How to Make Hakaishin Vegeta the Perfect New Form — My Warm Welcome to Our New GOD
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turn the tables on Granolah? But many questions still remain. What will it be like? And, perhaps more importantly, what should it be like? Let dear, old Analyze enlighten you as to what I think would make the form as good as it could possibly be.
We all remember the introduction of god ki with super saiyan god. It was big, it was flashy and, honestly, in retrospect it was kind of dull.
Yes, it kicked things up a notch or 10 in terms of power. But what did it really change? As I go over in my article What is a King to a God — The Missed Opportunities of God Ki, nothing much.
It still works pretty much the same as regular ki. You draw the energy from your insides, it enhances your fighting ability, it gives you a shiney and colourful aura and if you use it for too long you have to have a little lie down before using it again. Other than that the fights remain, essentially, exactly the same as they were when Goku and Vegeta were using regular ki. They look the same, they feel the same, they work the same.
Now Vegeta will be using yet another, alternative form of energy: Destruction energy or “hakai energy” if you’re a sophisticated gentleman. So how can we make this type stand out?
For it to be more distinct from its predecessors than god ki was it needs to do two things:
- Using hakai energy needs to somehow be fundamentally different from using regular ki or god ki. Meaning that it needs to affect the mechanics and/or the pacing of fights.
- It needs to somehow play into a larger character arc for Vegeta.
So, let’s get to it. First things first, how should it be different?
It Will Crush You, And Throw You Into the Wind
Destruction energy is, as its name implies, literally the energy of the gods of destruction themselves. A small set of beings who are tasked specifically with, you guessed it, destroying things. They are the destruction experts. The Einsteins of obliteration. The Newtons of negation. Whatever powers they have are destruction itself embodied. And the mechanics of the hakai energy Vegeta is using need to reflect that.
This means that a form based on Hakai energy, as the embodiment of destruction, needs to embody both sides of that destructive power. It needs to be both very powerful and very dangerous.
Let’s start with the power.
Normal ki and god ki are, at the end of the day, kind of limited. Warriors can pull a certain amount of energy from themselves. After they’ve pulled out a certain amount they have nothing left. When they have nothing left they lose their die jobs and are, usually, beaten to a pulp for a little while before being rescued by Goku.
For hakai energy I would get rid of this particular limitation. Hakai energy is the ultimate destructive force, unbounded by mortal limits. And so hakai energy should be essentially unlimited. Not only would this make it potentially more than a match for Granolah, but it would explain why Beerus-sama’s strength seems to constantly rise when the plot demands it. Because, unlike with regular or god ki, you can pull as much hakai energy out of thin air as you want. This means that users of the energy, like Beerusn can power up, given enough time, as much as they want. They have enough power too destroy, essentially, anything. But not without a price.
The Catch
When Vegeta cloaks himself in this pure destructive energy it should look awesome. Badass. Tremendous. And it should also begin to destroy and corrode the things around him.
As the aura expands from him the air should crackle. And the ground beneath him should start to crack and splinter apart as pieces of it are turned into dust and scattered to the winds. If it touches a building, the building should burst apart and sections of it should collapse. If it touches plants, they should wither and die. It should be a corrosive force. Killing and obliterating everything it so much as touches. And as Vegeta powers up more and more, it should spread.
When Vegeta first starts using it the ground beneath him might begin to crack, but as he continues power up and up and up in an attempt to outdo Granolah it should start to crack buildings far away from him too. It should start to wither plants on the other side of the field. Eventually it should start to crack the planet’s moon itself. And as time goes on, it should be made clear to both Vegeta and the audience that as you power up more and more you endanger everyone else around you with its uncontrolled destructive power. But not just everyone else.
The corrosive hakai energy should negatively affect the user too. Vegeta himself should not be damaged overly by Granolah during the fight, as he consistently outdoes him, but should find wounds and scrapes appearing on his body anyway. Particularly in places the little flickers and flames of destruction energy touched. And as he powers up these should intensify and multiply. Not only that, but his mind too should start to be affected. First as if he’d simply been hit in the head, but as time goes on he should start to feel as if the hakai energy is corroding away his sanity. His very mind.
By the end of the Vegeta-Granolah fight, whether he wins or loses, he should realize the true terrifying nature of this power and realize that he still has much to learn to be able to use it properly.
Most fights in Dragon Ball follow one of a few simple formulas. An enemy is more powerful, they dominate, then suddenly the other person gains a power up and they lose is the most popular one. Another one is someone’s on top, they seem like a match for their enemy, they seem like they could win, and then they tire themselves out and lose.
We saw this with super saiyan Vegeta vs. Android 18, we saw this with Golden Freeza vs. Goku and, to a lesser extent, this was a plot point in the initial fight between Beerus and Super Saiyan God Goku (where eventually Goku’s power would run out).
Hakai energy would put this formula on its head.
Instead of Vegeta becoming progressively weaker during fights he’d become progressively stronger, but as he becomes stronger he’d become more of a danger to everyone else around him. Meaning that, overall, it still balances out.
But not only could this form shake up Vegeta’s fights a little, it could lead into a longer arc of him learning to control it.
