The Martial Unity

While Rui was absorbed in his thoughts about the fight, the reactions of the crowd were not nearly as calm and collected.

Everybody was shocked.

Guardian Ieyasu had not challenged anyone ever since he challenged his predecessor, taking his spot as the number one Martial Artist.

He didn't feel the need, there was no one in the Squire Realm above him. He was the target of challenges.

Yet very few people challenged him, he was too powerful, and he showed no mercy. His opponents simply died.

The only one who did challenge him and managed to survive without dying was the second-ranked guardian, formerly the first-ranked.

Yet for some reason, Guardian Ieyasu had gone out of his way to challenge a guardian. Not only that, but the guardian that he did end up challenging was actually a really low-class guardian who was in the tenth class.

Of course, many knew that the truth about guardian Nake wasn't nearly as weak as his rank and class would suggest. It was said that he along with another class-ten guardian had managed to force Senior Xanarn to use a portion of true power as a Martial Senior. Something only guardian Ieyasu had managed to do prior to that.

Many of the lower class Martial Squires did not know that much about the most powerful Martial Squire of the Floating Sect. After all, not all guardians had been there five years ago when he claimed the title and status of the strongest.

Very few actually had a good understanding of what guardian Ieyasu did. Those who had a first-hand account of what he did, had already gained a good understanding of what the motivation behind guardian Ieyasu's actions were.

Nobody dared to blink while Ieyasu and Kane clashed against each other.

They shuffled, dashed, and darted around at incredible speeds!

So much so that many of the low-class Martial Artists were unable to even perceive their movements beyond hazy blurs.

In just the briefest of moments, both Ieyasu executed hundreds and thousands of movements in a matter of seconds. Their speed was so high, that they left after-image clones across the entire battle arena!

Yet the Martial Squires that were able to follow and were qualified to evaluate the battle all quickly came to realize something.

('Kane is losing,') Rui tutted.

It was a matter of just a single beat, but he was decisively inferior to Squire Ieyasu despite using Fulminata to his absolute best.

He did his best to evade Ieyasu's offensive maneuvering, but step by step, it was not working out well for him.

Rui could not help but admire Squirwe Ieyasu's maneuvering prowess. He had sealed off all the other Martial Art that Rui had seen him use and limited himself to the one field where Kane was incredibly powerful, and he was outperforming him in that regard.

The arena was silent as everybody who could or couldn't, did their best to keep up.

WHOOSH!

Kane gritted his teeth as he barely managed to evade a powerful kick. He was sweating profusely, bruised all over his body as he did his best to avoid all of Squire Ieyasu's attacks with mixed success.

Yet he wasn't able to hurt his opponent whatsoever.

Whether he landed a strike, or whether he didn't. It was clear that he was not a threat to guardian Ieyasu.

He knew.

He had always known. Any man who could accomplish by himself what had taken the full power of both himself and Rui was not someone he could take on by himself.

He knew.

Yet, he didn't.

He was able to understand the fact on a logical level, but only now was he able to actually feel it.

It was a distinct sensation. How small he was before the might of Tokugawa Ieyasu.

He felt deeply disturbed every time he looked at the man. His black hair and eyes eerily reminded him of Rui.

It wasn't just their feature that they had in common. They were probably the only two Martial Squires in the world that could make even Kane feel inadequate.

('Are people with black hair and eyes just overpowered?')

The thought left his mind as quickly as it had entered.

He couldn't afford to get distracted.

POW POW POW!

He grimaced as guardian Ieyasu blitzed him, landing three swift short jabs on Kane.

Yet they were light, lighter than Kane's strikes.

Kane had the sinking feeling that Ieyasu could have easily killed with just a single strike but chose not to.

Was it out of kindness? Why even challenge him if he was going to hold back as much?

"Argh!" Kane coughed as he quickly leaped back, expecting Ieyasu to exploit the opening.

Yet he didn't even bother.

Kane gained his bearings, catching his breath for a moment before gazing back up at guardian Tokugawa Ieyasu with knitted eyebrows.

He simply stared at Kane before opening his mouth.

"Is that all you can do?" He asked with a strange accent that Kane had never heard before.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Kane stalled, catching his breath.

"You have more," He murmured. "Show me more."

He walked nonchalantly towards Kane. "Show me everything."

"Hmph," Kane snorted.

"If you don't…"

The world around them grew perilous.

Every guardian felt an abysmal sense of dread.

The air grinded to a halt as the atmosphere was wrung taut.

Bloodlust.

Kane gritted his teeth as he did his very best to maintain his composure.

The sheer magnitude of pressure that he experienced from the man before him was almost unlike anything he had ever felt.

At that moment, he knew that the threat was real, he could feel it. The man would probably kill him if he didn't oblige.

"Jerk." He muttered under his breath as he deactivated Fulminata.

The technique was quite powerful, but it could not allow him to defeat guardian Tokugawa Ieyasu.

He considered resigning, but he had already realized that the man probably would not leave him alone if that did happen.