He did this to himself, it was all his idea, he could have listened to any of a dozen people who told him not to do it even though he didn't agree with their reasoning! He has absolutely no business feeling like he is about to vomit! And the conversation with the Calistrian went sort of okayish! So he's used up all his okayishness for the month and will not be okay until Erastus!

"Of course; my temple is this way."

“Thank you… I’m Thea, delegate of the faith of Irori.”

She decides to push on straight away.  Hopefully, having been murder by a mob himself, he’ll do a better job than Valia at not letting her information leak to a mob that comes after her.

“So I was raised in a cult dedicated to Eiseth, and they taught us a pretty warped idea of Law (in addition to being Evil), and they had an odd relationship with the hierarchy of the rest of Cheliax I’m only now making sense of in hindsight, and I’m working on making Lawful Neutral (I’m currently Lawful Evil) so I thought you might have useful thoughts to share.”

"My seminary covered Eiseth but only very cursorily, so I'm afraid I can't guess what warped ideas those might have been."

“They probably tried to keep their ideas secret from the Asmodean Church anyway.  They basically made sure that our sense of Lawfulness was completely divorced from obeying society’s laws or obeying anything outside their internal hierarchy.  And emphasized discipline and obedience to strength.  So that we could be assassins and covert agents but still read Lawful Evil.  At least, that’s what I’ve inferred in hindsight.  Maybe ignoring legal laws in favor of obedience and discipline is normal for other lawful evil teachings?”

"The church of Asmodeus had its tensions with the agents of the state but on the whole was well aligned and required adherents to obey the law where it applied. But Law is not identical to following the commands of whatever organization one happens to be in. Demons controlled by shrewd warlords often manage that for a surprisingly long period of time."

“I assume something about their teaching was lawful… actually I suppose Eiseth only needed Neutral Evil to select clerics?  I might be an exception in being Lawful?  I don’t actually know, most of the other former acolytes I’m left with are children, and the fully initiated members took all the records and writings with them.”

"Neutral Evil would do, yes. The Church didn't consider it a high priority to inculcate Law, just to ensure that anyone who sorted Neutral Evil at Judgment would tend to prefer Hell over the Abyss."

“That would explain it.  I guess I’m lucky I was Lawful enough for Irori.”

She pauses to mull it over.

"Were you Eiseth's before? I don't know what fraction of your order were clerics."

“I wasn’t chosen no, I was just a monk nearing full initiation.  I couldn’t tell you myself the true number of clerics, there were at least several other cells the details of which were secret to me.  We had enough healing to keep us healthy even with regular fights to near death as we came of age.”

"- as a circling measure, devotional practice, or both?"

"It was framed in theological terms at the time, but I think in truth it was primarily as a circling measure... well whatever the analog of circle is to monks.  I guess the development of ki?  My guesswork done in hindsight is that they lacked lower profile missions to use as training and lacked the resources or connections to find other more productive activities to use to strengthen us on."

"If you haven't already I think you should probably put a stop to that."

“I already did, immediately after being picked by Irori.”

She won’t mention how it was initially a pragmatic decision about her limited amount of healing.

She’ll move on to her next question.

“You mentioned in your interview you thought you were Lawful Neutral from some combination of fighting demons and a unique attitude even as a priest of Asmodeus?  Could you elaborate?  I’m trying to work my way up from Evil…”

"I don't know if I was, on the day He withdrew magic from His clerics, already Lawful Neutral. It took Iomedae some time to collect me and I could speculate about that that it had some relationship to my alignment or its trajectory, but it would be only speculation. But - I was very focused on containing the demons and that's something even paladins can do. I wasn't personally ambitious and abhorred the sabotage of colleagues some personally ambitious officers undertook. I permitted my subordinates the regulation amount of tortuous discipline of their inferiors but for myself preferred to reassign people if having them into my office for a chess game and dressing-down didn't curb misbehavior."

“Huh, you were able to maintain discipline just doing that?  That is pretty impressive.  I myself discontinued almost all use of corporal punishment on my younger sisters to give myself plenty of margin away from Evil.”

