The Martial Unity

Rui’s fist flashed forward with blinding speed and momentum, threatening to blast Anthea’s head off.

WHOOSH

The latter just barely managed to evade it with a swift sidestep, throwing a powerful hook towards the side of Rui’s jaw.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

The powerful blow struck vainly, negated by Rui’s Anti-Spiral, allowing him to absorb the power and return it to his opponent with great speed and power.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMM!!!

Anthea grimaced before sharpening his ephemeral eyes.

“Let us see how long you can keep this up.”

Unfortunately for him, Rui was the wrong person to challenge on the basis of stamina.

What ensued was a long and drawn-out fist fight between the two combatants, brawling over each other even as they adaptively evolved to the best of their ability. Rui activated his Metabody System, activating Hypetrophic Surge and Neo Godspeed, allowing him to reach a vastly superior echelon of power, enough to overwhelm almost any Martial Sage.

And yet, Anthea clapped back by adaptively evolving by genetically altering his neurons to fire faster and increasing the number of quick-twitch fibers in his muscles, sacrificing his stamina for power and speed.

RUMBLE!!!!!

The world shook as the battle escalated in intensity. Anthea, convinced by Rui being temporarily augmented by some exotic treasure, simply trusted that he would outlast Rui’s impressive performance. Whether he admitted or not, Rui had vastly outperformed the previous champions that Anthea had fought.

None of them had managed to push him to such an extent as Rui had, and none of them lasted too long.

Rui, on the other hand, maintained his output without faltering for extended periods of time.

With the Blood of Solaris, there was virtually no way that Rui could collapse quickly. He drew electromagnetic energy over an extraordinary amount of area and range.

The very Sun fueled his power, allowing him to continue like he had endless reserves at his disposal.

Unfortunately for him, Anthea was no slouch in this dimension either.

Cold fusion only required hydrogen atoms, which could easily be found and accessed from the environment. As long as he had hydrogen, he could fight as long as his brain could stay awake, for even the cellular wear and tear that he experienced could be fixed with their genetic ability.

Both sides had a stamina that already exceeded any attempt at quantification.

The battle could continue for an absurd amount of time if they simply slugged it out.

In fact, this battle alone could lead to a more destructive war that was centered around both Rui and Anthea.

Since both of them were extremely important to their respective civilizations, neither civilization would be willing to let them hash it out in a fair and free battle.

The Panamic Alliance would soon deploy their recuperated Sages back to the battle, with fresh Transcendent Candidates in their prime, potentially equipped with a healing fruit.

While the Evolutionary Army had already summoned a much greater army from their homeland in Moridia to the Panama Continent to reinforce the supreme commander against the indigenous population.

It could spark an all-out war with the Evolutionary Army on the land of the Panama Continent, which would be destructive beyond any measure and harm the Panamic Alliance more than the Evolutionary Army.

A protracted active war at this particular point in time, when neither side had prepared for it, was not desirable.

And yet, if the battle between Rui and Anthea continued long enough, then that was exactly what would happen.

BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM!!!!!

The sheer intensity of the battle between them only rose with each passing exchange as they grew more and more determined to win. Neither of them was willing to back down from the battle for various reasons, including political, strategic, and optical.

However, the greatest reason that neither side wanted to give in was that this wasn’t just a battle for territory.

It was a battle for adaptive evolution.

A retreat from Anthea would be an admission that he was not able to overcome Rui.

A retreat from Rui was an insult to Project Water and was a step back in his journey to fulfill his ultimate goal.

On top of that, adaptive evolution was the one thing that he was absolutely unwilling to admit defeat on.

Anthea’s ethereal eyes bore deep into the pitch-black darkness in Rui’s.

Even as they furiously exchanged blows, a hint of grudging respect emerged in the evolutionary’s eyes.

“You are strong.”

His tone was strangely earnest.

“The fact that your Body Phase is this powerful is quite impressive given that you have the body of an inferior species.”

His gaze grew more intense. “Your Soul Phase is extraordinarily potent and is the only reason that you are able to keep up with me right now. However…”

His tone grew more perilous.

“It is your Mind Phase that is unfathomable…” he continued with an eerie tone. “It is your most powerful phase of adaptive evolution, and yet…”

His eyes flickered with bloodlust.

“I have sealed it with the power of chaos.”

His body brimmed with power as it began changing.

“My strongest phase overcame yours.”

His attacks grew even stronger and even faster.

“That is the reason that I will win this battle.”

BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM!!!!!

Rui’s expression grew ugly even as he fought furiously with every ounce of his might.

The balance in the battle had begun crumbling.

Despite using his most powerful techniques, despite having used Soul Retcon and the Metabody System, and almost every relevant system in his entire Martial Art, he still found himself on the losing end of the battle.

Anthea’s body evolved.

It evolved in real time.

It was in this moment that he displayed the true power of the evolutionary race.

They were born for adaptive evolution.

It was their legacy.

And their greatest gift.

His DNA simply evolved in real time.

It evolved as the DNA of the human species evolved during the Body Evolution process.

It was as though he was spontaneously carrying himself to a higher Realm of power.

Spontaneously carrying himself to the evolutionary equivalent of the Transcendent Realm.