On a country road, two figures—one tall, one short—were walking slowly side by side.
"Hey, what's the deal with you? Why do you keep making me follow you around?"
The smaller figure, with green skin and an unusual appearance, had two antennae sprouting from the top of his head. He was walking quickly, keeping pace with the taller man ahead of him.
This little green-skinned being was none other than the son of the fearsome Great Demon King himself—Piccolo. Though he had only been born recently, his body was already the size of a three-year-old child. You could call him Little Piccolo.
After Naruto found him, he simply started walking—on foot, in silence, with the boy in tow. Along the way, Little Piccolo had tried to escape several times, but no matter how far he ran, he always somehow ended up back within ten meters of Naruto.
After dozens of failed attempts, realizing he absolutely couldn't get away, he resigned himself to follow obediently.
Seeing that Naruto wasn't responding to his words, Little Piccolo asked again, "What do you mean by 'guardian'? Are you supposed to be watching me or something?"
"How long do you plan on monitoring me? Three years? Five? Ten? I'll have you know, we of the Demon Clan live much longer than humans. By the time you die of old age, I'll still just be in my prime."
At that, Naruto suddenly stopped walking and looked down at him.
"W–what are you doing?" Little Piccolo instinctively jumped back a step, watching Naruto warily.
But before long, under Naruto's steady gaze, his defiance faltered.
Naruto's eyes—the ones every student at the Konoha Ninja Academy had once called "unnerving"—seemed to pierce right through him. Even though the world of Dragon Ball had far higher power levels, that didn't mean its people had stronger nerves.
Under Naruto's piercing blue stare, Little Piccolo felt utterly exposed, as if stripped bare before him.
"I'll tell you this right now," Little Piccolo blurted out, voice trembling slightly, "if you're going to kill me, you'd better do it soon. Because once I grow up, I swear I'll kill you!"
"I'm the son of the Great Demon King, after all."
Though he spoke threateningly, Naruto could easily hear the fear beneath the bravado.
A threat, after all, was just another form of fear pushed to its limit.
Naruto said nothing. Instead, he suddenly reached out his right hand toward the boy.
"Wha—" Little Piccolo panicked, thinking Naruto really was going to kill him. He tried to dodge, but no matter how he moved, Naruto's hand seemed to follow unerringly closer until, trembling, he gave up and squeezed his eyes shut.
But the expected pain never came. Instead, a large warm hand rested gently atop his head.
"Believe it or not," Naruto said quietly, "I have no intention of killing you."
Little Piccolo's eyes lit up. "Then let me go!"
Naruto glanced at him but ignored the demand, continuing evenly, "I'm going to train you for a while."
"You want to teach me?" Little Piccolo gave him a look of sudden understanding. "You're trying to make me a good person, aren't you? That's impossible. I'm the Great Demon King's son!"
"I was born evil. From the moment I came into this world, my destiny has been to become the next Great Demon King."
His words made Naruto think of someone else—someone who used to talk about "destiny" all the time.
"Destiny, my ass," Naruto said with a small laugh and shook his head. "Who decided that the child of a Demon King has to become one himself?"
Piccolo Jr. wasn't the same as Piccolo. Piccolo was the embodiment of Kami's pure evil. The child had inherited everything from him—but he wasn't the same person.
Right now, Little Piccolo was like a blank sheet of paper.
Just like Kami himself had been when he first came to Earth.
"Your father may have been a Demon King," Naruto continued, pausing for a moment, "but do you know what kind of being his father was?"
The question caught Little Piccolo's attention.
He hesitated. "Another Demon King?"
He had no memory of his father's father. In fact, not even Piccolo—or even Kami, for that matter—had any recollection of that part of their past.
"No," Naruto shook his head. "Your father's father was once a genius among your kind."
"A genius of the Demon Clan?!" Little Piccolo's eyes lit up.
"Sorry to disappoint you," Naruto said with a small shrug, "but he wasn't a demon at all."
"He came from a race that lived far away from Earth—a peaceful race, the exact opposite of what you imagine."
Katas—or rather, Katas of Namek. A contemporary of the current Grand Elder of Namek, and once considered the planet's brightest genius.
"That's impossible!" Little Piccolo shouted, pushing Naruto's words away. "The Great Demon King's father couldn't possibly have been some peace-loving fool!"
"Believe it or don't. I'm only telling you what I know," Naruto replied, not bothering to explain further. Truthfully, that was all he knew himself.
After a moment of silence, Little Piccolo frowned. "I get it now. You're doing all this because you want to make a new opponent for yourself—and for Goku, right?"
"As the Great Demon King's son, I'd make the perfect challenger."
"I just want to teach you, that's all," Naruto said simply. "You should already know—I'm far stronger than your father. Under my guidance, you'll be able to grow much faster."
"Ever heard of the saying 'raising a tiger to invite disaster'?" Little Piccolo asked cautiously. "Aren't you afraid that one day I'll surpass you?"
"Maybe I'll even kill you."
"Don't overthink it," Naruto replied casually. "I'll only be looking after you for three months. After that, I'm gone."
"When that time comes, whether you survive or perish has nothing to do with me."
"Oh, and one more thing—"
Naruto leaned down, extended a finger, and flicked the shiny green forehead of the little demon lightly.
"Stop saying things like 'kill, kill, kill' all the time. Even if you do want to become a Demon King one day, talking like that just makes you sound low-class."
Then he straightened and said:
"Do you know what's most important when it comes to becoming a Demon King?"
Little Piccolo thought for a long while before answering, "Power?"
"Wrong."
Naruto shook his head and stood up again.
In his mind, two figures appeared—
One, a bald man in a filthy black robe with no nose, laughing endlessly with a sinister "Heh-heh-heh-heh."
The other, calm and poised like a perfect gentleman, yet when he moved, he was as wild and radiant as a golden bird soaring arrogantly across the sky.
"It's style," Naruto said softly, closing his eyes, "and ideals."
"Without those, you'll never be more than a low-level terrorist—never a true Demon King."
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