The Martial Unity

That day, a shocking discovery was unveiled to the world. The world came to learn about the board that bore the words 'Welcome to the Town of Veril' inscribed on it. The previous assumptions that every shred of the town had been completely destroyed were now called into question.

Another strange part of the report was the presence of a burrowed line that began from where the board had been found extending all the way down into one of the tunnels of the Shionel Dungeon. Almost as if someone had drawn a deep line with the board into the first floor before tossing it in a place where people would eventually run into it.

What followed was many adventurers and parties following the drawn line all the way to the very end. What they found shocked the entire nation.

People could scarcely believe that after all this time, the town of Veril was still somehow not entirely annihilated. The many citizens who had a connection to the town of some sort gained a shred of hope that the town was salvageable and that the citizens had survived.

Yet, all those hopes were crushed painfully as the floor dubbed as the thirteenth floor came to be discovered, and the sheer carnage left behind shocked everyone. A large town filled with corpses indicating that none of them died anything short of a gruesome death.

What really shocked the world was that half of the corpses were natural and expected.

Their decomposition did not fall outside of the expected parameters, and there were no unexpected parameters. The other half, however, completely ming-boggled them.

The scene left behind by Rui and Kane thoroughly confused everyone that laid their eyes on them. The ghoulish corpses that had clearly died very recently were a bizarre anomaly that was hard to understand since they had not had access to as much information as Rui and Kane had. The latter had witnessed the corpses when they were alive and thus was aware of their tendencies when they were alive.

The former had no idea what the monsterified humans were like when they were alive, which would have assuaged a lot of their doubts regarding what exactly these sickly greenish-black corpses were like.

Another mystery was how on Earth the board of the entrance gate to the town reached the first floor. While it was true that the dungeon was not exactly the most stable or normal environment, there was absolutely no way that such a thing could happen normally.

The tragedy of the town of Veril was once more brought into the spotlight as the many people who had a connection to the town, be it having family members or having been born and brought up in the town of Veril. The many thousands of people who had lost loved ones, and their homes entered mourning as another day of remembrance was declared.

On the other hand, Rui and Kane continued their adventure as the two of them ventured down the Shionel Dungeon.

"Why do you insist on exploring tunnels that end in a dead-end?" Kane frowned as they hit another dead-end. "You know that there isn't anything worth here, yet you insist reach them to the very end."

This was something that Rui had insisted on doing very frequently, earning the ire of Kane. He couldn't see why Rui would go out of his way to do such a seemingly futile action. What was the point in exploring something one knew would not give one what they desired?

"That map I owe Guildmaster Bradt isn't going to draw itself," Rui calmly replied. "Have you forgotten that I'm mapping the entirety of the Shionel Dungeon? That means that I at the very least need to sense every nook and cranny of the entire dungeon at some point."

"Ah, right, Still, that can be done organically when we eventually clear the entire dungeon, right?" Kane asked him. "You're kind of being redundant wasting time exploring places you would eventually explore anyway, so why not just give Guildmaster Bradt frequent updates of the parts of the dungeon that you've naturally mapped?"

"Because that would also tell Guildmaster Bradt about our routes in the Shionel Dungeon," Rui calmly explained. "If I only give him information that I have mapped during our natural exploration paths, then he can figure out exactly what routes we've been using this entire time when he figures out the radius of my sensory range based on the limits of the information I give him."

Kane hadn't realized this. "That does make sense. But it's almost impossible in a practical sense to actually use that against us."

"You'd generally be correct," Rui replied. "But that doesn't apply to Guildmaster Bradt. The man is fiendishly shrewd and devious. Furthermore, he had access to practically endless wealth and power within the Shionel Confederation. All he needs is a single opening to exploit and he could very soon be on our asses."

"Damn, that's something I would rather avoid,"

"As would I," Rui smiled wryly. "That's why I'm going out of my way to explore other parts of the Shionel Dungeon so I can supply him with mapped information outside of our routes so that he won't be able to exploit it. It's worth taking such precautions. I've met both Guildmaster Bradt and Chairman Deacon in person, and trust me, there's no such thing as being too careful when it comes to tangling with those two."

Kane nodded appreciatively. He knew that if he had been running this operation instead of Rui, he probably would have long been caught by Guildmaster Bradt and Chairman Deacon long ago. He was not qualified to compete with these political titans of the Shionel Confederation. Hell, ordinarily, no Martial Artist would have anywhere near the necessary competencies with them.

But Rui was probably the only Martial Artist that defied this pattern. Despite being a young Martial Squire who had dedicated his life to Martial Art, in Kane's eyes he possessed almost otherworldly insight that compensated for his lack of a background in these fields.