Jayr POV - Earth, Georgia, Center for Disease Control and Prevention - 2010
I don't waste any more time and directly admit, "Indeed... I have a really bold idea on how to actually eradicate this virus. You see, in traditional medicine, there is a saying that in a few words means fighting poison with poison. Basically, it is the idea that sometimes to cure a poisoned patient you have to administer a stronger poison that will actually kill the first one before taking care of the second one. My idea behind the cure is the same, it is a virus that is causing all these problems then only another virus can deal with it, a very specific kind of virus... a virophage."
Shortly after I said that, Dr. Jenner looks utterly stunned by what he just heard while Rick, Shane, and Daryl are obviosly confused looking at one other hoping that one of them finally asks the question that is likely roaming in their head.
This silence lasts for a few seconds until Daryl lets out a sigh, steps forward, and asks, "So, Doc... what the hell is this viroplague you are talking about? And why does the older Doc seem to be so shocked about it?"
In response to that, I quickly correct him, "It's virophage." before I calmly start to explain, "Virophages are small, double-stranded DNA viral phages that require the co-infection of another virus. The co-infecting viruses are typically giant viruses. Virophages rely on the viral replication factory of the co-infecting giant virus for their own replication. One of the characteristics of virophages is that they have a parasitic relationship with the co-infecting virus. Their dependence upon the giant virus for replication often results in the deactivation of the giant viruses. Because of that some virophage may improve the recovery and survival of the host organism."
Hearing that, Daryl tilts his head and asks, "Okay... and in English that means...?" which makes me once again explain in a more simple way, "Using a similar example to the one we used before, it is like someone breaking into your house to use your kitchen but this time, he brought someone else with him. The virus still brought its own recipe, and again it needs to use your dishes, measuring cups, mixer, and oven to make it. But this time unknown to the virus that someone he brought is actually a mole that works for us who tampers with the virus' recipe and actions and after it has gained everything it needs from the virus it kills it and leaves the house mostly untouched, after it cleaned up the place."
In response, a wary Rick can't stop himself from asking, "This is all good and well but... it is safe to do something like this? I mean we are all in this situation because a virus, likely a man-made one, got out of control and spread all over the world. How are you so sure that this virophage won't make the situation even worse?"
Hearing that question, Dr. Jenner snaps out of his stunned state and replies, "No we can't be absolutely sure that it is going to be safe, after all, even if Dr. Pucci's idea is absolutely brilliant there are a lot of variants that one has to consider, almost too many and with a single, minuscle mistake things can easily go horribily wrong when talking about viruses... This is almost to the level of humans playing God..."
While Dr. Jenner is saying that, I almost can't hold back from rolling my eyes while thinking, 'How dramatic... It is only a simple virus created with the single objective of infecting the Wildfire Virus and all its possible strains and eradicating it from the hosting body before modifying the host immune system to make it able to fight off the Wildfire Virus on its own before it self-destructs, nothing so difficult. Especially when there is an actual God of Healing behind its creation, this isn't a case of "Humans playing God" but of "God playing Humans", after all, if I had access to my Spiral Cosmo I could have fixed everything with a snap of my fingers.'
Shortly after thinking that, I focus back on the discussion and reassure them, "While it is true that it could be very dangerous, that is only in the case that we are too careless. But I won't be careless with something that could affect the future of the whole human species, I'll make sure that the virophage we will create will only target the Wildfire Virus and its possible strains and that will also improve the immune system of its host making it able to fight off the Wildfire Virus on its own, basically doing almost the same thing a vaccine does. Luckily, it is quite easy to find samples of both the dormant and active virus to study as they are basically everywhere."
In response to my words, Rick, Shane, and Daryl look a lot more relieved but Dr. Jenner is still dubious and asks, "But what about the possibility of the virophage mutating in a more harmful direction than intended? It isn't totally impossible, isn't it?"
Hearing that question, I focus on Dr. Jenner, and with a confident smile I reply, "No, it isn't completely impossible but that can be prevented by encoding very specific sets of instructions in the virophage's DNA which will cause the virus to immediately self-destruct in cases of changes outside the ones we intended beforehand by gumming up the works of the usual replication process, causing the virophage to die without producing any offspring."
Shocked, Dr. Jenner's eyes open wide as he exclaims, "Something like that is actually possible!?" to which I nod with a smile and reply, "Yes, it is possible... I read the results of the researchers at Northwestern University and at the University of Arizona where they were able to do something similar using other means such as introducing it into the pathogen DNA of Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa), a highly antibiotic-resistant and deadly bacterium or by introducing a modified protein that screws up the replication process... So it is indeed something possible."
