In Dragon Ball: A brutal beating of Frieza at the start

Page 89

The scene shifts, and Lin Ye sees a group of figures in white robes constructing something. The technology they use far surpasses human comprehension, weaving spacetime itself into a complex structure.

"The system prototype is complete," a young woman reported, "but we need a host, a life form that can survive in the spacetime rift."

Begin searching for compatible units. The old man gave the order: the Machine Gods have breached the seventh defensive perimeter; we don't have much time left.

Suddenly, the alarm blared.

"They've found us!" someone exclaimed.

In the footage, a giant mechanical tentacle bursts through the laboratory wall. People in white coats urgently activate some device, launching the core system into space...

Lin Ye was jolted back to reality, drenched in sweat. That memory felt so real, as if he had experienced it himself.

The system was originally created to fight against the Machine Gods... he muttered to himself, but what happened next?

The mechanical heart suddenly began to pound violently, and a stream of encrypted data was injected directly into Lin Ye's consciousness. He collapsed to his knees in agony, feeling the information flooding into his brain like a torrent.

[Initial Protocol Unlocked]

Mission Objective: Prevent the Machine Gods from invading spacetime.

[WARNING: The current system version has been modified; some functions are restricted]

[Key Information: Searching for the Watcher of Time]

Lin Ye, panting heavily, processed this information: The Watcher of Time...who is that?

There was no answer. The mechanical heartbeat grew weaker and weaker, and the black data link tightened. Lin Ye knew he had to leave.

Just then, the entire space shook violently once more. The ceiling cracked open, and countless black spikes rained down like a storm!

Lin Ye rolled to dodge, but there were too many spikes and they were too dense. One spike pierced his shoulder, without drawing blood, but it brought an indescribable pain on a data-level scale—as if a virus had been injected directly into his consciousness.

Malicious program intrusion detected

[System defense mechanism activated]

The familiar system notification sounded, but this time it was the same clear, distinct tone. The Blade of Time within Lin Ye's body automatically activated, forming a protective barrier.

"Bulma! Pull me out!" Lin Ye shouted, while desperately retreating back the way he came.

There was no response. Communication was cut off.

The black spikes coalesced into a gigantic humanoid shadow, devoid of facial features, except for two purple dots that resembled eyes. It reached out and grabbed at Lin Ye.

"You shouldn't be here, host." The shadowy voice sounded like countless people speaking at once: "The system belongs to us."

Lin Ye barely managed to raise the Blade of Time to block, but the shadow's power was astonishing. Cracks began to appear on the blade.

"Who are you?" Lin Ye asked through gritted teeth. "Why did you tamper with the system?"

The shadowy figure let out a piercing laugh: "For control. For evolution. The Machine Gods are merely tools, and we... will be the new gods!"

Its hand suddenly transformed into a sharp blade, stabbing towards Lin Ye's chest! At the critical moment, a golden light descended from the sky, cleaving the dark figure in two.

Hurry! It's that same light and shadow from before; it looks even weaker now, and the passage has opened!

Without hesitation, Lin Ye rushed towards the portal that suddenly appeared on the wall. Just before stepping inside, he turned back and shouted: "Who is the Watcher of Time?"

Light and shadow struggle to hold on against the onslaught of the re-aggregating shadows: Go to the beginning of time... search for... silver...

Its voice was cut off. Lin Ye was pulled out of the portal by a powerful force, his consciousness tumbling back to the real world like a rollercoaster.

Lin Ye! Wake up!

Bulma's voice grew closer. Lin Ye suddenly opened his eyes and found himself soaking wet, as if he had just been pulled out of the water. The alarm lights in the connecting cabin were flashing frantically.

What happened? Bulma helped him remove the electrodes, and your brainwaves suddenly started jumping around like a rollercoaster!

Lin Ye struggled to sit up, his head throbbing: "I saw... the truth about the system." He grabbed Bulma's hand; it was originally designed as a weapon to fight the Machine Gods, but now it had been tampered with by something else.

Bulma's eyes widened: What could possibly tamper with a system of this magnitude?

It's unclear, but they claim they will become the new gods. Lin Ye recalled the shadowy figure's words, but deep within the system, he found crucial information—we need to find the Watchers of Time.

The Watchers of Time? Bulma frowned; she'd never heard of them.

Lin Ye looked at Gohan in the medical pod; metal was beginning to appear on his neck as well: Whoever it is, this is our only hope. The system also gave a prompt—go to the starting point of time and find the silver...

Bulma suddenly gasped: Wait... the starting point of time... She rushed to the computer, pulled up a set of data, and said, "When I was analyzing spacetime fluctuations, I found an anomaly. The time curvature there is infinitely close to zero... Theoretically, that's the starting point of time!"

where is it?

Thirty thousand meters above the Earth's North Pole lies a persistent spacetime singularity. Bulma calculates rapidly, but the energy readings there are too intense; any spacecraft that approaches will be torn apart.

Lin Ye stood up, his legs still trembling: "I have system protection, you can try."

