The most silent out of all the seven royal factions was, undoubtedly, the Raijun Faction.
Prince Raijun sat at the head of the table, listless.
His eyes were depressed.
His demeanor was soulless.
He glanced around the weakly. "…Have they yet to come? Perhaps they're delayed…"
A weak laugh escaped his mouth.
He had called for a meeting, but a whopping sixty percent of his most invested stakeholders and patrons had chosen to skip it.
Not a single one of the members of the Martial Union had chosen to participate.
When he left the Kandrian Throne Hall two hours prior, he had been extremely determined.
He had been incredibly resolved.
He would not allow the damage to grow too far. He immediately called for a meeting with all his patrons to reaffirm his intention to dedicate his heart and soul to becoming Emperor and turning Kandria into a Martial Supremacist nation.
A strong head-on affirmation was bound to ensure that as few stakeholders would choose to defect.
In fact, while the revelation of Rui's royal bloodship and heirship had shaken him to the very core of his soul, he had taken it in a very positive manner.
A challenge.
He would ensure that not a single one of his stakeholders would leave the meeting with any thoughts of leaving the Raijun faction.
Yet, they never came.
That was when he realized he was truly overcome.
The revelations of Prince Rui's royal bloodship had driven everybody to excitement. This was especially true for the members of the Raijun Faction.
Prince Raijun couldn't even begin to compare to Prince Rui as a Martial Artist.
When it came to Realm, feats and accomplishments, potential and progress, as well as overall utility and competence, Rui was overwhelmingly superior to Prince Raijun.
Everybody knew that.
Before, however, Prince Raijun didn't really care about that. After all, that didn't mean he could ascend the throne.
Now, however, it was all but overwhelmingly relevant.
Any stakeholder and or potential patron would look at both of them as Martial Artist princes and pick Rui Quarrier any time of the day.
Prince Raijun wouldn't even be a Martial Squire if not for Rui aiding him and holding his hand every step of the way all the way to Squire candidacy.
His secretary heaved a sigh. "Your Highness, as informed, they have chosen to skip the meeting to attend the emergency meeting held by the Martial Union."
"Right…" Prince Raijun smiled weakly. "Right. I'm sure they'll be here at the next meeting."
It sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than anything else.
Prince Rui had yet to even announce his bid for the throne, yet people were ready to dive into his faction, a faction that didn't even exist yet!
"Huff…" Prince Raijun heaved a sigh as a hint of hope flashed in his eyes.
He wasn't entirely done.
Not yet.
He had spent enough time with his half-brother to know that the man was certainly not a Martial Supremacist and deeply disliked the philosophy.
'That means that he will not be able to win over the Martial Supremacist Faction much, if at all,' Prince Raijun realized.
After all, why would they support them if he actively worked against their ambition for a Martial Supremacist state?
With that consideration in mind, he didn't think he would lose any support from the Martial Supremacist Faction.
What he was worried about was the progress that he had made rapidly ever since he started progressing towards the Squire Realm and after becoming a Squire.
He had truly begun gaining the approval of many sectors of the Martial Union after that recently, and he could lose all of these new bonds now that Rui had been declared royal prince and heir to the Emperor of Kandria.
In hindsight, the lifelong spying on Rui Quarrier was finally deciphered.
How many Martial Sects would favor Prince Raijun over Prince Rui?
It was hard to conceive that even a single one of them would.
In general, it was hard to imagine people favoring a Martial Squire over a Martial Seniors. But it was almost impossible to fathom it when the Martial Squire was a grade-one Martial Squire like Squire Raijun, compared to the youngest Senior in history with a multitude of shocking accomplishments throughout his long life as a Martial Artist.
There was simply no comparison to be made.
Prince Raijun had learned that there were even more shocking accomplishments made by the Martial Senior once the Virodhabhasa Theocracy announced their support for Rui Quarrier, revealing that he was a champion of the Virodhabhasa Martial Contest.
Apparently, he had withstood an attack from a new Martial Senior and walked it off without a single scratch visible on his body.
Prince Raijun had needed to physically suppress his mouth when he learned about that, lest he let out an undignified scream before others.
It simply reaffirmed the fact that Rui Quarrier was a Martial Artist who was cut from a different cloth compared to his peers. It could be said that he was truly the strongest Martial Squire of his generation before breaking through to the Senior at the tender age of twenty-three.
And now, at the age of thirty-one, he was already a powerful high-grade Martial Senior.
Prince Raijun simply didn't understand how a single Martial Artist was able to progress at such an absurd speed.
This was especially the case when the age he broke through to the Apprentice and Squire Realms, while impressive and optimistic, were definitely not too infrequent. It was as though he accelerated the stronger he got.
This was the opposite of what was usually the norm. Martial Artists tended to slow down relatively the stronger they got. Yet, looking at how each feat that Rui Quarrier accomplished seemed to be more impressive than the rest, Prince Raijun only grew more fearful of what his half-brother would go on to accomplish later on in life.
The more remarkable he was, the more the Martial Union would be irresistibly drawn to him. Prince Raijun could only envision how much harder things were going to get.
