Capítulo 57: Kandrian Power Dynamics
It was truly a fascinating tale to Rui. Just from this information alone, he realized how wise the Martial Union's decision to educate students on the context of the state of affairs was.
('The best way for history to repeat itself is to have those of the future forget about the past.') Rui mused. Although he suspected that the relationship between Martial Artists and the state was likely not pleasant, this made him realize how much he underestimated the issue.
('Ruling entities probably fear and disdain Martial Artists because of the tilt in the balance of power that Martial Artists cause, yet they not only cannot do anything to the Martial Artists because of foreign pressure, but actively need the power of Martial Artists to deter external enemies.') Rui realized.
('On the other hand, the Martial Artists resent sovereign states for their desire to suppress them, but need cooperate for the same reasons the ruling entities do; external pressure.')
Of course, Rui was cognizant that the reality of the matter was likely much more complicated. His understanding was likely an oversimplification of the issue. Furthermore, it was obvious that he had incomplete information. There was no way that the Martial Academy would reveal the true state of affairs and political machinations of the Union and Royal Family.
He would likely learn more about them if he grew stronger, and ascended to higher realms.
The next few portions and sections of his theoretical curriculum focused more on the Kandrian Empire and Kandrian Martial Union rather than delving deeper into the state of affairs of the Panama Continent.
The Martial Union was founded almost four hundred years ago, although it had a very different shape and form back then. The Kandrian Empire, like many surviving sovereign states of the Warring Era decided to opt for a state of co-existence and cooperation with the Martial Artists.
The Martial Union and the Royal Family forged and signed the Kandrian Martial Treaty, a declaration of peace, cooperation and an alliance. They also signed the Kandrian Martial Convenant; a contract that specified the terms and condition of cooperation.
The conditions and stipulations were explored in the textbook. The Convenant contained several clauses that meticulously established premises and context for the terms and conditions, before delving into them. This was to ensure there was no legal wiggle room or loopholes that either party could exploit to their advantage at the cost of the other.
The actual terms and conditions were remarkably similar. The first clause was about National defense. The Royal Family paid a huge sum of money as an annual commission to the Martial Union, in exchange for assistance with continuous and routine reinforcement, surveillance and patrolling of borders.
Another clause was related to the terms and conditions the Martial Union and the Royal Family agreed to in the event of a war or an invasion. Although there were actually a lot of conditions and premises, what it essentially boiled down to was that the Martial Union was willing to defend the Kandrian Empire for a vast amount of money and other resources, while still reserving the right to withdraw from the war, under certain conditions.
If the situation ever escalated to mass ruin, then the Martial Union did not want to be dragged down with the Kandrian Empire!
A sovereign state was nothing without a territory, but unions were much more flexible, if the worst were ever to come, moving house was not an impossibility.
There were several more clauses that all basically boiled down to the Martial Union aiding the country in matters of national interest, in exchange for money, resources and other exclusive privileges and benefits.
It was a very complex exchange dynamic.
This Convenant actually provided the Martial Union with a huge portion of its net revenue. The sheer wealth that the Royal Family was capable of splurging made even the mighty Martial Union look modest and humble.
Underneath all this convoluted and complex agreements was a sense of fragility, or atleast so Rui thought. Just looking at the contract gave him the feeling that the two parties were unwilling and reluctant to cooperate, but forced to do so due to numerous circumstances.
Still, just because they did agree to cooperate, doesn't mean there was true peace between them, at the very least Rui was absolutely certain there was no way that this could be the case.
If there ever came a day where either the Royal Family or the Martial Union grew weak or fell for power, he was sure that both parties would have absolutely no problem exploiting and dominating the other for the maximum utility they possibly could.
Considering this, the existence of the Martial Academies made more sense. The most immediate threat to the Martial Union was all around them. Furthermore, the nature of the Martial Art was such that the Martial Union would inevitably grow weaker with time gradually. Many Martial Artists died every year in the field completing missions, meaning, unless the rate of emergence of new Martial Artists was equal to, or ideally, greater than the rate of death of Martial Artists and the rate of retirement of Martial Artists, then the Martial Union would eventually grow weaker and perhaps even be pushed back by the Kandrian Empire.
Although Martial Artists were strong, the biggest disadvantage was that they were difficult to produce. Producing even a Martial Squire was very difficult, only those with talent and drive had the potential to become Martial Squires, and even then, only a small fraction of these candidates would end up becoming martial Squires. Furthermore, this would only happen several years after the process had initially begun.
('The ranks above Martial Squire must be even more difficult and time consuming.') Rui realized.
In comparison to the Kandrian Empire whose military and technological might was something that could much easily be replenished and strengthened with funds and resources.
Facing such an uphill battle when it came to maintaining and sustaining power, it was no wonder the Martial Union went all out on the Martial Academies! These institutions were a lifeline that allowed the Martial Academy to be able to maintain high militaristic strength.
