The Martial Unity

Indeed, civilizations couldn’t be babied if they wanted to grow up and grow stronger. The more they depended on him, the less pressure there would be to actually grow stronger independently. “Expansion. Recommended. Multi-Planetary Civilization. Recommended. Multi-Stellar Civilization. Recommended,” the laminar integument. “Reduces. Risk. Of. Extinction. One. Thousand. Percent.”

Rui nodded seriously. “We have been preparing for that for the past six years. We have the tools. We have the technology and the power to traverse the vast expanses of interstellar space in a short amount of time.”

He turned towards the laminar integument with a knowing expression. “Is your civilization willing to trade higher technology?”

The laminar integument considered the question before replying. “Your. Civilization. Have. Nothing. Of. Equal. Value. Aside. From. Paths. Pathwalkers. You.”

That was a harsh judgment, but it was unfortunately true. Even if the Laminar Civilization was inclined to treat Gaian Civilization favorably, they weren’t simply going to give away their high technology for free. And truly, aside from Paths, they probably didn’t have anything the Laminar Civilization didn’t have, including negatron matter and even esoteric matter.

He could probably get technology if he just gave them a billion pathwalkers to experiment on, but that was absolutely politically untenable, not to mention completely wrong.

Perhaps he could come up with a system of punishment that involved becoming the test subjects of Laminar Civilization. Martial Artists who committed the worst crimes with no redemption could perhaps be thrown to the Laminar Civilization to be treated however they wanted.

That was still controversial, though. He wasn’t sure if people would appreciate the ‘sell-out’ for high alien technology, but it would have to be something that they would need to do consider more.

Regardless, it didn’t change the fact that they would need to expand to other planets and other stars in their galaxy. The reality was that they needed more energy, and they needed more resources. If they wanted to build a giant worldship like the laminar integuments with their own technology, then they needed many, many, many billions of tons of metals and other matter, more than even what could be mined from Gaia.

They would also need large sums of energy from other stars, completely swallowing and extracting every ounce of energy from them in order to create the system of energy that they would need to create a stronger civilization that was more capable of protecting itself.

At the same time, their space warfare needed to grow much, much better. Their battle against the Laminar Integuments had revealed many shortcomings.

Space war was the foundation of their survival; they had all realized this. It didn’t matter how strong they were within the environment of Gaia when the forces trying to destroy them were outside Gaia.

They needed to completely and entirely redirect all of their effort into growing stronger in space war so that they could protect their civilization. Rui knew what he, what their civilization, would have to focus on.

“Race to the Stars.”

It had been a long time coming, and now the time had truly come.

Project Interstellar had been in the works for the past six years since he became Emperor of Kandria. The other civilization had also worked to prepare its own interstellar expansion projects with the closest layer of star systems in the galactic vicinity of Sol.

He turned towards the Tendril of Light with a knowing expression. “Is the Laminar Civilization willing to enter a mutual security agreement with the Gaian Alliance?”

It was a bit of a reach, of course. The power differential in civilizational might was vast, a ‘mutual’ security agreement would effectively end up being the Laminar Civilization protecting Gaian Civilization. “Only. If. Able. To. Guarantee. Laminar. Civilization. Acquiring. Paths,” the Tendril of Light replied. “Otherwise. Agreement. Too. Lopsided.”

Of course, Gaian Civilization had Rui, who could offer tremendous protection in the right circumstances, since the Laminar Civilization likely didn’t have any individual combat unit able to match him as a Martial Transcendent. Not that Rui would make such an offer, he was the leader of Gaian Civilization, and he could work as a security guard for another civilization. He would be far too consumed with protecting his own civilization.

The condition that the Tendril of Light was also very difficult, however, not impossible. In the past, he would have thought that ‘creating’ paths for other alien species was utterly impossible.

But he had gained deep insights into the creation and destruction of Paths in the past six years, punishing criminal Martial Artists who had committed heinous crimes.

He had come to suspect that it was possible to create a Path in a lifeform or even in a species by a process that would be information resonance. It might be possible for him to give the laminar integuments their path by altering the nature of their genome, if they even possessed such a thing. If he tinkered with them at the information dimension level, he might be able to create Paths of Power for all life in the universe.

It could potentially become an extremely powerful bargaining chip in the future if he managed to achieve this.

‘Something to keep in mind when I have to focus on this.’

He turned back towards the laminar integument with a knowing expression. “I have some thoughts about the prospects of you guys getting your own paths. But for now, I shall abstain from making that commitment until I’m certain I can live up to it. If not a mutual security agreement, are you willing to sign a free trade agreement? Allowing members of our civilization to exchange goods and services?”

Of course, he wasn’t even sure if the Laminar Civilization had such a concept. Not all species necessarily had free trade and an economy with free markets. The elves, who were within the Gaian Tree of Life, didn’t have an internal free economy. They just cooperated with each other because that’s how close elves were with each other sociogenetically.

Rui could even imagine just how different the laminar integuments would be, but to his surprise, the Tendril of Light was willing to affirm that.

“Willing. To. Do. Trade. Interested. In. Native. Technological. Paradigms.”

Rui grew more confident in maintaining a good relationship. They had secured multiple agreements. In the long run, it was likely that Gaian Civilization and Laminar Civilization would grow to become allies once their ties grew deeper.