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Piccolo's voice cracked with a mixture of disbelief and fury. "Gohan! How could it be Gohan!" He turned his gaze toward the screen, his internal Ki fluctuating wildly. "Goku! You're actually sending your own son to his death!"
Seeing Son Goku's chosen candidate, Piccolo, who acted more like Gohan's mentor and surrogate father, couldn't hold back his indignation. He had assumed Goku would step aside for Vegeta or perhaps the future warrior Trunks. He never imagined that Goku would willingly thrust his own child into the path of a monster like Cell.
"Exactly, Goku! What are you thinking?!" Chi-Chi screamed, her voice reaching a pitch that could shatter glass. "How can you let Gohan fight!" She was practically hyperventilating. If she weren't currently miles away from Goku, she would have lunged at him, grabbing him by the gi to lecture him on basic parenting. Was this how a father acted? To force his young son to face an apex predator that threatened the entire solar system?
Across the Wanjie Multiverse, countless viewers were equally stunned. Even though they had witnessed Gohan's power growing, he was still just a childâbarely ten years old. It was one thing for a desperate world to draft a child, but it was another entirely for his biological father to be the one to nominate him.
If Gohan proved to be no match for Cell, Goku wasn't just losing a fight; he was personally signing his son's death warrant. Many viewers asked themselves if they could ever make such a cold calculation with their own flesh and blood. The answer for most was a resounding no.
"Piccolo, Chi-Chi, don't get too agitated yet," Goku's voice appeared in the chat, calm and steady as always. "Since I've made this choice, it means I believe Gohan is the only one who can actually defeat Cell."
"But even you couldn't beat him!" Piccolo shot back. "How could Gohan possibly do it? He only recently mastered the basic Super Saiyan transformation!"
"Goku! I forbid it!" Chi-Chi's message flashed rapidly. "I won't let Gohan do something so dangerous! Krillin, Yamcha, you have to find Dr. Gero right now! Do not let him finish creating that monster!"
Watching the exchange, Akira felt a wave of empathy for Chi-Chi. As a transmigrator who had seen the series from the outside, he used to find her overbearing and annoying. But as he grew older and more tactical in his thinking, he understood her. To a mother, her child isn't a "weapon of Earth" or a "Saviour of the Multiverse"âthey are just her child.
However, Akira still found some of her logic baffling. He recalled her worrying that Gohan wouldn't get into a good school if he spent too much time saving the world. He couldn't help but chuckle; surely "Saved the Universe" was a decent extracurricular activity for a college application?
"Piccolo, take a breath," Krillin chimed in, trying to play peacemaker. "Don't forget Gohan's hidden potential. Based on what we've seen, his raw power might already exceed Goku's. And Chi-Chi, don't worryâthis hasn't actually happened in our timeline yet."
"Exactly," Yamcha added. "Goku loves Gohan. He wouldn't send him in there unless he was 100% sure Gohan has a secret weapon or a level of power we haven't sensed yet."
"Even if Gohan is stronger than Goku, the gap between Goku and Cell is a canyon," Piccolo argued. "Being slightly stronger isn't enough."
Suddenly, a comment from Fleet Admiral Sengoku shifted the perspective of the entire multiverse. "By the way... is it possible that the one who achieves 'Super Saiyan 2' isn't Goku, but Gohan?"
The realization hit the chat like a shockwave. "Hiss~ Now that you mention it, it's entirely possible," Kakashi replied, his tactical mind immediately connecting the dots.
"So, Gohan felt his father wasn't that impressive because he was already looking at a level beyond him?" Uchiha Sasuke mused. "That explains his lack of intimidation."
"That's it! Sasuke, you're a genius!" Naruto cheered.
"It's a basic deduction, Naruto," Sasuke sighed. "Only someone with your brain wouldn't have seen it coming."
"Hey, don't feel bad," Sanji interjected. "Our captain Luffy wouldn't have caught that either."
"Huh? What did I do?" Luffy's confused reaction popped up, likely while he was mid-snack.
"So the next step is Gohan ascending to Super Saiyan 2 and crushing Cell?" Li Xinnan, the Armor Summoner, asked.
"That seems to be the narrative flow," Duanmu Yan agreed. "But honestly, I thought Goku was going to nominate Krillin. I figured he'd send Krillin to his death to trigger his own anger and force the transformation. It worked against Frieza, after all."
The chat went silent for a moment as people processed the sheer ruthlessness of that suggestion. Akira rolled his eyes; he had seen those "Scumbag Goku" memes in his old world, but the real Goku would never sacrifice a friend like that.
"These are all just guesses," Piccolo muttered, still unconvinced. "What if Gohan gets beaten to a pulp? What if Goku has to watch his son die before he finds the strength to transform? I still don't approve of this gamble."
Piccolo knew that even if the plan worked, the psychological trauma on a ten-year-old would be immense. He looked at the screen with a grim resolve. He didn't care about the "proper" way to win a martial arts tournament. In reality, he would hunt down Dr. Gero and destroy Cell in his test tube before he ever let this video become a reality.