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Capítulo 58: Additional nuances
The textbook soon began talking about more practical, down-to-earth matters. Specifically, the occupation of being a licensed Martial Artist. The Martial Union was basically a liaison between customers who wanted to hire Martial Artists, and the Martial Artists themselves. However, not every Martial Artist could complete every mission.
Either they were too weak, or their Martial Art and skillset didn't match with the pre-requisites of the mission, etc.
Thus, the Martial Union divided missions by type and difficulty.
There were five ranks to difficulty, and each corresponded with the first five Realms of Martial Art; Apprentice, Squire, Senior, Master, Sage. Interestingly enough, the Martial Union didn't have Transcendent ranked missions, though the reason for this was not specified.
A ranked mission of a particular Realm was a mission whose difficulty was such that; one or multiple Martial Artists of that Realm could complete the mission. An Apprentice-ranked Mission was a mission that one or more Apprentices could complete.
This was to ensure that Martial Artists were assigned mission that was within their ability. It made no sense to assign a Martial Apprentice a Senior-ranked Mission, while giving a Senior an Apprentice-ranked mission.
('Makes sense.') Rui nodded.
Missions were also divided by their type because of this reason. The skillsets needed for different missions all required different skillsets and Martial Art.
Thus, the Martial Union divided missions into the following four classes;
Offense; These were missions that usually required launching an attack on a person, group of people or location with the goal of capturing, incapacitating or killing their opponents.
Defense; These were missions that required the protection of a person, group of people or location with the from harm.
Hunting; A large portion of the Kandrian Empire was uninhabited nature, furthermore a large portion of the Panama continent was uninhabited and unexplored. There large amounts of resources within the fauna, flora and the land of these uninhabited areas. Most mining and resource enterprises hired commissioned Martial Artists of the Martial Union in procuring high-value high-difficulty resources, before processing and reselling them to manufacturers who required said resources. Furthermore, the uninhabited lands of the Panama Continent contained powerful beast species that often hunted in human habitats. These were all mission classified within the Hunting class.
Covert operations; These missions included any missions that were highly clandestine and furtive in nature. Espionage, reconnaissance, infiltration, extraction, assassination, sabotage etc. were the most common kinds of missions within this class of missions.
Miscellaneous; These included somewhat niche missions, or missions with such low difficulty that any martial Artist could complete them. Things like tutelage, manual labour, demonstrations etc fell into them.
Generally, licensed Martial Artists stuck to usually one, maybe two, classes of missions. Martial Artists who mainly engaged in offense-class missions were called Assaulters, Martial Artists who mainly engaged in defense-class missions were called Defenders, Martial Artists who mainly completed Hunting missions were called Hunters and those who completed covert missions were called Shadows.
('Interesting...') Rui pondered about all this information.
This classification of missions was quite practical, it allowed for a smoother process of mission assignment/choosing for the Martial Union and Martial Artists.
Being made aware of all of this before discovering his Martial Path made a lot of sense in hindsight. He could train knowing what he was getting into. For one, the textbook mentioned the system of parties, which altered his image of how missions were completed.
The Martial Union graded difficulty of a mission even with the established ranks between low-grade, mid-grade and high-grade difficulty. Many missions had a high difficulty even within the realm they were assigned to, meaning it would be extremely difficult and risk for a single Martial Artist to complete them. Thus, licensed and registered Martial Artists could form officially form groups of usually three to five Martial Artists. All one had to is gather the numbers and sign some paperwork before being officially recognized as a Martial Party. This was quite a popular tendency among Martial Artists, as the burden and risk on individual was greatly minimized and divided between five people, allowing them to complete high-grade missions with safety, as much safety as the Martial World would normally have, that is.
This meant that hyper-specializing in a certain field of Martial Art didn't necessarily mean he couldn't apply for different kinds of missions.
This was also another piece of information that was useful to Explorers like himself. There was room for all kinds of Martial Art, the Martial Union wanted Explorers to explore Martial Art knowing the kind of role that Martial Art played in the kinds of missions they would choose.
Rui suspected that he might be an all-rounder, in fact, he suspected he had already discovered a hint of his Martial Path during all the sparring sessions of the Martial Foundation Stage. Though he needed more time to discover and understand more.
Rui closed the textbook. A few hours had passed since he had absorbed himself into all the information he had learnt. His worldview had altered considerably. The new information at hand raised all kinds of new questions.
If Apprentice-level missions existed, and almost all Martial Apprentices were within the Academy, then how did these missions get completed? Were these missions completed by students? This was something that the textbook did not go into. He intended to ask Kane about it when he saw him the next day.
Martial Art could be applied to covert operations in this world? In his previous life, covert operations were performed by state and federal agents trained by the intelligence, law-enforcement and security agencies and bureas of nations. Hand-to-hand combat was a must, but there were many, many other skillsets that these agents were required to master before they could be dispatched on these missions.
Yet it seemed in this world, there existed Martial Art that were singlehandedly suited and capable of performing covert operations.
Rui scratch his head in confusion, was it really possible for a Martial Artist to be a full-fledged Intelligence agent or a covert operative?
This was just one of the many things in this world that defied his expectations and sense of normalcy.
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