---Before Deployment---

“Aunt Cassa?” I blinked in shock at the woman whom I had scarcely seen after our first meeting.

She looked very different, mainly because of the rather conspicuous scar covering half her face. The scar resembled crinkled paper, covering the skin from her right cheek to her jaw, with a few smaller patches above that on her brow. Then, curving from the corner of her mouth all the way to her ear was a dipped and jagged line. The scarring on her brow covered a little of her right eye, which wasn’t a real issue, because said eye had been very clearly blinded by whatever hurt my aunt in the first place.

All of that told of a rather horrifying experience.

It was rather frightening, to think that something could injure her so much.

It’s hard to explain, but the adults in my life this time around seemed… untouchable, in a manner.

Must have been the child brain, because logically speaking, no one is untouchable.

“Hello, Cetulla.” My aunt politely greeted, looking at me with a somewhat strained smile. “How have you been?”

“...Worried.” And seeing my mother’s twin so injured didn’t exactly fill me with assurance, either.

“Ah…” As if reading my mind, aunt Cassa gingerly touched her scarred flesh. “Avoca was always the better fighter between the two of us, so you need not worry.”

“That doesn’t really make me worry any less.” I grumbled mulishly whilst glaring at my feet, both at my aunt’s ineffective advice and the fact that I got attached to my family in this life.

Them not being assholes really helped with that, and while annoying that I’m worrying myself sick over the people I love, I’m glad I got a good family to grow up in.

Now if I could replicate that when I grew up and started a family of my own, I’d be ready to declare Saiyans as better than Humans.

“You are early,” Aunt Cassa decided to change topics, looking at me with something akin to mourning, likely over my joining the army. “Are you excited?”

Judging by her tone, it’s easy to see she really hopes I’m not happy over the situation.

Well, it’s her lucky day. “No,” I shook my head, brows furrowing in a grimace. “I… Want to protect my family, and my home.” And that was a rather big surprise to me, because during my last life, I had little to no incentive to do either. Yet now…

Now I felt a sense of duty that I had long since left behind in my past life.

World War III was bad for everyone.

“I see,” My aunt hummed, closing her eyes for a few seconds before addressing me once more. “Then I will gladly teach you everything I can, so that you may protect Sadala and our family.”

“Our family and Sadala,” I corrected, feeling the need to be cheesy, an uncomfortable look spreading over my face. “I put you guys before everything else.”

A smile formed on my aunt’s face, her scar stretching at the gesture. “Very well, then.” She takes a deep breath. “You are half an hour early, so I can not teach you today’s lesson, but I can give you the bare basics of our family’s combat style.”

---In the battlefield---

“I still can’t believe mom taught you the Oozaru Claw,” My cousin huffed, both amused and annoyed. “I had to wait ‘till my training was over.”

I could only offer a shrug in response to that.

“Pay attention,” The literal princess of your group called, pressing a few buttons on her scouter. “From what I can gather, their strongest fighters are in the center. Pumkim, you’ll deal with them.” She ordered.

The currently strongest in our group nodded in acceptance, leaning around the tree he was hiding behind to look over the enemy camp our team had come across.

Our mission in this world was to deal with the small holdouts while the main army keeps their forces busy.

The problem with all that is that the Citadelians were billions, and Saiyans were a billion, and quality can only do so much to quantity before it stops mattering.

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That’s where we come in. All our training for this, children in a war. Me, the princess, my cousin and my new friend, all four of us ready to fight and die for our home.

War doesn’t change, does it?

“Cetulla, since you’re the best flier we have, I need you to run distraction,” Okora grabbed my attention, snapping me out of my thoughts. “Destroy what you can, kill as many as you can manage without putting yourself at risk, but most importantly, make it so they can’t get a lock on us.”

I nod along with my given mission, looking over the airspace on the enemy camp, old, half-forgotten instincts making me look at certain spots on the towers, where anti-air turrets would be stationed.

The Citadelians either didn’t have any, or they were those turrets that could just sink into the wall.

I’ll be hoping for the former.

“Everyone knows their duties?” The princess inquired, making me realize I had spaced out for half of her explanation.

I nod in confirmation either way, because wasting time means wasting lives.

“Now!”

