Now Leareth - feels bad, in some obscure way, he feels like something was damaged here that he hadn’t realized existed or could be damaged, he can’t put his finger on what. And - he’s confused about why Khemet would have tried so hard to get him to feel safe, here - he fully believes Khemet actually thought it was safe in his palace, he wasn’t - being manipulative to fool Leareth into actions he wouldn’t otherwise endorse... But why throw so much effort at that in particular, why is he so bothered about it now?

Abadar doesn't really get it. Humans are very confusing. But it points to a change in decision procedure, maybe, if he can identify one.

That makes sense. 

- He wishes he could understand why the Star-Eyed was willing to burn this much interworld goodwill when he wasn't even planning on going back to Velgarth, and he would have expected that to be apparent in their Foresight, the noise disappearing. But it's not like he even understands why She objects so strongly to his existence. He has guesses, that's all. He wonders if Abadar has more insight there. 

Some gods - some Golarion gods, too, ones He doesn't get along with - care about people growing up surrounded by people to whom they have duties, and who have duties to them, people who know them and will engage in shaping them into a worthy adult community member. About people having things that matter deeply to them in common with one another, and simple choices ahead for their lives. They dislike worlds where everyone meets one another as a stranger. The Star-Eyed is a god like this. Even when Leareth didn't make things blurry for her She didn't like what She was seeing. And - 

- Abadar is obviously with Leareth here, but - 

- Her trades are ones many humans would make, if offered them? The Tayledras have lives that are joyful and close-to-the-thing-humans-are-shaped-for and many other human lives compare badly, by the standards of the people living them. Abadar thinks cities will be better but in the material world he's hard-pressed to argue that they are better. Many people would choose to be Tayledras if you put it to them. And that matters. 

But so does the fact She doesn't let them pick, and so does the casualness with which She uses them towards non-shared ends when convenient, the thing Abadar explained a while ago He wouldn't do to Khemet, because then it'd be a bad deal, to be His...

Interesting. That fits, Leareth thinks. It vaguely matches with some shapes of human philosophies he's heard about or read about - cultures the body he took was born into, sometimes - that believe that...people are actually better off with a smaller number of clear, culturally-embedded choices? That the world Leareth has always wanted to build, that has opportunities to learn and create and build and trade, and the combinatorial explosion of possible choices and futures that gives people, is actually worse for their wellbeing than one with clear roles and duties and traditions.

Leareth does wonder how much his own philosophy here is shaped by the fact that he has never been someone who fit into any of those tight-knit local traditionalist cultures, and - he does think that everyone will be better off for a world that has bustling shiny cities and trade between dozens of countries, because in the world that doesn't have that, maybe people are closer with their families and communities but also most of them spend their entire lives working tirelessly in the fields just to stay alive. He thinks the Tayledras are kind of cheating here because they have such a high rate of mages, and so much magic granted to them directly by the Star-Eyed, nowhere else in the world can have that kind of material luxury and also have the thing the Star-Eyed likes, here. And it would be one thing if She wanted to offer everyone that, but She seems uninterested in even trying.

He's not sure. He also thinks cities in Velgarth are often pretty unpleasant for many of their inhabitants, and he thinks that could be different - was different, to an extent, in Urtho's time, he has only a few snippets of memories but Tantara as a whole had much closer to the Tayledras level of luxury, with their permanent Gate network for transport and their permanent light-spells and heat-spells and shields...

He's grateful Abadar is with him on this. He never, ever thought a god would be aligned with him on what the best kind of world might look like, and - he almost can't convey how it feels, knowing that, except that he's very happy about it. 

Abadar - something in the genre of 'pats him affectionately'. 

Abadar is going to avenge this, proportionately and sensibly and with a consensus of the other actors affected and in a way that hurts the Star-Eyed very badly.

Leareth appreciates that. He thinks. He - wants to apologize, a little, for failing to be on good terms with any of the gods of his home world, which must be irritating for Abadar who would presumably like to be able to operate there more easily. 

The Foresight dream with Vanyel was not enemy action, Abadar'd assumed Leareth realized.

