After Son Goku successfully confessed to Bulma, he suddenly seemed to remember something, and his expression stiffened slightly.
Right... Chi-Chi.
In the original story, Goku and Bulma missed their chance, and he married Chi-Chi, even though they were from completely different worlds. Chi-Chi wanted a peaceful life, while Goku only wanted to get stronger. In the end... they both had a hard time.
But this world is different. Since I've come here, since I've been given another chance at life, why should I repeat those regrets? Why should I make anyone sad?
Whether it's Bulma or Chi-Chi... I'll protect them both!
"Bulma," he said, letting go of her hand. His expression grew more serious than ever, and his voice sank as if he were holding something back. "There's something... I have to tell you."
"What is it?" Bulma was still basking in her happiness. Her cheeks were flushed, and her fingers absentmindedly twirled a lock of hair.
"It's about... Chi-Chi."
Bulma's smile froze.
"Chi-Chi? Ox-King's daughter? You two..."
"When we were kids," Son Goku said, looking straight into her eyes without avoiding her gaze or wavering, "I promised her I'd marry her when we grew up. I didn't really understand what marriage meant back then, but I was serious. I don't want to... break my promise."
The temperature in the laboratory seemed to plummet in an instant.
Bulma's eyes widened. The blush on her face faded before his eyes, replaced by a dangerous pallor. Her fingers slowly curled into fists until her knuckles turned white. "You... What did you say?"
"I..."
"So you just confessed to me because you want to marry both of us?!" Bulma's voice suddenly rose, sharp as a blade drawn from its sheath. She grabbed a wrench off the table and hurled it without a second thought. "Son Goku! You bastard! What do you take me for?!"
"Thud!"
The wrench struck Son Goku squarely on the forehead with a dull thump.
But he didn't put up any defense. He just stood there quietly as a red mark slowly appeared on his forehead.
"Say something! Cat got your tongue?!" Bulma's chest heaved with anger, her eyes reddening as her voice trembled with fury. "I thought you'd gotten smarter! But you're still an idiot! A... a womanizer! A bastard who wants to have his cake and eat it too!"
Son Goku neither dodged nor argued back.
He let Bulma vent, allowing the wrench, screwdrivers, blueprints, and everything else to rain down on him. He stood like a stone statue as the objects left their marks, until Bulma finally stopped, panting. Her eyes were red, both hands braced on the table, and her shoulders trembled slightly.
Son Goku looked at her reddened eyes, and his heart felt as if an invisible hand had seized it and squeezed hard.
She's crying.
Because of me.
He spoke slowly, his voice hoarse, each word seeming to come from deep in his chest. "Bulma, you're right. I'm an idiot. I don't understand love, or what it means to be a womanizer, or why... one person can't love two people at once."
He raised his head. His dark eyes no longer held their usual clear, innocent look. Instead, they were filled with a sorrow so deep it was almost painful, and Bulma couldn't help but shudder:
"But I know I don't want to lose either of you. It's not that I 'don't want to'... I can't."
He took a step forward, and the laboratory floor trembled faintly beneath his feet.
"Before I came here, I went to Fire Mountain and saw Uncle Ox-King. He said Chi-Chi had waited for me for six years, from when she was a little girl until now. Because of that promise, she turned down every suitor and stayed all by herself on Fire Mountain. She practiced martial arts every day and watched the road down the mountain. She said... 'Goku will definitely come back.'"
His voice grew lower and lower, as if he were talking to himself and declaring something to the whole world at the same time:
"If I told her, 'I'm sorry, I'm marrying someone else instead of you'... she'd cry. She'd hide in her room and cry alone, where no one could see. Then the next day, she'd keep smiling as she practiced, pretending nothing had happened. Because she's... so strong. She's been that way since she was little. You know that."
Bulma's lips trembled. She wanted to say something, but no sound came out.
"And if you said, 'I never want to see you again'..." Son Goku continued, his voice carrying a vulnerability Bulma had never heard from him before. "I'd cry too. Bulma, I'm not joking. I might... be even sadder than you think."
His eyes really were reddening. The gaze that always burned with the desire to fight now held a desperate, almost helpless plea.
"Saiyans are a warrior race, born to fight. But Grandpa told me that we don't fight to destroy. We fight to protect. To protect the people who matter and the things that matter."
He took another step forward, bringing himself within half a step of Bulma. He reached out and gently took her hand. This time, his hand trembled slightly—the same hand that could lift a boulder under sixty times Earth's gravity, punch through steel, and catch an energy blast now shook with fear of losing her.
