mouth was busy munching on snacks it had secretly hidden away to keep Whis from casually taking them.
"So that annoying Whis has gone out? Now that's a rare sight..."
The Oracle Fish grumbled contentedly, its fins lazily paddling inside the fishbowl.
"Every time I finally manage to hide something tasty, I don't know how he always finds it! Whis, you big meanie! Hmph!"
It was whispering all sorts of gossip behind the back of the angel it both revered and feared when a gentle voice, tinged with a hint of teasing, suddenly sounded beside its ear like a ghost's.
"Well now~ Oracle Fish, is that what you say about me when I'm not around?"
"Pfft—!" The Oracle Fish was so startled it nearly spat out all its snacks!
It stiffly turned its head. Whis was standing beside it, though it had no idea when he'd arrived.
Whis wore his trademark warm smile, his purple eyes fixed precisely on the bag of snacks the fish hadn't yet managed to hide.
The Oracle Fish's fins stiffened. Then, as if resigned to its fate, it let out a heavy sigh, its face wearing an unmistakably human expression of fine, you win.
It slowly pulled another package from somewhere at its side. It looked even more exquisite than the last. With a trembling fin, it offered it to Whis.
"Here... take it. Don't hold it against me, okay? This is my last bit!"
Before it had even finished speaking, it gave a sudden flick of its tail. With a swish, the entire fish vanished without a trace, moving so quickly that even Vitelli, standing behind Whis, hadn't seen it.
"Oh ho ho ho~" Whis chuckled with delight as he watched the Oracle Fish disappear. He caught the package of snacks gracefully and casually put it away.
Only then did he turn to Vitelli, who stood behind him with an expression of utter amazement.
"That was a quick reaction. The creatures of the God of Destruction Realm certainly are something."
Vitelli's admiration was sincere. Even a fish in the God of Destruction Realm was no ordinary creature.
"Ahem." Whis cleared his throat, his expression regaining some of the seriousness of a teacher.
"All right, Vitelli, welcome to the God of Destruction Realm. This will be the main place where you train for a while. Now then..."
Whis gave his Scepter a light tap. "Are you ready?"
"Of course!"
Vitelli's eyes sharpened instantly. His muscles tensed reflexively, and his ki stirred beneath his skin, poised to burst forth.
He thought Whis's training would involve some earth-shattering trial.
Instead, Whis merely curled his lips into a subtle smile. The crystal ball atop his Scepter flickered ever so faintly.
Bzzzz—
An unimaginable, terrifying pressure came crashing down on Vitelli without warning!
The pressure didn't seem to come from outside him. It felt as if the weight of every cell, every bone, every drop of blood in his body had suddenly multiplied countless times over!
"Ugh!"
Caught off guard, Vitelli grunted. His legs felt as if they'd been smashed by an invisible sledgehammer. His knees buckled, and he was slammed face-first to the ground with a thud!
His face pressed into the grass, and he couldn't even lift a finger!
Every bone in his body groaned under the strain. His blood seemed to congeal, and breathing became incredibly difficult!
The white aura around him snuffed out like a candle in the wind. Even maintaining Super Explosive Ki had become an impossible dream!
This feeling... was thousands, even tens of thousands, of times more terrifying than the Gravity Chamber Bulma had built! It was a complete crushing across dimensions!
"Don't worry," Whis said in the same gentle voice, as if he'd done nothing more than some trivial task.
"This is just the most basic adaptation training. It isn't set to a fixed multiplier. It's 'customized automatically' according to the current limit your body can withstand. Now then..."
Whis tapped his Scepter again, and a plain-looking gray stone, about the size of a washbasin, appeared out of thin air a short distance in front of Vitelli's head.
"I need you to adapt to your current condition, then lift this stone and move it around freely."
Whis pointed to the stone, his tone as casual as if he were assigning homework. "You can begin now."
With that, he turned gracefully and produced a delicate tea set from who knew where. He sat at a stone table some distance away and began to brew tea at his leisure.
His gaze rested on Vitelli with interest, his posture relaxed, as if he were settling in to watch a show.
"Wh... Whis!"
Vitelli struggled to force the words out through clenched teeth. Sweat poured from his forehead, neck, and back like streams, soaking his Battle Suit in an instant.
"Just... how many times normal gravity is this?! I... I can't even... move!"