Huh. Does Abadar mean the dream itself, a straightforward enough vision of Vanyel fighting a destined enemy, or the part where they were able to speak? He had assumed the former was enemy action, and suspected that the latter might be a different Power working with a different goal, one not clearly aimed at harming him, but he never understood what it was aimed at.  

He means the latter.  Valdemar's god is exceptionally hard for Abadar to communicate with but he is - broadly in favor of some things Leareth wants and was hoping Leareth and Vanyel could come up with something better than Leareth's original plan. Which Abadar would have opposed too, honestly, if He'd seen it bearing down on His country.

That is really reasonable on Abadar's part, it was a horrible plan and Leareth's only justification was that so many things were background horrible anyway, maybe not so acutely but in a way that added up over centuries and centuries of nothing. ever. changing. And he still put off actually making it his plan for almost a millennium. He's so glad that Golarion changes everything and now he has better options that justify spending another thousand years exploring to see what he can do with them. 

Should Abadar be worried about Leareth's immortality, He didn't know about that element of the situation and still doesn't quite see how it works.

Well, he doesn't see any point in being secretive about it now since it's probably irretrievable and would be risky to rely on again, his plan is to sort out something else with Aroden before this body get too old. Honestly that was his plan already because his immortality setup is also horrible, and Golarion has both more options and a lack of gods who want Leareth specifically dead and also have Foresight. But - there's a spell, he built, in Velgarth's Void, that would prevent his spirit from moving on and would instead link him back to the bodies of his descendants, and the spell itself should have been impossible to find. However, it's also - was, he corrects himself - tied to his current body, and clearly letting himself be in the same room as an unusually gifted Tayledras Healing-Adept for hours was enough that Moondance, he's pretty sure it was Moondance, was able to find that magical link, possibly by projecting his mind between planes as Leareth can, and snap the connection. The spell itself might be fine and he can find it again (with a lot of effort now that he's lost the link) but he has to assume the Star-Eyed could have used Moondance to locate it, and that it's compromised.  

That is - a significant loss, in some ways more significant than the death, and Abadar is grieved for him. If there's anything He can do He'd want to know.

Leareth thought it was self-evident that was a lot worse than just his body dying, he's been murdered a lot, he's usually not nearly as upset about it as he was this time. Though it does seem like being murdered when he had stopped expecting it and felt safe is - a lot more upsetting than all the times in Velgarth. 

He will definitely make sure Abadar knows if he thinks of anything Abadar can do to help. Aroden may know, he's the expert on Golarion's strategies for immortality. 

They will have to talk sometime. 

And Abadar withdraws from his mind.

Leareth doesn't call anyone to ask for Delay Pain this time - it wouldn't ruin his entire night's sleep again, since now like Khemet he's equipped with a Ring of Sustenance, but it's not like he has plans right now, realistically he was going to spend the next while in his room anyway. He lies under a blanket in the dark, and he cries a little and lets himself feel all the fear and loss that he was shoving out of the way before, maybe if he gets that out of the way it'll leave him alone afterward. 

Khemet has someone convey to Savil that Leareth has been resurrected and confirmed that Starwind and Moondance used a weapon from Urtho's Tower and that as far as he knows they acted alone.

Savil finishes questioning everyone who was in the palace at the time, and then heads back to the Dome, mostly because it's closer to Gate to than Cheliax and she has a suspicion Vanyel might still be there. 

He is! A servant can show her to his rooms.

She sits down with him. He seems calmer.

"So, Leareth confirmed Khemet's story about Starwind and Moondance?" 

"- Yes?" Vanyel seems startled that she's asking. "Um, once he'd calmed down enough. He was so upset when he woke up, it was awful, and - he didn't even know about the Star-Eyed trying to grab his soul too, She didn't succeed because of Abadar, but he was clearly so scared." 

"Huh. Thought he'd have been used to dying, given he's done it a lot. Did you Truth Spell him?" 

"What? No, I did not Truth Spell him when he was curled up on the floor under a sheet crying because the Star-Eyed broke his immortality method." 

"She what."