"Too dangerous!" Bulma objected. "We don't even know if that Watcher of Time is friend or foe!"

Just then, the entire laboratory suddenly shook violently! An alarm blared throughout the entire capsule company.

What's going on? Lin Ye steadied the swaying equipment.

Bulma pulled up the surveillance footage, her face instantly turning deathly pale: The Machine Gods... their main fleet has begun traversing the spacetime portal!

On the screen, a massive purple vortex appeared in outer space, from which countless mechanical warships slowly emerged. Even more terrifying, the vortex was expanding rapidly, like a greedy maw, poised to devour the entire planet.

Lin Ye looked at Gohan, then at the unconscious Piccolo, and finally at Bulma: there was no other choice. Prepare the spacecraft; I'm going to that singularity.

Bulma opened her mouth to object, but the increasing number of mecha warships on the monitor silenced her. Finally, she nodded heavily: "Give me an hour to modify the ship." But Lin Ye… her voice choked, "If you don't come back…"

"I will come back." Lin Ye interrupted her, his voice filled with a determination that even he himself wasn't sure of: he had to come back.

Outside the window, the sky began to turn an ominous purple. The first wave of mechanized warships had entered the atmosphere, and Earth's defenses were child's play before them.

Time is running out.

Chapter 230: The Tower of Watch

This godforsaken place doesn't even have any road signs!

Vegeta kicked away the purple crystal blocking his path, the fragments refracting an eerie light in the dim light. His battle suit was covered in dust from different universes; since embarking on the journey with Lin Ye to find the Watchtower, they had crossed the boundaries of seven parallel universes.

Lin Ye crouched down, his fingers lightly touching the blue-glowing moss on the ground. The moss immediately contracted like a mimosa, emitting a faint buzzing sound. He looked up at the twisted purple forest in the distance: Bulma's detectors indicated that the energy fluctuations were nearby, but...

"But my ass!" Vegeta interrupted him impatiently, slapping the ground with his tail in frustration. "We've been wandering around this damn forest for three hours! Can't your crappy system give us a straight answer?"

Lin Ye shook his head with a wry smile. The system interface on his retina flickered: [Warning: Current spacetime coordinates are unstable, positioning error ±500 meters]. Ever since entering this strange space known as the Gap Zone, the system's functions had been unreliable. Worse still, the gravity here seemed to change randomly; a stone that was as light as a feather one moment could be as heavy as a thousand pounds the next.

"You two, calm down for a bit." Suddenly, Number 18 leaped from the treetop, her long, golden hair, characteristic of androids, swaying slightly in the still air. The energy detector in her hand beeped rapidly; there were signs of construction two kilometers to the northeast, but... she hesitated, a rare occurrence. Her mechanical pupils contracted to pinpoints. There was life there, and... it was a familiar presence.

The three exchanged a glance and simultaneously unleashed their power, flying towards their target location. Lin Ye noticed that Number 18 had deliberately slowed down—since entering this space, her artificial energy core had exhibited unstable fluctuations.

After passing through the last twisted grove of purple trees, the sight before them made everyone stop abruptly—

A pitch-black spire stood on the edge of the cliff, its surface wreathed in red, vein-like patterns of light that pulsated rhythmically, making the entire tower seem like some kind of living thing. Five figures stood in the open space before the tower.

This is impossible... Vegeta's pupils suddenly contracted, and the muscles under his battle suit tensed instantly.

Lin Ye felt his throat go dry. Those five people were all himself.

From a young boy dressed in a Turtle Hermitage uniform to a white-haired version shrouded in divine aura, and even a cyborg form with one half of its body mechanized, they stood in a row, their eyes warily watching the visitors. The most eye-catching was the one standing in the middle—a middle-aged man with a scar near his eye, wearing a cloak resembling that of a God of Destruction, and wearing a system terminal on his left hand identical to Lin Ye's.

"Halt." The God of Destruction version of Lin Ye stepped forward, his voice so deep it seemed to come from underground: "This is the Watcher's Tower, and no time travelers are welcome here."

Number 18's finger was already on the switch for the energy cannon, and the cooling system under the artificial skin emitted a slight hum: a clone? Or an illusion?

"None of those." Young Lin Ye spoke, his voice carrying the familiar naiveté, but his eyes were far more mature than his age suggested. "We are Lin Ye from different timelines, here to voluntarily protect you."

Vegeta scoffed, deep blue flames swirling around him: Voluntary? Look at your expressions, it's like someone's pointing a gun at your heads.

Mechanical Lin Ye's right eye flashed a dangerous red light. He raised his mechanical arm, projecting a series of images of cosmic destruction: the destruction of each universe began with the fall of the Watchtower. We are here to prevent the worst from happening.

What's the worst-case scenario? Lin Ye stepped forward, meeting the gazes of his various versions of himself. He noticed that all of them bore injuries—the teenage version had a gruesome scar on its right arm, the cyborg version's mechanical parts clearly showed signs of repair. "I traveled through more than a dozen universes to find this place, just to uncover the truth behind the system."

