The Martial Unity

More than three months had gone by. Rui’s life had turned into an intense monotony of dungeon clearing, both as Rui and as the Voider, gathering information on the Root, and training with Project Forestep.

Rui had dedicated the entirety of his mind and body towards mastering as much of the Godspeed Breathing technique, hoping to gain as much of this power as he could.

Unfortunately, as good as he was with breathing techniques, he was not as good as Kane was with speed and thus was unable to reach Kane’s level of mastery of the technique.

After more than three months of dedicated training, his growth had finally plateaued at about forty percent of the full level of mastery.

“That’s still pretty good all things considered,” Kane told him. “If not for the fact that you lack the reaction speed to keep up even with thirty percent of the full mastery of the Godspeed technique, you could use it without compunctions. I still don’t know how you plan to get past that restriction though, honestly.”

Kane had not attempted to pry out Rui’s intentions regarding the Godspeed technique. Martial Art related matters were deeply personal to each Martial Artist, and they were not light matters that were generally discussed without care.

Rui on the other hand did not want to make claims that he could not support, and thus did not go too deeply about what he was trying to accomplish. All Kane knew was that Rui was trying extremely hard to realize his ambition of applying the Godspeed technique.

“I’m not entirely sure of much myself, Kane,” Rui sighed. “I guess we’ll find out. Come at me.”

“What?”

“I said, come at me,” Rui stood still.

“I’m confused,” Kane frowned. “Have you actually completed the technique? I thought you were going to spend time trying to look for a way to compensate for your lacking reaction speed.”

“I thought of a potential solution to that problem even before I decided to learn the Godspeed technique,” Rui replied.

Kane tilted his head. “Huh. That’s unexpected, to say the least. Is there nothing you haven’t thought of a solution for? Leave some intelligence for the rest of us man.”

Rui smirked. “Well, let’s see if I was right. Thankfully, you’re the perfect test subject. Come at me with your fastest standard attacks. Let’s see how I do.”

Kane shrugged, taking his stance.

His eyes narrowed as he generated a faint inscrutable pressure. His feet were centered, right beneath his torso, a position that was conducive to immediately begin moving in any direction. His heels were elevated, making it harder to read the moment of the start of his charge.

The rest of his body was loose, yet it was because of the lack of rigidity that he could move at astonishing speeds.

Yet despite all of this, Rui didn’t feel any wariness. The problem for Kane was that Rui knew him too well. The prediction model he had on Kane was probably the most well-developed one that he had in his Mind Palace.

He knew Kane too well inside out.

Even without Project Forestep, the VOID algorithm could crumple Kane with well-timed movements that devastatingly countered him in the most effective way possible. The combination of all his other techniques of his Flowing Void Style when applied through the VOID algorithm was simply too much.

“You don’t intend on taking a stance?” Kane raised an eyebrow.

“I don’t intend to use any of the techniques of my Martial Art,” Rui replied calmly. “I’m going use only the technique I’m trying to create with Project Forestep.”

Kane raised an eyebrow. Had anyone else said that they intended to compete with him with a single technique, he would strongly doubt them. Barring people like Hever who dedicated themselves to a single technique, or people in possession of an extraordinary grade-ten technique, it was not possible to compete with him with a single technique.

However, he knew better than to underestimate Rui, so he simply abided by his instructions.

His approach was swift.

In the eyes of Martial Apprentices and even low-grade Martial Squires, it would appear as nothing short of teleportation.

WHOOSH

STEP

In the tiniest of split seconds, he was already face to face with Rui, a swift blur of a jab flying to his face.

THWACK

Kane’s eyes widened.

Where Rui’s face should have been was his hand, intercepting the attack.

It came out of nowhere.

Yet he swiftly changed gears as he spun, launching the opposite leg into a blindingly swift backward spanning roundhouse kick to the side of Rui’s head.

WHOOSH

Kane half-expected a block, but what he did not expect was his kick passing through Rui’s head, dispelling the empty image. He quickly stepped away.

“I thought you said you weren’t going to use any other techniques,” Kane folded his arms.

He recognized the illusion that his kick had struck, he was sure it was the Phantom Step technique that created illusions inside the target’s head with extremely convincing and deceiving fakes.

Rui smirked.

“I didn’t,”

Kane’s eyes widened at those words. Yet he didn’t even have time to respond as Rui resumed the battle.

Yet this time, he was on the offensive.

WHOOSH

FLICK

Kane barely managed to dodge a palm jab as it nicked his cheek. He leaped back with an incredulous impression. (‘He came out of nowhere! Was that Blink?!’)

“You let your guard down,”

Chills shivered down Kane’s spine as he heard Rui’s voice from behind him, as his mind instinctively lashed away.

WHOOSH

Barely evading another palm jab from Rui.

“Tsk. Missed twice,” Rui frowned. “Preliminary results; quite effective defensively. Has much to be left desired as far as offensive application goes.”

Kane stared at him bewildered. “What as that?! How did you master the technique instantly? This is supposed to take time! No, wait. More importantly. How did you do all of that?”

Rui smirked. “All in good time, my friend. Come, I have more tests to run.”

A chill crawled up Kane’s spine at those words.