A Stroll Through Tarbel Town (Taori/Alpinia)

"I still don't know hot to feel about you reenlisting," Alpinia commented as she and Taori walked through Tarbel Village on this warm, summer evening. Taori shrugged. "It's either I get involved in this thing or wonder if I could've done something to help every time I hear about some new disaster or battle." Alpinia hadn't exactly loved the news that Taori was going to get out there and start getting involved in the war effort, now that things were starting to heat back up... But she wasn't telling him not to do it, so that was good.

He supposed he was glad his power level was quite high compared to most of those among the Saiyans. Saiyans were strong, generally, but even elite warriors often topped out around 10,000 power level or so. Taori had managed to push himself beyond that, all the way up to 16,000, which he attributed to his extensive combat experience on the front lines. All the training in the world amounted to little in the face of actual combat experience.

Of course, there were certain... Anomalies that had been popping up, lately. It was no surprise that the Arcosians Taori had seen were beyond him in power, those lizards were a race of overpowered freaks. But what was surprising were the others who weren't Arcosians. Rosemary had a power level above 50,000 when he'd clocked her in, and he recalled even the young Saiyan Amara had a power level more than double his own. 

So... What would he do if he happened to face one of those jacked up powers out on the battlefield? ...Taori supposed he'd just have to figure out how to get himself up there first. There had to be some sort of trick to it. Although, he really was just a low class Saiyan warrior when it came down to it. There were  certain limits to the potential of Saiyans based on their birth status - everyone knew that. "If it'll ease your conscience, fine, but I can't have you making me worry about you every minute you're off fighting," Alpinia replied as Taori found himself deep in thought. "You handled it alright before I retired," Taori stated, and as he did, his scouter beeped. 

He glanced over at the number that appeared, and his eyes widened. He paused and stared at the man in front of him, who made brief eye contact as he walked past. The man was an ordinary Saiyan, just like him, but... His power level was reading as 55,000?! With that sort of power, you could practically solo the Tuffle army...! "Excuse me," Taori said as he held his hand out to stop the man in his tracks. Alpinia glanced over with a raised eyebrow, not sure exactly what it was her husband was doing.

"Your uh, your power level..." Taori stammered, a little exasperated by the sheer sudden strength of this seemingly ordinary Saiyan warrior, one just like him. "How did you get it that high?" It may have come off as an odd question, and it honestly was, but something like this was too significant for Taori to ignore.

Alpinia blinked at Taori. "Why are you pulling aside random strangers and asking-" she started to ask, but then she used her own scouter, and her eyes widened. "Whoa, 55,000?!" she exclaimed, "What kind of steroids are you taking?" Taori and Alpinia both waited with baited breath as this incredibly powerful stranger seemed to briefly ponder their question. Was there some sort of special training regimen that only a special few knew of? Some special sort of herb that unlocked one's inner power? Or perhaps some magical blessing an ancient and powerful wizard granted those who proved themselves to him?

And then, this mysterious stranger answered, and both Taori and Alpinia's faces slightly fell. Training and... Fighting? Taori had been doing practically nothing but those things since the day he left his birthing pod. yet here he was, quite a great deal behind all the other top powers of the galaxy. Was there some truth to the minimal potential everyone said low class warriors had after all? If that was the case, then Taori glanced at Alpinia and wondered if she should have been the one training as hard as he was. She'd been born with a high battle power, after all. Her potential was likely quite a bit higher than his own... 

But, she didn't like fighting all too much. And Taori didn't want to force her to. So... Beefing himself up it was. "Right..." Taori slowly replied to the powerful stranger. "It's just that your battle power is much..." He paused and furrowed his brows as the scouter that had been reading this man's power level suddenly began to... Glitch out. 

First his power level dipped down to single digits, then shot up to the millions, then dipped back down again before leveling out once more. The reading was also fizzling out around what species it was reading the man as, so Taori knew something had to have been up with the scouter. "Damn cheap factory line things," he grumbled. "Uh, nevermind, I guess your battle power isn't actually... As high as I thought it was."

Alpinia's scouter seemed to have been having trouble, too, and she removed it from her face to prevent herself from getting a headache. "Yeesh, mine, too," she said. "I guess we did buy ours from the same place." Taori shrugged, then waved off the Saiyan as he turned to leave. "Sorry for bugging you, ignore the question."

