The Martial Unity

Tens of thousands of initiates, hundreds of Squires, and dozens of Seniors stood with their shoulders slumped over as Rui stood before them.

They were all in a deep hypnotic trance where he controlled what they experienced. His Martial Mind blazed with power as he carefully customized each person’s hypnosis to themselves.

The Martial Masters and government officials of the Kingdom of Ucrea gazed at what was unfolding in the field with a hint of wonder.

To Rui, this was something that he had been doing for the Kandrian Empire for many years. Even when working on Project Forge, he had made sure to break through all the Martial Artists who were fit to be broken through, continuously supplying the Kandrian Empire with new Martial Artists. Though, with Ieyasu around, his burden had been halved.

Regardless, he yawned even as the onlookers cooed with wonder when a wave of brand-new Apprentices, Seniors and Masters were broken through.

By the end of the session, the Kingdom of Ucrea had gained thousands of new Apprentices, a hundred new Seniors, and neary a dozen new Masters.

It was a truly staggering sight to those who had merely heard of it before.

Even though news of the breakthrough ability of the Dawnbringer had spread across the entirety of the Martial World and the political sphere, witnessing it was entirely different from hearing about it.

“Just like that…” Queen Carme whispered. “We have gained so many more Martial Artists.” It was magical.

She gazed deeply at Rui. Not only had he saved them in their most desperate moment, but he had also given them the power to withstand the Beast Incursion with their own merit.

“Alright, we’re done here.” Rui nodded at the newly broken-through Martial Artists. “Gather all the Martial Masters for the Hellbringer hypnotic embedding.”

Soon enough, all Martial Masters, new and old, were brought before Rui, led by Queen Carme who stood at the start.

She schooled her expression, maintaining the dignity of a head of state and a powerful Martial Master.

And yet, Rui could sense a hint of affection for him in her mind with his mind sense.

It was not mutual, unfortunately for her.

He didn’t have any relationship with her and didn’t even know her. He simply indulged in the pleasures of the flesh to alleviate what was otherwise a pretty testing and taxing voyage and journey for the most part. As for the consequences, he just hoped that the untested Martial birth control option he had employed had worked. Female Martial Artists could also prevent conception if they wanted to.

Regardless, he would be gone from this place soon enough.

“Let’s begin,” Rui declared. “I’m sure that you have gained access to the Hellbringer model and the memorization method that I’ve recommended, so we can immediately get into it. For now, picture the one location or set of locations that all of you are intimately familiar with. For most of you, that will be your primary residence. Or perhaps some of the training chambers that you frequent very often. Regardless, make sure that you have the place in mind. Close your eyes and visualize it. Find yourselves standing in it.”

The Martial Masters followed his instructions and closed their eyes, concentrating deeply.

A minute later, Rui nodded. “Now, I will commence the embedding of the Hellbringer model. I will pass on datapoint after datapoint of the Hellbringer model, and you will traverse your mindscape in the conjured image you have, and store those datapoints in a particular order. It is best if you use Martial Minds during this process; we will be able to get this done much faster.”

The Martial Masters nodded.

“Alright then, let’s start.” All of them activated their Martial Minds as he commenced the hypnotic embedding. He used non-verbal communication to forcefully insert the information in their minds after misdirecting the attention of their conscious minds.

“Rrrrggh…!”

“This…”

“Heavy…!”

Even though Rui had been incredibly gentle and delicate with the information flux that he imparted to them, they still gritted their teeth under the sheer weight of data that he dumped into their minds, never once failing to adhere to his instructions.

Bit by bit, Rui imparted a fraction of his enlightenment of the Tree of Life. He made sure to severely restrict his effort so that he didn’t overwhelm their Martial Minds with his own. There was no point in wasting time by going faster than they could handle and being forced to start over.

Eventually an hour passed by as they endured the heavy flow of information, storing all of it in their makeshift Mind Palaces that Rui had prepared for them.

“And… we’re finally done.” Rui heaved a tired sigh. “Good job, everyone.”

The Masters were all on the ground, having collapsed from exhaustion.

They stared at Rui with disbelief that even all of this was merely just a fraction of a single system of thought among several systems of thought. Rumors of his supreme affinity for mind and thought were not exaggerated by any means.

“Prince Rui…” Queen Carme got up and walked up to him. “…Thank you for everything. The Kingdom of Ucrea will never ever forget your contributions to our land and our people. Thanks to you, we have finally gained the power to fight back against the Beast Incursion without faltering.”

Rui smiled. “You’re welcome. I would recommend that you try out your new systems of thought against the next wave of beasts and monsters that should be coming very soon. It will take some time before you have fully grown accustomed to this new system of thought.”

She nodded with an enthused expression. “We will keep that in mind.”

“Well, I’m off to sleep off the effects of using the Martial Mind. Bye,” Rui bade her farewell unceremoniously before heading off back to his personal quarters so that he would be able to recuperate immediately.

The Kingdom of Ucrea had been a more fun and pleasurable visit than he had expected, but it was time to move on.