In the depths of space, a large, circular spaceship speeds through the empty void, moving at speeds that would even impress Frieza.

A red glow illuminates the inside of this ship, lighting up the three figures that have made it their temporary home.

The first figure-- the shortest of the three-- ducks a quick kick from his three-eyed opponent, immediately responding with a powerful uppercut.

His opponent, who is tall, muscular, and most surprising of all, sporting an extra eye in the center of his forehead, turns to the side, allowing the punch to whiff past him harmlessly. With a small scoff, his hands move to the sides of his head, and a very bright flash of light erupts from him, startling his short adversary.

Without wasting any time, the three-eyed man launches his own uppercut, slamming his fist into the shorter fighter's stomach. Immediately after, Tien follows up with a ferocious backhand, sending Gohan flying away.

Gohan instantly springs back up to his feet, narrowly jumping over a leg sweep, before sending a flurry of lightning-fast blows at his taller opponent. Tien, completely unfazed by this onslaught, slaps the small child's attacks away, then, before he becomes overwhelmed by the much-stronger fighter, grabs onto Gohan's arm, pulling the short martial artist off balance.

A massive knee to the face is what awaits Gohan as Tien pulls him downwards, snapping his head back roughly. As his small opponent stumbles back in a daze, the triclops points his hand at the Half-Saiyan's face, quickly building a large ball of energy in the palm of his hand...

"Boom. You lose." Tien says, dismissing the Ki blast as he turns away from Gohan. "You're a lot stronger than me, but it's painfully obvious that you don't know how to best use that power. When your power level is lowered to mine, or even if it's double mine like it was during our spar, you stand no chance. Remember what Raditz said: we can't overpower Cooler."

Gohan frowns at the three-eyed man's words, but doesn't deny what he's saying.

"Ok... I'll try harder." he says, shifting uncomfortably in place.

"You're not bad for your age, but you've been relying on your raw power far too much." the triclops continues. "If you don't change things up, then we won't stand a chance against Cooler, and we'd have to leave things up to Raditz. Even though he's almost regrown his entire arm, I still don't think that any of us want him to face Cooler without any actual help."

"..."

"I'm going to see if your Uncle is up for a sparring match. Keep working on your technique in the meantime."

"A-Alright... I'll do my best!" the child says, quickly moving to the other side of the room to train by himself.

Tien sighs to himself as Gohan runs off, and before long, the buff martial artist finds himself standing in front of Raditz, who's seated on one of the only beds on the ship. In the one-armed warrior's hand is a small, aged book, which he flips through at a speedy pace.

"Are you almost done with that?" the three-eyed man says sourly, gesturing towards the book in Raditz's hand.

"No." the Saiyan replies curtly, not even bothering to move his eyes from the journal.

"Tsk... you can finish it later. Come spar with me and Gohan. We need to train as much as we can before we face Cooler."

"I've already told you: this journal comes from the me from the future. The sooner I finish it, the sooner I can use whatever knowledge it has to help us train. I'd be deeply shocked if the future Raditz hadn't found any new ways to train or to improve Ki control."

"Hurry up then. We both know that I'm not powerful enough to contend with Cooler, and if I want to be able to help against him, I'll need to spar against a strong, skilled opponent. Your nephew may be strong, but his skills... well, the less I say about them, the better."

"He's incredible for his age, and his power more than makes up for any difference in skill." the one-armed warrior argues, still refusing to take his eyes off of the small book in his hand. "He has a shocking amount of potential."

"Yes, but 'potential' isn't going to help against Cooler, will it? With the way things are now, Gohan will just get himself killed against Cooler. You need to do a better job training him. I don't know why, but he seems far more motivated and ready to train when it's you giving him tips than he is when I train with him."

"I'll work on it. Give me another day or so and I'll most likely be done with this. I'd be done a lot sooner if someone didn't keep interrupting me."

"Tch... this had better not be an excuse to laze around. Goku and Vegeta may be blind, but everyone else knows about the miniscule amount of training you actually do."

Raditz ignores the triclops, putting all of his attention on the journal in his hand.

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'He's barely left that room since he started reading the journal, and it's been almost two days. I can sense that he's actually been reading it... so what the hell is taking him so long to finish? Is it a Saiyan thing to be adverse to reading, or...?' Tien thinks as he walks back to the main training room...

As Tien walks away, the one-armed Saiyan hurriedly reads through the pages of the future Raditz's journal, trying to speed through it as fast as he can.

...

...

...

"Could you fuck off?!?!?!" Raditz suddenly says furiously.

"..."

The tall Saiyan scowls as his words are met with silence. With an annoyed, slightly murderous expression on his face, he closes the journal, instead opting to sit silently on the bed in a meditative pose.

...

...

...

