The Martial Unity

Emperor Rael steepled his fingers as he fell into thought. “The Elder Tree was correct when it informed us that this was not an acute threat that would be over soon. Not that I harbored such an outlandish hope. Still…”

His eyes narrowed. “This does not bode well for human civilization. Based on the projections of the timelines of varying waves of varying migrative speeds, what is the estimated timeline for the complete suppression and eradication of the beast tide based on how well human civilization is doing now?”

“…We have not been able to come up with a well-informed evaluation of the estimated timeline, Your Majesty,” she admitted. “The intelligence is incomplete and keeps coming.”

“I understand that; nonetheless, I need to know what our best-informed evaluation of how long this threat will last is,” Emperor Rael insisted.

“…It can last months, potentially a year,” she remarked. “This assumes that the number of beasts and monsters will only decrease due to deaths in battle and will not increase. If this assumption proves to be false, then it is possible that the Beast Incursion can continue indefinitely.”

She didn’t need to illuminate just how much of a catastrophe this would be.

“…Let us operate with the facts that we know,” Emperor Rael’s rich voice was composed. “For now, let us operate with a timeframe of months up to potentially a year until we get more data that contradicts that timeline. Months is too long of a timeframe to survive without supplies. Thus, we will have to go ahead with the plan for seafaring supply chains. There is no point in holding back when we are lacking in crucial resources that have now become entirely vital.”

He fell into thought about all the information that he had at the moment. He didn’t expect the Beast Incursion to last for months, at minimum, even if he expected it not to be an acute threat.

The vision for the future of human civilization became extremely clear once he gained a good idea of the conditions for victory and the timeline of the entirety of the Beast Incursion.

Human civilization needed to weather and survive as it slowly exterminated each and every beast and monster that came out of the Beast Domain. Only once all or almost all of them were exterminated would human civilization return to how it once used to be. Given that the Beast Incursion would attack all human territory in a frenzy over the span of months, it could be hypothesized that as long as humanity successfully wiped out every wave that it was hit with, it would eventually fulfill the condition of exterminating all beasts.

“Another important variable is the mortality rates between Martial Artists and the beasts,” Emperor Rael realized. “We need to ensure that Martial Artists die at a proportionally lower rate than the beasts.”

Despite the sheer number of beasts that each Martial Artist seemed optimistic about, the truth of the matter was that the death of even a single sage was equivalent to the deaths of more than a thousand Sage-level beasts.

This was the ratio of their populations.

Martial Artists needed to ensure that they adapted as well as they could, for the death of each Martial Artist impacted the strategic outlook deeply.

“I want a strategic report on the ongoing battle,” Emperor Rael immediately demanded. “Conduct a differential analysis on the projected relative mortality rate between both sides and apply it to all of human civilization, taking into account the numbers from this battle.”

It wasn’t perfect, but this analysis would allow him to understand whether the Kandrian Empire’s battle was something that would lead to long-term success or something that would end up with beasts obtaining a pyrrhic victory.

“Sir, the Martial Artists have experienced a mortality rate of two percent thus far,” the director of intelligence swiftly supplied the Emperor of Harmony with the desired report. “The distribution of the death toll is not equal across Realms; the Martial Apprentices have had the highest mortality rate at about eight percent thus far while the Sages have not experienced a single casualty.”

Emperor Rael nodded. “It appears that our Martial Apprentices are the least battle-ready.”

“That has always been the case due to lack of experience at the first Realm, but in the case of the Kandrian Empire, it’s particularly bad due to mass triggered breakthroughs propagated by His Highness. It means we have a lot of kids who have never experienced a true battle to the death, let alone the horrors of war.”

“Every Martial Artist must shed the fragility of human psychology,” Emperor Rael’s tone was both soft and firm. “They are no longer human beings. They are Martial Artists. This is the life that they have chosen for themselves, and it is best that they are broken in and hardened at a younger age than sooner.”

His words sounded extremely cold and apathetic, but this was the common wisdom that was applied to Martial Artists. There were many Martial philosophies that regarded Martial Art and Martial Artists very differently across the entire world, yet all of them agreed that a fundamental requirement for being a Martial Artist was growing comfortable with the prospects of death. There were some exceptions, people with mental disorders who turned their fear of death into a source of strength, but for most people, it was weakness.

Martial Artists fought.

And when Martial Artists fight, they die.

This was also why the Martial Union ensured that the entrance exam to the Martial Academy had at least a few applicants die during the entrance exam. Any adolescent who was deterred by a scant probability of death was simply unfit for being a Martial Artist and lacked the psychological aptitude to become a warrior.

It was also why only zero-point-one percent of human civilization was comprised of Martial Artists. Most ordinary people could not stomach what it took to become a Martial Artist; Emperor Rael had no intention of allowing this trait to infect the newly broken Martial Apprentices. They would become true warriors forged in the crucibles of war, whether they liked it or not. –