The Martial Unity

Would three techniques be enough to handle all of his problems? He wasn't sure. He wasn't able to predict the end outcome of a project before he even started it. He could only do his best.

So far, he had a seventy-five percent success rate. Out of the four Martial Art projects that he had set out on, he had successfully completed three of them, while one of them had failed.

That wasn't too bad. He was sure that it was far higher than the average Martial Artist. He highly doubted anybody could create new techniques the likes of which no one had ever seen the way he did thanks to retaining the knowledge of his previous life.

That was reason enough for confidence.

He shook his head, putting aside such superfluous thoughts, before getting back to business.

('One of the biggest problems is the fact that Kane cannot maintain Void Step with two people forever,') Rui sighed.

Kane had once maintained it for twenty-four hours in their mission in the Commonwealth Duchy of Vinfrana in their mission to destroy the research on the Squire evolution breakthrough process. However, that was by himself. It was much more mentally strenuous to misdirect attention from not just himself but also Rui, who was also a Martial Squire.

He would definitely need to take breaks in between. At that time, the two of them could potentially be overwhelmed by a peak Martial Squire or by greater numbers of Martial Squires, or monsters, since there were so many of them.

Then there was also the fact that sensory techniques were hindered by the esoteric properties of the high-density esoteric mineral resources that were predominantly present across the entirety of the vegetation of the dungeon.

He needed to find a way to overcome to obtain an unhampered sensory technique or some way of retaining his ability to sense through the sense-hampering vegetation.

For that, he needed to figure out exactly why senses were being hampered.

According to the intelligence provided by the Martial Union. One's sense of hearing was hampered the most. It was further revealed that sensory techniques based on air and the ground were also quite hindered in comparison.

Furthermore, sensory techniques based on perceiving heat were also highly hampered. The sense that was the most hampered after that was actually the sense of sight. For some reason, even peering through the tunnels was harder than it normally was and their range of vision had been reduced.

According to the Martial Union, the high density of large amounts of esoteric substances was disrupting the flow of energy through which senses and sensory techniques functioned.

('The fact that even infrared vision and normal vision are being affected strongly suggests that the esoteric substances, or at least the ones that are present in this dungeon, can meddle with electromagnetic radiation,') Rui concluded. After all, both those techniques relied on perceiving radiation.

('It's quite likely that my Primordial Instinct will be hampered as well,') Rui sighed.

Primordial Instinct was a powerful technique that had great synergy with him. However, it was a combat-oriented sensory technique, not a long-range technique geared toward surveillance. Of course, it would still be immensely helpful in increasing his likelihood of survival, but he needed something else to be able to help gather information on the Shionel dungeon effectively. He could not afford to be able to go out in the dark inside such a dangerous dungeon.

That was one area he could try and overcome with the help of a technique.

('Alright, that's project number one,')

A project to develop a sensory technique that would allow him to surveil larger amounts of area despite the sensory jamming effect of the Shionel dungeon.

('As for the name… Hm,') Rui thought about it for a second. ('Let's go with Project Eyespy.')

It was a cool quirky name that he took a liking to immediately.

As for how he was going to go about this project, frankly, he wasn't sure. This was the first time that he had started a project for developing a technique whose mechanics and principles he had not even a shred of an idea at this point in time. After all, this was the first time that he had come up with a project out of sheer need rather than an idea that could potentially lead to a project.

This was the case even for his previous project.

Project Wavelap was born with a clear-cut idea for the mechanism of the technique. It relied on the ability to produce supersonic sound that allowed for two separate sound projectiles to meet and overlap in constructive resonance.

The same could be said for his first three projects as well.

For this project though, he had no idea what this technique was going to look like on any level. He just needed it to come to fruition.

('Well, I can work on it in a second after I figure out what I want to do with the remaining two project slots…') Rui pushed it aside for the time being. He could work on it full-fledged once he began all three projects.

The sensory issue was one of the biggest issues of the Shionel dungeon and was one of the largest contributing factors to why the exploration had stalled. With that out of the way, he could focus on handling another issue.

('The monsters,') He sighed.

The VOID algorithm was bad at counter monsters because the adaptive evolution model was not created to address non-human animals. He usually had to toss it out and rely on his own combat sense and intuition as well as his reflexes and instincts to take them down.

Considering that the Shionel Dungeon is infested with beasts and monsters, he could not afford to walk into such a dangerous place with such a shortcoming. He needed a way to mitigate the threat of the beasts without the help of Kane's stealth. Having a strong failsafe would greatly improve their chances of survival and success.