The Martial Unity

Rui simply stared at him with sharp eyes.

He did understand. To a certain extent, he felt the same way.

He was not going to hold back.

He couldn't. Not if he wanted to break through to a higher Realm of power.

The Martial Heart was a power that could only be accessed if he was pushed beyond the limit of what his conventional power could accomplish. This meant that holding back was antithetical to the very nature of the activation of the Martial Heart.

That was why not only was Rui not going to hold back physically, but he had already psychologically conditioned himself to not hold back mentally even in the slightest.

That meant no mercy.

No compassion.

No empathy.

If his opponent's death was a consequence of that, then he wouldn't feel any guilt over it either.

Rui had always maintained the philosophy that if one knowingly chose to partake in something where their life was at stake, as a Martial Artist, which was an occupation where lives were always at stake, and was willing to undertake those risks voluntarily after fully understanding them, then they had consented to the possibility of having their lives taken.

Not only did Tokugawa Ieyasu consent to this, but he had been the one to initiate it when he originally challenged Rui. Even though Rui was challenging him now since he wasn't a guardian and was a challenger all over again, they both knew that Rui had not made the first move.

Neither of them had even the slightest compunctions of taking each other's lives as a consequence of pursuing their Martial Heart.

Rui even had a plan as to how he was going to do it. It was quite simple.

Form a predictive model as soon as possible.

Win.

That was all.

"Take your stances." Senior Sarak instructed.

Both Rui and Tokugawa took simple neutral stances.

Their weight was well-balanced, catering to offense, defense, and maneuvering simultaneously.

It should have been the most ordinary of sights.

A trivial occurrence.

And yet every single guardian watching could only stiffen.

An absurd amount of invulnerable peril could be felt from them.

be more dangerous than a sword in

short of armed fortresses in the hands of those who had mastered them

even further as they focused on each

ceased to

ceased to

only in the reflections of each other's

word escaped Senior

"...Begin!"

guardians widened

they

And then they weren't.

in the eyes of the guardians, flashing forward toward each other with incredible

BOOM!!

the

ripple of shock

of power spread through

RUMBLE

exchanged, yet the floating island seemed to groan under the weight of

Yet the battle continued.

It had to.

POW POW POW!

Rui's guard. A powerful and swift fist flew forward, threatening to crash into Rui's

WHOOSH!

cleanly avoiding the attack as he threw a low sweeping kick

Yet Ieyasu was unfaltered.

avoiding the sweeping kick as he simultaneously

WHOOSH!

motion of his legs. A swift kick to the chin could threaten a knockout, yet Ieyasu surgically avoided it

STEP

for a moment, landing several meters from each

furiously flashed

of information on their opponent and reconstructing a superior one from the same building blocks. Ieyasu was aware that Rui constructed the most optimal counter to

extent of

Yet that was enough.

Martial Art was quite esoteric and deviant from the norm, it wasn't entirely obvious what would

minds. Regardless, there

faster one would

everyone else, a race had

him, then there would be a brief window where he would be dominant over Rui. If Rui adapted faster than he copied, then he would

a logical

Yet something was off.

reason, his pattern recognition was being delayed. He had hoped to make some progress from the initial exchanges, but he had been

been merely