After several long, boring minutes, Raditz reaches over to where he set the journal, then quickly continues reading, flipping through the pages at a lightning-fast pace...

...

...

"Dammit!" the Saiyan swears, snapping the journal closed with a ferocious expression on his face. "You are not subtle! I can sense you peeking!"

"..."

"..."

"...Just a small look wouldn't hurt, would it?" King Kai says in a small voice after a few seconds of silence.

"I swear I've told you no at least 30 separate times in the last two days. Stop trying to read over my shoulder!"

"Well... it looks like your Ki sensing abilities have improved by miles!" the Kai compliments, attempting to calm Raditz down. "I never thought that you'd be able to sense that I was watching you so easily! When in the world did you improve so much?!"

"Oh, that-- I... uh... I've been practicing hard." Raditz lies, glancing down at the air in front of him...

...or more specifically, at the light-blue screen, invisible to everyone else, floating in the air in front of him.

Warning: User is revealing details about The System to King Kai.

Warning: User cannot reveal any details about The System to others. Doing so will result in a Punishment Quest being issued.

Warning: User is revealing...

'You know, usually, I'd be pretty pissed about the System telling me what I can or can't do... but I think I'm fine with this one.' the Saiyan thinks. 'It isn't like I was planning on telling anyone about the System, and I definitely don't want it being revealed to someone spying on me without my knowledge.'

"If you're sure that you don't want me to know what the you in the future wrote down, then I guess I'll leave you alone..." King Kai says, going silent.

"..."

Raditz takes a single glance at the blue System screen in front of his eyes, causing his scowl to deepen.

"I know you're still here."

"Come on! We have no idea where Ginyu has gone!" the blue Kai complains bitterly. "That journal of yours has knowledge of the future, it must have something that can help me and the other Kais! Just let me have a quick look over!"

"If there's anything in here that I think can help you, then I'll make sure to tell you. You don't need to peek over my shoulder to read what the other me wrote! This is a private journal that nobody but me is supposed to read. Please have a little respect."

"But you may miss something! It could be a really subtle detail, which you'd almost certainly miss! After all, you're a Saiyan, and Saiyans aren't... uh..."

The Kai trails off as he realizes what he just said. Without waiting for Raditz to speak, he turns his mystical senses elsewhere, metaphorically running for the hills before the one-armed man can process his words.

"..."

'I haven't heard something like that in a long time... I mean, fair enough, most Saiyans don't usually use their heads, but...'

Raditz shakes his head to get rid of these thoughts, then, after taking a second to confirm with the System that King Kai isn't watching, opens the old, worn journal from the future.

'Whatever... at least I can finally crack this thing open.'

And so he does. Continuing where he last left off, Raditz speeds through the journal, finding it... more than a little depressing.

'I'm... not sure what I expected. It's a journal. It details the thoughts and experiences of a Raditz from a future where everything went to shit... and a surprising amount of the pages are focused on giving Trunks advice...'

The Saiyan continues to read on, flipping through page after page of a sad, bleak story of the future. Eventually, when he's about three-fourths of the way through the journal's pages, he comes across another ripped-out page. The page after is completely empty, save for a few words.

Don't read any further, Trunks. The pages after this one are for my eyes only. Give the journal to the past me when you visit. For the best effect and entrance, I'd recommend arriving on the day I died to Vegeta, then intervening at the last possible moment. If you go Super Saiyan right after, you'll have the biggest impact on Kakarot, Vegeta, and myself.

"..."

'Jackass.' the one-armed Saiyan thinks sourly, flipping to the next page.

The words on this page, despite being at the end of the journal, look like they were written far, far earlier than even the words at the beginning of the journal, as if the Raditz from the future had started writing the pages for his past self as soon as he got the journal. On top of that, the words inside are... almost mechanical in comparison to what Raditz has already read. They don't hold the same emotion or despair as the words previously written inside. And yet, despite the strangeness of the words, Raditz can't help but let out an astonished laugh as he reads the first few sentences.

If you're actually reading this, then I'm dead, or I'd have come back in time personally to tell you these things. I hope that what little I can actually tell you will help you.

I know that you've been curious about our situation. I know that you've always wondered about how you were transported into Raditz's body... because I've always wondered that. I've recently learned the details of how we found ourselves in this Universe. The long and short of it is that some 'God' with too much time on his hands decided that we'd be the perfect person to be his entertainment. I won't even bother attempting to tell you his name, as the System has made it clear that it will censor any information that it thinks you're 'not ready' to know, but what I can tell you is that you must talk to him. The information he will give you will help clear a lot of things up and, if you ask him the right questions, could help you become significantly stronger. Meeting him is pretty simple...

...All you'll have to do is die. Personally, I would recommend killing yourself as soon as possible. Make sure that you have the Dragon Balls on standby. You will be going to hell when you die, and the less time you spend there, the better.