The nine contestants' scores came up quickly.
Sakura had the highest score of anyone — even the current Supreme Kai of Time Kuronoa scored two points below her, and the blue-haired big cute girl Aeos scored more than ten points below her. All three were in the high range. No. 16 and Black-clothed Piccolo passed. The remaining four all failed.
Fortunately, Xiaofang's score was close to the passing line, and Kuronoa's score was high enough that, once averaged together, the Time Patrol squeaked through.
"How embarrassing. So this is the team the current Supreme Kai of Time has been leading? Hmph — a worthless leader breeds worthless followers." Aeos's team had only placed second in the first round. The ranking itself meant nothing going forward, but she stepped up anyway and gave Kuronoa a thorough lashing.
The current Supreme Kai of Time remained unmoved. "All three factions have passed the first round of the Super Space-Time Championship. Shall we take a break?"
"Of course."
"Yes — my side needs to rest."
Aeos and Ino replied at the same time.
Examinations were brutally draining. On Ino's side, Sakura and No. 16 wouldn't be competing in the second round, but Future Gohan needed to recuperate. The Gohans on the other two sides looked like they'd be fighting in the second round's martial arts bout as well — a Saiyan without energy can't maintain a Super Saiyan transformation.
Saiyans had no meditation technique for recovering stamina — not that they needed one. Find a spot, lie down for a bit, and the energy comes flooding back on its own.
All three factions went quiet, each retreating to their own area to rest and recover.
...
Sixth Universe.
No. 18 and Krillin, instruments in hand, touched down carefully on a planet that looked to be fairly prosperous. Kibito hovered nearby, eyes darting every which way, nervously keeping watch.
The three of them had slipped over here quietly to search for Majin Buu.
Majin Buu was like a thorn lodged in Shin's throat. Until he saw the Majin die with his own eyes, the Supreme Kai simply couldn't rest easy.
Ino had taken her group off to the Super Space-Time Championship — the Grand Minister and the Angels knew about it, but the Supreme Kai did not. Shin had gone to West Kai's Planet to find backup, only to come up empty. No. 18 was the only one he found.
After a brief conversation, he hired No. 18 to stand in for him, heading to the Sixth Universe with Kibito to scout out any trace of the Majin.
No. 18 had been at loose ends anyway — fielding calls all day, bored out of her mind. A bit of extra income suited her just fine.
Her best partner for something like this would have been No. 17, but these past few days No. 17 had gotten acquainted with some Earth beauty and the two of them had been practically glued together, looking ready to march down to the registry office and get married on the spot.
No. 18 hadn't gone over to make things awkward. Even now, some people still assumed she and No. 17 were a couple — what kind of nonsense was that? They were twins. Fraternal twins, at that.
Pulling No. 17 away from a new relationship just for a scouting mission? Not worth it. No. 18 decided she'd handle it herself.
The problem was — how do you find a single Majin in the vast expanse of the Sixth Universe?
After reaching out to various contacts, they learned that Bulma back on Earth had spent some time studying Majin cells. Dr. Hedo — Dr. Gero's grandson — had given her plenty of good ideas, and by the time Shin and Kibito arrived, she had already used the Dragon Ball Radar as a conceptual blueprint to engineer a high-tech Majin Radar.
The device had a tracking function. Switch it on, and anything not too far away would show up.
Son Goku was a little worried about Krillin's safety and felt the mission was too risky, but Krillin volunteered anyway, insisting on going with No. 18 to carry out the reconnaissance.
His reasoning: Saiyans' energy was simply too enormous. Even when carefully suppressed, an experienced martial artist could still pick up on something — hide ninety-nine percent of battle power in the hundreds of billions, and you've still got a hundred million left over. His own few hundred thousand? Easy to conceal. An enemy wouldn't notice a thing. No. 18 went without saying — Androids have no energy signature at all.
The two of them were the safest choice for this job.
Son Goku wasn't so dense he couldn't see what was going on. Anyone with eyes could tell Krillin had feelings for No. 18. There was no way Goku could offer to go instead — what was he supposed to say? Step aside, I'll take your place with 18? That was a one-way ticket to losing his oldest friend.
Kibito quietly ferried the two of them to the Sixth Universe, hopping from transmission to transmission, closing in on the Majin's position step by step.
...
"Baldy — look over there. That's what you people call the Majin, isn't it?" No. 18 had been training for three years. Her battle power was now on par with Perfect Form Cell, which had given her a nerve to match — she was conducting this reconnaissance mission in a style that was one step away from walking right up to Majin Buu and pressing her face against his.
Krillin followed the direction of her finger — and felt his heart clench.
Majin Buu no longer looked like a woman. Judging by the clothing, he looked somewhat like a Namekian.
His body moved like putty — rapid, writhing undulations — before he launched himself and splattered against Frost's face. A startled cry rang out, and then Buu had absorbed the Sixth Universe's Universe Peace Prize winner.
He moved so fast that the two scouts and Kibito couldn't follow the motion clearly. Frost was simply gone.
"Strange — why no change?" Majin Buu stood in place and waited, but found no transformation occurring anywhere in his body.
"Was this guy just too weak?" He couldn't work it out, and eventually couldn't help bursting into laughter.
The Sixth Universe really was a wonderful place. No enemies of any particular strength, and complete and utter chaos everywhere you looked. He'd been drifting around for some time now, and not only had he fully recovered his peak-era power — the tentacle on top of his head was nearly three feet long by now, proof that the stronger a Majin gets, the longer that appendage grows — his battle power had climbed even higher than before.
"Ha ha ha ha—" He let loose a roar of utterly unbridled laughter.
"Heh. What a fool — all power and no brains. Too easy to trick." A faint white luminous barrier rippled outward from Frieza's body. He had used a pure-energy shield to sever himself from Majin Buu's absorption ability. The enormous cocoon opened its maw like a Venus flytrap, inhaling repeatedly — three times in a row — without drawing in so much as a single scrap of energy, and then simply deflated on its own.
The Majin never noticed a thing. Frieza strolled through his interior as if taking a leisurely walk through his own back garden.
Frieza had already come to recognize the immense potential locked inside himself — the trouble was that he was currently half-mechanical, and no matter how hard he trained, a metal body offered precious little room for battle power growth.
The matter grated on him terribly.
He had tracked down the Namekians in the Sixth Universe as well, but that avenue had gone nowhere — those people simply did not know how to create Dragon Balls. Frieza had been left with no choice but to have his subordinates cultivate his own cells, attempting to replace his half-mechanical body with flesh and blood once more.
That experiment had barely gotten off the ground when Majin Buu and Zamasu came knocking.
Frieza had witnessed Majin Buu absorbing the strong. The Majin's incomparably powerful cellular regeneration ability stirred something in him — and so, turning the situation to his own advantage, he played along and allowed himself to be drawn inside.
____
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