Chapter 2052: Tomorrow
It hadn't been too long since his breakthrough to the Master Realm. He had many, many holes in his knowledge regarding it. From the price of the Martial Mind that he learned from the Divine Doctor to learning about the core principle of Martial Minds from Sage Sayfeel to learning about progress in the Master Realm from his grandmother to learning about how power was evaluated in the Master Realm from Master Reina.
Each pitstop he made seemed to enrich his understanding of the Realm that he had just entered.
"Facing off against as many Martial Masters, was it?" Rui raised an eyebrow. "That is a cumbersome way of evaluating what grade a Martial Master is."
"It can't be helped." She shrugged. "Martial Masters had an additional dimension of power with many parameters within them that cannot be directly measured. Thus, one can only brute-force the measuring system. When the Reign of the Master Realm began, there weren't too many Martial Masters back then. Thus, this was much easier back then. But today, you will need to fight dozens of pre-graded Martial Masters to learn where you stand on average. The grade where your win rate and loss rate are exactly fifty percent on average across said grade is estimated to be your grade of power."
Under the given circumstances, this was the best Martial Art organizations were able to do. The advantage of such a system was that it naturally accounted for growth without needing to shift grades every generation to adjust for growth.
"Now that you have entered the Master Realm, you must adjust your mindset to be able to accept more uncertainty. Uncertainty of the path ahead, the uncertainty of power, the uncertainty of victory, and so on and so forth," she informed him. "The Upper Realm is a solitary Realm, in many ways."
CLACK
The door opened as his chief of staff walked in, yet by the time she walked in, she merely saw Rui sitting on a chair.
Master Reina was nowhere to be seen.
"Mikhaila," Rui addressed her as he pretended to be immersed in whatever Master Reina had been studying.
"Sir, the Martial Union has just delivered a document containing what appears to be a contract for a duel," she frowned. "It is marked as highly classified. Thus, I saw it to bring it to you without delay."
She didn't possess the awareness needed to distinguish passive auras between Realms, and neither did she know him well enough to notice any differences in his mannerisms.
"It is indeed highly classified." He accepted the document with interested eyes. "I'll look over it myself.
"Understood, Your Highness."
Master Reina appeared out of thin air after the woman left, turning to Rui with a curious expression.
"Duel?" Her eyes lit up with interest.
"Yeah, thanks to your fuck-up, I need to fight to earn reduced penalties," Rui calmly informed.
"Not fair," she folded her arms. "What am I supposed to do when a Martial Sage ambushes me? In fact, I should have you compensate me for bringing me to the brink of death!"
"Hah," Rui snorted. "After the mess you have made in the past three years, I should have you compensate me for emotional damage. Now, let me read this contract in peace."
He ignored her complaints as he read through the agreement fleshed out in the document.
The duels were scheduled in North Kandria, Daracol.
Rui recalled this place, and it was the same place where he had fought Master Krakule, a region devoid of human settlement built specifically for Martial Masters to fight without worrying about causing psychological damage to human onlookers.
"Good." He nodded appreciatively.
His Martial Embodiment was too destructive; it was mental torture of such magnitude that it eroded consciousness, turning people into brain-dead vegetables unless their minds were powerful enough to handle it.
The criteria for victory were knock-out, submission, or incapacitation.
Killing one's opponent was strongly prohibited.
That made sense, too. Martial Masters were national treasures. Neither the Martial Union nor the Kandrian government could possibly afford to have them dying in duels and spars.
The contract also specified the many exact crimes Rui had committed, describing multiple charges of fraud within his elaborate deceit, and also put a number on the total losses suffered by the Martial Union due to fraud.
"...Twenty-one billion Kandrian gold coins." He winced at that number. "Yikes."
He understood the anti-Rui faction's sentiment against him a little better. He had always been willing to compensate them with priceless assets like the Elder Tree intelligence network and the Divine Doctor's services.
"But if they want a fight, then a fight they will get."
The contract also specified the three exact outcomes as well as the manner in which the three Martial Artists would be chosen.
"One from the lower third, one from the middle third, and one from the upper third of the thirty grades of the Master Realm chosen at random, barring those who have a conflict of interests," Rui furrowed his eyebrows in thought.
"Interesting," Master Reina remarked as she read alongside him. "So you'll have to fight a Martial Master from within the first ten grades, another from the middle ten grades, and a particularly powerful Martial Master in the higher echelons of the Master Realm. Hehehe, that sounds exciting."
A smile cracked at the edge of Rui's mouth as his eyes lit up with enthusiasm. "Three opponents won't be enough to help me understand precisely how strong I am, but it should give me a rough estimate of my own power."
The weight of the agreement pressed down on his shoulder.
The outcome would forever impact his relationship with the Martial Union. He needed to ensure that he secured the best possible result to prevent an inadvertent end to a great partnership.
"Seems they're particularly quite eager to arrive at a conclusion without any further delay."
"Why do you say that?"
His eyes narrowed.
"The duel is tomorrow at the break of dawn."