The battlefield fell silent except for the sound of labored breathing and settling dust. Sage stood between the fallen Gohan and the approaching Saiyans, blood streaming from cuts across his face and arms. His left shoulder hung at an unnatural angle, and every breath sent fire through his cracked ribs, but his feet remained planted firmly in the scorched earth.
"Still standing?" Vegeta's voice carried a mixture of amusement and irritation as he stepped over Piccolo's motionless form. "How pathetically stubborn. Just like a low-class warrior—too stupid to know when they're beaten."
Nappa brushed dust from his armor, his earlier confidence replaced by annoyance. "Want me to finish him, Vegeta? He's starting to get on my nerves."
"No." Vegeta raised a hand, his dark eyes fixed on Sage with predatory interest. "I'll handle this myself. It's been far too long since I've had the pleasure of educating one of our... lesser brethren... about their proper place."
The prince began walking forward with casual arrogance, each step deliberate and measured. "Tell me, low-class, what was your father's name? I like to know whose bloodline I'm ending."
Sage's jaw tightened, but he remained silent, shifting his weight to favor his good leg.
"Nothing to say? How disappointing." Vegeta's power began to rise, a white aura flickering around his compact frame. "My scouter reads your pathetic power level at around eight thousand. Do you know what mine is?"
The air grew heavy as Vegeta's energy climbed steadily upward. Nine thousand. Twelve thousand. Fifteen thousand.
"Eighteen thousand," Vegeta said with cold satisfaction, his aura now blazing around him like white fire. "More than twice your strength, and I haven't even begun to try. This is the difference between royalty and refuse."
Sage's hands clenched into fists, blood dripping from his knuckles to the ground below.
"Your father," Vegeta continued, taking another step closer, "was he one of those sniveling cowards who bowed and scraped before their betters? Did he teach you to know your place, or are you simply too brain-damaged to understand basic hierarchy?"
"My father..." Sage's voice was barely a whisper, raw with pain and exhaustion. "My father was a warrior."
Vegeta laughed—a harsh, mocking sound. "A warrior? He was cannon fodder. Disposable. The kind of Saiyan we sent to die first so that real warriors could conserve their strength for battles that mattered."
Something flickered in Sage's eyes—not the usual calculated calm or guilty uncertainty, but something deeper and more dangerous.
"Your father died like all low-class Saiyans should—forgotten and meaningless. Just like you're about to." Vegeta's aura flared brighter. "But don't worry. I'll make sure to tell everyone how the last low-class Saiyan died begging for mercy."
"I don't beg."
The words came out flat and cold, carrying a weight that made even Nappa glance over with interest. Sage straightened despite his injuries, and for the first time since the battle began, he looked directly into Vegeta's eyes without flinching.
"What did you say?" Vegeta's amusement faded, replaced by genuine irritation.
"I said I don't beg." Sage wiped blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. "Not to Frieza's dogs. Not to royal pretenders. And certainly not to a prince who couldn't even protect his own planet."
The temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. Vegeta's aura vanished completely as his face went utterly still.
"What... did you just call me?"
"You heard me." Despite his broken body, despite facing certain death, Sage's voice grew stronger. "You talk about hierarchy? About knowing our place? Where were you when Frieza destroyed our world? Where was the mighty Prince Vegeta when our people burned?"
Nappa took an involuntary step backward. Even he could sense the lethal fury building in his prince.
"You were his lapdog," Sage continued, his voice gaining a harsh edge that hadn't been there before. "Following orders. Wearing his armor. Doing his bidding while our race died. And you have the nerve to lecture me about Saiyan pride?"
Vegeta's hands began to shake—not from fear, but from pure, incandescent rage.
"You insignificant worm," he whispered, his voice deadly quiet. "You have no idea what you're talking about."
"Don't I?" Sage shifted his stance, ignoring the agony in his ribs. "I spent fifteen years wondering why I survived. Wondering what I was supposed to do with my life. But looking at you... I think I finally understand."
His power began to fluctuate—not rising exactly, but changing. The quality of his energy shifted, becoming denser, more focused.
"I survived to see what the Prince of all Saiyans really is." Sage's eyes were no longer the haunted orbs of a broken survivor. They held something cold and fierce. "A slave playing at being a king."
"ENOUGH!"
Vegeta exploded forward, moving faster than the eye could follow. His fist slammed into Sage's solar plexus with enough force to shatter stone, lifting the younger Saiyan off his feet and doubling him over. Before Sage could even register the first blow, Vegeta's knee drove into his face, snapping his head back with a sickening crack.
"You dare—!" Another punch caught Sage in the ribs, the sound of breaking bone echoing across the battlefield. "You DARE—!" An elbow to the spine sent Sage crashing face-first into the ground.
But impossibly, incredibly, Sage pushed himself back to his feet.
Blood poured from his nose and mouth. His left eye was swelling shut. He swayed like a tree in a hurricane, but he stood.
"Is that it?" he asked, spitting blood. "Is that the best the Prince of all Saiyans can do?"
Vegeta's face went white with fury. "I'll show you power, you low-class scum!"
He appeared beside Sage in a blur of motion, fists moving in a devastating combination that should have ended the fight instantly. Should have—but somehow, impossibly, Sage was still standing after each blow. Not blocking, not dodging, but simply... enduring.
"What's wrong, Your Highness?" Sage's voice was thick with blood but steady with conviction. "Having trouble putting down one 'insignificant worm'? Maybe you're not as elite as you think."
"I AM THE PRINCE OF ALL SAIYANS!" Vegeta roared, his power spiking even higher as his attacks became more vicious, more desperate. Each blow could have leveled a mountain, but Sage refused to fall.
"No," Sage said quietly, and for the first time in the battle, he began to fight back. Not with his usual calculated precision, but with something raw and primal. His fist connected with Vegeta's jaw—a solid hit that actually staggered the prince. "You're just another survivor. Just like me."
Vegeta stumbled backward, touching his lip and staring at the blood on his fingers in shock. "Impossible... your power level..."
"Power level?" Sage straightened, and his aura began to change. Still not visible, but the air around him seemed to shimmer with heat. "You really don't understand, do you? This isn't about power levels."
His eyes flashed—not with fear or guilt or desperation, but with something that had been buried for fifteen years under trauma and survivor's guilt. Something that was purely, undeniably Saiyan.
"This is about pride."
The word seemed to hang in the air between them, carrying weight beyond its simple meaning. In that moment, Sage wasn't the broken survivor who had accidentally caused Goku's death. He wasn't the guilt-ridden young man who couldn't sleep or rest. He was something else entirely—something that had been waiting fifteen years to emerge.
"My father died protecting me," Sage said, his voice carrying a new authority. "He died so that the Saiyan race would survive. So that our pride would endure. And I'll be damned if I let some royal puppet make his sacrifice meaningless."
For the first time in the battle, Vegeta took a step backward.
In the distance, growing closer by the second, a familiar energy signature raced toward the battlefield at impossible speed. But for now, in this moment, there were only two Saiyans facing each other across a field of fallen warriors—one whose pride was built on titles and hierarchy, and another whose pride was finally, truly awakening.
The real battle was about to begin.