The Martial Unity

“Warships. Subpar.” The laminar integument leader continued. “Spacecrafts. Subpar. Spacefighters. Subpar. But. Infantry. Superior. Powerful. Seek. Explanation.”

It expressed that even as it unleashed an onslaught of attack of tendril attacks. It leveraged the power of esoteric matter and dark energy to allow those attacks to phase through the very fabric of reality, appearing on his neck with a sharp edge.

And yet, not even that was enough to land so much as a scratch on Rui.

WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH

The attacks crashed into after-images, crashing into empty space where Rui had been just a nanosecond prior. Rui, on the other hand, teleported his attacks on his opponent’s body, launching a powerful jab to pierce the concentric lamination of the jellyfish-like alien.

It was within its prediction.

A tendril attack phased upon Rui before his jab could reach the jellyfish.

A devastating impact that would have eradicated an entire planet.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!! And yet, a combination of Aqua Existentia and Outer Divergence allowed him to survive an attack that would have erased almost any other pathwalker alive. He smoothly absorbed half the impact, redirecting the other half away.

Only to find a dozen other tendrils phasing on his body.

WHOOSH

He teleported away, putting some distance between them as the two entities simply hovered in space silently.

“Seek. Explanation.” The same set of light signals emerged from the laminar integument as the alien lifeform insisted that Rui explain how the infantry of Gaia was so powerful.

Rui fell into silence for several moments as the blood-red suns within his eyes shone with blinding brightness. His mind pondered whether he ought to answer the alien lifeform’s question. They had diverging interests, and even if Rui could understand its motivations and even respect them to an extent, this creature was trying to destroy Gaia, civilization, and his daughter.

They were not friends.

And yet, at the same time, he came to the conclusion that giving an explanation to the laminar integument would only work in his favor, not against it.

“They are strong because they follow paths,” Rui explained through the flickering blood-red suns in his eyes. “They follow paths of power that allow them to get stronger and stronger with effort, discipline, and other conditions. We call them pathwalkers in our world.”

This seemed to intrigue the laminar integument.

“Pathwalkers.” The alien remarked through light pulses with a hint of what seemed like the alien equivalent of interest. “What. Paths. They. Walk.”

“There are seven fundamental paths at the moment,” Rui explained, ignoring the Blood Path for the sake of simplicity. “The Martial Path. The Nature Path. The Beast Path. The Technology Path. The Creation Path. The Giant Path. And the Path of Adaptive Evolution.”

He gestured to himself with a hand on his chest. “I am a Martial Artist. I follow the Martial Path.”

The more the alien learned about them, the more fascinated it seemed to grow.

“How. Paths. Make. Strong.”

“Paths are when the dimension of potential of a being is attuned in one direction,” Rui explained patiently, partly stalling. “They allow for entities to grow progressively stronger, often in ranks or Realms, and they grow stronger and stronger.”

That seemed to truly move the laminar integument, as the light that composed its consciousness began to flash more brightly. “What. Paths.”

It pressed him for a deeper explanation, unsatisfied with his more general explanation.

Rui’s eyes sharpened a little. They were entering classified information territory, but if he could get the laminar integument to believe that they were special, then they would likely increase their probability of survival.

He had already come to the conclusion that, as a civilization, the laminar integuments were light-years ahead of Gaia. Even the mighty world ship behind the jellyfish-like alien in the distance was likely one of many, many such ships. The operation that they were conducting against Gaia was a standard operation, from what he gathered. Generally, no civilization deployed more than a minute portion of its army for specific operations, such as assaults and destruction.

He didn’t know if the laminar integument would see a verbal promise through to the end if they did manage to survive long enough. And even if it added up in game theory, it was possible that these creatures had a fundamentally different kind of logic.

He needed to create as many reasons not to want to destroy Gaia.

He already noticed that the other laminar integument infantry were weak and underwhelming. They didn’t possess the kind of power his opponent did, which meant that they didn’t have paths, most likely. It was curious why this particular specimen he was fighting was strong enough to equalize him, even when he used Gigabrain and even gained an advantage, but that was something to consider after they survived the immediate threat.

At the same time, he was aware of the risks. If they found the power of paths attractive, then they would undoubtedly try to research them.

Through force.

But if he, if they, could survive that for just some time, then they would have gained some real leverage.

“Paths are information-phenomena,” Rui remarked. “I describe paths as any lifeform whose internal information attunement is very high. This means that the underlying patterns describing their existence are attuned enough to facilitate a ‘path’ of power.”

This seemed to truly stun the laminar integument as a large wave of light emerged from within the laminar integument. “You. Know. Source. Realm?”

Rui furrowed his eyebrows at the difference in nomenclature, but it was clear that they were referring to the same thing. “Yes, I do. I call it the information dimension. It is the source of all reality, and its contents describe reality and causality.”

“Unexpected,” the laminar integument remarked with pulses of light. “Not. Expect. Limited. Primitive. Civilization. Know. Source. Realm.”

Rui clenched his fists. He didn’t think the laminar integument was being snarky, given that it could not hide its thoughts from him by the very nature of its existence. However, the fact that it called them a limited and primitive civilization despite seeing their quasi-Dyson Spheres and their space force only confirmed his greatest fears.

They were dealing with a civilization that likely dwarfed theirs in power, quality, and scale.

This species survived the explosion of their planet more than 187,000 years ago, which meant that they were a multi-planetary species even back then. He couldn’t even imagine how strong they were now.

It was all the more reason.

He was confident he wouldn’t lose any individual battle, but he knew that Gaian civilization had its limits in space warfare.

“You. Will. Captured. Turned. Test. Subject. After. Infected. World. Destroyed.” The laminar integument declared with no weight, as if it were just another Tuesday. “Pathwalkers. Must. Studied. Experimented. Paths. Must. Research. Must. Harness.”

The light within the depths of the laminar integument flared with intensity.

“Surrender.”

RUMBLE!!!!!

The very fabric of space and time shook as the laminar integument unleashed upon him enough destructive power to destroy one hundred worlds.