The Martial Unity

WHOOSH

The world around him shifted in a blinding blur.

One moment, he stared death in the face.

The very next moment, he found himself staring at the gray ground and the shattered cracks that spread across it. A burly, male arm held him at the waist, wrapping around him protectively and paternally.

It was a sensation he recognized.

It was a sensation he had known his entire life.

”You’ve grown stronger, Runark.”

His voice was powerful, projecting a profoundly deep calmness.

Runark’s eyes widened as he almost recoiled, turning to find none other than his father smiling at him.

A single remark escaped him.

”…Dad?”

Kane had changed in the past thirteen years. Although Martial Artists aged slowly, he certainly had grown visibly older. His hair was shorter than it was before, while he fashioned a well-groomed beard. His body was as lean as it always was, being the maneuvering-oriented Martial Artist that he was. His green eyes were mature, projecting calm power, while his voice had gained the luster of age.

He wore a dark gray exo-Martial suit with green and black streaks running across its esoteric surface.

Immediately, Runark felt safe.

In his father’s arms. He felt like nothing in the world could possibly hurt him. His father felt more powerful than any Martial Sage, brimming with power that exceeded Runark’s capacity to fathom.

And yet, he couldn’t overcome the shock of seeing his father so far from Planet Gaia Prime.

Kane smiled at his son, letting him down as Runark gaped at him with a stunned expression.

”What…” Runark asked with a bewildered tone. ”What are you doing here?”

”I joined the Kandrian mission to Planet Amadeus III when I heard from Arastia that you had joined the operation from the Society’s side,” he remarked. ”As for where the rest of the Kandrians are…”

He smirked.

”They were too slow for me. So I decided to come here by myself before they did.”

Before Runark could even respond, Kane shifted his attention towards the homoarachnoid that was approaching them.

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK!

”Who. Are. You. Where. Did. You. Come From?!”

-o—o-o had been frustrated by the sudden interference into what should have been a simple enough battle to win. It charged forth towards Kane, eager to crush the new variable before it could cause any trouble.

And yet, time slowed in Kane’s green eyes as a single remark escaped him.

”Fulminata Godspeed Maxima.”

His body shifted.

It shifted through space itself.

The very fabric of space and time warped around him as he activated a large amount of negatron matter within his body, creating a powerful warp gravitation field around him.

A warp field of the same caliber as those created by FTL warp drives.

A feat that should have been impossible for any pathwalker.

And yet, Kane had achieved in the past thirteen years.

What followed was impossible for any living being to track.

He moved.

He moved faster than light.

WHOOSH

It was over in femtoseconds.

WHOOSH

He decelerated, gracefully landing on the gray soil, returning his unsheathed daggers in his hands.

STEP

Behind him, the homoararchnoid was frozen mid-step, as if he had been petrified into rock. Runark’s neurons fired belatedly as he did a double-take in shock, watching his father move so fast that it may as well have been teleportation.

-o—o-o slowly started moving as horror emerged in his eyes.

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK!

”What. Have. You. Done. To. Me!” The creature began slamming its pincers in loud, frantic clicks. ”You…. You. Have. KIlled. Me—”

SPLAT SPLAT SPLAT SPLAT SPLAT!

Runark watched with horror as the homoarachnoid melted into a puddle of blue blood and flesh. Kane simply turned around with an expression of disapproval.

”Maybe we should be a little bit slower next time; sometimes we cut so fast that even molecules and cells need some time to realize that they have been cut.”

Runark’s eyes widened with shock at those words.

His father had cut him so fast that even the laws of physics could barely keep up with him. The sheer speed at which he had moved allowed him to vastly outstrip any kind of natural organism in raw agility, making him one of the most powerful Martial Artists in the world.

”So this…” Runark muttered with a stunned expression. ”So this is the power of the seventh Realm.”

His father was no longer classified as a Martial Sage.

In the past thirteen years, the recognition of a new tangential realm between the Sage Realm and the Transcendent Realm had come to pass.

It was called the Corporeal Realm.

His father had recently become a Martial Corporeal.

A Realm that, unbeknownst to Runark, was a Realm that the Emperor of Water had discovered many years ago when even before his daughter was born.

It was the Realm of the corporeal consciousness.

The Emperor of Water had had it created so that it could serve as intermediary between the Sage Realm and the Transcendent Realm. The corporeal consciousness was so powerful that it could truly elevate Martial Artists to an entirely different level of power. The only difference between the Corporeal Realm and the previous Realms was that it wasn’t strictly necessary to get to the next Realm of power.

And yet, it introduced Martial Sages to the information dimension, making it a helping crutch nonetheless.

Some of the most powerful and talented senior Martial Sages had managed to tap into their power of the body-consciousness, promoting to a higher rank of power, allowing them to perform feats that were previously reserved for the reality-defying power of Martial Transcendents.

Kane had turned his body into a space-time negatron warp drive, allowing him to warp the very fabric of space and time around him in a manner similar to superluminal spaceships. A feat that was only possible thanks to the corporeal consciousness of his existence, allowing him to manipulate negatron matter with the finesse of a highly advanced technological masterpiece.

He had used the power of the Corporeal Realm to become the fastest man alive.

”Now then,” he turned towards Runark with a serious expression.

”Where is Ria?”