"The Worldwound is the horrible giant hole into the Abyssal Plane, right? Yes, I think they'd want to help with that. I'm not sure how many people they could afford to send, but we do have a lot of soldiers who're not needed on the southern border anymore." 

"That's the one. Long run I assume - the person we think is in Rahadoum - would have to have some kind of plan for it, I can't imagine he'd be planning to conquer Cheliax without one. But just getting a little more help there could matter a lot. And - it would be stupid to get off on a bad foot with your country if we can possibly avoid it.

But I guess I am kind of wondering what other things the size of the problem today we might be failing to think of."

"So am I. That could've gone a lot worse than it did, even, if you didn't have really good shields - how did you shield it that well, anyway - and healing magic. Um. The trouble is that 'what am I not thinking of' is kind of a hard category to think of examples of." 

"- I wasn't specifically shielding it? I had some armor up but I don't think it was actually helping. Over time people who've been in lots of fights get harder to hurt, though. - is that not a thing in Velgarth?"

"No? At least, to the extent that's true it's because people get really good at shields. I bet Leareth would've been fine because he wears multiple shield-talismans even in his goddamned sleep in a secure building." 

"Having now been in Velgarth for ten minutes this makes more sense to me. Uh, around here people get tougher as they get into more fights. It is debated whether this is because the spirit, uh, focuses resources where they're needed, in the fashion that muscles get stronger when you exercise them, or whether it's a product of getting magical healing all the time - the idea is that maybe magical healing does more than just set you right...anyway if you throw a lightning bolt that'd kill a normal person it'll probably give me a tidy little burn, and I can jump off a hundred foot cliff planning to channel twice when I land. I assumed this was also true of the two of you or I'd have been more panicked - not that that would've helped, I've been meaning how to learn how to channel while I cast but I don't know how yet..."

:It's really not. I mean, I think Van and I are both tougher than normal for humans, I think an un-Gifted person would've been dead in seconds from that - he's got personal shields all the time and also a tiny bit of Healing, though not enough to do much against that. I'm a bit tougher than Van physically, both because I'm a horse and because Companions have some innate magic. But neither of us can survive jumping off hundred-foot cliffs. Really glad we cleared that up now!: 

"This has interesting metaphysical implications someone should write a paper about. I am surprised it didn't come up in Leareth's studies but I guess maybe he can survive jumping off hundred foot cliffs."

:Does it happen for anyone who gets into fights, even if they're not actually fighting with magic?:

"Well, it happens for, like, Hagan, who only has a little bit of magic but could jump off a cliff just fine. A taller cliff, probably, which depending on which theory you subscribe to is either because he gets injured more, indirectly because of that since he gets healed more, or because he's been in more fights independent of whether they hurt him. - there's also plenty of individual variation, here, and of course it matters how you land in the specific case of the cliff. But no normal human can survive falling off a hundred foot cliff and very few adventurers at our level couldn't."

"That does seem like it'd have interesting implications! Guess you could have the Healers Leareth brought over look at really high level adventurers versus normal people and see if anything shows up as different." 

"Oooh, we definitely should. Maybe I will track one down for that this afternoon."

"Seems like a good idea. I think I'm going to try to have a restful afternoon, I'm still kind of tired and I don't exactly feel more ready for Haven after all of that." 

"Me neither." And he tracks down some Healers to ask if anyone has examined this and if they want to see if it results in his body looking different than most peoples'.

They would love to do that! It had come up a little but apparently not enough that they realized it was due to something other than better shielding. 

Well, they don't themselves know all that much about what it is but it sounds like Healers get a lot more information with their Healing so they can check it out.

It definitely shows up differently! It's hard to tell exactly what is different; it looks a little like Fazil's entire body is faintly magical, and a little like he has some sort of continuous self-Healing process running - but not like a Velgarth Healing Gift at all - and his life-force is just - brighter? More focused somehow?

The Healers declare this will need more study before they can make heads or tails of it, but they're very grateful to him for bringing it to their attention now. 

Of course. He's happy to be helpful. 

He is actually mostly very tired. He goes to bed early. 

Vanyel does too. With Yfandes smushed up next to his bed, he manages to sleep soundly and wake up feeling rested, not that this helps much with his nerves. 

Nuzzle. :I know it's going to be very awkward. I don't think it'll be worse than awkward and stressful, though. Really: 

The pharaoh's security are unhappy about his opening a dimensional portal blind. (There has been a lot of scrying, but still.) They've marked out a spot in the desert outside the palace, with the ocean in the background; the pharaoh is going to stand about two hundred feet back from where the portal is going to open. There are a lot of people in the intervening two hundred feet. Some of them are armed but the scariest ones mostly aren't. 

He wishes them safe travels, looking unbothered by all of the fuss.

Yfandes politely thanks him for being so willing to help her and Vanyel go home. 

"Of course. I hope everything goes smoothly."

And he opens a semicircle, twenty feet in diameter, at the marker two hundred feet away from him where they've been told to stand.

Yfandes looks dubiously at it. :We just step in there?: she asks Fazil.