Noren Workshop

Biodata

Background / History

Noren Workshop is a mid-tier wizard force within the Star Ring Federation, governing multiple planes and operating a large network of Noren Academies. Its founder is the Level 8 Archwizard Wizard Noren, a top-tier alchemist whose name is synonymous with the organization. 20 35 371

The Workshop developed along the Logistics Department’s orthodox path. Alchemy, runology, and magic potions became its three core disciplines, although it also maintains substantial Combat Department forces. 3 372 466

Its academy system trains apprentices under binding contracts: graduates who reach formal Level 1 Wizard are required to serve on plane battlefields, while the contracts also prohibit betrayal of Wizard Civilization. 35 130

The academies function as basic talent-training bases for the wider organization. Apprentices sign their contracts with Noren Workshop rather than with an individual academy. Originally, apprentices who completed ten years of study were sent directly to plane battlefields, and survival of that service effectively constituted graduation. The formal Graduation Trial was introduced during Benjamin’s cohort to support talent screening and subsequently developed into a standardized system. 5 286

During a period of rapid expansion, the Workshop began establishing new academies and sending selected talent to pioneer new plane clusters. Eloria was converted into Noren Plane 147 after nearly a thousand years of transformation and construction, formally integrating it into the Workshop’s core territorial system. 286 325

Grand Mentor Anton Buchanan’s advancement to Level 8 gave the Workshop a second top-tier wizard. This raised Noren Workshop’s independent factional rating to a medium-sized force and enabled its two Level 8 wizards to alternate faction-guarding duties rather than leaving the organization exposed whenever its sole top combatant was absent. 450 843

Organization

Academy Network

Noren Workshop oversees more than a hundred Noren Academies. These academies recruit and educate apprentices, conduct graduation trials, select elite candidates, and supply personnel for expansion, research, and warfare. 86 286

• Noren Academy No. 1 — The Workshop’s headquarters academy, located on its core headquarters plane. 369
• Noren Academy No. 2 — One of the top-ten academies; Kaelen Vania represented it as a Level 10 talent genius during the general examination. 87
• Noren Academy No. 13 — A stronger mid-tier academy that sent elite apprentices to the Workshop’s general examination. It is located on Noren Plane 13. 5 86
• Noren Academy No. 147 — Established on the former Eloria Plane as an expansion outpost and talent-training base. After several thousand years of development, it became an important institution capable of consistently producing high-level wizards. 144 325 780

Noren Academy No. 147 conducts regular freshman admissions every five standard years. Its administration can place senior wizards in acting guardianship and instructional roles when required, including the appointment of Level 6 instructors. 781

Admissions schedules differ between academies. Noren Academy No. 13 follows a five-year intake cycle, while the top ten academies admit new classes annually. At the time of Benjamin’s general examination, those top-ten institutions had produced thirteen Level 10 talent apprentices over the preceding decade; these apprentices received exceptional Workshop support and were regarded as central prospects for Wizard Civilization’s future. 70 87

The Workshop’s academies also serve as fortified institutional centers. According to Benjamin’s recollection, each academy’s core is protected by a Magic Array equivalent to an Elite Level 7 Wizard, made possible by Wizard Noren’s combined mastery of alchemy and runology. 887

Departments

The Workshop’s Alchemy Department is a major Logistics Department lineage. Mentor Clark belongs to this faction, and students of Alchemy Studies are automatically incorporated into it as apprentices. 149

Despite its Logistics Department orthodoxy, only around 2% of the Workshop’s wizards belonged to that department when Viola explained its staffing to Benjamin. This was still a higher proportion than the Tower of Silence’s approximately 1%, while the Chaos Cult’s logistics specialists were largely confined to its founding upper ranks and their successors. 170

Below Level 6, Logistics Department wizards generally hold higher status and possess greater combat strength than their Combat Department counterparts. At Level 6, that disparity becomes much less pronounced, with departmental affiliation primarily reflecting a difference in research and development path rather than personal ability. 466

