The Martial Unity
chapter-2134

Not even a week had passed before Rui grew bored and restless.

A peaceful life was fun before one realized that it also meant that there was nothing for a Martial Master to do.

He visited some of his old friends, talking to them about how things had changed while reminiscing about their days in the academy. So many of them were so different from how they were more than ten years ago that it was rather jarring at several points.

In comparison, he might as well be frozen in time. His breakthrough to the Master Realm naturally put some distance between himself and Martial Artists of the Lower Realms. However, he had already accepted that this was the price of breaking through to the Master Realm. He wasn't sure that he could have normal relationships with people outside of the orphanage.

Yet, once it was all over, he yearned to go back to training.

And he did.

His father had already commenced Operation Transcension a week ago.

This meant that at this point in time, the manifold was almost certainly up and running.

He knew that his father planned to break the news to the Martial Community, slowly and in a limited fashion. He could not just come out and tell everyone that they had developed a four-dimensional Manifold for training that altered the flow of time such that fourteen seconds passed in it every time one second passed in the real world.

That was a foolish way of going about it.

While Martial Masters and Martial Sages were qualified to know the whole truth, Martial Artists of the Lower Realms were simply unqualified and untrusted to know the entire truth. Rui suspected that his father would be deceptive when explaining the effects of the dungeon and, sure enough, he was right.

"Hey, big brother, do you know about that training drug that the Martial Union apparently developed that messes with your sense of the flow of time?" Mana frowned. "Apparently, if you consume it, it messes with how your mind and body perceive how time flows. So you can get a lot of work done in a short amount of time. We've saved up a lot of Martial Credits. Do you think we should purchase a dose of the drug?"

Rui smiled knowingly. "It's probably the best decision you can make."

"Really? Hmmm… then we'll definitely purchase it."

His father and the Martial Union had gone about it in an interesting but prudent manner. This way, the investigative efforts of any foreign power were doomed to be stalled due to focusing on the wrong direction.

The amount of time it would take them to see through this deception would most certainly increase.

Soon enough, this 'drug' would spike in demand for its training benefits while other nations would conduct their own research and intelligence gathering to crack the formula. On top of that, they could fake everyone out by expressing a high demand for materials and ingredients that had some correlation to the alleged effect of the drug.

Rui couldn't help but grin at the thought.

They also would probably increase the prices of the dungeon once its effects became well-known. So much so that even Martial Masters would need to compete in order to gain access to it.

Not Rui, of course. As the part-owner of the dungeon, he had complete access to the dungeon at all times.

He had no intention of being remiss in its utility. However, staying there for too long without stimulation for his Adaptive Evolution would impede his Martial Path. While he couldn't afford to abuse the dungeon due to that, he most certainly could afford to use it for training new techniques or grinding for some experience.

It was what he intended to do.

STEP

Rui had arrived in the depths of a forest, gazing at nothing in particular. "Here?" he asked, shifting his gaze to the suited man who stood beside him.

"Yes, Your Highness."

Rui's gaze returned to nothing in particular. "Well, I assume you have some way of communicating with the team managing the manifold inside."

"Indeed, Your Highness." The man pulled out a strange device with a special esoteric substance stuck inside it. "His Majesty has established a system of protocols of how, why, and when the manifold can be opened. We are to open and close it as and when you desire."

"Good to know." Rui smirked. "Now, open it up; I can't wait to see what my father and the Martial Union have done with it."

"Yes, Your Highness." The man pressed a button, and soon enough, Rui felt a ripple through space and time itself.

The manifold had opened.

Yet…

"I don't see anything." Rui frowned at the unchanged scenery before him before realization dawned on him. "Ah, I see…"

"The entire manifold boundary is armed with state-of-the-art Sage-level sensory disguising technology, Your Highness," the man informed Rui. "Let us step inside."

And he did.

Just one step forward and—

WHOOSH

Rui's eyes widened when his entire view changed.

One moment, he was in a forest.

The next moment, he found himself staring at an enormous expanse of training infrastructure and facilities that stretched as far as the eye could see. An ocean of cutting-edge Martial training resources. The dream of any Martial Artist.

"…Woah," he whispered.

He couldn't help but get lost in the sheer scale of the investment that both the Kandrian Government and the Martial Union had put into the project. It was an enormous project that had taken an unfathomable amount of resources and capital to build.

"This is a game changer," he murmured, rising to the sky to get a better look at everything.

His father had gone all out.

He had undoubtedly drained the Royal Inventory of esoteric resources to help see the project right through to the very end. However, Rui also knew that they would be able to recoup all of it soon enough thanks to the Elder Tree Connection; thus, it could be seen as an investment for the future.