The Martial Unity

Most fights ended anti-climactically. In most cases, there wasn't a last-minute powerup, a last-minute turn-around, a last-minute victory. In most cases, fights ended exactly how one would expect it to. There was no flashy clash, high-risk decisions from both sides or high stakes. The winner simply won, and the loser simply lost.

This was the cold unromantic reality of Martial conflict, of the martial World.

Yet every once in a while, this truth was broken.

Fights where one combatant was clearly losing, ends up winning. Despite all odds, despite all the damage one had suffered, one occasionally managed to win. These were rare and marvelous moments, where the losing fighter managed to defy all odds and deny his or her fate.

Unfortunately for the beast, this wasn't one of those times.

The beast was covered in blood, as multiple orifices gushed it out. It had begun losing its balance, speed and even the ability to dig underground.

Rui had splendidly managed to avoid any lethal attacks, even if just barely at times. In the end, he had managed to pull through the worst of it.

BLAP

"ROOOOOAAAAAAR!" Its roars had lost all anger, leaving only despair and fear.

Rui had timed a Flowing Canon and an Outer Convergence attack perfectly well with a Blink, and had managed to damage its eye almost entirely. The beast had lost most of its vision, and now was flailing around wildly.

BOOM

BAM

POW POW POW

WHAM

it with strikes over and over, for

an hour later, the beast

that there was no chance

convinced that there was no life left. He heaved a deep sigh of

Breathing was

opening the pouch and taking out a healing potion. The first healing potion he'd needed in the entirety of the mission. The beast had left many acid burns throughout their long, drawn-out fight. Each time it had burned

low-grade standard-issue healing potions would not heal that. He deeply inhaled the gas that had been stored as a pressurized liquid, allowing it to reach the deepest parts of his lungs via Helical Breathing so that as much blood as possible would come into contact with it, to hasten the healing

later, his skin was

felt even

body, meaning the nutrients, compounds, substances and

quickly proceeded to consume a mental and physical rejuvenation

need to bother with manual operation of it too much. Part of the data would

indicated the successful completion of both objectives of the nested mission through the standard mission-tracking device given to him by

Aaaaand he was done!

sense of accomplishment and relief had filled

dashing success. It was an eye-opening experience as well in many ways. He had come to realize that he quite liked the adventurous spirit of hunting missions. It felt open-ended and free, he had never experienced a mission with as much as freedom as the one he had just