A Rock and a Hard Place

At least Mint was being cordial. Mostly, anyway. Taori didn't fail to notice the Arcosian still kept quite the smug attitude about himself, but, from his experience, that was just a default genetic trait of all Arcosians. They couldn't help themselves feeling mightier than everyone else around them. In fairness, Taori had also met his fair share of fellow Saiyans that were like that, too.

"Well," Taori replied after a moment of silence following Mint's explanation of how things went down after Azoth's sudden death, "Glad I could be of help." A bit troubling that Blizzard was still out there somehow, but Taori figured he'd gotten strong enough at this point that he could likely handle the Arcosian if he ever dared attack Sadala again. He just had to hope it wouldn't be another ambush while he was preoccupied elsewhere...

Alpinia, meanwhile, was more troubled by how nihilistic Vetch still was about their odds of removing the chains. "Hmm, I don't know, Vetch," she replied, "My husband is strong, of course... But Arcosian strength is on a whole 'nother level from Saiyan strength."

"Hey...!" Taori grumbled in protest, but Alpinia just shrugged back.

"Am I wrong?" she asked him.

Taori thought for a moment, then replied, "I... Suppose not, but more than one Arcosian has gone down over the years because he underestimated a Saiyan." Either way, Mint wasn't wasting any time in putting that famed Arcosian strength to the test, as he powered up in full and approached the chains. Something about his powered up form looked a bit... Off, though. Like his body wasn't really ready for the strength it carried. Taori didn't say anything, though, as he watched the Emperor take hold of the chains, only to immediately let go of them.

"Yeah, like the big guy said, they aren't particularly pleasant to touch," Taori commented, a smirk gently forming on his lips as he folded his arms and watched. Mint took a moment before he summoned the will to try again, and began to pull on them with all the might his lizard body could muster. And, well, Taori supposed he shouldn't just stand and watch.

He cracked his neck back and forth, then shook out his hands before flexing his muscles and surging the ki within his body. His power level flared up and his eyes yellowed, slightly, but he was in control. The Saiyan stepped forward behind Mint and grabbed hold of the chains himself, wincing at the unpleasant and sharp pain that ripped through his body as he did so. But he held tightly, regardless. "With me, on three," he instructed Mint through grit teeth. "One, two, three...!"

Taori tugged with all his might at the chains, presumably in sync along with Mint. His own strength alone had been insufficient, but together with Mint? Maybe, just maybe, they could do this.

Alpinia nervously rubbed her hands together from a few meters away as she watched, her brows furrowing and lips pursing with unease. "Be careful, you two...!" she warned.

Taori's blow struck true, and Mint was hit rather forcefully by the Saiyan's fist, luckily causing him to drop the chains and prevent any further damage to the fragile, mysterious planet they were all standing on. Taori briefly maintained a fighter's stance even after Mint had been knocked away, as he knew just how prideful Arcosians were, and couldn't be sure that the Emperor wouldn't strike back against him in retaliation. However, Mint accepted the blow with a surprising amount of grace, prompting Taori to lower his own guard back down. 

"Well... Good," Taori said with some hesitation as Mint expressed how he rather did not want Taori and Alpinia to end up dead as a result of his actions. Taori glanced over at Alpinia and found that Vetch had erected some sort of protective barrier around them, which he was thankful for, and he gave the other Saiyan a nod to express this.

"Thanks, Vetch!" Alpinia chippered out loud towards the big lug. "I'd erect some kind of ki barrier too, but it'd be awfully weak compared to yours. I'm pretty out of practice with that sort of thing." Alpinia did possess some natural talent for ki energy, but given that she'd rarely even used it in her thirty or so years of being alive, that innate talent had all but withered away and dried up.

Mint then began talking about the legendary 'Super Saiyan,' at which Taori rolled his eyes. "They call it a legend for a reason, you know," he stated, crossing his arms. Seeing as they were no longer needing to exert their strength, Taori also allowed his unleashed ki energy to die back down and relax, reverting to his base power level.  "I wouldn't lose sleep over it. In the meantime, though..." Taori glanced back down at the chains that had bound Vetch for an eternity and frowned, giving one of them a light kick out of annoyance. "How the hell do we get these off of you if even the two of us combined can't break them? I don't mean to sound arrogant, but Mint and I are among the most powerful folks in the universe."