"Now that everyone has arrived, I hereby declare! The 325th Joint Conference of the Eastern Domain Wizards! Begins now!"
The executive committee member seated at the very center swept his gaze across the crowd and immediately spoke up.
Though his voice was not loud, it carried with perfect clarity to the ears of every wizard present.
The moment his words fell, the books, quills, scales, and other items held by the nine executive committee members began emitting a faint white glow, floating up into midair.
"Summon the Lost City!"
Nine beams of light instantly shot out from the books and other objects, converging into the massive white sun that had formed earlier.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The Nuota Highlands trembled violently as fissures spread outward from deep beneath the earth.
The wizards present, however, remained remarkably calm in the face of this earthquake-like catastrophe, simply using magic to shield themselves along with a few apprentices, their luggage, and their horses.
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!
Several colossal stone statues, towering and majestic, were the first to breach the surface, erupting from underground like mountains, casting enormous shadows across the ground.
"These must be the ancient wizards of the Dark Polar Domain — Ignis, Nicolat, Morfei, and the others?"
On the way here, Xiling had naturally briefed Leilin about the conference venue.
Since ancient times, the Joint Conference had never been hosted by any single school. Instead, the location was always fixed here.
The Lost City, according to legend, was an ancient city built by the primordial wizards, enshrining the glory of that bygone age.
The nine colossal stone statues at the center represented nine particularly renowned wizards of the primordial era.
In truth, the nine executive committee members of the Joint Conference were modeled after these very wizards.
RUMBLE!
Massive chunks of stone continued to break away as building after building sprang up from the earth like bamboo shoots after rain.
Beneath Leilin, a sturdy rock platform rose steadily, lifting him upward until it reached a certain height.
Leilin looked around.
The location where all the wizards had gathered was the central structure of the entire Lost City.
The architectural layout resembled an ancient Roman colosseum, or perhaps a Greek civic assembly ground — tier upon tier of open-air seating encircling a raised circular platform at the center.
Outside the conference grounds, twelve pristine marble columns gleamed with brilliant light, stretching from earth to sky.
"The Joint Conference has掌握ed the method to summon the Lost City, but unfortunately we can't find any records here about that Final War… nor a single living creature. Otherwise, perhaps the glory of the ancient wizards could truly be restored…"
In Leilin's ear came a soft sigh from Xiling.
The numerous wizards took their assigned seats, arranged in a circle around the central platform.
Leilin glanced around. The medium-sized schools sat in the front rows, the smaller schools behind them, and he and Xiling were seated roughly in the middle-rear section. The lesser, non-ranked schools occupied the outermost ring.
Moreover, each seat occupied a generous amount of space, maintaining a comfortable distance so that every wizard could see one another without feeling cramped.
The venue could easily accommodate ten thousand people; with only a few hundred wizards present now, the space felt truly vast.
"How are these nine executive committee members chosen?" Leilin asked, his arm around Xiling as he leaned close to her ear.
"The large schools each put forward their own candidates, and then all of us wizards here vote on them!" Xiling's cheeks flushed slightly red, but she dutifully explained nonetheless.
"Oh! So that means there are roughly nine large schools in the Eastern Domain of the Dark Polar Region?"
Leilin stroked his chin. This level of power was actually somewhat comparable to the South Coast, though he wondered how many Third-rank Wizards there were.
Yet he had a feeling that while advanced Meditation Methods were widely disseminated here, most of the lineages — though slightly better than those of the South Coast — were still incomplete. More importantly, the advanced Meditation Methods themselves had inherent problems, requiring specific extraplanar resources to advance further. In a situation where external contact had been severed, the Dark Polar Domain likely had very few high-level wizards, perhaps even fewer than the South Coast.
"Now, proceeding to the first item on the agenda! Let us observe a moment of silence together to honor the wizards who perished in the ancient Final War! They were seekers of truth, the founders of the Dark Polar Domain!"
The nine executive committee members at the front rose to their feet, their expressions solemn as they bowed their heads.
In their hands, a pure white flower bud was slowly unfurling.
The petals of this bud seemed to be composed of countless rays of light, giving it an almost dreamlike appearance.
Following this, all the wizards present rose to their feet in silence, and the light in their hands shimmered, forming identical white flower buds.
"This is the Light-and-Shadow Daisy, a specialty of the Dark Polar Domain, used to express remembrance and mourning!"
Leilin's eyes flickered, and his spiritual power swept across Xiling in an instant.
This flower-forming spell was nothing more than a cantrip — even apprentices could learn it easily. The magical fluctuations emanating from Xiling were immediately recorded by the Chip, which then decomposed the specific model and spiritual power oscillation pattern.