"The reassignment was possibly load-bearing. I believe I eventually had a reputation and anyone with the wherewithal to do so who expected to thrive at #11 collected there. The men who could not maintain an adequate standard of behavior under my system still wound up tortured, just at other hands."

“Still, even with a select group, it makes me optimistic about how little corporal punishment you can get by on.”

Now how to get more exact numbers.  He seems straightforward, she’ll ask directly as gently as she can.

“I’m trying to figure out how long doing charitable actions I should expect making Lawful Neutral takes… I have one ‘accidental’ death and one outright murder… you defended the worldwound for a little over 20 years if I understood correctly?  And avoided direct torture and murders in that time?  And before that… I can’t imagine you made it through seminary without some torture and murder… if you don’t mind me asking… what is the number of deaths and murders you were responsible for?”

"- so, I'm not sure that number is going to be useful to you, because plenty of the deaths were executions for judicial reasons, and some of them were in fact after I adopted the Lastwall disciplinary handbook. The number of definitively inexcusable deaths is four." He has practiced saying it now and while he vividly imagines stuttering it he doesn't. Yay. "But I think it is - more expensive - to change your alignment by trying to change your alignment as opposed to while trying to accomplish some Good thing out of its inherent desirability to you."

Twenty years and four murders is… she struggles with the math… 5 years per murder?  That seems reasonable?  Except the caveat he gave.

“I have some Good and non-Evil things I’m doing out of my own clear desire, like doing right by all my younger sisters.  The charity was on top of that in hopes of speeding up the process…”

If it’s barely getting her anything in alignment, she’s definitely not expanding her effort at housing and feeding beggars, but it would feel unlawful to kick the 3 she’s currently got out.

“I suppose I can direct future charitable efforts at things I care personally about.”

She’s heard vaguely about the Sower’s adoption sermon, she could talk to him about the wisdom of trying to raise a few more besides her sisters.  And maybe offer free reading lessons to girls if the schools don’t get reopened?

"This is to be clear a Pharasmin decision and not a decision by any Good god, if I am correct about it at all. Monetary charity at least does not do less good if the motive behind it is venial."

“I should try to learn more about her theology… I’ve been working through reading Holy Texts of various non-evil Gods.  That reminds me, are there any commentaries on the Acts of Iomedae for common people you would recommend?”

Thea suddenly has a clever idea.

“You know, given how packed the church has been (I assume from the desperation of the populace for Good teachings?), the censorship bill leaving many scriveners unemployed, the drop in price of paper over the past year, and the high literacy of Cheliax… if there was a suitable commentary for the Chelish people, you could have it copied and sold at cost.  It would be a substantial improvement on pamphlets, the few rare decent pamphlet series like the Inquirer not withstanding.”

"I actually have several different commentaries I brought back with me from Lastwall and you are welcome to Scriven copies if you will do it in the temple of Iomedae, they would be awkward to replace if something occurred in transit. None of them speak very specifically to the Chelish condition but it's possible when I have enough information to write the book I've been advised to produce it will take the form of a commentary on the Acts, though that doesn't seem likely to be the best form factor at this moment."

She smiles happily.

“I have scrivener’s prepared today, I don’t have enough paper on me but I can buy some and start making a copy this evening.  And yes, I’m fine staying at the temple with them while I make the copies.”

She’s mentally tired, but casting and recasting a cantrip is easy, almost relaxing compared to the convention.  And she can start reading as she copies!

“I suppose Chelish circumstances are pretty unique.  And if you’re writing a book from scratch, I suppose a commentary isn’t necessarily the best form.  Anyway, if you write a book I will be one of the first to line up to buy a copy, or even make one myself.  Is there any information in particular you are searching for?”

"I gave the interview to the Inquirer specifically because I hoped to elicit - questions and comments from anyone who thought, based on its information, that my experience would be valuably informative to their needs. So the nature of the conversation you chose to have with me is itself helpful."