The clouds covered the sky like a quilt, shaking their light feathery flurries over the valley. Nestled in the snow were small round houses with buttery lights peeking through the ice that piled upon their window sills and gathered in mounds at their foundations. People adorned in furs and thick coats busied the white streets only the children finding the weather pleasant enough to have snow fights.
Seated at the window of one of the homes was a young girl with blonde hair and blue eyes. A pink wool sweater embraced her warmly and blue jeans road her slender legs into white, fuzzy snow boots. Her fingers were curled, her chin rested upon her knuckles as she stared through half-lidded eyes at a couple passing her window arm-in-arm. A deep sigh left her lips and formed a white circle of vapor on the glass.
Sitting back in her chair with a pout shrinking her lips, the lovely blonde known as Lena whined, “He’s been gone for days.”
“I’m not complaining,” came her father, Tobias. He was at the stove stirring a pot of snow buffalo stew. “These past few days have been ni~ce and quiet.”
Lena crossed her arms upon the window sill and buried her nose within her sleeves as her father continued, “It’s nice being able to cook a small soup without someone criticizing my cooking. There no meat! Bear man eat like rabbit!”
Lena giggled at her father’s impersonation of Grisha. Sitting up, she raised her arms, curling them in a flex as she deepened her voice, “Meat make Grisha big and strong! More meat bunny man!”
“If I put in anymore meat, then the soup won’t be a soup. It’ll be a pot of meat.”
“You cry like baby! Grisha hate noisy baby!”
“You really need to teach him some more pronouns.”
“Lena try, but Grisha always gone,” Lena joked on a laugh.
Her face glowed with infectious laughter that tickled her father into joining in.
Mount TengokuThe snow fell thickest in the mountains. A white mound in the form of a seated man stirred as clumps of snow and ice cracked free from his crown. Ice fell away from dark eyes that stared tensely into the horizon, overlooking the ice caps that bowed before the heavenly mountain. It hadn’t been the frozen scenery that he regarded but beyond the horizon was a foreign and great power that made the hairs of his tail stiffen. His brown tail unraveled from his waist and flicked in the air, ridding its pelt of ice. A low growl hummed from the snow-covered warrior’s throat before he uncrossed his legs and rose to his feet. Snow rolled from his body to pelt the stone at his feet.
Thrusting his arms out, he shrugged his shoulders and enveloped his body in the brown cape that hung from the steel mantle on his shoulders. The power level put the warrior on edge, and hopefully, whoever possessed it wouldn’t be drawn to the little village below. Crossing his arms, the guardian, Grisha, nervously monitored the unknown foe. He tensed up when the greater power started hurriedly in his direction. Grisha's nose wrinkled like the maw of a threatened beast. Immediately, he started to think about Lena and Kousetsu Village. If he remained where he was and confronted the enemy, then they would surely be safe. Not once did the warrior think about defeat. He would fight this foe until his last breath to keep Lena and his village safe.
Patiently, Grisha waited. His strong arms were still crossed beneath his cape and his tail sought comfort about his hips. The enemy had arrived as a speck in the distance and barely a second after, his approach was brought on by an enormous blast of air pressure. As the creature halted abruptly before the warrior, the air pressure struck Grisha like a typhoon, blowing the White Devil Crown from his head and tearing the cape clean from his mantle. Grisha, however, didn't move a centimeter. His arms had remained crossed and his frown remained hardened on his mug.
The creature, Dyce, grinned sinisterly at the Saiyan.
"If you had been toppled by my approach, then I may not have taken you seriously, bravo."Grisha said nothing as his dark eyes burned holes into the green man's. Dyce's smile never thawed as he went onto explain,
"I am Dyce, one of a race known as the Zandol. I was sent here to judge the power of its inhabitants, but so far, I have found none that would prove to be a hindrance to our reign..."Dyce eyed the warrior curiously,
"Unless of course, you prove to be a challenge?"The silence that stagnated between them eventually grew on the alien's nerves. Did this warrior not speak? His grin drooped into an irritable frown as he growled, "Does the Zettle worm have your tongue or does my presence frighten you so much that you are speechless?"
Dyce grinned condescendingly at the Saiyan, and Grisha finally spoke, "Grisha confused. Grisha never seen green vegetable speak or walk."
Grisha's hand went to his head as he began to scratch his scalp at this baffling discovery. "Plant have arms and legs like Grisha..."
Dyce's eyes widened in shock.
"Plant? You mean me?"Then in Grisha's mind he began to imagine a cucumber sprouting arms and legs and dancing about.
Shaking in anger, Dyce growled,
"I am no vegetable you fool! I am a Zandol warrior! My people have destroyed thousands and conquered millions! This pathetic planet is but a stone in our path!"The alien paused in his monologue of his nation's glory when he noticed the Saiyan wasn't paying him any mind. Grisha's palm was pressed against his forehead for trying to imagine a vegetable suddenly growing arms and legs was giving him a headache. Dyce could hear the warrior mumbling to himself, "What Lena say if Grisha bring home plant? Lena like veggies but be too big for pot. Perhaps Grisha chop to pieces?"
