Part 37, Chapter 181.

PART THIRTY SEVEN: UUB'S ODYSSEY

Chapter 181

Translated by npberryhill, edited by Guilarai

A short while earlier, in Universe 4.

A number of people waited patiently outside the divine palace of the all-powerful Djinn, awaiting his return. A few days earlier the great Buu had left their world, summoned by a grand destiny. He had promised to return—whether in a week or several months, with him there was no telling.

Many pilgrims had already given up and gone home. Only the most determined remained, some having abandoned everything for the chance to be the first in line when to have their wishes granted.

While a few of them went about their business in makeshift tents, a sudden noise erupted in the palace courtyard. Someone shouted:

"He’s back! The genie is here!"

Everyone rushed to the giant gate—only to freeze in astonishment. Hundreds of Buus were scattered across the ground and floating in the air. Some people screamed in terror at the sight of a gigantic Buu head floating menacingly above the palace.

The Djinn’s avatars looked around in surprise. One of them spoke first.

"Well. They really outdid themselves. I didn't expect such a calculated move. The Vargas of Universe 1 are smarter than I gave them credit for."

His main body began to think aloud.

"Tracking them down won't be easy. But now that I know inter-universal travel works on principles similar to time travel, I should be able to reverse-engineer something. With Bulma and a few Vargas from my own universe, I certainly don't lack resources."

He conjured a workbench in front of him and started examining the problem. Nearby, a pilgrim cautiously approached another of the Buus.

"Excuse me... Are you back to grant wishes? Can we start lining up?"

"That depends. Do you know how to travel between universes?"

"Uh, no..."

"Then no."

He turned the pilgrim into chocolate and ate him in full view of the terrified onlookers. Trying to sound reassuring, the gluttonous Buu told the others to wait while several more avatars gathered around his primary body.

"Strange,” he muttered, grimacing. “I copied their technology down to the very last atom, and still nothing works. There’s some principle governing Universe 1 that’s completely beyond my power. I simply can't get it to function. Give me two hours."

No matter how hard he thought or how much he racked his gelatinous pink brain, no solution came.

"Well... two days, then? Two weeks? It doesn't matter—I can always turn back time! Even though I promised myself I wouldn’t... is it really worth it? And even if I do, would I end up in the exact same universe, or create a new one? That is a genuinely tricky problem."

He sighed, floated upward, and crossed his arms as he stared at the sky.

“We’ll work on it. In any case, I doubt my friend the Kaioshin can handle what’s coming. I know XXI’s plans. If he succeeds, I need to be ready. It’s going to be difficult. If that creature wishes for the ability to travel between universes, I’ll never be able to get rid of him.”

He weighed the future ahead of him—torn between the thrill of facing an ultimate threat and the quiet doubt that he might not survive it. Then a sudden thought struck him.

“Damn it!” he exclaimed. “I forgot about Uub! He’s alone, and certainly not ready to face XXI. He’d have to survive the tests I set up for him first...”

Buu sighed wearily. He was going to miss some truly spectacular chaos—and he was already missing the tournament.

A few dozen minutes earlier, back in the Universe 0 arena.

Uub stepped into the dimensional space Buu had created inside the Universe 4 quarters. He found himself standing in an enormous classroom lined with bookshelves, chalkboards, and every kind of magical tool imaginable. He stared around in fascination.

“Wow...”

“Welcome to my magic class—advanced beginners only,” Buu said with a wide grin. “My dear student, I have a great deal to teach you, and it’s going to take time. So we’re going to accelerate the process.”

“What do you mean, Master? What is this place?”

“We’re in a parallel dimension. I shaped this room from my own mind and gave it physical form. Everything you see is my knowledge made real—every book contains something I know. And as for the time difference: this place works like Earth’s Room of Spirit and Time. One minute outside equals six hours here.”

“So a year in here would only be a day out there?” Uub asked. “Just like on Earth?”

“Precisely.” Buu smiled. “I don’t think you’ll need that long. But the sooner we begin, the sooner you’ll leave here as the greatest magician in Universe 18. You only barely lost to Son Goku, and you managed to catch him off guard twice. With proper training, you won’t lose again.”

“I understand! You want to finish this before your own fight so you can focus.”

“Oh, that? Already handled. But enough talk—let’s begin.”

For the next sixty hours, Buu put young Uub through a complete course in magic. He even created two fairly-like assistants to keep the boy company—though they mostly distracted and teased him.

