The Martial Unity

BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM!!

"Rrrgh!" Rui gritted his teeth as his body began hurting under the sheer strain of the effort that he was exerting. Blow after blow crashed into Senior Zenshin's body as the man's condition rapidly declined with all the damage he incurred. The successive blows to his diaphragm hampered his breathing even more, albeit temporarily.

Of course, it didn't take long for Senior Zenshin to regain his wits. He abandoned defense entirely as he swung both claws at Rui.

But alas, not even that could reach Rui.

WHOOSH!

Rui stepped away briefly as he evaded the attack, yet the battle had already tilted in his favor. Ugly purple and brown bruises had already formed across Senior Zenshin's entire body. He had been bleeding profusely from multiple open wounds and orifices. His breathing had not entirely recovered to even its previous state which had still been horribly hampered due to the Breathing Crucifix technique.

The multiple shocks that his diaphragm had sustained in addition to the continuous damage it had suffered due to the permeation of impact from Reverberating Lance made it so that he truly struggled to breathe, making every single movement extremely labored, heavy and sluggish.

Rui had no intention of remaining passive anymore.

'I don't have much time left,' He noted as even his breathing had begun to grow labored. He had been fighting for a long time, and even though he had purposely designed Breathing Crucifix as a high-stamina technique to last for a long time, it still put a strain on his mind and consumed his mental energy continuously.

If he let things continue for too much longer, the battle would become even again.

WHOOSH!

Rui surged forth one more time.

Senior Zenshin staggered unstably, haphazardly swinging his claws in Rui's direction in a desperate attempt to ward him off.

But even if Rui was too exhausted for continuous extravagant maneuvers, the pattern recognition system was still far too powerful to allow him to be tagged so easily.

WHOOSH!

Rui smoothly shifted a foot, avoiding the haymaker claw swipe with minimal effort while cleanly surging in with a powerful Flowing Canon.

BOOM!

A powerful blow to the solar plexus with the full might of Outer Convergence caused the man to vomit blood.

BAM BAM BAM!!!

Three blows to the man's jaws caused a bout of dizziness, yet the stubborn warrior refused to fall unconscious. He swung his claws, wandering about, hoping desperately that they struck Rui.

His offense was so lethal, that even in this state, he could still cause fatal damage to Rui.

But alas, such a thing never happened.

Rui cleanly avoided each blow as he surgically bombarded Senior Zenshin with blow after blow.

Yet the man never fell.

He staggered, he coughed blood, he shuddered in pain, yet he stood his ground, swinging to the very end. Not once did the fire of vengeance in his eyes ever snuff.

Rui could not help but feel an immense amount of respect for the man, even if the latter would have loved nothing more than to skin Rui alive with his claws. The sheer fortitude and perseverance that the man displayed was something that he ought to have been proud of.

Rui had no doubt that Senior Zenshin could have easily fallen into a bout of despair and emptiness and could have broken psychologically the way Senior Marna did. Yet despite the sheer degree to which Rui adaptively evolved to overcome his Martial Art with a much weaker Body and Heart, he still did not give in.

His spirit never broke even to the very end.

BAM!!

A powerful high kick crashed into the man's jaw. His skull shook violently as his eyes rolled back. A critical threshold had been crossed as the blunt force trauma to the brain caused it to shut down.

THUD

The gargantuan body collapsed, unconscious. Rui fell to his knees as he finally dispelled the Breathing Crucifix technique, catching his breath.

"That was close…" Rui panted. "Far too close."

He had lost count of the number of times that he had almost lost an arm or a part of his limb against Senior Zenshin.

Even with the Hypnomatrix, Metabody System, and the pattern recognition systems of the VOID algorithm, he had still needed to squeeze everything from all his techniques to all his tactics and strategies to edge out a decisive win at the end.

'The VOID algorithm and the various upgrades that I have made to it are impressively powerful, however, they are usually compensating for massive gaps in raw physical parameters between myself and my opponent,' Rui heaved a sigh, pulling out a rejuvenation potion. Even in the Squire Realm, his Martial Body had been substantially behind those of peers of the same rank, although it was far stronger than Martial Artists his age. His Martial Body had been grade seven or eight when he was a grade-ten Martial Squire.

That gap only widened when he broke through to the Senior Realm. Here were Martial Seniors that had been around for more than a century with Martial Bodies that had grown significantly in that time.

Then there was the gap in Martial Hearts, which further increased the gap in raw power between himself and other Martial Seniors of his grade. These were not small gaps, and even with the VOID algorithm, it was truly difficult to compensate and overcome such a large gap.

'I definitely need to fix this issue somehow,' He shook his head. 'I'll put it on the list.'

Meanwhile, some distance away in the human domain, a single carriage had pulled up to the Gereign base of the Carnil Mafia. A single middle-aged woman stepped out of the carriage, frowning as she inspected the great damage that had erupted as a result of the battle between Senior Zenshin and Rui.

"What happened here?" She called out, with an amplified voice.

One of the managers in charge widened his eyes as he immediately scurried to the woman, bowing his head deeply.

"Apologies for the delayed welcome, Master Haishi."