Elite Selection

The Workshop uses academy trials to identify and cultivate talent. Only the top tenth of graduates qualify for subsequent elite screening, while successful candidates may be sent to developing plane clusters or recruited into specialized units. 286

The general assessment that Benjamin attended was requested by the Star Ring Federation and gathered elite apprentices from more than a hundred academies at the Workshop’s headquarters. Academy-level planar trials served as preparation and qualification for this wider examination. 35 86

Standardized Graduation Trials use small, low-energy planes with controllable danger. High-level threats are cleared in advance, and apprentices undertake a simplified plane war as both a final assessment and preparation for actual battlefield service. For Noren Academy No. 147’s first trial, Dean Avery Knight proposed using a suitable plane from his private collection and releasing domesticated servant races of appropriate strength as opponents. 286

Wizard Noren later announced the Star Ring Federation’s Elite Development Program, which formed Elite Combat Units from the accumulated talent selected through the Workshop’s Elite Trials. These units were intended for deployment to the second-line battlefield. 324 325

Wizards selected for Elite Combat Units were relieved of routine academy teaching and management duties while retaining academy-mentor benefits. Those benefits included longer intervals between missions for low-level wizards and shorter mandatory service terms or rotation cycles for high-level wizards. 325

The Workshop also uses special training agreements to protect valuable talent. Level Two Training Agreement recipients were rare but recurring prospects, with seven or eight emerging per intake across the academy network. Starfall’s Level One Training Agreement represented a much more exceptional case: her research into Living Planes becoming wizards made her a strategic asset recognized by the Star Ring Federation, and the Workshop kept her away from the coming wizard war to safeguard her work. 452

Education Reform

A later education-reform discussion considered greatly expanding admissions to include every child meeting the minimum standard. Equipping the enlarged apprentice population with multiple corresponding clones through the Blood Sacrifice Method initially appeared prohibitively expensive, even when measured against the resources of all Workshop-controlled planes. Dean Avery Knight explained that the cost problem had been resolved through a Low-Level Soul Cultivation Technique developed by a low-level wizard from the Crimson Court. 860

Wonder Investigation Teams

After recalculating the approach of a mysterious Wonder in the Endless Chaotic Void, the Workshop assembled several investigation teams of elite High-Rank Wizards. These teams combined specialists in fields including space, time, fate, life, soul, elemental theory, and runic analysis to determine the Wonder’s nature, range, structure, and possible weaknesses. 888 889

Wizard Noren divided their objectives into two phases: first determining the nature, extent, and general structure of the disaster’s outer region, then seeking ways to weaken or neutralize it before contact. 889

The First Investigation Team included Level 7 elemental analyst Chloe Nasha, runic structural analyst Ed Danka, temporal specialist Tori Merlin, Fate School Wizard Elma, and Level 6 spatial analyst Benjamin. Despite Benjamin’s lower rank, his appointment was supported by senior spatial experts Savien, Bastian, and Morna. 889

Headquarters

Noren Workshop’s headquarters occupies an entire transformed plane. Its central city consists of floating platforms, energy conduits, kilometer-high rune spires, orbital laboratories, training spaces, and large-scale teleportation infrastructure. 86

The headquarters combines magical and technological systems on a vast scale.

• Skyscrapers, floating vehicles, autonomous mechanical constructs, and energy-force-field transport networks are integrated into daily operations. 368
• An enormous space station hangs above the headquarters city. 368
• Core planes have achieved universal wizard aptitude among their human populations, producing an exceptionally large base of apprentices and formal wizards. 368
• Noren Academy No. 1 serves as both an academy and the faction’s headquarters. 369
• The Noren First Plane is the first plane established by the Workshop and the core of the faction. Summons to it commonly concern developments of major organizational importance. 592
• Within Noren Academy No. 1, Level 4 and Level 5 wizards are commonplace, and Level 6 wizards are far less unusual than in ordinary academy settings. Its personnel include human-form wizards, elemental lifeforms, and spirit-like beings. 369