Shortly after explaining that, I answer a few more of their questions, mostly those of Dr. Jenner, before I ask Daryl, Rick, and Shane to go out of the building with a few other people and capture a walker for us as we need a sample of the active virus to create an effective virophage that targets only the Wildfire Virus and its possible variants, I also remind them of cutting off the arms and the jaws of the captured walker to take away their ability to grab and bit thus making them harmless and way more docile.
While Rick's group goes out to capture a walker so that we can study the active virus, I teach Dr. Jenner how to produce the Rad-X and the RadAway and I also teach him their formula so that he can teach it to others and they can produce it even when I'll leave this world.
Son Goza POV - Earth, Georgia, Unnamed Woods - 2010
I'm still aimlessly walking through the same thick, humid forest I found myself in when I first arrived in this universe when I passed through the Unigate and even if 7 days have already passed, I still wasn't able to find a way out or at least find out in what universe I actually ended up.
Luckily I'm not completily clueless about that last point, in fact, there are a few clues that helped me narrow down the possible universes I could actually be by quite a bit.
The first clue, one that I noticed as soon as I set foot in this universe, is the absolute absence of Ki or any other supernatural energy, this was quite easy as the Ki in my body became inert as soon as I arrived.
Moreover, the same can be said about my much weaker Magic Power, which is quite a shame as while I'm not as strongly talented in Magic as I'm with my Ki, the things I learned from, Dende, Popo-san, and Piccolo-san could have been very, very useful in my current situation as I learned how to heal, conjure, transmute, and seal using Magic.
Anyway, thanks to that, I at least learned that I'm in a universe where Magic and Supernatural Powers do not exists.
Luckily as a Saiyan, I'm still way stronger than a regular human which means that I'm pretty safe as long as I don't get hit by a nuke or something at that level, even more so because I'm pretty sure that the technology of this universe isn't as advanced as the one in my home universe.
The reason behind my confidence in that statement is the second and most important clue that I found shortly after my arrival in this universe, zombies.
I met a small horde of zombies after wandering around this forest for some time, and their presence made me instantly realize that I'm likely in one of the many, many universes that are centered around a Zombie Apocalypse.
The only bad news is that the Zombie Apocalypse theme was quite popular in my previous life and I wasn't too much of a fan of the genre and only know of the most famous and popular works, so even with the exclusion of supernatural powers and magic, the possibilities are just too many for me to guess just where I'm actually am, the only thing I know for sure is that I can exclude is that I'm not in World War Z Universe as the Zombies aren't running faster than Usain Bolt, nor I'm in the Resident Evil Universe as only humans seems to be affected by whatever caused them to turn into zombies.
I can also exclude the High School of the Dead Universe from the list, for a very simple reason, because the chest of all the female zombies that I have seen until now is quite regular, something that is almost impossible considering the gravity-defying assets of all the female characters, moreover, the faces of most of the zombies I have seen until now have more western features than eastern ones which makes it quite unlikely that my current location is actually Japan.
In fact, considering just how varied the ethnicity of the zombies I have seen, it is more likely that I'm somewhere in Europe or America, but it is more likely that I'm in America as I have encountered a black bear before and I remember reading somewhere that the black bear is an animal that is exclusive of North America and can't be found nowhere else.
*Grrrrr!*
Once again, my stomach growls loudly which makes me stop and casually comment, "I'm hungry again... That means that 5 hours passed since my last meal which in turn means that it is around midday..."
Shortly after saying that, I started to look around and think, 'Time to once again hunt for something to eat... I hope I'm able to find another black bear or at least two deers, those are the only animals I found that have enough meat to easily fill my Saiyan's stomach. After all, I don't want to already use the emergency food supplies that I stored in the dozens of capsules that I safely put into my Soulbound Territory yet... It is better to hold on to them for as long as possible, after all, if there is something that is common for all the Zombie Apocalypse stories I have heard of is that food quickly becomes very scarce.'
At this point, I let out a sigh and continued to let my mind wander as I searched for prey, 'Luckily, I have more than enough food for someone with a Saiyan appetite to last for about a year or so. Which means that I have enough food to feed a small community for six months or so if I ration it well... Damn, now that I think about it we Saiyan really eat a LOT!'
