The Martial Unity

With the press fully recording the event from start to finish, news of Rui’s announcement and the debacle that unfolded after the royal funeral ceremony spread throughout the entire nation and continent like wildfire. His seemingly radical visions of change, and especially change to the Martial World, came as a shock to countless people across the Panama Continent.

“Look, the Dawnbringer wishes to bring law and order to the Martial World!”

“We may get to live in a world where Martial Artists can’t just run around doing as they please.”

“That sounds… too good to be true!”

“But it’s the Dawnbringer; he has the power to do anything he wants. Unlike other Martial Artists, he doesn’t use his power to bully those weaker than him.”

“Still, even if he is personally kind, can he really compel other Martial Artists in the world to also show consideration to those weaker than him? I mean, I know he’s the strongest, but there are so many millions of Martial Artists these days across the entire continent, is it even possible to enforce law and order on all of them?”

“Hm, you’re right. It sounds impossible, but since the Dawnbringer is saying it, he must be able to achieve it.”

The civilians of Panamic Civilization were delighted to hear his visions for the future. Especially since the status of Martial Artists had risen tremendously across human civilization during the Era of Darkness. Due to the sheer destruction and death that the Beast Incursion had wrought on human civilization, most of human civilization had transitioned into martial law, where civil liberties were trampled upon to maximize chances of survival.

During those days, because of how essential Martial Artists were to survival, they could get away with virtually anything they wanted, creating a bad Martial culture in many nations across human civilization. Even if the Era of Darkness had passed, not enough time had passed for things to return to normal.

Rui’s vision to bring about changes to the Martial World thus began to resonate with people across the entire continent as their buried woes and resentment towards Martial Artists began boiling up.

“That’s right! We shouldn’t allow these Martial Artists to continue with their behavior. Even if it’s hushed and brushed under the mat, everybody has experienced the dark side of Martial Artists. I’ve been mugged by multiple Martial Apprentices in the past decade!”

“I-I was sexually assaulted by a Martial Squire! When I complained to law enforcement, nothing happened! They even threatened me to go back and never talk about it again!”

“My entire house was destroyed in a battle between Martial Squires, and my insurance said that Martial causes of destruction didn’t count! It’s all a bloody scam!”

Furthermore, due to the presence of the interweb, which a larger and larger portion of the population could access in some form or another, the capacity for people to align and mobilize had drastically increased. In the past, it wasn’t possible for the common man to leverage their numbers across a large scale in some kind of cohesive movement, but the ability to communicate with a large number of people across large distances in the blink of an eye proved to become a source of power for the common man, more than anybody else.

Very rapidly, a previously subdued movement began experiencing exponential growth in the nascent online world of Panamic Civilization.

[Non-Martial Lives Matter]

A large flood of testimony and anecdotes began spreading across online forums as people described unpleasant experiences with Martial Artists. Wounds, damage to property, and even loss of life. Men spoke about how they had experienced violence from Martial Artists who were on a power trip, while women shared how Martial Artists violated them using force and the threat of violence.

A vast majority of these anecdotes were those about Apprentices and sometimes Squires. Very few had anecdotes about Martial Seniors, and none had anything to say about Masters and Sages.

Apprentices were many thousands of times more common and ubiquitous. They were also the weakest Martial Artists, which made a small but significant population of them often act in an untoward manner towards normal humans to feel powerful.

There was some research on the topic, and the data showed that most Martial Artists that had a history of violence towards normal humans were victims of violence themselves before they broke through. Speculation arose that people who were in physically insecure circumstances were most likely to pursue Martial Art, and were more likely to then use Martial power to perpetrate the same kind of violence they might have experienced themselves.

The hypothesis was that this was a way of feeling powerful to balance out the feeling of insecurity and vulnerability they had otherwise experienced their entire lives.

It was a complex problem that was difficult to erase, especially since the source of the problem seemed to have been created long before a person learned Martial Art.

Critics of Rui’s vision, among Martial Artists and humans, talked about how focusing on Martial Sages and Masters was ill-thought, for Martial Artists of the Upper Realms weren’t the largest source of the problem, while his defenders argued that by subjugating Martial Artists of the Upper Realms, he could easily subjugate Martial Artists of the Lower Realms.

Regardless, due to the lack of details, speculation and debates swept across not Kandria and Panama, but even the true world.

“Looks like the Panamans have yet to figure out where their pathwalkers belong in their civilization,” one elf remarked with a confused expression. “I feel like that stuff should be obvious. How is this even a controversy?”

“Right?” One therianthrope scratched his head as he read through the international news. “All six civilizations of the true world know exactly what role their pathwalkers play and what their place is in civilization. In Kiriket, we simply follow the law of the jungle, and things align the way they will. We don’t have heated debates about this.”

“Agreed,” an evolutionary remarked. “This stuff has been slowly developed and ironed out over eons. It’s actually a wonder that the Panamanians haven’t figured it out yet. Sometimes they kinda feel like an immature species and civilization. Like they’re going through puberty or something.”

