The Martial Unity

Even as Gaian Civilization was reeling from the shocking announcements that Rui made to the world after the ratification of the parliamentary federalist system for the alliance, the man himself had long moved on.

He had institutions that could handle PR and maintain public opinion. One of them was the Ministry of People in the Kandrian Empire, led by none other than his brother, Raul. Of course, Raul didn’t think of himself as managing public opinion of the people, he thought of himself as managing the government’s opinion, representing the people.

But it was the same thing, as far as Rui was concerned. Ever since he had become a Martial Transcendent, he had abandoned all hope of possibly being able to relate to the common man. His very view of reality was different.

Everything was Water, people weren’t even individuals, but ripples in the stream of Water that was the flow of causality itself. Their phenomenology was so different from his that relating to them had become an impossibility.

The more he interacted with them, the more they would realize how inhuman he had become in so many ways. Especially when it came to his perspective on the world.

If the Martial Mind caused a tilt towards psychopathy due to being able to perceive people’s emotions through their brainwaves, then one couldn’t even begin to fathom how strong that pull was for the Martialverse.

Only his Enlightenment of Self and other active measures prevented him from simply regarding all life as merely meaningless complexity that sustained.

And also, Ria.

His love for Ria and how important she had become to him were central to serving as an anchor. She was the most important thing he had ever created, even more so than Project Water. It was what allowed him to keep in touch with whatever humanity he had left as what was effectively a god who had transcended human limitations.

“More importantly, let’s get started,” Rui’s voice grew serious as he leaned forward on a table, resting his elbows on it as he steepled his fingers. He was in an isolated briefing room with heavy anti-espionage measures, including his own. Behind him stood Secretary Claris, while several military leaders from other civilizations had gathered around him.

Mother Alicia had chosen to partake in this meeting as a combat-oriented Mother of Nature. Lord Narsimha, the leader of the War Faction, appointed as general of the United Kiriket Forces under the commander-in-chief Lord Vakratunda had also partaken in the meeting.

Argenton from Greater Tekvoria and General Longern of the Bournvyrne Empire were also present, as was Deputy Commander Wiles of the Evolutionary Army.

Opposite them on the other side was Director Brenner of the Panamic Space Organization and Director Selvin of the Panamic Space Force. They directed a glance at each other with a nod before starting the presentation.

“We will be commencing the intelligence briefing on the gargantian specimen A1, Garg, as we have decided to call it colloquially.”

Behind them, the screen lit up, featuring live footage of Garg the gargantian. The exotic planet rotated slowly about its axis in outer space, its surface shining with exotic lights that made it clear that it was no ordinary planet.

Rui leaned forward with interest at the planet. Indeed, he had seen footage of it, but with just a single look at it, he could tell it had exotic substances within it.

“Garg is about eight times less heavy than Gaia,” Director Brenner began with a general introduction. “It has a mean temperature of thirty degrees, and it’s a planet largely made up of mundane substances that you would find on an ordinary rocky planet except for…”

A list of exotic substances appeared on the screen. Their naming schemes had been completely rehashed with an explosion of exotic material sciences. Before, they were referred to by more colloquial names, but now each of them had scientific names that pointed to the fundamental particles composing each of them.

“We have detected large presences of tachyon condensate, negatron matter, pluripotent exotic matter, hyper-baryonic plasma, Quantum-quasi-matter,” Director Brenner remarked. “While the diversity of exotic matter in Garg is lower than in the Panama Continent, the amounts of matter are the same, actually. It is just that Garg is smaller, so even the amount of exotic matter we have would easily occupy the entire planet at a similar distribution density.”

Rui’s eyes lit up at that. The fact that Garg had as much exotic matter as all of Panama was definitely very attractive. Because it meant that they could have all of it if they captured the planet.

However, it was not going to be that easy, clearly. It was one of the three major civilizations, out of all the stars that the Laminar Civilization had explored, of course, not necessarily across the entire galaxy. Not even the Laminar Civilization had mapped all of the hundreds of billions of stars across the entire galaxy.

It was entirely possible for there to be even greater forces out there.

But a civilization of sentient planets that had nonetheless managed to spread across a billion or so stars was still clearly very formidable.

“The sentient planet appears to have weaponized all of the esoteric matter present within it to varying degrees,” Director Selvin continued, as several more feeds appeared from the battles that emerged on the screen. “The first abilities it displayed to us were weather manipulation to an extremely precise and powerful degree. So much so that even experienced old-gen Martial Sages couldn’t get out. While new-gen Martial Sages were crushed in an instant.”

Rui’s expression grew serious as he watched the footage of fissures opening up in the ground, crushing several of the Martial Sages dispatched to investigate the planet. He watched his old friend Ceeran leap into the air, facing off a powerful storm of the planet’s creation, one that would have destroyed him if not for the reinforcements that Rui had managed to send just in time to extract him.

“However, that, I’m afraid, is only the beginning of everything this tremendous planetary lifeform can do,” Director Selvig declared with a solemn tone of voice.