The Martial Unity

"Wait a second," Kane frowned. "Didn't you already conclude that the Divine Doctor was responsible for the emigration before?"

"Yes, but before, I did not know how," Rui replied. "Looking at the environment, the probability of him having triggered an environmental event that caused the mass emigration is low. Even if many years have passed, something that caused such a large crisis that all fauna emigrated would not be undone so easily. The land and soil are pristine, as are the water sources. There is no evidence of seismic wear and tear, nor any evidence of geological stress."

He turned and closed his eyes as he recollected his survey data from within his Mind Palace. "There is no archaeological evidence of mass death during the period of the Divine Doctor's visit."

"What?"

Rui turned to Kane. "It's a piece of evidence that reduces the probability that the Divine Doctor triggered an environmental calamity. Such an event would have caused mass death, which would mean a lot of corpses that would not escape my senses. Yet I do not sense such a thing. Thus, I can conclude that it was not a life-threatening environmental crisis that caused the mass emigration."

STEP

Kane raised an eyebrow. "What if it wasn't life-threatening but still an environmental crisis?"

"Then it would not have caused mass emigration," Rui remarked. "The Adventurer's Guild recorded a complete exodus of all land animals with only the aquatic animals remaining behind, for obvious reasons. The fact that the Adventurer's Guild was unable to identify the cause also reduced the statistical likelihood of it being environmental since such a thing cannot be hidden."

Rui quickly eliminated impossibilities before evaluating the most likely possibilities. "I think the most likely case is that the Divine Doctor came to this region and did something, probably employing his extraordinary medical prowess that caused mass panic among the creatures in the region, causing them to leave."

"Then why did they come back?" Kane asked, growing curious. "And how does that explain the predators being absent, like you mentioned?"

"…The herbivores are more environmentally shackled than the carnivores are," Rui narrowed his eyes. "They usually need a specific diet of grass. The flora in the Beast Domain has an even higher variance and diversity than the fauna does. Carnivores can get sustenance by eating whatever fauna exists unless it's extremely esoteric. The same cannot be said for herbivorous animals. Hence, they returned while the carnivores migrated somewhere else, probably deeper into the Beast Domain as beasts in the Beast Domain are known to normally do."

"Hm, that makes sense, I guess," Kane shrugged. "But if that's your hypothesis, then how can you use that to find where the Divine Doctor went?"

Rui's eyes sharpened.

It was a pertinent question.

The whole reason that they had come to the Valley of Prisms was to find more clues about where the Divine Doctor had gone after the Valley of Prisms, to eventually find the man and get him back home to the Kandrian Empire.

Rui closed his eyes. "If the Divine Doctor triggered a mass emigration without leaving behind any environmental trace, then the only source of information is…"

He opened his eyes, turning to the herds of grazing animals in the distance with narrowed eyes. "…is their memories."

"…Huh?" Kane tilted his head.

"Barring the young ones, many of these animals must have undoubtedly retained memory of the Divine Doctor," Rui remarked. "Thus, I'm sure that precious intel on the Divine Doctor lies locked up deep within their brains. There is a chance that that intelligence could help us locate where the Divine Doctor is, where he went, or maybe even his objective."

"I mean, what if they forgot about it?" Kane asked impassively. "They are animals, after all."

"Unlikely," Rui shook his head. "If it was just an ordinary occurrence, I would be inclined to agree with you. However, this was probably, by far, the most traumatic experience of their life."

"And how can you know that?"

"Because every single animal ran away from the entire region," Rui replied. "It is a direct measure of psychological impact. And considering the peace that they are naturally accustomed to…"

He gestured at the many grazing herds, their images shattered and distorted like misplaced pieces of a puzzle due to the refraction caused by the Valley of Prisms.

"…it undoubtedly is seared and embedded in their memories. It probably caused trauma, among other things. There's no doubt they experience nightmares, especially when it is evident that they are not as dimwitted as the average farm animal back on Earth."

"…Alright, but how do you intend to extract that information from them?" Kane asked skeptically. "It's not like you can just walk up to them and ask them."

"I can, actually," Rui smirked.

"Oh yeah…" Kane recalled. "Well, worth a try, I suppose."

Rui nodded, disappearing and appearing before a large herd of catoblepas faster than they could react. He knew that they had a tendency to avoid him, so he couldn't approach them slowly.

"MOOOEEAAUUU!"

Rui activated a breathing technique, bending his breath to bend heaven and earth to his will, holding them in place, refusing to allow them to escape. Yet they struggled vigorously, much to his dismay. Even without his Martial Heart, he was a quasi-senior-level Martial Artist. Creatures that weren't even Apprentice-level didn't stand a chance of escaping his grip.

He waited patiently for them to grow tired and finally cease their futile resistance.

"Alright then," Rui clapped, conveying his message through non-verbal communication.

This was the best part of Fauna Flow. Or rather, the best part of communication. Research in behavioral psychology had thoroughly demonstrated that an overwhelming majority of the communication between people, regardless of language, was non-verbal. Demeanor, body language, line of vision, eyelids, and many other things conveyed more information than the words themselves.

Thus, it stood to reason that one could communicate with non-verbal communication. A language that was universal across the biosphere. All species of the animal kingdom developed evolutionary traits to read body language naturally.

It was only the human species that lacked this inherent communication method due to thought patterns that caused the mind to become more desensitized towards it while searching for human language, be it written or heard.

Fauna Flow was a technique that unlocked the capacity to learn the language of non-verbal communication.

Rui smirked, excited, as he began speaking to the catoblepas non-verbally.

Now that you lot have calmed down, I'll have you answer some questions.