The Martial Unity

He wasn’t new to this game; he knew what was very close to happening. That was why he knocked her out just a moment before it happened.

It had been a long time since he had destroyed a Martial Path. The last time he did was before he broke into the Master Realm. Ever since he broke into the Master Realm, however, he discovered that he simply didn’t have the power to break the path of a Martial Master.

It was too strong.

Too sturdy.

It wasn’t just a matter of combat power, he didn’t have enough adaptive evolution. Not even all his systems of thought-the Metabody System, the Hypnomatrix, and the Yggdrasil System-were enough to destroy a Martial Path of a Martial Master.

There was a reason that the Upper Realms were so different from the Lower Realms.

It was only after he created the Forge of Creation that his adaptive evolution had risen to a whole new level of power that was far beyond his reach prior. It had single-handedly redefined his Martial Path, destroying the solidity of his Martial Art and reducing it to liquid. Water.

His adaptive evolution had become so potent that even the invincible Martial Paths of the Upper Realms succumbed under the sheer weight of his.

He had mixed feelings about this, although he was generally leaning positive.

On one hand, he was extremely satisfied and pleased with the undeniable proof that his adaptive evolution had reached a whole new level of power far beyond anything it had prior to the Forge of Creation.

This meant that he had taken massive strides in the direction of fulfilling Project Water. On the other hand, it was annoying that he once more had to be careful not to destroy Paths. If he had destroyed her Path like he was about to. It would have had disastrous consequences for his negotiations and deliberations with the Sekigahara Confederate. He had been invited over as a guest and treated with hospitality. Provoking a fight and then crippling an important Martial Master of the Sekigahara Confederate would have becomea diplomatic crisis and fiasco of the highest order. It would be no different from an ambassador committing murder amidst a diplomatic visit to another nation.

“Thank god that didn’t happen,” Rui murmured as he gazed at her unconscious body, shaking his head lightly before glancing at the spectator stands. “Next.”

Rui frowned. “What’s the matter? Come on out. I’m relatively tired at this point so you might actually have a slim chance at winning.”

They gritted their teeth with humiliation. “… You have defeated everybody.”

“Oh…” Rui’s expression fell with disappointment. “That’s… dull.”

He suddenly missed Ieyasu for some reason.

He was the only Martial Artist who made Rui feel ordinary and normal.

Standing before the Martial Masters that he had mopped up, he couldn’t help but wonder if there actually was a Realm in between the Master Realm and Sage Realm that people had kept a secret from him for some reason.

He still had a third of his stamina.

The Martial Masters had tried their best to drain his stamina, but with his systems of thought, techniques, principles, and, most importantly, the Forge of Creation, he was able to take them down while preserving as much stamina as possible. He actually found it quite interesting and challenging to alter the conditions of the Forge of Creation not to just

maximize the probability of victory, but to obtain victory with the least energy-consumptive technique.

Additionally, he had to admit that the Sekigahara Confederate did have strong Martial Masters. The fact that they had Martial Masters as strong as Master Mito despite losing a hundred Martial Masters at the Sekigahara-Kandria battle of 558 showed that their average Martial Artist level had undoubtedly been higher than the Kandrian Empire’s before Rui had brought back home the treasures.

He could respect why a nation as powerful as the Sekigahara Confederate had gone on to become a Sage-level powerhouse over time.

And yet, he couldn’t help but feel disappointed on a personal level that they couldn’t even make him feel genuine danger when he was fighting them while holding back on multiple levels. He had let Master Mito display her full power instead of unleashing the full might of his Martial Art against her with the Metabody System, the Yggdrasil System, or some of his most powerful techniques.

Of course, he had also thought he would be facing more Martial Masters that would not let him win so easily, so he had been preserving his stamina too.

Still, while it was interesting, it couldn’t make his blood rush or his heart race. It was not exciting to any extent.

“Not to mention…” he murmured. “I will be getting stronger soon enough.”

With the fruits of the Tree of Healings, he would be able to elevate the Megamind technique

to a higher level with a conditioned blood-brain barrier that could withstand even greater blood pressures than ever before.

Just how strong would he get within the Master Realm?

Just who could possibly challenge him without being a Sage?

It was a depressing thought.

The closer and closer he got to fulfilling Project Water, the more he found himself wishing it

was further and further away.

“Maybe the reason I care about fulfilling Project Water is because of the journey to getting there rather than the end goal?”

His eyes lit up with a hint of self-understanding.

It was a profound realization.

Most of his life, he had been lightyears away from fulfilling the project.

Only now was he closer to the end goal than the starting point.

And thus, only now had he gained the power needed to illuminate parts of himself that he had

simply been too weak to see.

“Truly…” He gazed at his hands. “Power does reveal who one is after all.”

It wasn’t just that fulfillment of Project Water that he sought.

It was the journey to getting there that was equally important.

It might even have been even more important.

He truly loved the art and science of Adaptive Evolution.

He loved running into an insurmountable barrier and then figuring out a way to adaptively

evolve.

He loved discovering new dimensions of adaptive evolution he didn’t know about before.

He loved exploring them.

He loved his Martial Art with all his heart.

He wished there were an infinite number of things for him to adaptively evolve to.

These realizations that he had gained only after crossing a certain threshold of power taught

him much about who he was as a being.

And now, he had taken one more step closer to the Sage Realm.