The Martial Unity

The story didn’t stop there.

No.

It was just the beginning.

The progenitors of Genism sought to cultivate their path and develop it. They sought to spread what they perceived as the path to self and enlightenment.

They sought to spread the path to the universe itself.

And thus, they created the Gen Temple.

And that was the origin of what was now one of the most powerful nations in all of Panama.

The story continued across the walls, spreading far beyond what the eye could see. It described the journey of Genism, the challenges it overcame, and the blessings it received as it elevated not just in the world but through the Realms of Martial Art.

They had truly carved out the history of the entire temple and the history of their philosophy. By the time he had had his fill of studying the architecture and art of the entire place, he turned back to the gates, ready to head in.

Only to find himself face to face with a woman standing right in front of him, staring at him with a peaceful expression.

“Woah!” he leaped back, almost falling all the way down the steps. “What the heck?!”

She smiled at him with a hint of amusement, bringing her right hand to form half of a praying posture. The entirety of her hair and her eyebrows were entirely missing, while a long black cloth thoroughly wrapped itself across the entirety of her body in a complex bind.

“You…” his eyes lit up as he recognized her. “…You’re the Abbot of the Gen Temple.”

She was the most powerful Bodhisattva of the Gen Temple and leader of the Sage-level powerhouse.

“Amitabha.” her voice was as peaceful as it was harmonious. “It soothes my soul to know that you found yourself so immersed in the story that we and our ancestors have carved upon our walls that you failed to notice my arrival before you.”

Rui furrowed his eyebrows.

He failed to notice her arrival before her because of how engrossed he was.

Even though his Martial Heart and Mind were still active from the leap?

That was bullshit.

He didn’t know how she did it, but the powerful Martial Sage managed to bypass his extraordinary senses even without actively using her Realms of power. Instantly, his grudging but deep curiosity into all things Martial Art demanded that he understand what in the world she had done.

“How did you do that?” He stared at her intently

Her serene smile deepened with even greater amusement. “Your mind is powerful. More powerful than any other that this one has ever seen, and yet…”

She gazed at him with a knowing look.

“Yet it cannot compensate for the holes in your soul.”

His eyes lit up at her words. “That… That…”

His expression crumbled with confusion. “That makes no sense whatsoever.”

The elderly woman simply chuckled at his confusion before continuing. “The Gen Temple welcomes the infinite light within you to our abode, Dawnbringer.”

The gates behind her opened, revealing massive expanses of training fields and chambers where countless initiates and Martial Artists trained vigorously. Simultaneously, he grew engrossed by the sense of harmony that existed within the nation, permeating across the entirety of the temple.

They didn’t distinguish between the non-Martial and Martial infrastructure. Unlike the Sekigahara Confederate and virtually every other nation that he had run into, the Gen Temple didn’t separate Martial Art and non-Martial Art into different parts of the nation.

They existed as one.

“Come, Dawnbringer,” Bodhisattva Maitreyi coaxed him gently. “Allow me to show you around the temple that we have cultivated with all hearts and souls.”

They sky-walked through the skies of the the temple at a slow pace, giving Rui enough time to observe the Gen Temple.

It was jarringly different from anything that he was familiar with.

It appeared that the very fundamentals of the civilization were unique and unlike anything that he had ever even conceived of before.

From what he could tell, there was no concept of an economy at all.

He couldn’t see anything even remotely resembling the free trade of goods and services. He hadn’t observed a single thing resembling currency whatsoever. It was so divergent from all other Sage-level powerhouses that he found it difficult to wrap his head around the whole thing.

“Is it that difficult to imagine a world where people are not driven by their base urges and material greed?”

Her voice seemed to transcend heaven and earth, directly rooting itself in his head. She gazed at him with a serene expression and knowing eyes. As though she could read him like a book.

“Yes, actually,” Rui murmured as he studied the Gen Temple. “Those base urges and that material greed are the normal state of humanity. That’s why it’s so universal. Hunger, fear, lust, anger, and joy are things that we as a species have evolved to experience. It predicts

survival.”

She regarded him with a hint of acknowledgment. “That, it does. But it is no different from locking one’s self in a prison to protect one’s self from the world. What if there was a way that these material shackles could be abandoned without forsaking one’s life? What if there was a way that one could find true peace and live a longer and healthier life…?”

Her calm gaze swept over the Gen Temple. “Here, we have found the way to do just that. It is what you see below. We do not have a free market to allocate goods and services to assuage human greed, but instead, we have eliminated human greed entirely, thereby eliminating the need for a free market and an economy in the first place.”

Her words were truly difficult for Rui to wrap his head around.

Eliminating the economy, the very foundation of human civilization, by eliminating human greed and desire?

He found it difficult to even fathom or parse as a concept.

Bodhisattva Maitreyi simply smiled at his shortcomings before glancing in particular.

“Come, let me show you the Valley of Peace, where we unshackled material beings and give them inner peace.”