The diamond-shaped crystal was clenched in his palm. Moments ago, it had been blasting blue light into the sky, threatening to overturn the entire Tenchi Bridge. Now it was as docile as a child who had just been beaten, without a trace of temper.
Goten turned his right hand over and glanced at the image reflected on the crystal's surface: deep beneath Konoha, the gap between the doors was still widening.
"Show off and run, huh?"
Ki surged from his palm, wrapping the crystal tightly in four layers. He stuffed it into his left trouser pocket. The right one had already burned away.
Yamato was still swaying from the old tree, his back collar caught on a branch. He looked no different from a dried salted fish, a strand of drool trailing from his mouth and fluttering in the wind. It was an utterly undignified sight.
Goten walked over, plucked him off the branch, and slung him back over his shoulder. Yamato's head knocked against his shoulder blade, and drool trickled inside his back collar.
"Yamato, if you keep drooling, I'm throwing you in the river as fish bait."
He pushed off with both feet, leaving a footprint crater half a meter deep, and shot straight up to an altitude of three thousand meters with Yamato, flying toward Konoha at full speed.
The shock wave pressed a straight, bare strip through the treetops below, sending leaves flying everywhere.
About three minutes into the flight, the man on his shoulder stirred.
Yamato's eyelids fluttered. He opened his eyes to a vast sea of clouds, an azure sky, and his own legs dangling in midair.
He shuddered and wrapped both arms tightly around Goten's neck, his voice rising until it cracked.
"W-w-w-why am I in the sky? Ninjas can't fly!"
"You can't.