"You're both people I want to protect. I don't know if that makes me greedy, or a bastard... but if you make me choose one of you to give up..."
His voice suddenly trailed off.
It wasn't because he couldn't find the words. He'd realized he couldn't keep talking. Something seemed to clog his throat, and his chest ached with tightness. He opened his mouth, but all that came out was a hoarse rasp.
Then he did something that left Bulma utterly stunned—
He dropped to one knee.
It wasn't the kind of kneel someone made when proposing. It was more like a warrior at the end of his rope, laying down all his pride on the final battlefield.
"I can't do it."
His voice was low, but it held a stubbornness almost as tragic as it was resolute. He seemed to force each word out through clenched teeth:
"I can't give up either of you. I tried... On the way here, I kept thinking: if I had to choose one, which one should I choose? I thought about it the whole way..."
He raised his head, his voice firm:
"The answer is—I can't choose."
"You're like my left hand and my right hand, like my energy and my very self. I wouldn't be whole without either one. If I lost either of you... I'd die."
"It's not a metaphor, and I'm not exaggerating. I... really would die."
Bulma was utterly stunned.
She looked at the young man kneeling before her—the man who wouldn't back down even in the face of the nearly fatal threat posed by the Ultra Divine Water—now kneeling here because he was afraid of losing her. She looked at his trembling hands, his reddened eyes, and Son Goku, who was always smiling, always getting stronger, and seemed like he would never fall...
At that moment, he was as vulnerable as a child.
This idiot... This blockhead...
He's actually... afraid.
He's afraid of losing me.
This battle maniac, who isn't even afraid of death... is afraid of losing me.
"You..." Her voice trembled. She turned her face away, not wanting Goku to see that her eyes were reddening too. "What are you planning to do? Make Chi-Chi your second wife?"
"No." Son Goku stood up, his voice firm again, but he was still holding her hand, gripping it so tightly that it almost hurt. "There's no first or second place. You're equally important to me. Bulma, you're smart and capable. You can make all those amazing machines. Chi-Chi is gentle and strong, and she can make delicious food. You two..."
He scratched his head, trying to find the right words, but his eyes were more serious than ever:
"You two... you're like my left hand and my right hand. I wouldn't be whole without either one. I don't want anyone to be sad. I don't want anyone to cry. If that makes me greedy..."
He took a deep breath, as if making a momentous decision. His voice suddenly rose, carrying the forceful, almost overbearing conviction unique to a Saiyan:
"Then I'll be greedy to the very end!"
"I want both of you!"
"Whether it's you or Chi-Chi, Earth or Namek—everything I care about, everything that matters, I'll protect it all! I won't give up on a single thing! I won't let a single thing go!"
"If the universe says I can't have both of you, then I'll fight until the universe changes its mind!"
The force of his words made Bulma take half a step back, her heart pounding.
This idiot...
Why... Why can he always get the better of me like this...
Not with sweet talk or clever words... Just with this naked, unreasonable sincerity.
With this overbearing vow to protect everything.
She looked at Son Goku for a long time. At last, the tears slipped down her cheeks despite her efforts to hold them back, but she smiled as she cried. "You... You really are a monster. A monster in battle, and... a monster when it comes to feelings too."
"Bulma..."
"I'll say yes," Bulma said, letting go of his hand and folding her arms across her chest, trying to hide her completely surrendered heart behind one last show of tsundere pride. "But not because of all that stupid stuff you said. It's because..."
She paused, her voice softening with a touch of tender resignation:
"Because I... don't want to lose you either. And..." She pushed up a pair of nonexistent glasses, trying to hide her embarrassment behind a scientist's rationality, but her bright red cheeks gave her away. "From a biological standpoint, polygamy could help ensure the survival of the Saiyans, a warrior race on the brink of extinction... And with your single-minded personality, if I forced you to choose between us, you might actually break down..."
"Bulma?"
"J-just... I agree!" Bulma's face turned as red as a tomato, but her voice suddenly rose as she pointed at Son Goku's nose. "But! The wedding has to be grand! The ring has to be the biggest! And I control the family finances from now on! Also, no playing favorites!"
Son Goku froze for a moment, then broke into a smile so radiant that it left Bulma dazed. It was that familiar, reassuring, sun-bright smile:
"Okay! Whatever you say!"
Before you continue