Regardless, he didn't necessarily resist learning more about the Martial Contest.
The contest was limited to the Lower Realms. The difficulty of holding a contest grew astronomically with each Realm.
Martial Apprentices were by far the easiest to hold a contest surrounding due to how grounded and shackled by conventional human limits they were. This meant that important aspects of the planning such as infrastructural constraints, observation viability, spectator safety, battlefield volume, etc., were all much easier to handle. You could have a large number of spectators fit in within a reasonable amount of area that was reasonably close to the battle arena, and they would be able to follow the fight to just barely enough of a degree where they would be entertained. It was possible to shield even a large audience from the Apprentice-level techniques and ensure their safety with ease.
With Martial Squires, that was increasingly more difficult to achieve. Martial Squires fought over increasingly larger ranges, and over larger areas. An ordinary battle arena was not enough for them.
That was why even the battle arenas of the Floating Sect were more than a kilometer in diameter to be able to accommodate all ranges of Martial Squires. Normal humans couldn't even perceive the entirety of such a battle arena at once with their senses. Furthermore, spectator safety was much costlier.
It meant that the number of spectators who could even afford to witness the battle between Martial Squires was limited to wealthier and upper-class connoisseurs of Martial Art.
If the Apprentice-level contest was treated as an event for commoners and middle-class folks, then the Squire-level was for the wealthy.
The Senior-level contest for even more so. It was for the top one percent of society.
The Virodhabhasa Faith did not even bother with Martial contests for the upper Realms. It simply became far too unviable to be able to actually execute in practice. Rui couldn't even imagine trying to set up a Martial Contest for Martial Masters.
He had no idea what Martial Masters were actually capable of, but if the previous gap between Realms was capable of an indication of anything, then they were bound to possess a level of strength that Rui ought to find impossible to even wrap around his head.
Regardless, he was most interested in the Squire-level contest out of all three. According to the information provided by the guides that the staff member had supplied him, there were one thousand Virodhabhasa Church towns, just like this one across the entire continent!
That was a staggering number, one that made Rui double-take in shock.
That would mean the Virodhabhasa Faith had infested the entire continent from end to end.
('No wonder Guildmaster Bradt did not list all Virodhabhasa Church towns, that would been a redundantly long list.') Rui mused. He was grateful that the man had referred him to only one Church town.
Regardless, that meant that there going to be a huge number of representatives at the actual contest. This was unexpected as when Rui had partaken in the Kandrian Martial Contest, he had only had to face fifteen other representatives from the different Martial Academies spread throughout the Kandrian Empire.
It turned out that while the Martial Union copied the Virodhabhasa Faith but to a much lesser degree.
('This is going to be far harder than the Kandrian Martial Contest was,') Rui mused.
The sheer pool of Martial Squires from which the champion would emerge meant that whoever the champion was would have the capital to be the strongest Martial Squire. It was a task of extraordinary difficulty.
Yet the results and rewards from the victory were bound to be absolutely phenomenal. No force would want to yield a Martial Squire that powerful to anybody else. After all, power as a Martial Squire correlated with synergy between technique, Martial Body, and Martial Path, which came with creating or customizing techniques for one's self, or individuality, which was necessary for the higher Realms.
Thus the strongest Martial Squire was also the likeliest Martial Senior in the future, especially in a setting like this. It wasn't guaranteed, of course, there were other variables that affected whether a Martial Squire would become a Martial Senior.
Still, aiming for the high-probability crop was the best way to get one's Martial Seniors. Rui learned that much of the audience of the Squire-level contest were scouts or third parties that were interested in buying the most promising Martial Squires.
The majority of the Martial Artists that wandered into a Virodhabhasa Church Town were generally traveling nomadic Martial Artists who did not have fixed inclinations, and thus could potentially be swayed by interested employers and patrons.
That was one of the reasons the Virodhabhasa Faith received a flood of spectators every time it held a Martial Contest during its Martial Festival at the Squire and Senior levels.
"When is it being held?" Rui asked out of the blue, interrupting her long religious spiel.
"It will be held a little over a year from now," She explained, smiling reverentially.
"And there are stands advertising it already?" Rui frowned.
"We wish to spread the message to as many Martial Artists as possible so that they learn of the contest and choose to partake," She explained with a well-meaning smile.
That was quite some dedication to the event, it meant that they were extremely interested in ensuring that all the Martial Squires in all of the church towns partake in the Martial Contest.
Rui shook his head. "I see, I appreciate the information but I shall take my leave for now."
He left the stand as he headed towards the main church that half functioned as a place of worship but also served as an official place to house the management of the town. After all, no amount of faith was going to run a town and manage the many things that needed to be managed.
Regardless, he was there to actually evaluate what it would take to achieve what he wanted to achieve.
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