The Martial Unity

Time passed on Cloudia as Rui immersed himself in training. He spent most of his time meditating in the meditation chambers of the cloud town, isolating himself from any and all disturbances and distractions.

The only times he wasn't doing that were when he was sleeping or doing other daily basic necessities. 

Of course, every once in a while, he would spar against the Hypnomaster alongside Ieyasu. He also sparred against Ieyasu many times just to ensure his battle instinct didn't rot.

"This is one of the issues with training mental techniques," The Hypnomaster explained. "Spend too long immersed in training them, and you'll go from a Martial Artist to a sage. The normal kind, too, not the Martial kind. Hahaha!"

On top of that, Rui and Ieyasu were routinely tasked with the duty of hunting food for all of Cloudia every once in a while. This too was because of another rule from the Martial Master. They could hunt any beast or beasts as long as it wasn't the Illusionary Dragon, the beast was apparently a rare and powerful species that the Hypnomaster was rearing. Furthermore, it filtered out the competent Martial Artists from the incompetent.

It only made their jobs harder when they ran into it, since they weren't allowed to kill it. 

"Hah! It's good to face challenges. Martial Artists should learn to hunt their own food. Being coddled will do you no good," He said, as he was coddled by multiple women attendants. 

Rui heaved a sigh, massaging his temples. The man was an eccentric character, even if he was a powerful Martial Master. It helped that he was earnestly helping Rui and Ieyasu out.

Rui didn't know what he was helping the latter out with specifically, but he knew that it had something to do with the man's Martial Mind. He grew stronger every time they fought.

He would be lying if he said that working to be ahead of Ieyasu wasn't one of his goals as a Martial Artist. It couldn't be helped, Ieyasu was one of the few guys of his own generation that he didn't have to hold back about.

Often, when he sparred against peers or friends, he generally needed to hold back in order to ensure that he didn't go far and cross a line. However, he had found that Ieyasu was perhaps the first person he had come across who possessed a Martial Path that was of the same caliber as his own.

It was not something Rui could overwhelm easily. It meant that Rui didn't have to worry about him or coddle him, he could simply go all out and focus on winning. This was something that he had come to treasure, even if he was too proud to admit it to Ieyasu.

It was true that both of them had grown at a much faster rate than when they were away from each other. Frequently being forced to spar with each other not only allowed them to compare their rates of growth but also drove them to train and work harder.

Rui suspected that that was the reason that the Hypnomaster made them spar with each other in the first place. 

Regardless, his routine drew into a monotony of training, hunting, and sparring. Most of his time went into one of the four hypnosis projects that he had chosen to embark on.

He mad remarkably fast progress, as expected, faster than any Martial Artist that the Hypnomaster had ever seen. Yet most Martial Artists only trained one technique at a time, while Rui was working on four.

On top of that, he had chosen to also work on an elementary algorithm that would allow him to decide how to apply the hypnomatrix most efficiently. After all, it wasn't the most cut-and-dry matter.

For one, not every Martial Artist cleanly fell into offensive, defensive, and maneuvering. He, of all people, knew that very well. If he did come across Martial Artists who were clearly heavily inclined toward one of the three, then that was fine, but if he didn't, then he needed to choose the best outcome.

With the way mental techniques worked, it was possible to use multiple at the same time at a fraction of their individual potency. It may have been the case that there was an optimal distribution of how much of each technique he ought to use against Martial Artists who didn't cleanly fall into offense, defense, or maneuvering categories.

In such cases, how was Rui supposed to use the three mental techniques?

That was why he also worked on a minor system of thought that would allow him to arrive at the best way to use the three techniques. It was certainly a difficult thing to add on top of the four projects that he was already working on, reducing his time even further, but alas, it could not be helped.

He was prepared to lengthen the time he spent on Cloudia if that was what it took. This was especially important since he knew that this fifth extra project would contribute to his Martial Mind, which was definitely ranking extremely high at the top of his list of priorities.

If he was going to create a system of thought that could fill his vast Martial Mind, he needed to make little steps of progress until they eventually accumulated enough to get him to fulfill the necessary threshold.

He didn't know how much he had left to go, all he knew was that the VOID algorithm filled up some uncertain amount of the totality of his budding Martial Mind. However, it was highly unlikely that he would fill the remaining gap left with another megaproject like the VOID algorithm.

'I should make progress wherever I can.'

Smaller projects like the Hypnomatrix that allowed him to decide how to apply his mental techniques might be much smaller than the rest of the VOID algorithm, making a small impact, but it was progress nonetheless.

By the time Rui completed his training, more than two years had already passed.