The Martial Unity

Six months passed. Rui worked day and night, literally, mastering his new techniques. The first technique he had mastered among the six was the Mind Mask technique. His mastery of the technique was immense and he could either amplify or reduce his presence and the sense of danger he evoked in sentient minds depending on what kind of image he projected on himself.

The second technique that he had completely mastered was the Fauna Flow technique, it was a rather unique technique the learning process of which he had enjoyed thoroughly. The technique was rather bizarre but he enjoyed the process of it. His growth speed and cognition allowed him to master it rather swiftly. He embedded the language into the secondary brain as well, using the Mental Embed technique.

The remaining techniques followed suit quickly. He attained mastery in the Reverberating Lance, the Final Breathing, and Shadow Step techniques one by one.

The final technique that followed was the Mindmirror Symbiote technique. It took a whole extra month after the remaining five techniques until he was finally ready.

CLICK

Rui gasped in disbelief after he finally embedded the last bit of combat information into the secondary brain. The embed was complete and the secondary brain was finally ready to be used in combat. He closed his eyes as he felt the secondary brain exchanging a massive flux of information with his mind.

Time slowed down as the world became sharper. It was as though someone had lowered the playing speed of a video. The secondary brain had been embedded with the sensory processing neurological protocols. It processed the information parallelly alongside his own mind, producing much better results much sooner.

“So, this is what the Mindmirror Symbiote does?” Rui muttered aloud as he brought his hands up to his face.

His eyes widened in shock as he realized he was both hearing his own voice and seeing his own hands in slow motion.

(‘I see, because my cognition speed has risen while my physical speed has declined, even my own body appears slower to me.’) He realized.

He closed his eyes as he applied the Primordial Instinct and the Seismic Mapping techniques. Seismic Mapping had also slowed down in his mind, the incoming seismic radiation had a lower frequency. This was within his prediction.

What was a little outside his prediction was how Primordial Instinct interacted with the secondary brain. Primordial Instinct was merely the instinctual subconscious sense of danger and risk trained to an extremely high degree. It worked better out than he had ever expected.

The Primordial Instinct sense had become more accurate and precise. Or at least, that’s what Rui felt like. Before, it was merely limited to vague feelings, but now Rui could feel it was more tangible and concrete information regarding the dangers and risks.

“Man, I wonder what the VOID algorithm is like now?” He muttered with an excited grin. “I need to test it immediately!”

The problem was, he needed an opponent in order to test out the VOID algorithm against. But this had already become a major problem at this stage.

“I’m too strong.” He murmured. He was already considerably stronger than his friends, who were extremely powerful Martial Artists themselves even before his last training stage. At his current level, even other grade-ten Martial Artists were no longer much of a threat to him.

“Squire Kyrie again then?” He wondered, before shaking his head. “I already have a predictive model for Squire Kyrie.”

One of the reasons he had chosen to master the Mindmirror Symbiote in the first place was because it was a symbiote that allowed him to speed up the process of forming the predictive model. If he wanted to test the actual increase at the speed at which he formed the predictive model thanks to the secondary brain, then he would need to fight someone he didn’t have a predictive model on.

He had already formed one when he fought against Kyrie, so he couldn’t fight for his purposes.

“If not Squire Kyrie then… I guess I’ll have to make do with Squire Dylon.” Rui murmured. Ideally, he would liked to have fought an all-rounder since those were the hardest for the VOID algorithm, but alas, Kyrie was the only all-rounder Martial Artist in the Academy as the combat training Squire instructor.

He didn’t waste any time, choosing to immediately head towards the offensive training facility. He quickly consumed a few potions on the way. He wanted to be at his peak when he fought Squire Dylon. He spotted Squire Dylon mentoring several Martial Apprentices practicing techniques when he arrived.

Yet the moment he stepped in, he drew everybody’s attention.

The sheer pressure he exerted was eye-drawing. Not a single person could avoid throwing a glance his way. One thing was clear to all of them.

He had grown stronger.

“Well well well.” Squire Dylon said, addressing him. “Lookie who we have here.”

“Squire Dylon.” Rui replied.

“You know, there’s a reason we Squire instructors put a tight lid on our minds when we’re in facilities training.” He said. “It’s to ensure we don’t disturb the Martial Apprentices training. Although you’re not a Martial Squire, you’re no ordinary Martial Apprentice either. Turn down the pressure a bit, will you? You’re disturbing the other students.”

“Ah.” Rui glanced around before nodding. “Alright, my bad.”

He closed his mind before activating the Mind Mask technique, completely concealing every ounce of mental pressure. The people around him grew startled as all the suffocating pressure disappeared into thin air instantly as Rui appeared to be no more than an ordinary sixteen-year-old boy.

Squire Dylon’s eyebrow raised at the sight. “Huh. You’ve mastered some interesting Martial Art techniques. Speaking of which, why are you here? You’d already mastered the Reverberating Lance technique a month ago. Don’t tell me you’ve already purchased more techniques?”

“No.” Rui shook his head. “I’ve come here because I wish to spar with you.”

“Ah…” Squire Dylon pondered the matter as he scratched his chin, before shrugging. “Sure.”