As The Herald's influence spread, tensions between the Arcane Circle and the rogue Mage-Lords reached a tipping point. The Guild War began, a civil war among the mages of Novus Mundus. The Arcane Circle, led by Lyra, sought to restore order and reassert the Five Pillars that had once governed the use of magic. The rogue Mage-Lords, however, rejected these rules, claiming that power should not be restrained by philosophy.
The battlefields of the Guild War were not like those of previous conflicts. Instead of clashing armies, the war was fought with arcane duels, magical beasts summoned to do battle, and devastating spells that could reshape landscapes. Entire regions were transformed into wastelands of magical fallout, and the common people were left to suffer the consequences.
The Guild War threatened to unravel the Arcane Circle itself. As powerful mages defected to the Mage-Lords' side, the Circle's influence waned, and cities once aligned with the Circle now declared independence, governed by rogue mages who wielded magic like tyrants.