The Martial Unity

Yet Rui bore all of it as he blasted the man's head with even more attacks, doing his best to inflict as many strikes as he could.

BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM!

Even as he bombarded the already dizzy man's head with strikes, his flesh had already burned off entirely. 

Yet he didn't stop.

BOOM!

A powerful drop kick landed on the man's head, sending yet another impact permeating through his head.

The man's eyes rolled up as his body went slack.

The accumulated blunt-force trauma crossed a critical threshold, causing the man's brain to shut down.

THUD

The man's unconscious body fell to the ground. Yet compared to his much better body, Rui's charred body was unrecognizable. He collapsed to his knees, quickly deactivating Godspeed and his Martial Heart as he pulled out rejuvenation and healing potions that had managed to survive within his Senior-level garb, before inhaling them deeply. 

An incredibly soothing sensation spread through his body as his body began recovering at a pace that was visible to the eye. Yet the potion did work much slower than it did when he was a Martial Squire.

Healing the body of a Martial Senior's body was perhaps harder than that of a Martial Squire.

It wasn't until a minute later that he was finally fully recovered. Yet an incredible wave of exhaustion hit him harder than it did when he was a Martial Squire. Martial Squires were capable of exerting great power, but they required even rejuvenation and sustenance to return to their prime. 

Ordinary amounts of ordinary food were usually not enough. 

It appeared that was even more true for Martial Seniors who not only exhausted the body's ordinary power but also a good amount of his Martial Heart. In order to restore both these reservoirs of power, the amount of food that he would need to eat would be extremely high.

He immediately felt a deep amount of hunger welling up within him.

Thankfully, this was a problem that already had solutions, from dense food pills, and supplements that could be added to regular food. Rui routinely traveled with the former, quickly consuming them as he gave himself some momentary respite.

His eyes drifted to his unconscious opponent. In hindsight, as painful as it was, he made the right decision. Had he chosen to go along with the stalemate clash, he most likely would not have had the fuel to finish the job in this manner.

Before any further ado, he quickly walked over to the unconscious man, raising his leg high before activating his Martial Heart.

BOOM!!

CRACK!

Without the Martial Heart amplifying defensive techniques, the attack effortlessly crushed his skull.

He heaved a sigh. "That was too close for comfort."

He hadn't really had such a close battle since his battle with Ieyasu. However, because Ieyasu had also been the peak of the Squire Realm with him before they broke through, he didn't feel the fact that he entered the lower echelons of the Senior Realm.

But the fact that this random Martial Senior almost roasted him to death was an indication that he had yet to fully readjust his mentality as a young inexperienced Martial Senior who was no longer at the peak of his Realm.

Of course, he generally felt more secure since he was vastly stronger than before, but he knew that he would be subjecting himself to even greater forces in the Senior Realm as opposed to the Squire Realm from here on out.

He shook his head, leaving the man's corpse behind. He knew that the Beggar's Sect probably already knew of his victory and his success in taking down the Martial Senior.

It was a good feeling knowing that, at least for a while, the human trafficking sector in the Saiful region would go down. It wasn't long before he had returned to his quarters, before resting in his bed and heaving a deep sigh as his mind flew through the many thoughts that had been budding.

He had gotten a better understanding of how strong he was, given that Senior Minneson had been a Martial Senior for twenty-five years after breaking through to the Senior Realm at the age of sixty-one.

In other words, despite being much older, and having two and a half decades of experience in the Senior Realm, Rui had managed to overcome him with everything he had. The fact that he had been pushed to his limits was a good thing because only when he was could he determine where his limit was. 

The fact that he was able to overcome someone who had spent so many years in the Senior Realm despite just having broken through a few weeks ago showed that he most certainly had started remarkably high in the Senior Realm.

However, the fact that the Senior Realm was fifteen grades wide showed that even if he started several grades above the bottom, that was still quite far away from the peak of the Senior Realm and from being a high-grade Martial Senior. 

Given that Martial Seniors seemed to stall for a long time in the Senior Realm before they broke through to the Master Realm, Rui could estimate that making progress in the Senior Realm was most certainly harder than making progress in the Master Realm.

His eyes narrowed. "I should wrap up my acclimatization period and quickly begin moving on to reaching greater heights. It's not as though the Saiful Region has too much to offer to Martial Seniors in the first place."

Like the Kaddar Region, the Saiful Region only had a few dozen Martial Seniors at most. It wasn't rich with the opportunity to fight other Martial Seniors. In his, estimation, he would most likely have to leave the place and head to greater avenues of opportunity to grow stronger.

His mind flashed back to the list of places across the continent where one could grow stronger Martial Seniors that he got from the Beggar's Sect. He would definitely have to pick a place from the list soon, and continue completing operations and missions for the Beggar's Sect as he traveled the continent, growing stronger.