The Martial Unity

Rui had spent the past few days going through all of the information that the Martial Union had gathered regarding the Shionel Dungeon. Thankfully, the Martial Union had organized and presented in a way that was quite user-friendly. Martial Artists were not known to be the brightest tool in the box, and intelligence management and processing was not their strongest point.

Thus, the Martial Union first provided an extremely broad outline of all of the information present that was simple enough for even a child to understand. The complexity slowly increased only if the Martial Union then further studied any particular aspect of the information provided.

Of course, this was an unnecessary measure for Rui, but it did make things easier. He needed time to process all that information once he stored all of it in his Mind Palace. After all, memorizing it did not necessarily mean storing it.

('But before that, I should try and clarify the goals and objectives of this little adventure…') Rui narrowed his eyes.

They weren't going on a picnic to the local hill, or anything like that. They were going to be partaking in an incredibly dangerous and risky adventure that could while stimulating them and pushing them forward in their Martial Path, also take put them at grave risk and even kill them if they made a single mistake.

Thus, they needed to make sure that they were aware of the risks and aware of what they were seeking.

('Kane doesn't particularly seek anything asides from putting distance between himself and his family… And he has a lot of trust in me so he's willing to follow me along in pretty much anything I do. I shouldn't take that trust for granted, and I should make sure that Kane not only doesn't regret trusting me but also rejoices in doing so,') Rui had resolved himself to make sure that would end up being the case.

In which case, he needed to iron out exactly what their objectives were, and how they were going to achieve it.

('The first objective is to be the first to clear the dungeon after having explored the entirety of it,') Rui smirked.

Rui did not want to subject himself to a safer and more peaceful objective of simply exploring the dungeon at their own pace. That was boring and did not pressure him enough to gain meaningful experience or to stimulate him to develop his Martial Art with even more individuality. He came here to get stronger, and only by holding himself to the highest standard could he possibly achieve that.

This was not a light objective. He wanted to be the first to reach the extremities of the dungeon, both the tower dungeon and the underground dungeon.

('Second… earn enough money to sustain long-term exploration of the dungeon…') Rui concluded.

Rui did not want to eat into his savings for months and months on end to sustain his little adventure, he wanted to make sure that he always had enough earnings from his little escapades, and then some. He wanted to make sure that he was earning as much as he would have had he been doing regular and normal missions.

For now, these two objectives were good enough, and he wasn't the only one who thought so either.

"You want to be the first to explore and clear the entire dungeon?" Kane furrowed his eyebrows as he stared at Rui with scrutinizing eyes, looking for a hint of humor.

Even though he knew Rui was not joking.

The two of them had agreed to meet at Kane's little cottage in the town of Crene. The latter did not feel comfortable residing in the town of Hajin where his family's main manor was. Although it wasn't likely, if they got word that he was residing that close to them he would not be able to resist them.

"That's incredibly ambitious and incredibly difficult, you know that right?" Kane sighed, half resigned and half amused.

"I'm aware," Rui nodded with a calm expression. "But that is the objective I have set for myself."

"You do realize that you are competing with many Martial Squires across the nation, right?" Kane sighed.

"Of course," Rui snorted. "But we'll win the race anyway."

"Alright, I'm in," Kane shrugged. "You also said something about earning enough money to sustain our activities and still have enough to match the equivalent time spent in completing normal missions?"

Kane frowned. "That is really difficult, you know?"

"We're going to have to earn a lot of money, that's all," Rui shrugged. "Shouldn't be too hard considering how lucrative this adventure will be."

Kane scratched his head as he thought about it. "Well, how do you plan on doing that?"

"There is the most straightforward way; we plunder a huge amount of esoteric mineral supplies and then sell them in the market."

"Hmmm," Kane considered that possibility, before shrugging. "I guess that could work, but we'll be competing against people who will also be selling a ton of that stuff too, right?"

"True," Rui admitted.

In reality, he knew that there was a limit to how much they could earn with just the two of them. Yes, they could be considered geniuses, but at the end of the day, their actual Martial prowess was not shocking or anything of the sort. They did not possess too many advantages.

"That's one plan that we could go with," Rui mentioned. "As of right now, I have another idea but… it will take some time to confirm whether it is viable or it isn't. I'll also need to come up with a way to realistically achieve the first objective too so, this whole endeavor will require an immense amount of preparation, that is true without a doubt."

Kane nodded. "I'll work on a technique and grow stronger."

"That is definitely on the list of things that I'm planning to do before we set out for the Shionel Dungeon," Rui nodded. "I have no intention of going there as weak as I am now.