The Martial Unity

Rui woke up groggy and disoriented after what felt like an eternity.

His vision was blurry while his mind was a mess.

For more than just a few moments, he was lost.

Who was he?

Where was he?

Why was he here?

What happened?

It wasn’t until he got up, easing himself onto the bed in his medical ward, that it finally came back.

“Kane…” he murmured lightly as his eyes lit up with delight. “Heh, he broke through.”

Rui was deeply delighted at his friend’s breakthrough, not to mention the Gatekeeper’s breakthrough as well.

Kane had demonstrated an extraordinary level of power when he broke through, reaching a higher starting point within the Master Realm than most Masters. He also defeated Rui in a duel by using his greatest trump card when Rui had made the mistake of lowering his guard down. He had made an enormous amount of progress in the manifold after spending seven years in it.

Unlike Rui, his Martial Path was not reactive, and neither was his growth. It meant that he could spend massive amounts of time in isolation training without needing to experience external forces to grow.

It was something Rui envied but did not like.

The Gatekeeper was also similar to Kane in that he benefited greatly from it, more than most people would.

He also had one of the most unique Martial Minds Rui had ever seen. Rui hadn’t been able to spend much time pondering it back then, for they were in the middle of a dire battle, but he intended to learn as much about it as possible.

“A system of thought for training…” He grew engrossed in the matter, “is within my capabilities.”

He didn’t need to add it to his Martial Mind, of course.

He didn’t want to weaken his Martial Mind in combat by adding a training Martial Mind to it.

However, it was worth pursuing it because he had inherited the memories of a man who had conducted plenty of research into combat training. Of course, much of it was invalid when it came to Martial Bodies, but there was plenty that could still be applied.

“I’ll put it on the list.”

He was glad that Sir Armstrong managed to break through to the Master Realm; if anybody deserved to be rewarded for their perseverance and dedication, it was the man who’d spent about five hundred years in grueling training without ever faltering.

He had always been respected by the Masters of Kandria, but soon, he would have the power to boot. Rui had no doubt that with his explosive training progress, his Martial Mind, and the manifold’s acceleration, his Martial Body would reach extraordinary levels of power previously thought impossible.

Kane, on the other hand, had started enormously high from the very get-go.

Rui had learned more about Kane in that battle.

The truth was that Kane did not want to be broken through artificially the way he had been last time. Because being broken through artificially meant that he would be much weaker than Rui was.

After all, Rui needed to threaten the destruction of one’s path in order to trigger their breakthrough.

However, he could not do that against an equal, only against people significantly weaker.

Thus, if Kane was artificially broken through, it would mean he had made no actual progress with his goal of reaching Rui.

That was something that Kane was very unwilling to let be the case.

Thus, he had worked extremely hard in the Manifold to reach a level of power so great that not even Rui would be able to dominate him or threaten to break him through with his own power.

On the surface, that might seem entirely irrational, and perhaps it was to a certain extent. However, Rui understood why Kane had chosen to go that route. His goal to become Rui’s equal or as close to it as possible was not just something he pretended to harbor without taking seriously but was something he intended to achieve.

Thus, Rui actually respected his friend’s determination to refuse to be weak enough just to break through to another Realm. There was no point in pursuing power. It required him to forsake the reason that he pursued it in the first place.

And it paid off; Kane’s breakthrough was something that he could truly take pride in because he broke through to the Master Realm of his own merit. His breakthrough was entirely natural, and the trigger had been to defeat Rui in a battle rather than Rui breaking him through artificially.

As long as Kane continued to work hard and grind in the manifold, it wasn’t entirely impossible that he would eventually catch up to Rui. It was actually something that Rui looked forward to, as Kane was the only Master of the same generation as Rui.

CLACK The door opened, breaking Rui out of his thoughts and bringing him back to the real world. He found himself looking at four Martial Masters who had been standing guard outside his medical ward.

“Your Highness, you have finally woken up.”

Rui raised an eyebrow. “…Finally?”

They glanced at each other before heaving a sigh. “It has been a month since the battle passed, Your Highness.”

Rui’s eyes widened. “…I didn’t even use my Martial Mind.”

“According to the Divine Doctor, that is the only reason that you haven’t suffered permanent brain damage,” they informed him with a soft sigh. “What you did was reckless, Your Highness. There was no need to push yourself after the battle. Especially when you informed us you were going to merely watch.”

Rui’s expression grew sheepish as he recalled exactly what he had said to Master Zentra. “Ah, well, my bad. I had not gone there with the intention of acting. I just found myself in circumstances where I had no choice but to act. I think the outcome speaks for itself, though.”

“We are not chastising you, Your Highness. What’s done is done. Now, however, you must deal with the consequences of your actions.”

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