The Martial Unity

If one were to ask Rui how many times his mind had been free from thought, he probably count the number on one hand.

It was rare.

It was rare, and this was one of those moments.

"Reincarnated."

Rui froze then and there.

His body.

Mind.

All of it seemed to freeze in time itself.

He was almost unable to parse what she had just uttered.

His name was something he hadn't given too much thought to in his life. He had initially had some trouble adjusting to it as the new label of who he was. After all, John Falken had lived with his name for nearly sixty years. That was an attachment that was not easy to rid.

By the time he got used to it, he didn't hold any curiosity about its etymology.

After all, it was three letters and two syllables.

About as basic as a name could get.

Today, that illusion had been shattered.

A single whisper escaped him.

"…What did you say?"

"It means 'reincarnated' or 'reborn,'" his grandmother helpfully reiterated. "It is a very strange name to give to a person. Imagine naming your son 'reborn!' Very much unlike her. I wonder…"

Her words erased any shred of doubt that may have lingered. Rui didn't know how or why, but somehow, his mother knew that he was reincarnated. There was no realistic explanation for why she went out of her way to give her son a patently absurd name in the Silas Dialect if it didn't hold significance.

Even if she had developed eccentric tastes and given her son some strange names, the probability that the name she chose would be exactly what his deepest secret in this world was was extremely low.

How did she know he was reincarnated?

Did she have anything to do with it?

Did she know how or why he reincarnated?

A multitude of questions flew through his mind by the second as the reality of his name sank in.

"You seem alarmed."

Rui froze.

His eyes met his grandmother's powerful gaze.

Her eyes bored into his with askance.

In that moment, he put aside his emotional turmoil, which she undoubtedly sensed as a Martial Sage. He knew he could not hide it from her, which is why he focused on disguising it.

"I'm rather disturbed at this revelation," Rui narrowed his eyes as they swam around. "I wish she were here so that I could speak to her. I wish she could tell me about everything."

This was the sincere truth.

However, it was indirectly deceptive because she lacked the context to understand what he meant or what he was referring to. And while it was not the most ethical, reminding her of her dead daughter did draw her attention away.

Her eyes softened with sorrow. "I, too, wish I could speak to her and understand her choices. Why did she choose the Kandrian Empire over us? Why did she foresee her death yet refuse to take any measures to avert it of any kind?"

It became clear that there was more to his mother than he had ever suspected in his entire life. There were too many oddities for him to possibly shrug off, even if he ignored the elephant in the room, which indicated that his mother was very aware ahead of time that her unborn baby was a reincarnated person.

Regardless, he knew that he wouldn't get any answers here and now.

His grandmother's words indicated that she, too, didn't really understand the mysteries that surrounded his mother shortly before her death.

On the one hand, he could avoid being exposed as a being from a different world. He was glad that his grandmother was not a devotee of the Virodhabhasa. She didn't seem to think he was the Antithesis himself or didn't care if she did know.

This response would have been very different if Master Uma had been there. She would have undoubtedly taken that as further proof that he was the Antithesis, fueling her insane theological delusions.

On the other hand, if she did have answers, then he could perhaps solve some of the most burning questions that he had had the entirety of his second life.

"Huff…" He shook his head. "What has happened has happened. It can never be changed. I am more inclined to look to the future than the past."

His grandmother agreed with that sentiment. "The future is within our grasp. Especially within the grasp of we, the Silas Clan, for prophecy runs in our blood."

Rui smiled wryly. "Indeed."

That had somehow held to be true, considering that Rui had obtained the power of prediction independently of the Silas Clan as their blood kin.

"I am willing to bear the name of Silas and the responsibility and privilege that comes with it," Rui declared, steering the conversation in more important directions. "I seek the Eye of Prophecy for my Martial Art, and I am certainly willing to share my prophetic power."

He didn't mind sharing the predictive model as long as he was appropriately compensated. In this case, the exchange was truly equal and fair, so he had no issue. This was especially true when the whole purpose of Project Water was initially to universalize Adaptive Evolution. It only became a more self-

centered goal after he rediscovered it as his Martial Path.

Matriarch Nephi smiled at those words. "I am pleased at your openness to cooperate. By working together, we can ensure that all of us harness the power of prophecy to a much greater degree."

"Yes, however, as I said, I cannot do so immediately. I am in pursuit of a man and am too committed to finding him before I run out of time. I am unable to dedicate myself to mastering it, nor am I able to teach my technique to others during this time. I was hoping to make use of your services to find the person that I am seeking at the moment."