The Martial Unity

The negotiations on the details continued for about two hours. Because of radically different military doctrines and astronaval paradigms, translating concepts took some time. His sister Ru constantly helped him with her input, allowing him to get everything that he needed. At the end of two hours, they managed to iron out a rather detailed agreement.

Rui heaved a deep breath, nodding at his soon-to-be partners. ”I think this works. Let us officiate this right away.”

They had different officiation actions. Humans signed with a pen. Arakai deposited a unique composition of web that only their body could produce. The dessandrites left an imprint of their feathers, which was, again, unique. The aquadites bit down on tough, thick sheets of paper formed from seaweed fibers, leaving an imprint of their fang-like teeth.

However, before they could actually officiate all four copies of the agreement, the aquadites paused, making an odd demand.

”Emperor of Water,” the S’rrigin began. ”We have a request, one that we hope you are willing to humor us. We have heard that your power is so similar to that of ours that the arakai simply assumed that we were responsible for the death of Divine Mother o-o-o-o. We hope to be able to verify that with a demonstration.”

Both the Divine Mother and Alpha of the Firebreather Tribe stirred at the request, clearly not having expected it.

Rui raised an eyebrow. ”A demonstration. As in you want me to show my Martialverse?”

”More than that, we hope you are willing to duel with one of our Sea Sovereigns.”

This made the other three parties make different expressions, each corresponding with surprise.

They wanted to duel him with a Sea Sovereign? Just to see his power? Did that make any sense? Everybody knew that the Sea Sovereign would disappear if that happened. They would lose a priceless asset if that were to happen.

This made the other three parties make different expressions, each corresponding with surprise.

They wanted to duel him with a Sea Sovereign? Just to see his power? Did that make any sense? Everybody knew that the Sea Sovereign would disappear if that happened. They would lose a priceless asset if that were to happen.

Obviously, the S’rrigin was aware of this. None of his advisors or council, seated behind him, objected or even reacted to the proposal, so clearly this was not a spontaneous request. He genuinely wanted to pit one of his Sea Sovereigns against Rui simply to bear witness to his power.

”…Are you sure, S’rrigin?” Rui couldn’t help but ask. ”You’re at war. You never know when it might escalate to the point of needing Administrators. This seems like a waste of an Administrator.”

The S’rrigin made sounds that Rui could only interpret as their form of laughter. It was a series of infrasonic pulses.

”Rest assured, Emperor of Water, we have thought this through,” the S’rrigin replied. ”I do not believe that there is anything for you to lose.”

Rui’s eyes sharpened as he tried to guess what the true motivation of the aquadites was. The first thing that came to mind was that they hoped that they could see just how he managed to overcome the price of the Verse.

23:22

After all, he knew that they had two Sea Sovereigns: one could observe, while the other would fight. An observant Sea Sovereign would be able to see what actions he took to avoid the price of the Verse. Thereby, they would be able to crack his secret.

The other two parties also made this deduction, turning towards Rui eagerly. Both the Divine Mother and the Alpha of the Firebreather Tribe had every reason to want to witness his miraculous ability. They were confident that as long as they had a single clue, there would be able to reverse engineer his entire technique or ability. Then they would no longer need to depend on him.

Rui resisted the urge to twitch his mouth. ’Do they think I’m stupid? Why in the world would I agree to something like that?’

”We hope you agree,” the S’rrigin quickly added before Rui could reject. ”After all, we believe that we have a right to witness the power that caused us to suffer a great war, even if at no fault of its own. I believe this would be a great show of friendship and sincerity to your earlier words regarding your innocence in the catastrophic war that you have suffered.”

Rui took a deep breath, maintaining his composure with sheer will. Inwardly, however, he cursed the S’rrigin. ’I knew it! There was no way he wouldn’t weaponize that in some way.’

He put Rui in a difficult spot. If Rui refused, it was unlikely that this agreement that they had forged would break down, but it wasn’t impossible. It would cool the budding partnership between them and him, for sure. It might even signal to Divine Mother ooo—o- that he wasn’t being serious when he committed to forming a trade web between humans and the arakai.

Ultimately, even though he was personally strong, he was still representing the weakest civilization out of all of them.

They clearly thought that they had managed to trap him, but alas, they underestimated him.

This was not the worst situation that he had adaptively evolved to.

He smiled. ”Very well then, to celebrate our new friendship, I will accept your request. Let us duel.”

The meeting ended after they quickly clarified a few details. No killing. No attempting to kill. The lethality of attacks needed to be restricted to a certain extent. And both sides would spar until one side was no longer able to.

That meant the battle was undoubtedly going to take some time.

The three of them had insisted on this particular clause in order to force him to exhaustion so that he would have no choice but to shut off his Martialverse, allowing them to see just how he overcame the price of the Verse.

”Tsk, a bunch of scammers,” Rui tutted when the meeting ended, reclining back in his seat in the conference hall.

”Why did you agree to such a deal?” Ru frowned. ”Isn’t your secret priceless? What’s the point in allowing them to see exactly how you overcome the price of the Verse?”

Rui smirked. ”Relax, I have the perfect idea on how to make them go on a wild goose chase, hehehe.”