Vitelli's heart sank.
Popo delivered the Guardian's message.
King Piccolo had been freed. Goku was fighting him.
The Guardian wanted Vitelli to kill Piccolo and accept the position of Earth's Guardian.
The news hit Vitelli like a boulder thrown into a calm lake.
He trusted that Goku could beat Piccolo… but leaving Bulma unprotected still made him uneasy.
What if the battle spilled into West City?
As for the Guardian's throne…
No thanks. He didn't want it.
He turned to Whis with a serious request.
"I need to go back to Earth immediately. Please take me."
"Ho ho ho~"
Whis set down his teacup, smiling gently with a hint of mischief.
"Vitelli-san really does dote on Bulma. But these few days are a little—"
He glanced toward Beerus's palace.
Right then, Bulma's voice chimed in sweetly through the screen, like a casual complaint:
"Oh dear. With Vitelli gone I got bored and invited the top chefs on Earth to the estate… and then I got carried away and had them make a huge, once-in-a-lifetime feast! Fugu sashimi, dinosaur ribs, rainbow pudding… I can't even remember all the names! I can't possibly finish it alone. If it spoils or has to be thrown away, what a waste… I'm so troubled!"
Each word landed perfectly on Whis's weak spot.
Whis's eyes lit up like a volcano.
His refined composure cracked; he swallowed.
He laughed eagerly and stood at once, staff spinning.
"Ah-la-la~ Vitelli-san is right. Earth matters a great deal to you. As your caring teacher, how could I stand by? Let's go at once!"
The shift was so fast and shameless that Vitelli's mouth twitched.
Even Popo's eye corner seemed to twitch.
"Oracle Fish-san, please mind the house," Whis called lightly.
Then he whisked Vitelli away in a blur.
Behind a rock, the Oracle Fish heard all of it, rolled its eyes, and muttered,
"Hmph. So noble, huh? You're just baited by food. Fake. …Hope he remembers to bring me something back…"
Then—
BOOOOM—!!
A deep, piercing blast shook the Destruction Realm's palace.
The whole realm trembled.
The Oracle Fish's face went white.
"Oh no—Lord Beerus?! He woke up now?!"
It vanished instantly.
In the vast cosmos, Whis carried Vitelli at unimaginable speed.
Stars stretched into brilliant trails.
Galaxies folded backward.
Suddenly Whis stopped dead.
His easy smile vanished into rare, weary annoyance.
"Ah-la…"
He frowned, sensing the familiar, furious wake-up aura from the realm's core.
"He woke up at this timing…"
Vitelli steadied himself, puzzled.
"What is it, Whis?"
Whis weighed things quickly, then looked at Vitelli.
"Vitelli-san… you know Instant Transmission, yes? Teleporting long distances by sensing ki?"
"Yes."
Whis spoke faster:
"We're close enough to Earth now. With your strength and control, you can teleport the rest of the way. Please return on your own."
He grew more serious.
"Tell Bulma-san to preserve that feast carefully. I will bring a very troublesome… god to taste it soon. This concerns Earth's survival. She must take it seriously."
Vitelli's heart jolted.
Beerus is coming to Earth?!
He understood instantly why Whis was sending him ahead.
He nodded firmly.
"I understand."
He pressed two fingers to his forehead, expanded his senses like a net, and locked onto a familiar ki—
Goku.
"Then I'm going!"
Flash—Vitelli vanished.
Whis watched him go, sighed, then turned back toward the Destruction Realm.
"Ho ho ho~ Time to pacify that temperamental god. Let's hope Bulma-san's food can tame his anger."
He streaked back, returning to calm the newly awakened Beerus.
On Earth, at Goku's battlefield with King Piccolo:
The blue glare of a Kamehameha reflected on Goku's youthful face—and on Piccolo's twisted old green features.
"Kamehame… HAA!!"
A huge beam surged toward an exhausted, cornered Piccolo.
Death swallowed him.
"Wait!! You can't kill me!"
Piccolo howled.
"I'm one with the Guardian! If I die, he dies too! Earth will lose its Guardian!"
That was his last card.
Goku blinked, curious, and kept firing.
"What's a Guardian? Can you eat it?"
"HA!!"
The beam intensified.
Piccolo despaired.
This kid didn't care at all!
Just freed, about to die again—by Mutaito's student's student?
He shut his eyes, resigned. He was too old and weak even to spit out a revenge egg…
At that instant—
A figure appeared like a ghost in front of him, perfectly in the beam's path.
Vitelli had just teleported in and was hit by the oncoming torrent.
"Goku… I just got back and this is my welcome?"
Vitelli's mind flashed a ridiculous thought—is he mad I didn't take him to the Destruction Realm?—but his hand moved calmly.
He raised his right palm and flicked the Kamehameha aside like brushing away a fly.
No blast.
No shockwave.
The beam bent ninety degrees, roaring into the sky, blasting so far it shoved the moon out of the way.
"…Uh."
Vitelli swore he didn't mean to.
He glanced at the displaced moon, then looked down at stunned Piccolo.
He raised a brow, amused.
"Well if it isn't old Piccolo. Haven't seen you in a while—looking rough."
He understood what he'd interrupted: Goku's finishing blow.
