WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Dragon Ball Super Chapter 76 "The Fate of the Saiyans," by Akira Toriyama, Toyotarou, Caleb Cook and Brandon Bovia, available now in English through Viz Media.
While Vegeta has long toiled away in the shadow of his greatest frenemy Goku, constantly striving to surpass him to become the strongest warrior in the Dragon Ball Multiverse, the Dragon Ball Super manga series gave the Saiyan Prince a combat transformation unique to him. Dubbed Ultra Ego, the transformation has Vegeta channel the latent powers of a God of Destruction, with the Power of Destruction's effects having the opposite effect on the user's mindset as Goku's Ultra Instinct transformation. Besides being Vegeta's most powerful transformation to date, the form gives him a profound amount of insight into himself and how committed he is to combat and destruction.
After prolonged training under Whis and Universe 7's God of Destruction Beerus throughout Dragon Ball Super, Goku and Vegeta received godly energy to combine with their natural Super Saiyan potential. This initially manifested through the Super Saiyan Blue transformation, although Goku would attain an even more powerful transformation known as Ultra Instinct during the Tournament of Power. Vegeta achieves Ultra Ego sometime later; however, whereas Ultra Instinct has its user let go and go with the flow of battle, Ultra Ego has its user let the thrill of battle consume them as they indulge themselves in the carnage, allowing their baser, more violent instincts take control.
In many ways, this is the combat transformation that Vegeta has striven for his entire life, rewarding his insatiable hunger for battle and allowing him to embrace the darker impulses that were previously revived when he was transformed into Majin Vegeta during Dragon Ball Z. To maintain this transformation, Vegeta has to effectively stay enraged throughout the battle, to the point of lashing out at friends and allies and allowing himself to take damage to fuel this anger. And while Vegeta's Ultra Ego transformation has him put up an impressive fight against the new villain Granolah, it also reveals that Vegeta perhaps isn't as singularly focused on combat and power, at the expense of all else, as he long believed about himself.
Vegeta's battle against Granolah ends with the Saiyan Prince reaching the realization that the Power of Destruction is beyond him, and that he is unable to fully embrace its potential and let his rational self go. In a way, this is an extension of the moments of self-discovery Vegeta experienced throughout DBZ, with the realization that he genuinely cared for his growing family and a begrudging acknowledgment that Goku was indeed a stronger, more naturally gifted fighter than him while observing his rival battle against the evil Kid Buu.
Ultra Ego gives Vegeta a taste of ultimate, combat-fueled power and the chance to fully revel in his destructive potential -- yet it also reveals to him that there are some lengths he's not willing to go to in order to ascend. This could give Vegeta a sense of peace, not to just become a more balanced fighter but a more well-rounded family man who better appreciates the more domestic side of his life -- something he intermittently neglected and resented during DBZ. Vegeta may not be cut out to become a God of Destruction, but the Saiyan Prince is all the better for it.
