An Unknown Earth in an Unknown Time
"At a glance… this doesn't look like man-made ruin."
Gohan shot into the sky and circled the planet several times. What he saw chilled him: no animals, no plants almost nothing alive in the oceans either. The landmasses looked as if they'd only just thawed; the ground was still a charred, umber black.
"Crap. Don't tell me I've landed right after an Ice Age."
A spark of dread. If he was right, he'd slipped unimaginably far into the past.
"Mr. Popo… he did say he'd lived through more than one extinction."
Gohan tried to find the Lookout from memory. With no landmarks, there was nothing to aim for. He couldn't even be sure there was a Lookout yet.
"Mr. Popo! Are you there? Heeey !"
He drew a lungful of air and bellowed, flooding his voice with ki until it rolled across the whole planet.
Silence. Not so much as an echo back.
"Great. Don't tell me this is before Mr. Popo ever came to Earth…"
He stood listening to the quiet a moment longer, then returned to his landing site and popped the time machine back into its capsule.
"Fine. If I can't find Popo, I'll find the Supreme Kai."
He closed his eyes and searched for the Sacred World's signature.
"Got you."
He vanished.
Sacred World of the Kais
A middle-aged man in a Supreme Kai's robes handsome features, righteous air was steeping tea in perfect peace when
Whip!
Gohan appeared out of thin air.
"Pfft !" The tea went everywhere.
"Who are you? How did you just… appear?" the man demanded, genuinely baffled no recognition of Instant Transmission in his eyes.
"I'm Son Gohan. Due to… circumstances, I fell into this timeline. I came to the Sacred World to ask the Supreme Kai to send me back to my own era."
The robes were familiar; Gohan knew who he was talking to.
The Kai's gaze sharpened. "How can that be? The Time King only just abdicated, and already the timeline is unstable?"
"The Time King?" Gohan blinked. A thought clicked. Don't tell me… the one who ruled before the Omni-King?
"I am Kashins, fifth-generation Supreme Kai of the Time King Era, first-generation Supreme Kai of the Omni-King Era," the god said. "Child, time travel is a capital crime. You'll come with me to face the Time King. How you're judged will be his decision."
Time King. Omni-King. Eras. A fresh Omni-King?
Gohan's stomach sank. He knew how serious time travel was. And if the Time King stood on the Omni-King's level… even in his awakened "mystic" state, he was only a hair beyond Super Saiyan 3. Facing someone like that now? No way to bluff it.
"Heh. You just said you're the first Supreme Kai of the Omni-King Era," Gohan said lightly. "Now you want to hand me to the Time King? Aren't you worried the Omni-King will… misunderstand?"
"You " Kashins realized he'd tripped himself.
"Relax. I'm not here to cause trouble," Gohan said, letting his ki settle, his intentions open. "In my timeline, I'm on the same side as the Supreme Kai, the God of Destruction, even the Angels. I just want to go home."
Kashins' eyes narrowed, then eased. He could feel the boy wasn't hostile.
"Very well. I won't report you yet. But you will explain exactly where you come from. And as for sending you back… I can't."
"Why? Don't the Supreme Kais use Time Rings to traverse eras?" Gohan asked, startled.
Kashins shook his head. "Perhaps someday. I don't have that authority now. You must be from the future. As for your 'God of Destruction,' that's only a proposal the Omni-King announced recently. In this universe, there is no Destroyer yet."
Gohan clenched his fists. Complicated didn't begin to cover it.
"So I've fallen into an ancient age."
"That's my guess. In your time, what year of the King's Era is it?" Kashins asked.
"The King's Era…?" Gohan searched his memory. At the start of the Tournament of Power, the Grand Priest had announced the date…
"About Year 3.1 billion, plus a few thousand days. I can't recall the exact count."
Kashins gave a rueful laugh. "We're only in Year Three."
"Not even a rounding error," Gohan muttered, stunned.
"Seems so."
"You called him the Time King. Who is he?" Gohan pressed.
"The Time King is the supreme being who created the eighteen universes," Kashins said, and told the story: how the cosmos began, the rules laid down by that first sovereign how every law across all eighteen universes bore his hand.
Eighteen. The Omni-King hadn't erased six yet.
"Then why appoint the Omni-King to rule?" Gohan asked.
"The Time King said he'd reached the peak and would break past this reality. He severed a sliver of his own consciousness and fashioned it into a new lifeform the Omni-King to govern in his stead."
"So… the Omni-King is the Time King?" Gohan asked.
"At first we thought so," Kashins said. "But it seems… different. The current Omni-King shows no joy or sorrow. In three short years he's erased many who opposed him. He's more like an innocent, uncomprehending child one everyone fears. That's why I said we should go before the Time King. The Omni-King's mind is… unfathomable."
"Didn't think the 'eraser' was always the eraser," Gohan murmured.
"'Eraser'?" Kashins frowned.
"Figure of speech. Go on."
"That's the gist. Your 'Destroyer' is merely a concept on the table."
"What about the Grand Priest?" Gohan asked.
"The Grand Priest? I've never heard of such a god," Kashins said.
"No Grand Priest… then what about the Angels?" Gohan tried.
"The Angelic race exists. They are beings formed directly from the Time King's rules attendants to the Omni-King," Kashins answered.
"So the Grand Priest just hasn't risen yet…"
"Are you implying the Grand Priest would come from the Angels?" Kashins' brow knit.
"Is that a problem?" Gohan asked at his expression.
"Son Gohan, you must come meet the Time King," Kashins said again, firmer.
"No."
"In this era, with the Time King present, all powers touching time and space are under his hand. Refuse, and you won't be going back," Kashins said evenly.
"…"
"Take heart," he added, seeing the boy's hesitation. "The Time King is benevolent. He created everything here with his own hand. Your arrival is an accident, nothing more. He won't harm you."
Gohan exhaled. "All right. I'll go." He had to if he wanted any chance of returning to his timeline.
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