The Workshop’s broader territory lies relatively close to the border between the Star Ring Federation and the Crimson Court. 864

Research and Infrastructure

Noren Workshop prioritizes knowledge, results, and practical application over ceremonies or honors. Its research systems include task-assessment centers, shared knowledge repositories, logistics services, and the Magic Network. 20 140 363

Materials and Artifact Research

The Workshop receives materials from conquered and newly invaded planes, then subjects them to rigorous testing to determine their properties, grades, and possible applications. 20

Its Magic Network records specialized runes and wizardry models, allowing wizards to identify and develop new spell structures through the organization’s knowledge database. 161

The knowledge base also contains wizard body-strengthening techniques developed through research into other planes’ extraordinary systems, including methods incorporating body tempering, bloodline curses, and divine remains. Benjamin consulted this repository when seeking to improve his physical capabilities. 152

The Workshop’s official services provide access to specialist manufacturing, although demand can create substantial delays. When Benjamin sought spatial equipment, Clark suggested applying through the Workshop’s official website using his Level Two Training Agreement authority; even the least occupied qualified craftsman was already booked ten years ahead. 81

Wizard Noren and Grand Mentor Anton Buchanan also received the Reflection Prism from Benjamin for joint research under agreed conditions, demonstrating the Workshop’s continuing interest in powerful anomalous artifacts and cross-disciplinary discoveries. 838

During the Wonder investigation, Wizard Noren awarded Benjamin a captured Level 8 robot from the hostile mechanical civilization. Benjamin subsequently scanned its energy circuits, miniature runes, and Phase Space technology, while distributing mechanical wreckage and advanced materials to specialist researchers for long-term technological study and adaptation. 899 903

Following the First Investigation Team’s mission, Noren confirmed that the Workshop would record the Wonder’s origins, perimeter data, and subsequent analytical findings. 901

Construction Capacity

The Workshop’s Logistics Department can construct and reinforce battlefield infrastructure even during active combat. During the war against the Chaos Cult and Tower of Silence, hundreds of thousands of logistics wizards continuously expanded a steel-fortress defensive line under enemy attack. 472 479

A typical fortress incorporated layered composite materials:

• Energy-absorbing honeycomb inner structures.
• Self-repairing memory-metal middle layers.
• Hardened, anti-magic alloy outer layers. 472

Its construction teams also undertake private planar infrastructure commissions. Benjamin hired a Workshop engineering team to transform the Purgatory Sulfur Plane’s energy infrastructure and establish a plane-wide collection and dispatch network. Completion of the project’s second and third phases enabled full-domain energy mobilization and greatly accelerated his Black Giant incubation program. 279 286

Plane and Population Development

The Workshop develops academy planes through long-term environmental and population investment. Eloria was selected because its large plane cluster offered substantial growth potential. Dean Avery Knight and other high-ranking wizards led a project to draw in and fuse suitable neighboring small and medium planes with its main plane, increasing its scale, resources, and capacity to support a growing population. 283

Aptitude-enhancement potions are diluted and distributed as rain over entire planes, gradually improving the population’s average wizard aptitude. Combined with the tendency of high-aptitude parents to produce more gifted descendants, this process supports the long-term goal of universal meditation aptitude. The oldest core planes, numbered before 10, had already achieved universal extraordinary aptitude and exceptionally high average talent. 84

Historically, recruitment remained selective even while population aptitude was being raised. Noren Academy No. 13 accepted only apprentices with Level 3 aptitude or above rather than lowering its threshold to admit less gifted applicants. 84

Economy and Resources

Noren Workshop uses an internal point system for resources and knowledge. Its points can be exchanged within the Workshop, while Military Merit—issued by the Star Ring Federation or Star Track Tribunal—has wider purchasing power across Wizard Civilization. 71

The Workshop’s control of numerous planes provides a steady supply of resources, including rare materials and high-value planar assets. 20 237

The Academy’s Adamantine production assignment illustrates its ability to mobilize large material reserves: it assembled more than ten thousand cubic meters of gold in three days, supplied the raw materials and sales channels, and commissioned Benjamin to perform the manufacturing in exchange for high-tier Military Merit. 71

