The Guardian's Growth

Just after breakfast, Chi-Chi stood on the stone steps at the entrance to Mount Paozu, clutching a densely written list in her hand. She still had her apron on, and steam from the bamboo steamer lingered in her hair, but the gentle focus she had shown while making breakfast was gone. In its place was a "commander-in-chief mode" that made both Son Goku and Ji Ming instinctively take half a step back.

"Gohan's family is coming back to Mount Paozu tomorrow for a week. I've already cleaned Pan's room, aired out the bedding three times, and replaced the window screens." She tapped the first item on the list with her fingertip, then traced downward. "The Saiyan delegation from Universe 6 will arrive at the end of the month. Caulifla and Kale specifically asked to stay at Mount Paozu instead of the West City hotel Bulma arranged. I've redone the guest rooms, but Caulifla said she wanted to sleep on tatami mats when she came last time, so we need another set of bedding."

"Didn't she also say she wanted tempura last time?" Son Goku cut in.

"Tempura is on the menu, third item." Chi-Chi flipped to the next page. "The first item is refreshments for the signing ceremony—Bulma said the Supreme Kai of Universe 6 will be coming too, so the snacks can't just have Earth flavors. I asked Piccolo to find out what ingredients from Namek would be suitable. The second item is the buffet for the opening ceremony of New Vegeta City's Gravity Chamber. King Vegeta's side said Saiyans love meat, so I've listed six kinds of grilled meat, but Bulma said your dad has been watching his blood lipids lately, so we need to add a few low-fat dishes. The third item is Caulifla's tempura, and the fourth is specially for Kale—she mentioned last time that she wanted to try Earth desserts, so I'm planning to make strawberry daifuku. The fifth item..."

"Wait." Ji Ming finally caught a piece of information in Chi-Chi's rapid-fire speech that he had known absolutely nothing about. "The Supreme Kai of Universe 6 is coming? A signing ceremony? What are they signing?"

"You didn't know?" Chi-Chi finally looked up from her list, her tone carrying a trace of displeasure. "Bulma sent you a document last night. You said you'd read it after breakfast. So you really didn't read it."

Ji Ming looked down at the still-flashing unread-message icon on his wristband and silently opened it. The title of Bulma's message was <Strategic Cooperation Agreement Between Universe 7 and Universe 6 (Draft)>. The body ran for more than a dozen pages, covering bilateral military assistance, Saiyan cultural exchanges, technology sharing, joint Gravity Chamber research, and one clause that made Ji Ming raise his eyebrows—"Article 7: At the special request of Lord Champa, God of Destruction of Universe 6, Universe 7 agrees to export a batch of organic agricultural products directly supplied by the Mount Paozu farm to Universe 6 every year. Varieties include, but are not limited to, pumpkins, radishes, strawberries, and other crops designated for cultivation by Ms. Chi-Chi."

"Champa wants us to export pumpkins?" Just as Ji Ming read that line aloud, Vegeta pushed open the door to retrieve the gloves he had left on the dining table. Hearing the word "pumpkins," he paused, then gave Ji Ming an exceedingly subtle look.

"Piccolo has competition now." After saying that, Vegeta picked up his gloves, turned, and walked out, casually closing the door behind him.

Chi-Chi ignored the interruption and continued down her list. From the lodging and meals for the Universe 6 delegation to the menu for New Vegeta City's opening ceremony; from Dende's healing technique training plan to the extra lunches for Goten and Trunks, whose final exams were about to begin; from the schedule for regularly delivering vegetables to Tien Shinhan and Chiaotzu to the support bento boxes for Mr. Satan's new movie premiere—her list spanned at least five entirely different fields, yet she changed topics faster than Bulma's computational array. As Ji Ming listened, he suddenly realized something: Dende had indeed mentioned earlier that he wanted to compile a general textbook on healing techniques so that the medical teams of Namek and Earth could learn from one another. But Dende himself was not especially skilled at breaking complicated healing techniques down into steps that laypeople could understand, so Son Gohan had ultimately taken the lead on the project, working with Dende, Nail, and Piccolo. Now, the textbook was finally complete, and Bulma had arranged the launch event at Capsule Corp headquarters in West City.

"There'll be a symposium after the textbook launch." Chi-Chi stuffed a printed schedule into Ji Ming's hand. "Bulma said she hopes you'll attend, because one chapter in the textbook specifically covers the combined application of Saiyan near-death recovery mechanisms and healing techniques. That section cites your combat data from the Tournament of Power. She wants you to prepare your speech in advance."

Ji Ming looked down at the circled date on the schedule. Before he could say anything, Chi-Chi had already turned to the next page of her list.

At lunchtime, Son Gohan arrived early with Videl and Pan—because Pan had heard that her grandmother had made fresh strawberry daifuku for her, and she had been pestering them about it since morning, to the point that Son Gohan had even cut his morning training short. Pan had now grown taller than Chi-Chi's knees. With two little pigtails in her hair, the first thing she did upon entering was throw herself at Chi-Chi, and the second was throw herself at the strawberry daifuku on the table. She grabbed one in each tiny hand, took a bite from the left and then the right, and puffed out her cheeks like a hamster. Son Gohan stood in the doorway, laughing so hard at his daughter's face covered in glutinous rice flour that his shoulders shook.

