Chapter 4566 Old Friends

Soon enough, the time for the meeting came. Rui sat on a chair before a mirror while a grooming team mended his appearance, garbing him in fresh royal attire. He simply heaved a tired sigh as he contemplated ditching this and running away, but ultimately decided not to. He didn't want to be known as a man-child of an Emperor.

It hadn't been his idea in the first place.

"Honestly, what were you thinking, trying to go to an important inter-civilizational conference without the appropriate grooming?" The voice of his sister drew his attention.

He turned to spot Ru staring at him with a critical gaze, her arms folded.

Given that this meeting was a more formal meeting, he decided not to go alone since the other sides were going to bring along a convoy of advisors along with them. It would not reflect well on his status as the anointed representative of a civilization for him to come in looking like he represented himself.

Normally, even sovereigns had caucuses and factions and bases of power who would send representatives with him to serve as advisors and whatnot, but Rui couldn't be bothered with trying to get the others on board.

Even though human civilization was a remarkably diverse civilization without stuffy centralized control, he was still acknowledged as the de facto and de jure leader of the entire civilization. Nobody disputed that he was the only person who had the ability to represent all civilizations fairly.

This came from the fact that, when he had the opportunity to dominate all of them, he chose not to and instead allowed them to develop remarkably freely and deal with them quite fairly. Thus even when the dwarves got their own Transcendents, Emperor Ranoua didn't feel the need to call up Rui and try and leverage their new Transcendent to re-negotiate more power.

Rui's existence had become a totemic pillar for the entire civilization such that he could represent everybody himself and nobody, not even the Evolutionary Army, would object. He had brought Ru on board, giving her an information package with all the relevant information to memorize and comprehend before she could join him as a second.

"They're aliens, Ru," he told his little sister. "They don't give a damn if my hair is combed or not. We're not of the same species, so aesthetic considerations are only for our satisfaction, not theirs."

"That is not a good rationale. Even if they are aliens, they can still tell whether or not you have put effort into your appearance," she remarked with a disapproving tone of voice. "Hair, fur- these are convergent evolutionary traits that are universal."

She wasn't wrong. The arakai had fur, and his investigations revealed that they liked to keep it groomed. And even the information on the dessandrites he had gathered from o-o-o-o's memories revealed that the dessandrites liked to keep their feathers directionally continuous.

Animals across the animal kingdom liked to keep their fur groomed; there was simply a pleasure to order that seemed to transcend species and even neurology.

Rui simply heaved a sigh, allowing the grooming team to finish their work before they finally propped the Royal Crown on his head to finish his appearance.

Rui simply stared at his appearance for several moments. On the one hand, he could appreciate how good his refined appearance looked. On the other hand, he didn't like it. It didn't suit him the way his Martial attire did. Or at the very least, he found it difficult to relax in this appearance.

Despite the fact that he had been groomed in this manner many a time in the past eighteen years, he never fully got used to it. It made him remember his thoughts of abdicating the throne because it had increasingly become a burden rather than something that spurred his growth as a Martial Artist, as it had after he became a Transcendent.

He simply shook his head, getting up. "Let's go."

Of course, the preparations needed to get to a distant star system were enormous, and he didn't look forward to it. They mobilized the best Royal ship, commissioned from the dwarves, meant to carry royalty from place to place. This was most utilized by Ru and Ranea when they traveled across human civilization to the many planets that the Kandrian Empire had colonized. Rui simply teleported wherever he needed to go, but he couldn't do that this time.

Along with him came two Martial Sages, just to showcase what warriors of human civilization looked like.

"Your Majesty, it has been a while." The voice of Sage Zentra made Rui smile as they made their way to the teleportation portal in the Royal Palace.

The man wore a crisp, groomed appearance with Martial attire bearing the crest of the Royal Family on its chest. His beard was maintained with consistency even at the micro-scale, although it had gained a tinge of gray that it hadn't had when he had first met the Martial Sage many decades ago.

Not even Martial Artists were immune to aging.

"How have you been, Rui!" Sage Ceeran grinned, waving at him. He had remained as jovial as he used to be, still a member of the Martial Union who served the Royal Family.

"It's good to see you two. It's been, what, a whole year?" Rui smiled at the two of them, shaking their hands.

Ru schooled her expression, trying to hide her disapproval of the lack of protocol in all three of them. This was not how Martial Sages serving the Kandrian Empire ought to interact with the Emperor, but she knew better than to voice her opinion this time.

Rui chatted with his two friends as they made their way to the Royal teleportation portal, catching up with old friends. His job as Emperor had caused him to grow estranged from a lot of the Martial community, since he would often spend time in his office or by himself with his family.

"The two of you didn't get assigned to the space force for the upcoming war?" Rui raised an eyebrow. "That's interesting."

"My specialization is useless in space," Ceeran replied with a depressed tone of voice. "With no medium, heaven-based projectiles are useless. Sigh, if I had known that we would become a space-faring civilization this quickly, I might have chosen to alter the developmental trajectory of my Martial Art."

Rui's smile grew bittersweet. He wasn't alone in being reduced in usefulness in the space age. Unfortunately, such was the development of a civilization. As it grew more sophisticated, things that used to be cornerstones were no longer nearly as useful as they used to be, many times being made obsolete.

There were a lot of Martial Artists who had been rendered obsolete; entire sects had been reduced in importance in the Era of Expansion. The Heaven Sect, which once was a powerhouse in the Panama Continent, had gone into a downward decline in the past thirteen years. It was no longer even considered a powerhouse.