Dragon Ball Z: The Beast Within - CH4

[Escarot POV]

Saiyans had a very loose interpretation of the word; training. By now, it had been a month since I stepped out of the pod, and I had come to realize that for Saiyans “training” was more along the lines of throwing someone into the deep end of a river and seeing if they could swim.

If they couldn’t? Well… too bad. Natural selection and stuff.

After my first fight with the Tennenman, I’m not gonna lie, I was feeling pretty good about myself. I had won, after all. Sure, it had taken me a while to do so, but I had beaten that ugly little bastard into the ground.

I had figured that meant I was strong. Maybe even really strong.

Then, the next day, they made me fight two at the same time.

I lost.

Badly.

One had been hard enough to deal with, but two? It was a completely different fight. One would come at me head-on, and just when I thought I had a handle on it, the other would flank me and knock me on my ass.

They weren’t mindless drones, either… They fought together, exploiting every chance they got, all while giggling and screeching every time they landed a hit.

I had walked out of that fight bruised, bloodied, and humbled. But hey, I was one of the lucky ones that didn't die that day.

The instructors couldn’t care less if you died on their so-called “training”... and if someone did, they would just say there was no greater glory than dying for strength.

It was quite twisted, I know… but that was the way of things here.

So, every day, at the break of dawn, I fought them. Every day, I got the shit beaten out of me. And every day, I got just a little bit better.

Until, eventually, I managed to beat the two. Then they upped the number again. And that cycle continued until… well.

I was at five now.

Five of those freakish little monsters swarming me at once, their shrieks filling the air as they tore into me from all directions. It was exhausting, frustrating, and painful, but the worst part?

I was starting to enjoy it.

At first, I thought it was just the rush of battle, the satisfaction of improvement, but it was more than that. The harder the fight, the stronger the enemies, the more I felt that buzzing sensation deep in my core.

Saiyan instincts.

I had come to accept them as a part of me, though I still wasn’t sure how much of me was really left. That was the part that unsettled me the most. The fact that I had adapted so quickly, that fighting felt right, that the pain of battle was something I could shrug off like it didn’t matter… that was the part that made me pause.

I wasn’t human anymore. Not physically, not mentally; at least not entirely.

But the scary part?

I didn’t care. Not as much as I should, at least.

The battle arena had become my second home at this point. Every morning, I would step onto that cracked, bloodstained ground, and by the time I left, I’d either be victorious or half-dead. There was no middle ground.

Fighting wasn’t the only thing I’d been learning this past month. When I wasn’t getting tossed around the training arena like a ragdoll, I was picking up bits and pieces about how Saiyan society actually worked.

And, honestly? It had more depth than I imagined. It goes to show there’s more to something than what you can see.

Everything revolved around power… raw, measurable strength. Your worth, your future, your very survival depended on a single number: your power level. That was all that mattered.

The lowest tier belonged to infiltration babies.

Saiyan infants deemed too weak to contribute anything worthwhile. Instead of being raised or trained, they were sent to low-threat planets to wipe out their populations. If they survived and completed their missions, maybe they’d have a place among the rest of the race.

If not? Well… nobody cared. After all, they were considered a disposable asset.

Most of them didn’t make it.

Above them were the workers—scientists, technicians, engineers. Saiyans who had just enough strength to avoid being labeled disposable but not enough to be sent into actual battle. They handled everything the warriors didn’t care to do: maintaining ships, improving the technology, managing supplies.

It was a step up from cannon fodder, but still nothing impressive in the eyes of most warriors.

I’d briefly entertained the thought of enrolling in one of their engineering courses, because, really, who wouldn’t want to learn about this in my shoes? But that idea was shot down pretty quickly, and not by me.

I tried to enroll. I was rejected.

Why? Well…

My power level had already dictated my role around here.

I wasn’t a worker. I wasn’t a scientist. I wasn’t an infiltration baby.

I was a warrior.

A high-class warrior, to be exact. A cut above the mid- and low-class soldiers. The kind of fighter expected to handle high-profile missions. The kind they actually invested in.

And I use the word invest very loosely here.

Either way, I didn’t have a choice in the matter.

That was the thing, Saiyan society wasn’t built on freedom. You didn’t get to choose your path. Your strength determined everything from the moment you were born. If you were weak, you were disposable.

If you were strong, you were a weapon. That was the way of things.

Sure, I was a high-class warrior.

That meant slightly better treatment, stronger training, higher expectations. But at the end of the day, I wasn’t some prized asset being carefully developed, I was just another weapon being sharpened before being thrown into battle.

Tomorrow, I was supposed to start my Ozaru training. After finishing that, I’d be assigned to a squad to learn how to operate in real missions.

I left the damn pod a month ago… and I was already on my way to the front lines.

That’s all my so-called high class status had bought me: a month before being shipped off to kill in the name of the Saiyan race.

I sighed, running a bloodied hand through my hair as I sat outside the battle arena, letting my sore muscles rest for once. The air was warm, heavy with the scent of sweat and blood. I think the Saibaman killed twelve kids today.

