In the northwest of Zauberia stood a thousand-metre-tall snow-white tower between the Missia, Dexa, and Ingrid isles, also known as the Three Western Isles. The location was regarded as a continent by ordinary people, whereas casters and knights just regarded it as the centre of the isles.

The huge, white tower was the Sanctum. There was a giant forest underneath the Sanctum, which was inhabited by many high-rank and peaked-rank major monsters, among which level-one and level-two major monsters were either used as watchdogs for the Sanctum or resources for the casters’ experiments.

At the bottom of the Sanctum was a disc-shaped building, through which casters came and left. Almost all of them were high-rank Lehrlings, but there were also many Magisters among them. This was the academy of the Sanctum, and the Magisters were the mentors for the high-rank Lehrlings. There were casters living on each floor of the Sanctum. The strength of the casters increased the higher the floor.

In the circular conference room on the 436th floor, there were more than a dozen casters, all dressed in robes and hats. Some had a ball of flame on their lower body instead of legs and some of their bodies were made out of white crystals. There were even a few of them who didn’t look like humans at all as they either had a spider head or a blank, featureless face. They all looked really weird and horrifying. Fortunately, these casters were special cases. Most of the casters still looked like human beings.

“Meister Banam’s order has been passed down from the spatial fortress. Centauria needs a division of one million slaves soldiers and two thousand casters to participate in the battle. Who’s interested in joining?” asked an old man in a black robe with a hoarse voice that sounded like coarse iron scraping. His whole body was shrouded by black mist and nobody could see how he looked like, no matter how close they were to him.

Everyone in the conference room looked at each other, and no one said anything. A while later, an old lady with spots on her face said, “I thought Centauria is going to be conquered soon with Meister Banam attacking it personally. Why does he still need reinforcements?”

“It seems like their plane has woken up for a few short seconds." explained the old man.

The conference room fell into silence again. The awakening of a plane could temporarily increase the combat power of its inhabitants by one-third. It would probably take another one or two hundred years for Centauria to be captured.

“What about Botania then?” asked a black crow that stood on the shoulder of a caster. From its expressions and fluent speech, it seemed really intelligent.

“We might have to give up on Botania temporarily as we have to give priority to Banam’s strategy,” said a caster with an upper body of flames but a lower body made out of blocks of ice helplessly.

“Huh, that’s the lesser plane that produces Botanian essence. I’m pretty sure that you, the person who has the body of ice and fire, will be tempted by it.” The crow glanced at the caster in disdain.

“What did those at the Hall of Knights say?” asked another caster in the conference room.

“The Ritter conscripts have already followed Gaia and Zachary to Centauria,” said a caster.

“I’ve heard that they’ve also dispatched half of the Ritters still in probation to Centauria a few days ago.” This was the news that another caster had heard about.

“Are the two centaur gods really that powerful that even Banam, Gaia and Zachary couldn’t take them down after joining forces?”

“Well, their plane did awaken..."

“Even then, that doesn't sound plausible.”

The quiet conference room gradually became as noisy as a wet market. The black-clad old man who conducted this meeting shouted for them to quiet down several times, but it was useless. In the end, a black light radiated from the seal in the old man’s hand, before pin-drop silence filled the conference room.

The black crow’s eyes widened as it looked at the casters around it who had their mouths wide open no sound could be heard. Silent Light was the signature spell of Banam, the owner of this Sanctum and this was only a simplified version of it. Normally, the spell could also freeze the flow of surrounding magic essence, but this version only drowned sound out.

When everyone in the conference room stopped talking, the old man sighed and put the seal away. The black light disappeared along with it as well. The crow and everyone else in the conference room looked at the seal solemnly. It was a token that was given to the old man by Banam, a sign he was in charge of the Sanctum in his absence.

“Here comes the main question. Who wants to participate in the battle of Centauria?” The old man sighed. He didn’t want to be the deputy dean of the academy anymore. It was really tiring, and he could offend people easily. He would rather be in his laboratory instead of the conference room and being involved in these pointless arguments.

“I’ll go!” said a masked caster.

“I’m going too!”

“Me too!”

More than half of the casters who were present raised their hands. A quill appeared in front of the old man and began to write the names down on the parchment scroll by itself.

“The slave division will be formed by recruiting slaves from Shawol and Muslpelheim,” suggested the old man. Nobody raised an objection to it.

When the meeting ended, the old man left the room with the scroll in his hands, and the atmosphere in the room instantly lightened up.

“With eight level-three casters joining, Centauria can probably only hold on for another 100 years at most.” The crow flew around the room, landed on the shoulder of another caster, and began chatting with them.

“So what? The far more valuable Botania slipped through our fingers. Who knows when we’ll be able to capture a plane like that in the future,” said a middle-aged caster in a regretful tone.

“You never know!” The crow widened its eyes and looked around to make sure that no one was looking at them. He then flew towards the middle-aged caster and whispered in his ear, “Don’t forget that Odis is in Three Western Isles.”

“Oh? What news do you have?” The middle-aged caster seemed interested, but the crow didn’t answer. It just squinted its eyes and rubbed its wings arrogantly.