The Martial Unity

Rui skimmed through some other of his personal commissions but ultimately shook his head in dismay. What he was looking for wasn't there at all. None of these were particularly stimulating missions. Ideally, he would have liked to have had a mission that would pit him against another Martial Squire. But he wasn't quite yet eligible for such a mission just yet.

He was evaluated to be a grade three Martial Artist in his current state. He was inexperienced with combat in the Squire Realm and had only just re-mastered six techniques. Normally, such a Martial Squire would be graded at grade one, but not Rui.

For one, he had the VOID algorithm. This technique allowed him to keep up with those with combat parameters much higher than his and even defeat them. Furthermore, he had naturally retained his mental and sensory techniques as well, increasing his formidability thanks to it. Thirdly, his body was above that of a baseline all-rounder Martial Squire. He was stronger, faster and healed faster, and had greater stamina.

All these factors allowed him to operate several grades above grade one, which he would be without those factors. He didn't think he would lose even if he were pitted against another Martial Squire, as long as they weren't too much of a much higher grade than his own.

Unfortunately, none of his personal commissions could provide him with that.

That was why he found himself standing in the mission library of the Martial Union, the Squire-level one. If he could find a mission that pit him against another Martial Squire, he would most certainly take it. It wasn't as though he wanted to fight a Martial Squire because there wasn't another way that he would be able to fight one, he most certainly could commission a sparring partner if he wanted to.

However, there was always a large difference between a sparring partner and someone who was genuinely hostile against you in a fight in the real world. The latter was a much greater experience than the former. The former usually operated within a certain limit, otherwise, death was plausible and that was something no sparring partner would want.

It simply wasn't real.

He glanced around the mission library.

Even at the Squire level, missions were divided similarly to the way they were divided in the Apprentice Realm; Offense, defense, hunter, shadow, and miscellaneous classes.

The best class to guarantee combat in a mission among all of the classes was...

('The offensive class, without a doubt.') Rui glanced at it, walking over to it.

Ideal missions in the defense, hunter, shadow, and miscellaneous missions were those missions that didn't entail combat and conflict. However, the same could not be said for missions of the offense class.

The offense-class mission necessarily entailed conflict. Which meant that Rui could ensure that he was participating in some form of conflict. All he needed to do was find one that allowed him to fight against a Martial Squire.

He began skimming through some of the lower-grade missions.

[Offense-class mission: elimination mission

Clientele: Frilin Marnen

Targets of elimination: Apprentice Jurver, Apprentice Gernin, Apprentice Har, Apprentice Vundeg, Apprentice Kernil, Apprentice Seren, Apprentice Axel, Apprentice Meren, Apprentice Kolun, Apprentice Hilos, Apprentice Gringar.

Location of targets: Kingdom of Gunir, town of Hatchel (65.34, 54.2)

Difficulty grade: two

Mission summary: The clientele seeks to commission a Martial Squire to eliminate eleven Martial Apprentices who, on average, are high-grade. The difficulty of the mission arises not from the physical difficulty of killing Martial Apprentices, which is trivial, but from complications of even a single or two of the target Martial Apprentices escaping the assault in time that most are killed. Or complications arising from the Martial Apprentices learning of their impending fate and going into hiding.]

"Hmmm..." Rui winced at the mission. He was not interested in mass-murdering Martial Apprentices. It was distasteful, not to mention pointless and boring.

He skimmed through a few more mission bills at the lower grade, but unfortunately, they were not too dissimilar.

A lot of the lower-grade missions involved an enormously large number of normal humans, requiring him to mass murder many thousands of humans, if not tens of thousands without letting a single one escape alive, or mass-murder a large number Martial Apprentices, or in many cases, capture them instead.

In hindsight, Rui should have expected this. The lower-grade missions were missions that were not supposed to threaten the life of the Martial Artist undertaking them. The moment a mission involved other hostile Martial Squires, his life would be at threat and the difficulty grade would likely exceed his own grade as a Martial Apprentice.

Something similar was also the case with Apprentice-level missions, missions at lower grades of the Apprentice level were centered around larger groups of humans that no single ordinary human could defeat. It was only at grade four and above that missions could threaten his life, and involve other Martial Artists of the same Realm as the Martial Artist undertaking the mission.

('I guess for now I should just level up until I reach a point where I can undertake a mission that involves fighting against other Martial Squires.') Rui shrugged.

As long as he gained more experience and demonstrated his abnormal and unnatural combat prowess, he was bound to be upgraded to a higher grade as a Martial Artist.

The Martial Union by default placed newbie Martial Artists at extremely low grades regardless of their capabilities. The lack of experience was the main issue. While it wasn't as though the experience of the Apprentice Realm was useless or obsolete, Martial Squires differed too much from Martial Apprentices, allowing brand-new Martial Squires to fight against experienced Martial Squires was too risky. Rui would need to prove his combat capabilities and gain some experience with combat in the Squire Realm before he could be eligible to fight other Martial Squires.

Just as he finished his thoughts, he happened upon an interesting mission bill that caught his eye. A familiar name from the past...