The Martial Unity

Eventually, he completed all his social calls soon enough, having spoken to everyone he needed and was obligated to. He was glad to see that they were doing well and alive, more importantly.

Once that was done, his attention immediately shifted to the matter regarding Master K’Mala. It wasn’t long before he procured an intelligence packet from the Martial Union regarding all the developments that had occurred in the G’ak’arkan Tribe and Vilun Island since his departure from the place many years ago.

The developments had been interesting, to say the least.

“So she either wiped out or assimilated all the tribes on the island after breaking through?” Rui raised an eyebrow. “That’s disturbing.”

It was nothing short of genocide and ethnic cleansing.

Then again, that was par for the course, he supposed. The tribes on that island had a gruesome warring culture with each other. The concept of human rights and other things was something that they fundamentally did not possess, harboring significantly different views on life and death.

The reports and records of the Martial Union talked about how, soon after breaking through, she slaughtered all enemy Martial Seniors effortlessly. Wiping out all those who could possibly threaten her newfound dominance.

The reports detailed how, even after the enemy tribes of the island surrendered to her, she killed all the men, sparing only the women and the children, who were then assimilated into the G’ak’arkan Tribe. Essentially, she had eliminated war in the Vilun Island by eliminating anybody to war with. “Well, looks like I changed the future of the island forever.” Rui heaved a sigh as he read through the reports, struggling to reconcile what he was reading with the woman he had known twenty years ago.

Of course, twenty years was a long time. Who knew what had happened on the island over the course of that period?

Still, the K’Mala that he knew was the least aggressive Martial Artist in the G’ak’arkan, she was also the most thoughtful out of all of them. Yet, her actions after she broke through to the Master Realm were a departure from what he remembered of her. “Wait, after she broke through to the Master Realm…?” His eyebrow rose. “Could it be…?”

He had some suspicions as to what had happened.

“…I’ll need to speak with her to confirm my suspicions, but there’s nothing I can do about it,” he mused. “Oh well.”

His goal was to enlist her aid in the war against the East Panamic Treaty Alliance. In other words, he didn’t need to fix any problems; he could just use them to further his objective. He had already plotted out several pathways through which he could enlist her aid. Considering the good relationship that the Martial Union had with the G’ak’arkan Tribe, it was best to go with a friendly carrot approach where he incentivized them to partake in the war. This was particularly easy as the G’ak’arkan was quite the primitive civilization compared to modern humanity, given that, outside of their Squire evolution breakthrough process, they didn’t harness the power of esoteric substances all that much, if at all.

It meant that the Martial Union always had a lot to offer.

This was especially true now that they had the Elder Tree’s intel on the Beast Domain. Thus, Rui wasn’t really worried about how he was to convince her to partake in the war.

“Besides, she’s probably even less experienced with the Master Realm than I am.”

After all, she didn’t even have anybody to spar with. “Considering the Martial culture of the G’ak’arkan Tribe, she must be yearning for a partner to train with; that alone is probably enough to get her to join the war.

There probably wasn’t a single war in the world that served as a better testing avenue than the war between the East Panamic Alliance and the Kandrian Empire. There were several other possible avenues of diplomacy he could undertake, but he didn’t need to sweat it.

As far as diplomacy went, this was light work.

Over the next few days, he simply prepared for the short trip to the G’ak’arkan Tribe. Considering that he didn’t intend to spend too much time there, his packing was light and to the bare minimum. He simply donned his Martial attire, taking the senior ambassador insignia given to him long ago.

Just as he predicted, he was able to take over the mission entirely without any resistance. Only Martial Sage could impede his path, but it was clear that none of them saw fit to.

He declined all traveling and logistical arrangements; he didn’t need a team to help him with this mission.

“Just the two of us?” Master Ceeran raised an eyebrow. He was packed more heavily, anticipating to spend some time there than Rui did in pursuit of good inspiration and source of his new technique.

“Don’t see why not,” Rui replied nonchalantly. “We can travel much faster if it is just the two of us. Let’s go.”

“…Alright.”

BADUMP!

Their Martial Hearts blazed into power.

WHOOSH!

The two of them shot to the sky as Rui activated Greater Phantomind to cover them with misdirection-derived stealth. He didn’t want to let people track him easily, after all. Although he was willing to face assassinations head-on, he was not willing to make it easy for them. Regardless, the two of them shot through the sky unimpeded as they headed East. Rui had long memorized the path to Vilun Island in his Mind Palace. Thus, navigation was no issue at all.

They soared past the port town of Farund, heading into the Great Nam Ocean at top speed. The salty humidity of the ocean and the cool wind blowing from afar prickled their skin while the odor of the ocean wafted in the air.

“Let’s pick up the pace,” Rui remarked. “I don’t want to remain at sea for too long. Let’s get to land before our Martial Hearts run out.”

The two of them activated their Martial Minds, blazing through the sky as they headed towards Vilun Island.

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