Leareth, back with Nayoki, has what he thinks is their first breakthrough on Velgarth Gates - which is that they can route the search part of the spell through one or more of the elemental planes, without actually having the Gate land there. If they're right and Velgarth shares the same elemental planes with Golarion, then if they go 'through' the spell ought at some point be able to find it. 

He demonstrates a tiny test Gate on two hand-sized practice thresholds across a table from each other. Notes that it has the surprise plus of, he suspects, also being untraceable - even if a mage is directly watching one terminus, they won't be able to follow the threads of magic to where the other one is.

Leareth is delighted! He's tempted to go find Khemet and tell him right away, but 'go find the pharaoh' is probably a huge breach of protocol, so instead he just asks one of the servants if Khemet is still available. 

The servant goes off to check. The pharaoh comes by a few minutes later.

"We have the first step toward an inter-world Gate." Leareth casts it again, quickly explains the magic, all while looking very pleased about it. "I am much more confident we will have this working in time." 

"Oh, excellent!"

(Leareth really appreciates talking about Velgarth magic - or anything really - with Khemet, who has zero context on it and is nonetheless smart enough to follow easily.)

He takes the Gate down. "Unfortunately it is more tiring than an ordinary Gate, which will present a greater difficulty if we wish to move thousands of people, but - once the spell exists I can teach it to others. I think we can make it work." 

"Have we tried having someone stand by and cast fatigue-combatting spells on you while you do tiring things? I would be curious if they can keep up with the tiredness that way or if eventually you run out of something the spell isn't quite addressing."

"Lesser Restoration is quite effective on backlash but I have not tested continuing to do tiring work for a long time while having it cast repeatedly. It does seem worth trying. If someone is available to cast fatigue-combating spells now, it will not matter much if I do end up exhausted since I am going to bed after that." 

He waves someone over. 

Hmm, what's the most tiring but still non-destructive magic he can do...? Leareth settles on repeatedly raising a very big un-scaffolded Gate from where he is to his bedroom and taking it down again; holding a Gate is easier than raising one, and un-scaffolded uses a bit more power than putting a Gate on a doorway, not normally enough to be that significant but if he's going to do it twenty times in a row it'll add up. 

...He's going into it kind of tired already, after working all day, and despite the short range, he's tired enough after the third one that he kind of wants to sit down. He nods to the cleric who's going to cast the spell for him. 

The cleric does that. 

He's now less tired! He casts another three Gates and then is tired again, and the second iteration of the spell - doesn't seem to quite do as much, or something, he feels physically fine and has the reserves for another Gate but it still feels like something, somewhere, is emptying and not getting refilled. 

He does another two and then is tired again, and the next iteration of the spell only ekes out one more Gate. That's interesting. 

He is watching fascinated. "There is a cleric spell - not a healing spell - called Recharge Innate Reserves, that creatures with innate magic use can cast - but only on themselves, there're a lot of spells like that... I wonder if it works better than Restoration for something like this."

"Interesting." Aaaaand he's going to find somewhere to sit down now, that was enough Gates. "What defines innate magic use, in your system?" 

"Some species are - I guess you could think of them as all sorcerers but usually there's just one or two limited magical abilities that are common among them. Invisibility, or magical flight, or teleportation, or a electricity attack... Sometimes we've been able to design a spell that imitates the ability, sometimes we haven't. Dragons have lots of them, which is one of the things that makes them terrifying. Outsiders usually have some."

"A little similar to Velgarth's specialized Gifts, then." 

"It seems quite possible that that spell would do something for you. If we were lucky enough, something complementary with Restoration."

"This is something I would only be able to test if I accepted Abadar's offer to become His cleric." 

"Yes. I will confess that I did not neglect to think of that at all."

"Of course." Leareth's eyes narrow. "What level is it? I am aware that ordinarily, clerics start out at a low level and gain levels with experience." 

"First."

"How convenient." 

"I think conceptually it's a very simple spell - just converting one kind of energy to another, kind of." Shrug. "I heard the diamond trick does not work quite as easily as may have been hoped."

"It calls for a spell that can sustain higher power without breaking; the one I use has never had Vanyel thrown at it. It is not a complicated redesign but it will still take some work, and I hear Vanyel must return to Valdemar to help coordinate things there, so he will not be around to test it." 

Nod. "Well, we can still resurrect particularly critical people. - I assume we shouldn't bother trying for either you or Aroden?"

"My method is not particularly fast and will land me somewhere in Velgarth without most of my memories at first, so it depends whether you want me for the rest of the war effort. I will be fine either way, though, so - ought certainly not be the highest priority. I think his method is faster but we did not discuss it in detail."