The Martial Unity

A week passed as the Void Order began subjugating Martial crime through Martial Artists of a Realm above, and covert and overt tactical measures. Because of the gap in power, the demolition of organized Martial crime was smooth. Martial Artists struggled and resisted bitterly to the very end, but because of the sheer number of vastly superior Martial Artists, they never truly stood a chance.

Just as the Emperor of Harmony once completely erased the Kandrian Underworld in one fell swoop, the Emperor of Water, as he had begun to be called, began wiping out Martial underworlds all at once. Unbeknownst to the entire world, the Void Order deployed the power of the Silas Clan, just as Rael did, to smoothen what could have ended up being controversial failures.

The end result was an ongoing streak of wins that were eerily smooth and didn’t seem to be likely to be broken anytime soon.

“…It looks like he really is his father’s son, after all.” Prime Minister Edward’s voice was one of deep consideration. “I heard that he was preoccupied and distant, so I predicted a grand failure. But…”

The man’s gray eyes sharpened as he watched a stream of news surrounding the subjugation of Martial crime. “He’s much better than I expected. To think the subjugation process would go this smoothly… however, he hasn’t truly gotten to the hard part yet.”

The hardest part was the subjugation of the surplus of Martial Sages that had flooded the Martial World in the past eight months. More than one thousand Martial Sages.

Against one man.

And this time, there was no Martial Transcendent to use a higher-Realm tactic to subjugate them. Rui would have to subjugate them with his own power.

Because a civil war between the Martial Sage of human civilization would destroy Panama. Martial Sages were just that extraordinarily powerful and innately destructive.

Prime Minister Edward hadn’t forgotten about how they created a black hole that threatened to consume the entire world during the Great East Panamic War with just forty Martial Sages or so. Of course, they had acquired the technology to create and control black holes, within a limit, but those weren’t the only consequences.

Now, there were hundreds who were unwilling to bend the knee. This was especially true for those Martial Sages who had very recently broken through and did not want to lose the freedom that came with the Sage Realm right after becoming Martial Sages.

The Britannian Prime Minister shifted his gaze back at the stream of news as a change occurred.

[And now, we have arrived at the so-called Broken Pave Center in the Kandrian Empire!] The reporter in the news enthusiastically reported, gesturing at a large facility in the Kandrian Empire shaped like a colosseum. [We have yet to learn about what is to happen to these Martial prisoners. Like everybody else, we are merely waiting for the Void Order to do what they seem to want to show everybody.]

The camera panned to a number of prisoner Martial Artists across the entire continent who had been found guilty of continuous Martial crime. They were shackled in linked chains, being guided to the Broken Pave Center, through the corridors, and into a vast open field along with numerous other Martial Artists gathered in the open field.

The presence of the press in the colosseum was immense, with reporters and camera crews of countless organizations taking pictures of the captured Martial prisoners who were forced to gather in the field of the colosseum.

The Martial Prisoners exchanged glances with each other with expressions of grave severity. They sensed a vast range of power levels across the captured prisoners.

There were Martial Apprentices as well as Martial Masters shackled without distinction and treated exactly the same. It didn’t bode too well, but there were silver linings.

The mass presence of the continental press made them feel relieved. It was unlikely that they would get executed or tortured in front of so many people. They had no idea why they were captured alive and brought to this open-air facility in the Kandrian Empire with so many eyes.

However, if the press was invited, then many could deduce that he wanted to send a message to the continent. They could only hope that it was a message that did not end up with their lives lost.

They found that they couldn’t activate their Realms of power for a chilling reason, but it most likely had something to do with the special technological measures of the shackles that bound them. It made it impossible for them to activate their Martial Hearts while the technological measures were active, while the chain shackles were more than strong enough to paralyze Martial Squires.

The air was silent, save for murmurs among the press and the sounds of flashing cameras. Soon enough, he arrived.

WHOOSH

In the blink of an eye, he teleported to the colosseum, arriving before the gathered Martial prisoners. His unmistakable ethereal presence caused a wave of shock to ripple through the Martial Artists. They gazed at him with shock and awe.

Even if they were of the underworld, most Martial Artists had a deep admiration and awe for the most extraordinary Martial Artist alive. Even if he was responsible for their capture, they could help but have a deep admiration for him.

The press began growing noisier upon his appearance as the flash and shutter of their cameras occurred more frequently, capturing his appearance sparkling with the light of the overhead sun that illuminated his translucent appearance.

His ethereal eyes bore deep into their depths as they found themselves almost instantly hypnotized by their dark depths.

Then, he began.

“You, who have impeded the advent of law and order, will be punished right here.”

His eyes sharpened.

“Right now.”

Before they could even respond, they found themselves in a hypnotic trance.

CRACK!

A loud sound of a cracking solid structure metaphysically rang in the air.

It was the sound of a Martial Path being destroyed.

A sound that only the victim and he could hear.

“ARRGHGHHH!!!” The Martial Artist screamed in agony as his Martial path crumbled into smithereens. “PLEASE! STOP! Not my Martial Path! Anything but my Martial Path!”

“You were offered amnesty if you surrendered, but you chose not to.” His voice was chilling. “We will offer you no mercy.”

A sense of horror boiled in the atmosphere at what followed.

CRACK CRACK CRACK CRACK CRACK!!!!!

Martial Paths shattered like glass as the captured Martial Artists stared at him in horror.

They struggled.

They resisted.

They fought back.

All in vain.

Their Martial Paths cracked all the same.

CRACK CRACK CRACK CRACK CRACK!!!!!

“ARRRGHHHHH!”

“NOOOOOO!”

“RGGHGARGHHH!”

Gut-wrenching howls emerged from the Martial Artists even as they gazed into the depths of his unfathomable ethereal eyes. There wasn’t even the slightest hint of warmth within them.

Rui didn’t even register their emotions; his clinical attention was solely fixed on the mass Path destruction. Ever since he had discovered that the Martial Path was an information phenomenon, he had understood exactly what the breaking of paths represented.

‘Information dissonance.’

A path was an information phenomenon of aligning potentials, creating a path for the growth of power along those aligned potentials. When he destroyed paths, what he was actually doing was creating dissonance by severely mentally harming his victims’ potential and power. By the time he was done, the potentials were damaged and no longer aligned, getting rid of the path.

He could even observe, closer than ever, what path destruction actually was. Using these Martial Artists as test subjects, he meted out justice. It was a fascinating sight, but it couldn’t help but make him wonder, if he could destroy paths through information dissonance, then could he theoretically create brand-new paths with the opposite process, information resonance?

If so, he would be able to literally create paths in lifeforms that didn’t have any. In fact, he could theoretically use information resonance to properly merge the Martial Path and the Blood Path into a single path. Another compelling hypothesis he came up with then and there was that the difference between successful hybrids like himself or sentinels compared to ‘failed’ paths like the Druid Path was simply a matter of the degree of information resonance.

Could he enhance paths by increasing their information resonance somehow?

A hint of interest emerged in his eyes. “Projects to explore in the future. But for now…”

His gaze shifted in a specific direction.

“Time to subjugate the Martial Sages.”

WHOOSH

He teleported away in the blink of an eye, leaving the Martial Artists in a fate they would consider worse than death, and the press utterly paralyzed in horror, having streamed the horror scene to the entire continent.

Only later did they fully understand the sheer terror of what had just taken place, causing uproar to emerge across the Martial World.