At Okora’s cry, I launch myself into the sky, air around me ablaze with the energy emanating from my body, the light of the full moon on this planet empowering me further.

Saiyans in this weird amalgam of DC and whatever else don’t turn into Oozarus, but there is a transformation called ‘The Oozaru State’, Oozaru meaning ‘Wrathful’ in Sadalan, a state that enhances a Saiyan’s powers tenfold, but heavily impairs their mind, making the careless descend into a blind rage, attacking everything and everyone around them.

Of course, you have to know how to access the Oozaru State in the first place, which is not taught to anyone outside the elites, who train under the priests, monks and nuns in the Yamoshi Temple of Combat.

For your regular, every day, normal Saiyan, the moon just strengthens them about twofold.

Which is more than enough for my given mission.

The stationed Citadelians cried out in shock as I rained balls of ki down at them, the vaguely ape-like creatures ducking behind cover so as to not get grievously wounded under my attacks. Their newfound cover proves disadvantageous to me once it becomes clear that my ki can’t destroy whatever metal they use in one hit, which opens me for counter attacking.

So I fled, flying deeper into the camp while taking potshots at random to keep the attention on me while the rest of my team infiltrated.

“Walls cannot stop me!” Pumkim suddenly yelled, shortly followed by the sound of steel bending and bricks breaking.

‘Infiltrated’ might have been too weak a word.

One of the Citadelians screamed something that probably translated to ‘They broke in!’

Which, yes.

We did.

He got a golf ball sized blast of energy to the face for his troubles.

I gulped, tearing my eyes away from the growing carnage, opting instead to focus on the newfound problem I was facing; The anti-air turrets. Sprouting from the side of the towers and quickly taking aim at me like a cat spotting a bird, forcing me to take some non-conventional maneuvers.

Like, for example, entering one of the towers, knocking the guards stationed atop it off while doing my best to ignore the fact that gravity is a thing.

War is awful, so I’m not thinking about it. Not that I can just ignore the situation, but I’m living in denial until I can cope properly.

Launching several blasts down the stairs in the tower I took over, I managed to weaken the structure enough to make it start toppling over to one side, which meant I had to bail, flying back out into the open air and into the line of fire of the turrets mounted to the sides of the other towers.

Did you know that being hit by plasma bolts running at the speed of sound hurts?

Because it does.

“Cets!” I heard my cousin cry out as I fell through the air, soon followed by him screaming his lungs out like a proper Dragon Ball character, accompanied by the sounds of ki blasts and explosions everywhere.

Shaking my head to clear the dizziness, I managed to mostly right myself before hitting the ground, landing on the hard ground with a crouch, grimacing at the pain that shot up my legs.

Righting myself, doing my best to ignore the tenderness on my knees, I glance over at my cousin, who’s— “Oh Boy.” I cringe, watching as Cabba loses himself in his rage.

Funny thing about the effects of the Blutz Waves, even though we don’t turn into giant apes, and even though we don’t get the ten times power boost, we can still go far above our normal limit under a full moon.

A regular Saiyan gets their power doubled? Well, a berserking Saiyan is basically going Kaio-Ken four back when it meant something.

With the drawbacks, yes.

Now incapacitated, Cabba stumbled to the floor, falling on his hands and knees, body shaking under the strain caused to his body. Which left him completely exposed to the approaching Citadelians, who could take him as a hostage, or even worse, kill him.

If I didn’t believe in returning the favor, that is.

“Get away from him!” I screeched both in horror and rage, because I’d be damned if I let a child die in a war while I could do something about it. “Pumkim, grab Cabba and get him out of here!” I ordered, seconds before getting socked right in the face, making me stumble to the side.

The sound of gunfire almost makes me dizzy, and the impact of the plasma bolt fades away under the abhorrent noises of fire, crying, helicopters falling and God damn it they’re everywhere!

With a panicked cry, I rushed the soldier that struck me, striking him across the face with all my might, and I did not stop until all I could see was red.

Then I switched targets, glaring at the panicking soldier trembling in his boots, who pressed the trigger in response to my stupid blunder of staying still, making me stumble backwards a couple of steps, clutching the hot spot on my chest while gritting my teeth.

“You should have aimed for the head.”