Dragon Ball: Enlisted

I sat on the grass, still damp from the water, but I didn't mind.

The breeze felt good against my skin, cooling the faint sting of ki that lingered from my improper use of it. I still didn't have great ki control and had burned my hands in a desperate attempt to save Edith.

Considering my heat resistance, it didn't do much, but it still kinda hurt.

That damn notification that hovered at the edge of my vision hurt more, to be honest. I didn't need to look at it. I knew what it said.

o–o

Quest Complete!

[Beginner] – First Evaluation Day

Objective: Pass the evaluation and increase your rank. +1 [Spirit] per rank increased.

Bonus Objective: Save Edith.

Reward: +8 [Spirit].

Bonus Reward: Ability – [Oxygen Independence]

o–o

I ignored it. Or tried to.

The evaluation had ended, and Aprico announced the new ranks not long after Edith was hauled off for medical checks.

I'd managed to scrape my way into 7th place.

I let out a slow breath, watching the thin mist disappear into the night air. Seventh wasn't bad. A solid leap from the very bottom of the group.

It should've felt like… something.

But I hadn't cared about my rank at all, to begin with.

The system didn't know that. Or maybe it did, and it just didn't care.

I leaned back on my palms, tilting my head up to the sky. The stars were faint against the backdrop of the facility's lights, but they were there if you stared long enough. I focused on them instead of the words still floating at the edge of my vision.

Eight points in Spirit. That was more than I'd earned in three months of meditation. More than I ever earned myself.

The system shouldn't be handing out rewards for something like that.

Well, not the Spirit, at least. I'd earned that as far as I was concerned. But the ability? I didn't deserve it.

I didn't dive in to save Edith because of some damn quest. I didn't even know there was a bonus objective until after she was already gasping for air.

But now I had this ability—[Oxygen Independence]—just because I couldn't let her drown.

o–o

[Oxygen Independence]

Allows the user to survive in airless environments indefinitely. Breathing is optional.

o–o

It felt… dirty. Like I'd profited off something that shouldn't have been part of the system's checklist to begin with.

Edith almost died. And I got an ability for it.

I exhaled through my nose and rubbed the back of my neck.

"Quit moping," I muttered under my breath. "She's fine. You're fine. It's done."

The logic didn't help much.

For one, the fact that the system knew she was going to drown and created a bonus quest for it was scary.

And the irony of gaining the ability to not need oxygen afterwards wasn't lost on me. It felt like the system was treating it as one big joke.

I shifted, brushing dirt from my palms.

A sickly, depressingly familiar sensation settled into my gut. I knew this feeling like the back of my hand. It was the same feeling that always told me to walk away from the situation. That whatever I was getting into was too much for me.

It was that feeling that pushed me to avoid all of my responsibilities in my past life… 

But was that feeling wrong this time?

I hadn't signed up for this much stress. I just wanted to get stronger—train, build myself up, and maybe one day find some quiet corner of the universe to exist in peace.

I didn't sign myself up for this universe, much less the patrol.

Besides, the universe had plenty of warriors. Heroes, even. If it didn't, it would've been destroyed years ago. I could walk away and do my own thing. 

No one was forcing me to stay except myself.

…Because I didn't want to stay the same person I was before.

So I sat back on the grass and closed my eyes. My ki churned as my thoughts went into a spiral. One side of my mind was insistent that I just leave. The other side was adamant that I couldn't leave even if I wanted to.

But why? Why did I have that nagging feeling that I needed to stay here? Was the system influencing me somehow to follow this narrative?

Or maybe… Was it the various evil beings that I knew existed in this world?

All of those enemies that Goku faced would be dealt with eventually. And if he failed, why did I even have to get involved?

Logicaly, it wasn't my problem.

It was selfish, sure, but it's not like the universe needed me. Frieza, Cell, Buu. All of them were in this corner of the universe. I could just leave this sector of the universe and go live in another.

Hell, even the Tournament of Power wasn't something that—

The answer slapped me like a brick to the face.

I sat up straight, my eyes wide.

"The Mortal Level," I whispered, horrified at my realization.

I'd almost forgotten about it—that simple but terrifying measure Zeno used to decide whether a universe deserved to exist. If the Mortal Level dropped too low, he wouldn't hesitate to erase everything. Everyone.

And I didn't know where I was in the timeline.

In the original timeline, the one where Future Trunks originated from, the entirety of Earth's heroes died one after another. It was only through the miraculous genius of Bulma that they even had a sliver of hope.

Yet, even after defying the laws of physics and breaking the taboo of the gods by creating a time machine… they still lost. 

At its core, this universe was hopeless.

Zamasu just came and managed to get the universe erased because of his massively overinflated ego.

If I wanted that peaceful life—if I wanted to make sure I wasn't erased along with the rest of the universe—I had to do something about it.

I had to make sure the Mortal Level never dipped into the danger zone.

Which meant tyrants like Frieza couldn't be left to run wild.

I swallowed, fingers curling against my knee.

The weight of it all settled heavily on my chest.

Maybe it was selfish. I didn't want to save the universe because it was the right thing to do. 

I wanted to save it because I wanted to survive.

Because I wanted the chance to exist in peace, to get stronger without the looming threat of everything disappearing in a blink.

I rested my hand on my chest, feeling the steady thrum beneath my palm.

I didn't have a grand plan. I didn't feel like some chosen hero, and I sure as hell wasn't ready to take on tyrants like Frieza. Even if I had the power, I was sure that I'd freeze up and mess everything up right now.

That was why I needed to stay—to learn how to save the people in front of me.

And if the system wanted to reward me for it, fine. I'd take the stats, the skills, and whatever else it wanted to throw my way.

I'd use every last drop of power it gave me to drag this universe into something better, even if it was kicking and screaming the whole way.

I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding.

It wasn't a declaration, not really. More like a quiet promise to myself.

My fingers dug into the dirt, grounding me in the present. The faint crackle of ki still hummed beneath my skin, a reminder of how close that situation had come to spiraling. 

I couldn't let that happen again.

A soft rustle of grass broke the quiet. I didn't bother turning around, already guessing who it was. Wraak didn't walk that quietly, and Edith was still getting checked over. The instructors were too busy to be talking to me.

That only left one person I knew of.

"You look like you're sulking." She commented.

"Just thinking," I muttered.

She plopped down beside me without asking, arms crossing over her knees as she stared out at the horizon. For a while, neither of us said anything.

"I have to ask," Irelia began, her tone measured as always. "...Why?"