Rui's plan was straightforward.
He would employ his Mind Mask technique and diminish his presence to an Apprentice level and his appearance and identity with a mask. The Martial Apprentices all wore masks anyway as Martial Apprentices normally did, so there was nothing suspicious or abnormal about that.
The Martial Apprentices had all been debriefed about his presence in the operation. However, they had all been informed very firmly that Rui would not divulge his power until the Martial Squire appeared. He would be operating at the level of a modern grade-ten Martial Apprentice of the Martial Union. When, and only when the Martial Squire from the K'ulnen Tribe would be deployed would he intervene and fight with them.
They were to retreat when that happened, for they could all potentially die being near the fight between Martial Squires.
('Not that it will even reach that stage,') Rui kept that thought to himself. If his plan worked out, then he would achieve the most shocking victory a Martial Squire could have over one of their peers.
Of course, this wasn't that easy given that he wasn't all-powerful within the Squire Realm like he used to be in the later years of his time in the Apprentice Realm. He was in grade-four, perhaps verging on grade five.
The natural growth of the Martial bodies due to evolved muscle hypertrophy and enhanced cell adaptability meant that the strains that came with subjecting the body to training and combat made the Martial body stronger that was one of the reasons that the Squire Realm was so much larger than the Apprentice Realm, the body was a constant, rather than a variable, in the Apprentice Realm. What didn't kill a Martial Squire always made them stronger in the long run.
('Still, it's not like they're going to send in their top Martial Squires just to protect their Martial Apprentices from a losing battle against other Martial Squires,') Rui noted. ('It's quite likely they'll send in someone on the lower half of the grades of the Squire Realm. Which means it isn't likely that I'll be overwhelmed in a fight.')
Soon enough, it was time for the preparations for the operation to begin immediately.
Rui entered the military facility in the outer ring of the settlement, heading to the dispatch grounds.
The gathered Martial Apprentices bowed to him.
"Not anymore, no," Rui replied, before adjusting his mind mask to diminish his presence to the peak of the Apprentice Realm. "I'm a Martial Apprentice for the time being. Treat me that way."
This was a little hard for the Martial Apprentices. They all gazed at Rui with awe and admiration in their eyes. After all, at this point, there wasn't a single Martial Apprentice that hadn't heard of the great Rui Quarrier. There were many rumors and legends floating around him in many circles. He was the reason that the Martial Union adjusted the grading standards for Martial Apprentices. He killed a Martial Squire with his team. He was the reason the Kandrian Empire won the Serevian War.
Once all the preparations were done, they simply left the settlement, heading towards the K'ulnen Tribe at a solid pace.
('They should be getting ready in a hurry by now,') Rui noted calmly.
All the Martial tribes had scouts watching all of the others. Their means of surveillance were much more primitive than that of the Martial Union, but they were still enough to get the job done. It would be impossible even for the Martial Union to dispatch such a large force without the K'ulnen Tribe realizing what was going on.
('A little over ten minutes to the tribe at this rate, though we will be intercepted by a force sooner than that,') Rui mused.
The speed at which they were running meant that even ten minutes was a huge distance between the two tribes was quite large, it was just that with how fast Martial Apprentices were, that distance was quite manageable to run across.
"I sense something," Rui said calmly as they were running.
Even if he was going to limit his aura and combat prowess to the Apprentice level, there was no way that he could suppress his own senses. He could sense far beyond any of the Martial Apprentices in their forces.
"How far away sir?" One of the Martial Apprentices asked.
"Four minutes," Rui replied. "Their force isn't as large as that of ours. Maybe about five to ten percent lower than that of ours. Hm."
This was a good sign. Not just because they were likelier to win, but also because it meant that they really were being stretched by conflict in three ways. It seemed as though they were hitting their limits with Martial capital.
The force they gathered was the bare minimum to ensure that a loss wasn't guaranteed.
('That means the likelihood of a Martial Squire being dispatched is quite high,') Rui noted.
No group, Martial tribe or otherwise, could afford to lose too many Martial Apprentices. Although a single Martial Squire would win against even dozens of Martial Apprentices, that did not make a single Martial Squire more valuable than dozens of Martial Apprentices.
Martial Apprentices were all, in some ways, Squire candidates in a sense. In the future, dozens of Martial Apprentices would yield a few Martial Squires. In the long run, the value of Martial Apprentices exceeded their combat prowess alone due to their potential to discover their Martial body and enter a higher realm of power.
The K'ulnen tribe was the same, they would not allow their Martial Apprentices to get butchered, and hence would send in reinforcements capable of helping and saving them; Martial Squires.
('When that happens, I'm going to kill them so quick they won't know what hit them... Literally.')
Soon enough, the two forces ran into each other.
The Martial Apprentices paused the moment they sensed them, before retreating slowly. They each began firing long-range attacks at their opponents from a great distance. A flurry of wings, sounds, and even rocks flew forward as the battle began.