" - I think stability makes those things easier to fix, actually? If you know there's not going to be a war you don't have to waste time training for a war, and can spend it inventing new magic or whatever. If you aren't worried about bandits on the roads or pirates at sea you'll send out more ships and get more trade goods. If your kids are probably going to live, you send them to school, spend more money on them..."

Leareth gives her a startled and mildly impressed look. 

"- Ah. We are using the word differently, I think. ...Or perhaps it is merely a difference in degree? I agree, a certain level of stability is essential for progress, but...my impression is that the Haighlei gods in particular are optimizing for stability alone, at the cost of everything else. Their society is incredibly averse to any changes, unless they are approved by the gods which is rare - that includes adopting a new invention or form of magic and for all I know it bans exploring new trade routes. They do have schools, they are literate, their children are educated, but...nonetheless their society has progressed very little in a thousand years." 

"Huh. - well, Asmodeus isn't going to do that, Cheliax gets richer every generation."

"I am glad to hear that. Asmodeus is - Lawful, I am guessing, you seem to approve of Law. Lawful Good, then?" 

"Asmodeus is Lawful Evil."

"...I think I failed to follow one of your definitions of terms, then. Evil is seeking one's own desires - why would Asmodeus care if Cheliax is richer– Oh. Of course. For instrumental reasons - if Cheliax is His resource, that He can use to accomplish His other goals?" 

"Yes. People are a resource and wealthier, smarter, more competent people are a more valuable one. A King would rather be King of a rich populous country than a poor stagnant one, at least if he can control it, and the same goes for gods, at least our gods."

"I see." It certainly makes sense to Leareth, as a paradigm; if anything, what he's not used to is other people pointing it out so blithely. "So - do you consider yourself a resource belonging to Asmodeus, then, to be wielded as He wills it?" 

"Yep. We also pay in, you know, money and magic items, though, if that's more your speed."

"Well, if you are a tool wielded by Asmodeus, then I think I need to know what Asmodeus' desires and goals are, here. And then we could speak of payment in magic items, if I - feel inclined to ally with Him at that point." 

"Asmodeus rules Hell, and He wants people to go there when they die, where they're useful to Him, and are transformed into the devils that are His servants and that are like humans without all of the weaknesses and failings like not knowing what you want and knowing what you should do but not doing it and being upset about things that are actually fine, which on Golarion were introduced to the world by other gods who wanted humans to be free willed. He prefers that Cheliax be stable and prosperous and it is wealthier every generation. Cheliax defends our planet from the Worldwound and from other dangers that might destroy or destabilize it, and trades with other countries, and is prosperous enough that every student with the potential to be a wizard gets to study to be one. It allows women to become wizards too." She says this like she considers it a substantial selling point next to most places. "It is His eventual intent that every soul will go to Hell, because the other afterlives are irresponsible with them."

"You ought probably be aware," Leareth says dryly, "that the word 'Hell' as it is - being translated by your magic, I suppose - does not exactly have positive connotations to most people in this world." 

It's not the most important point to be responding to, here, but it's true - while still saying little about his own beliefs - and it buys him time to think. 

Leareth is suspicious and on edge and so incredibly confused. Her explanation mostly coheres, to him? It does feel significantly as though she's defending against people who aren't him - who aren't even from his world - but of course she would be. 

He's...actually very curious about the 'human weaknesses' part.

- Not knowing what you want and knowing what you should do but not doing it and being upset about things that are actually fine - 

He wouldn't disagree that all of those are weaknesses. He WOULD disagree that they're in any way related to 'free will' as the scholars of Velgarth conceive of it. Not that Leareth necessarily thinks of that as a coherent concept at all. Mostly he's...wondering if the training methods Asmodeus uses are anything like the ones he's figured out for himself, over long millennia of trying relentlessly to make fewer mistakes. 

Maybe they're better. 

"Huh. Maybe we should call it something that doesn't sound like a local afterlife it isn't. The Nine Circles, does that sound neutral?"

"It does, yes. ...Why does Asmodeus feel that your other 'afterlives' are irresponsible with the souls they hold?" 

"Well, Abaddon has daemons that just eat souls! Then they don't exist anymore! And the Abyss doesn't have people who eat souls recreationally but a lot of them still wind up destroyed one way or another. And in the Maelstrom everyone eventually turns into a bundle of chaotic energy that can't have effects on the world or be affected by it. Elysium is an infinite wilderness where you wander around forever. In Nirvana you turn into an animal. In Heaven you become a being of pure Lawful Good, which means you only care about others and not yourself and you don't have any desires or preferences as an individual. In Axis you become a being of pure Law, which loses even more. And the Boneyard doesn't want to have souls so it only holds onto them for a bit until it can shuffle them off to some other places."

"I see," Leareth says, neutrally. 

(He is deeply suspicious of that explanation. It feels particularly - motivated in a certain direction? And even if he doesn't fully understand what these directions mean, yet, he can still be suspicious about bias in general.) 

"Anyway. What does Asmodeus wish to achieve by conquering Iftel?" 

"I have no idea."

"- Well, that does seem relevant to whether I wish to sign on as - what, the head of an auxiliary mercenary company? I have little concern with Iftel specifically. If Asmodeus intends to conquer the entirety of this continent, that may be a different story."

Leareth says it quietly and sincerely and none of it is exactly false. He's busy taking down half a dozen mental notes to pursue later, when he's less distracted - ideally when his captors are more distracted, just in case they have Thoughtsensers who can slip through his shields unnoticed - but at the same time he can't let that paralyze him, he can't just stop having thoughts - 

(He's also terrified, but quietly, in the back of his mind. It won't help.) 

"I really doubt He means to do that. I think Iftel started it and now we've got to finish it but we haven't got a grievance with anyone else, and it'd be pretty ill-advised to go to war with an entire continent. But probably a lot of this depends on negotiations among the gods and you and I aren't going to be able to guess how those'll pan out."

Leareth is buying very little of that! He's not sure how much he thinks Carissa is lying, versus was given false information, versus - some sort of broader and even worse systemic distortion, where everyone believes the false story they tell themselves... 

He really needs a plan here, for where he's steering this conversation and what he wants the outcome to be, but he's trying to piece that together on the fly, and without pausing so it's clear he's doing so - 

"I see. ...To be honest, I have no grievance against Iftel as a polity, and whatever I may think of Iftel's god, I am not sure whether I would be interested in killing Iftel's soldiers, even for money. However, I also, of course, prefer not to remain a prisoner." 

"Maybe we can send you to the Worldwound or something. It wouldn't be my call."

"I understand. Whose decision would it be, then?" 

"Not gonna answer that. What kinds of magic can you do? That'll be relevant to how much effort they'd be willing to put in to getting you to the Worldwound in the middle of a war."

Leareth's eyebrows lift slightly. "I am a mage. As I am sure you noticed. I have the capabilities one would expect, which I am also sure your leadership has been cataloguing." 

"Not all mages are the same and we haven't seen any other ones fall out of the sky when startled. They haven't been wearing gear like this, either."