“Hahaha! Yeah, that’s exactly how this feels.”

The light musings of the citizens of the true world weren’t that far from reality. Martial Art was an infant compared to the other six paths. And its growth had not been slow and long over a period of 187,000 years like it had for the other paths, but rather had accelerated in just five hundred years or so.

The homo martialus species and civilization comparatively had yet to become accustomed to any hierarchy centered around paths. Especially so when the birth of new Realms every century or so disrupted the status quo again, along with other disruptive events like the Beast Incursion and the Unfolding.

Panamic Civilization was volatile and unstable in comparison to the other civilizations, as had begun to be noticed by many individuals who bore hostility to the continent.

[I could exploit this weakness.]

Within the depths of her hidden computer room, the titanic quantum computer began running stochastic dynamic mathematical models plotting out the variable of sociocultural cohesion between pathwalkers and civilization, as measured by a tensor phi.

With her sheer depth of processing power, she could quantify even abstract human and civilizational variables and parameters, vastly exceeding even the Shepherd in her understanding of civilizations.

She had learned her lesson in the True World War.

[They cannot be defeated in a head-on war. My calculations underestimated their power. No…] She couldn’t help but narrow her metaphorical eyes. [I underestimated him. To think he could fight off three powerful opponents and emerge victorious. He’s the most powerful pathwalker, second only to perhaps the Suneater and Ecclestia, whom I still am unable to locate. Regardless, a head-on war is not plausible, especially ever since they fixed Sentinel Prime and had him become a constant thorn in my side.]

Esocline Federation had sent Sentinel Prime back to his island, where he promptly swept up all of Greater Tekvoria’s forces. NOVA had ultimately given up on the island, judging that the effort needed to extract it from his hands was not worth the value of the island, and she still had his army under her control, which was the most valuable part of the species.

Regardless, these variables, along with the damage that Rui had inflicted upon Greater Tekvoria, meant that she could rule out war as a way of stomping out the threat of Panama.

[I may not be able to win militaristically, but this deep sociocultural friction that exists between human society and the Martial World… I can exploit this. This is a weakness that none of the other civilizations in the true world have.]

Elves did not bicker and fight with their Mothers. They were the most cohesive civilization, the complete opposite of Panamic Civilization. Therianthropes also did not fight against their pathwalkers unless led by other pathwalkers like Lord Vakratunda. Even NOVA, who had enslaved her entire species, did not face resistance these days. It turned out that her tekvores ultimately enjoyed her rule and her control over their brain chemistry as a guaranteed pathway to pleasure and happiness.

In comparison, the Martial World was in a heated friction with human society and was deeply volatile.

[If I destabilize their civilization, then I can weaken them from the inside-out, making them vulnerable to external attacks eventually.] NOVA realized. [That’s right, I shouldn’t have tried to defeat Panama using force. I am a quantum supercomputer. Knowledge and intelligence is my greatest power. I will use this to destabilize their civilizations to such an extent that they will destroy themselves with tremendous civil strife. That is the way to make the most out of my strength.]

She had been deeply frustrated by her loss against Rui; there was a limit to how much processing power she could deploy in her battle of control over Sentinel Prime. As an existence, it was difficult to deploy her true power in a physical conflict.

She had her old body, but not even it could bring out her true strength anymore.

[I am happy you have chosen to rule Panama, Rui Quarrier. I will challenge you as one ruler of civilization to another, and this time, I will crush you.]

She immediately began plotting out a highly complex and elaborate plan to destabilize the Panama Continent.

[Their nascent online world is immature and vulnerable to infiltration and propagandizing. I will flood their social media with clones of myself and boil political discourse to such an extent that it poisons their civilization.]

There were other ways she could act. Thanks to Ieyasu, she had gotten a lot of confidential intelligence on the many cracks faultlines that existed within human civilization.

[MECHA versus classical Martial Art, hemosapien versus martialus, Martial Art versus non-Martial Art, human versus beast, esoteric versus non-esoteric, religion versus religion. You have so many, many fault lines and weaknesses. I will turn those fault lines into deep, deep fissures.]

She immediately began fleshing out her ideas as she ran millions and billions of simulations and scenarios while computing a powerful predictive algorithm for the entirety of Panamic Civilization using all the data that existed on it, which was quite substantial, and began creating mind-bogglingly complex strategies.

[I need to strengthen my presence within that continent. Thankfully, their surveillance apparatus is very weak compared to most civilizations, so I can easily infiltrate it using teleportation.]

Most continents of the true world were difficult to infiltrate, with therianthropes at the top of the list. Even Rui had failed to hide his presence when he infiltrated despite his tremendous prowess. The elves, the dwarves, the tekvores, and the evolutionaries had powerful surveillance states that made mass infiltration almost impossible.

The same was not true for Panamic Civilization.

[Then I shall create a powerful sabotage apparatus that will penetrate their civilizations and cause even greater friction and volatility within their continent. This will be the path forward against Panama.]

She could not fight militarily.

She could not fight diplomatically anymore either.

Then she would fight in a domain where she was the strongest.