He didn't know how long the battle would continue, or who would emerge victorious, but he did know that if Master Deivon fell too quickly, it was game over. Martial Masters operated in a different dimension of speed and cognition.
Master Deivon had traveled the distance between the Virodha Theocracy and the Seonmun town in less than half a day, a distance that Rui would take weeks to travel.
That meant that he needed Master Deivon to stall Master Uma for quite some time if he wanted to have any chance of getting away. He had already known that Martial Masters possessed sensory ability that was extremely powerful. Their senses were to Martial Seniors what the latter's were to Martial Squires. They were two orders of magnitude higher than Rui, at bare minimum.
The combination of their speed and their senses meant that running away and hiding from them was essentially impossible for Martial Squires unless they had an enormous headstart.
Rui was worried that even a day's headstart would not be enough. She could cover that distance in less than half an hour.
'I just need to have faith in Master Deivon.' Rui gritted his teeth, clenching his fist. "Damn it. Damn it all."
He hated everything about what had just happened.
He was running away.
Again.
All because he was too weak.
So what if he was the strongest Martial Squire? So what if he was the Virodha Champion?
Those titles were worthless.
They simply meant that he was a larger ant than the rest of his peers.
But ant was an ant nonetheless.
He hated it.
He hated every second of it.
He hated being forced to leave behind people he cared for because of his weakness.
He hated his inability.
He hated his insignificance.
'I need power.' His eyes blazed with furious determination and desire.
Never before had he yearned for power in the way that he did at that very moment.
In fact, at that moment, he hardly cared about anything else.
He realized that Project Water was a luxury.
A luxury of the strong.
This was not Earth.
This was Gaia.
In a cruel world filled with violence and war, the weak had no right to pursue such lofty ambitions. Only the strong did.
'If I want to protect myself, my family. If I actually want to fulfill an ambition inherited from another world and another life. Then I need power.'
Every cell in his body roared in agreement as he pushed himself to an absolute limit.
His furiously kicked into action as he rigorously analyzed the most optimal course of action for the current circumstances.
Running away was a mindless action of fear and panic. But to Rui, it was a problem that had an optimal solution.
If he was to get out of this predicament he needed to do everything he possibly could.
'I need a course of action that maximizes the probability of not getting caught by Master Uma regardless of how long Master Deivon manages to stall her.' He sharply analyzed. 'That requires not ever being in the same vicinity as her, since she will be able to distinguish me as a Martial Squire even with a Mind Mask on even if am in disguise.'
Master Deivon had noticed Rui's Mind Mask technique when he was in close proximity to Rui. Thus it stood to reason that Martial Masters possessed a high ability to sense mental techniques at close proximity.
Of course, there was the possibility that they could sense it from much greater ranges as well.
'They also managed to detect Squire Ran's Martial Path cracking.' Rui narrowed his eyes. 'Thus the hypothesis that they can sense abnormal mental phenomena within a radius of a kilometer or so stands to reason.'
It did not mean that they were limited to that, but it was also true that when they did sense the Martial Path cracking, they were already focusing on Squire Ran since their fight was ensuing. That likely made it easier to notice. Based on his interactions with Master Deivon, the nature of the relationship between awareness and consciousness did not change in Martial Masters, they would be too inhuman psychologically if that was the case.
'With that condition set, I need to maximize ways to ensure that she doesn't identify my either through mental means or physical means.'
He glanced at his attire. 'This needs to go.'
If she did manage to eventually defeat Master Deivon and manage to reach close enough to detect Rui, his attire would be a dead giveaway.
'Ironically, this mask needs to go too.' Rui noted. 'It's a liability.'
She knew that he wore a mask that could hamper even Master-level senses. She would be looking for someone who wore that mask.
'I also need to change my hair color, again.'
Those were good measures that he could take to prevent her from identifying him immediately if the worst-case scenario did happen and he did end up within her sensory range.
However, he also needed to take measures to ensure that he didn't end up within the range of her senses in the first place, which meant ensuring that his direction and location eluded her.
'This is much harder.' Rui narrowed his eyes.
At this moment, he was still within the senses of both Master Uma and Master Deivon. He was relatively certain about that.
If he chose to go in a permanent direction at this point, Master Uma would merely need to follow that direction later on at top speed.
Thus, whichever direction he did decide to go, he needed to make sure that he chose to go in that direction after he exited their sensory range. Until then, it was best to just keep running as perfectly straight away from them.
It wasn't until he was a thousand kilometers away a little under fifteen minutes later that he finally paused in a dense jungle, panting as he caught his breath.
Running at the absolute pinnacle top speed that he could muster was very exhausting.
He heaved a sigh, he had a decision to make, and he needed to make it quickly.
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