" - has there been a breakdown in diplomatic relations with the Reclamation which should feature in this report?" he says, that being the only even conceivably diplomatic way he can think of saying that fully a quarter of the Church's strength are presently dedicated to rebuilding Cheliax with absolutely no payment or benefit beyond the souls saved thereby.

" – What? No. I have great respect for the Reclamation, but I thought that Lastwall was consistently extremely clear that they don't represent the Church and operate entirely independently." Because the organized Church has and has had insane priorities for the past hundred years. 

" - the Reclamation is the single largest organized arm of the Church unless you count Lastwall itself as one. The Reclamation is not part of Lastwall's chain of command and does not operate out of Lastwall, so that if when we picked the fight for Cheliax we lost there was a chance the world would survive Cheliax's retaliation."

What.

"...I think we may need to have a longer conversation about what exactly the church is. Does Cansellarion answer to – who, Varvatos? But I've been in a room with the both of them, and he didn't treat her as his superior officer – are there Church headquarters other than the ones in Vigil? Do the different Paladin orders exchange personnel? If I was going to ask for help from the Church of Iomedae and not Lastwall or the Reclamation or anyone else, who is it that I'd have to speak to?" 

"- this is entirely our fault and I should have anticipated it. I owe you an apology and I suspect so does the Church.

The Church seventy years ago decided to keep efforts to retake Cheliax out of Lastwall's chain of command and out of Lastwall's territory and have them not employ Lastwall's resources in any way that any Good organization on the face of this planet couldn't employ Lastwall's resources. They did this because they expected that if an effort to retake Cheliax failed, and Cheliax conquered Lastwall in retaliation, the Worldwound would fall and Tar-Baphon be released. They thought that preventing that was worth some costs to the efforts to retake Cheliax, and that those costs could be - relatively small, if the division was executed cleanly and if open communication was still permitted about the question 'where can each individual do the most service to our world'?

Cansellarion resigned as an officer of Lastwall to found the Reclamation. He consults with Varvatos on matters of how the Church ought to allocate resources across its different fronts, but the only authority she has over him is the authority to find that the Reclamation is not in good standing with the Church, and accordingly to, say, deny it Communes or officially recommend that the Church's members exercise the caution in joining it they'd exercise in joining Cyprian's army. 

Lastwall made it very easy for any person in Lastwall to resign for reasons of conscience. Almost every powerful person in Lastwall's chain of command spoke with Cansellarion about whether they, personally, ought to resign their role and join the Reclamation.  When we took Drezen and there was a little less pressure on the Worldwound, several thousand resignations as a matter of conscience, which is of course the objective for which we had taken Drezen. When Cansellarion said he thought the war would be soon, several thousand more resignations as a matter of conscience. When it actually started, several thousand more."

Well. That explains a lot, really. 

" – I thought you were asking for a bribe, with Drezen. If we solved your problem, you might, at some point in the future, deign to consider helping us with ours." 

"Oh. I see. I mean, it was a - trade of your assistance for resources for the war, but not one that went through how friendly your relations with Lastwall were, just  - many men will go and fight in the south if that won't mean we lose a fortress in the north. Fewer forts to man in Mendev and the March of Gundrun meant more people could join the Reclamation. 

The aim was - that our enemies could be openly enemies with the part of the Church that was dedicated to destroying them, without that part being shielded behind the parts that are dedicated to preserving the planet."

"My understanding had been that the main body of the organized Church did care about the Worldwound, and didn't particularly care what happened in Cheliax, and when the war started a few thousand people changed their allegiance because at that point it was obvious even to them what really mattered – actually, I'm not sure I did know that had happened at the time. It didn't end up mattering, in the end." 

"This seems like a fairly obvious consequence of trying to maintain a separation of concerns in the way that we did. I do think the Church was, while the Worldwound was open, unwilling to trade the loss of containment of the Worldwound for a free Cheliax, which might be a values difference between the Church and you. You can read all the relevant reports if you'd like. Mostly they argue that the loss of containment of the Worldwound would likely increase Hell's power on the Material if it didn't result in the end of the world. But it is not a certain argument."

He's having the uncomfortable realization that he's spent a great deal of time resenting these people unfairly for the second time in ten minutes. 

"I think it's I who owes your Church an apology, for thinking so little of you. But, then, I don't understand. If you thought the continued existence of the Worldwound was likely to so advantage Hell – why not close it yourselves?" 

"...how?"

"The ritual took about a year to develop, from my perspective, and I don't think I needed to be an archmage to do it. It helped that I had Tien ritualists to work with, and Holomogi wardstone builders, but you could have asked them. We needed to kill Deskari, but Cansellarion and your paladins actually did most of the work there. We needed Nocticula's cooperation, but she's really shockingly easy to work with, if you just reach out and learn what it is she wants. And Areelu Vorlesh – would have been truly difficult, I grant you. But I wasn't applying the whole resources of a nation to solving this problem for seventy straight years, and it was not an especially insurmountable challenge once I started to really try." 

He's really not sure what to say to that. "I think that is indeed what Iomedae would have done, and would have wanted Her church competent to do," he manages, after a while. "It does seem easier if you are an archmage. And we do try to produce archmages." They just all die along the way.

"Easier, I'm sure. But being an archmage is overrated for – almost everything important, really."

"This conversation is turning out reminiscent of the one with the Archduke Blanxart, whose ultimate advice for the Church was 'if Tar Baphon is that much of a constraint, figure out how to kill him'."

"...Do you want me to?"

"...yes. Yes we do, very very badly. The facf that any one of the seals suffices to release him is an enormous problem for the world even with the wards reinforced; having four locations to defend is just a much more substantial constraint than having one."

"I wish you'd said so earlier. I'm already spending a lot of my time figuring out how to fight Geb, if it comes to that, and I think a good deal of that work should straightfowardly transfer. I'm sure he has three or four tricks I don't know about, and I'd have to consult – my allies – " because they both know who he's talking about but there are some things you don't say out loud – "but I'm cautiously optimistic. I don't think he's really entirely sane in there." 

"I think that having to devote - to purely defensive not-game-changing measures against the destruction of the world - more resources than the Church even commands without extraordinary efforts on the recruiting front has been very bad for us, and very bad for our ability to work with our allies, and intend to make a great many recommendations to this effect in the report, and yes if you think you can kill Tar-Baphon we would be delighted to give you almost whatever we can in support or in exchange.

Do you have other recommendations for the Church here."

"If there's one thing I've learned in this conversation it's that I don't know enough about the Church or how it operates to give any confident advice. If you're willing to listen to me opine anyway, though, I might say you should stop acting like communicating with your allies comes directly out of your goddess's ability to intervene on the material plane. I know I'm not the only person who to assume that Lastwall speaks for the Church, and that the Church has no interest beyond securing its own ancient obligations – and then, even the Reclamation didn't manage to tell me that they wanted representation in the convention. It would be much easier to work with you if I had an idea of what you were trying to accomplish and what you needed to do it." 

you should stop acting like communicating with your allies comes directly out of your goddess's ability to intervene on the material plane. 

That's a good line. He'll quote it in the report. 

"Thank you. I have a great many thoughts on that but I think they're better saved for the report than given now, especially since immediate collaboration with you is complicated while we presume you forbidden from intervention in Razmiran."

"I look forward to reading it." 

On consideration, he sincerely does.