The red sky above had started to darken slightly, the twin suns dipping toward the horizon.

The Great Ape transformation.

Even with my hazy memories of Dragon Ball, I still remembered the basics. Saiyans had the ability to transform into massive, hyper-destructive apes under the light of a full moon. Their power multiplied tenfold, and they became “unstoppable” forces of destruction.

The first power up, before the Super Saiyan made the transformation obsolete.

I exhaled slowly, glancing down at my hands. Unlike most kids here, I was expected to master the transformation and if their… way of training in the arena extended to this, well, I was fucked. Based on the anime alone, I could tell it wasn’t just about power, it was about control. And from what I’d gathered, a lot of Saiyans didn’t have it. Once transformed, they lost themselves to instinct, becoming mindless, rampaging beasts.

Would that happen to me?

Most likely.

And that bothered me.

I just didn’t like the idea of… losing control. Having my mind buried under the weight of primal instinct? That didn’t seem particularly fun.

I had already changed so much since waking up in this body. I wasn’t human anymore. I didn’t think like a human anymore. How much more of myself would I lose once I transformed?

I shook the thought off. There was no point in overthinking it. Tomorrow would come whether I liked it or not. And the sooner I got over this, the better.

On the bright side, I had learned that Frieza wasn’t a thing to worry about just yet.

That little revelation had been a relief, to say the least. Saiyans still worked under King Cold, an asshole, sure, but one less prone to mass murder, meaning the destruction of Planet Vegeta wasn’t as close as I’d feared.

Or at least, not as close.

It was hard to say exactly when it would happen. My memory of Dragon Ball was spotty at best, and even if it wasn’t, the anime never showed dates, so it was hard to guess, but I knew that Frieza was the one who ultimately wiped out the Saiyans.

King Cold? He was around before all that, the one who led the Cold Force before handing things over to his son.

So, if Frieza wasn’t ruling yet, then maybe, just maybe, I had more time than I originally thought.

Time for what? No idea.

I wasn’t about to delude myself into thinking I could change the fate of an entire planet. The Saiyans were on a collision course with extinction, and nothing I did was going to stop that. But knowing I wasn’t living on borrowed days? That made things a little easier to deal with.

At least I wouldn’t wake up tomorrow to see a death ball falling from the sky.

I exhaled, staring up at the endless red horizon of Planet Vegeta. The air was dry, the heat pressing against my skin, but I barely noticed anymore. A month ago, this place had felt alien—hostile, even.

Now? It was just normal.

That was another thing I had stopped questioning.

I wasn’t fighting against my instincts anymore. I wasn’t clinging to the idea that I was just some guy who used to be a human trapped in a Saiyan’s body. That was pointless.

This was who I was now.

It was strange how easy it was to let go.

A part of me thought I should feel guilty, like I was betraying something important by accepting my place in this world so quickly. But the truth was, I didn’t miss being human. I didn’t miss Earth.

I barely even remembered it.

My old life felt distant, like a dream I had trouble recalling. The emotions, the attachments, the memories, they were all still there, but they didn’t pull at me the way they should have. I didn’t feel like I had lost anything.

If anything, I felt like I had gained something.

Strength.

A future.

What that future actually was, though? That was still up in the air.

For now, all I could do was keep moving forward, and figuring things out.

And tomorrow, that meant Ozaru training. Hopefully, they would actually teach me something.

I sighed, rolling my shoulders as I stood up from where I’d been sitting. My tail flicked behind me, the motion lazy but controlled. A month ago, I couldn’t figure out how to use it. Now, it was just another part of me.

Another thing I had adapted to without realizing it.

A thought crept into my mind as I made my way back toward my quarters.

If adapting to this had been so easy…

How much longer before I stopped thinking about any of it? Before my past life stopped mattering at all?

Would that be a bad thing?

I wasn’t sure.

And the scary part?

I wasn’t sure if I cared.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next day, I made my way to the training field designated for Great Ape training.

It was far from everything, in a place with nothing but barren wastelands that stretched out in every direction. The ground was dry and cracked, littered with the occasional jagged rock formation. But the main point was that there was, no buildings, no people, nothing but us.

It made sense.

If a bunch of massive, rampaging godzilla sized apes were going to be stomping around, the last thing you wanted was to risk collateral damage.

There were already several instructors waiting, along with a handful of other trainees. Most of them were older than me, already brimming with anticipation. For them, this was just another step in becoming a true warrior.

For me?

I wasn’t sure what to expect.

I had seen it in the anime. I knew the mechanics. Saiyans transformed into great apes under the light of a full moon, their power multiplying tenfold. But knowing about it and actually experiencing it were two very different things.

I knew rage was part of the whole thing, but other than that. Not much.

Hopefully, they would actually give me some instructions to know what to do. Right?

The instructor, a scarred-up man with a permanent scowl, stepped forward. “Alright insects, you are going to transform. Control the power, or be a failure.”

That… was it? That’s all the instructions we are going to get?

I honestly don’t know what I expected, but this is on me, by this point I should just assume they just take the swim or die approach with everything.