Snarling, Dyce growled,
"It is I who will be chopping you to pieces!"The kick had come so fast that before Grisha knew it, he was rocketing into the frozen sky with a terrible ache in his gut. The cucumber had appeared over top of him and dropped upon his shoulders, dropping him toward the rocky earth like a missile. An eruption of stone and ice arched into the air as a ten foot crater formed at the impact. The Zandol hovered over him and started to rapidly stomp against Grisha's back. Dycen suddenly stopped, grasped the back of Grisha's neck, and tossed him into the air over his shoulder.
"I don't have time for the likes of you!" Dyce roared.
As Grisha flew like a rag doll through the air, the warrior opened his eyes, his teeth grit in his pain. He saw Dyce holding his hand out in his direction. Immediately, he felt a searing heat against his skin and then after, everything went black. The Saiyan detonated in an orange flower of fire and smoke. His armor fell in pieces of melted shrap as the warrior's limp body went tumbling lifelessly down the mountain side.
Dyce exhaled his anger on a relieved breath before a smile returned to his face. He couldn't believe he had let himself get so worked up over nothing.
"Pathetic."Dyce had remained on the mountain, staring down the cliff side hoping that that hadn't been the end of the duel. His last opponent had at least managed to fight back. Sneering in disappointment, Dyce sucked his teeth and pressed the button to activate his ki-sensing visor as he started to comb the earth for another adversary.
There has to be a challenge somewhere, the Zandol thought in frustration.
Slowly, Dyce levitated a few feet into the air unaware that he was being watched and turned in a circle until he faced the south. There were three signatures in the distance that twisted the alien's smile.
"Three versus one; this is going to be interesting," Dyce said to himself before he erupted in a yellow energy and took off like a rocket in the direction of
North Capital.
Kosetsu VillageThe door to the little round house opened and Lena sat up in her chair, raising her head from the window sill to see a familiar silhouette in the door.
"Grisha?" she queried in her uncertainty.
The warrior stepped across the threshold, the interior light bathing him and revealing his half-naked form. What remained of his clothes were some burnt and torn pants barely hanging onto his hips and the charred briefs that were seen visibly through the gaps in his trousers. His tail was singed, his short, black hair in disarray and he smelt of fire. The Saiyan hadn't come to the house alone, behind him were a string of young ladies, standing in his shadow and admiring him secretly from behind.
Lena's blonde brows shot upwards at the guardian's appearance and she asked in concern, "Grisha, what happened to you?"
Tobias turned from his cooking and was almost thrown back by Grisha's appearance. He was practically naked, and in his house in front of his poor, innocent daughter! He thrust the soup ladle in the incompetent warrior's direction.
"Put some clothes on!" he exclaimed.
Grisha stood there silently, staring back into his mind as his defeat played over and over again. His brows furrowed angrily when Lena asked him what had happened. The incident still gave him a headache even after its end. Clenching his fists in anger, the warrior growled, "Green Man hurt Grisha. Grisha fell from mountain. Mountain took Grisha two days to climb, and Grisha no finish him! How Green Man fly but Grisha can't? Green Man talk too, better than Grisha."
Baring his teeth in his anger, the Saiyan growled before raising his fists and bellowing, "GRISHA WILL AVENGE HIMSELF AND KILL GREEN MAN!"
Grisha's pants and underwear popped free from his hips to plop to the floor at his feet and Lena's mouth fell open in speechlessness. The girls behind him froze in shock and Tobias's ladle bobbed up and down between Grisha's crotch and face as his mouth fell open. His eyes darted to Lena whose face was glowing so red it lit the entire room. Grabbing his apron, Tobias dropped the ladle and rushed over to Grisha to smash it against him. Poking his head passed the warrior's hip, the father screamed, "There's nothing to see here!"
Pushing the door closed, the girls remained standing in flushed shock.
"Lena, well, you see, uh..." How was a father supposed to explain what her virgin eyes had seen?
Lena had a hand pressed to her face and she fanned at her father dismissively, "You don't have to explain. It's all right."
Her inner demon giggled impishly,
When Grisha was in a coma, I got to see as much of him as I wanted, hee, hee, hee!The father stared up at Grisha who was staring at him as though HE was awkward. Looping the apron strap about the warrior's neck, the father stepped back as Grisha's gaze lowered to the garment.
"Why give Grisha apron? Grisha cook nothing."
"You're naked you imbecile!" Tobias barked.
Lena frowned at her father, "Daddy don't yell at Grisha. He only means well."
Tobias faced Lena and argued, "Means well? Coming in our house half-naked, looking like he played with fire and lost, means well?"
Upon glancing at the pot of soup, all thoughts about his revenge were forgotten as Grisha questioned with raised brows, "You make soup for Grisha?"
Tobias's head snapped so hard over his shoulder that he could have broken his own neck. "Oh no! Not this again!"
Lena laughed at her father's and Grisha's antics. Despite Grisha's appearance, things seemed back to normal, although the warrior's disheveled appearance and his mentioning of a "Green Man" bothered her. He never was good with details. It was another something they would need to work on.
After LunchAfter a dull meal—there wasn’t enough meat—Grisha had started racing to North Capital. His powerful legs moved in a blur, carrying him up mountains and across the water without sinking. From a small secluded island in the north, Grisha made a beeline through canyons and between cliffs to North Capital.
Punished GN
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