Buu found genuine enjoyment in teaching. In his home universe, Thorn had grown into a powerful warrior who now traveled the stars seeking knowledge and justice. But Thorn had no talent for magic. Buu had made him strong, yet he had never been able to pass on his true legacy. Now he’d found the perfect student. Even if Uub was essentially another version of himself, and from a different universe, it didn’t matter.

In many universes Buu had been sealed away or destroyed. It was vital that his existence continue and thrive. Universe 18 had turned out better than most—Buu still existed there in some form—so it was essential that his identity survive there with complete free will.

He felt affection for people in his own world, but he regarded Uub as his true protégé. Everything would be passed on to him.

After sixty hours Uub collapsed, completely spent. Despite many early mistakes—similar to ones he had made against Goku—he had mastered the fundamentals. He could now turn a table into candy without effort, and the same principle worked on living beings.

“Perfect, Uub! I expected this to take longer. Barely ten minutes have passed outside. We can move on to the next stage, and—”

He stopped mid-sentence. His assistants began vanishing with sharp cries, and he felt the same force tearing at his own body. Buu understood immediately. XXI had somehow cast the sealing spell—the one weakness Buu shared with his previous iterations. But he had prepared for this long ago. Under Uub’s shocked gaze he simply gave a thumbs-up and said calmly:

“Don’t worry about me. Keep practicing while I’m gone. I’ll be right back.”

Then he vanished completely.

Exhausted, Uub sat on the floor.

“He’s got some nerve,” he muttered. “If he’s gone for twenty minutes, I’ll be stuck here for five days. And I don’t even know if there’s any food in this place. I’m already getting hungry.”

So, he waited. Eventually he found a small apartment with a bathroom and a bedroom and made use of both. There was no food, however—Buu had created everything they had eaten so far by hand.

Uub pointed at a training dummy.

“Turn into a bowl of rice!”

The dummy became a bowl... with no rice in it. Frustrated, he tried again, this time asking for a chocolate cake. That appeared instantly. Apparently the Djinn’s magic worked best on sweets. Uub stared at the cake in dismay, realizing he might be stuck eating nothing but sugar.

After roughly thirty hours of studying Buu’s books, the Djinn reappeared in a flash of light. He tried to smile, but Uub could sense the tension underneath.

“We can continue. Sorry about the interruption,” Buu said, not quite managing to hide his irritation.

“What happened?” Uub asked.

“Nothing important.” The Djinn waved it off. “As I was saying—next you need to use magic spontaneously. You understand the principles, but you’re still too slow. Whether you’re in a fight or at a birthday party, you have to be fast and precise.”

He snapped his fingers and filled the room with dozens of floating targets. For the next several hours he pushed Uub to the edge, forcing him to cycle through transformations at high speed. Uub had no idea that outside, in the real Universe 0, Buu was currently facing the full fury of the tournament organizers and every fighter in the arena. While Universe 18 stood against him, Uub was quietly growing stronger under his guidance.

Eventually Buu called a halt, satisfied.

“Excellent. You’ve got the moving targets down. Now we move on to enemies. And to make it interesting, I’m going to create opponents stronger than you. You’ll have no choice but to rely on magic. Raw power isn’t everything.”

“I get it,” Uub panted. “Since this is an illusion, you can break the rules however you want.”

“You haven’t been listening carefully, student.” Buu’s voice was mild but firm. “This isn’t an illusion. It’s a real parallel dimension. Creating a being stronger than you is... extremely easy for me.”

“Oh.” Uub’s face fell.

He had knocked down Goku—one of the two strongest fighters in all of Universe 18. That was no small achievement. Was Buu so far above them that they looked like children to him?

“Hmm.” Buu considered. “Yes, this should work. It was difficult with Thorn, but I think you’ll manage better. I can’t wait to see what you can do.”

He grinned and snapped his fingers. Uub shut his eyes against the flash. When he opened them again, they were standing on a vast spherical platform with different landscapes stretching away in every direction.

“Welcome to my training planet,” Buu announced cheerfully. “I spent years training in every kind of hostile environment. There’s something for everyone here—including the classic volcanic zones. Just don’t pick the carnivorous plants in the jungle. They’re a protected species. And they’re more dangerous than you are.”

“Wow...” was all Uub could manage, eyes wide with wonder.

This was perfect. It offered everything the Room of Spirit and Time did, and more. A few weeks here with Buu would make him far stronger—strong enough, finally, to live up to the expectation of the master who saw him as Earth’s future protector.

