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Ji Ming was dead.

Dead as a doornail.

A second ago, he had been pulling an all-nighter in his rental apartment, catching up on Dragon Ball Super. He had been trembling with excitement while watching the silver glow of Ultra Instinct on his screen. The next moment, his vision went black, and his consciousness felt as if it had been shoved into a washing machine—spinning, tearing, and rearranging violently.

When he opened his eyes again, the sky was a strange shade of blue.

No—it wasn't the sky. It was a patch of blue fractured by a canopy of leaves, carrying an eerie sense of oppression. The air was thick with the scent of damp earth and grass, mingled with a pungent metallic tang. The smell of his own blood.

Agonizing pain radiated from every corner of his body; every single bone in him seemed to be screaming.

"Urgh—" He tried to move, but only a milk-soft whimper escaped his throat.

Milk-soft?

Ji Ming's pupils contracted violently as he looked down at his hands. These weren't the steady, knobby hands that had spent ten years pounding on a keyboard. They were the hands of a toddler—smeared with blood, bruised and swollen, as small as a leaf.

His heart skipped a beat.

A chill, far more terrifying than the physical pain, raced up his spine. He fought to turn his head, his gaze sweeping over the surroundings. A purple hat with the character "Rice" printed on it lay in the grass not far away.

"Rice."

Dragon Ball.

Son Gohan.

Four years old.

Raditz's invasion of Earth.

Fifteen words exploded in his mind like fifteen thunderclaps. Ji Ming—no, he had to be Son Gohan now—froze in a pool of blood, his eyes threatening to burst from their sockets.

"Fuck..."

In the distance, the roar of energy blasts echoed like the heartbeat of the earth, rolling over him in waves. That was his father, Son Goku, and Piccolo, locked in a death match against the Saiyan Raditz.

The original plot. He knew it better than anyone.

In the original story, this four-year-old child would unleash terrifying combat potential, shattering Raditz's scouter with a single headbutt and turning the tide of the battle. But that was the original story. That was a manga. That was a story on paper, viewed through a screen, easily glossed over by a simple phrase like "plot armor."

But now?

The suffocating sensation of shattered ribs piercing his lungs was real. The iron-like taste of blood in his mouth was real. The killing intent radiating from Raditz, heavy enough to crush a man into a pancake, was a million times more real than any 4D equipment.

Ji Ming's brain worked at a fever pitch. Or rather, the brain of this Son Gohan, now fused with Ji Ming's soul, was burning at a speed far exceeding that of a four-year-old. Extreme terror, the absurdity of his transmigration, and over two decades of accumulated knowledge as a Dragon Ball fan twisted into a cold, sharp blade.

Survive.

He had to survive.

The "plot" was his only trump card. He knew Raditz's combat data, the weaknesses of the Saiyan armor, the fact that the scouter measured energy values rather than actual combat fluctuations, and that the Special Beam Cannon could pierce Raditz's defense.

But knowing was one thing.

What could a four-year-old with three broken ribs do with that knowledge?

"Ha... haha..." Blood bubbled from the corners of his mouth, yet he laughed. His expression was twisted, but his eyes were terrifyingly bright. The hardcore fan who had once spent thirty thousand words on a forum analyzing power levels had opened his eyes inside this child's body.

In the distance, Raditz stood with one foot pressed against Son Goku's chest, laughing wildly. Piccolo lay to the side, his right arm severed at the shoulder, his purple blood staining half his body. Raditz's scouter beeped rhythmically, displaying the power levels of the two "ants" before him, which hovered around four hundred.

"You really are a piece of trash, Kakarot." Raditz lifted his foot and ground it into Goku's wound. "Look at this pathetic display. You're a disgrace to the Saiyans."

Son Goku's face was buried in the mud, a low growl of frustration rumbling in his throat, but he couldn't even lift a finger.

Despair.

Utter, absolute despair.

Raditz savored this despair. He turned his head toward Piccolo: "Namekian, you're next. Once I'm done with you two, that brat—" He raised a hand, pointing his thumb toward where Ji Ming lay. "A little whelp with a power level of only 1. Crushing him will be easier than crushing an ant."

On the scouter, the number representing the toddler's power level was a 1.

That number hit Ji Ming's nerves like a needle.

Then, something he couldn't define—whether it was humiliation or rage—erupted from the deepest part of his heart. It was the innate battle spirit of the Saiyan bloodline, catalyzed into a raging inferno by the reason and pride of a modern man. He could no longer feel the pain; or rather, the pain had been burned away as fuel for this fire.

The four-year-old body began to tremble in the pool of blood.

It was not a tremble of fear.

