"...yeah.  What she said."

He's worked out why he's sad now.  It's like having a toddler you were intending to raise, and then somebody puts an artifact-grade headband on it, and the next day it's talking in full sentences without you ever having had the chance to teach it more than a few words.

"So at some point soon, perhaps even, dare I say, now, while the memories are piping fresh and hot, we should segue into the question of how much I'm getting paid to put up with this sort of thing.  I may have shifted some of my previously expressed opinions on that topic."

"I admire your attempted timing on compensation negotiations, but that doesn't work on people who are reasoning Lawfully."

"Be that as it may, 15 gold a week is not going to cut it.  To be clear, I'm not talking about the consequences of my personal decisions, I'm talking about all this Project Lawful weirdness in the first place, my not blinking at the sudden truthspell just now, the fact that I'm going to deliver this morning's Probability lecture in your place and literally nobody else on Golarion could, and that I come with a +6 Wisdom headband as personal equipment.  Anything less than 50 gold a week for me is downright disrespectful."

One of the problems with Project Lawful is that - it feels like Ione sometimes, and Asmodia now, are just aliens. Not even the same way as Keltham, who knows that he's an alien and tries to compensate for it, some other and mostly unpleasant kind of alien. Predicting Keltham is hard, but not impossible: he's Abadaran, he wants to know that everyone who happens to pass in front of his nose is okay, he's paranoid. Asmodia and Ione are different unpredictably alien kinds of aliens, and what they care about is entirely incomprehensible, and they think that they're not aliens they're just smarter than you.

All of this to say that Meritxell hopes Keltham tells Asmodia she's fired, though obviously he's not going to. Asmodia is really annoying, see. Meritxell's pretty sure this is objectively the case and not just jealousy.

(Carissa didn't pass along all the details of Keltham's salary plans; one less things for the girls to fake, and Keltham's Sense Motive is getting better.... still bad, but getting better.)

Gregoria is pretty sure that 1) no compensation for this project could possibly be adequate and 2) Keltham's going to offer them a lot of money. Though it'd be nice if instead he cut Asmodia down to size. Overconfidence isn't a superpower.

"That's an awful lot for a second-circle wizard, as I'm given to understand it, but I suppose you now have a sufficiently vital role on this project that I do want to keep you happy.  Is 50 gold a week going to make you happy?  Will you be positively cheerful about that, Asmodia?"

"Cheerful is more like 75 gold a week."

Okay, you know what, Manohar's Detect Thoughts has run down, he's not bothering to cast another one, and he's going to show himself invisibly out and then write a scathing report to the Queen about this clownshow operation, in lieu of slowly burning a number of different people here to death.  He truly does not want to listen to especially this part of this shit for one minute longer.  Asmodeus ought to smite this place.

"If that's what it takes to keep you cheerful, fine.  75 gold a week."

Asmodia has a sudden sinking feeling.

It occurs to her that it sure is unusual that she can't tell whether or not Keltham is hiding something, Keltham usually has no Bluff so why does he suddenly have any Bluff now?

Bluff in general, no.  Skill Focus: Trolling, yes.

Keltham turns to address the group; Paxti and Pela have been brought here too, now, and have been standing back and staying quiet with a permanently slightly cheerful expression which, it is only now occurring to Keltham, must have been concealing nearly total bewilderment, unless somebody briefed them while he was out, which somebody hopefully remembered to do... anyways.

"So, the announcement I was planning to make before we all got distracted."

"Bad news first, four of you have already been notified that the rate at which you're absorbing Law was, in my judgment, not sufficient to keep up with the speed at which I intend Project Lawful to go.  You remain the brilliant high-Intelligence wizards who were considered good candidates for this operation in the first place, but that doesn't correlate perfectly with aptitude for Law, either here or in Civilization.  All of you took the risk that it might not work out, when you came here, and some of you won that gamble and some of you lost it."

"Some of those leaving the main Project are currently planning to stay in this fortress and work on some new project - thereby among other things allowing those who stay on Project Lawful to have some people in their cohort they can hang out with, who are not quite as close to the center of all the craziness.  Others of those departing say they may explore other possibilities, but are considering that one as well."

"I don't know how people express gratitude here for having meta-successfully completed the hard work of trying at something you're not sure you can do, and failing, and giving up when the time comes - as one must be able to promise to yourself you will do, says a proverb out of dath ilan, if you're going to dare to try things like that in the first place.  This attempt, in particular, is going to have more of an impact on their lives than most such, and now it's up to everyone remaining to produce results which justify the risk they took and realized.  In Civilization there's rituals for this, but they're not single-person rituals and I don't want to pause to explain and it should be your own way anyhow - so, however people in Cheliax say thank you as a group and not just individuals - may the rest of us all please thank Jacme, Pela, Paxti, and Yaisa now."

People in Cheliax don't thank each other at all and certainly not for failing. 

Carissa summons a flock of dancing lights at her fingertips and sends them off to gather around the four of them. Should be easy enough for everyone to imitate, seems like vaguely the kind of thing Good people would do if they had a lot of wizards which they don't.

...well, he can't join in on that one, he doesn't have Dancing Lights at the moment.  And stamping his feet probably seems odd if he's the only one doing it - no wait, actually, he's got a Light cleric cantrip at the moment.

Keltham casts Light on his hand, and waves gravely at each of Jacme, Pela, Paxti, and Yaisa in turn.

This is the worst thing that has ever happened to Pela in her entire life which is weird because she's been tortured quite a lot. But she hasn't had to pretend she likes it!!!

"We may most of us be joining you sooner or later so get a good tutor. I recommend rings."

"I thought you had to be fourth circle to learn rings," Jacme says, blinking rapidly at the suddenly many lights.

"The curriculum says that but it was written by cowards."

"I'll protect you all from Carissa if that becomes necessary."

"You'll be protecting them from getting good."

"My offer stands."

"I'll keep that in mind," Jacme says, not at all like Keltham's offering to defend her from her actual superior, which he cannot do.

"That was all I had to say to the whole original group forming Project Lawful. You're not obligated to stick around here for even an additional five seconds, if you don't want to; so far as reporting goes, you're back to Maillol, or I think that's how it would go, and you're no longer answerable to my suggestions at all.  That said, Project Lawful itself is going back on its schedule for today in 10 minutes and reconvening in Breakout Room 4, so if you all want to hang out more as a group - which, to be clear, I don't know one way or the other whether you'd actually want to do - I'd suggest setting that up for evening hours."

Message to Carissa:  Do you have anything to say to the Ostensos?  If not, let's go off and leave them some time to themselves, I think is the polite thing to do, or it would be in Civilization?  Also I want to talk with you about how I'm supposed to react to Asmodia on this as her new boss.  Let me know if any of that was stupid.