---

The armor...? Taori and Alpinia both looked quizzically down at this powerful stranger's armor, which looked... Absolutely normal. By all appearances, it was your standard issue galactic battle armor that nearly everyone across the galaxy wore. But there was no real reason for them to believe he was lying, so... Taori just shrugged. "That's some weird armor," he commented, and Alpinia agreed, her tone vaguely suspicious. "That's for certain... I've heard of energy techniques that can fool scouters, but never armor - especially armor that only covers up your torso!"

There must have been some real interesting stuff lining the inside of that thing if it was driving both of their scouters this crazy, though. "Maybe I'll have to look into getting myself a set," Taori mused, "In fact, if the Saiyan military could make those standard issue, the Tuffles would have a hell of a hard time getting a read on us during any battle approaches." Alpinia quietly rolled her eyes as Taori immediately jumped to applying the armor's use to the war for Plant, though she didn't say anything.

As they turned to leave, though, the Saiyan stopped them, apparently willing to divulge a little bit more about how he had achieved his impressive strength, rather than just the standard 'training and hard work.' "Yeah?" Taori asked, intrigued. Alpinia was a little bit suspicious, though. "Wait, why can't you tell us out in the open?" she asked. She didn't really detect anything nefarious from the guy, but, well, he was a stranger, and he had more than enough power to do pretty much anything he wanted to the two of them.

If he was looking to cause harm, it'd be all too easy for him to do just that if he got them out of view of the public. She crossed her arms, then frowned. "I smell something a little fishy here," she stated, "First, I don't know if I totally buy that it's your armor that's causing our scouters to glitch out, and second, well, you're acting kinda weird. What's so special about your tricks that you can't risk anyone hearing, but you're willing to tell them to two perfect strangers?" 

Sense energy? ...Oh, right, some folks around the galaxy could do that, couldn't they? Taori had never figured out how to do that himself, but now that he thought about it, Alpinia had mentioned being able to do that before. She somewhat struggled with it, though, so she did still prefer to use a scouter. That, and scouters had so many other useful features, just relying on an innate ability to detect ki didn't really feel like a muscle worth flexing to her. Something else this stranger said had caught Taori's attention too, though. "...Not from this planet, huh?"

As Taori spoke, he crossed his arms, his gaze hardening, though only slightly. He knew some Saiyans lived off world, either by their own choice or by the choice of an ancestor of theirs. He had no issue with them at their cores, but... When they came back around to Vegeta like tourists checking in on the state of the war, he couldn't deny there was a bit of automatic resentment that built up inside of him. He and many others have risked their lives for the future of their species on this planet, yet here were Saiyans just like them who knew no such hardships and arrived to gawk at something they truly knew little about.

Of course, he wasn't going to say all that to this stranger, but he felt a bit more reluctant to take his advice, now that he knew he was just a tourist. Alpinia, having not really experienced the war firsthand herself, however, had no such qualms with foreign Saiyans. "Oh, what planet are you from?" she innocently asked, "I know a lot of Saiyans tend to go to Earth if they aren't living on Vegeta. My cousin lives there right now, actually!"

Taori cleared his throat. "It's uh, fairly quiet just outside town," he offered, changing the subject back to this special powering up method the stranger mentioned. "Why don't we head there? Should be away from any prying eyes." Even if this Saiyan was from another world, if he knew how to get stronger faster than those around him, well, Taori would have been a fool to turn down that kind of information. He only had a month to catch up to where both Rosemary and this stranger were at, so time was of the essence.

Taori couldn't prevent the snort that came out of his nostrils as the stranger explained that, all the way off on some planet called Earth, during some sort of martial arts tournament, both Saiyans and Tuffles alike were attempting to recruit strong powers into their cause. It was kind of pathetic, really. Did his own Saiyan brethren doubt their own ability to win the war with their own strength that much? And were the Tuffles truly so desperate that they'd scour the galaxy for powerful fighters to aid them? And... Why would any Tuffle ask a Saiyan for help? They really were desperate if they were resorting to that.

Then again, they did ally themselves with Yangcong. In fact, the stranger mentioned Yangcong. Though, one thing he said about the man confused Taori. "Half Tuffle?" he asked, "Wait, you mean to tell me Yangcong was a half Tuffle this entire time?" He almost couldn't believe it, but it explained so much. Yangcong had looked Saiyan enough to pass himself off as one, but he must have been acting as a double agent for the Tuffles that whole time. Though... What kind of Saiyan would have a child with a Tuffle? No good or honorable one, that was for certain.

