Dragon Ball Roshi-Chapter 310: Training

At first glance, it looked like a perfectly ordinary room, even the door resembled that of a common Western-style house... Hathaway blinked and glanced back at the way they came. There wasn't just a single staircase—several corridors crisscrossed along the way, giving the place a complex layout. Mr. Popo, who followed behind, looked at her. Hathaway smiled and nodded in return. Along the way, she had already memorized the path instinctively, even the layout of the buildings inside the temple. Though she didn't fully understand it, she remembered every detail as if etched into her mind.

Taro also sensed the surroundings. This place... seemed to be located right at the bottom of the hemispherical temple. Suddenly, something struck him—he recalled the Power Pole he had just tossed into Mount Baozi! The top of the Power Pole, the part that connects to something... wasn't that where the base of the temple was?

The Hyperbolic Time Chamber, a pocket dimension...

The Power Pole, with its infinite flexibility...

Could there be some connection between the two? Taro considered it for a moment, but eventually figured he was probably overthinking things.

---

"This is it." Kami stopped in front of the Hyperbolic Time Chamber's door, leaning on his wooden staff, and addressed both Taro and Hathaway.

"You'll wait for me outside, alright?" Taro turned his head to Hathaway. "A person can only spend two years in here over their entire life—that's two days in the outside world. The environment inside is extremely harsh, and I don't think you'd be able to handle it. It's just two days. No matter what, I'll come out once they're up."

As he said that, Taro pondered. In the original story, Piccolo had told Vegeta that staying inside longer than two days would trap someone in there forever. But why? What was the principle behind that? Did the exit temple disappear? What was it that detected the time limit?

To be honest, Taro was actually tempted to stay into the third day, just to see what would happen if one got trapped in a pocket dimension. Maybe it would help him comprehend the laws of space-time even better. But... he was no longer alone. Hathaway would worry too much. Taro couldn't afford to act on a selfish impulse like that. Since he had chosen to keep his bond with Hathaway, he had already accepted the compromises that came with it.

But Hathaway shook her head. "Let me come in and take a look. If I can't take it, I'll leave."

"Suit yourself. Just don't come crying to me," Taro said with a shake of his head.

At that moment, Mr. Popo had already opened the door to the Hyperbolic Time Chamber for them. Immediately, a suffocating wave of hot air poured out from the narrow doorway, sending chills down their spines. Just before stepping inside hand in hand with Hathaway, Taro paused and suddenly turned to Kami.

"I heard there's a machine in the temple that can travel through parallel timelines... is that true?"

Kami was surprised. "How do you know that?"

Taro, of course, wasn't about to say he read it in the original story. He simply said, "You know I'm also a mage now. Sometimes..." He tapped his temple and smiled, "I catch glimpses of things—fragments. Things I've seen, things I haven't. From Earth, from the universe, from the present, from the future... it's complicated."

"You used to say things like that even before you became a so-called mage," Kami said, frowning slightly. But he didn't press. Taro was not someone who would bring harm to Earth. Slowly, he said, "Yes, there is such a machine. It was left behind by a Kami even older than the one who built the Hyperbolic Time Chamber. The machine is ancient—there's not much use left in it. Why? Are you thinking of using it?"

Taro nodded gladly. "If I don't gain much in here..." He pointed to the chamber door in front of him. "Then maybe I'll try that machine. Might be interesting."

Hathaway pressed her lips together without speaking. When Kami mentioned the machine's age, she instinctively didn't want Taro to take that risk. A machine that traveled through parallel timelines? If something went wrong, what would happen? Still, despite the worry in her heart, when she looked at her husband, she couldn't bring herself to voice any objections. Instead, she subconsciously tightened her grip on his hand.

Feeling the tension in Hathaway's fingers, Taro paused, then understood. He remained silent for a moment, looking at her, and said quietly, "Maybe... I won't need to use that old relic." Hathaway pressed her lips and shook her head. "You don't need to worry too much about me. I'll support whatever you decide." Taro nodded to both Kami and Mr. Popo, then stepped into the Hyperbolic Time Chamber with Hathaway.

"They really... are like one being," Mr. Popo murmured as he closed the door.

"Indeed. Their ki is intertwined—there's no distinction between the two," Kami said with a sigh. He remembered the wish Taro had made more than seventy years ago on Muten Island, a wish to bind their lives together. "I always thought I had good judgment... but back then, what Taro did still caught me off guard."

---

The moment they stepped inside, the air thinned drastically.

As they crossed the threshold, Taro clearly hesitated for a second. He could vaguely sense the subtle difference between the space inside and outside, like an intuitive spark passing through his mind.

Though the chamber was eternally shrouded in pale light, it currently qualified as "daytime," and the temperature was extremely high. On top of that, gravity was several times stronger than on Earth. As soon as they entered, Taro passed a dense wave of white ki to Hathaway, enveloping her in a halo of glowing light.

Just like he had done on King Kai's planet long ago, helping the Phoenix resist tenfold gravity using ki.

Now, Hathaway and he were quite similar to how it had been with the Phoenix. The Phoenix had been his blood relative, while Hathaway was connected to him on a fundamental, life-essence level. In fact, their bond was even tighter than before.

Hathaway only felt her body get heavy for a brief second. That strange sensation of something dragging her heart downward disappeared almost instantly. She noticed the change in her body and smiled. Holding on to Taro's arm, she teased, "It's really not so bad. Just hotter and thinner air. Feels like hiking."

Taro shook his head. "You..." He led Hathaway through the sleeping quarters and storage rooms inside the Time Chamber's main building. "The only food here is flour and water. You sure you can handle that?"

"Eh?" Hathaway's expression instantly soured.

Taro chuckled and tapped her on the forehead. "So you see? You'd better head out after a little while. You brought capsules, right? Just tell Kami if you want to leave—he'll open the temple's barrier for you. I probably won't be coming out early. I plan to stay the full two years. You can just enjoy yourself for two days out there."

With that, he lightly floated back and flew out into the vast, endless white plain beyond the living quarters.

Taro sat cross-legged in midair, hands resting on his knees. His pitch-black eyes spun, turning bright crimson. Then they spun again, and intricate patterns burned across his entire sclera, with clockwise and counterclockwise tomoe rotating in tandem—three tomoe per ring, nine in each eye.

It was the Eye of the Divine Tree—the Nine Tomoe Rinnegan.

"Now then... let's see just what these eyes are capable of..."