The Martial Unity

"Woah, who is that guy?"

"Whoever he is, I hope he wins. I'm rooting for him."

"Man, to think that even monsters like him are participating. Even the preliminary contests go hard!"

"If he wins, I'm going to purchase a ticket to the main contest in Li."

The crowd only grew more excited when Rui unveiled a portion of his true power. Yet, in reality, he was a little bored.

Ordinary Martial Squires were not able to excite him anymore. This had already begun being true even before he began Project Metabody.

But now that he had completed it? He couldn't even pretend they were entertaining anymore.

When he looked into the eyes of those who sought to eliminate him with numbers, he knew he wouldn't lose despite the numeric disadvantage.

Those who returned his gaze also knew that.

And he knew that they knew.

And they knew that he knew that they knew.

That was why they retreated.

Rui couldn't even be bothered to chase them.

What he proceeded to do drew gasps from the various spectators. His actions were stunning to those who witnessed him.

In the middle of an ensuing rumble, Rui had the audacity to sit down on the ground.

It was a statement.

A declaration that this contest was not worth his full effort.

Or that was how the spectators interpreted it.

In reality, Rui couldn't be bothered with such frivolous forms of show-off. His actions were more innocent than people were willing to believe. His attention had already turned in directions that actually held his interest. The three grade-ten Martial Squires.

A smile crept on his face.

"Strong."

This was undeniable.

Rui carefully watched and analyzed all of their Martial Art as he continued building predictive models on all of them. He began the moment the fight began, dedicating a portion of his attention to those he knew were the greatest threats in this competition, and now, he could dedicate all his attention to them in a full-fledged manner.

The one that drew his attention the most was the one with a Martial Art that he had never seen before. It was a shocking fighting style that he didn't even think was possible. She sashayed around the arena, those that crossed her path were left frozen on the spot. The ground she treaded upon hardened as frost began covering it. The air around her chilled. Rui couldn't help but widen his eyes in shock as he watched tiny snowflakes form in the air around her.

She had a Martial Art that was centered around freezing!

It was an absurd tale at first, one he would have found hard to believe had he heard it through second-hand sources.

Yet now that he was seeing it occur in real-time right before his eyes, he could not deny that it not only existed but was incredibly powerful.

('Her lethality is off the charts!') Rui watched in rapt attention as everything she touched or even came near froze. ('She doesn't generate ice, she lowers the temperature of her body as well as her environment and the targets of her strange cold techniques. How does he do it?')

Although it very clearly appeared to everybody as though she generated a thin layer of ice on top of her targets to freeze them from the outside in, only two people realized what was actually happening.

One of them was Rui.

('She's freezing them from the inside out!') An amazed smile appeared on his face. ('She's freezing the water inside the Martial Body, causing them to freeze on the spot and die.')

It was an instant death with no hopes of recovery. Furthermore, this form of offense bypassed all passive and active defense.

Tough flesh, tough skin, tough bones. None of it mattered. None of these things could possibly prevent the rapid lowering in temperature that she caused within their body. Furthermore, the healing factor that a lot of these Martial Artists had was also largely ineffective against cold. The damage was done across the entire body on a molecular level. Seventy percent of the human body was simply water. That reality made her attacks absurdly lethal.

('Damn…') Rui tutted, yet he couldn't hide the excitement on his face. ('Nemean Blossom and Weaving Blood are either entirely useless or simply not worth it against her.')

He had already concluded that the only way to combat her was to keep her well out of range. If she got within five meters of him, it was probably game over. She had no compunctions of freezing his brain over, killing him on the spot.

Unlike the other two, she actually appeared to be in her twenties, albeit well on the latter side. She had reached the conventional peak of the Squire Realm through the sheer potency of his Martial Path. She had more in common with Rui and Kane than the other two older men who were her peers.

Of course, the other two were, by no means, weak.

Rui glanced at the next most interesting among the three grade-ten Martial Squires.

One man stood stationary at one spot, with his legs firmly planted on the ground. His attackers moved in, rushing in with attacks from all directions, yet he was unperturbed. Any attack that entered within arm's length of him, however, immediately regretted that decision as they were twisted into oblivion. Skin stretched and spun, bones crumbled into gravel, and muscle tore as fibers resisted the force as much as possible.

Only to fail.

The end result was almost comical. Hands were twisted into sharp spiral noodles with the sheer amount of force the man generated.

('A Martial Art centered around torque eh?') Rui gazed with interest. The man's primary offense was torque, he used torque to inflict damage in a manner that was entirely different from normal collision-based offense that an overwhelming majority of Martial Artists used to some degree. It was closer to the locks and holds of certain grappling principles, but the man had elevated them to an entirely different level.

He was like a more lethal version of Hever.

His body was gigantic and his muscles were loaded. He looked like he could give Hypertrophic Surge a run for its money on raw power, but unlike with Hypertrophic Surge, he didn't have any strict time limits. He used a principle similar to Outer Convergence to draw power in from across the entirety of his body to his hands, allowing him to twist his opponent's arms with great ease.

('That's not enough to explain this absurd twisting effect.') Rui narrowed his eyes as he analyzed the man's Martial Art deeper. ('He also likely has hyper flexibility in his arms from the shoulder down. That's the only way he can possibly twist his opponent's arms to such a degree.')

It was a truly incredible solution.