“Get ready!” The instructor said, and without much preamble, he lifted a hand and conjured a bright, glowing orb of energy.

A Power Ball.

If I remembered correctly, Saiyans used them to create an artificial full moon when one wasn’t available. That way, they could trigger their transformation at will, without waiting for the right conditions.

After all, not every planet has a moon.

The instructor threw the power ball into the air, and immediately, the sky was filled with an eerie, white glow.

The second my eyes locked onto it, everything else ceased to matter.

The world around me faded. The people, the sounds, even my own thoughts, all gone.

There was only the light.

A deep, instinctive part of me knew what it was. Knew what it meant. And I couldn’t look away.

I felt my pupils dilate, my breathing slow. My heartbeat pounded in my ears, heavy and deliberate.

Then the pain hit.

It was sudden, like a bomb going off inside my chest. My muscles locked up, my spine cracked as my body started to expand. Every bone, every fiber of my being stretched, shifting into something different.

I could feel my teeth sharpening, my jaw elongating into a snout. My fingers curled, thickening into claws as coarse fur sprouted across my skin.

The pressure in my skull was unbearable. My head throbbed, my vision blurred, and then—

Nothing.

No thoughts. No control.

Just rage.

A deep, primal fury consumed everything.

The last thing I remembered was a roar, my own, deafening and earth-shaking.

Then—

Blackness.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When I woke up, I was lying face-down in the dirt.

My body ached, sore in ways I didn’t even know were possible. My mouth was dry, my limbs felt sluggish, and my head was pounding like I had just lived through a car crash.

It was night now. The power ball was gone. The air was still, filled with the groans of many.

I could see the instructors staring down at the group, me included. Based on their scowl, which was more prominent than usual, no one had gotten a passing grade.

I pushed myself up slowly, my muscles protesting with every movement. My armor was scuffed, covered in dirt and scratches, but at least it was still intact.

I blinked, trying to piece together what had happened.

The Power Ball. The light. The Rage…

Then nothing.

It was like a blackout.

I had lost everything the second I transformed. My mind had just... disappeared. I hadn’t been me anymore. I had expected something—anything—to remain. Some fragment of awareness. Some small part of myself that could still think.

But it seemed that hadn’t been the case.

Just pure, mindless instinct.

I took a slow breath, “Well… that was fun.” It seemed like it was time to go home.

“Not so fast, brat, no one leaves until they master their transformation.”

I tensed, lifting my head just in time to see him raising his hand again.

Another Power Ball.

A glowing, artificial moon formed in the sky once more, bathing the wasteland in that same eerie white light. My stomach twisted as my eyes instinctively locked onto it, my muscles already reacting, my body remembering what came next.

These bastards would keep us here until we mastered this.

If I was lucky… I would beat them as a Great Ape.

The last thing I felt was power—raw, overwhelming, uncontrollable power—before the world disappeared again.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I woke up on the ground, again.

Dirt clung to my face, my limbs heavy, my breathing ragged. My body hurt, like I had been thrown off a cliff and stomped on for good measure.

The Power Ball was gone. The transformation had ended.

I groaned, pushing myself up to my elbows, my head spinning. Around me, other trainees were in similar states, scattered across the wasteland, dazed and battered. Some looked worse than others, armor cracked, bodies bruised. A few still hadn’t woken up.

I swallowed, my throat dry as I tried to piece together anything from what had happened.

Nothing.

No memories. No flashes of awareness.

Just blackness. Again.

My hands curled into fists.

I had lost myself completely.

Again.

A heavy boot landed near my head, and I looked up to see the instructor staring down at me.

“You tried to kill us when you transformed,” The instructor chuckled. “I guess that means you are angry at us, insect.”

I didn’t answer. I wasn’t even sure I could. But if I could, I would say… fuck you.

Wait… did he say I tried to kill them? Does that mean some part of me remained inside the Great Ape? At least enough to know I kind of hate the instructors right now?

His lips curled in mild disappointment, but he didn’t seem surprised. He stepped back, looking over the rest of the group.

“Again.”

I fucking hate this guy.

I barely had time to react before he raised his hand, forming another Power Ball.

The light filled the sky.

And once again, I changed.

I just hoped in one of these transformations, I would crush them.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

POWER LEVEL SECTION.

Paragus' power level: 5157

Saiyan Instructors: 3500-4500

Escarot's power level: 2687

• Ozaru: 26870

Tenneman: 2300-2400

Escarot's power level didn't increase that much because his Zenkai boosts were... marginal at best. He was never close to death, so, his power increased in small portions every time he lost vs the Tennenmen.

Also, keep in mind, Zenkai boosts go from a small increase to massive ones depending on the situation. This situation didn't demand a massive boost.

NOTE SECTION:

If anyone willing to try and draw the protagonist, let me know. He looks like OC Broly, but his skin tone is a bit darker, like just a bit.

This is what I have so far for him.

I did that with editing skills, its a Frankenstein picture, I basically grabbed parts from multiple characters and made it. I found the body in some wiki. But this is basically how I envision the MC. Kind of.

But with Saiyan Armor.