Frohze stared at the frozen images—one of devastation, one of joy—and the war within her was visible on her translucent features. The breeze off Shell Mountain carried the scent of Komatsu's cooking, of hope and desperation intertwined.
"You're offering me a deal," she said slowly. "My service as your chef, in exchange for my children's future."
King inclined his head. "I'm offering you a choice. The same choice every mother gets: to protect her children, or to watch them suffer." His voice softened. "You couldn't protect them before. Acacia's schemes, your death, the years they spent without you—that wasn't your fault. But this..." He gestured to the images. "This is within your power to change."
Frohze's hands clenched at her sides. "And if I refuse? If I choose to believe that my sons are strong enough to face their own destiny?"
"Then they will face it. And they may win." King shrugged. "The future I showed you is only one possibility. There are others. But—" He paused, letting the weight of his words settle. "—are you willing to gamble their lives on 'maybe'?"
The mountain wind howled between them.
Down below, a cheer erupted. Komatsu had finished his dish—a drink that shimmered with the colors of the aurora, its surface swirling with constellations that had never existed. Toriko was grinning, clapping the young chef on the back. Even Saitama looked up from his dessert preparations, impressed.
Frohze watched them, her children among them, and made her decision.
"What would you have me cook first?"
King's smile was warm, genuine. "Something for yourself. You've been dead a long time, Frohze. You've forgotten what it feels like to eat. To taste. To live." He reached into his coat and withdrew a small, unassuming seed. "Plant this. Water it with your tears. Let it grow."
She took the seed, turning it over in her palm. It was warm, pulsing with a faint heartbeat. "What is it?"
"The seed of the First Tree. A sapling of the very first ingredient. It will grow only for someone who remembers what it means to be hungry—not for power, not for control, but for life."
Frohze's eyes glistened. "You've been planning this for a long time."
"I've been hoping for a long time." King corrected gently. "There's a difference."
She knelt, pressing the seed into the rocky soil of Shell Mountain. A single tear fell from her eye, sinking into the earth beside it.
And the seed sprouted.
A tiny shoot emerged, pale green and trembling, reaching toward the false sun of the Soul World. As it grew, the ground around it softened, darkened, became fertile for the first time in millennia.
"You see?" King said softly. "You still have life in you. Still have purpose. Still have love."
Frohze watched the sapling grow, her hand pressed to her chest. "My sons... they don't even know me."
"They will." King crouched beside her, watching the tiny plant unfurl its first leaves. "When they're ready. When you're ready. Some reunions take time."
"And Acacia?"
King's expression hardened slightly. "Acacia will face his own reckoning. Whether that reckoning comes from his sons, from the world he betrayed, or from the hunger that consumes him..." He shrugged. "That remains to be seen."
Frohze was silent for a long moment. Then she reached out and touched the sapling's leaves. They shimmered under her fingers, responding to her presence.
"I'll cook for you," she said finally. "I'll be your personal chef. I'll help you complete your Full Course Menu." She looked up at him, her eyes clear and steady. "But I do this for my children. For the world they're trying to save. For the hope that they won't have to sacrifice everything the way I did."
King rose, offering her his hand. "That's all I ask."
She took it, and her form solidified—still ethereal, still touched by death, but more somehow. More present. More real.
"Then let's begin," she said. "What's first on your menu?"
King's smile was enigmatic. "We start with something simple. Something that tastes like a new beginning."
He led her toward the cooking stations, toward the chaos and the hope and the impossible dream of feeding the universe.
Behind them, the sapling continued to grow, reaching toward a sky that had never seen a sunrise.
But it would.
Soon.
Frohze's eyes widened, a delicate blush creeping across her translucent features. "You want me to... persuade Ichiryu? To return to the world of the living?"
"I promised Don Slime," King repeated, his expression unreadable. "And I keep my promises."
"He's been dead for years. He's made his peace with the Soul World. He—"
"He's been hiding." King's voice was gentle but firm. "Hiding from responsibility. From pain. From the world that needs him. Don Slime has been trying to revive him for centuries, and Ichiryu has refused every time." He paused. "But he won't refuse you."
Frohze's hand drifted to her chest, where her heart would have been beating if she still had a living body. "You're asking me to drag an old man back from the peace of death into the chaos of life."
"I'm asking you to give him a choice. A real choice. Not the one he's been making out of guilt and sorrow." King stepped closer, his crimson-gold aura mingling with her silver-white glow. "Ichiryu loved you, Frohze. Not the way Acacia did—possessively, selfishly. He loved you the way a student loves a teacher. The way a son loves a mother. The way a man loves the woman who showed him what it meant to be good."
Frohze's form flickered with emotion. "You know things you shouldn't know."
"I know a lot of things." King's smile was sad. "It's a burden."
"And if I refuse? If I let Ichiryu keep his peace?"
"Then he'll watch from the Soul World as his students—his family—face Acacia's hunger alone. He'll watch Toriko and Starjun and Komatsu fight and bleed and perhaps die. And he'll do nothing. Because that's what he's been doing for years." King's voice hardened. "Is that the legacy he wants to leave? The man who could have helped but chose not to?"
Frohze closed her eyes. The wind howled around them, carrying the scents of Komatsu's cooking—hope and desperation and love all tangled together.
"Ichiryu was always stubborn," she said finally. "Even as a child. Even when I told him a dish was perfect, he would insist on making it one more time. Just to be sure."
"And you loved him for it."
"And I loved him for it." She opened her eyes, and they were clear now. Certain. "I'll speak with him. I'll tell him what you've shown me. What's at stake." She looked at King. "But I can't promise he'll listen."
King inclined his head. "That's all I ask."
They stood in silence for a moment, watching the preparations below. Saitama had somehow set his dessert on fire and was trying to put it out with Garou's help, which mostly involved Garou yelling at him while Rin handed them buckets of water. Komatsu was stirring his drink with intense concentration, his tongue poking out slightly. Toriko and Starjun were working side by side, their movements unconsciously synchronized.
"He'll come back," Frohze said softly. "Not for me. For them." She gestured to the scene below. "For that. For the hope that the next generation can do what we couldn't."
King nodded. "That's the thing about hope. It's infectious."
Frohze turned to face him fully. "When this is over—when Acacia is dealt with and the world is safe—what will you do? What will we do?"
King's smile was enigmatic. "We'll cook. We'll explore. We'll find ingredients that have never been tasted and dishes that have never been made. The universe is vast, Frohze. And hungry."
A ghost of a smile crossed her lips. "You really are something else."
"I've been told."
Below, a cheer erupted. Komatsu had finished his drink, and it glowed, radiating warmth and light that seemed to push back the grayness of the Soul World.
"He's good," Frohze observed. "Komatsu. He has the gift."
"He does." King's voice was proud. "And he's still growing. In a few years, he'll be better than anyone. But for now..." He looked at Frohze. "For now, I need you."
Frohze placed her hand on his arm—a gesture of agreement, of alliance, of something that might become friendship.
"Then let's not keep them waiting. I have a drink to help create. And a stubborn old man to convince."
They descended together, leaving the sapling to grow on the mountain peak.
Behind them, its leaves shimmered with silver and gold, reaching toward a sky that was slowly, gradually, beginning to lighten.
The feast was coming.
And with it, a new beginning.