"Vitelli?!"
Goku finally recognized him, eyes wide with joy.
"You came back?! And you just swatted my Kamehameha away… that was awesome!"
He wasn't even mad his enemy got "saved"—he was thrilled at Vitelli's power.
Piccolo, after the violent plunge from hell to heaven, recovered his senses.
His shock turned into frantic, swollen greed.
"Uwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!!"
He laughed even harder than before.
"I knew I couldn't die that easily! Fate favors me!"
He straightened up and looked down on Vitelli.
"Boy! I don't know who you are, but you saved the great Demon King! Kill the brat for me, and when I rule this world, you'll be second only to me!"
Vitelli stared at him like he was brain-dead.
He couldn't help asking,
"Old man… are you always this bold? Who gave you the nerve to talk to me like that? Liang Jingru?! Huh?!"
Vitelli pulled a green Senzu Bean from a Capsule box and tossed it.
"Here. Recognize this? Eat it."
A Senzu Bean?!
Piccolo's eyes glittered with greed.
He grabbed it and swallowed immediately.
Life energy exploded through his dried-out body.
Bones snapped back into place. Wounds sealed. Wrinkles eased.
"Power! My power is back! Hahaha!"
Confidence surged into madness.
He glared at Vitelli, now with ferocity.
"Boy! You gave me a bean, but your disrespect—"
He raised his hands, energy gathering. He was about to turn on Vitelli.
Before he could finish—
Vitelli was in front of him.
A steel grip locked around his throat.
Piccolo froze.
His renewed strength felt like an infant's in that hand.
No struggle, no aura burst moved Vitelli's fingers even slightly.
Choking terror flooded him.
Vitelli's voice was ice.
"…Spit. Out. An egg."
Piccolo's eyes bulged. He understood it wasn't a request—it was a command.
"Damn you—!"
Survival overrode everything.
Piccolo fired a zero-distance Demon King Piercing Cannon into Vitelli's chest.
A purple explosion devoured them.
"Vitelli!" Goku shouted, alarmed.
The smoke cleared.
Vitelli stood steady.
Not a hair out of place.
The beam had felt like a breeze.
His free hand was even busy casually pinching Goku's cheek as if nothing happened.
"Spit. Out. An egg."
Vitelli repeated calmly.
Piccolo broke.
In the face of absolute power, all his hatred and schemes meant nothing.
He nodded, humiliated.
Vitelli loosened the choke but kept a hand clamped on Piccolo's shoulder to prevent any tricks.
Piccolo's abdomen convulsed and swelled.
"Gah… AHHH!!"
With a wretched scream, he forced a huge, slimy, green-glowing demon egg out of his mouth.
The egg shot into the sky as a streak of green light and vanished.
Vitelli glanced after it.
He was too lazy to chase. He knew that was future Piccolo.
"Alright. Task complete."
Piccolo sagged, older again from the effort.
Vitelli didn't wait.
A golden point formed on his fingertip.
"Pfft!"
A piercing ray punched through Piccolo's forehead.
The Demon King's eyes froze—hatred, fear, disbelief—then went dark.
The tyrant who once drowned the world in darkness lay dead.
Vitelli withdrew his finger like he'd crushed an ant.
He turned to the still-stunned Goku with a smile.
"I'm heading back. Bulma's probably been waiting for me. You coming to West City? She made a feast."
Goku scratched his head, grinning.
"Nah! Master Roshi and Krillin are waiting for me. I'll visit later—save me some food!"
He called the Flying Nimbus, waved, and zipped away as a golden streak.
Vitelli didn't linger.
He shot into the sky at Nimbus-crushing speed toward West City.
He had to hurry—Beerus was almost there.
At minimum, Bulma couldn't be allowed to slap the God of Destruction like in the original story.
Still…
With his current mastery of godly ki, he was sure that given a few more years, if he couldn't beat Beerus outright, he could at least fight him evenly.
And then…
Heh.
High above, at the Lookout:
The Guardian had watched everything.
His wrinkled green face twisted with shock, confusion, faint dread, and deep relief.
"So… it's over?"
He murmured, as if dreaming.
His imagined sacrifice, the tragic mutual annihilation—none of it happened.
King Piccolo had been toyed with like a puppet by Vitelli.
What chilled him most was Vitelli forcing Piccolo to spit out an egg.
"How did he know that secret?"
The Guardian couldn't understand.
I never told him Piccolo and I share one origin. So why…?
He had learned something else too.
Popo had barely arrived before Vitelli returned.
This was a man who loved his wife.
Either way, the worst threat was gone.
The Guardian frowned at the vanished egg—future trouble, surely.
But for now, the crisis was ended.
He exhaled like a hundred-year burden had lifted.
"Popo," he spoke through telepathy, lighter than ever.
"King Piccolo has been dealt with by Vitelli. Return to the Lookout."
After that message, he quietly decided to shelve his earlier plan to pass on the title.
"The Guardian's seat…"
He looked down at Earth, a flicker of attachment in his cloudy eyes.
Vitelli is too young. Strong, yes… but his temperament still needs tempering.
And he may not want the job at all. This burden… let this old man carry it a few more years.
He found himself a dignified way down from the ledge.