It was a tremble of extreme intensity, pushed to the limit by his intellect, a sign that his power was about to explode.

Ji Ming controlled his breathing. He closed his eyes and sank his consciousness into his body. He wasn't Son Gohan; he was Ji Ming. He had studied every muscle line Akira Toriyama had drawn; he understood the theory of how "ki" functioned in the Dragon Ball world—a theoretical model analyzed by countless fans. Now, he would use this body to test that model.

He imagined the ki rising from his dantian, flowing through his meridians to every limb and bone.

Compress.

Compress it further.

Gather it into a ball, then detonate it.

"Ugh—AAAAAAH!!!"

A sharp, piercing scream erupted from the four-year-old's throat. It wasn't Son Gohan's roar; it was Ji Ming, using this body to let out his first howl at this damned world.

Raditz's scouter let out a shrill, piercing alarm.

Beep, beep, beep, beep—

The combat power value jumped frantically: 1... 5... 10... 71... 200... 534... 710!

"What?!" Raditz whipped around, a look of shock appearing on his face for the first time.

A mass of purple-black aura erupted from Gohan's body, the air pressure crushing the grass into a perfect circular pit. Gravel and soil sprayed outward, pelting the tree trunks with a rhythmic patter. Gohan's body rose into the air, not through controlled flight, but hoisted by the sheer force of this uncontrollable energy. His eyes were half-lidded, but his pupils glowed like red-hot coals, swirling with a calm, terrifying killing intent that did not belong to a four-year-old child.

Piccolo's eyes widened, his mouth agape, forgetting the pain of his severed arm.

Son Goku lifted his head from the mud, looking at his son with utter disbelief.

"Impossible! A mere whelp—" Raditz's trembling lasted only a second before being replaced by shame and rage. He abandoned Goku and strode toward Gohan. "With a fluctuation in combat power like that, I must kill you before you grow any further!"

The earth cracked beneath his feet; every step felt like a cannonball hitting the ground. Raditz moved so fast he left only afterimages, but as he reached a point ten meters from Gohan, the hovering child made a move that sent a chill down his spine.

Gohan lifted his head.

Then, the corners of his mouth curled into a smile.

It was not the innocent smile of a child, but the grin of a hunter locking onto prey—a mixture of excitement and cruelty.

"Just in time," Ji Ming said, using Gohan's voice.

Raditz had already thrown his punch, the immense power behind it carving through the air. But Gohan vanished, leaving behind only a fading afterimage of purple aura.

Raditz's punch struck empty air, his pupils shrinking to pinpricks.

His scouter reported position changes frantically—upper left, lower left, behind, directly above—so fast that even the machine struggled to lock onto him.

This was impossible.

A four-year-old child couldn't possibly understand combat techniques.

But he wasn't facing an ordinary child at all. The moment Ji Ming took control of this body, he had already begun calculating his combat strategy. The body was too small and lacked sufficient power; a direct confrontation would be suicide. But he knew all of Raditz's weaknesses, including the Saiyan's most fatal dependency: his scouter.

"Where are you looking?"

The voice descended from directly above.

Raditz jerked his head up, only to be met by two small fists wrapped in every ounce of available strength. Gohan plummeted like a cannonball, his fists slamming heavily into the bridge of Raditz's nose.

BOOM—

A deep crater exploded into the ground. Raditz was driven into the dirt, the bridge of his nose emitting a crisp cracking sound as blood sprayed out.

"Argh—you little bastard!" Raditz swung his arm in a violent, enraged sweep, but it hit nothing. Gohan had already used the recoil to spring away, landing steadily on a rock ten meters out, his heavy breathing betraying the limits of his stamina.

He had used up most of his energy in that single strike.

Raditz crawled out of the pit, his face covered in blood, his expression as hideous as a vengeful spirit. He stared intently at the child on the rock, setting aside his contempt for the first time.

This whelp was not right.

Something was very wrong.

"You are not a normal Saiyan whelp." Raditz wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, his eyes sinister. "This combat power, these combat techniques—what exactly are you?"

Ji Ming panted heavily, every part of his body screaming with intense pain and exhaustion. Yet, his mind was clearer and more exhilarated than ever before. He watched Raditz's disheveled state—the Saiyan who had once existed only on screens and in data files was now standing right in front of him, bleeding and gripped by fear.

This was the world of Dragon Ball.

This was the place where he had to survive.

"Me?" The small figure cast a long shadow under the setting sun.

"Just a high-level player passing through."

His voice was soft, yet it caused Raditz's scouter to burst into another ear-piercing alarm.

It was a warning that the threat level had reached "Extreme Danger."