While wiping Pan's face, Chi-Chi announced even more startling news to Ji Ming: "After the next Universe 6 delegation leaves, she plans to take Pan to Universe 6 for a visit. When Champa came for dinner last time, he said he wanted to invite Chi-Chi to open a short-term Earth cuisine training course in Universe 6, teaching the local Saiyans basic cooking—he thinks the Saiyans of Universe 6 are improving their fighting power quickly, but their diet is still stuck at the level of military compressed rations, which is seriously hurting morale."

"You're going to Universe 6?" Ji Ming put down his chopsticks. Up to this point in her life, Chi-Chi had never even left Earth. The farthest she had ever been was North City. Yet when he looked toward Son Goku, the father who had fought alongside him from the battlefields of the Human Revolutionary Union Empire to the Tournament of Power merely scratched his head and said that if Chi-Chi wanted to go, they would take her—there was a dedicated wormhole passage now anyway. For once, Vegeta did not pour cold water on the idea. He simply folded his arms and snorted, saying that the Saiyans of Universe 6 really did need to improve their diet—when Caulifla had come last time, she had not even known how to pick up sushi with chopsticks. It would be downright embarrassing for Saiyans if that got out. Watching them, Ji Ming realized that his family was each growing into something new.

The launch event for the general healing technique textbook was held as scheduled at Capsule Corp headquarters in West City. Son Gohan stood at the podium, with an enormous holographic projection screen behind him displaying the basic energy circulation pathways of healing techniques. Medical representatives from various universes sat below—elders from Namek, Saiyan military doctors from Universe 6, and even a technical observation delegation personally led by the Supreme Kai of Universe 12. Son Gohan began with the fundamental principles of healing techniques, speaking at an unhurried pace and occasionally inserting clinical cases to illustrate how different constitutions responded differently to healing techniques. When he reached the chapter on "Combined Application of Saiyan Near-Death Recovery Mechanisms and Healing Techniques," he cited the data curve of Ji Ming recovering his fighting power after taking a heavy blow from Jiren during the Tournament of Power. Low murmurs spread through the audience. Ji Ming sat in the front row, watching his son speak with confidence onstage, and suddenly remembered how Son Gohan had blushed when speaking to the Supreme Kai during his first Tournament of Power years ago. The curve of his lips slowly deepened.

A few days after returning from the launch event, Chi-Chi set off with Son Goku through the dedicated wormhole passage to Universe 6, carrying her lesson plans and several insulated containers packed to the brim. Caulifla and Kale greeted them at the exit of the passage. Caulifla was still barefoot, while Kale hugged a notebook to her chest. News of Chi-Chi's cooking class at the Universe 6 Saiyan base quickly spread throughout the entire base. The first session filled up that very day, forcing Cabba to urgently add two more sessions. Son Goku led the Saiyans of Universe 6 in combat training, connecting the portable Gravity Chamber model brought from Earth to Universe 6's power system. On her first day inside, Caulifla was nearly crushed to her knees by one hundred times gravity, but she gritted her teeth, climbed back up, and kept training. As she cursed, she shouted about how many beatings Ji Ming had taken in the basement and whether old Veggie, with that stiff face of his, got coffee force-fed to him by his wife every day. Partway through training, Kale's berserk form was triggered, and her wild green aura exploded outward out of control. Caulifla was just about to protect the trainees nearby when Son Goku had already entered Ultra Instinct and stood before all the students. After his silver-white aura deflected the entirety of Kale's berserk shockwave, he softly told her—he would teach her how to control it.

The guardians of the two universes stood side by side beneath the starry sky on a mountain ridge, watching the bonfires in the distant camp and the Saiyan trainees singing around them. Ji Ming remembered that when he had first heard the name Universe 6 at Kami's Lookout, it had been nothing more than a vague coordinate. Now, it finally had Chi-Chi's cooking classes, Caulifla's constant swearing, and groups of young Saiyans singing around bonfires. Son Goku stood beside him with a blade of grass between his teeth, watching the flames. Slowly spitting out the grass, he said the training grounds here were pretty good, and that they could bring Vegeta next time. Ji Ming could not help curling his lips. That was probably the highest praise possible between Saiyans.

A month later, when all the events had concluded, Chi-Chi returned to Mount Paozu with a huge pile of local specialties from Universe 6 and a stack of cooking notebooks filled with messages of thanks from her students. She stored the notebooks on the top shelf of the kitchen cabinet, together with the repair order for the first Gravity Chamber Vegeta had broken, the draft of the wedding speech Master Roshi had written for Krillin, and the sencha recipe Whis had left behind. Once, when Ji Ming happened to open that cabinet to get some tea leaves, he saw the shelf crammed full of those things and finally understood—Chi-Chi had never been part of the background of this world. She simply protected the people and things she wanted to protect, in the way she herself had chosen. And the wind of Mount Paozu passed through the pine forest and over the giant boulders, carrying the aroma of stew drifting from the kitchen into the hearts of everyone seated at the table, waiting for the meal to begin, just as it always had.