Rumble!
The void shuddered, and the air thickened like paste, churning violently.
At that moment, it was not just the High Tower Institute shaking. Both the inner and outer districts of the capital, Serinburg, rocked without cease, as though struck by an unprecedented calamity.
As heaven and earth shook, cracks tore through the ground. Countless buildings and homes collapsed into the fissures and vanished.
Amid unending screams, panicked crowds fled through every street and alley. Spellcasters rose into the air one after another, staring blankly toward the High Tower Institute.
Inside the institute, students, professors, and visiting scholars alike stared wide-eyed and open-mouthed as the Wizard Tower at its center, soaring into the clouds, shook with a thunderous roar.
As it trembled, afterimages rippled visibly across the tower. In the next instant, it broke apart into a vast, violent tide of energy.
Countless String Sorcery runes and spell formations sank into the tide.
Whoosh!
A spark lit up within the surging torrent of energy. It swiftly blazed like a great sun, and the immense, indistinct figure of a sacred being appeared.
What was that?
Before the institute's students and professors, or the capital's many Spellcasters, could even reel from the tower's destruction, the sacred figure in the energy tide had already crashed unchecked into the depths of their eyes.
Its incomparable presence filled their vision and their minds.
One glance was enough. They could no longer look away, and a burning emotion rose from the depths of their hearts.
They wanted to draw near. They wanted to worship!
Overwhelmed with wonder, countless Spellcasters felt as though they had glimpsed the ultimate truth of the world. As the sacred figure shone ever brighter, thousands upon thousands of strings manifested.
Each string became a wave, gathering into a tide that swept across