Taking a bath and looking in the mirror, I discovered my name was Gou Kong. What a name.

His heart finally settled down.

That restless feeling, as if he were hanging over the edge of a cliff and could be swept off by a gale at any moment, gradually faded as he gained a deeper understanding of his current situation.

He had to admit, a healthy mental state was absolutely the foundation for survival.

If he spent every day neurotically staring at the sky, terrified that Frieza's ship would warp in the next second, there would be no living like that.

Ever since he figured out the lay of the land, he had spun into motion like a tireless top.

He learned Saiyan habits, adapted to Planet Vegeta's harsh environment, and gnawed down bloody, half-raw meat.

Things that would have seemed unbearable to others became smoother and smoother for him.

That was thanks to the language talent that could be called an "official cheat."

The common language of this world was like an instinct carved into his DNA, with no barrier in reading, writing, listening, or speaking.

Otherwise, just trying to gesture at those irritable Saiyans would have worn him to death.

Of course, smooth did not mean easy.

Saiyan culture was completely different from Earth's civilization, and the savagery and lust for battle rooted in their blood constantly battered his original values.

Adaptation was a long and painful process.

He often asked himself: why push himself so hard? Why force himself to integrate into the lives of these "monkeys"?

The answer was simple: when in Rome, do as the Romans do.

Since he had come to Rome, he had to live like a Roman.

In order not to be singled out as an outsider and killed among these Saiyans, he had to learn to disguise himself, had to learn to maintain a normal appearance within this barbaric race.

But that did not mean he had to completely abandon himself and become a walking corpse that only knew how to shout "Kakarot" and "battle."

"Earth..."

He murmured the name under his breath.

In this universe, that blue planet still existed, and its native inhabitants, Earthlings, were still peacefully multiplying and living on.

To him, that was the final destination.

After all, no one wanted to spend their whole life wandering the universe covered in black fur, wearing spiky hair, and dragging a tail behind them.

Especially after he investigated Earth's current situation, that longing to return home grew even stronger.

The intelligence showed that Earth was located at the edge of the North Galaxy, so remote that even dust was too lazy to drift over there.

Frieza's fleet?

They had crossed it off the navigation charts more than a thousand days ago.

For no other reason.

Too poor, too weak.

The combat power of the natives there was outrageously low; calling them the bottom of the entire universe would not be an exaggeration.

As for the technology they took pride in?

In the face of cosmic civilizations that destroyed planets at the drop of a hat, it was simply children playing house.

Missiles hitting a Saiyan?

They probably could not even singe a single hair.

This extreme "barrenness" and "backwardness" instead became Earth's best protective coloring.

Frieza had no interest whatsoever in such a useless planet. After all, occupying it would require expensive fuel and a long voyage, but yield no valuable resources. That kind of money-losing deal was something that stingy emperor of the universe would never make.

It was precisely because of this forgotten sense of safety that Earth had been able to develop unharmed until now without Saiyan interference.

This was also why Bardock had sent Kakarot to Earth back then.

Because nobody cared about that corner. It was the safest harbor in the universe.

"Perfect. It's practically a refuge made by heaven and earth."

A sharp gleam flashed in his eyes.

There was no place more suitable than Earth for hiding from Frieza's eyes and ears.

More importantly, its environment, climate, and culture were all highly similar to his original world.

Compared with this Planet Vegeta, filled with the stench of sulfur and an air of violence, Earth was home.

"Whew..."

Letting out a long breath, he sat up from the cold floor.

The muscle soreness after training was still there, but the hunger was even stronger.

This Saiyan body was simply a bottomless pit that could never be filled. After every high-intensity training session, his appetite was terrifyingly good.

A rare vacation, a full week.

If he kept lying here staring blankly at the ceiling, that would be far too much of a waste of this combat suit.

"First a shower, then a proper meal."

He picked up the battle suit on the floor, soaked so thoroughly with sweat that water could practically be wrung from it, slung it casually over his shoulder, and got up to walk toward the shower room beside the training room.

He pushed open the metal door, and steam rushed into his face.

Just as he was about to strip and step into the shower, his gaze swept unintentionally across the mirror on the wall.

In the mirror, the figure with a wild head of black hair, a brutish face, and a thick tail trailing behind him once again stabbed at his nerves.

He still had not fully adjusted to this face.

"The Dragon Ball world. I'm actually fucking in the Dragon Ball world."

He raised his hand and slapped the mirror hard, leaving a clear handprint behind.

That sense of absurdity still refused to fade, even after several months.

Why here, of all places?

A dungeon with such a ridiculous difficulty level?

He would rather have been thrown into almost any other world—even as cannon fodder in a Ninja World war—than live here on edge every single day!

On the surface, Dragon Ball was nothing more than a hot-blooded shonen manga, with the protagonist's halo shining blindingly bright.

But if you peeled back that sugar coating even a little, what lay underneath was an absolutely scalp-tingling dark core.

Just imagine not following Son Goku's main perspective, but looking at it from another angle.

Say, some innocent passerby on Earth.

One second he was shopping in the street; the next, an alien dropped from the sky, raised two fingers, and half a continent was gone.

Nukes?

Missiles?

They hit those people and couldn't even leave a red mark.

Even more terrifying was that these monsters, who possessed the power to destroy everything, spent all day shouting about conquering the universe and casually annihilated heaven and earth at the slightest provocation.

Today, it might be a grasshopper-like monster sucking an entire city's people dry; tomorrow, it might be an out-of-control energy wave blasting straight through the planet.

This was a jungle world where the strong devoured the weak to the absolute extreme.

Low combat power meant you could die at any moment, and die without the slightest worth.

And what if you wanted to keep your head down?

Not a chance! Enemies would always find their own way to your door and drag you into that endless vortex.

Frieza wiped out entire races just because he was in a bad mood, and the Androids killed purely for fun.

In this world, if you didn't evolve, you could only wait to be eliminated.

"Hide? Where the hell would I hide?"

He gave a cold laugh and turned on the tap.

Cold water washed over his scorching body, carrying away the sweat, but not the sense of crisis.

In this world, as long as you weren't strong enough, even if you hid in a rat hole, someone would dig you out.

To avoid becoming the kind of cannon fodder who didn't even deserve a name, to avoid that meaningless "dog's death" ending, he had to grow stronger!

Strong enough to protect himself, strong enough to come out of that genocidal catastrophe in one piece!

The insane training these past few months had all been for that goal.

"Gou Kong..."

He turned off the valve, letting the water droplets slide down from the tips of his hair, stared at the stranger in the mirror, and slowly spoke the name.

After spending this period filling in the gaps and verifying what he could, he had basically confirmed the identity of this body's original owner.

That unlucky bastard—or perhaps that lucky one—had left behind the name Gou Kong.