Planar assets can also be awarded as substantial rewards. Benjamin noted the Workshop’s generosity in granting him the Purgatory Sulfur Plane despite its extensive mineral wealth, which he believed its conquest forces must already have investigated. 149

Following the First Investigation Team’s successful completion of its initial Wonder mission, Wizard Noren awarded each team member ten billion Advanced Military Merit. 901

Military Operations

Plane Warfare

The Workshop expands through interplanar warfare and requires qualified academy graduates to undertake frontline service. Its forces conduct invasions, establish outposts, administer conquered planes, and develop new academies in secured territories. 3 35 144 286

During the Eloria trial, apprentices were tasked with helping break a battlefield stalemate; their contributions determined their share of permanent ownership rights in the plane. 89

Not all acquisitions require the destruction of native civilizations. Some of the Workshop’s Servant Planes originated from planes that surrendered their knowledge and resources and were accepted into a subordinate relationship. 72

Before their later war, Noren Workshop, the Tower of Silence, and the Chaos Cult maintained a shared plane-war registration point at their border junction. Although they competed with one another, they frequently cooperated in external expansion and shared the spoils of large-scale plane wars. Low-level volunteer wizards could register there in a role comparable to mercenary service. 163

Post-conquest logistics duties include eliminating remaining resistance, conducting resource inventories and exploration, and reconstructing conquered planes. Eloria’s development into a new academy brought an unusually large concentration of high-level wizards and veteran scholars, allowing the cluster’s initial administrative cleanup to be completed within a few years and its Plane Origin to be marked by the Workshop. 163

Purification Protocol

After discovering the conceptual contamination associated with the Fungus Lord, Wizard Noren ordered the Purification Protocol. The Workshop destroyed the Triangle Plane Cluster and spent fifty years eliminating potentially contaminated civilizations and remnants. 322

War Against the Chaos Cult and Tower of Silence

The advancement of Grand Mentor Anton Buchanan to Level 8 disrupted the regional balance of power, prompting a coordinated war against the Tower of Silence and Chaos Cult. 450

The Star Ring Federation mediated the dispute as a limited, regulated conflict rather than forcing the factions to abandon hostilities. Its intervention delayed the outbreak by at most eighty years, giving the Workshop time to prepare. 450

Noren Workshop entered the conflict at a numerical disadvantage:

Only official wizards at Level 3 and above were forcibly conscripted, because lower-level personnel were judged unable to contribute effectively and liable to become tactical vulnerabilities. Noren Academy No. 147 supplied a little over a thousand eligible wizards, including more than twenty Level 6 wizards. 463

Its million-strong wizard army was divided into twelve battle groups, each containing ten brigades of ten squads. A basic squad comprised ten thousand Level 3–5 wizards, several Level 6 wizards, and at least one Level 7 commander. 472

Noren Workshop relied on defensive fortresses, composite barrier arrays, logistics construction, traps, and coordinated counteroffensives to stall for time and protect its hidden trump card. 465 472 479

At Fortress No. 7, Benjamin deployed one million Level 5 Black Giants, ten thousand Level 6 Black Giants, and seven hundred Level 6 Black Giant Priests. Clark also reinforced the high-level battlefield with over a million Level 7 shadow creatures and more than ten thousand Level 8 Shadow Lords. These auxiliary forces helped the Workshop compensate for its disadvantage in wizard numbers. 472 477

The Workshop’s expanding defensive line converted the Coalition’s intended rapid assault into a costly war of attrition. During the Coalition’s first withdrawal, Clark killed the opposing commander Mordiggian, the first Level 7 wizard to fall in the conflict; Noren Workshop then declined pursuit in order to consolidate its defenses and treat casualties. 479 480

The defensive system linked more than a hundred steel fortresses. By the time over 40% of its energy circuits were connected, its shield was more than three times thicker than at the battle’s beginning, contained five times as many flowing runes, and repaired itself seven times faster. 479

