How should one judge Alhaitham's plan? All one could say was that his cunning bordered on the uncanny!
Of the Thirty-Six Stratagems, Alhaitham had used deceiving the heavens to cross the sea, feinting east while attacking west, secretly advancing along a hidden route, beating the grass to startle the snake, luring the tiger away from the mountain, taking the sheep in passing, capturing the leader to capture the bandits, fishing in troubled waters, replacing the beams and pillars, sowing discord, inflicting injury on oneself to win trust, and more in this operation.
Of course, needing so many stratagems just to secure a slim chance of survival against such an overwhelming disadvantage also meant that a single careless move could cost them everything.
It was already difficult to coordinate their own side's actions. Most crucially, they also had to predict the Akademiya Sages' predictions.
It had to be said that Alhaitham, who could devise such an operational plan, was a scholar well versed in human nature. He was calculating, politically shrewd, and ruthless. Someone like him could be called a born ruler.
If he had any intention of entering politics, he would have a vast stage on which to perform. Unfortunately, it was precisely his excessive rationality that left him uninterested in Sumeru's officialdom, with its deceit and tangled interests.
While Alhaitham's plan proceeded in an orderly fashion, deep within the Sanctuary of Surasthana, in the God-Descension Workshop, Great Sage Azar and three other Sages were nervously watching the masterpiece before them.
The body of an artificial god-Shouki no Kami.
The colossal structure before them was something their Akademiya had created with enormous expenditures of manpower, materials, and money.
Indeed, to carry out the God Project without anyone discovering it, the Sages had built the God-Descension Workshop right inside the Sanctuary