Yes, That's the Feeling

The moment they stepped fully into the Hyperbolic Time Chamber.

Thud!

Trunks's legs suddenly buckled, and one knee slammed hard against the white tile.

"Cough... cough, cough!" He braced both hands against the floor and gasped for breath, his face instantly turning red. "Th-this is the Hyperbolic Time Chamber?!"

This Trunks had never undergone any kind of high-gravity training. The gravity, ten times that of Earth's, pressed down on his back like an invisible mountain. And that wasn't all: the air was so thin it was almost unbearable. Every breath he drew felt like swallowing knives. Even more terrifying was the temperature. One moment, it felt like he was standing in a furnace; the next, he seemed to have plunged into an ice cave. Extreme heat and cold alternated without warning in the air.

As far as the eye could see, aside from the small expanse of Lookout Plaza beneath their feet, everything around them was a featureless sea of white. There were no boundaries, no landmarks, and not even a sense of direction.

Empty. Oppressive.

"This is only the beginning, Trunks." Gohan stood firmly in place.

Although this was his first time experiencing an environment like this, he had prepared in advance, so he wasn't nearly as disheveled as Trunks.

He looked down at the purple-haired boy, who was still struggling to adjust. "Get up, Trunks. The gravity here isn't even a tenth of what your father trained under back then. As long as you can move around freely here, your strength will improve rapidly."

Trunks gritted his teeth, the veins standing out on his hands as he forced himself upright against the tenfold gravity, inch by inch. Sweat streamed from his chin and evaporated the instant it hit the white tiles.

"My father..." Trunks panted, his eyes filled with yearning and frustration. "Gohan, with the strength I have now, can I really defeat the Androids if I stay here for a year? I... I still can't even turn into a Super Saiyan!"

As far as Trunks knew, becoming a Super Saiyan was the only way to fight the Androids. But he had tried again and again and still hadn't managed to transform.

Gohan looked at him quietly.

In the original story, Trunks had seen his own battered corpse in the pouring rain. Only the overwhelming despair and grief of that moment had pushed him past his limits. But now Gohan was alive and well, so Trunks had lost his most powerful emotional trigger.

However, as a transmigrator, Gohan had all kinds of transformation guides from different versions of the story stored in his head. Helping Trunks transform wouldn't be difficult.

"Trunks." Gohan stepped in front of him, his voice calm. "Your base battle power has already reached the threshold for transforming. You just haven't found the right way to do it."

"The right way?" Trunks stared at him, bewildered.

"Close your eyes." Gohan's voice grew stern.

Trunks obeyed at once.

"Now, focus all your attention on your back." Gohan recalled the trick Vegeta had used to teach the Saiyans of Universe 6 in the main timeline. "Gather all the ki in your body at the point between your shoulder blades."

Trunks furrowed his brow and followed Gohan's instructions, slowly drawing the ki in his body toward his back.

"Focus on that spot. Do you feel a tingling sensation? Like countless needles pricking you, along with an intense numbness?" Gohan's voice echoed through the empty space.

"I... I feel it!" Trunks's eyes flew open, a look of disbelief flashing across his purple eyes.

"Now! Take that tingling feeling and your ki, and release it all at once!" Gohan shouted.

"Aaaaaah!"

Trunks gathered his ki and surged forward with all his might.

Boom!

A violent gust of air burst outward from him, instantly scattering the oppressive stillness around them. Golden aura erupted from his body like a volcanic blast. His hair stood on end, turning gold, and his eyes turned teal.

Super Saiyan!

"I did it! I really did it?!" Trunks stared at his hands, wrapped in golden aura, unable to believe it. He could feel an enormous power within him, unlike anything he had ever experienced.

But the transformation lasted less than ten seconds. The golden aura went out like a firework with its fuse snuffed, and Trunks's legs gave way. He slumped to the floor, gasping for breath, almost all the ki drained from his body.

"Good. Remember that feeling." Gohan nodded, not disappointed in the slightest that Trunks had returned to normal.

"Yeah." Trunks wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.

"What I'm about to tell you is the real key."

Gohan sat cross-legged in front of Trunks, his expression turning utterly serious.

"Trunks, do you think that as long as you can become a Super Saiyan, you'll definitely be able to defeat the Androids?"

Trunks froze for a moment, then nodded instinctively. "Isn't that right? Super Saiyans are the strongest warriors in legend."

"No. What matters most is your base battle power," Gohan explained slowly. "Becoming a Super Saiyan 1 increases your base power fiftyfold."

"Fiftyfold?" This was the first time Trunks had heard the number stated so precisely.

"That's right. If your base battle power is only three million, multiplying it by fifty gives you one hundred and fifty million. If your base power is one hundred million, then your transformed power is five billion!

"So your base battle power is the key factor that determines your upper limit." Gohan stood up, and his ki burst forth at once.

Trunks suddenly understood, as if a veil had been lifted from his eyes.

Boom!

Golden aura surged skyward as Gohan entered the Super Saiyan 1 state.

"Watch closely, Trunks. Super Saiyan 1 actually has several stages."

Gohan gave a low shout, and his aura swelled once more. With a bone-rattling creak, his muscles ballooned as if he were being inflated, stretching his tattered gi tight and making him appear much larger.

"This is Super Saiyan 1's second stage. It's stronger than the ordinary Super Saiyan form."

Then Gohan powered up again.

"Haaa!"

His muscles swelled to an even more absurd degree, and veins coiled over his skin like dragons. His golden hair stood up even more sharply, like a mass of spikes. The pressure was so terrifying that even the air under the tenfold gravity let out a strained, explosive roar.

Both of these stages were easy. Son Gohan had figured them out with little effort and demonstrated them for Trunks.

"This is Super Saiyan 1's third stage." Gohan's voice grew low and heavy. "Trunks, what do you think of this form?"

Trunks swallowed, feeling the world-shaking power, and nodded again and again. "It's so strong! With this kind of power, I could blast the Androids into dust!"

"Foolish!"

Gohan scolded him sharply and immediately released the muscle-bound form, his body returning to its normal proportions.

Trunks stared at him, stunned by the rebuke.

"This form, which trades speed for strength by forcibly bulking up your muscles, is a dead end!" Gohan coldly pointed out its fatal weakness. "Your strength does increase dramatically, but look at how big you were just now. How much slower would you be? What good is all that power if your attacks can't hit the enemy?"

Gohan secretly congratulated himself for steering Trunks away from this dead end in advance. In the original Cell Saga, the kid had put too much faith in this muscle-bound form, only to be toyed with by Perfect Cell.

"Even worse, this form consumes an absurd amount of ki," Gohan continued. "The Androids have unlimited stamina. If you try to win by wearing them down, you'll exhaust yourself to death before they even have to lift a finger."

Trunks broke out in a cold sweat, finally understanding what Gohan was getting at.

"Then what should we do?"

"Aim for Full Power."

"What's Full Power?" Trunks's expression had changed completely, now filled with an intense desire to grow stronger.

"Ahem... Well, it's too soon for us to worry about that."

Gohan pretended to cough and changed the subject.

He pointed toward the boundless white emptiness outside.

"Let's spend this year steadily increasing your base strength." A cold smile tugged at Gohan's lips. "Ready to welcome hell, Trunks?"

"Anytime!" Trunks sprang to his feet and, bracing himself against the tenfold gravity, took up his opening fighting stance.