The Coalition subsequently identified twenty-nine missing Level 7 Workshop wizards and approximately five hundred missing Level 6 wizards, concluding that they were preparing the Workshop’s trump card away from the main defensive line. Under its new commander, “Ashes” Saladin, the Coalition reduced frontal assaults in favor of harassment and scouting operations designed to locate those preparations. 482 483

Noren Workshop later launched a surprise counterattack using tens of thousands of wizards concealed by a large-scale group concealment barrier. Its scouting operations also penetrated the enemy rear: two Level 7 Soul School wizards located the Coalition factions’ hidden trump cards, although the Workshop was unable to stop their completion. 492 528

The Workshop’s strategic defense included a Super-Wide Area Transmutation Array, which was used to construct defenses and redirect explosions while resisting the Tower of Silence’s antimatter tide. This commitment occupied its available strength while the Chaos Cult prepared its own intervention. 533

In the Level 8 engagement, Noren and Anton confronted the Chaos Cult’s Cult Leader and the Tower of Silence’s Silence. Anton’s recent advancement initially left the Workshop at a slight disadvantage against the two veteran opponents, but he subsequently manifested four equally powerful true bodies corresponding to childhood, youth, middle age, and old age. The combatants restrained their attacks’ range to avoid destroying the Federation-designated battlefield and the millions of wizards below. 536

Following the war, the Workshop assumed control over former Chaos Cult and Tower of Silence planes as part of the defeated factions’ territorial concessions. 540

Post-War Expansion and Preparedness

In addition to territorial concessions, Noren Workshop confiscated the former observation ranges of the Chaos Cult and Tower of Silence, enlarging its allocated search sector within Wizard Civilization’s vast exploratory territory. 771

Its permitted search region follows the exploration-allocation rules established by Level 9 wizards and incorporated into apprentice contracts. Even after acquiring its rivals’ observation ranges, the Workshop’s sector remained a sharply bounded cone extending from the Origin Plane with an extremely small angular span. 771

After the discovery of a future threat connected to a newly found wonder, the Workshop began long-term preparations. The Wonder’s temporal and spatial interference disrupted exploration and coordinate calculations, and it obstructed the Workshop’s escape route. Contact was initially estimated to occur in approximately fifteen hundred years. Dean Avery Knight instructed the wizards to avoid overly distant expeditions starting one thousand years after that warning and to remain near their academy so that the organization could gather its highest combat power if necessary. 843

Subsequent coordinate calculations placed the Wonder’s intersection with Noren Workshop’s sphere of influence only approximately 120 years away. In response, Wizard Noren convened thousands of High-Rank Wizards at Noren Academy No. 1 and formed dedicated investigation teams to assess the unknown phenomenon before it fully developed. 888 889

Wonder Investigation and Mechanical Civilization Conflict

The First Investigation Team entered the Wonder to survey its spatial stability, elemental environment, runic structure, temporal fluctuations, and fate-related anomalies. The mission developed into a major conflict with a technologically advanced mechanical civilization operating within and around the Wonder. 889 898

Wizard Noren and Grand Mentor Anton Buchanan directly intervened against the mechanical forces. Anton destroyed warships and Level 8 mecha through overwhelming law fixation and direct force, while Noren repeatedly altered his spell structures to prevent the enemy’s analytical systems from developing effective counters. 898

After the enemy attempted to destabilize the Wonder, Noren redirected its elemental energy into the surrounding mechanical fleet. Anton captured the enemy commander’s mechanical head, revealing that the civilization transformed living creatures into machine-based forms. 899

The confrontation escalated when the Grand President, a Level 9 technological lifeform and leader of the mechanical civilization, manifested as an immense mechanical planet above the Elemental Black Hole. Noren and Anton prepared to confront it, while Noren summoned three concealed Level 8 Wizards that had been positioned nearby for the engagement. 899