Of course, the Capsules full of food aren't the only things I have stored in my Soulbound Territory, together with them there are also a few Capsule Houses that Bulma gifted me when I asked her for some, and some others that contain useful and important objects like Electric Rice Cooker and other portable cooking devices, a Closet with my spare clothes, a couple of empty Caps. A big fridge to store any other excess food I could find, a Capsule containing a portable Gravity Room for my daily training, a couple more useful Capsules, and many more empty Capsules that I can use to store any useful or precious object I may find in the future.
Then there are also a couple of other useful things that would surely help in my current situation, but at the moment, I think it is wiser to lay low and gather some more information before I take them out to make my life easier.
Not seeing any prey in my immediate surroundings, I close my eyes and focus on my other senses to try to pick up the sounds of some nearby prey to hunt down.
At the same time, I can't help myself from internally complaining once again, 'Geez! I never thought I would miss the presence of Ki so much in my life! Not only I can't use my Ki Sense which makes me feel almost blind as I have to rely on my other natural and way more limited senses. But I can't even do things that I thought as natural and easy like flying or starting a fire with a simple controlled Ki Beam.'
Shortly after thinking that, I pick up a weak shuffling sound in the distance, and without any hesitation, I start to carefully move toward it while thinking, 'Please not another zombie. Please not another zombie. Please not another zombie.'
In these seven days, I was wandering this very big forest, I have almost encountered way more zombies than actual animals.
Luckily these zombies are way too weak to even remotely be a threat to me as I can easily get rid of them by using the shockwaves produced by a simple punch before they can even get close to me.
Of course, even if they get close, I doubt that their teeth are strong enough to pierce through my skin so even if they are able to bite me for some improbable reason, they still won't be able to harm me.
Another worrying detail is that until now, I haven't been able to encounter any living person yet but that may be because I'm still in this very vast forest that is apparently in the middle of nowhere as I still haven't seen any nearby town, city, or village when I climb up on top of a tree to scout my surroundings from time to time, in fact, the only thing that I saw is only more forest.
Of course, that doesn't mean that I'm actually trapped in this forest as I could easily find more information about my surroundings by jumping very high, but I refrain from doing that for two reasons.
The first one is that I'm not in a hurry to find any kind of "civilization" yet as it is very likely that they are of the less savory kind than actually good people, especially if I'm in some kind of universe where it is inspired by some of the many games around the genre, which would imply that most of the people still alive are likely some kind of raiders armed with all kinds of weapons.
The second and most important one is that I still don't know what the other Champion who arrived at this universe at my same time is capable of, for all I know he could be someone with very advanced technology to the point that he or she has already the whole planet under surveillance by using some kind of satellites that he somehow launched in the sky and that will notify him or her of any unusual activity.
That is the reason why I decided to lay low and calmly wander these woods that function as a good cover from very possible unwanted attention while using as little of my superhuman physique as possible.
On top of that, if the Champion in question is a ruthless or even evil person, it is likely that he or she won't hesitate to attack me with an orbital strike or a nuke without caring about the consequences just to get rid of me.
That kind of attack isn't something that I can survive at the moment as I can only make use of my Saiyan physical body and the powers that my Blessing granted me, which can still be used even if this universe doesn't allow the existence of supernatural powers which also implies that the other Champion also can use the powers of his or her Blessing another thing to be wary of especially if his or her Blessing level is at a higher than mine.
Talking about the Blessing that the Concept of Void gave me, I have to admit that I am quite happy with it as I was very lucky because it can potentially be very OP.
At the first level, the Blessing gave me the ability to survive in the Void, and I'm not talking about only the void of the space, but the true Void the thing where nothing can exist and everything is consumed.
It also gave me a very high affinity with everything related to the void, may that be techniques, magic, creatures, and so on, which is quite the advantage, especially if one remembers what kind of nightmarish horrors actually live in the void.
Meanwhile, at the second level, my Blessing granted me a very weak form of Nothingness Manipulation.
From what the Concept of Void explained to me, Nothingness Manipulation allows the user to create, shape, and manipulate nothingness, the absence of entities or substance, with this the user can remove energy and matter from existence, by simply making things disappear, preventing energy from ever being conceived or via varied other means.
At higher levels, the user can control the essence of oblivion, allowing him or her to delete an eternity, remove targets from all timelines in every dimension, alter, reverse, or negate energy, etc.
This could also lead to an ultimate goal of "destroying matter and energy" as in bringing it out of existence, it is far superior to Destruction and Erasure, which merely cancel/remove targets from existence, this power allows me to control the very nature of nothingness, allowing the user to break any attack and defense since anything that comes into contact with it disappears irremediably without leaving any trace behind especially when it's the user's own void.