Buu watched his student’s awe with quiet amusement, already planning to shatter that sense of wonder.

Another snap of his fingers dropped a massive pink figure from the sky. The impact shook part of the planet. The creature looked like Majin Buu, only far more muscular and enormous.

“Grubuu!” it roared.

“We’ll start gently,” Buu said. “A nice, docile little practice partner. You’ll have no trouble dodging, but if he lands even one hit, you’ll be unconscious for a while. Don’t bother attacking him directly—he won’t feel a thing.”

“You’re underestimating me, Master!”

“Am I?” Buu chuckled. “Go ahead. Hit him and find out.”

Uub shot him a skeptical look, then smiled sharply. He was going to prove he wasn’t that weak.

“Transcended Kaioken!”

His aura flared crimson. His clothes tore as his muscles swelled. He threw everything he had into a single punch—the same kind of strike that had once dropped a Super Saiyan 3. It felt like slamming his fist into an unbreakable wall. The impact hurt him.

Uub hopped around, clutching his hand, yelping in pain. Buu burst out laughing.

“That’ll teach you, insolent brat. Now that you’ve learned brute force is useless, just turn him into a cake and eat him. Easy victory.”

Uub stared at him, still smarting from the humiliation.

“So turning someone into something automatically wins the fight?” he asked, voice edged with sarcasm. “Because I’ve heard about a certain piece of candy that didn’t exactly work out that way...”

Buu’s expression soured at the memory.

“Forget that,” he said with a forced laugh. “Your opponent would have to be hundreds—maybe a thousand times stronger than you—to keep control after being transformed. Against almost anyone else, magic is still a massive advantage.”

“So back then, Vegetto...”

“You’re really pushing my buttons, kid,” Buu cut in, suddenly serious. “You’re about to get exactly what you’re asking for. Enough theory. Time for practice.”

Uub felt a dangerous presence drop over him an instant before the massive fist crashed down where he had been standing. The entire planet trembled. Sweat beaded on his forehead. One hit would end him.

The creature was overwhelmingly strong, but Uub was fast enough to stay ahead of its attacks. He slipped past several more blows, pointed a finger, and fired a pink beam. The golem transformed instantly into an enormous gingerbread bell.

Both master and student looked satisfied. Uub had finally used magic without needing to speak a spell.

“Not bad,” Buu admitted, clapping. “That confirms it works properly on living targets.”

“I’d still like to be able to create actual food,” Uub muttered.

“We’ll get to that. What can I say? Candy and I have a long relationship. Cookies, chocolate, sugar—that’s what life is all about.”

“Why force yourself to eat it? There’s enough there for two hundred people!”

“You shouldn’t waste food.”

“Fine. Next time I’m turning the next one into a size-twelve wrench.”

“I like eating those too,” Buu laughed. “Speaking of the next one...”

A sharp impact slammed into Uub’s stomach, driving the air from his lungs and sending him skidding backward. He staggered up to find a Djinniya facing him—smaller than the previous opponent, but with far more vicious eyes.

“Next level,” Buu said. “She’s a little weaker, but ten times faster. Your Kaioken won’t keep up. You’ll have to catch her by surprise.”

Uub settled into a stance and started to fire a magic beam. The female Djinn appeared directly in front of him and drove a kick into his face, then followed with a rapid series of punches aimed at vital points. They weren’t devastatingly strong, but they were precise and relentless.

“Maximum Kaioken!” Uub shouted, pushing himself further.

His fists met only empty air. The Djinniya dodged by centimeters, always just out of reach, and punished every opening. Hand-to-hand combat was a losing battle. When he tried to transform her, she never gave him a clean moment. In under two minutes Uub was on the ground, face bloodied.

Just as she raised a finishing blow, Buu clapped once.

“Pause.”

She froze mid-motion and sat down calmly. Uub struggled to rise, shaking. Buu crouched beside him.

“I warned you,” he said, almost gently. “Do you want me to heal you?”

“I... yes, Master...” Uub managed, spitting blood.

“I have something better.” Buu took his student’s hand and guided it. “You won’t last if you keep relying on me or on Senzu beans. Now that you control your power, you can do more than reattach an arm. Watch.”

A green aura enveloped Uub. His wounds closed rapidly until he was whole again. He stared at his hands, then at his master in amazement.

“As long as you have energy left, you can heal most injuries,” Buu explained. “It won’t restore stamina or your energy reserves, and it’s not the same as a Senzu bean. If your head is cut off or your heart is pierced, you die. You’re still human—you can’t regenerate the way I can. But you now have a massive advantage over almost anyone else.”