Parallel Civilization Expedition

Noren Workshop participated in a Star Ring Federation-organized gathering involving all Four Great Factions to visit a parallel wizard civilization. The expedition offered wizards the possibility of finding counterparts who could serve as highly compatible research partners. Wizard Noren and Grand Mentor Anton Buchanan appeared at the departure gathering, and Noren transported the assembled Workshop wizards through his teleportation array. 595

Governance

Noren Workshop governs its territory through a centralized structure in which the Workshop serves as the core and academy-led plane clusters retain limited autonomy. In critical matters, all subordinate territories follow unified Workshop command. 540

Its stated model treats ordinary people and wizards as equal in race and personhood, though wizards hold greater practical status due to their power. Wizards assigned to local territories generally serve fixed-term protective or administrative missions rather than hereditary rule. 540

Ordinary protection assignments can begin at two hundred years, making a temporary wizard posting appear to mortals like an ancient noble lineage. Noren Plane 13 retains a medieval appearance but is fundamentally administered through Artificial Humans performing functions comparable to AI governance. Other Workshop populations possess technological levels ranging from medieval societies to interstellar civilizations. 540

Following its acquisition of former Chaos Cult territories, the Workshop faced the task of dismantling entrenched theocratic and feudal systems. Its personnel generally combined an initial display of authority with long-term reconstruction, education, and the replacement of population-control mechanisms and inherited social structures. 540 541

Central Command assigned takeover missions to almost every idle official wizard. The defeated factions had spent the preceding year relocating large portions of their resources and populations, leaving the Workshop to administer the remaining planes and inhabitants. Benjamin and David were among the personnel sent to the resource-depleted Els Plane, where the population had been conditioned to worship wizards as holy beings. 540

Relationships

• Star Ring Federation — Superior faction; oversees broader strategic policy, Military Merit systems, and coordination between wizard powers. It requested the Workshop’s general apprentice assessment, initiated the Elite Development Program, and regulated the war against the neighboring factions. 35 71 324 450
• Wizard Noren — Level 8 founder, legendary alchemist, and supreme figure within the Workshop’s lineage. He directs the Workshop’s Wonder investigation and personally leads its highest-level responses to major threats. 322 371 372 888 899
• Grand Mentor Anton Buchanan — Wizard Noren’s disciple; his advancement to Level 8 gave the Workshop a second Level 8 wizard. 372 450 843
• Mentor Clark — Alchemy Department mentor and a member of the Workshop’s direct teaching lineage. Regarded as its strongest individual genius because of his non-replicable research, he supplied powerful shadow forces during the wizard war and later prepared for advancement to Level 7. 149 472 477 681
• Benjamin — Academy-trained logistics researcher and battlefield participant. He contributed Adamantine production, deployed the Black Giant Legion in the wizard war, commissioned Workshop engineering services, and served as spatial analyst on the First Wonder Investigation Team. 71 279 472 889
• Starfall — Living Plane and exceptionally protected research asset. Her Level One Training Agreement and work on enabling Living Planes to become wizards led the Workshop to keep her in the rear rather than deploy her in its war against the neighboring factions. 452
• Tower of Silence — Former neighboring partner and later wartime enemy; lost territory and observation ranges to Noren Workshop after defeat. Before the war, it cooperated with the Workshop in external plane campaigns through their shared border junction. 163 450 540 771
• Chaos Cult — Former neighboring partner and later wartime enemy; lost territory and observation ranges to Noren Workshop after defeat. Before the war, it cooperated with the Workshop in external plane campaigns through their shared border junction. 163 450 540 771
• Noren Academies — Educational and administrative institutions that train apprentices, select elites, and govern affiliated planes. 86 286 325
• Crimson Court — Neighboring major faction across the nearby Federation border. A low-level wizard from this faction developed the Low-Level Soul Cultivation Technique that resolved a central cost problem in the Workshop’s proposed education reform. 860 864
• Mechanical Civilization — Hostile technological civilization encountered during the Wonder investigation. Its forces employ adaptive war machines and transform living beings into mechanical forms; its Level 9 Grand President identified Noren and Anton as valuable research subjects. 898 899

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