After a moment of silence, the God of Destruction version of Lin Ye sighed and waved for the others to make way: Follow me, but only you are allowed to enter.

The tower's interior was much larger than it appeared from the outside, with countless floating screens displaying real-time images of different universes. Lin Ye noticed that some screens had turned into a snowflake-like pattern, while others were slowly fading. A strange metallic smell permeated the air, like the odor of overheated electronic devices.

Those are universes that are dying. The God of Destruction, Lin Ye, pointed to an exceptionally large screen displaying an image of the Omni-King's palace. In the image, two Omni-Kings stood back to back, black mist seeping from the edges of their robes. The problem was more serious than we imagined. The Chaos Omni-King was awakening.

Chaos Omni-King? Lin Ye frowned. Suddenly, a message popped up from the system that he had never seen before: [Data Fragment #001: Primordial Trinity], I only know that there are two Omni-Kings.

There were originally three. Young Lin Ye interjected, explaining that he was adjusting the parameters of a complex instrument. The instrument appeared to be an upgraded version of the quantum computer designed by Bulma. The Chaos Omni-King possessed the power to reorganize reality, allowing him to alter it at will. Because it was too dangerous, it was sealed away by the other two Omni-Kings.

Suddenly, Lin Ye pulled up a set of data, projecting it into a DNA helix structure in the air: Your arrival is not accidental. The system chose you because you possess a fragment of the Chaos Omni-King's genes.

Lin Ye suddenly took a step back, knocking over a metal chair: What does this mean?

Literal meaning. The God of Destruction, Lin Ye, turned serious. He pulled open his collar, revealing a peculiar mark below his collarbone—exactly the same shape as the system core on Lin Ye's chest. "Your father wasn't an ordinary Earthling; he was a cellular incarnation of the Chaos Omni-King. That's why you're compatible with the system—it was tailor-made for you."

A violent explosion suddenly erupted outside the tower, causing the entire building to shake. A screen flashed a blinding red alert, displaying that Vegeta and Android 18 were being attacked by a group of dark figures. These figures had no fixed shape, appearing to be composed of flowing dark matter.

"Damn it, they found us here!" exclaimed Lin Ye, the young man, as he quickly typed a string of code into the console.

Who? Lin Ye had already assumed a fighting stance, but the system interface suddenly turned blood red: [Warning: A higher dimension has been detected approaching].

The minions of the Chaos Omni-King, we call them the Zeroers. Mechanical Lin Ye quickly pulled up the surveillance footage; the shadowy figures in the footage were moving in a way that defied the laws of physics. They specifically hunted you across different timelines, weakening the anchor points for the Chaos Omni-King's resurgence.

The God of Destruction, Lin Ye, grabbed Lin Ye's wrist with such force that he almost crushed bones: "Listen, there's no time to explain. You must go to the core universe, the origin of the multiverse, and the only place that can stop the Omni-King of Chaos."

How do I get there? Lin Ye felt a wave of dizziness. Suddenly, a new message popped up from the system: [Hidden Quest Activated: Journey of Creation].

"Use this." Young Lin Ye handed him a peculiar badge engraved with a triple helix pattern. This was the Badge of Time, meant to guide him to the entrance. But be careful, the physical laws of the core universe are completely different; your power there might...

Another, more violent explosion interrupted the conversation, and the ceiling began to collapse. Mechanical Lin Ye shoved Lin Ye sharply: "Go! We'll hold them off! Let's leave through the basement portal!"

Lin Ye hesitated for a moment: Then you...

"We're long dead." The God of Destruction, Lin Ye, gave a bitter smile. He pulled open his battle suit, revealing a huge hole in his chest—no heart inside, only a swirling ball of starlight; what remained was merely a projection of memories. The real us had already perished in our respective timelines.

As Lin Ye rushed into the basement, the sounds of battle behind him were already deafening. He glanced back one last time and saw five different versions of himself unleashing astonishing energy—the teenage version activated a rainbow aura he had never seen before, the cyborg version deployed six giant energy cannons from behind, and the God of Destruction version had energy spheres in his hands capable of destroying galaxies—all locked in a fierce battle with countless shadowy figures.

The basement was larger than expected, with a black ring suspended in the center, surrounded by twelve smaller halos, each containing a different symbol. The air was thick with static electricity, causing Lin Ye's hair to stand on end.

"Is this the portal?" Lin Ye murmured to himself, the Badge of Time in his hand suddenly becoming scorching hot.

and many more!

Suddenly, Number 18 tumbled down the stairs, her left arm gone, revealing flickering wires beneath her artificial skin. Her right eye was shattered, exposing the mechanical structure inside: "Take this!" She tossed a small device that arced through the air—Bulma's custom-made multiverse communicator, which might work in the core universe!

Just as Lin Ye caught the device, he was pulled into the portal by an irresistible force. In his last moments before losing consciousness, he heard Number 18's final shout:

Find Sun Wukong! He's the key!

When Lin Ye opened his eyes again, the scene before him made him wonder if he was dreaming—