"Well, he died in that battle, didn't he?" Alpinia asked, and Taori nodded. "Yeah, at the very least, we won't have to worry about him pulling any more crazy stunts like that. Who knows what else the Tuffles might try, though." As Taori began to lead the stranger toward the outskirts of the town, he listened in on his explanation of where he was from. "Kaishin? Haven't heard of it. Doesn't kai mean god, though?" he asked. Alpinia chimed in, "Maybe it's a heavenly kind of place!" "...Sure."

It didn't take too long for them to get far enough out of town that it was doubtful anyone would take notice of them - Tarbel Village was a fairly small place, relatively speaking. "Alright, I won't get my hopes up too much," Taori replied after the stranger warned that what he had to show them wouldn't be anything completely game changing. "Any help at all is what I need."

Finally, they'd made it out far enough away from Tarbel Village that it was highly unlikely anyone would really take notice of them, unless explosions started flying. This guy didn't plan on sending explosions flying everywhere as part of his technique, did he? If that was the case, it'd probably be a better idea to get a few miles away from the village first, Taori thought. It didn't appear things would be going that way, though - not yet, anyway. "Oh, believe me," Taori replied at the man's thoughts on Yangcong, "You aren't the only one who'd have liked to get some licks in on the old bastard."

The topic quickly moved on from that, though. And it took a turn neither Taori nor Alpinia had really been anticipating. The 'Saiyan' suddenly explained he was no Saiyan at all. Rather, the appearance he had was... a disguise? Taori's brows furrowed as he looked the man up and down. As far as disguises went, well, it was pretty immaculate. To the point where even the scouters had been confused about just what species to clock the man in at. And scouters weren't so easy to fool.

Both Taori and Alpinia listened in silence, with Alpinia's face looking rather puzzled and concerned all at once, while Taori crossed his arms and maintained a rather firm but generally neutral expression. The Shinjin had a lot to say, and neither seemed inclined to interrupt him. A few moments after he was done, and he had dropped his disguise to reveal his true, emphatically un-Saiyan form, Taori finally spoke up. "First thing's first," he said, "Don't pull this with any other Saiyan unless you want them to punch you in the face." 

He had major doubts any of his fellow Saiyans would've taken too kindly to being deceived like the way the two of them had just been, and while he wasn't exactly pleased with the man, he could hold himself back enough to not just outright attack him. Especially with Alpinia present. Speaking of Alpinia, she seemed more confused than upset. "Why go through all this trouble, though?" she asked. "I don't see why the war on this planet would be of any real concern to you. I could sort of get it if you were a Saiyan or a Tuffle from another planet, but... What sort of stakes do you have in all of this?"

At least this Shinjin seemed to know what he was in for with the Saiyans. Taori could easily have imagined any of the other soldiers in his platoon attacking the stranger almost immediately upon learning of his deception, so the fact that the Shinjin had prepared himself for that was, well, good. "You just watch, then?" Taori asked after the stranger had finished most of his spiel. "Is there some kind of heavenly rule that says you're not allowed to intervene?" Taori didn't totally get it, but he at least got the gist that this was no ordinary sightseer. Alpinia also didn't totally get it, but she came to a similar conclusion to Taori. "You're uh," she quietly started to ask, "Well, you keep calling us 'mortals'... Does that mean you're not a mortal?"

Taori, due to no fault of the Shinjin, rolled his eyes. The last time he'd met someone who kept calling him a 'mortal', they were a psychotic elf demon that nearly razed over an entire city block of Radditsu. So, Taori was slightly wary of folks who went around talking down to Saiyans with that word in particular. Although, this guy didn't seem to be using it in a way meant to put them down. He more seemed to use it as if it was simply a regular word to describe what they were.

"Surely there must be wars on other planets of a similar scale to what's going on here, right?" Taori asked. "True, genocide is bad and all, and I think we'd all like to avoid that if possible, but I doubt this is the only area of potential genocide in the galaxy." Alpinia tilted her head and frowned, her black eyes drifting up and off to the side as if she were deep in thought. "That's true... I wonder what's so special about us that you got all those requests to come here in particular?"

Ah, well. Taori supposed it didn't really matter if the stranger wasn't going to interfere. He could watch all he liked, as far as Taori was concerned. And, when it came to the stranger's offer to show Taori some tricks about attaining true power... "No, thanks," Taori replied with a smile. "I mean no offense, but I'd rather win the war with Saiyan power, not through the aid of an outsider. I'll find a way to get strong on my own."