Hum! Leilin followed the crowd and stood up, a layer of white light flickering to life in his hand.
In an instant, countless Light-and-Shadow Daisies bloomed across the vast plaza. Invisible ripples flowed ceaselessly as petal after petal — pure constructs of light — drifted apart, scattering through the air.
A rain of flower petals drifted down, many of them landing upon the nine ancient wizard statues.
"Hm?" Just then, Leilin suddenly looked up.
In his perception, the cascading petals seemed to have triggered some mechanism or magical array. The nine mountainous stone sculptures at the very center were now trembling slowly.
An aura that was ancient and desolate, yet brimming with overwhelming power, rose from the heart of the venue.
The surrounding wizards, however, looked completely unsurpassed by this — if anything, they hurriedly closed their eyes to absorb the sensation. Leilin understood immediately that this was intentional.
He relaxed his own spiritual mind as well, letting his consciousness merge with that aura.
BOOM! Like a volcanic eruption, like the arrival of a tsunami, a tremendous tremor surged through Leilin's mind. At the same time, countless fragmented images streaked past his consciousness.
"This is… the aura of an advanced Meditation Method!"
Leilin glanced at Xiling, whose expression had turned somewhat intoxicated, and immediately understood.
"For these Dark Polar Domain wizards, without extraplanar resources, their Meditation Methods simply cannot progress. And now, the aura of these ancient wizards' own Meditation Methods points them in the right direction!"
Although this served only as guidance, the benefit to First-rank Wizards was still considerable. Moreover, it was entirely possible that some prodigious wizard might use this ancient aura to modify their own Meditation Method and bypass the limitations of the missing ancient materials.
"What a shame. There are no ancient Warlocks among them — not much inspiration for me. And Second-rank Wizards have already committed to their own paths, continuing to deepen them further, so those who've already advanced wouldn't be interested in this either…"
After the petal rain subsided and the nine colossal statues returned to stillness, the wizards reluctantly opened their eyes.
"Very well! Proceeding to the second item on the agenda — dispute mediation!"
The central committee member holding the scales spoke softly, yet his voice reached every wizard's ears through some unknown channel.
Two wizards from the assembly then stepped forward, arguing loudly about something, occasionally projecting light-based recordings of evidence.
The executive committee member with the scales listened and then rendered his judgment.
Most of the wizards on both sides accepted the verdict calmly. Occasionally, one would refuse to comply, and the two would commence a duel right there in the central arena.
"Can this kind of executive committee ruling actually be trusted?" Leilin asked Xiling.
"Committee Member Gando is a fair and wise elder. His rulings have always commanded our respect. Furthermore, the Golden Scales he holds are the very symbol of impartiality — his own convictions would never allow him to act against justice and law!"
Xiling whispered her explanation to Leilin. "Don't ask questions like this openly, or we'll draw the hostility of the other wizards!"
"Oh!" Leilin nodded indifferently.
Still, watching case after case play out in the arena was beginning to bore him.
He understood, of course, that the Joint Conference's dispute mediation was meant to preserve the Dark Polar Domain wizards' overall combat strength to the greatest extent possible, preventing internal attrition so they could face external threats.
Humans were not the sole rulers of the Dark Polar Domain. Setting aside the myriad Dark Beasts from the outer regions, even their neighbor — the Elven Empire — was a source of concern for many far-sighted individuals.
But this philosophy didn't align with Leilin's own thinking. In his view, if Dark Wizards held power, they would have long since waged aggressive campaigns abroad, launching continuous wars and recruiting apprentices through brutal selection processes — sending them all to low-intensity battlefields and gradually escalating the difficulty. Those who survived to the end would be the truly elite wizards!
Constantly suppressing conflicts was not the way to go.
This approach seemed more like a compromise between White
"Leilin! Next comes the school grade assessment — be careful!" Xiling whispered a cautious warning.
"Don't worry." Leilin replied calmly. Just then, two hostile gazes swept across their position.
Leilin's brow furrowed as he looked toward the source.
In the seating area of the Eight-Legged Spider School, Shigeli quickly lowered his head, though a vicious glint still flickered in his eyes.
"You absolutely won't survive today. After today, Xiling will be mine!"
"Did he prepare some trump card, or is the Misty Forest going to intervene directly?"
Leilin remained perfectly composed. This Shigeli had previously scurried away like a drowning rat at the sight of him, but now he clearly had backing.
Yet for Leilin, the strength of a single medium-sized school was simply not worth worrying about.
"Very well! Now proceeding to the fifth item on the agenda — School Grade Assessment!" the executive committee member announced.
Every wizard in the audience immediately sharpened their focus.