章 120: Ch. 120: The Emperor's Second Form

After Frieza's armor exploded off of his body, the small tyrant clenched his fists and began to shout loudly as he gathered energy. "HAAAA!" Suddenly, his power level began to shoot through the roof, materializing as red lightning that shot into the air around him as his aura pushed the air around him into a frenzy of wind and power as everyone except for Raditz and I looked on in horror.

Next, Frieza's form bulged horribly. First, his right arm became three times the size, then the right arm bulged as well as the rest of his torso. Now, only his head and legs were their original size, but that changed after a moment of blinding light.

Once the light faded, Frieza was standing in front of Vegeta, his body's proportions back to normal, but his general size double what it originally had been.

"N-no... Goodbye, everyone..." Krillin couldn't help but mutter, feeling Frieza's new power level, which broke a million. I couldn't help but click my tongue at it. I felt like I was facing Gohan's ape form again.

Sure, this new version of Frieza had a huge amount of energy. Truly a stupid amount, in fact, when compared to anything else I'd personally seen outside of the Core so far, but the key to real power was in the balance between power and control tilting firmly to the control side. Coming from somebody who could technically destroy the entire cosmos with their full controllable power, sensing so much chaos from any one person's energy just annoyed me. I couldn't even fake fear, I was so annoyed by Frieza's aura.

"We're not giving up yet. Uncle Raditz can still beat this guy." Gohan muttered beside me. I couldn't help but spare my brother a look when I heard those words come from him. I'd already known that my existence had made this Gohan's character far stronger than his canon counterpart's had been, but seeing him stand strong in the face of such overwhelming power made me smile a bit.

"Vegeta, why don't you say anything? Don't you like my new look? I personally think it suits me... Towering above the masses who look up at me like trembling ants... You, look like a trembling ant right now, Vegeta." Frieza goaded, his new power immediately going straight to his incredibly large ego.

But Vegeta hesitated to answer. Control or no, Frieza's power washing over him made Vegeta feel like he was swimming through thick syrup. He could barely breathe, let alone move.

"By the way, my fighting power in this form is over one million, you know. I'd say that you should all simply surrender now, but that would take the fun out of beating you to death!" Frieza couldn't refrain from letting that little tidbit go, and I could see something in Vegeta's eyes begin burning with an even more furious blaze than before. Now, for the Saiyan Prince, I could tell that it wasn't just about his pride anymore. Vegeta was in survival mode once again, willing to do anything to get out of this predicament alive. Not that it would matter in the grand scheme of things, since I could tell from Frieza's energy that he was planning on taking Vegeta out of the fight right here and now.

"NOW SIT BACK LIKE A GOOD MONKEY!" Frieza suddenly shouted, unleashing a powerful shockwave of energy directly at Vegeta. But the shockwave never hit the Saiyan.

"Girl... What are you doing?" Vegeta couldn't help but seethe. I was standing between him and Frieza now, my Grey Mode multiplying my power level to 500,000, which wasn't much higher than Vegeta's, yet I'd stopped the energy-based shockwave that would have tossed Vegeta backwards like a ragdoll.

If anyone were to look back at where I had been, they'd see a crater where I'd launched myself from with all my might, but that wasn't the full story.

I could tell immediately after Frieza transformed that he was no longer interested in 'playing' with Vegeta. There were too many other 'toys' nearby for him to place his interest in, especially Raditz, who hadn't even flinched when he'd seen Frieza's new power level after his transformation. In other words, the battle had reached a new stage, and Frieza didn't want Vegeta to participate in it.

Now, I needed Vegeta to gain a certain amount of strength and experience from this battle. More importantly, I needed him to be at least partially conscious when Frieza finally blows through the rest of his restraints and begins to use his full 120 million power level against Super Saiyan Goku. I couldn't risk Frieza's terrible control going too far and accidentally killing the guy right now.

So the decision had been fairly easy to make. I'd simply protect Vegeta myself. Even if he tried to get in my way, or hated me for getting in between the two of them, I'd take Frieza's attention off of the Saiyan. By getting the tyrant's attention myself.

Now, I knew that I wouldn't need to fight Frieza by myself for long. Raditz would almost certainly step in the moment that he was able, propelling the battle into phase three, but that didn't change the fact that Frieza's second form made him twice as strong as me, and his attack had been almost immediate and rather far from my current location at the time.

I hadn't actually been fast enough to get between Vegeta and Frieza before the shockwave had sent Vegeta flying, and even if I had, my full power would have just gotten me sent flying too.

But somehow, here I was, unmoving, standing directly between Vegeta and Frieza, having stopped Frieza's first strike without breaking a sweat.

"Frieza, I can't let you hurt anybody else." I declared, pointing at the tyrant, my gray hair whipping behind me in the breeze. "It's time for you to finally face somebody who you can't beat."

Without a sound, energy began collecting around me, the winds growing wild as they swirled around me like a hurricane of pure, absolute force that seemed drawn to my body. To anyone watching, the spectacle probably seemed mesmerizingly beautiful.

The seal that I was releasing this time wasn't power. It was something far more.