Whis was carefully pouring spring water into the teapot. Without looking up, he replied leisurely, "A multiplier? Hmm... I'm not sure either. Didn't I tell you? It's customized automatically according to your limit. Don't worry about the details. What matters is the result, Vitelli. Ho ho ho~"
Vitelli ranted furiously in his mind, but his body was so honest that he barely had the strength left to complain.
He tried to focus his will and summon even the tiniest bit of strength to move the stone in front of him.
But forget lifting it—even after giving it everything he had, he couldn't raise a single finger a millimeter off the ground!
In his eyes, that stone might as well have been a massive mountain to an ordinary human.
Left with no choice, Vitelli gave up on the foolish idea of wrestling with the stone.
He turned to the simplest method, and the one he believed would work best.
Push-ups!
He would start with the most basic physical adaptation!
Vitelli gritted his teeth and poured every last bit of strength he could muster into his arms and core muscles.
"Hah...!"
A suppressed growl burst from deep in his throat.
Only by straining with all his might could he lift his chest a few centimeters off the ground. His arms trembled violently.
But he didn't give up. Once, twice, three times... Each lift was agonizing, and each time he lowered himself, the impact sent his blood surging. Sweat slowly gathered into a small puddle on the grass.
Whis took a sip of fragrant tea. Watching Vitelli struggle, he smiled approvingly.
"Vitelli is quite clever. You found the right approach so quickly."
Vitelli had just managed to finish a few push-ups and was lying on the ground, panting heavily. When he heard this, he nearly choked.
He turned his head with difficulty and gave Whis a resentful look. "Wh... Whis! I... I'm not three years old! You don't have to... praise me so sarcastically!"
To Vitelli, Whis's words sounded like nothing but teasing.
"Oh my," Whis said, setting down his teacup and waving a hand with complete sincerity.
"I'm serious, Vitelli. You see, a very, very long time ago, when I first started training Lord Beerus, he..."
Whis's expression turned nostalgic, with a hint of amusement.
"He spent three whole days trying to fight a stone I'd conjured! He tried all sorts of methods, even attempting to blow it to pieces. In the end, he nearly wore himself out, but the stone didn't budge. It wasn't until he collapsed from exhaustion that he finally understood how foolish it was to try to remove the obstacle in front of him by leaping straight to the end, when his foundation wasn't solid enough."
Vitelli could imagine the scene—an irritable God of Destruction blasting away at a stone for three days... It was almost too beautiful to picture.
He said no more. Keeping Whis's words in mind, he lowered his head again, cleared his mind of all distractions, and devoted himself entirely to this most basic and grueling training.
Once, twice... ten thousand times... thirty thousand times... Every lift and drop came with the tearing and rebuilding of his muscle fibers.
Time lost all meaning here. The sound of sweat dripping and Vitelli's heavy, bellows-like breathing became the main rhythm of the place.
Earth, West City, inside Brief Manor.
The first day without Vitelli, Bulma missed him.
The second day without Vitelli, she missed him, missed him.
By the... Bulma had lost track of which day it was.
At that moment, she sat alone in a wicker chair in the backyard, the black tea on the small round table in front of her long since gone cold.
Her gaze was unfocused as she stared blankly at the first-generation Gravity Chamber in the corner of the backyard, an old model her father, Dr. Brief, had built early on.
Its weathered metal shell gleamed faintly in the evening sun.
Without meaning to, Bulma pictured a scene in her mind: the Gravity Chamber's heavy alloy door would suddenly give a soft hiss, then slowly slide open.
Then Vitelli would come striding toward her, freshly showered, with a towel casually draped over one shoulder. He would wipe his damp, spiky hair as he walked, wearing that familiar, slightly lazy and mischievous smile...
She shook her head sharply, banishing the unrealistic fantasy.
"Idiot..."
She muttered the word, unsure whether she was scolding herself or that guy somewhere in some distant corner of the universe.
"I know it's impossible... He's only been gone a little while. How could he come back already?"
Reason told her that Vitelli had gone with Whis to train in the God of Destruction Realm, and that there was no way he would return anytime soon.
But the intense longing and anticipation in her heart wrapped around it like vines, keeping her from finding any real peace.
Just then, a soft "hiss—" really did come from the direction of the Gravity Chamber! Its alloy door slowly slid to one side!
Bulma's heart skipped a beat!