Of course, all of that is in the future when my Blessing level gets higher, at the current level it only allows me to at most create a small, weak region of space that is devoid of any matter and energy, but this isn't as OP as it sounds as the region of space created can still be overwhelmed and broken by a high concentration of energy or force outside of it which means I can't use it as an ultimate form of defense, as my father's Kamehameha painfully taught me.
Soon, I arrived at the area where the sounds I picked up were coming from, it was a small glade, a grassy meadow under the canopy of the surrounding trees, and in the middle of this glade was luckily not a zombie but an animal but unfortunately it isn't either a deer or a bear like I hoped.
Instead, the animal was a medium-sized coyote who still didn't notice my presence as it was too focused on ripping chunks of meat from the carcass of a cottontail rabbit.
Seeing that scene, I almost let out a sigh while thinking, 'Well, for sure this isn't the animal I wanted to hunt... I would have preferred encountering a deer or a bear as I'm more used to their taste and they have a lot of meat... but well, a coyote is fine too. But before I hunt this one, it is better to make sure that is a male coyote, or at the very least that it isn't pregnant in case it is a female one as I don't want to harm a pregnant animal.'
Coming to that decision, I slowly approach the coyote lowering my presence as much as possible until I get close enough to it and take a close look at the coyote and see that it is indeed a male.
Then without any hesitation, I send a quick, precise punch to the neck of the coyote, breaking his neck, well, more precisely his spinal cord to provide the animal with a fast, painless, and easy death.
Shortly after that, I bring out a couple of capsules from my Soulbound Territory which contain all the electrical cooking devices needed and a cooking robot built by Dr. Brief in person who programmed it to be able to do just about anything remotely connected to cooking which strangely enough includes cursing like a sailor when someone does something wrong and singing when it is cooking a particularly well-done dish.
With a puff of smoke, the cooking robot together with the electrical cooking devices appears in the middle of the glade and without wasting any time nor receiving any command, the cooking robot quickly moves toward the body of the dead coyote and quickly drains his body of all the blood before it starts to skin it and butcher it.
As the cooking robot does its job, I calmly sit on the ground and start to think back about everything I have gone through in these last few years.
After the defeat of Majin Buu peace returned to earth once more but I knew that it wouldn't last too long and that I wasn't anywhere strong enough to face what was coming next, so I decided to head to the Lookout to ask Dende, Popo, and Piccolo-san to train me not only to help me gain control over my Legendary Super Saiyan state, but also to learn magic from them.
Just like that, the years quickly passed from training almost constantly while a clone that I made use of Tien Shinhan's Multi-Form went to school just to keep Mom happy.
After some time, my brother Gohan and I graduated and Gohan went on to become an entomologist, and shortly after that, he married Videl.
Shortly after Gohan and Videl's wedding, I finally completed my training and was able to get my Legendary Super Saiyan Transformation under control, and just in time at that as not too long after, the dread purple cat and his cyan-skinned attendant/master came to Earth searching for the Super Saiyan God and damn that fight was a brutal one even with Beerus going easy on us.
I wasn't able to keep up with him even with my Legendary Super Saiyan 2 Transformation, he was just that good luckily in the end everything ended well when Father transformed into a Super Saiyan God with our help and it seems that our battle with him earned enough of Beerus' goodwill to make the planet fall under his protection, that or Earth's cuisine.
After that battle, I followed through with my plan and requested Whis' help in training to help me control my Oozaru Transformation so that I could finally fulfill my ambition to master the coolest Transformation ever created, the Super Saiyan 4.
Unfortunately, I was forced to cut my training short to take part in this Random Battle but before that happened I already had some modicum of success.
Suddenly, I hear the crickling sound of something stepping on a dried brand breaking it which makes me realize that something is approaching my current position.
Realizing that I do not hesitate to pull the cooking robot back into the Capsule and turn off all the cooking equipment before I prepare to face whatever is approaching my impromptu camp.
I don't have to wait for long before I see three figures slowly walking toward this glade, but I immediately realize that two of those figures are actually zombies as they are clearly missing their arms and lower jaws and more importantly they have a collar around their neck tied to a chain that is held by the figure walking in front of them.
The figure is clearly that of a woman who is armed with a katana on her free arm as she stops in place noticing my presence.
I can't see her face as it is covered by a dark green hood but despite that, I still find this womanly figure somewhat familiar like I have seen something like this before.
After looking at it for a few more seconds, a memory of a show I watched in my previous life suddenly appeared in my mind and I immediately realized where I was, 'Oh my Zeno! I'm in the freaking The Walking Dead Universe, ain't I!?'