"...I very badly wish that - shared goals - had been a more viable route in my own past, in this world... I think that the fact that it was - not - is probably a great deal of why I read as Evil, in your world's schema."

"You just....don't know of other people, ones who don't work for you, who share your goals and values?" His sense of the world is that there are Good people everywhere, even in countries where they've never heard of Iomedae; the emphasis is different but the core is all there.

"- Values are different? I think that a great many people do not disagree with me on the core part, that - that people suffering is bad, that people dying is bad, that the world would be better if it contained less of those..."

He shrugs, helplessly. "Though - even on that - less than you would hope or expect? I think it is...a move people do, to make existing in a broken world that they lack the resources to fix, hurt less. They say that dying permanently is - part of the natural order of things - even that it is what gives life meaning... Certainly it is a not-uncommon moral belief, here, that killing one's enemies in battle is not bad, and is even valiant. Or that suffering builds character. Or - people will look at those worse off than themselves, and say that they deserve it for being unvirtuous. Or, well, most often they will just - look away, instead. And most people, I think, just do not have the concepts they would need, to think about the future being morally significant, at least not on a scale any larger than their own children's futures." 

That seems right, that most people won't come to it on their own, but it still feels - like the set of ideas that are Good are not random, that they have a power over other sets of ideas, a power which has to do with the fact most people are trying to do the right thing even if they haven't thought about it very much. Evangelists for Good religions do much better than evangelists for Evil ones. Asmodeus's church has to bribe everyone at great expense. Good churches largely don't. And most of the things people get confused about are confusing, right - it is, in fact, courageous to go to war, though it also takes courage to notice when you shouldn't, and a society that totally forbade the killing of enemies in battle would quickly fall to one that didn't - so people are exercising the virtues they understand, at the expense of the virtues in the most tension with their lives -

- but the claim, anyway, isn't really that most people are Good, it's that Good is a kind of trust that can be extended, a way that faraway people can take up your banner without ever having met,you, even if they get it partially wrong, as long as they've had the insight that the things they want for themselves, they can also want for everyone.

It takes Leareth a surprisingly long time to find the right words to respond. 

"...I believe you, that that - works - in Golarion," he says quietly. "And it - does not fail completely, here - there are people who dedicate their lives to caring for orphans or healing the sick - the Heralds of Valdemar are Good and the world is, in fact, better for having them in it. But...they are not like Iomedae - they are not even trying to fix everything, to win. And I do not think that you could have a church like Iomedae's, here. This world and its gods punish trying to change the world." 

"The gods here seem quite bad! Iomedae intends to try negotiating with them, and hopefully with time She'll get somewhere; if not I guess we'll be looking at very-well-defended missionaries setting up everywhere, or maybe at setting something up here and allowing immigration. I don't have the faintest idea what we could grow in this climate - the problem with just relying on lots of magic is that it complicates allowing lots of immigrants."

Nod. “I think it is worth trying to set up in Valdemar. Their main god is - much more hands-off. And I think that you would get along rather well with the Heralds.” He smiles, thinly, “Better than you will with me.”

He's not sure quite what to make of that. Probably there is a lot of Evil going on around here, but also this man has only had the Asmodean account of what paladins are and who they can work with, and might be substantially misled about how well they can work together. 

"Are there - particular things that give you pause, about allying with us?"

“- I think that I want to find a way where I can work with you. I…” how to put this, “- I think that I share many of Iomedae’s values, at the core? But I am very much - shaped, as a person, by having spent thousands of years trying to fix this world. And the incentives there were - mostly toward being very ruthless and very paranoid. And not relying on the kind of coordination that Good can do - the kind you mentioned, where people can join your cause without having ever met you, just by noticing that they care? I agree that strategy is valuable, and I have tried it - or tried to try it, perhaps the failure was in myself and not in the world… But also I think that kind of coordination is - limited in how much weight it will bear, when the circumstances are adversarial?”

Leareth is not at all sure that any of that made sense. It’s hard to think about. He’s…scared? Maybe? He’s not sure what he’s scared of.

Finally, he just shrugs. “I respect what you are doing, and I would offer you all the resources I can to help. I - just - I suppose I have some expectation that you will not trust me.”

"I don't have an expectation that you treat prisoners well. I don't have an expectation that you, if asked to carry out a complex operation, would carry it out in a way conscionable to us. I don't have an expectation that, if the right thing to do involves bearing terrible danger or giving up resources, you'll do it. But I always hope to be wrong, on such things, and I don't really care at all what you've spent the last thousand years doing. Just what you intend to spend the next thousand on."

Leareth forces himself to pause and take a deep breath, rather than immediately arguing with that on every level. Being stressed and defensive and - oh, is it that? - being scared that the paladins of Iomedae will end up deciding the world is better off if he’s permanently destroyed, or at the very least stripped of his hard-won resources because they expect him to use them in “unconscionable” ways…

Why is he dwelling on that, it seems so premature, he doesn’t think it’s even likely. 

But it’s definitely making it harder to feel like anything good-for-his-values will come out of showing the paladins more of himself. 

“…For what it is worth,” he says heavily, “I am absolutely not going to spend the next thousand years doing the same thing. There are other worlds and that changes everything. And I - expect that I will change as well, because - the shape most well-suited to winning is going to be different.”

He closes his eyes. “I also noticed I am concerned that if you carry out complex operations in ways that are conscionable to your people, in Velgarth in teeeitories under the influence of the god, they will not work, and many precious things will be lost and destroyed. I - hope I am wrong. I certainly do not expect you to listen to me. But I think that I am calibrated on the conditions here, and your people are not, yet, and…”

"There's a reason the first thing we're doing here is giving Iomedae visibility. So we can do things that work, and make as few costly mistakes as possible. It would have been much harder, without a god on your side. But if your side is - people getting the opportunity to become better, and stronger, and happier - then you do have a god on your side, now."

