Benjamin finally returned to the enormous spatial rift connecting the "Ship Plane" and the "Void Plane," only to find that the scene before him had undergone earth-shaking changes.
During his absence, the command headquarters had constructed a massive Floating Camp beneath the spatial rift, like an island suspended in the air!
The entire camp was built from sturdy black rock, apparently sourced directly from the Ship Plane.
All manner of fully equipped wizard buildings had already been erected there. Energy towers, Alchemy Workshops, and even a trading market had begun to take shape.
Countless energy runes flickered along the camp's edges, forming several layers of sturdy protection.
Benjamin controlled his flight path and slowly descended into the Central Plaza of the Floating Camp.
He discovered that the place was even livelier than he had imagined when he arrived!
Besides the wizards steadily returning from all directions, the plaza was filled with great numbers of native creatures captured by those wizards during their explorations.
All kinds of bizarre creatures were driven in from every direction by powerful wizards using energy chains or soul contracts, escorted like shipments of cargo in an unending stream.
The camp swallowed up the enormous quantities of spoils brought in, like a giant beast that could never eat its fill.
After landing in the camp, Benjamin easily found the conspicuously marked Affairs Center.
He stepped forward and registered at the terminal that he had accepted and would carry out a mandatory mission. At the same time, he received from a nearby Alchemy Puppet a large pile of marble-sized "signal markers" that flickered with faint spatial fluctuations.
Having completed the preliminary procedures for the mandatory mission, Benjamin did not leave immediately.
He planned to search this temporary camp to see whether he could buy a Wizard Artifact that