Sovereign of the Ashes

"As a gentleman, you should return these kidnapped magic initiates to where they were originally headed," Lorianne began.

"However, since the Divine Tower of Ashes is currently in urgent need of initiates, I'll pretend I didn't see anything," she said with an angelic smile.

Although there were only about two hundred initiates, it was still a good number for the Divine Tower of Ashes.

At the very least, the hired academy mages now had steady work for the foreseeable future.

Gone were the awkward days when a full-fledged mage had only five initiates to instruct.

Now, each of them had at least ten initiates under their guidance.

Compared to two years ago, the Divine Tower of Ashes had undergone some subtle changes.

For one, it no longer felt so empty. There were more people within the tower now.

The total number of registered mages at the Divine Tower of Ashes currently stood at ninety-six.

Of these, fifty-two were war mages who had joined because of the impending White Sand World War.

Another forty-four had been attracted by the tower's generous offer.

Although fewer than one hundred full-fledged mages might seem a bit underwhelming for a divine tower, the Divine Tower of Ashes had made a solid start.

This was partly due to the war effort drawing attention, and partly thanks to Crescent Bay's gradual integration with the Verdant Wave Canal, which had made travel and communication between Ashenreach and the surrounding regions far more convenient.

Lorianne was confident in Sein's ability to establish a foothold in Ashenreach.

Her confidence did not stem from the region's development potential but purely from her trust in Sein.

This apprentice of hers had already surprised and impressed her many times. She doubted this would be any different.

"Alright then. You'll take over from here. I'm heading back! I still have a few experiments to finish," Lorianne muttered, turning away quickly, almost as if she were afraid Sein might try to make her stay again.

"Come visit again when you have time, Master Lorianne," Sein called out, waving at her.

Lorianne, already airborne, hurriedly transformed into a streak of verdant green light, shooting across the northern sky like a meteor.

***

Upon returning to the Divine Tower, Sein instructed someone to settle the two hundred or so initiates before making his way up to the upper floors.

The Divine Tower of Ashes stood at over four hundred floors—actually on the smaller side by divine tower standards.

Grandmaster Feylis' divine tower had over two thousand floors and could accommodate more than ten thousand full-fledged mages.

Then again, Sein's tower did not follow conventional design logic.

Even though the visible structure above ground was only two thousand meters tall, the space below it was far more extensive.

Master Wenger had designed the tower so that the deeper sections that extended into the underground and magma layers could also serve as living quarters for full-fledged mages.

The areas near the magma, in particular, had a high concentration of pyro elements, making them ideal for Pyromancers to train and conduct experiments.

This was also one of the key features Sein could use to attract more full-fledged mages to the Divine Tower of Ashes.

Since the tower's completion, this was the first time Sein had the opportunity to closely examine its architecture.

For now, there was no need to open up the middle and lower levels of the tower.

The surface structure alone was more than sufficient to house the current number of hired mages, even if each were to occupy an entire floor.

Of course, if any mages applied to move into the lower levels or even the bottom levels near the magma zone, Sein would review those requests on a case-by-case basis.

At the moment, the Divine Tower of Ashes still had too few members to appoint a dean.

As a result, many of the tower's administrative duties still fell to Sein himself as the tower master.

After touring the buildings above ground, Sein continued his inspection down through the underground levels, all the way to the magma layer at the bottom.

The magicoins poured into the project had been well spent.

The elemental pools in the Divine Tower of Ashes had all been completed.

Among them, the pyro and umbra elemental pools were the most numerous and boasted the highest output.

Since the Divine Tower of Ashes had been built atop a planar node, it also received a modest infusion of lumen elemental law, allowing the corresponding elemental pool to produce a respectable amount of energy as well.

The energy generated by these pools not only met the tower's daily consumption needs but could also be refined into a substantial quantity of energy essence.

Many divine towers provided salaries and benefits to their registered mages through the elemental pools, rather than relying solely on loot gathered from interplanar wars.

Naturally, the output of these elemental pools, along with the various lawful resources produced by the divine tower's planar node, was strictly controlled by the tower master.

Others, including the dean, had no authority to interfere.

The dean could only submit a request to the tower master for allocations when the academy was short on operational funds, much like when Sein had once sought funding from Master Dark Flame.

Sein spent a long time at the bottom level of the Divine Tower of Ashes.

The top dozen floors and the bottom dozen floors of the tower were all laboratories reserved exclusively for him.

At the lowest level, where boiling magma and dense pyro elemental energy merged with the help of powerful magic arrays, a crimson-gold ore floated in midair.

This was a lawful material, nurtured directly by the planar node beneath his feet.

Planar nodes, being convergence points of elemental forces and laws, naturally had the potential to produce rare treasures and resources.

The crimson-gold ore before Sein was not fully formed yet.

Nevertheless, as something born from the node of a top-tier plane, it was far superior to most of the rare materials Sein had collected from Faeloria and stored in his space conch.

"Once it's fully formed, it should make a fine material for reinforcing my magic rod," Sein murmured, stroking his chin.

The types, quantities, and growth rates of resources produced by a planar node were entirely unpredictable.

With good fortune, a large batch could appear within a short time. With poor luck, a tower master could do nothing but wait.

Even so, a divine tower and its planar node shared a mutually reinforcing relationship.

The Divine Tower of Ashes, with its complex network of enhancement arrays, naturally helped stabilize and strengthen the planar node.

In turn, the planar node nourished and empowered the tower.

The crimson-gold ore that was taking shape now was a clear sign of that feedback.

After spending some time gathering energy essence from the elemental pools at the tower's base, Sein returned to the upper levels.

***

Sein summoned all the registered mages of his tower for a meeting.

Such gatherings were only possible in the early years after the Divine Tower of Ashes had been built.

Once the tower stabilized and more mages joined, it would no longer be feasible for Sein to welcome every newcomer personally.

The first batch of mages to join had fairly strong foundations.

Eileen and Selina had both resigned from the Divine Tower of Verdant Spring and officially joined the Divine Tower of Ashes.

Sein also noticed many familiar faces from his mentor's divine tower among the other mages present.

Gloria was here too, along with her father, Finn.

Lorianne had truly helped Sein tremendously during the tower's initial construction.

Sein genuinely had no idea how to repay his mentor for all the care and support he had received from her.