“It’s incredible,” Uub whispered. “With this, I could have beaten my master. I never imagined reaching this level.”

“You’re still a long way from ready,” Buu said firmly. “Gast alone is far beyond you right now. I measured his combat and magical ability—you’re at a clear disadvantage. You need to condition your body to handle Transcended Kaioken properly, and knowing how to use magic is not the same as knowing how to defend against it. After the trails I have planned, Gast won’t look so impossible. I’d even say you could become a real threat to that Son Bra you keep stealing glances at.”

“Wha—Master!”

“I’m joking... mostly. We still have a long road ahead. For now, finish this stage.”

For an entire day Uub fought the Djinniya. Unbeknownst to him, at the same time Buu was single-handedly fighting every warrior in the tournament arena.

After many healings and short rests, Uub finally caught her with a clean feint and transformed her into a size-twelve wrench. He collapsed, laughing and exhausted, unable to move.

“Finally... I got her...”

“Well done.” Buu helped him up. “One last trial. If you complete it, I’ll make you the strongest warrior-mage across many universes—and I’ll teach you counter-spells.”

Uub rose, more determined than ever. He had spent dozens of hours in this parallel world and developed powers he never thought possible. He was no longer the same person who had entered. At this level he felt certain he could have defeated Son Goku in their earlier match. If only he had learned this magic sooner.

“Your final opponent is fast, strong, and highly intelligent,” Buu said. “She will adapt to everything you do and evolve in response. You’ll have to outthink her, which will force you to grow. No one from your universe could defeat her.”

“Her?” Uub expected another Djinniya.

“Heh...” Buu’s smile turned mischievous. “How about something with a more... attractive physique?”

He snapped his fingers. A new figure appeared. Uub recognized her instantly—Anju, his childhood friend, wearing a combat outfit. Buu had deliberately enhanced her curves just to tease him.

“Master, that’s not funny!” Uub clenched his fists. “You shouldn’t have done that even in a dream—”

“I’m only joking!” Buu rubbed the back of Uub’s head. “That’ll teach you to talk back to your big brother. I’ll make you a proper monster instead—”

POP

Buu vanished mid-sentence.

Uub blinked. The Djinn was gone. Completely. This time it felt different—no residual presence at all.

“He’ll be back soon...” he muttered.

Then a massive, hostile aura flared nearby.

The copy of Anju was staring at him. Her power began climbing at a terrifying rate. When she spoke, it was in the familiar voice that had lived in Uub’s thoughts for years—now cold and murderous:

“Destroy... the... target!”

Her fist slammed into his cheek before he could react. He flew several kilometers and crashed into a mountain, blood dripping from his mouth.

He healed himself just in time to see her already closing in again. He barely dodged the next strike and put distance between them, flying over a landscape that looked like a place on Earth he had only seen in photographs—rugged mountains rising from a deep blue ocean.

She’s too strong and too fast. I don’t stand a chance!

Another kick drove him through three rock formations before a mountainside finally stopped him. He healed again.

Hang on—he said she was intelligent. Maybe I can talk to her!

“Wait!” he shouted as she advanced. “Buu isn’t here! We should wait for him to supervise!”

“No.”

At least she could speak. The next blow sent him flying a hundred meters.

“Master Buu created me to attack you continuously until you pass the trial. My program is active. It will only end when you win. The quality of your training is the absolute priority.”

She charged again. In desperation Uub remembered the command from the day before and shouted:

“Pause!”

The aggressive expression vanished. Like the Djinniya before her, she sat down calmly, as if switched off. Uub stared in disbelief.

“The pause function is essential for training,” she said in a flat voice.

“But... I didn’t even ask about it yet!”

“Reading your thoughts is also necessary to keep you safe. I need to know when you are failing so I do not go too far.”

“Uh… okay. Do you know where Buu went?”

“Negative. I do not know when Master Buu will return. Until he does, you will follow the training program he established. I will remain your partner until you succeed in transforming me.”

“I see. Do you have a name?”

“No. But I will answer to whatever name you choose.”

Uub considered. She wasn’t Anju, but she looked exactly like her.

“In that case... to honor the person who inspired your appearance, I’ll call you Juna.”

The newly named Juna nodded and offered a small smile. She was honored to share this program with her master’s student. She would carry out the mission faithfully. She would not go easy on him—not even a little—until the task was complete.