The Martial Unity

“…A thundering success, was it?” Emperor Rael mused as he pored through the report. “Well, Matriarch Nephi had already predicted the Kandrian Empire would be entirely fine in this regard. Still, Ieyasu is as apathetic to the chain of command as ever.”

He heaved a sigh.

He didn’t look forward to managing him once the Sages departed from the Kandrian Empire. Although he still had powerful deterrents and fail-safe, he needed to make sure that Ieyasu didn’t go too far.

The annoying part was that with Rui gone, he was the only one who could break Martial Artists through, giving him a lot of leeway. If not for Rael’s clever management, he might have acted even more rambunctiously in his desire to gather even more power.

His drive to grow stronger had only heightened and intensified in the past two and half years.

It started when Rui rivaled a Sage in the Sekigahara Confederate. The shock at how much progress Rui had made with his power after departing from the stuff and overprotective environment of the Kandrian Empire jolted him into accelerating his own power.

This had grown even more urgent after Rui defeated the Terrampager in the Nest of Terra, in the enemy’s home court.

It was an absolutely mind-bogglingly shocking event that has shattered the Martial World’s understanding of power.

If not for the fact that the Beast Incursion was too important to deviate focus from, it would have had much greater political consequences in the Martial World and the Panamic Martial Federation.

The Emperor of Harmony shook his head lightly as he shifted his attention from the matter as he focused on more important matters, reading through the analytical reports written by the analyst division of the Kandrian Bureau of Intelligence.

It evaluated the probability of nations around the world being able to meet the viability threshold of being able to survive without their Martial Sages. For most Sage-level powerhouses, this was decently high.

It showed that the solution of the two pillars of human civilization was powerful and effective enough that, with some effort, most Sage-level nations get the knack of surviving without their Sages.

The biggest red flag was the Sekigahara Confederate.

He narrowed his eyes as he read through the analytical conclusion of the likelihood of their survival without Sages.

“…Uncertain. Potentially impossible.”

He wasn’t surprised.

When it came to Master-level combat, the Sekigahara Confederate was the weakest of them all. The wound of having lost a hundred Masters in its battle against the Kandrian Empire had yet to heal, even after Rui broke through their Martial Artists.

Emperor Rael narrowed his eyes as he fell into thought. “It might be prudent to send over Ieyasu to reinforce them, but the only reason that he is with the Kandrian Empire is because of its growth resources. He will refuse any deployment and would rather leave.”

That was deeply undesirable.

In his eyes, Ieyasu’s strategic value as a Martial asset was similar to that of his son. He was a treasure that could not be allowed to get away.

“In that case, I should aid with their recruit process of Martial Masters from North and West Panama,” Emperor Rael calmly analyzed and arrived at the best option. “As long as I’m fast enough, I should be able to help bolster their numbers before Rui reaches North Panama.”

He wouldn’t be able to help them with recruiting Martial Masters from East and South Panama because they had stabilized under the influence of his son. This meant that very few Master-level nations fell, which meant that very few Masters needed to evacuate to other nations who could be recruited.

North and West Panama, however, had yet to be touched by his son’s empowering influence. Thus, he ought to be able to help the Sekigahara Confederate at least survive without its Sages.

“They won’t ever tolerate Masters loyal to us defending their nation, and frankly, it’s not as though the Kandrian Empire has limitless leeway,” he noted with a keen analysis. “I must prioritize Kandria’s safety over any other nation’s.”

At the same time, he needed to ensure that the Solution of Harmony needed to work.

He wasn’t worried too much about the other nations.

His son’s stunning victory in obtaining the acknowledgment of the Transcendent Prophet proved once more, beyond all reasonable doubt, that the Emperor of Harmony could fully trust his son and leave matters in his competent hands.

The acknowledgment of the entirety of the Theocracy and the Transcendent Prophet that Rui was the Antithesis was an explosive piece of news that had blazed all over human civilization.

The Virodhabhasa Faith was a religion that had spread its tentacles across most of human civilization, with religious towns now abandoned and spreading across the human domain to facilitate the spread of the Virodhabhasa Faith.

It was one of the major religions of human civilization.

This civilization had now openly declared that it had found its deity.

On top of that, the major powers of human civilization knew that this wasn’t just a political move. It was a purely theological move.

A Martial Transcendent had acknowledged the Dawnbringer as the one and only Lord Virodhabhasa!

If Emperor Rael was being honest, he didn’t expect his son to succeed so directly. He was confident that his son would succeed in reeling over the Theocracy through some political powerplay to get the Martial Pontifex to acquiesce.

He didn’t expect his son to gain official recognition as a living deity of the Virodhabhasa Faith.

The only one who wasn’t shocked was his mother-in-law.

“About damn time,” she had grumbled with contempt. “Those delusional antithetants finally realized that my grandson was always the Antithesis. As per the Virodhabhasa Gospels, they must blah blah blah…”

He hadn’t heard a word she had uttered after she broke off into a long religious rant about how the antithetants were foolish and heretic and how they needed to penance.

He spent one hour politely listening to his mother-in-law speak incoherent nonsense, pacing about his Royal Office, forcing him to listen.

It was at moments like these were the Emperor of Harmony couldn’t help but feel that Rui was better off leaving him dead and ascending the throne to spare him from such torture.