Becoming a God of Destruction
You see, it should be revealed that as hakai energy grows and grows infinitely, it becomes harder and harder for an inexperienced user to fully control. It is this lack of control over the energy which allows it to get out of hand and damage things near you without you even desiring to do so. To even damage your own body and your own mind.
Vegeta should realize this. Afterwards Vegeta’s eventual goal in training with Beerus should be to learn to gain mastery over ever increasing levels of hakai energy. So that, eventually, he can reach Beerus’ own level and maybe even eventually have the chance take his place as universe 7’s god of destruction. Something which could present an interesting choice for him between the power the position offers vs. the presence in the lives of his family.
But that wouldn’t be the end of it. Oh no, not at all. The form could also play into the deeper, more character-focused parts of Vegeta’s arc.
Colour Theory
Many of you may be familiar with the “colour theory” videos by Masako X. In brief, these videos postulate that the colours of various forms (like super saiyan) are derived from the “chakras” that we are all thought to have in certain Eastern traditions. These chakras are “batteries” of a sort from which you can draw energy. And, it is speculated, the saiyans draw their ki from these chakras and the colour of their forms reflects the colour of the chakra. But they’re not just your average AA battery. Instead these chakras are also tied, among other things, to certain values and ideas. Vegeta’s new Hakaishin form should be no different.
The colour of hakai energy is purple. This seems to line up (at least in most of the sources I could find) with the highest level of chakra, the seventh chakra, the Sahasrara or “crown chakra.”
What chakras are associated with, from my own research, is not always straightforward and sometimes contested. But, at least according to some sources, this chakra is associated with spiritual connections, divinity, the higher self, the spiritual self, unity and inter-connectedness and, essentially, transcending yourself.
Most importantly for our purposes, according to the same source (and the picture to the left) signs of problems with this chakra are associated with an inability to find peace of mind, a feeling of disconnection to anything greater than yourself, a lack of morals and selfish behaviour and a tendency towards self-obsession.
Now does that not paint the prettiest little picture of a certain saiyan prince we know?
A Proud Saiyan Prince
Vegeta, as many of you well known, has had a history of having his ego cloud his judgement. Of being selfish and lacking morals. Of having quite the tendency towards self-obsession (particularly in his past desire to suprass Kakarot).
Not only that, but his ego and self-obsession has often lead to great, and sometimes unintentional, destruction for those around him. The best example, naturally, being when he enabled Buu to come back and nearly wipe out all life on earth (including his wife and child).
In line with this it could be explained by Beerus that, in order to control hakai energy, you must first learn to control the chakra it emanates from. In order to do this you must let go of any remaining self-obsession or selfishness. To step away from your self-interest and aim for a higher purpose. Only then can you truly control its destructive energies without them harming anyone else.
This would tie perfectly into Vegeta’s character arc.
He started as a selfish, immoral bastard, turned into a selfish, self-obsessed bastard wanting to surpass Kakarot, eventually started to care about his own son (when Cell killed him), then went through a little mid life crisis where his self-obsession almost destroyed the world and only then did he, for the first time, sacrifice himself for the good of others. But this did not end his redemption arc, far from it.
Instead, in the Moro arc, Vegeta showed not only a new regard for the Namekians, but a growing awareness that what he did on Namek, out of selfishness and immorality, back in Dragon Ball Z was wrong. A growing awareness of his own past sins and that he should make up for them.
This doesn’t only apply to himself either. But also the larger saiyan race.
If there’s one thing everyone who knows about Vegeta knows it’s that he’s prince Vegeta. He’s the prince of all saiyans. And he cares very deeply about his race, mostly because it strokes his own ego.
Granolah however is also the result of the saiyans’ violence. A person traumatized by the destruction of his own race at their hands and driven to give up over a hundred years of life just to get his vengeance. In many ways, a shell of what he could have been. Granolah is the consequences of the saiyans’ destruction. Of their selfishness and immorality. They did it, after all, to make a quick buck.
The hakaishin form as I’ve described it provides a perfect symbollic representation of this dynamic.
It’s a force which is extremely powerful and destructive, like the saiyans (and Vegeta himself). And yet it’s also a force which, when driven by ego and selfishness (as Vegeta and the saiyans often were), can grow out of control. And not only destroy what you mean to destroy but also cause the suffering of so many innocent people (people like Granolah or the Namekians). In doing so perpetuating an endless cycle of destruction in the long term that leaves everyone worse off. Saiyans killed Granolah’s people, now Granolah is here to destroy Vegeta and Goku, and what comes after that? Where does it end?
Vegeta’s mastery of the hakai form should thus represent the culmination of his entire redemption arc. Not only does he attain a power greater than any he could have previous imagined but he does so by abandoning the last remnants of his own ego and selfishness. It requires him to come to understand not only the unintended consequences of his own selfishness and search for power, and attempt to make that right, but also the brutality of the saiyan race of which he was prince. That Granolah is the product of that sort of life. That sort of power driven by selfish goals towards needlessly destructive actions. And that he, if he’s going to lay claim to being their proud prince, bears part of that burden. But can also learn from their mistakes.
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Copyright: The images used in this article are screenshots taken from the episodes of Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball: Super and the Dragon Ball: Super manga. We are allowed to use them under section 107 of the US Copyright Act of 1976. Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball Super belong to Funimation, Toei Animation, Shueisha, and Akira Toriyama.
