The Martial Unity

"There are cons, of course," Rui added. "I'm not denying that the Martial Union can be difficult to deal with sometimes. The contract can be considered exploitative for Martial Artists of the Apprentice and Squire Realm since there are clauses that involve conscription. But Martial Artists are free to dissolve the partnership at any time with a written letter."

"The reason that the Martial Union can get away with exploitation is because it is hegemonic and oligopolistic," She replied. "If I liberalize that market and dissolve the Union, then corporations will not be able to get away with adding such tyrannical clauses because another corporation will exploit that opportunity to offer a free contract, attracting all the Martial Artists instead. This is the power of a free market. Competition and a wide variety of choices force everybody to be more lenient and pleasing to Martial Artists to not lose out on attracting them. Currently, there is no real competitor to the Martial Union that can threaten it or keep it on its toes. That is why it thinks it can get away with adding such authoritarian clauses."

Rui stared at her wordlessly.

She did have a point. Rui recalled how he had essentially been conscripted into the Serevian Dungeon War and how he had been pressured into serving as an ambassador for Vilun Island.

Although those worked very well for him, it was true that he was compelled to serve in those regards.

largely outweighed the negatives in this case. The reason that the Corporate Princess was unable

predicated on the assumption that it is fundamentally a commercial organization," Rui heaved

younger Martial Artists are attracted to it in the first place. The charter of the Martial Union

commerce exists to support this agenda. That is what you fail to understand. It exists to maintain Martial supremacy from the state to ensure that Martial Artists do not ever become reduced to tools and weapons

of the political inclinations of the

Rui replied. "Even if I were to steelman your perspective on the oligopolistic nature of the Martial Union, I would still disagree with your conclusions. A Martial oligopoly may be sub-optimal economically, but it is optimal politically. Martial Art will be easier to tame and conquer if it is divided. This was the case in history at one point in time. That is why unity is required. If we fight amongst ourselves, then we become easy pickings for ambitious rulers who wish to commercialize or enslave

at face value," She replied. "It is sub-optimal economically. A more competitive market would yield more revenue, which would strengthen the Martial sector, which, in turn, would increase

to cultivate a greater quality and quantity of Martial Artists. Simply pouring in one thousand

amount of wealth into the sixteen Martial Academies to vastly reducing the difficulty of finding commissions that were perfectly attuned to the Martial

experience that a defensive Martial Art gained from an assassination mission was worthless compared to what they would get from a

and sophisticated commission system that allowed