Chapter 102: Efficiency
After a later-than-usual breakfast, Vahn was once again relaxing in the convertible's back seat, this time with Grayfia seated next to him, his left arm around her shoulders. More significantly, in place of her usual or sexy Maid outfits, Grayfia was wearing a pair of form-fitting white short shorts, an off-white, long-sleeved safari blouse with golden buttons, nearly knee-high black leather boots, black leather gloves, and, as she regarded it as part of her identity, her usual frilly headband.
"At this rate, it'll only take another hour to reach the location of the final Dragon Ball," remarked Bulma, steering the convertible through a barren wasteland heavily populated by tall, stone-like mushrooms.
"Any idea what you want to wish for...?" asked Vahn, genuinely curious as he doubted Bulma still planned to wish for a boyfriend. Though, if she did, that would arguably make things easier for him.
"Well, I thought about your suggestion of having the Dragon Balls return to my basement between uses, but since there's a chance someone else could create a radar, that would just make my home a target..." explained Bulma, appending, "That said, I was thinking of wishing for everyone but us to lose all knowledge of the Dragon Balls, along with the means to find them. That means we'll need to locate and collect them again a year from now, but I'm not too concerned, given how easy it was this time."
"Wow...I knew you were smart, Bulma, but that's some incredibly forward-thinking..." remarked Vahn, brows raised and eyes wide in surprise. Nearly every major plot development in early Dragon Ball centered around one or more groups seeking to use the Dragon Balls to achieve world domination or some other nonsense, so if Bulma followed through on her wish, groups like the Pilaf Gang and the Red Ribbon Army would lose their relevance...
"Well, after hearing what you said you would wish for, I got to thinking and realized that the Dragon Balls could be used to help but also harm a lot of people," stated Bulma, quickly adding, "I mean, I already knew that, but your words got me thinking about what that actually meant. And so I figured that, instead of wishing to have them destroyed, removing them as a threat but also preventing them from being used to help people, the simplest solution was to make potential ne'er-do-wells forget they exist or prevent those with wickedness in their hearts from using them. I mean, if a cloud can make such determinations, a set of magic, wish-granting balls should be able to as well, right?"
"You would think so..." agreed Vahn, genuinely curious to know why Kami didn't place such a restriction on the Dragon Balls. By the time of Dragon Ball Z and Super, they had at least placed a password on them, but it was such a simple phrase that anyone with more than a room temperature IQ would be able to figure it out...
"What about you and Grayfia...?" asked Bulma, staring back at the duo through her rearview mirror as she contended, "You should have at least one or two selfish wishes you'd like granted. I know for a fact that you're not lacking in desire..."
"Mmm...if I had to make a selfish wish, I'd ask for a personal, localized Room of Spirit and Time..." responded Vahn, prompting Bulma to ask, "A Room of Spirit and Time? What's that...?"