The Martial Unity

It had been a long time since Rui had looked back to the past so deeply. The reason he avoided doing so was not because he was running away from the past.

No.

It was not that he was avoiding the past, it was that he was too focused on the future. 

He had a Martial Path to tread. He had a Martial Art to grow. A higher Realm of power beckoned to him. That was why he didn't have time to wallow in the past. of course, he didn't forget it, but it had been a long time since he was immersed in it.

That was why he felt overwhelmed when he revisited his previous life. It made him boundlessly grateful for everything he had in this life.

A healthy body.

An extraordinary mind.

Priceless memories of his previous life which not only contained invaluable knowledge and experience, but also contained the magnum opus of his previous life; the VOID algorithm, and his lifelong ambition that became his Martial Path.

He went from struggling to breathe to gaining the power to deprive an entire town of air and then destroy that town with a single breath. It was a stark contrast that surpassed anything he could have ever imagined.

'Alright, back to the topic.' He heaved a sigh, getting rid of all superfluous thoughts. 'My memories are a powerful base for the manipulation of my opponent's mind.'

He only needed to gather all his memories of suffering from asthma, which was a lot, and then refine and distill the suffering caused by strained breathing, and then embody that image. 

Once again, he needed to make sure that he extracted purely the suffering of his asthmatic attacks from his memories and ensured nothing else came along. The more irrelevant information came along, the greater the dilution of the image, causing the technique to be less effective.

If he wanted to cause the maximum impact, he would need to go through every single memory he had of an asthmatic experience, and then distil all of those away from the irrelevant information of his memories, and then refine and distil all of those into a single video.

'This time, the video can't be visual, I suppose it will have to be another sensory track.' Rui noted. 

After all, nobody visually saw themselves breathing, so there was no point in creating a visual image. Breathing was felt more than anything else. Thus he would need to create a sensory track rather than a video. 

That was new. He didn't know how to go about it since on Earth, people could produce visual data through images and videos on a screen, but there was no such thing as touch communication technology.

Or rather, there was, but it was cutting-edge and highly niche. Certainly nothing that he had ever come across before. There were no established variables like frame rate or definition that could be numerically measured, he wasn't even sure if he could develop them.

'It's not worth going down that rabbit hole, I'll have to rely on my mind alone. As long as I create it, it will forever be stored in my Mind Palace.' Rui mused.

As high as his ability to create and refine images was, scouring through his entire life and distilling painful memories into a single embodiment for the hypnosis technique was not easy, even for Rui. It would take quite some time.

Especially when he had four other projects to work on, however, he had a very solid direction to go in. Thus, he was quite satisfied with how this technique project was going to unfold.

Another technique that he was quite satisfied with was the maneuvering-sabotage technique. For this technique, he would need to spend quite some time thinking back to his experiences of mastering the Forestep technique in the Shionel Confederation.

These memories were not nearly as rich and wide as his memories of hampered breathing, but they worked fine otherwise. He had struggled a lot with trying to keep his mind up with the sheer speed of his body.

Furthermore, every time he used the Void Forestep technique, his actual reactions and processing couldn't keep up with his own movements, he relied on thoughtless reflexes and predictions to use it. Thus he had many memories of it to rely on.

Thus the maneuvering-sabotage mental technique was quite satisfactory as well.

'The only one that isn't quite satisfactory is the defense-sabotage hypnotic technique.' Rui sighed.

The only feasible idea he had was pain induction. But that was a little dull as far as he was concerned.

'If I have to use pain, then I'm going to have to go all out.' Rui narrowed his eyes. 'The greatest pain that all Martial Artists past the Apprentice Realm have felt.'

The Squire evolution breakthrough process. It was easily far and away the most painful experience he had ever had in either life. It was most certainly a dark memory in the minds of all those who had experienced it. 

It was the price of the power of the Squire Realm, in addition to the risk of life.

'That could be worth it, but the pain was so extraordinary that it's hard to recall it precisely and accurately.' Rui mused. 

Still, if he was going to go for pain, then he would not stand to go for anything less than the highest pain imaginable.

'That's set then.' Rui mused. 

That left the self-hypnosis upgrade for the Godspeed technique so that he could get rid of the Forestep technique. 

Self-hypnosis was different from the other technique, it involved willingly removing the guard of the consciousness while impacting one's own subconsciousness. The issue with self-hypnosis was reaching a level of proficiency such that one could execute then and there on the spot in the middle of a battle.

Considering the nuances and challenges of all four technique projects, he knew that it was not going to take a short amount of time. Regardless, given his affinity for mental techniques, he wanted to be thorough rather than quick.