Heaven and Earth Lose Their Color, Shenron Descends to Ask the World

The Great Ape's roar seemed to still echo in their ears.

But its massive body, towering into the sky, was nowhere to be seen.

In its place were broken walls, shattered ruins, and utter silence.

"Pant... pant..."

Bulma collapsed onto the ground. The exhaustion of surviving the disaster left her too drained to move even a finger.

She gasped for air, her chest heaving violently.

The terrifying sight of that giant palm crashing down kept replaying in her mind.

Oolong had long since reverted to his original form. He lay sprawled nearby, foaming at the mouth with his eyes rolled back.

He had clearly fainted from fright.

Pilaf and his two companions clung to a broken pillar, crying their hearts out.

Their dream of becoming rulers of the world had shattered along with their castle, leaving nothing behind.

Amid the chaos, only Lin Xuan stood quietly atop a relatively intact section of roof.

His clothes fluttered faintly in the night breeze, his expression as calm as ever.

As if the world-destroying disaster just now had been nothing more than a dull farce.

No one knew that, at this very moment, earth-shaking changes were taking place within him.

The range of his senses was expanding at an unprecedented speed.

Passing through the ruins.

Stretching beyond the land.

But Lin Xuan's attention was elsewhere.

He slowly lowered his gaze onto the naked, unconscious boy not far away.

"Goku!"

Bulma snapped out of her terror.

She hurried to Son Goku's side and nervously checked his breathing.

He was still alive.

Once she confirmed that Son Goku had merely fainted, the tension in Bulma's nerves finally drained away completely.

A surge of overwhelming joy immediately flooded her heart.

She suddenly remembered something and, trembling, held up what she had been clutching tightly against her chest.

Seven Dragon Balls.

Not a single one was missing.

They lay quietly in Bulma's palms, radiating a gentle, mysterious glow.

"Wonderful... this is wonderful!"

Bulma could no longer hold back. Her tears burst forth as she hugged the Dragon Balls and sobbed aloud.

There was the relief of surviving the disaster in her cries, the excitement of seeing her dream fulfilled.

And the release of every grievance and fear she had endured along the way.

"Stop crying, Miss Bulma! Hurry up and make a wish!"

Oolong, who had somehow woken up, limped over.

His face was full of impatience.

"If we don't make a wish soon, it'll be dawn!"

His words reminded Bulma.

Bulma wiped away her tears and nodded firmly.

She stood up and swept her gaze over everyone's faces.

"Does anyone have a wish?"

"Me, me, me!"

Oolong was the first to raise his hand, his face full of anticipation.

"I want a pair of girls' panties that will never get dirty!"

Bulma's face instantly darkened.

She kicked Oolong away and snapped irritably, "Get lost! At a moment this important, who would make such a stupid wish?!"

After saying that, she froze as well.

That was right. At a moment this important.

She remembered her original wish: to find a Prince Charming and make him her boyfriend.

But after going through Flame Mountain, surviving the Great Ape disaster, and witnessing Lin Xuan's unfathomable methods.

That wish suddenly seemed so small, so insignificant.

She looked at Lin Xuan's calm profile, her mind drifting.

Perhaps there were many things more important than a boyfriend.

"Forget it!"

Bulma gritted her teeth and made up her mind.

"Whatever! Let's summon Shenron first and see what happens!"

She carefully arranged the seven Dragon Balls together atop a relatively level patch of rubble.

After finishing, she took a few steps back, straightened her rumpled clothes, and cleared her throat.

Everyone at the scene held their breath. Even Pilaf stopped crying as they watched tensely.

Bulma pressed her palms together, closed her eyes, and recited the spell to summon Shenron with all the strength in her body:

"Come forth, Shenron! Grant my wish!"

The instant her words fell.

The world lost its color.

The bright moonlight vanished from thin air, and the stars filling the sky disappeared in an instant.

An ink-black darkness descended from the heavens, swallowing the entire world with an irresistible force.

The castle ruins, the distant mountains—everything sank into a suffocating, deathly stillness where one could not see even a hand before one's face.

Then, the seven Dragon Balls on the ground suddenly erupted with dazzling golden light.

The radiance shot into the sky, becoming a thick golden pillar.

It tore through the darkness and pierced the heavens.

Rumble—

A deep roar came from the far end of the sky.

Golden lightning streaked madly through the pitch-black clouds, yet not a single sound emerged.

The bizarre sight made everyone's hearts leap into their throats.

An incomparably enormous vortex slowly formed in the sky above their heads.

At its center was a void deeper than the night itself.

The next second.

A head so colossal it defied description slowly emerged from that vortex of nothingness.

It was a dragon's head.

Its two whiskers alone were longer than the collapsed castle towers.

Its scarlet eyes, burning with eternal flames, were like two blood-red suns hanging in the sky.

They gazed coldly down upon everything below.

"Ah—"

Bulma's legs gave out, and she dropped to her knees.

Her mouth hung open, but no sound came out. The sight before her was so far beyond comprehension that her mind completely shut down.

Oolong screamed, rolled his eyes back, and promptly fainted again.

After what had just happened, Pilaf and his two companions saw this.

As though their souls had been sucked away, they stood frozen in place.

Shenron's body began pouring continuously from the vortex.

Its winding dragon body, covered in jade-like scales, seemed endless.

Coiling across the sky again and again, it blotted out everything, leaving only a vast, boundless shadow.

A terror and reverence born from the most primal instincts of life crashed through everyone's mental defenses like a tsunami.

Before this dragon's world-destroying might, they felt smaller than even a speck of dust.

Only Lin Xuan remained standing quietly.

He raised his head and met those scarlet dragon eyes.

His gaze was as still as an ancient well.

The spiritual power of the Dust-Cleansing Realm allowed him to sense clearly.

Though Shenron appeared invincible, the essence of its power still lay within the framework of the laws of heaven and earth.

Powerful, but not beyond understanding.

Just then, a vast, majestic voice devoid of all emotion did not travel through the air.

Instead, it boomed directly within the depths of every survivor's mind.

"State your wish. Any wish can be granted, but only one."