The Martial Unity

Five hundred meters.

Two hundred meters.

One hundred meters.

Fifty meters.

Ten meters.

Just when it was ten meters away from the herd, Rui was already in crouched tensed position, waiting for the right moment to use Balanced Direction, Parallel Walk and Outer Convergence to leap towards it.

And there it was.

The ground trembled, and a meter away from herd, a huge bump emerged.

Five meters in length, five pairs of limbs, scales covering its entire body. But that was not the most eye-drawing part of the beast.

It had a single big eye, and a circular mouth that expanded immensely to reveal jagged razor-sharp teeth within as multiple tentacle-like tongues protruded out.

It looked like a monster created by a character design department of a horror film that were allocated far too much time and money to make the monster look as grotesque and terrifying as possible.

It was the first time that Rui had seen such a grotesque creature in either of his lives.

Rui immediately began recording from the eco-survey device, relieved that he had effectively fulfilled the first objective of the mission. The eco-survey device was strapped onto his body, a feature that made it convenient to carry around and use immediately when needed, allowing it to witness everything that Rui did.

Rui waited for it to consume, at the very least, one beast. He wanted to document its consumption to verify that this beast was in fact the beast responsible for the mass-hunting of the herbivorous population of the Shaia Plains.

('Nice, nailed it.') Rui thought ecstatically as he watched the beast consume a gazelle in seconds, as its acidic saliva decomposed the deer's flesh into a gooey sap which was sucked in immediately.

A living gazelle was reduced to a skeletal carcass in less than a second.

This was when Rui decided to jump in. He clutched the standard-issue tracking device and leapt towards the beast with Apprentice-level techniques. The beast in turn froze as it detected powerful seismic radiation from very close by. It tilted its head in the direction of the source of the seismic radiation.

BOOM

Rui landed ten meters away from it, grinning in ecstasy and flinching in disgust at the beast's appearance.

The beast on the other hand, did not look pleased, if it was capable of making expressions in the first place. It was an apex predator as well, even if it avoided other predators, that was to minimize risk, not because it was incapable of winning. There were very few predators in the Shaia Plains more dangerous than itself.

But Rui was a Martial Apprentice, and was entirely focused on the beast in front of him. The weight of his mind pushed on the beast's mind, making it wary.

Every sentient living being had a nascent instinctual sixth sense, if it could be called that, as a result of evolution. This sixth sense was a result of subconscious analysis and evaluation of the risk and danger.

Right now, the beast's instincts were warning it that as tiny as the little pup of a creature Rui was, it was dangerous.

The beast struggled to make a decision. One on hand, the gazelles had already fled away and its meal had been interrupted, evoking its primal rage and unsated hunger, on the other, fighting someone as strong as Rui in its current hungered state was even more dangerous.

('It's more rational than I expected.') Rui noted. The beast had simple stared at him with its giant wide eye.

Suddenly, the beast retreated, as it faced Rui.

('It's really gonna run away? That is incredibly rational.') Rui cursed, he'd hoped the beast would attack him.

Still, Rui had anticipated this, and prepared a contingency.

The beast dug mud at an immense speed, using its saliva to break down the resistance in order to speed up the process.

But Rui was even faster.

He pressed a button on a device he had obtained with the explosives from the Ministry of Ecology and Environment.

It was a detonator, a detonator that detonated all the explosives he had obtained from the Ministry of Ecology and Environement.

Of course, most of the explosives he had obtained had long been detonated before to guide the beast into coming here, but there were a set of explosives Rui had not yet detonated.

These explosives were placed ten meters deeps outside the grazing they were in.

The detonator was triggered, the beast froze.

Rui grinned. "That's right... Don't go there, there's danger there, come here instead."

The objective of the detonated explosives was to prevent the beast from retreating by placing the explosives in such a way that would fool the seismic sense and the beast's limited intelligence that there were threats underground capable of producing such seismic radiation.

The beast dug itself out of the ground, a faint look of fear could be seen on its face. When did so many predators enter the Shaia Plains? It didn't understand. Its limited intelligence associated all intense seismic radiation with threats.

The only safe way out of the Shaia Plains were on land, in its mind.

And this was all part of Rui's big plan.

FWHOOSH

Rui dashed towards the beast at incredibly high speeds with all of his Apprentice-level techniques, and as he anticipated, the beast turned away, moving remarkably fast even on land.

But not as fast it was underground, and not as fast as Rui was.

He immediately caught up and tagged the beast with the standard-issue reconnaissance tracker that the Martial Union and the ministry had provided him.

The reason he hadn't done it earlier was because he wasn't sure the tracker would remain intact when the beast attempted to escape when it began digging, since he assumed the tracker was almost certainly not built for high-intensity subterranean rigour.

But now that the beast was escaping on land out of fear of the strange subterranean predators that had surrounded the land there was no problem placing the tracker.

"The hunt has begun." Rui grinned, as he chased after the beast.