"....I very badly hope that is true. I - that is what I had wanted. What I was planning for, before contact with Golarion."

Leareth isn't sure he feels like explaining that problem in any more detail.

But it does seem relevant, here, that he has a full design schema for a god aligned with the flourishing of all sentient beings now and always, and - obviously that's a spectacular act of hubris, to even attempt a plan like that. He expects it to be frustrating to communicate it to the paladins on several levels - one, they're unlikely to have any of the math background they would need to follow the concrete details, to see why and how it's the case that Leareth has (or believes he has) a way of checking the math on something so vast that he can't even slightly fit all of it in his head. And, two, he - maybe this is an unfair belief he picked up from Asmodean philosophy, but still - it feels like the Good belief-structures and culture would have some kind of friction, there. 

It does feel like there's an important crux to him, somewhere in all that, but Leareth still isn't sure how to talk about it, and definitely anticipates that trying to talk about it anyway will go badly. 

The paladin is assuming he means something more like planning to ascend, which is a very reasonable thing to do, if none of the gods are Good and working towards the most important problems in the world. It's not strange that Leareth doesn't trust Iomedae, yet, but there's not actually any doubt in his mind that Iomedae can be trusted with this. It's who She is, it's who She has been since She was a teenage human child, and She will work towards it in Velgarth as in Golarion, and everywhere else, if there are other places.

Leareth is fairly sure that Aroden would endorse that. Aroden chose Iomedae as His paladin. He trusted Her. ...And trusts Her again now; that much was very clear, even though he was obviously terrified in the moment he learned Leareth had communicated his identity. 

And Iomedae trusts Aroden, and that genuinely feels like information. Aroden is Lawful Neutral and...like Leareth, in many ways. Iomedae is  obviously, uncontroversially, incontrovertibly Good - and that means something, even to Leareth, and it's - it's bigger and realer than the moral concepts around virtue spoken of in Velgarth... 

But there's still a sort of circular reasoning, there, he's...updating on Iomedae's character because Aroden chose Her, then also updating that Aroden's assessment-of-character is valid because She trusted Him... And, from a starting position where he doesn't obviously trust either of them, and without having any kind of more objective verification, there's - still a gap, there. 

The kind of gap that can only be crossed by taking a leap of faith. Leareth isn't opposed to this in theory. He would have taken that leap with Vanyel, eventually, probably, if the situation hadn't cascaded wildly out of control before he ever had a chance... 

It feels like information on Iomedae's character, too, that Leareth was able to reach Her by prayer at all, and specifically that thinking of Vanyel worked. Leareth...doesn't have much doubt of Vanyel's fundamental Good-alignment. Not anymore. Whether he could ever become the sort of person who could survive and carry on this fight in the deeply adversarial circumstances of Velgarth, he had been less sure of...

He takes a deep breath. "I do want to exist in a world where Good works - where we can agree on the core, the thing we care about most, and coordinate around that. I...can see that you believe you live in that world already. And that I could as well. I - just..." 

"You think we're going to lose?"

"I am not sufficiently convinced that you are going to win, to - feel comfortable gambling all of my own resources on it. ...I am going to help anyway, of course, as much as I can." 

"What steps would you take, if you were convinced we were going to win?"

Leareth considers this for a while. 

"I would be more comfortable with just informing you of my resources, and letting your leadership allocate them as they thought best, since - your people obviously have more context on your needs, and catching me up would be time-consuming. I would also be more willing to run all of my current policies by you, and - commit to not engaging in operational tactics that you consider unconscionable." 

- all of those are just details, though. Not the core of the thing. And it feels important, to try to get closer to the centre of this, even though it's also terrifying. 

"...I - so - there is a pattern in my life, where I have - always needed to put my own survival first, and invest significant resources in that, and - avoid plans that risk myself being permanently destroyed. Because the gods of Velgarth, at least some of them, very badly want to destroy me. And - because the world would look very different, if there were others who would take up the mission in my absence. If I...truly believed that that were no longer the case - that there could be a path to victory without me personally steering the way - then I would...feel comfortable taking more risks." 

...he nods. "Golarion - also has resurrection. So the risks might be smaller than those to which you're accustomed. Of course, at present, if you were connected to Golarion's afterlife system at all you would go to Hell, but - alignment can change with time, or with intent."

Leareth sighs, heavily. "I - had reason to think about this, before. When I was a prisoner of the Chelish force. I - think I would have preferred to stop existing than to go to Hell and - be used as raw material to accomplish Asmodeus' goals. ...I imagine it would take a very long time to shift my alignment, even if I immediately change all of my actions? Because I have a great deal of history to balance out." 

"- no. It is possible for a person who repents of their past actions to request a god intercede for them, and change their alignment at once. It only works if it is your sincere desire for it to work, and if you sincerely regret your past actions and intend to change, but when you're ready, your alignment need not lag behind your heart."

"- Huh."

'Why does that work' is probably not a question he'll get a useful answer to.

"...What does it mean, to regret past actions? I - am not sure I am capable of regretting that I...have tried to have goals, and achieve them, even when it came at great cost. I regret the cost - I have never stopped regretting it - that is not new or a change. It - I think it is the world that has changed, here, and - if my 'heart' is going to change, it will be downstream of that." 

"I think it is enough to say, I did terrible things, and they hurt people, and I did them believing there was no other path forward, but now I believe that there is, and so I intend to try to choose it."